You've got a bad habit. You need to fix it.
This is what I'm talking about:
"The whole point of it is to make sure that all ideas are on the table," the president said in the interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek, which will appear on newsstands Friday. "So what I want to do is to be completely agnostic, in terms of solutions."
(hands to forehead)
Here are some more examples:
President Obama kicked off a White House jobs forum on Thursday by saying he is "open to every demonstrably good idea" to reverse the worst job losses in decades.
On Tuesday’s CBS Evening News, anchor Katie Couric and White House reporter Chip Reid cast President Obama’s push for "bipartisanship" in a favorable light, with Obama "working hard," "following through on a promise" and "open to ideas from Republicans."
At a White House forum on health reform this week, President Obama emphasized that his campaign plan for a health coverage overhaul is just a suggestion, and that he is open to any and all ideas and input for a better way to ensure that Americans can access the care they need.
This appears to be coming from (when) the administration and representatives of the administration went to Congress and said, 'We are open to all ideas to talk about health reform.'"
You get the picture. I could give you hundred examples of this sort of talk.
It seems to me that President Obama has a very strange theory of government: First you fight a tough hard campaign of ideas and policies and politics, and then once you win, you discard all that and become "agnostic" and stand for nothing in particular. You become an advocate for basically anything "good." The first President Bush called it "governing mode."
Mr. President. Bruh. Brougham. I don't know how more simply I could put this, but,
EXECUTE YOUR OWN IDEAS.
You don't need to be open to good ideas, bad ideas, or all ideas. You need to advocate YOUR IDEAS. This isn't a high school science fair. YOU WON. YOU GET TO RULE. Thats what your job is all about. Instead of always saying "i'll support whatever ideas are on the table that have consensus" instead say "here's what I want to do, everyone get behind me."
Stop listening to "experts." Stop listening to people who have "years of experience with this issue." Stop listening to "stakeholders." You've studied the issues. You ran on an agenda. STICK WITH IT.
I'm no expert on..for example...environmental policy. Maybe you aren't either. But it shouldn't take you long to read up, come to a conclusion about what you want to do, possibly bounce a few ideas off a few people, then announce your position and order your minions to execute it. You don't need to start every meeting with a "lets hear from everyone" ethos. I've found the best meetings are the ones where everyone comes to listen to me give instructions. Then the meeting ends. I don't want to hear any ideas. I want to hear "already done that, Triple Bee."
Your job isn't gathering people around tables. Your job is to run the table.
FEEL ME?