POWIP Piece of Work In Progress

President In Over His Head

The Coast Guard has quietly posted their after-action report on the big oil spill from last year, and it's not exactly flattering to the CIC.  The criticisms seem mainly to be about the PR disaster, which is amazing considering the White House seemed to be solely focussed on the PR aspects:

Asked about the report, sources with knowledge of White House and DHS involvement went even further, saying the administration "looked at this as a political problem, not an operational problem."

I have to admit, this isn’t so much surprising as merely evidence of what we’ve all felt from the beginning.  Really, most of us here knew this before he was even elected, but this administration has repeatedly shown themselves to be amateurs.  The presidency is almost always a learning experience, even for the most seasoned executives who take the office; but Obama has shown a complete inability to even keep his head above water.  From the simplest events (hosting dignitaries) to the most troubling (Libya), he gets caught off guard.  Two weeks ago, John Podhoretz commented that,

We’re going on four weeks now, or more, that Barack Obama has been reading My Pet Goat.

Frankly, it seems to me to have been going on for two plus years.

The thing is, we expect a president to have to learn on the job; a little.  But we also expect him to actually get it figured out at some point.

Adam Wells

Living life at 84 mph and 7000 feet. All I ask is that you don't block traffic, act like a professional, and don't act all surprised when your actions have consequences. Oh, and don't complain about the refs; trust me, they don't care if your team wins or not.