Obama confesses tactical errors
US: US President Barack Obama admitted having made tactical errors
but stood by his accomplishments Sunday in an interview weeks ahead of
crucial midterm elections.
Obama confessed to the The New York Times that during his first 20
months in office he had probably not focused enough on public relations,
which, like it or not, is an all-important part of the job.
“Given how much stuff was coming at us, we probably spent much more
time trying to get the policy right than trying to get the politics
right,” he was quoted as saying in a lengthy magazine piece.
With Republicans poised to make big gains in congressional and
gubernatorial races in the November 2 elections, Obama and top aides
also quoted in the article discussed ways to reboot his stalled
presidency.
In a reinvented administration, which aides have dubbed “Obama 2.0,”
he will make sure he plays more by Washington’s rules so that his
accomplishments don’t get drowned out by the opposition Republicans.
“I think anybody who’s occupied this office has to remember that
success is determined by an intersection in policy and politics and that
you can’t be neglecting of marketing and PR and public opinion,” Obama
said.
He told the newspaper he had learnt “tactical lessons” after allowing
himself to look like “the same old tax-and-spend liberal Democrat,”
despite having presented himself as a fresh-scrubbed agent of political
change.
Nonetheless, Obama, who took the helm in January 2009 with the United
States in the midst of two wars and facing a financial crisis unseen
since the Great Depression, said his administration’s record had been
commendable.
“I keep a checklist of what we committed to doing, and we’ve probably
accomplished 70 percent of the things that we talked about during the
campaign,” he said. Obama, whose administration passed unprecedented
stimulus packages to stabilize the American economy, before embarking on
significant overhauls of health care, education and financial
regulation, lamented that he had allowed Republicans to stall his agenda
and control his message.
But, he said, “It would be very hard for people to look back and say,
‘You know what, Obama didn’t do what he’s promised.’ I think they could
say, ‘On a bunch of fronts he still has an incomplete’.
” Washington, AFP |