This training was especially obvious in, for example, John Kennedy, while unfettered bragging was equally obvious in his successor, Lyndon Johnson. Operators may be drawn to carpentry, auto mechanics, sales, or computer programming because these are wonderful arenas for manipulating objects and events. Similarly many and perhaps most great battlefield generals are Operator Artisans, including Alexander the Great, the Union commander Phil Sheridan and the Confederate commander J. E. B. Stuart during the Civil War, and Generals Patton and Rommel of World War II fame. And of course one may add to the list of successful Artisan field generals the names of Andy Jackson and Zachary Taylor, both of whom became American Presidents. In their position the action is here and now, the need is here and now, the opportunities are here and now-and, in combat, the heat of battle is intense and immediate.
Operators typically demand of themselves that they be tough.
Furthermore, toughness has its own virtue for the Operators, and they look upon those who do not show it with contempt. The meek, the weak, and the powerless are somehow tainted. If a person is weak and timid and if things do not go well for him, then he probably deserves what he gets. Andrew Jackson was physically frail, both as a youth and as an adult. Yet he was frequently in fights that he deliberately brought upon himself.