I’m on a sort of random observation kick today and with the Chicago teachers’ strike and the role that teacher evaluation has played in it measuring performance is much in the news. How should President Obama’s performance be measured? By the results, how hard he’s tried, by how much opposition he’s received, or by what he promised? Something else? Some combination?
In foreign policy I don’t think the results have been too bad. He hasn’t started any new ground wars which is something. I wish he’d withdrawn from Afghanistan two years ago, gotten the Doha round of trade negotiations back on track, negotiated more free trade deals. I wish he hadn’t engaged in the air war that was instrumental in ousting Moammar Ghaddafi (not that I’m any friend of Ghaddafi’s). A few other things.
Measuring performance is even trickier on the domestic front. A lot depends on how highly you weight what you’re afraid might have happened. Using that yardstick President Bush was a pretty darned good president (which I don’t think he was).
Ya know, the one unquestioned, unqualified good that should have come from getting rid of the Libyan dictator still hasn’t happened, and that was we could finally stop having to worry about how to spell his name. (I favor Qaddafi myself.) But it keeps turning up like a bad penny.
Expectations and results. Phil Jackson was a good coach, but having Jordan, Pippen and Grant on the team went a long way towards success. I was disappointed that we ended up in the coalition against Libya, but at least it was handled competently. I was hoping we’d get back to DOHA. I didnt really expect new free trade agreements with the world economy so bad. On the domestic front, I expected a prolonged, weak recovery. I have been disappointed at the inability to work across the aisle and to think outside the box.
Steve
Steve
The Bulls didn’t win squat with Jordan, Pippin and Grant………until Jackson managed the team.
You know my views on management. Think about it. It’s easy to just look at team talent. I’m in the business of taking it and making something of it.
Few understand what it really takes. It’s why I’m so dismissive of so much commentary here ant OTB. It gets me called arrogant. But if you have to do it, you understand it.
A harsh reality.
The Afghan policy is collapsing, as Andy has noted. (Have any of the major American news organizations picked up on this? The BBC, for one, is covering it as such.)
Here’s a bit from the BBC about the confusion among NATO command. Apparently the USA is treating our allies in high-handed manner:
I guess Barry O was too busy getting ready for that tough interview with Letterman, and those rapper parties are notoriously dangerous, to bother doing his job.
Here’s one of those linky things lest someone accuse me of making this up.
Excuse me, I linked and quoted a story from the Independent instead. I had been reading the Beeb earlier, I believe.
I’ll tell you the honest truth. I don’t think the Obama Administration ever had an Afghanistan policy. I think that what was done was almost entirely for domestic political purposes.
In contrast I think the Bush Administration had an Afghanistan policy. It was nuts but it was a policy.
ACTUALLY from the Beeb this time
This only IMPLIES that we don’t trust our Afghan partners? LOL
And let’s not forget that we’ve got troubles all over.
On the upside it’s International Talk Like a Pirate Day, so avast, you scurvy dogs!
I’ll tell you the honest truth. I don’t think the Obama Administration ever had an Afghanistan policy.
Which is criminal if true.
It was the same policy Bush used to get us out of Iraq, but very few considered that Afghanistan is not Iraq and now we are seeing that policy fail.
Drew,
I think this is a case where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. You need talent and you need good management.
PS. Most military people understand that leadership is what makes a good force great.
@Dave Schuler
My thinking also.
I think the initial Afghanistan policy was to put somebody in to run the place, but after the third hat change, Kharsai should have been gone. It went downhill from there, and the democracy project was/is beyond stupid.
The Obama policy in Afghanistan was a stingy COIN doctrine spearheaded by the COIN believers. Pretty much the same thing, as Andy noted, as was done in Iraq. We didnt get the ethnic cleansing that made Iraq work and there were no SOI to recruit to our side.
I think Bush actually had several policies. The problem was twofold. First, they didnt pay much attention. Their focus was on Iraq. Secondly, They all involved, just like Obama’s, eventually turning things over to an Afghan govt being supported by a trained Afghan military and police force. We dont know how to make that happen. No one does for Afghanistan. The gods hate hubris.
Steve
steve:
COIN isn’t a policy. It’s a tactic. The problem with COIN in Afghanistan is that it isn’t furthering a strategic objective tied to a policy.
In a related vein see this post at Zenpundit. Not having a doctrine for transition would seem to be a major problem to me.