e-on-one meeting took place in the Oval Office four months later, after McChrystal got the Afghanistan job, and it didn't go much better. 'It was a 10-minute photo-op,' says an adviser to McChrystal. 'Obama clearly didn't know anything about him, who he was. Here's the guy who's going to run his f-ing war, but he didn't seem very engaged. The Boss was pretty disappointed.'"- Excerpt from a Rolling Stone magazine profile on Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan
President Obama is under fire again. Conservatives are using an article set to appear in Rolling Stone as evidence of Obama's incompetence. Coming amidst weeks of criticism over his dealing with the Gulf of Mexico oil crisis, the timing of this article couldn't be worse.
However, it's a recent New York Times/CBS News poll that reveals one of Obama's biggest problems. Most people (54 percent) don't believe that Obama has a clear plan for creating jobs. That lack of confidence in such a personal and crucial area of people's lives is bad news for the young president.
As I have said many times in this blog, jobs are the key to everything from economic recovery to support for incumbents. Jobs are what get people out of bed in the morning and contribute to the tax base. Jobs are what pay for new schools. police and roads. Working people support big and small vendors, which in turn fuels the overall economy. Without good jobs, accessible to anyone who is qualified and willing to work, Obama is going to continue to slide in popularity polls.
Why is that important? Because Obama has some good ideas that are going to die on the drawing board as long as his political clout continues to decline. Given time to grow into the job, Obama might actually do some good for this country and for the planet. But time is about to run out and Obama has to take some of the blame for that.
Job security allows people to take vacations, buy things and enjoy the fruits of their labor. Obama has underestimated how bad the job market really is and is now paying a price. Because of his unwillingness to immerse himself fully in the quest to improve the economy, people are questioning whether he's up to other tasks of the presidency. Military leaders are apparently having similar doubts about Obama as are job seekers and environmentalists. We don't hear more negative comments about Obama from animal-rights activists because, frankly, the alternative (Republicans) is so much worse. But make no mistake about it, Obama is beginning to appear to a wide variety of Americans as a president who is out of touch. A smart guy without a plan.
The McChrystal flap will be used against Obama by the usual suspects, the right wingers. Unemployed folks of all political persuasions are not seeing any signs of things getting better under this Democratic president or his leadership party. And while Obama did get BP to set aside $20 billion for oil-spill victims, he has not been able to stop the leak. He personally claims to have organized the best and brightest scientists to address the problem, but where is the evidence that those people have done anything to cap the well? Who are these government experts Obama has talked to? It appears to most people that BP is running the whole show.
Yes, there is a pictured being painted that Obama is in over his head and/or doesn't have the right people working for him. The campaign charges against him, about never having been a manager of anything, seem to be more valid as time goes on and each crack in his armor gets a little bigger. Good managers don't let those cracks get too large. They fix them. But if you've never managed anything, well, you might not have an intuitive sense of how to deal with a crisis. This is why experience matters in all walks of life.
I was rooting for Obama and still am because his failure won't do me or the country any good. But I am having serious doubts about the man's management abilities. I thought he'd stay off the golf course and be a nose-to-the-grindstone president with vast intellectual skills to solve or at least understand key issues. Even McChrystal said he voted for Obama, only to be disappointed later on. Obama's management abilities don't seem to be up to par with his values or analytical abilities, rendering him as essentially ineffective. Management abilities and hands-on political skills (like giving speeches) are two different things. The world needs good managers because hands-on skillful people don't always know how to keep the trains running on time.
Most of this wave of negativity could be turned around if Obama would do what he said he was going to do. Focus on job creation. Real jobs. Not temporary Census Bureau jobs. Not low-level jobs that result in the underemployment of professional and educated people. If people are employed in relatively satisfying jobs, a lot of this negativism would disappear. Americans tend to vote with their wallets. They also assess a president on a variety of topics based in large part on their bank accounts. If Obama wants to sell clean energy, he needs to get people back to work. No one is going to focus on solar panels if they are in foreclosure. People worried about their jobs aren't going to learn about or support Obama's loftier ideas. Regular folks just want to eat and pay their bills. If they can do that relatively securely, then maybe they'll pay attention to broader issues. But until that job security returns, Obama is going to continue to get stuck in the mud.
The Obama honeymoon is over. The opportunities for advancements in clean-energy initiatives and fine-tuning of health-care reform have to be tabled for now. Generals are blasting Obama and so are some liberals. It's no longer just a right-wing radio show assault. And my gut feeling is that it's all made worse by the administration short-shrifting job creation and the economy. Fix the economy and everything else would fall into place. Many of those folks who aren't working because of the current moratorium on deep-water oil rigs might be able to find employment elsewhere if the economy would return to some sort of normal state. But with most industries struggling, there are few opportunities for anyone to transition into other fields. The ultimate answer isn't to keep risky rigs running in the Gulf of Mexico so that people can have jobs. The solution is to create a country and an economy where workers have options, where if one industry collapses for whatever reason, unemployed people wouldn't be left to rot.
It's hard to come to the defense of a president when you've been out of work for the entire time he's been in office. It's difficult to believe this is a president who wants to protect the environment when just a few months ago he was talking about drilling for oil off the coast of Virginia. He is a president who parades around golf courses while wildlife is caked in oil. Perceptions mean a lot, and if one is going to blast BP's Tony Hayward, the CEO of the oil giant, for participating in a yachting competition last weekend while the oil continues to flow, then raising an eyebrow over Obama's golf outings seems like fair play.
Simply put, Obama needs to clean up his act. That doesn't mean silencing generals. It means he has to stop giving people legitimate reasons to question his actions and lack of actions.
I can't fully support a president who has taken his eye off the ball -- the ball being jobs, and now an oil disaster. Until Obama's actions match his campaign promises -- until he rolls up his sleeves and gives up a vacation or two -- I don't really see much of a difference in Obama as compared with George W. Bush. We're still at war. Unemployment and underemployment aren't getting significantly better. The rich are still getting richer, often at the expense of the poor and middle class. Can one man solve these issues alone? No. But he can set the proper tone. He did it with health care, why isn't he doing it with other issues?
Unfortunately, the alternatives to Obama are in many ways worse. The Republicans not only wouldn't stop the oil, they would probably offer BP tax incentives to clean up the spill and make you and I pay for the bulk of the mess. They wouldn't produce jobs, but instead would create more millionaires at the top of large corporations. They'd cut off unemployment benefits and potentially get us into another war with either Iran or North Korea. Sorry, Tea Party people. But those are pretty much facts. I leaned Republican at one time in my life, but no more.
We have a leadership problem more than a political problem in this country. It can be seen in the White House and in the private sector. It's been getting worse for years. Lowering the unemployment rate will at least create the illusion of things getting better so that other issues can be addressed, but I fear the basic principles of leadership are lost.
We tend to rally around illusions and marketing campaigns more than truth and values. A candidate, like Obama was in 2008, becomes a product, not a man. Then when the product fails to work as advertised, we get upset with it. What we should be doing is getting angry with ourselves for not demanding more of everyone and anyone in leadership positions, from teachers to presidents and generals. From the owners of a small businesses on up to the CEO of oil companies, we need better, brighter and more principled people running the show. Mediocrity can't continue to rise to the top of businesses and government. What qualities and criteria a person must posses in order to be promoted must change. That's on voters, boards of directors and others with the power to elect or appoint leaders.
By all accounts, Gen. McChrystal is far better than mediocre, and not some political hack. That is why his criticism of Obama is getting so much attention today. The people in charge of damage control in the White House are probably going nuts this afternoon, trying to spin this situation into something more less negative for the evening news and morning papers.
A pattern is emerging with Obama. It appears he isn't as engaged as his eloquent speeches would have people believe. I think his intentions are good, but I also am beginning to wonder if he has the capability to relate to average Americans or a thick enough skin to be a great leader. How strong is his commitment to lead? Obama might be a skilled intellectual and have some smart political handlers, but is he a general? From what McChrystal, certain polls and some folks in the Gulf states are saying, the answer is no.
More bad news for the president. Obama's deep-water oil-drilling moratorium is overturned by a judge. Read more.
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