Not Knowing Isn’t Ignorance

Darline Graham Nordone did her candidacy no favors at yesterday’s debate when she directly admitted her ignorance on national security issues. Her critics seized on it as disqualifying, but if we actually care about what we say we care about in politicians, they’re wrong.

If you haven’t been following the South Carolina senate race, Nordone is running under her maiden name Graham for good reason: she is the appointed replacement for her late brother, Sen. Lindsey Graham, whose death we reflected on here at OFB a few weeks ago. Her brother was a singular figure in the senate, able to bridge MAGA and older streams of the GOP to focus on, ironically, national security priorities with a steadiness few in either party have shown.

Nordone’s stumble on U.S. policy concerning Taiwan seemingly confirmed the fears of her same-party critics (who opposed a “nepotistic” appointment) and cross-party foes salivating at any misstep that somehow might yield an unlikely Democratic win in South Carolina. Both sets are perfectly content to point to the newly minted senator’s present viral moment to suggest President Trump and others who pushed for Nordone are treating democratically elected positions as hereditary holdings. 1

One response I saw on X quipped, “If my surgeon died, I wouldn’t want to just be handed off to his brother or sister.” Quite true. Even if his siblings shared his passions and values, if he graduated medical school and spent years researching my condition, my only concern would be if they too had that expertise.

Anyone who has followed my comments knows I (and, I think I can fairly say, the contributors of OFB) are far more aligned with Graham’s foreign policy than that of many of the late senator’s foes. I’m more than willing to take the label “neocon” as a badge of honor. Why, yes, I do think there is right and wrong in the world, there are dangerous elements out there and that both morality and security require us to deal with the rest of the world.

So, I’m no isolationist who says, “Eh, I don’t care if she knows about the risks around Taiwan or not.” But, the reason I don’t think Nordone is mere dynasty building is also the reason why she can admit ignorance and I’m OK with it.

The surgeon analogy is actually more revealing than its author intended. It points out that we care about a successor having the right attributes to see through a job well.

What attributes are needed for this job? It isn’t foreign policy experience or any particular subject matter experience. Not even the most brilliant renaissance man of a politician is going to be erudite on every field of knowledge he or she is going to necessarily weigh in on. If anything, what really matters most is integrity, followed in quick succession with a commitment to the right values and a willingness to learn the things one needs to know.

If Nordone had been in the Senate for a year or two — or even six months — I might feel differently. But, here we are talking about a sister who just lost the brother who helped raise her. Their closeness was never a question, so she is a woman who, in five weeks, went from her normal life, to grieving her brother, to being a sitting U.S. Senator finishing out her brother’s term, to running for reelection. Phew.

Do I expect someone to reach peak knowledge on world issues within such a month? No. What I do expect is exactly what she’s done: to arrive in D.C. with a passion to ensure what her brother cared about — and his voters had repeatedly elected him to do — got done. And, while she seems well aligned with the president, the passing of the Iran and Russia sanctions bill in the Senate seems to speak to her doing precisely that.

The president had tried to say the way to honor Graham was the “Save America Act,” which the senator had indeed supported, but Nordone started off laser focused on what had been her brother’s actual long-term focus: sanctions against the modern Axis of Evil. It’s no mere coincidence that Graham had not only traveled to Ukraine numerous times over the last few years, but that it also was his final trip: he was passionate about ending Russian aggression.

Nordone got that, because she got her brother. And that’s why it made sense to support her: she isn’t a non-doctor doing heart surgery, she’s a sibling-in-mourning carrying the legacy of her brother’s heart. That’s something a beloved sibling actually can do.

Of course, if she’s to be more than a caretaker for the late senator’s seat until January, carrying his passion alone won’t be enough. She will need that all important integrity and willingness to learn. But that’s precisely what her ill-fated comment speaks well of: the normal politician play when lacking knowledge on a subject is to feign knowledge. Many of those on the left who are wringing their hands over Nordone no doubt have pointed out the president’s penchant to do just that.

How refreshing instead for a politician to admit she doesn’t know something while affirming the larger principle that she intends to apply as she learns. Admitting ignorance is, as Socrates noted, the beginning of wisdom.

Again, maybe in a year, she’ll still be regularly admitting ignorance on things she should have gotten up to speed on and showing no sense of growth. Her long pre-Senate résumé makes me doubt that will be the story, but if so, that’d be troubling. But more so, than, say, a very knowledgeable and credentialed politician who does whatever slimy populist notion the ever changing winds of opportunity push him towards? We’ve had no problem seating plenty of those chameleons before and, no doubt, will again.

Or worse than her primary opponent? While Nordone’s enemies suggest her appointment — fully legal, proper and only for six months — is the end of democracy, the other GOP hopeful actually supported martial law to prevent a presidential transition. Rep. Ralph Norman texting to the White House Chief of Staff, “Our LAST HOPE is invoking Marshall [sic] Law!! PLEASE URGE TO PRESIDENT TO DO SO!!” makes any assertion he’s the more pro-democracy option positively absurd.

And this is the same man, who — however well informed he may be — misapplies that knowledge when it comes to how we handle the very adversary helping Iran kill our troops? Knowledge, applied in the wrong direction, is little solace, even if he did know the difference between a Marshall plan and “Martial Law.”

If someone values what Sen. Graham did, who is the better choice for carrying on his legacy that voters have clearly said they supported? Someone “better informed” but opposed to the things he cared about? Or someone still ramping up, but who is bound to Graham in values and not just genetics?

Every early indication Nordone shares far more than parents with her predecessor. Admitting a lack, rather than pretending, appears like the same kind of integrity that led a man to be one of the most powerful men in the senate without enriching himself off of that position.

There will be bumps on Nordone’s get-up-to-speed road, especially given essentially zero preparation time. But, if voters will value integrity over polish, and teachability over pride, I suspect they will be rewarded for valuing what matters.

If not, we oughtn’t to cry the next time a politician speaks nonsense while insisting knowledge. It’ll be on our own (empty) heads.