How to hold Obama accountable
I have been accused of being an Obama butt-kisser. Apparently I am not critical enough of him.
There have been some people, especially in the black community, who feel that it is their duty to criticize the president at every turn. This, they believe, keeps him ‘accountable’ and helps him to do his job properly. Except it doesn’t.
There’s a reason why I don’t spend my time poking holes in what the president does (I make an effort not to poke holes in what people do, period). First of all, I believe strongly that we and our leaders are one and the same – we exist in a reciprocal relationship. Without the support of the people, no leader would be where he/she is and without support after election that leader is unlikely to succeed. Similarly a leader who doesn’t support the people fails the people and him/herself. Therefore, we need to empower our leaders rather than cutting them down.
This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t ask questions or expect someone to fulfill on their promises. However, there are ways to hold leaders accountable without poking holes in the good. There is very little that’s constructive in the way that we comment on our leaders these days, nor is much commentary/criticism intended to be constructive. It’s usually intended just to look for what’s wrong.
I’ll draw a parallel to relationships. Some people think that harshly criticizing their kids and always pointing out where they are going wrong helps them to be stronger. But what happens in reality is that the kid grows up to have low self esteem and is more likely to be messed up than if they had some encouragement and support. Similarly anyone who has been in a relationship of any kind with someone who was very critical will attest to how dispiriting and destructive it was.
I find that much criticism of leaders comes from a place where the criticizer sees him or herself as being separate from the leader and is looking to the leader alone, up there on their pedestal, to provide all of the solutions. To me, that kind of attitude is actually more likely to produce autocratic leaders who do what they want without input from the wider society because when people feel separate from their leaders, the leaders feel separate from the people and are perhaps more inclined to do what they want.
We now live in a world of opinion where everybody has a view on what shoulda, woulda and coulda happened. It is a very normal part of life to spend our time opining on what people do or don’t do. I am becoming increasingly aware of the kind of commentary I provide in my work. In the past I too have moaned about what’s happening. But I fail to see how sitting on the sidelines and moaning about what Obama (or any other leader whether president, prime minister or even your boss at work) has said or not said does any good. It adds absolutely nothing. It makes us all feel increasingly resigned and cynical. It makes the public feel despondent and victimized and it doesn’t empower the leader to do a better job, because that leader can only succeed through the people. Ever been in a work situation where your co-workers gosssiped and bitched about the boss all the time? Was that boss effective?
If we have a complaint or a suggestion for what could be better, then it is our duty to not just whine but to actually DO something. Because if you’re not part of the solution, you are part of the problem.
Perhaps Obama isn’t doing what you think he should be doing with education. Are you out there teaching the kids how to read yourself? Are you volunteering in schools? What are YOU doing to help rather than just bitching? What am I doing?!
We are all leaders. The president/prime minister/coach/boss is just the head leader of the leader. But to sit in our armchairs and pass judgement without having any solutions ourselves or without doing anything positive makes us passive victims in our own lives, with the worse thing being that we don’t realize how much we contribute, and even create, the situation that we are bitching about.
So yes let’s hold our leaders accountable… but so do in a constructive and empowering way.
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Great article. Some of the criticism of Obama is a result of some kinda weird guilt, where people feel if they show they are an Obama supporter, they somehow are shallow and are just following him because his black/liberal/handsome whatever, therefore they accentuate their criticism of him to crazy levels.
The world loves this guy at the moment, we can argue whether or not the media is unconditionally in love with him (I think not, thats stupid!) but he is such an amazing an charismatic leader, and especially coming after the GWB (Idiota!) some people can’t believe one man can be this good, in such a short space of time.
To sideline a bit, the coverage of his Middle East trip on Fox News is pure comedy..it’s also frightening that such views are said by so called educated people *shudders*