“Is Fred Thompson lazy?” seems to be one of the questions of the day in blog-land. I would expect Jonah Goldberg to chime in on this soon, as he has been Mr. “Don’t just do something. Sit there!” before; perhaps he has a similar take on this as I do.

To wit: I am hoping Fred is in fact guilty as charged—if, as I suspect, the D.C. crowd is saying “lazy” when they really mean “knows the difference between what needs doing and what doesn’t”.

There is too much of a culture of blind frantic striving, of overwork for overwork’s sake, in Washington these days—and that includes the other presidential campaigns, which, for instance, never miss an opportunity to issue a blizzard of statements and press releases on matters that will concern no one in a half-hour’s time. Such habits are not only bad for the health, but inimical to the sort of contemplation which undergirds wise action. (And of course those habits are also fatal to humility and a sense of proportion.)

We don’t need another President who brags about working so very hard for the American people. (What exactly is he doing? It doesn’t matter: he’s working so hard that he must, by definition, be doing us a world of good!) We need a President who sweats every last detail of the essential stuff, and pretty much ignores the rest. Both halves of that equation would be a refreshing change.

I do hope that Fred is our man. If he continues to tune out the consultants, running his Presidential campaign his way, with a fresh-eyed look at what is actually important and productive and what is not, what has changed with blogs and YouTube and such and what hasn’t, that will be a very good sign indeed.