ddjango

Twenty years ago, as a management developer, I taught a form of employment interviewing called "behavioral questioning". In this method, the interviewer does not ask, "What would you do under "X" circumstances?", but would say, "Think of an instance in which "X" happened and tell me how you handled it." The theory supporting that technique is simple: the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.

Within this framework, however, often the best candidate will respond by describing a situation that s/he handled badly, then will relate what s/he learned and how s/he would handle it differently or did handle it differently in similar circumstances. Applied to the 2008 campaign circus, as well as to its aftermath, we might be looking at different scenarios entirely.

One of John McPain's main stump riffs was that Obama didn't have the experience to be an effective president. He was right on with that one (too bad he didn't make the same point about his sidekick). If asked a question like, "Tell us about a time when you faced a serious financial crisis and what did you do", he wouldn't have experienced such a thing, so he couldn't tell us. He would have, as would any good politician, answered a question that wasn't asked. In fact, with little experience solving critical problems, he had to be the beauty queen and could offer only "Hope" and "Change" and a history of living through some hard times with a lot of support from his mother.

It was this lack of experience, ironically enough, that won him the presidency. And it really wasn't any appeal to the people's desire for a "Washington outsider". He has proven to be quite the compleat insider, the master of vague-speak and subtle manipulation.

Obama first surrounded himself with hard-core DC bulls and bears who simply wanted a return to power, not change. Power is the coin of the realm; change is small.

I would imagine that the conversation that took place after the first rounds of interviews (the primaries), having hypnotized the quivering "progressives", when he finally entered the domain of the high priests of the Church of Bilderberg, went something like this . . .

"Senator. Will you follow orders?" "Sirs. Yes. I. Will." Inexperienced? Yep. Game? You betcha. Unlike Dubbleduh, Obama doesn't have a Cheney - he has several surrogates: I'm sure that Rahm, Zbiggy, Kissinger, Bernanke, and the rest make up for the absence of one omnipotent snarling pit bull, dragging Obama through the right doors. Frankly, the only four a.m. crisis call that Barack should fear would come from the Archangel Emmanuel, telling him to get dressed and report to the Oval Office in 10 minutes to receive instructions.

Now to the present . . .

It is damned certain that a corrupt form of behavioral interview was employed in staffing the offices of power. The usual suspects clearly had a plethora of experience to draw on:

"Tell me, sir, of a time when you were faced with overwhelming international crises and how did you respond?" "Well, Mr Emmanuel, I waged distracting, illegal wars and committed war crimes, built the unshakable foundation of a police state, robbed the American people of their rights and money, distributed the booty to the folks who pulled it off, and lied like hell twenty-four-seven." "Great! Your new office is down the hall. Call me first thing in the morning."

One thing for certain - nobody asked anybody, "By the way, pay your taxes?"

Do you really want to know the reason this administration will not prosecute the previous one? It's because at least half the people involved in this one are guilty of the same crimes. And they want to keep committing them. And they don't wanna get called on it later. There's too much at stake.

Do you really want to know how this is going to turn out? Turn around. The future is following us. And we're being Obamboozled.

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Source: http://tinyurl.com/c6gyah