Clark Too Weird To Be President?

I talked with people who worked with him, some of them very closely, asking over and over again a variation of the same question: Is Wesley Clark too weird for prime time?

Something about Clark makes people bristle. He is undoubtedly brilliant -- a Rhodes scholar and first in his class at West Point. He is a fine athlete and a Vietnam combat veteran who was decorated for bravery. He won the respect, even the awe, of his colleagues, but too much of the time he did not win their friendship.

The rap on Clark is that he lacks precisely those qualities that define a politician, particularly warmth and affability.

Even his most steadfast champion in the army, Gen. John Shalikashvili, recognized that Clark was too brash, too cocky, too driven, too self-absorbed, too hard on subordinates, too dismissive of critics and criticism -- but also too brilliant and talented to be overlooked. Shali promoted him.