The Actions of Obama’s Advisers Raise Questions About Obama

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In today’s Boston Globe, Peter Canellos highlights Barack Obama’s recent difficulties in keeping his advisers on message:

“But if there was a warning for the Obama campaign {in the Samantha Power incident}, it was not about the dangers of negative campaigning. It was about the importance of having a consistent message and an effective chain of command.

“Power was the third Obama adviser to stir up a cloud of dust in recent weeks by apparently substituting his or her own views for Obama's: In addition to the "monster" comment, made to a Scottish newspaper, Power told the BBC that Obama's plan to withdraw all troops from Iraq within 16 months was subject to change once he took office.

“Susan Rice, another foreign policy aide, committed the misstep of opining that neither Obama nor Clinton was ready to handle a 3 a.m. phone call announcing a foreign policy crisis. Rice probably meant that no one can be fully prepared for the burdens of the presidency, but John McCain was only too happy to jump on her words and announce that he, at least, feels up to the job.

“Perhaps most damaging of all, Austan Goolsbee, a University of Chicago economist advising Obama, apparently sought to reassure Canadian officials in the days leading up to the Ohio primary that the senator wasn't really as critical of the North American Free Trade Agreement as he sounded on the stump. A memo produced by the Canadian consulate in Chicago suggested that Goolsbee felt the heated antitrade rhetoric was ‘political maneuvering.’”

Canellos suggests, “The actions of Obama's advisers raise as many questions about Obama as about the advisers.”

Explaining further, Canellos writes: “'Message control’ is a common catchphrase among political consultants, but it is crucial to governing as well. And when recent administrations have had problems with message control, it has usually signaled some sort of weakness in the boss”

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