Managing the Oval Office
By DAVID ROTHKOPF
Published: January 19, 2013 191 Comments
FACEBOOK
TWITTER
GOOGLE+
SAVE
E-MAIL
SHARE
PRINT
REPRINTS

BARACK OBAMA's critics and supporters tend to agree: the first four years of the Obama administration have included plenty of disappointment and frustration.
Enlarge This Image

Mark Ulriksen
Related in Opinion

Room for Debate: What Should Obama Say? (January 19, 2013)
Enlarge This Image

Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
Many say President Obama has not empowered his cabinet. On Jan. 10 the president, with the departing Treasury secretary, Timothy F. Geithner, right, announced that he was nominating Jacob J. Lew, left, for the post.
Readers' Comments
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
Read All Comments (191) »
Some of the that can be attributed to inherited challenges like the financial crisis. Some were caused by unexpected developments overseas. Some are the result of a dysfunctional Congress better known for logjams, corruption and ideological intransigence than action. (So much so that a recent poll showed that Americans like Congress less than cockroaches, colonoscopies and root canals.)

But Mr. Obama and his team would benefit, as they begin the second term, by acknowledging that many of the biggest problems facing the administration flow directly from the man at the top. Mr. Obama is a lousy manager. As chief executive he gets a C — and then only if graded on a curve that takes into account his predecessor's managerial weaknesses.

For all of the notable achievements of Mr. Obama's first term — getting troops out of Iraq, passing health care and financial services reform, signing legislation that guarantees that women get equal pay for equal work, removing Osama bin Laden — many of the administration's shortcomings are traceable, at least in part, to troubles connected to the way Mr. Obama has chosen to run the government.

more at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/20/opinion/sunday/managing-the-oval-office.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&