We are a passionate nation. From baseball, to abortion rights, to immigration, it seems everyone has a viewpoint. And we express it loudly. All you have to do is listen to the outcry over an ump's blown call that cost Detroit Tigers pitcher Armando Galarraga a perfect game and his chance of making it into the history books.
Our nation is founded on the passion of the oppressed who for centuries have done whatever it takes -- including risking death -- to land on our shores and cross our borders. Abroad, we are known for our imperial and indiscriminate view that America rules the world. This is who we are.
So why, Mr. President, don't you get it? Why are you remaining calm while the nation is watching wall-to-wall coverage of this gushing underwater geyser? Especially now that we're seeing powerful pictures of pathetic birds and dolphins covered in oil.
Why haven't you told the American people that, to quote Network, a movie about tv executive Howard Beale -- 'I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore!'" Why haven't you -- instead of CNN's Kyra Phillips -- stood on the ocean drilling rig with Admiral Thad Allen and been our messenger of anger? Why haven't you looked BP CEO Tony "I want my life back" Heyward in the eye and told him to stop his whining?
Rage is building. Your presidency is on the line. And yet in an interview with CNN's Larry King, you calmly tell us that "My job is to solve this problem and ultimately this isn't about me and how angry I am." What you say may be true, yet you are misreading the pulse of the people. We want, we crave your outrage.
You need to take a page out of your nemesis former President George W. Bush's playbook. He got it right when days after 9-11 he climbed to the top of the rubble with a bullhorn at the base of what was left of the twin towers and vowed to fight back against terrorists. Where is your bullhorn?
Your media advisers are falling down on the job. Press Secretary Gibbs said yesterday in his daily press briefing that "what the American people and the citizens of the Gulf are expecting are results. And I think that's what the President will be measured by. I'll leave emotional psychiatry to others." Really? It seems the emotional state of the President is driving news cycles -- a no-no when you are trying to get out your message that the administration is in control.
While critics say that getting mad doesn't bring us an inch closer to solving the problem, it will calm our country and give us a sense of justice. We are accustomed to and like irrational outbursts.
It's not too late Mr. President.
As a journalist, I know all too well how the media enjoys analyzing the White House tactics for managing the press. For us, it's sport. It's so obvious to us what you need to do and how you need to do it. Isn't someone, somewhere in the administration guiding you on Media Management 101?
Here's a primer from all of us in the Fourth Estate scratching our heads on the sidelines as your administration bungles its way through missed media opportunity after missed opportunity:
Number One: Get out front and center in the heart of the action and get mad.
Number Two: Repeat number one.
Number Three: Watch the video of the oil-soaked wildlife. Express human emotion at the senseless tragedy.
Number Four: Be the messenger of positive action your administration is taking. Examples: When you start a criminal investigation, get out in front of the press and tell us. Don't announce it late at night in a memo from Attorney General Holder's office. When you cancel trips abroad to deal with the crisis, tell us personally.
Number Five: Act as if the victims in the tragedy are members of your own family. Spend time with the families of those killed and those who have lost their livelihood as a result of the spill.
Number Six: Use social media (Gibbs' Twitter account?) to hammer your message to the people.
Number Seven: Take credit when something good happens. If it ever does.
We get your need to 'speak softly and carry a big stick'. But I promise you, in this instance, it won't hurt you to bang that stick against the wall.
Lauren Ashburn is President of Ashburn Media Company. She is a 20-year veteran of print and broadcast news and a former managing editor for the Gannett Company.
Follow Lauren Ashburn on Twitter: www.twitter.com/laurenashburn
You're upset that he isn't putting more time into the gulf. As soon as he does, someone else is going to be just as upset that he isn't putting more time into unemployment. Then the war. Then this. He can't win for trying, so all he can do is put his head down and keep working. The decades of cutting corners and taking the path of least resistance are catching up to us NOW. We are at the crossroads and the Gulf is massively important, but so are the dozen other historic issues at hand.
www.dailyreusables.com
Be DEMONSTRATIVE! Don't you GET IT???? We need DEMONSTRATIVE!!!
As if we don't give MORE credence to whether or not he's actually DOING the job...?
I don't need him ACTING like he's hopping mad... this President is cool, calm, and collected. I like that about him.
Oh, but yes... he's furious. I look at people "going off" all angry and noisily, and I question their judgement. I see people taking measure, and acting quietly in the same circumstances? I know which one will succeed and I know which one will do better in the end...
I guarantee it isn't the one getting all emotional. (Think about how the Iraq War started if you want an example of "emotion-driven" responses)
No, Mr. President. Stay cool... I trust your way better than the one advocated.
It's tragic and my heart breaks for those families. Knowing it was dangerous does not make it any easier for them in dealing with their loss. But for the president to start making time for every victim of a tragedy like this is not in the country's best interest. Yep - it's a cold view point, but there is far to much to be done going forward. www.dailyreusables.com
From the NYT today:
NEW ORLEANS — Over six days in May, far from the familiar choreography of Washington hearings, federal investigators grilled workers involved in the Deepwater Horizon disaster in a chilly, sterile conference room at a hotel near the airport here.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/07/us/07capture.html?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/06/us/06rig.html?hp
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE62G2DO20100317
Surely this post is an attempt to use reverse psychology to promote competent leadership in a time of crisis.
Those who support Obama aren't interested in the bush playbook.
But I admire your attempt at dry wit and sarcasm, nevertheless.
"Number Seven: Take credit when something good happens. If it ever does."
The Republicans are waiting for President Obama to fix all the problems caused by Bush, then, and only then, will it be safe to bring out bush again.
After Bush started the Iraq war, he flew out on an aircraft carrier and left us with the famous "Mission Accomplished" legacy. Bush didn't seem mad at all that he "had" to commit brave soldiers to a war where many of them would not make it back to our shores.
Number One: President Obama didn't even start the oil spill. He would have looked silly flying out somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico and putting up a "Mission Accomplished" banner.
Number Three: Watch the video of the oil-soaked wildlife. Express human emotion at the senseless tragedy.
Bush refused to allow photos of soldiers that didn't make it out of Iraq (alive) as they returned to be reunited with their families (in flag-draped coffins). Bush never expressed human emotion at the senseless tragedy. Fox News even stopped showing footage of the Iraq war.
Number Three: President Obama has seen the videos and expressed human emotion at the senseless tragedy, however he didn't make a Photo-op out of it.
Number Five: Act as if the victims in the tragedy are members of your own family. Spend time with the families of those killed and those who have lost their livelihood as a result of the spill.
Bush never had any contact with the families of those killed and those who have lost their livelihood as a result of the war.
As he sent our nation into war. As he sent our sons and daughters to die. He giggled and flipped off the camera... then, a few moments later, "put on a grim mask", and announced the start of operations.
I don't need that kind of made-up "reality TV"... I want a genuine, calm, rational human being in office.
One who doesn't just "get mad" to put on a show.
One who recognizes that even at the worst of times, we are ALL better served when he remains calm, and thinks things through without the veil of "anger" and "emotional turmoil" clouding his judgement...
Hell, even murders committed out of anger are seen as such irrational moments that you don't get executed for them... we want a President making decisions from THAT state of mind? No thanks......
take off his shoe and pound it on the table as did Nikita Krushchev back in
the sixties?
The question, "Where's the Anger," is an article which I didn't enjoy nor condone.
To attempt to stage-manage Presidential posture during the nation's worse
disaster is not only beyond arrogance personified, but it's ludicrous. I really
disliked the 7-point plan for telling President Obama what to do and how to
react. Is someone trying to get a WH contract or what? I think we have
quite enough media experts constantly barking at our doors in a 24/7 news
cycle, 7 days a week. I'll take an honest reaction, even if it's understated.
The last thing I want to see in my President is a fit of rage, even if that
should happen to be his core experience.
Hope for a return fan in the spirit of networking those who respect the Presidency.