Like so many others I’ve been watching events unfold around the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. It’s by far the worst ecological disaster we’ve faced. The Exxon Valdez that everyone is using as a bench mark palls in comparison. But as expected those who dislike this president couldn’t wait to make the Katarina comparison. One has to wonder, are they so angry at losing the election that any misstep Obama takes is the justification for all the vitriol hurled his way? To be balanced, some of his supporters have no claim to impartiality, a number of them have climbed on the bandwagon of criticism.
What has transpired over the last 44 days is indeed dreadful. I understand that the people of Louisiana are worried, and angry. It seems they have been the victims of one catastrophic event after another that would drain the life fiber from even the stoutest of people. So their anger is understandable, and it’s also reasonable they feel the president should be taking the lead in dealing with this problem. Wanting the president to show more emotion, to express anger would no doubt make them feel good. People feel that if their leader demonstrates some level of emotion it’s indicative of his caring, his understanding about their problem it would make him seem less “Spock” like.
But to read the papers or watch the talking heads opine about the president’s lack of emotion, or failing to understand the “optics” of the situation, you wonder if what people want is for him to enact his version of the Klingon death howl. Now that would be a sight and we would see it in an endless loop on all the cable news shows with the crawl moving across the screen saying the president loses his cool. People want him to drop his Spock like approach and embrace the Kirk personality and like Kirk call on Scotty to find some solution that will plug the leak.
There-in-lies the paradox show some emotion but the solution to the problem has to be logical and make everyone whole. One problem, logic and emotion don’t always work well together. One has to be suborned to the other. Emotion clouds judgment.
Leadership and management place you in the decision making arena. Many of the decisions you make will significantly impact people who report to you. Leaders who allow their emotions to surface can place themselves in difficult situations. They could say or do something that exacerbates the situation instead of providing a solution.
Then there is the possibility of being seen as weak because emotions are not associated with people of power or those who are in charge. It’s not to say that one shouldn’t show anger or rage, but it has to be justified anger or rage, it can’t just be done for show. And here lies the problem with the president. He doesn’t want to do things just for show, for the thirty-second sound bite. His approach is to collect the as much data as possible, look at the totality of the situation, and present the best possible solution that invokes the greatest good for all not just the one, clearly a Spock like approach to dealing with a problem.
In his new book The Promise, Jonathan Alter explains how the president seems to have clearly demonstrated his management skills, an area many thought he would have a problem with because of his lack of actual management experience and ace the communication area. But for some reason he’s having a problem communicating effectively with the country. He’s too Spock like for them. Too Spock like, why that is a problem is unclear to me, this situation clearly calls for level thinking, unemotional thinking, anger – while justified – will not get the well plugged. People want him to emote, but who are these people?
The people who want him show more emotion, are the pundits and his opponents. Those calling for him to be less Spock like – remember Bones and his insults – is either looking for a story or something else to attack him on. Could the president be more empathic, many believe he can and will. I for one am ok with they way he is, I have no problem understanding him, but that’s because I remember the episode when Spock became emotional, and it was a pretty site.
Maybe people should be careful what they ask for.
© Timothy A. Wilson All Rights Reserved
