Great Speaker. The Right Experience?

Maybe you thought I was talking about Barack Obama? No, I was actually referring to Sarah Palin. She will deliver a dynamic speech at the Republican Convention, but is a great speech enough to be the leader we need?

The Republican talking points are trying to convince us that Sarah Palin has MORE experience than Barack Obama. It would seem laughable if it were not so readily accepted by so many. So let's just take a quick look at the type and duration of experience of Palin vs. Obama. We now know a lot more about Palin than we did Friday morning when her candidacy was announced. She received her B.S. in Communications and Journalism in 1987, did a brief stint as a sportcaster, and started out her political career as the head of the PTA in Wasilla, a town of about 9000. She was on the City Council and then ran for Mayor of Wasilla, where she served two terms. She was the Chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Commission before running for and winning the Governorship of Alaska in December 2006. She has served less than two years as the Governor of Alaska, population 670,000. She never travelled outside the U.S. until she made one trip to visit troops in Kuwait and Germany with a refueling stop in Ireland. Her supporters have suggested that her foreign policy knowledge is linked to the fact that Alaska is next to Russia.

Barack Obama's bio is more well known, but for comparison sake, he went to a prestigious Hawaii High school, graduated from Columbia University (B.S. in Political Science and International Relations) and worked in New York for public interest groups for a year before applying to and being accepted at Harvard Law School, where he served as the President of the Harvard Law Review. He worked as a community organizer for three years on the South Side of Chicago before running for the Illinois State Legislature (Illinois - population 12 million +). He served in the Illinois legislature for 7 years, while also teaching law at the University of Chicago Law School, before he ran for the U.S. Senate in 2003. He has been in the U.S. Senate almost four years, serving on the Foreign Relations Committee, Environment and Public Works, Veterans Affairs, with additional assignments on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, Homeland Security and Chairman of the Senate's subcommittee on European Affairs. He has made several official trips to visit U.S. troops and has made additional official trips to Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa.

Ok. Obama's political experience has been on a larger state and national stage, but let's examine the value of so-called executive experience. The Palin supporters are valiantly trying to make the point that because she has served 22 months as Governor and small town mayor, she has more experience than anyone on the ticket, including McCain. If executive experience is so important, why would we vote for McCain who has none? But that's beside the point here.

What is the value of executive experience? Does all executive experience have the same importance? Is being a Governor really the ONLY qualification for President? If so, should we be electing the CEO of AT&T? I believe that a President should be a leader not a just a manager. Leaders have followers; managers have subordinates. A leader must establish a vision; a manager focuses on objectives. Leaders set direction; managers plan the detail. In summary, Leaders are transformational; managers are transactional.

All this means is that the skill set for a leader is very different from that of an executive. It's not bad to know how to manage, but the skills a manager needs are distinct from the skills a leader needs. You want the President of the United States to be establishing the overall strategy for the country -- not obsessing with the details of the implementation.

Our greatest Presidents have understood that leadership is more than just management - think of Kennedy, Reagan, Roosevelt. Experience means not only years of working in different settings but showing that you have the judgment to make the critical decisions.

If you can imagine Sarah Palin stepping into the Presidency if McCain were to die, and are comfortable with that thought, then you cannot be convinced otherwise. But if you feel slightly uneasy, you might want to consider the decisions Obama has made in the past 20 months -- running a multi-million dollar campaign organization with tremendous discipline and success, making the kinds of judgments about the Iraq war that so resonated with the Iraqis that they were able to support a timeline for withdrawal and decisions about the economy like resisting the trap of an easy gasoline tax rebate that would not solve our energy problem. They say that who you choose for Vice President is one of the most important decisions you will make prior to becoming President - McCain made a hasty, rebound decision and barely vetted Sarah Palin. Obama took his time, did his homework and made the decision to add to his ticket a seasoned and experienced veteran like Joe Biden. Who has the right experience and the best judgment to lead?

Comments

[ghostpigeon]

I have to take a moment to agree with Palingate that you were a little too generous to Reagan, though he should be credited on things like nuclear disarmament where he contributed. We should not bend over backwards to soften in anyway our criticisms of Sarah Palin in the same way. Her ideology is clearly so antithetical to liberals, progressives and anyone right Scoop Jackson, that I think she is simply too dangerous to give any kind of a free ride. If her involvement with the Oil Industry, her penchant for defending environmental degradation, her misuse of public funds to ram through projects like the Wasilla hockey rink at a cost of an extra 1.3 million dollars because she tried to proceed so quickly she ordered construction started before the land title was clear, her fondness for earmarks as mayor and governor and her heavy handed and "it's personal" style of management in the Governor's office with troopergate are put out front early and often, she will become a liability. Let's not get too willing to accommodate any supposed strengths before we take them on. It's not clear she was a good manager at all, yet. And what she was managing was not defensible even if she was good at it.

[ghostpigeon]

It is bewildering that Sarah Palin is trying to claim outsider/reformer status in this campaign as a Governor of Alaska. Alaska has been a sinkhole for federal money since it was accepted as a state and federal money started pouring in during the Cold War. No state in the union is more dependent on federal funds (read "earmarks") than Alaska. The entire forest industry in Southeast Alaska exists at all because of federal subsidies through provision of lumber from the only remaining temperate rainforest in the world, through roading, through subsidized sales of lumber and circumventing of environmental laws and they have been called on abuse of provisions time and time again in federal court. The Alaska pipeline, which btw provides more gasoline for export than is used for US refineries, exists because of federal subsidies for roads and facilities and through a massive payoff to Native American tribes which include provisions requiring their abandonment of tribal status. Sarah Palin signed off on more than 230 million dollars of earmarks in the 2007 budget. This is reform?

[Palingate]

Hmmmmm, ya had me then ya lost me. Reagan a great leader? Reagan was one of the worst Presidents of our time. He spent most of his time chopping wood, riding horses and taking naps. He doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as F.D.R. or Kennedy. Thank goodness Gorbachov was wise enough to take the struggle from Lech Walesa's Union movement and carry that mantle from the Eastern Block to Germany’s ‘Wall’. Reagan only brought us closer to Armageddon with his 'Star Wars' fantasy.

The rest of your article made a great deal of sense, however you don't have to be very intelligent to read 'teleprompters' from a speech someone wrote for you. Never mind not having any ideas or solutions to difficult and complex problems. Let’s see.....she believes in ‘Intelligent Design’ and ‘Creationism’.....I assume she doesn’t believe in evolution? We may never know since she’s evidently hiding in the bunker with Cheney. How smart can this person be? We already know the answer to that one. The race needs to be shifted from the superficial to the issues. Let’s turn the spotlight on McCain/Palin’s poor judgement and ignorance regarding the economy, foreign policy and domestic issues. Palin needs to be prodded out of hiding and forced to debate. Let’s see how well she holds up against Joe Biden who has over 30 years of foreign policy experience. Frankly it doesn’t take much to preside over ‘Podunk Alaska’ population 5, 000.

[BHJensen]

Actually Doc, the speech was not delivered very well, at least for someone seeking that office. Some of the "lines" were Rovishly clever but the delivery somewhat amateurish. I do admire McCain's service record; that doesn't make him the best choice. I even admire Palin's tenacity, such as it is, but that does not a vp make. I was however struck by the audience and then thoughts reinforced by "grendl's" comment above....a convention that is old(er), whiter, and devoid of the faces I see in America today....even here in the heartland. This is NOT the party of women, minorities, the economically deprived, the American-dream seeking middle class.....not in their policies nor in their delegates. Grendl is right...being white may mean, to some, a proxy to overlook the faults and to that end we are at risk of amateurs in the White House...ag­ain......m­akes my head hurt.....

[zedthewizard]

what we need is more reasoned writing such as this before the republicans spin this to their favor. mccain has almost no choice to go forward with his choice.

obama/biden must fight by friday. they must define sarah palan before the republicans. dems can keep the focus on palin and hit mccain for judgement at the same time. no doubt, mccain's getting pissy about her stories upstaging his rise to power.

the disturbing fact of palin trying to censor the local librarian, almost recalled, forced to hire an administrator. censorship is not a value for middle america. it also segways into, "palin had more trouble in firing people as mayor. then as governor -- troopergate. palin's ties to the alaskan powers to be are great.

the transcanada pipeline ships jobs to a foreign company, it could lead to gas being shipped to china since it will no longer be under america's control. she provided $500 million with no guarantees. palin did this to skirt negotiating with oil companies because they believe they are contractually owed $10 billion dollars. however, transcanada won't move forward until the state negotiates and gets waivers from big oil. then, big oil has their own better funded project that will likely have to be given incentives once transcanada doesn't move forward. big oil having the gas leases wants ownership of the pipeline for more profit. who believes they will waive $10 billion and the rights to ownership of a pipeline that will increase profits.

[Apache6]

What the hell was the flock chanting? Dig More Wells? Make More Holes? Put a Hole In Sumthin?
It was remarkably devolved whatever it was.

[Herrington]

It is so hard for me to imagine that my country has been reduced to a talking points contest over whether an obviously political fringe Governor can match up with a candidate with some of the highest educational and legal credentials ever offered in a resume for the office of the Presidency.

Send Palin to Harvard, see how she does, and than talk to me about her experience. Governance is about LAW, first and last, and not about crackpot ideas of Alaska becoming Suadi Arabia. For one thing, there is not that much oil there.

Law is not about extremes. It can't be. For every extreme there is an equal and opposite extreme, and promote one extreme over the others is exactly, precisely, what the founders had in mind when the created the construct of separation of church and state. Law is about judiciousness, wisdom, and wisdom is not evidenced in subjecting half of the population to the extreme views of the other half. Civil wars result.

And make no mistake, Sarah Palin is an extremist, harboring tenfold the extremism of any Reverend Wright.

[Intelligentia]

Thank you for telling the truth. The stench of the foolishness of the so-called Republican leadership, in shamelessly asserting that Palin is more qualified than Obama, is so pugent that even Hell will reject it.

[IndependentTogether]

Thats. What. I'm. Talkin'. About! Preach it, Linda!

[georgiapeach40]

This is a very insightful article. I have a degree in Organization Leadership and I can tell you that Barack exhibits all of the classic leadership traits that I studied. The best description of a leader that I can think of is a person who can take you where you would not go on your own. Obama clearly has a vision for this country and the ability to inspire millions. He also has the ability to surround himself with people that can carry out his strategic plans. Jim Collins in his book about leadership in large cooperations "Good to Great" talks about the importance of getting the right people "on the bus."
Clearly Barack has mastered this skill as evidenced by the brilliant way he has run a disiplined and principled campaign. I just hope the American people understand that this type of leadership is what we so desperately need right now.

Independents for Obama/Biden 08

[IForgotMyName]

Great Post

[bwilder]

not sure how 'dynamic' it will be. she can read a teleprompter but she's
got a grating voice and I'm not sure she can pull off the sincerity factor.
The drones at the convention and the zealots of the right-wing will
dig it but I have some serious doubts about her pulling off anything
dynamic.

[Danigirl65]

Grating voice is the understatement.

[Apache6]

if someone has already mentioned this, please forgive. All I could think of was Francis McDormand in Fargo.

[edla]

Amen and hallelujah! PLEASE distribute this post everyone...we MUST make sure our Independent friends start thinking about this NOW!!

Thank you, Linda!

[erykah]

Oh sister you nailed this!

[grendl]

They mean Sarah Palin has more experience being white than Barack Obama.

[SpoxLogic]

Good one. I never thought of it like that.