The Agitministrator

Chief Executive
Chief of State
Chief Diplomat
Chief of Party
Chief Citizen
Chief Legislator
Commander in Chief
Leader of the free world

These titles describe a leader, a manager, an administrator, an executive. These are titles by which the President of the United States is routinely called. The position of President of the United States is clearly a senior management position. One might even say it is -the- senior management position. What are the odds that a nation of over 300 million people would elect a man with no management experience to be the most senior manager in the country? Apparently...pretty good.

Agitators, radicals, community organizers, are not noted for their managerial qualities. They may be charismatic leaders, but we don't generally think of leaders in these roles as 'Presidential'. It takes an entirely different set of skills to manage a crisis than it does to create one. The agitator's focus is the creation, or exploitation of crises in pursuit of his goals. The administrator's focus regarding crises, is management and resolution. Since January of 2009 we have seen example after example of crises being exploited in pursuit of goals, and virtually no crisis management from the leader of the free world.

The BP oil spill in the gulf of Mexico highlights the anti-managerial nature of Barack Obama. The most basic crisis management techniques were either a completely foreign concept to this President, or he intentionally avoided putting them into practice. Either of those two possibilities is unacceptable in the Chief Executive of the United States. Accusations of incompetence have been made, but this is a level of incompetence that is staggering. There has also been speculation that there is a more sinister motive behind the administration's inaction, but the evidence for simple incompetence is compelling simply due to the variety of crises that have been met with  incompetence by the administration.

Experience was an issue in the 2008 general election for President. It was enough of an issue that the entire race was pitched as if Barack Obama was running against Sarah Palin for the Chief Executive position. The irony was that Palin's executive experience was probably more relevant than McCain's Senate experience, and certainly surpassed the experience of Barack Obama, but the issue was not seen that way by most people. Obama's main managerial experience claim was that he had managed a campaign of several hundred workers. The sycophant press never questioned how picking a campaign manager or working with a few hundred people that, by default, were all die-hard Obama supporters would prepare him for managing the truly epic crises of global scale that the US president routinely has to personally manage.

Fast forward to the Obama Presidency. Any crisis that Obama can exploit to further his ideological agenda gets exploited; illegal immigration in Arizona to push comprehensive immigration reform, gulf oil spill for cap-n-trade and increased oil production regulation, auto manufacturer's bankruptcy for stronger cafe standards and union growth, financial crisis for anti-capitalist financial reforms and expanded government influence. In case after case the drum beat for 'fundamentally transforming America' provides the underlying rhythm. In case after case we see that the focus is not on correcting a problem, not on managing the crisis, but on making the most of the crisis in pursuit of ideological goals. What we see are the actions of an agitator, a radical, a community organizer.

What may not be obvious when looking at bureaucratic machinations becomes more clear when the impact of the administration's incompetence is physically manifested. The most under reported story of the year is the horrible flooding in the Nashville area. The Nashville flood is one of the most expensive natural disasters in US history. More than 30 people lost their lives. Barack Obama may have had a record of voting 'present' in the Senate, but he could not even take the time to do that for Nashville. There was no agenda that could be furthered in Nashville and the press apparently had other stories to cover. Where an administrator with the best interests of the citizens might have had some stake in Nashville, there was nothing there to concern the agitator.

The management of the gulf oil spill has been simply non-existent. Any responsibility that the government might have in facilitating the clean-up or keeping oil from reaching US shores has been hidden behind BP's responsibility for the blowout. These two aspects of the spill illustrate the administration's complete lack of action in this crisis. The blowout is being managed by BP. Agree or disagree with the actions taken by BP, BP has been working to stop the leak from day 1. For the clean up effort and the effort to keep oil from reaching US shores, the administration has done nothing. They haven't mismanaged the crisis. They haven't even bothered to show up. It has been obvious for weeks that the spill would not be contained, that a clean-up effort would be needed, and that oil would reach the beaches of the gulf coast. It has also been clear that BP would not be able to do anything to stop any of those things from happening. The administration has gone to great lengths to be very cross with BP, and to do absolutely nothing else. The President appears to even be incapable of cutting the red tape that inhibits the ability of local authorities to protect themselves or for foreign flagged ships to take part in the skimming operations.

The administration may have some conflict of interest in cleaning up the spill. The disaster probably works in their favor for pushing their legislative agenda. But it also advertises a level of incompetence that is nothing short of dangerous. Any first year project manager could have dealt with the gulf oil spill better than the President of the United Sates has done. Some very specific and obvious actions (like meeting with the management of BP) have just been ignored by this administration. We can be certain that they have not been ignored by the enemies of the United States, or by those that would seek to capitalize on a weak America.

If Barack Obama can't get a few oil industry execs together, or work with local governments to coordinate a containment plan, how would he manage the effort to deal with a North Korean invasion of South Korea? If Barack Obama can't see that it is a bad idea to send condolences to Turkey for the deaths of a the jihadis in the gaza blockade run, how is he going to deal with Iran's insistence on building a nuclear bomb? Does China think that Obama could effectively obstruct a 'reunification' effort with Taiwan? Do Chavez and the Organization of South American States think that Obama would do anything to defend democracies like Honduras from socialist expansion in the region?

It is a very dangerous thing to give the enemies of freedom and democracy the idea that the Leader of the free world is lost on a golf course somewhere. The balance of power in the world is giving way to a dangerous imbalance of power. The impression of incompetence and weakness in the US administration may force the hands of those that see a window of opportunity that they can not expect to stay open indefinitely. We can only wonder if the resulting crises will be dealt with by an administrator, or exploited by an agitator. The evidence is not encouraging.