Friday, October 02, 2009

STRATCOM Epic Fail ...

One of Olympic proportions.
After deciding to go to Copenhagen to pitch Chicago for the 2016 Olympics, Obama failed to bring home the bacon or the Olympics. Chicago was eliminated from consideration which is now down to Rio and Madrid.
To get the right story - you have to ignore the legacy media both TV and print and go elsewhere; again.

Let us be clear about one thing. That was not Mr. and Mrs. Barak H. Obama that went to Copenhagen - that was the President of the United States. That was not Chicago that got rejected; with the CINC there, that was the United States that got rejected.

Let us be clear about another thing. We are at war with a culture and mindset that is by and large shame based. In the mind of our enemies our President, and therefore the nation he leads, has lost face in a very public and personal way. This has done huge damage to our short, medium, and long term image in the world - especially amongst our enemies and those who do not wish this nation well.

When the President took off, I thought that it was a done deal. Staff Weenie 101 - you do not set your boss up for failure.

The more public and important the event you invest his time and resources in, the more you need to make sure that you know the outcome, and at the minimum have done a proper risk analysis.

The downside of not knowing the outcome and investing the CINC's credibility into a situation such as this where he could fail are way beyond any possible up-side should Chicago win. I am just gobsmacked at the Strategic damage that has been done to this nation by this absolute epic failure of proper staff support and leadership positioning.

Again, this is not the President's fault (though as President, the responsibility is his in the end - the President is smart, the should have see this) - this is all in the lap of his Chief of Staff.

When Air Force One lands and the stairs come up to the aircraft; once they open the door we should see heads roll down to the tarmac - and then picked up by a detachment of Air Force Senior NCOs who will place those heads on pikes on the front gate of Andrews AFB as a warning to all that the President of The United States will not tolerate being shamed in other countries.

OK, we can't do the head on pikes thingy .... I will let the President do what he wants with his staff. If the CINC is looking for some advice though - there are some unfilled billets at Thule Air Base that need to be filled before winter sets in hard.

Take important lessons from this. Never set the boss up for failure. Never.

You can still laugh a bit though.


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