Reagan’s Role

“President Reagan is the blithe spirit of world leaders. He works little, thinks less, specializes in funny stories and unfailingly sees the bright side of things.” So wrote columnist Joseph Kraft (Editorial Pages, Dec. 30).

Men always have had difficulty understanding a leader’s job. And Kraft, journalist of long experience as he is, appears to be no exception.

We know we must follow someone; that someone must lay out the work, for we are so busy doing it that we have not time and (here’s the rub) probably not intellect enough to lay it out.

There are leaders, and there are leaders, and because President Reagan stands back, watches the whole picture, works his political craft with as much success as we Americans have seen since Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower, Kraft’s constricted vision sees a President who “works little, thinks less.” This tells us more about Kraft than about the President.

The people have a different majority opinion, obviously. They understand why the President leaves the work to his underlings while he watches the company’s business overall, enjoying a success here, suffering a failure there. And they approve his thinking, no matter what Kraft’s opinion is--or that if he were President he could do it better.

W. J. VALENTINE

Long Beach