Pity the plight of the leader. No matter what the setting, from the McDonald’s night shift manager to the president of the United States, an agonizing duality faces leaders. Whether because of law, practicality or knowledge of effective management, they cannot supervise every action of every person being led.

But they also take the responsibility when mistakes are made.

There is nothing wrong with this system — leadership’s perks usually outweigh its pains. And it’s socially convenient to be able to immediately fix blame at the top of an organization.

Still, pity the leaders who get up each morning wondering if their well-intended plans will be waylaid that day by someone they can’t really control. In many cases, that someone probably doesn’t even like or particularly respect the leader. They might disagree on everything. Yet the leader represents everybody.

Assuming for the sake of argument that they have the best of intentions, Ariel Sharon and Mahmoud Abbas are the two leaders most deserving of our sympathy right now. They are, of course, the political leaders of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization, respectively. Since Abbas’ election a little more than a month ago, both he and Sharon have said all the right things and taken bold steps to demonstrate a commitment to peace (in some form) and a Palestinian state (details still pending).

They’ve used the language of compromise and concession. And they have even overcome some early obstacles in the form of murders on both sides. Where once this would have brought a swift end to already-tense and likely insincere talks between Sharon and former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, we now see seeming forgiveness from both men, a symbolic truce now a week old — and swift reaction from Abbas, who fired three security officers after an attack by militants in Gaza last week.

This is promising. But of course it’s all happened before. The only way there will be lasting change in the Middle East is if the majority of its people follow the lead of people like Abbas and Sharon. And this has proven soberingly unlikely time and time again.

Not that it’s a problem unique to the Middle East. A few troublemakers can cast an enormous shadow on any group’s endeavor. Ask Dan McCarney. Ask President Bush (who can’t possibly have created every ethical villainy that’s beset his administration). Ask that McDonald’s manager whose new drive-through attendant put pickles on your quarter pounder, the moron.

Don’t mistake our argument — we’re not saying every leader is a visionary for the ages, tragically thwarted by malcontents and idiots. Most leaders are not substantively different from the people in their charge.

We don’t expect permanent solutions to happen until Israelis and Palestinians really want them to happen.