Governor Romney’s First Presidential Debate Performance Exposed President Obama’s Tendency to Coast — which Explains Afghanistan’s Purposeless Bleeding and the Fact that All the Elements that Led to the Recession Are Still in Place

© 2012 Peter Free

 

04 October 2012

 

 

The point

 

The first presidential debate yesterday demonstrated why we are still bleeding through a purposeless war in Afghanistan and why America’s domestic future still does not look any better than it did four years ago.

 

It turns out to be about the President’s arrogantly complacent character.

 

 

A productive debate session for the Republican team — and a reminder that Life surprises

 

Last night Mendacious Mitt Romney managed to reveal the significant personal strengths that have made him successful.

 

And President Obama carelessly let his petulant complacence shine through.

 

Governor Romney managed to come across as a masterful business leader by:

 

marshaling facts — but only to the degree that they wouldn’t get him into trouble with the voters,

 

demonstrating vision — limited by intentional vagueness,

 

displaying a honed sense of his adversary’s political weaknesses,

 

and

 

manifesting visibly obvious personal decency.

 

The President, in contrast:

 

demonstrated a lackluster grip on facts,

 

lobbed a mostly lame vision,

 

repeatedly missed pointing out his opponent’s most significant political weaknesses,

 

and

 

looked annoyed and angry that someone would challenge his supposedly obvious mental superiority.

 

In short, the President got whipped by a possibly more capable man.

 

 

More than just political theater

 

Those of us, who were paying attention, repeatedly heard how the Mitt Romney we have seen during the campaign is not the man that his staff admire and like working for.

 

Last night, we got a glimpse of the probably real Romney.  An apparently astute person, who combines a sense of (at least tactical-level) mission with respect and appreciation for the people who help him implement what needs to be done to achieve it.  Someone whom any sane person would like to work for.

 

In comparison, the President appeared to display the annoyed arrogance and peeved “throw them under the bus” attitude that people, who have worked with him, whisper about.

 

President Obama’s irritating conceit plays out in his characteristic leadership complacence.

 

 

The President’s preference for coasting explains a host of national let-downs

 

I have written before that the President appears to use politics to advance his personal ambition — without simultaneously displaying the sense of honorable national purpose that one would expect in someone who reportedly wanted to model himself after Abraham Lincoln.

 

Given that the President had time to prepare for last night’s debate, and especially for its closing two minute argument, and did not, reveals a lot.

 

He coasts on his intellect and purported likeability.  He lets ride what might hurt him politically.  His sense of mission is more personal than national.  And he seems to have genuine difficulty even conceiving that someone else might best him in meaningful ways.

 

 

Just a few examples of the President’s leadership complacence in action

 

President Obama committed to a troop surge in Afghanistan, when it was already clear that such a tactic would fail, apparently only for political purposes.  Then he failed to respond appropriately, when surge’s impotence manifested.

 

Today, our troops continue to die and be maimed for no valid geopolitical purpose.  Yet the President is too politically gutless to do the right thing and bring them immediately home. (Safe retreats don't take years.)

 

In Libya, the Commander in Chief apparently threw American diplomats into harm’s way, without making adequate preparations to defend them.  Then, when Ambassador Stevens and colleagues were murdered in Benghazi, he was too unconcerned even to secure the scene weeks afterward.  (When CNN beats you to confidential documents at a crime scene, you’ve got obvious security problems.)

 

More broadly, on the domestic front, the President has blathered a lot about economic justice, but he has made no sincere attempt to lead the public in demanding that out-of-control plutocratic institutions be reined in.

 

On so on.

 

 

“I’m too good to need to talk to you”

 

That’s the impression the President leaves in his wake.  That’s the insight that came across last night.

 

 

At least Governor Romney gave the impression that he might actually care enough to work hard at solving problems — according to his lamentable vision of the world

 

Mendacious Mitt (whose plutocratic vision and penchant for lying I have repeatedly deplored) came across as the better manager last night.

 

He might even have come across as the more attractive inner person.

 

 

The moral? — Life surprises and wrong directions may not always be bad

 

Last night, President Obama’s alleged likeability took a nose dive into the vacuous professional complacence that seems to define him.

 

Governor Romney’s political ineptness suddenly transformed itself into at least the appearance of managerial competence that he and loyal associates have been trying to point out.

 

That Governor Romney’s plutocrat-enhancing vision goes counter to what the nation’s future actually needs may turn out to be partially irrelevant.  At least we would be trying to go somewhere, rather than bleeding to death on Complacence’s forgotten side street.

 

Sometimes visibly going in the wrong direction eventually forces us to self-correct.

 

After last night, I wonder whether Governor Romney’s intuited managerial skill may take us more capably in the wrong direction than President Obama’s “let things lie” attitude — which, if left to drift, is merely going to bleed us to death.

 

Votes may flip, if President Obama leaves his carcass bloating on the debate field.