Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t mind plain speaking politicians. He doesn’t mind when people are blunt and/or direct.

But he doesn’t like rude.

He really doesn’t like rude.

So, imagine your Maximum Leader’s dismay when he reads that Jim Webb was intentionally avoiding President Bush at a Luncheon. Then when the President and Senator-Elect Webb finally do meet, Mr. Webb chooses to respond to a polite question from the President with a sharp political retort. When the polite question was followed-up with a restatement of the polite question, Mr. Webb basically told the President that the answer was none of his (the President’s) business.

First piece of advice from your Maximum Leader to Mr. Webb. If you don’t want to be seen with the President, or have to speak to the President; then politely decline the President’s invitation to the White House.

Of course, your Maximum Leader will defer to George Will on chastizing Mr. Webb. From Will’s column yesterday in the Washington Post:

That was certainly swift. Washington has a way of quickly acculturating people, especially those who are most susceptible to derangement by the derivative dignity of office. But Jim Webb, Democratic senator-elect from Virginia, has become a pompous poseur and an abuser of the English language before actually becoming a senator.

Wednesday’s Post reported that at a White House reception for newly elected members of Congress, Webb “tried to avoid President Bush,” refusing to pass through the reception line or have his picture taken with the president. When Bush asked Webb, whose son is a Marine in Iraq, “How’s your boy?” Webb replied, “I’d like to get them [sic] out of Iraq.” When the president again asked “How’s your boy?” Webb replied, “That’s between me and my boy.” Webb told The Post:

“I’m not particularly interested in having a picture of me and George W. Bush on my wall. No offense to the institution of the presidency, and I’m certainly looking forward to working with him and his administration. [But] leaders do some symbolic things to try to convey who they are and what the message is.”

Webb certainly has conveyed what he is: a boor. Never mind the patent disrespect for the presidency. Webb’s more gross offense was calculated rudeness toward another human being — one who, disregarding many hard things Webb had said about him during the campaign, asked a civil and caring question, as one parent to another. When — if ever — Webb grows weary of admiring his new grandeur as a “leader” who carefully calibrates the “symbolic things” he does to convey messages, he might consider this: In a republic, people decline to be led by leaders who are insufferably full of themselves.

Well put, Mr. Will. It costs one nothing to be polite. And civility, if not a cornerstone of civilization itself, certainly is the lubricant that makes civilization works.

Carry on.