The Social Psychology of Barack Obama

  

Anyone who really takes President Barack Obama at his word that he was just being "polite" during the first 2012 Presidential Debate... does not really understand him OR his relationship with Team Obama. I am writing this a half-hour before his second debate so I can make the case for why Barack Obama CAN NOT lose tonight's debate (Oct. 16, 2012).

Fact #1: the President of the United States (POTUS) is too authentic, to be merely "polite." He leads as much from the heart, as he does the head. President Obama knew it was unlikely he would win the first debate because historically it's the challenger that has the most to gain. For merely by getting face time with an incumbent president, a challenger is legitimized.

Barack Obama's implicit strategy was to not let Mitt Romney score points by getting him into false fights. This became painfully obvious from the President's face when he suddenly realize the extent to which the former Governor was distorting the truth and changing his position to the opposite of what he had established during two years of campaigning.  For example, if the President had attacked Romney on the 47% he claimed in a video didn't matter, Mitt would have said, as he did a day later, that he was wrong to say that. The President was thus smart not to give Mitt Romney a national audience to say he wanted to re-frame his answer.

In fact, Barack Obama did not do what Mitt and his debate preparers had expected him to do. It was a gamble on the President's part AND it left the GOP feeling perhaps more confident about their candidate, than they should have.  The President's tactic not to actually debate Romney point-by-point was a smart one based on the later reaction of Undecided Voters.  The one time President Obama took issue with Romney's changed position on an issue, it was seen as negative by a CNN Colorado Focus Group; they gave the President their lowest points for the entire debate.  They said they didn't like Obama going negative.

So, President Obama was right in his Mohamed Ali-like strategy to let the challenger take his best shots in Round One. By laying back rather than defending every point tossed out by Mitt Romney, the President showed his brilliance and confidence. He chose to look presidential and chose to describe what he had done in four years. He was not baited into action or side-tracked by later-proven lies. In fact, the average viewer could see President Obama staying on his message when refused to even look at the challenger. By looking down and elsewhere, the President revealed the extent to which he lacked respect for Mitt Romney.  To have attacked the former Governor of Massachusetts, the President would have needed to look at him as he repeatedly told him again, and again, that he was wrong. Mr. Obama chose not to do that or to live up to the expectations of TV commentators.  He also chose not to "bully" the moderator.

Fact #2: The President will definitely win the second debate because his behavior in Round One cleared the way for him to be more energized or aggressive. With everyone saying the President was "wimpy," not engaged, "disappointing," he can now come out swinging.  Barack Obama realized more so than the media that his job was not to "entertain" TV watchers, but to inform them. Where Mitt tried to be "hot" and full of energy for the TV audience, Obama was cool, in control, and presidential-like because he was already President.  And in "disappointing," pundits and media journalists, they became the very ones to fill-in the-blanks and reveal what the President should have said during the first debate. The beauty of this strategy is that the media itself revealed the many lies and half-truths deliberately spun by the GOP and its candidate.  "Where is Obama," screamed Chris Matthews of CNN who obviously had different expectations.  That refrain eventually turned to the President and former President Bill Clinton asking: "Who is this man pretending to be Mitt Romney."

Fact #3: the President can not lose the second or third debate because he's not just a better candidate than Mitt Romney, he is also a smarter and more authentic one. Have we already forgotten about historic it is that an African-American is president of these United States?  Have we forgotten that the immediately reaction  by the losing party in 2008 was to see him fail, so he could not be re-elected four year later? The real story, then, is not what is Barack Obama going to do for us in the future, but how was he able to do as much as he did, despite continuing efforts by some of the richest racists and white supremacists in the country?  It certainly should not be forgotten that if 50% of Americans favor re-election, regardless of his race, another 50% do not, largely because of his race. Now more than ever, it seems clear in the 21st century that such GOP calls for "small government" and fiscal responsibility or questions about whether Obama was born in this country... are really code words to hide the incipient racism that lives on. On September 5, 2012, Rush Limbaugh, for instance, said Obama is not "authentically black" because he lacks "slave blood."  In May 2012, a Republican lawmaker from Colorado, U. S. Rep. Mike Coffman told the audience at a fundraiser that the President is not an American.  What other POTUS has had to put up with these kind of hateful rhetorical barriers while running the country?

Fact #4: President Obama can't lose in remaining debates because he is consistent in showing how much Republicans and Democrats differ on taxes, abortion, health care, immigration, parity in pay for women, education, etc.  When all the rhetoric dies down, citizens get to see that the political solution for our country's problems is philosophical. With the Democrats, the solution is in the people. For the Republicans, the solution is in a republic driven by an invisible hand in the marketplace where low-wages are a solution to economic problems.

But, Obama's race, gender, intellect, and style come into play for what is one of the most exciting times in our country.  To not understand the President's strategy is to  forget that he is a fighter who did the unthinkable for an African-American:  took on the Chicago Machine and won; convinced a majority white population to elect a Black American as the leader of the Free World AND saved the country from bankrupcy after eight years of Republican-created greed, deregulation, and huge deficits.  Obama's background makes him different, wise, patient, and a student of east and west cultures. He understands that life is not a zero-sum game and that like most games, there's more than one inning or quarter for scoring points.

I might also add that those who believe Barack Hussein Obama makes decision based on the expectations of TV journalists probably forget that the Harvard graduate, scholar, and community outreach worker has a tool chest of  strategies.  President Obama is tested, now, and continues to show that he is consistent in his character, his integrity, and leads with his heart as much as his mind.  AND... he has high expectations for himself.

That's why some forget that Barack Obama tends to pace himself in fights. Like in the sports he love, he often performs better the closer he gets to the end of the game. So don't look for POTUS to lose the remaining debates or the presidency. 

Mitt Romney has shown he is a profit-making CEO.   Now the question is:  Can the single-term former governor of Massachusetts convince enough people in the United States that's he can also be the leader of the free world. Without a doubt... YES!!!

This kind of publicity shows how much some people FEAR diversity, change, and a non-white in the White House.

     

  

                              


                               

The Insanely Great Steve Jobs...

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    Steve Jobs Lives... 

HOW DO YOU know he's not in the next room or across the country in a meeting? We're still talking about him. He might as well be here, right?  In fact, everyday millions upon millions of people are using something that Steve Jobs nearly lost his mind over to create for our enjoyment.  Up until his last breath after saying what his sister describes as his final words - "Oh, wow. Oh, wow. Oh, wow" - Steve Jobs was still making plans for the future and living fully on his journey.  Now that's the way to live!  Why worry about "off" or "on" switches when you get that life is about transitions. 

I became convinced Steve Jobs lives in our hearts, pockets, minds, and homes after hearing his biographer - Walter Isaacson on April 14, 2012. The biographer of Einstein, Franklin, and Kissinger delivered a stunning one-hour talk in downtown Baltimore, Maryland.   I wasn't alone in feeling Jobs' spirit; hundreds in the nearly standing room only auditorium at Pratt Library... were mesmerized with the up close and personal stories about the "genius" and somewhat bullying nature of a man who basically lived life on his own terms.

After some 40 interviews with Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson,  not surprisingly, didn't need notes. The President and CEO of the Aspen Institute, charmed the crowd energetically with stories about the good, bad, and sometimes the ugly sides of an extraordinary human being.  He gave us inside information, for instance, when he revealed that when Microsoft's Bill Gates whent to visit Jobs at his home in 2011, Steve Jobs told him that Gates was only coming because he had heard that "I was dying." By the end of Isaacson's presentation, however, one had to wonder whether Steve Jobs was seen as complicated because  he lived life fiercely with purpose and passion. And, I might add, with a great deal of self-awareness, a trait typically rare among most of us..

It had taken me to get to page 134, before I could even begin to like Steve Jobs. He sounded like a bully, someone who suffered from manic depression or a bipolar disorder, and a person so focused on his way and ideas that he was sometimes called "narcistic, dishonest, irresponsible, and unethical."  Having never been a fan of Apple products or Steve Jobs, my warm-up to him was not surprising.  But by page 570, I got it:  my opinions really didn't matter.  Whether exploring his leadership style, his personality, or his results... the truth is Steve Jobs was consistently different BECAUSE he had a mind so intimate with change that he couldn't lead a mediocre life.  In the 21st century Steve Jobs is the new kind of renaissance man - steeped in art and technology, rather than art and science.

Who else but a college dropout, living life so fully - always tweaking and re-imagining things - could come up with the ultimate multitasking tool for an overly stressed society - the iPad.  While the Amazon Kindle e-reader (2007) was designed to allow books and magazines to be downloaded, Steve Jobs once again got it right.  He realized some people might want to do more than just read books on an electronic tablet.  In 2010, Steve Jobs introduced the perfect distraction for those who might get tired or bored with just reading books - an iPad with movies, games, music, and Internet surfing.

AND ONE MORE THING...

Walter Isaacson, the former chairman of CNN and author of biographies about Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein, and Henry Kissinger revealed, perhaps, for the first time that Steve Jobs had actually seen a small portion of the book before he died.  In an attempt to capture the legacy of Steve Jobs, Isaacson decided to let Jobs have the final word by piecing together his thoughts on the subject shared during their interviews. Since Isaacson put the thoughts in a long, nearly three-page section, he decided it made sense to at least let Jobs read that section.  And although nothing was changed, that section of the book is important because it shows that Steve Jobs was not so ego driven over the years that he didn't get that he had help with his insane greatness.

"Everything I do depends on other members of our species and the shoulders that we stand on.  And a lot of us want to contribute something back to our species and to add something to the flow"  (page 570).

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (Simon & Schuster, 2011) is a thoroughly researched and well-written story about a man of whom much has been written.  So clear and compelling is Isaacson's work, that I'm doing the unthinkable - reading the book again, all  630 pages.

Jobs' magical thinking also worked on Isaacson:  "I really did believe he would be around a year later to read the book as promised."  But the highest complement for the biographer is that he accomplished what Steve Jobs asked him to do in the authorized work - write a book that would help his children understand him better and explain why he wasn't always present when he was present.  Isaacson did that and more.  He's produced a cross-disciplinary classic case study of an ordinary human being who did some extremely extraordinary things in his life time.  It's a must read and a credit to the author that his work captures the humaness of a man who has made the world a better place... by following his own truths.  The Steven Jobs family should be proud of their loved one's contributions to "the species."

                   

Why Whitney Houston Matters!

  

The life and death of Whitney Houston Matters!

 There are three reasons Whitney Houson's life and death matters.

 First, no matter what the superstar was experiencing in her life, she was always truthful about what was going on. Her struggles were not a secret.  At even her lowest points, you can really believe that it was her FAITH that sustained her. With God in her life, suicide was just not a part of her vocabulary.  She had a mission - to mentor her daughter; she just had too much to live for. Whitney's life teaches us that anyone can fall down. Her struggle to get up was eventually successful  because of her strong support system and her faith.  She told one interviewer that even when she was getting high... she would still read her Bible. Even at her worse, she never forgot the true  source of her strength. To the day she died, Whitney still had a twinkle in her eye when she sang, "Yes, Jesus loves me."  

  Second, Whitney's death is a cogent reminder of the danger of drug interactions and side effects. Four days before she died, she had received new prescriptions to treat a throat condition.  Did the prescribing doctor know what other medicines she was taking? Did Whitney really understand the danger of drinking alcohol when taking medications for anxiety, panic attacks, and depression? Obviously she did since alcohol was not found in her system during an autopsy.  Did the public ever understand she actually had fears and anxiety about being on stage?  Does the public ever get how challenging it is to perform and practice for long hours? So few of us really can grasp a life that has it all in super portions... a life lived large.  There's not book on how to live large or how to manage when you reach your dreams and more. Yet, even before the cause of death was released... people jumped to conclusions.  And even though an autopsy revealed that Whitney did not die of a drug overdose, many in the media still insist that she did.  Who's in charge here? Of course, prior behavior is always a precipitating factor for any of us when it comes to death. But on the day Whitney died she did not have enough drugs or alcohol in her system to allow the experts to rule either caused her death. The coroner ruled her death was due to "accidental drowning."  Was it her heart or someone else that caused that? If she had had too many drugs in her system we would have had a different ruling.  

       Because the general public is not educated enough about the side effects of prescribed medicines, few recognize what was really going on with Whitney.  Here's what was missed.  The sweating, erratic behavior, and mood changes were the result of reactions to incorrect dosages or types of medicines being taken together.  If you've ever been around someone taking medicines for phychological reasons, you know first hand what happens when their meds are being adjusted to find what works best for them. Because these medicines act on receptors in the brain, it is not unusual to experience changes in taste, temperatures, and moods and yet not be fully aware of ongoing changes in vital signs.  The media was quick to describe the blood and scratches on Whitney's legs and yet not realize that she was having an allergic reaction.  We need more drug education in this country.  The allergic reaction coupled with tiredness, dizziness, and drowsiness are typical of such anti-depressant medicines as Xanax.  Xanax is used to treat anxiety disorders, panic disorders, and anxiety caused by depression. This could explain not only Whitney's mood changes but also her inability to fully taste the alcohol she was consuming - a potentially lethal combination with most drugs.  When she entered the bathroom with a turkey sandwich to take a bath, it was probably to have some food in her as she took a pill.  She could be heard singing for a while and then as her meds began to work, she probably fell asleep. Certainly, if one is advised not to drive while taking Xanax, a reasonable person can also conclude that judgement is off, even while sitting in a tub.  What is clear, is that Whitney is more likely to have had a heart attack than to have overdosed on drugs. She was too street savvy not to know they could kill her. That doesn't mean she did occasionally indulge in a drug, she admitted to Oprah that the temptation lingers. But having just finished a movie (Sparkle) that kept her in the presence of Bishop TD Jakes and other supporters, it is unlikely she had gone back to heavy drug usage.
  
Thirdly, with Bobby Brown out of her life since 2007, she had lost her primary enabler for doing cocaine. She sought "recovery." Indeed, she told Oprah that she stayed in her pajamas for six months after leaving him and moving to Los Angeles. She also admitted she went to counseling and rehab at various places around the country.  She dedicated herself to being a good parent and a better role model for her daughter. Yet, so many in the public have branded her not as a "recovering addict" but an addict whose behavior was beyond forgiveness or understanding. The "haters" remain.  The scorching comments following the governor of New Jersey ordering flags flown at half mast for her is as curious as demanding that President Barack Obama produce his birth certificate to prove he's a citizen.  

   So Whitney Houston's life and death matter because they are both wake up calls that we as a society needs to:  (1) change the mindset regarding prescription drugs; legal is not necessarily safe, (2) cease permitting medicine to be depicted as normal and safe and allowing it to be advertised on television, and (3) accelerate the push for having an electronic medical system so doctors can access what medicines their patients are taking.   

   It would be a shame to learn that Whitney's death was avoidable because her various doctor didn't have accurate information about her medicines.  All of the signs during the week leading up to her death point to a bad reaction to legally prescribed medicine.   The sweating, mood changes, and scratch marks were symptomatic of such. She may even have had other underlying medical conditions that were not helped by her tendency to panic or anxiety attacks.   

Whitney Houston's living will not have been in vain, if legislators get it.  It's time for Congress and the President to collaborate on creating Whitney's Law: a new law requiring electronic filling of all medicines in a central source.  It's time to modernize our medical system to increase awareness of interactions and indicators of drugs.  As a certified teacher of adults who have relatives with mental illnesses, I also would suggest that the public become more educated about medications and treatment for various kinds of mental illness and even take the Free, 12-week course offered around the country by NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness). That would certainly be more productive than blaming Whitney Houston for her own death, even before results are released.  

Rest In Peace, Whitney Elizabeth Houston. Thank you for your honesty about your struggle, your loving spirit, and decades of great music.

What's Happening Now...

...Well, after working for four years as a week-end International Broadcaster in the Worldwide English Division at Voice of America, I've moved on to seek jobs elsewhere and, to finish up several unfinished writing projects.  You'll see in this Blog that my passion for writing for various media is a more than two-decade affair.

...Thanks to columnist John Kelly of The Washington Post, for example, his recent article (10/7/10) in the Metro section has increased my volume of emails and kick-started my ongoing research project on this country's first national pre-school program - Head Start.  I'm looking for some of the 1965 graduates of the 45-year old program.

(Click on the link below to see The Washington Post article.)

   http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/06/AR2010100606980.html?referrer=emailarticle

I've already heard from quite a few of my students in the pictures below.  Most are getting ready to turn 50 and some of their stories have brought me to tears. Email me at  ggibson@jhsph.edu   if you see anyone you know.  Their comments are going to make a great book.

"Miss Gibson's" 

Head Start Class

     H. D. Cooke Elementary School

     Washington, DC

                            1965

www.headstart1965.blogspot.com