The choice between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama is made a little clearer by George Packer's piece in the latest New Yorker. Packer's focus is largely on Clinton -- on both Clintons -- in his article. But what interest him most are the differences between the two candidates' leadership qualities.
How important is inspiration? Greg Craig, an old friend and political ally of the Clintons, has his own view. Lawyer and close friend of both Clintons dating back to their days at Yale Law, Craig effectively led Bill Clinton's defense team during the impeachment trial in the Senate. But today he is a supporter of Obama, not Hillary Clinton.
In spite of his long history with the Clintons, Craig is an adviser to Barack Obama’s campaign. “Ninety-five per cent of it is because of my enthusiasm for Obama,” he said last month, at his law office. “I really regard him as a fresh and exciting voice in American politics that has not been in my life since Robert Kennedy.” In 1968, Craig, who is sixty-two, was campaigning for Eugene McCarthy when he heard a Bobby Kennedy speech at the University of Nebraska, and became a believer on the spot. Since then, Craig has not been inspired by any American President. As for the prospect of another Clinton Presidency, he said, “I don’t discount the possibility of her being able to inspire me. But she hasn’t in the past, and Obama has.”
So is it inspiration or perspiration or vision or administrative skills or charisma or education... or what? Will Obama's vision of united America win the day, or does Clinton's self-assessment as an experienced executive and politician do the trick for most Americans? Packer writes:
...Perhaps the most important difference between these two politicians—whose policy views, after all, are almost indistinguishable—lies in their rival conceptions of the Presidency. Obama offers himself as a catalyst by which disenchanted Americans can overcome two decades of vicious partisanship, energize our democracy, and restore faith in government. Clinton presents politics as the art of the possible, with change coming incrementally through good governance, a skill that she has honed in her career as advocate, First Lady, and senator. This is the real meaning of the remark she made during one of the New Hampshire debates: “Dr. King’s dream began to be realized when President Lyndon Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, when he was able to get through Congress something that President Kennedy was hopeful to do—the President before had not even tried—but it took a President to get it done.”
Even a Clinton supporter would have the right to ask how Hillary Clinton can lay claim to experience as an executive, as an administrator. She offers as a given her ability to erase the mistakes of the Bush/Cheney administration, to turn the government around, to cure the ills at the Department of Justice and heal the wounds of the intelligence agencies. She has the zeal, but does she have the leadership qualities required? Does she really have the political and administrative abilities? Where has she demonstrated that? Packer thinks they look at America's problems in quite different ways.
These rival conceptions of the Presidency—Clinton as executive, Obama as visionary—reflect a deeper difference in how the two candidates analyze what ails the country. Obama’s diagnosis is more fundamental: for him, the illness precedes the Bush years and the partisan deadlock in Washington, originating in a basic failure of politicians to bring Americans together. A strong hand on the wheel won’t make a difference if your car is stuck in the mud; a good leader has to persuade enough people to get out and push. Whereas Clinton echoes Churchill, who proclaimed, “Give us the tools and we will finish the job,” Obama invokes Lincoln, who said, “As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.”
When I described to Greg Craig the Clinton campaign’s skepticism toward the idea of transcending partisanship, he said, “You’re getting to that five per cent of Hillary that I don’t like—which is to see in every corner a conspiracy or an opponent that must be crushed. Look at her comment ‘Now the fun part starts’ ”—Clinton’s announcement in Iowa that she would begin attacking Obama’s record. “There is a quality of playing the embattled, beleaguered victim that I find unappealing and depressing.” He added, “I want a President who is looking to move the out of their vulnerability and jeopardy country with positive inspirational ideas rather than to fight off the bad guys and proclaim victory by defeating the forces of reaction. I would like us to inspire the forces of reaction to join us in treating people better, and lifting more vulnerable people and people in jeopardy.”
Packer recognizes that Hillary Clinton is, for many, simply unlikable. He doesn't mention her egotism and self-absorption, but this description nails it.
A former Clinton Administration official explained his decision to support Obama by urging me to read the two candidates’ autobiographies side by side. Obama’s “Dreams from My Father,” unlike Clinton’s “Living History,” he said, reveals a narrator who has struggled through difficult questions of identity and resolved them, and who, as a result, is comfortable not just with himself but with the complexity and contradiction of the world. “When I’m with her, I feel she wants to impress me,” the former official said. “When I’m with him, I feel he wants to know what I have to offer him.”
The problem for Clinton is that she appears to share too many character flaws with George Bush. One of them is precisely the self-absorption, arrogance and, in the end, defensiveness. So it's surprising that many Clinton friends see her differently.
In numerous conversations, friends of both Clintons expressed a preference for Hillary, upending the public perception that Bill is the warmer and more likable of the two.
Packer doesn't say that much about Obama, but here's one perceptive bit.
At times, Obama almost seems to be trying to escape history, presenting himself as the conduit through which people’s yearnings for national transformation can be realized.
What Packer doesn't say but what becomes clearer is that it isn't good enough for a candidate -- like Clinton -- to say she's a leader. Her very candidacy has to demonstrate leadership. That's where Obama stands out. When we talk about inspiration and vision, we are talking about leadership.
Let's imagine Clinton achieves the nomination. How would she do as the nominee? Packer thinks she would have a hard time beating John McCain who has shown himself during campaign speeches to be “witty, combative, humble, and blunt.”
Clinton has made the mistake of continuing to tell the public what she feels rather than showing it. During the debate in Las Vegas, she tried to explain her commitment to social change by talking about herself, not about the people she wants to help: “It is really my life’s work. It is something that comes out of my own experience, both in my family and in my church—that, you know, I’ve been blessed.” Her response displayed the awkwardness that comes from a lifelong habit of self-concealment in the face of exposure, and toughness in the face of hurt. It’s a little sad and painful that this enormously accomplished and capable woman, in her sixty-first year, had to bring her mother and daughter on a “likability tour” in the days before the Iowa caucus, and found her voice—as she put it—only on the night of her upset win in New Hampshire.
Dee Dee Myers, Bill Clinton's press secretary, thinks Hillary Clinton still has to learn how to lead.
“Hillary needs to connect two things,” Myers said. “What’s in her heart and what she wants to accomplish and why. There are many reasons to think she’d be a good President. She knows what she wants to do, she understands how the process works, she’s shown an ability to work with Congress, she’s become more incrementalist. But the Presidency isn’t all that powerful, except as the bully pulpit. It comes down to your ability to get people to follow you, to inspire. You have to lead. Can she get people to come together, or does she remain such a polarizing figure? That’s what the campaign will be about.” In other words, winning the Presidency might require Clinton to transcend her own history.
That, and get over herself.
