Winning stratagem

I had a French friend who once told me an interesting story about how his
uncle had become the youngest Professor of Chemistry in France, where
it used to be notorious that Professors remained in office until they were
carried out. When he was a graduate student, to decide where to go to do his
equivalent to Assistant Professor, his uncle did a small research project. He
analyzed the median age of all the Professors in all the Chemistry Departments
in France, and then he went to the one with the oldest mean age. By doing
this he expected to be able to replace one of the oldest when he either died
or was forced to retire. The stratagem worked, he went to a small city in
northeast France, not one of the most desirable, but the one with the highest
median age, and he became full professor at the young age of 32. Because of
his young age he became famous, and so was then able to transfer to the most
prestigious University in France, the Sorbonne in Paris (this is a true story,
I met him some years ago).
I thought of this story when I saw Acting PM Olmert in recent ads and
news stories, gazing across the West Bank, looking towards the future. All
politicians are opportunists to a degree. Olmert went from being Mayor of
Jerusalem, to be PM Sharon's "yes" man and trial balloon artist. He lost any
real credibility he had himself when he became Sharon's shadow, his creature.
But, it was a great career move, because Sharon at the age of 82, running for
office again, was definitely on the downward turn of his life's curve.
So Olmert made a clever career move, although he may not have realized
himself that hitching his planet to a dying solar system might catapult him
into the star position so quickly, but his stratagem was a success.
Failing a very unexpected upset in the election next Tuesday, Olmert will
become PM, and will set Israel on a new course, whereby there is no
Palestinian partner to deal with, because Hamas is so extreme, and the
Israeli public are fed up with and want to be disengaged from the
Palestinians. It is an attractive concept, but we cannot know in the long
run whether or not it can be carried out successfully or whether Olmert is
capable of seeing it through.