President Obama at Cabinet meeting April 20, 2009 at the White House. White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy
Team of Mascots -- Todd S. Purdum, Vanity Fair
Four years ago, Barack Obama said he wanted a Lincoln-esque “team of rivals” in his Cabinet. Thanks to his own temperament, the modern White House, and the 24-hour news cycle, what the president has created is something that doesn’t look Lincoln-esque at all.
Just four years ago, when it was clear that he would be the Democratic presidential nominee, Barack Obama famously declared that, if elected, he would want “a team of rivals” in his Cabinet, telling Joe Klein, of Time magazine, “I don’t want to have people who just agree with me. I want people who are continually pushing me out of my comfort zone.” His inspiration was Doris Kearns Goodwin’s best-selling book about Abraham Lincoln, who appointed three men who had been his chief competitors for the presidency in 1860—and who held him, at that point, in varying degrees of contempt—to help him keep the Union together during the Civil War. To say that things haven’t worked out that way for Obama is the mildest understatement. “No! God, no!” one former senior Obama adviser told me when I asked if the president had lived up to this goal.
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My Comment: I can see this style at work with the military. He rarely meets the Chiefs, and he definitely does not communicate with the commanders on the ground in Afghanistan. And while he maintains regular contacts and briefings from US Sec. of Defense Panetta and his national-security adviser Tom Donilon .... that's about it.
Is this the way to run (and be responsible for) the national security of the U.S. .... I have my doubts .... especially when intelligence and military leaks are now being regularly leaked by this White House and its supporters. But this is the style of President Obama and his team .... and unlike 2008 .... the American voter will now have the chance to pass judgement on his style and government approach this November.
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