When I look at the current financial mess in Europe, and it ain't much better in the US, I do what many others do and say "What do you expect from self serving politicians.
" And then I look back in time and think about earlier politicians and conclude the current lot seem to be particularly inept.
The reasons for that include short termism and professionalism of modern politics.
However there is another thought that keeps coming back to me.
Despite having ever more sophisticated ways of killing people and a vast array of intelligence gathering assets our military performance, in recent years, appears lacklustre - we don't seem be doing any better fighting wars than we are dealing with our economies.
But I know if you ask most military people they will say - we could win this but the politicians keep us with one hand behind out back - so it is the politicians again: worse than inept it seems.
Then another thought occurs to me - it was the British general in the Crimea war who upon discovering he could be reached by telegraphs from London is reported as saying, "That is the end of warfare as we know - the politicians are involved.
" In other words the military could no longer simple do what they wanted to achieve an objective: they had to listen to their ultimate bosses - the politicians.
And that is even more so today when politicians can watch the battle as it progresses.
And that puts the politicians in an insidious position: they have to take responsibility.
So even when fighting terrorists who regard human life as irrelevant, the military has all kind if impediments placed on it -it is very difficult to win a tough war if CNN are lurking behind every bush.
War is extremely nasty and normally to win it the victors have to be tougher and nastier than the other side.
But in today's all media world that is almost certainly going to bring the wrath of armchair experts down on the heads of the politicians.
But it is not just in war but in everything else- the politician gets the news - if they are lucky - a micro second ahead of the rest of the world, but all too often everybody else knows first.
It is very easy to say do something but good decisions take consideration.
I thought that Bush when he received the news of the first incident in the 9/11 attack did exactly the right thing.
An aeroplane had flown into a tower of the World Trade centre: that is all he knew - bluntly what could he do about it at that moment.
But he has received massive criticism for not doing something - what I am not quite sure.
At least Lincoln after the news of the fall of Fort Sumter could sit his bath and have a cigar before deciding how to respond.
Thus I get the feeling that this spontaneity of information and news is partly responsible for many of our current ills and the apparent inadequacy of our politicians.
And that is compounded by the globalised business world and the 24 hour news cycle.
It is difficult enough for managers of private companies who do not have to explain everything to a cynical public but is it well nigh impossible for a modern politician.
However the more I think about this the more I realise modern politics itself is accentuating the problems.
They are so concerned with spin and being 'on message' they miss the vital confidence of a conviction politician.
If our political leaders listen less to polls and more to their instinct they have more chance of getting it right.
But it is the pandering to politically correct media that make crises so difficult.
For that reason I suspect politicians of yesteryear probable where better able to the deal with unexpected events - their believes one way or another pointed the way forward but on top of that they had time to consider both action and reaction.
Now our politicians are so anxious to 'get in right' they dither and make it worse as well as making them look indecisive and weak.
So yes it is harder but maybe it is not all the fault of the high speed world we now live in.