Where Have All the Leaders Gone?
By Lee Iacocca with Catherine Whitney
Had Enough?
Am I the only guy in this country who's fed up with what's
happening? Where the hell is our outrage? We should be
screaming bloody murder. We've got a gang of clueless bozos
steering our ship of state right over a cliff, we've got
corporate gangsters stealing us blind, and we can't even
clean up after a hurricane much less build a hybrid car. But
instead of getting mad, everyone sits around and nods their
heads when the politicians say, "Stay the course."
Stay the course? You've got to be kidding. This is
America,
not the damned Titanic. I'll give you a sound bite:
Throw the bums out!
You might think I'm getting senile, that I've gone off my
rocker, and maybe I have. But someone has to speak up. I
hardly recognize this country anymore. The President of the
United States is given a free pass to ignore the
Constitution, tap our phones, and lead us to war on a pack
of lies. Congress responds to record deficits by passing a
huge tax cut for the wealthy (thanks, but I don't need it).
The most famous business leaders are not the innovators but
the guys in handcuffs. While we're fiddling in Iraq, the
Middle East is burning and nobody seems to know what to do.
And the press is waving pom-poms instead of asking hard
questions. That's not the promise of America my parents and
yours traveled across the ocean for. I've had enough. How
about you?
I'll go a step further. You can't call yourself a patriot if
you're not outraged. This is a fight I'm ready and willing
to have.
My friends tell me to calm down. They say, "Lee, you're
eighty-two years old. Leave the rage to the young people."
I'd love to—as soon as I can pry them away from their
iPods for five seconds and get them to pay attention. I'm
going to speak up because it's my patriotic duty. I think
people will listen to me. They say I have a reputation as a
straight shooter. So I'll tell you how I see it, and it's
not pretty, but at least it's real. I'm hoping to strike a
nerve in those young folks who say they don't vote because
they don't trust politicians to represent their interests.
Hey, America, wake up. These guys work for us.
Who Are These Guys, Anyway?
Why are we in this mess? How did we end up with this crowd
in Washington? Well, we voted for them — or at least some
of us did. But I'll tell you what we didn't do. We didn't
agree to suspend the Constitution. We didn't agree to stop
asking questions or demanding answers. Some of us are sick
and tired of people who call free speech treason. Where I
come from that's a dictatorship, not a democracy.
And don't tell me it's all the fault of right-wing
Republicans or liberal Democrats. That's an intellectually
lazy argument, and it's part of the reason we're in this
stew. We're not just a nation of factions. We're a
people.
We share common principles and ideals. And we rise and fall
together.
Where are the voices of leaders who can inspire us to action
and make us stand taller? What happened to the strong and
resolute party of Lincoln? What happened to the courageous,
populist party of FDR and Truman? There was a time in this
country when the voices of great leaders lifted us up and
made us want to do better. Where have all the leaders
gone?
The Test of a Leader
I've never been Commander in Chief, but I've been a CEO. I
understand a few things about leadership at the top. I've
figured out nine points — not ten (I don't want people
accusing me of thinking I'm Moses). I call them the "Nine Cs
of Leadership." They're not fancy or complicated. Just
clear, obvious qualities that every true leader should have.
We should look at how the current administration stacks up.
Like it or not, this crew is going to be around until
January 2009. Maybe we can learn something before we go to
the polls in 2008. Then let's be sure we use the leadership
test to screen the candidates who say they want to run the
country. It's up to us to choose wisely.
So, here's my C list:
A leader has to show CURIOSITY. He has to listen to people
outside of the "Yes, sir" crowd in his inner circle. He has
to read voraciously, because the world is a big, complicated
place. George W. Bush brags about never reading a newspaper.
"I just scan the headlines," he says. Am I hearing this
right? He's the President of the United States and he never
reads a newspaper? Thomas Jefferson once said, "Were it left
to me to decide whether we should have a government without
newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not
hesitate for a moment to prefer the latter." Bush disagrees.
As long as he gets his daily hour in the gym, with Fox News
piped through the sound system, he's ready to go.
If a leader never steps outside his comfort zone to hear
different ideas, he grows stale. If he doesn't put his
beliefs to the test, how does he know he's right? The
inability to listen is a form of arrogance. It means either
you think you already know it all, or you just don't care.
Before the 2006 election, George Bush made a big point of
saying he didn't listen to the polls. Yeah, that's what they
all say when the polls stink. But maybe he should have
listened, because 70 percent of the people were saying he
was on the wrong track. It took a "thumping" on election day
to wake him up, but even then you got the feeling he wasn't
listening so much as he was calculating how to do a better
job of convincing everyone he was right.
A leader has to be CREATIVE, go out on a limb, be willing to
try something different. You know, think outside the
box.
George Bush prides himself on never changing, even as the
world around him is spinning out of control. God forbid
someone should accuse him of flip-flopping. There's a
disturbingly messianic fervor to his certainty. Senator Joe
Biden recalled a conversation he had with Bush a few months
after our troops marched into Baghdad. Joe was in the Oval
Office outlining his concerns to the President — the
explosive mix of Shiite and Sunni, the disbanded Iraqi army,
the problems securing the oil fields. "The President was
serene," Joe recalled. "He told me he was sure that we were
on the right course and that all would be well. 'Mr.
President,' I finally said, 'how can you be so sure when you
don't yet know all the facts?'" Bush then reached over and
put a steadying hand on Joe's shoulder. "My instincts," he
said. "My instincts." Joe was flabbergasted. He told Bush,
"Mr. President, your instincts aren't good enough." Joe
Biden sure didn't think the matter was settled. And, as we
all know now, it wasn't.
Leadership is all about managing change — whether you're
leading a company or leading a country. Things change, and
you get creative. You adapt. Maybe Bush was absent the day
they covered that at Harvard Business School.
A leader has to COMMUNICATE. I'm not talking about running
off at the mouth or spouting sound bites. I'm talking about
facing reality and telling the truth. Nobody in the current
administration seems to know how to talk straight anymore.
Instead, they spend most of their time trying to convince us
that things are not really as bad as they seem. I don't know
if it's denial or dishonesty, but it can start to drive you
crazy after a while. Communication has to start with telling
the truth, even when it's painful. The war in Iraq has been,
among other things, a grand failure of communication. Bush
is like the boy who didn't cry wolf when the wolf was at the
door. After years of being told that all is well, even as
the casualties and chaos mount, we've stopped listening to
him.
A leader has to be a person of CHARACTER. That means knowing
the difference between right and wrong and having the guts
to do the right thing. Abraham Lincoln once said, "If you
want to test a man's character, give him power." George Bush
has a lot of power. What does it say about his character?
Bush has shown a willingness to take bold action on the
world stage because he has the power, but he shows little
regard for the grievous consequences. He has sent our troops
(not to mention hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi
citizens) to their deaths — for what? To build our oil
reserves? To avenge his daddy because Saddam Hussein once
tried to have him killed? To show his daddy he's tougher?
The motivations behind the war in Iraq are questionable, and
the execution of the war has been a disaster. A man of
character does not ask a single soldier to die for a failed
policy.
A leader must have COURAGE. I'm talking about balls. (That
even goes for female leaders.) Swagger isn't courage. Tough
talk isn't courage. George Bush comes from a blue-blooded
Connecticut family, but he likes to talk like a cowboy. You
know, My gun is bigger than your gun. Courage in the
twenty-first century doesn't mean posturing and bravado.
Courage is a commitment to sit down at the negotiating table
and talk.
If you're a politician, courage means taking a position even
when you know it will cost you votes. Bush can't even make a
public appearance unless the audience has been handpicked
and sanitized. He did a series of so-called town hall
meetings last year, in auditoriums packed with his most
devoted fans. The questions were all softballs.
To be a leader you've got to have CONVICTION — a fire in
your belly. You've got to have passion. You've got to really
want to get something done. How do you measure fire in the
belly? Bush has set the all-time record for number of
vacation days taken by a U.S. President — four hundred and
counting. He'd rather clear brush on his ranch than immerse
himself in the business of governing. He even told an
interviewer that the high point of his presidency so far was
catching a seven-and-a-half-pound perch in his hand-stocked
lake.
It's no better on Capitol Hill. Congress was in session only
ninety-seven days in 2006. That's eleven days less than the
record set in 1948, when President Harry Truman coined the
term do-nothing Congress. Most people would expect to be
fired if they worked so little and had nothing to show for
it. But Congress managed to find the time to vote itself a
raise. Now, that's not leadership.
A leader should have CHARISMA. I'm not talking about being
flashy. Charisma is the quality that makes people want to
follow you. It's the ability to inspire. People follow a
leader because they trust him. That's my definition of
charisma. Maybe George Bush is a great guy to hang out with
at a barbecue or a ball game. But put him at a global summit
where the future of our planet is at stake, and he doesn't
look very presidential. Those frat-boy pranks and the
kidding around he enjoys so much don't go over that well
with world leaders. Just ask German Chancellor Angela
Merkel, who received an unwelcome shoulder massage from our
President at a G-8 Summit. When he came up behind her and
started squeezing, I thought she was going to go right
through the roof.
A leader has to be COMPETENT. That seems obvious, doesn't
it? You've got to know what you're doing. More important
than that, you've got to surround yourself with people who
know what they're doing. Bush brags about being our first
MBA President. Does that make him competent? Well, let's
see. Thanks to our first MBA President, we've got the
largest deficit in history, Social Security is on life
support, and we've run up a half-a-trillion-dollar price tag
(so far) in Iraq. And that's just for starters. A leader has
to be a problem solver, and the biggest problems we face as
a nation seem to be on the back burner.
You can't be a leader if you don't have COMMON SENSE. I call
this Charlie Beacham's rule. When I was a young guy just
starting out in the car business, one of my first jobs was
as Ford's zone manager in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. My
boss was a guy named Charlie Beacham, who was the East Coast
regional manager. Charlie was a big Southerner, with a warm
drawl, a huge smile, and a core of steel. Charlie used to
tell me, "Remember, Lee, the only thing you've got going for
you as a human being is your ability to reason and your
common sense. If you don't know a dip of horseshit from a
dip of vanilla ice cream, you'll never make it." George Bush
doesn't have common sense. He just has a lot of sound bites.
You know — Mr.
they'll-welcome-us-as-liberators-no-child-left-behind-heck-of-a-job-Brownie-mission-accomplished Bush.
Former President Bill Clinton once said, "I grew up in an
alcoholic home. I spent half my childhood trying to get into
the reality-based world — and I like it here.
I think our current President should visit the real world
once in a while.
The Biggest C is Crisis
Leaders are made, not born. Leadership is forged in times of
crisis. It's easy to sit there with your feet up on the desk
and talk theory. Or send someone else's kids off to war when
you've never seen a battlefield yourself. It's another thing
to lead when your world comes tumbling down.
On September 11, 2001, we needed a strong leader more than
any other time in our history. We needed a steady hand to
guide us out of the ashes. Where was George Bush? He was
reading a story about a pet goat to kids in Florida when he
heard about the attacks. He kept sitting there for twenty
minutes with a baffled look on his face. It's all on tape.
You can see it for yourself. Then, instead of taking the
quickest route back to Washington and immediately going on
the air to reassure the panicked people of this country, he
decided it wasn't safe to return to the White House. He
basically went into hiding for the day — and he told Vice
President Dick Cheney to stay put in his bunker. We were all
frozen in front of our TVs, scared out of our wits, waiting
for our leaders to tell us that we were going to be okay,
and there was nobody home. It took Bush a couple of days to
get his bearings and devise the right photo op at Ground
Zero.
That was George Bush's moment of truth, and he was
paralyzed. And what did he do when he'd regained his
composure? He led us down the road to Iraq — a road his
own father had considered disastrous when he was President.
But Bush didn't listen to Daddy. He listened to a
higher
father. He prides himself on being faith based, not reality
based. If that doesn't scare the crap out of you, I don't
know what will.
A Hell of a Mess
So here's where we stand. We're immersed in a bloody war
with no plan for winning and no plan for leaving. We're
running the biggest deficit in the history of the country.
We're losing the manufacturing edge to Asia, while our
once-great companies are getting slaughtered by health care
costs. Gas prices are skyrocketing, and nobody in power has
a coherent energy policy. Our schools are in trouble. Our
borders are like sieves. The middle class is being squeezed
every which way. These are times that cry out for
leadership.
But when you look around, you've got to ask: "Where have all
the leaders gone?" Where are the curious, creative
communicators? Where are the people of character, courage,
conviction, competence, and common sense? I may be a sucker
for alliteration, but I think you get the point.
Name me a leader who has a better idea for homeland security
than making us take off our shoes in airports and throw away
our shampoo? We've spent billions of dollars building a huge
new bureaucracy, and all we know how to do is react to
things that have already happened.
Name me one leader who emerged from the crisis of Hurricane
Katrina. Congress has yet to spend a single day evaluating
the response to the hurricane, or demanding accountability
for the decisions that were made in the crucial hours after
the storm. Everyone's hunkering down, fingers crossed,
hoping it doesn't happen again. Now, that's just crazy.
Storms happen. Deal with it. Make a plan. Figure out what
you're going to do the next time.
Name me an industry leader who is thinking creatively about
how we can restore our competitive edge in manufacturing.
Who would have believed that there could ever be a time when
"the Big Three" referred to Japanese car companies? How did
this happen — and more important, what are we going to do
about it?
Name me a government leader who can articulate a plan for
paying down the debt, or solving the energy crisis, or
managing the health care problem. The silence is deafening.
But these are the crises that are eating away at our country
and milking the middle class dry.
I have news for the gang in Congress. We didn't elect you to
sit on your asses and do nothing and remain silent while our
democracy is being hijacked and our greatness is being
replaced with mediocrity. What is everybody so afraid of?
That some bobblehead on Fox News will call them a name? Give
me a break. Why don't you guys show some spine for a
change?
Had Enough?
Hey, I'm not trying to be the voice of gloom and doom here.
I'm trying to light a fire. I'm speaking out because I have
hope. I believe in America. In my lifetime I've had the
privilege of living through some of America's greatest
moments. I've also experienced some of our worst
crises — the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean
War, the Kennedy assassination, the Vietnam War, the 1970s
oil crisis, and the struggles of recent years culminating
with 9/11. If I've learned one thing, it's this: You don't
get anywhere by standing on the sidelines waiting for
somebody else to take action. Whether it's building a better
car or building a better future for our children, we all
have a role to play. That's the challenge I'm raising in
this book. It's a call to action for people who, like me,
believe in America. It's not too late, but it's getting
pretty close. So let's shake off the horseshit and go to
work. Let's tell 'em all we've had enough.
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