Obama’s Effete Leadership

When Candidate Obama was selling himself to the electorate, he promised with King Canutian assurance a new era of “hope and change,” a post-partisan climate in Washington in which legislation would no longer be enacted by the power of the majority– certainly no more one-vote laws – that the "planet would begin to heal," and "the rise of the oceans begin to slow."

Bold talk for someone who has never held a private sector job, a “real” job in my opinion, or even a political position giving executive experience. Now, after nearly 18 months of President Obama’s brand of leadership, hopefully those who voted for a man who was to herald in this chimerical millennium have come to their senses and realized that, stentorian rhetoric aside, proven experience and leadership really do matter when it comes to occupying the highest office of the land.

A case in point …

On April 20 a wellhead explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, killed eleven men and began spewing oil into the Gulf at a rate that was conservatively estimated at about 5,000 barrels a day. With the history of the Valdez oil spill and other spills around the world, one could reasonably expect that this would have piqued the attention of the people’s chief representative and leader in affairs of national interest. It didn’t.

As oil burbled 5,000 feet below the surface of the Gulf, Obama was flying back on April 20 from a fundraiser for Barbara Boxer. On Day Four of the developing crisis, April 23, the Obama family (including dog) took off for a three-day vacation in Asheville, NC to chomp on some ribs, play some golf, and get massaged at the Grove Park Resort. After hosting a White House reception for the NY Yankees on the 26th, eating a slice of rhubarb pie at Jerry’s Diner during a fundraiser in Iowa on the 27th, lunching at Peggy Sue’s Diner during another fundraiser in Missouri on the 28th, followed by another fundraiser at the “swank” Washington home of a DNC faithful on the 29th and a comedy routine with Jay Leno on May 1, Obama finally found time in his high priority schedule of play and politics to visit the Louisiana coast on May 2 – the 13th day of the crisis.

You’d think Obama was finally engaged in the unfolding disaster that could be his “Katrina” moment, but think again. Between Day 14 and Day 25, Obama would host the Navy football team and Cinco de Mayo celebration at the White House, have private receptions for Nobel laureate Elie Weisel and Harmid Karzai, take Michelle on a date at the glitzy Komi restaurant in D.C., play an afternoon round of golf at Ft. Belvoir, and fly to another fundraiser in Buffalo with a side visit for hot wings at Duffs before he would find time to make a speech in the Rose Garden on May 14 to tell the American people what he was doing concerning the oil spill.

OK. Now he’s engaged. Not really. Another round of golf on the 15th and 16th (does this guy have time for the presidency?), a plant tour in Ohio during another fundraiser on the 18th, then the knock-your-socks-off state dinner for Mexican President Calderón on the 19th, followed by a White House meeting with rock star Bono (that’s surely an “A” priority), more golf on the 22nd at Andrews AF base outside of Washington (he must be trying to play every course in the area), another fundraiser in S.F. for Boxer hosted by the very rich and beautiful Getty family on the 25th, then skipping the Memorial Day tradition of wreath laying at the Tomb of the Unknown, off for another three-day weekend vacation in Chicagoland (the second in a little over a month) on the 27th, which he interrupts for part of the 28th for a photo op of him digging his finger in the sand of a Louisiana beach (what a guy) before heading back up to Chicagoland, BBQ and beers with Michelle on the 29th, then some pick-up basketball at the University of Chicago on the 30th.

June 1 (Day 43) OB hosts Sir Paul McCartney at a White House love fest where Paul (and Faith Hill, Jonas Brothers, Emmylou Harris, David Grohl, et. al.) serenaded the swooning Michelle (when you’re the president, nothing is too good for your sweetie) and Snookums Obama chortled that the Beatles “"helped to lay the soundtrack for an entire generation" (‘aw shucks). Thanking Obama and the event’s co-sponsor, the U.S. Library of Congress, McCartney couldn’t let it go without a dig: “After the last eight years, it’s great to have a president who knows what a library is.”

June 2 (Day 44) OB appears with the noted oil spill expert, Larry King, on “Larry King Live” and gave his best imitation of emotion. He said that he was “angry and frustrated” about the oil spill. Then asked how he felt about his job, OB said it is the best job on earth. (I can understand why – look at the perks.)

June 6 (Day 48) OB hosts a party at the White House and then shuffles off to Ford’s Theater with Michelle for an evening of laughs and music. No mention by the President or White House that it was the 66th anniversary of D-day.

June 7 (Day 49) OB addresses the graduating class of Kalamazoo Central High where he exhorts them to take responsibility for their successes and failures (now there’s a novel idea) and “when you screw up … it’s the easiest thing in the world to start looking around for someone to blame. Your professor was too hard; your boss was a jerk; the coach was playing favorites; your friend just didn’t understand. We see it every day out in Washington, with folks calling each other names and making all sorts of accusations on TV.” (Well, he should know; he’s an expert at finger-pointing.)

June 8 (Day 50) OB is interviewed by Matt Lauer on the Today show where he makes a statement that will be remembered in his legacy. Asked about the panels of experts he had convened and the investigations he had commissioned, Obama snorted that he visited the Gulf a month ago to meet with fishermen before most media "talking heads" were paying attention to the issue and that, "I don't sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar; we talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers — so I know whose ass to kick." I’m sure that threat sent shivers of fear down the spines of the BP execs.

How fitting that a President who speaks in gutter language would have an Interior Secretary, Ken Salazar, threatening that the government would 'have its boot on the throat of BP.'" Coupled with the addiction to profanity of Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Immanuel, these guys sound more like thugs than high government officials.

The fact is Obama began taking incoming fire from the press at least by May 30 when the NY Times criticized his lethargy in an editorial. The media that had adored Obama and deflected his incompetence in his handling of so many issues was now turning on him. The petulant Obama did what he has done ever since he became president and is criticized – he blames someone else and finger-points, not taking the advice he gave the Kalamazoo kids. In the financial meltdown, it was the fault of the “big banks,” in the healthcare crisis it was “big pharma” and the “big insurance” companies, and now it’s “big oil” and the greedy capitalist profit seeking companies like BP. Without any evidence of culpability, he accused the “oil industry’s cozy and sometimes corrupt relationship with government regulators” and how that has meant “little or no regulation at all.”

Releasing his DOJ goons, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that criminal and civil investigations had begun into the oil spill, threatening criminal prosecution if any environmental laws were found to have been violated. Wow! Under the Damoclean threat of incarceration, Obama’s leadership style certainly has a way of motivating folks to solve a problem getting worse by the day. He went on to warn the company execs to “make sure that BP is not lawyering up.” Obama ought to be happy BP stayed on the problem instead of leaving to focus on its legal liabilities.

Obama’s nemesis, Sarah Palin observed: “50 days in, and we’ve just learned another shocking revelation concerning the Obama administration’s response to the Gulf oil spill. In an interview aired this morning, President Obama admitted that he hasn’t met with or spoken directly to BP’s CEO Tony Hayward. His reasoning: ‘Because my experience is, when you talk to a guy like a BP CEO, he’s gonna’ say all the right things to me. I’m not interested in words. I’m interested in actions.’”

Years ago I gave a leadership speech entitled “The Power of Your Presence.” I subsequently turned it into an article and then into a chapter of a book I authored. The first principle of leadership, which Obama’s calendar shows he doesn’t get, is showing up! His phlegmatic leadership style is more akin to a head of state than presidential governing, which he willingly delegates to his co-prime ministers, Pelosi and Reid.

Another leadership principle that the vainglorious Obama doesn’t get is: never promise what you can’t personally deliver. Yet on May 28, feeling the heat of the media questioning his competence, Leader Obama confidently proclaimed "I ultimately take responsibility for solving this crisis…I am the president and the buck stops with me … the American people should know that from the moment this disaster began, the federal government has been in charge of the response effort… In case you're wondering who's responsible, I take responsibility." Poppycock! No leader worth his salt would put his personal reputation or that of his organization at risk by promising an outcome over which he has absolutely no power to deliver.

I’ll mention one other important principle of leadership that Obama doesn’t get: what’s done is done. The present state is the starting point for solving every problem – not who did what, not why or how something happened. Begin where you are. Solving a problem and diagnosing its cause are separate issues. Because Obama doesn’t get this principle either, he is as interested, if not more interested, in fixing blame than focusing all of the energy and resources he can muster to work along side of the BP experts (who are paralyzed in Admiral Thad Allen’s command structure) to minimize the irreparable damage that this catastrophe will cause. Culpability comes later. There will be plenty to go around in a fair hearing for both BP and the federal government, I’m sure.

As environmentalists have gained greater sway over U.S. federal policy and legislation, even reasonable land-based and coastal shelf drilling in 1,000 feet or less are not permitted. Oil companies therefore have been forced to drill farther out, in deeper waters, on more complex platforms, that maintain their position via global positioning satellites using on-board engines to offset ocean currents and wind.

Until the April 20 explosion hundreds of drilling platforms in the Gulf had experienced only one significant spill in more than 60 years, including many drilling in very deep water. Working on the bleeding edge of technology, this success in deepwater drilling obscured the omnipresent dangers, which led to overconfidence, which ultimately led to failure. Success and failure are always first cousins.

Something I ask the executive officers in our companies to address in their annual business plans is: “what can go wrong and what will you do if it happens?” It is the question Obama should have asked his direct reports … but didn’t.