A Blog about Leadership

I was watching Larry King Live on CNN a couple of weeks ago when he had former President Bill Clinton as a guest.  Clinton has written the book Giving and was discussing it with King.  King asked Clinton if he would want to be remembered as a philanthropist who happened to have been President.  I’m guessing the question was to provoke Clinton to reveal how he felt of the philanthropy versus being President.  Of course, Clinton’s immediate response was “No.”  He then went on to elaborate by saying that he wanted to be remembered as having left the Presidency leaving things better than when he started and to finish with philanthropy by leaving things better than when he started.

I am not very consistent in my opinion of Bill Clinton as a leader.  He certainly had and has influence which is the primary characteristic of a leader and the goal to leave things better than how he found them is a truly admirable goal for any leader; I would actually go so far to say that a leader is someone who leaves a group, organization, etc. better than how he found it.  I just take a couple of different positions with Clinton in the “how to” leave things better.

Here’s my quote for the day:
“A leader will leave a nation better than how he found it”

To apply the same standard to George W. Bush, you would have to admit a critical problem with the state of things as it is.  The US is not really better than it was when he took office.  I think time will be the best indicator, but right now the state of affairs is quite disappointing.

1. The military is spread thin.

With the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the US military is not in a position to respond or otherwise deal with a major or significant threat to the United States.  I don’t want to argue the position of whether we should be in Iraq or not or how the war on terror is being conducted, but I want to speak critically about the current state of the military to protect and defend the people of the United States.  If another major world power were to declare and conduct war against the United States, would the military be able to redirect attention from Iraq, Afghanistan, Kosovo, North Korea, and every other location that we have troops?

2. The economy is notably volatile.

The Fed cut a key interest rate by half a percent last week.  The steps were taken because the concern over the housing slump and credit crunch.  I was watching CNBC and heard one analyst report that the half a percent cut probably indicates the problem was worse then was previously thought as several analyst were anticipating merely a quarter of a percent cut.

The Presidency has very little direct impact on economic policy and certainly has very little impact on the banking practices that has lead to the credit crunch.  However, the leadership from the White House does have influence on the policies and practices of the US.  Right now, our government is spending billions of dollars on wars that are controversial at best.  At the same time, we are having difficulty raising the billions of dollars needed to rebuild the southern gulf after Hurricane Katrina.  There’s a problem of priorities and leadership.

3. The US does not have the needed clout with other nations to impact change.

After the UN general assembly, we should take a hard and critical look at the state of the US as a nation of influence.  We have many of our neighbors taking positions directly against us – Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia… While at the same time, we are unable to make a difference in more problematic areas – Darfur and Burma.

We are so split on areas of controversy – Iraq – that we are weak in the face of other problems.  We need leadership.  We need someone who will arouse faith and confidence.  We need someone who will make the tough decisions and will garner respect rather than spite.  We need someone who will unite rather than divide.  We need someone who will inspire rather than discourage.  We need a leader…

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