Geodog

Why Bush sticks in my craw

Bush's worldview is extremely rigid, circumscribed by the good-versus-evil religious convictions to which he has adhered since his recovery from alcoholism seventeen years ago. "Practically," Brookhiser writes, "Bush's faith means that he does not tolerate, or even recognize, ambiguity: there is an all-knowing God who decrees certain behaviors, and leaders must obey." While this clear-cut belief structure enables him to make split-second decisions and take action with principled confidence, it also means that he is limited by "strictly defined mental horizons." ... Abstract, imaginative thinking, Brookhiser emphasizes, is not the President's strong suit.

The quote above goes a long way to explaining why Bush sticks in my craw so badly. It comes from Sage Stossel's write-up of an interview that he did with Richard Brookhiser, a historian and journalist for the National Review who just did a long and mostly sympathetic profile of George W. Bush, "The Mind of George W. Bush", for the Atlantic Magazine. I was struck by the quote because it describes exactly the quality of Bush's that I find most repellent. George W. Bush is so sure that he is right that he can't even hear other points of view, much less imagine that they might be correct. Besides the fact that I often disagree with Bush's policies, I find the arrogance of his certainty infuriating, and a fatal flaw in a leader. It has nothing to do with religion -- that is a red herring. The excesses of the dot com boom are only the most recent reminder that the religious have no monopoly on arrogance and hubris.

I gather that people besides just partisans of Bush actually find this rigidity and lack of tolerance for ambiguity attractive (at least until they run into it on some point where they disagree with him on something). I understand that it stands in stark contrast to his predecessor Clinton, who seemed to lack a moral compass, and who was portrayed (unfairly, I suspect) as not being able to make a decision without consulting his pollster. I also understand the hunger people have for a politician who stands for something, almost anything. I occasionally find myself supporting John McCain, a right-wing Republican, for those reasons. However, in Bush's case, I fear that people are confusing the necessary qualities of decisiveness and judgment with the fatal qualities of hubris and arrogance.

In my experiences as a leader, from being a project manager, then running a division of a small public company, then helping run a small start-up, being decisive was very important, but being a good listener and seeking out other points of view were equally important. A little humility goes a long way. I've found the old saw by Mark Twain, "It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so" is right on. As a leader of a strongly hierarchical organization, like a business or a government, you have to seek out other points of view and listen to them. Those points of view will not come to you, because of the nature of hierarchy makes most people tell you what they think want to hear. And without those points of view, you miss important information and you make big mistakes. You also need to be humble enough to open up your mind to the possibility that you are wrong. If your mind is closed in the first place, other points of view will not try to make themselves heard, and not only are you guaranteed to make big mistakes, but people who might have been your natural allies helping you out will actively work against you instead. We can see this happening today, in the world's reaction to Bush's War on Iraq. When Bush gave the impression of listening as well as talking, and being willing to work through multilateral institutions, countries supported US policies, with modifications of course. When it became clear that Bush had no intention of changing his course even a single degree, and that his method of working with multilateral institutions was to issue ultimatums to them, people lined up to oppose his policies, even when they agreed with his ultimate objective.

Bush's arrogance doesn't serve him well, and more importantly, it doesn't serve America well.