Should Obama handle the Oil Spill with more emotion?
Too often it feels as though Barry is watching from a balcony, reluctant to enter the fray until the clamor of the crowd forces him to come down. The pattern is perverse. The man whose presidency is rooted in his ability to inspire withholds that inspiration when it is most needed.
Oblivious to warnings about Osama hitting the U.S. and Katrina hitting New Orleans, W. often seemed more absorbed in workouts than work. Obama, by contrast, does his homework; he conveys a rare and impressive grasp of difficult subjects when he at last deigns to talk to the news media and reassure those whose lives are overturned by disaster.
The wound-tight, travel-light Obama has a distaste for the adversarial and the random. But if you stick too rigidly to a No Drama rule in the White House, you risk keeping reality at bay. Presidencies are always about crisis management.
Obama invented himself against all odds and repeated parental abandonment, and he worked hard to regiment his emotions. But now that can come across as imperviousness and inflexibility. He wants to run the agenda; he doesn’t want the agenda to run him. Once you become president, though, there’s no way to predict what your crises will be.
F.D.R. achieved greatness not by means of imposing his temperament and intellect on the world but by reacting to what the world threw at him.
For five weeks, it looked as though Obama considered the gushing that became the worst oil spill in U.S. history a distraction, like a fire alarm going off in the middle of a law seminar he was teaching. He’ll deal with it, but he’s annoyed because it’s not on his syllabus.
Well, watching his press conferences on YouTube about the spill; I can tell you that there was no emotion I am used to see from him when talking at public events and to his constituency about the recession, renewable energy, new jobs, financial reform. So there is a little difference I guess, but then again it is my perception as an outsider.
On the other hand; There is already much emotion fuelled speak against BP and the Administration. One could recommend not to combat a public crisis with public emotions. It doesn’t make the problems go away, it rather could escalate them.
