04/30/2009

Opinion

The Most Expensive President Since 1945

Part 2: Communication -- First Rate

Communication -- First-Rate

In this subject, the new president is truly a world-class performer. In fact we Germans might like to send our chancellor, Angela Merkel, to the White House for a four-week internship under Mr. Obama.

German politicians tend to be insulted when someone disagrees with them. Instead of reflecting on a critic's arguments, their thoughts run to how best to neutralize that critic. Former Chancellor Helmut Kohl, for example, marginalized the brightest politician in his Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party, Professor Kurt Biedenkopf, while current Chancellor Merkel has given her party's only economic expert, Friedrich Merz, the same treatment.

Obama, by comparison, made arch-rival Hillary Clinton his secretary of state and kept former President George W. Bush's defense secretary in office. He is clearly making an effort to break with traditional notions of partisan politics.

The president has taken a similarly liberal approach to his interactions with journalists. Kohl refused to allow his critics to travel with him on his official aircraft, and Gerhard Schröder, another former German chancellor, was stingy about interviews. Obama, on the other hand, invited his sharpest critics in the media to dinner shortly after his election. The president includes people rather than excluding them. His method is to win over his critics, rather than try to punish them.

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