Sen. Clinton's Management Skills

Now that some changes have been made among the personnel in the Clinton campaign, stories are swirling about a campaign that miscalculated the degree of opposition it would face, failed to establish contingency plans, and stuck with a failing strategy long after its failure became clear.

For example:

It's been said that one benefit of the torturous process presidential candidates must undergo is that it gives voters an extended view of their managerial ability. After all, this line of thinking goes, if a candidate can't organize a national campaign, he or she can't run the federal government.

If that's true, there are four emerging reasons why voters may want to take a second look at Hillary Clinton. So far, in a number of key areas, her campaign is falling short - and she won't solve the problem simply by changing campaign managers, as she did earlier this week. (http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/02/clintons_squandered_lead_can_s.html)

Margaret Carlson notes:

Clinton saw the New Hampshire result as her political resurrection, where she finally found her ``voice.'' But if the voice was different, the message was the same. Her Lazarus-like win kept her from looking any further into why she lost so badly in Iowa. It put off any move to change her insular staff and validated her original strategy in which the primaries were a mere formality.

Voters would coronate her partly because she had been first lady, because shewas a Clinton, and because it was her turn after all she had been through. It wasn't as much a matter of competing as it was waiting until Super Tuesday to accept the crown. (http://bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&refer=columnist_carlson&sid=azceW2G4gToM)

One of the principal concerns about Barack Obama is that he will not be able to lead effectively and that his plans for Iraq represent false hope. It is safe to say that there has been plenty of false hope spread around regarding the Iraq strategy from the start. Remember the claim that, "We will be greeted as liberators?" It was that miscalculation, based on false hope that seems to have kept the Bush administration from making contingency plans in case a more hearty opposition emerged. Failure to plan for contingencies and effective reconstruction are widely regarded as among he more obvious managerial failings of the Bush administration in the Iraq War. They assumed that their cause was unstoppable, and acted without thinking it through. The result was a strategy that miscalculated the degree of opposition it would face, failed to establish contingency plans, and stuck with a failing strategy long after its failure became clear.

The military and tactical side of war will always be the purview of the Generals. No need to fear an inexperienced young president moving troops on a whim. The principal of civilian control of the military is not based on the idea that the president is a military strategist; it is based on the notion that the president has the wisdom, foresight, and humility to think it through. Self-assured and arrogant leaders make their mistakes less by alienating others than by failing to think it through. There is no reason that the Bush administration could not have planned for stiff opposition or implemented a strategy to win the peace. Yet, even after the glaring absence of such plans became obvious, the administration refused to change course, remaining loyal to Donald Rumsfeld even at the expense of the 2006 Congressional Elections.

Reading this account of the recent changes at team Clinton leaves me with the eerie feeling of déjà vu. I realize that a political campaign and a war are vastly different, and while George Bush's poor planning has cost lives, Clinton's poor planning stands only to cost her a chance at the presidency. Nevertheless, a political campaign is a managerial challenge, and while the presidency is much more than just management, Sen. Clinton has grounded her campaign on her particular strengths in that area.

Perhaps the question of voting to authorize the war is ultimately only the tip of the iceberg. Perhaps the management experience that Clinton and her team have brought to the campaign is more reminiscent of the Bush administration than she would hope to admit. If management, foresight, wisdom, and the humility to plan for unanticipated contingencies are skills we should value in a president, is Barack Obama really the more risky choice?

Two Cents on Iraq

This blog concerns itself mostly with Tennessee Politics, but Iraq policy currently dominates politics nationally, so I offer the following observation:

The phased withdrawal plans that are beginning to float around offer the potential for bi-partisan consensus when one considers the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (Welfare Reform). Democrats and Republicans were finally able to come together for that bill once Democrats embraced a portion of the conservative critique of welfare dependency. Welfare (government assistance), Republicans had argued, undermined the opportunity for recipients to work because they were shielded from assuming personal responsibility. The longer the government provided assistance, the worse the situation was said to be for those receiving welfare. A strict time limit on the lifetime receipt of welfare assistance was imposed in conjunction with specific requirements (once called workfare) that recipients also pursue job training or actual jobs to qualify for aid.

So, how about following that same logic in Iraq. If the problem is that Iraqi soldiers and government personnel have become overly dependent on US forces to provide security, then indefinite assistance or increases in US troop support may breed their dependency on US forces. If so, then according to the logic of welfare reform, continuing indefinite assistance must be damaging the Iraqi government's opportunity to provide their own security by shielding it from assuming personal responsibility. So, a phased withdrawal with strict time limits ought to reverse the situation by forcing the Iraqi government to provide its own security, especially if further US aid, even under the strict time limits, is conditioned on their successfully providing that security for themselves.

Why, then can't the Iraqi Security Opportunity and Governmental Responsibility Reconciliation Act of 2007 achieve support from the GOP?

Rumsfeld Out - The People Have Power After All

Well, it's official. Rumsfeld will step down. Leaving aside whether Robert Gates will be an improvement or not, one lesson is perfectly clear. When the people of the country speak with the clarity and volume of this year's midterm election, even a go-it-alone president who had promised to stick with Rumsfeld until the end of his term can be encouraged to rethink.