Where Have All the Leaders Gone?

Where Have All the Leaders Gone?
By Lee Iacocca with Catherine Whitney

Had Enough?

Am I the only guy in this country who's fed up with
what's happening? Where the hell is our outrage? We
should be screaming bloody murder. We've got a gang of
clueless bozos steering our ship of state right over a
cliff, we've got corporate gangsters stealing us
blind, and we can't even clean up after a hurricane
much less build a hybrid car. But instead of getting
mad, everyone sits around and nods their heads when
the politicians say, "Stay the course."

Stay the course? You've got to be kidding. This is
America , not the damned Titanic. I'll give you a
sound bite: Throw the bums out!

You might think I'm getti ng senile, that I've gone
off my rocker, and maybe I have. But someone has to
speak up. I hardly recognize this country anymore. The
President of the United States is given a free pass to
ignore the Constitution, tap our phones, and lead us
to war on a pack of lies. Congress responds to record
deficits by passing a huge tax cut for the wealthy
(thanks, but I don't need it). The most famous
business leaders are not the innovators but the guys
in handcuffs. While we're fiddling in Iraq , the
Middle East is burning and nobody seems to know what
to do. And the press is waving pom-poms instead of
asking hard questions. That's not the promise of
America my parents and yours traveled across the ocean
for. I've had enough. How about you?

I'll go a step further. You can't call yourself a
patriot if you're not outraged. This is a fight I'm
ready and willing to have.

My friends tell me to calm down. They say, "Lee,
you're eighty-two years old. Leave the rage to the
young people ." I'd love to-as soon as I can pry them
away from their iPods for five seconds and get them to
pay attention. I'm going to speak up because it's my
patriotic duty. I think people will listen to me. They
say I have a reputation as a straight shooter. So I'll
tell you how I see it, and it's not pretty, but at
least it's real. I'm hoping to strike a nerve in those
young folks who say they don't vote because they don't
trust politicians to represent their interests. Hey,
America , wake up. These guys work for us.

Who Are These Guys, Anyway?

Why are we in this mess? How did we end up with this
crowd in Washington ? Well, we voted for them-or at
least some of us did. But I'll tell you what we didn't
do. We didn't agree to suspend the Constitution. We
didn't agree to stop asking questions or demanding
answers. Some of us are sick and tired of people who
call free speech treason. Where I come from that's a
dictatorship, not a democracy.

And don't tell me it's a ll the fault of right-wing
Republicans or liberal Democrats. That's an
intellectually lazy argument, and it's part of the
reason we're in this stew. We're not just a nation of
factions. We're a people. We share common principles
and ideals. And we rise and fall together.

Where are the voices of leaders who can inspire us to
action and make us stand taller? What happened to the
strong and resolute party of Lincoln ? What happened
to the courageous, populist party of FDR and Truman?
There was a time in this country when the voices of
great leaders lifted us up and made us want to do
better. Where have all the leaders gone?

The Test of a Leader

I've never been Commander in Chief, but I've been a
CEO. I understand a few things about leadership at the
top. I've figured out nine points-not ten (I don't
want people accusing me of thinking I'm Moses). I call
them the "Nine Cs of Leadership." They're not fancy or
complicated. Just clear, obvious qualities that every
t rue leader should have. We should look at how the
current administration stacks up. Like it or not, this
crew is going to be around until January 2009. Maybe
we can learn something before we go to the polls in
2008. Then let's be sure we use the leadership test to
screen the candidates who say they want to run the
country. It's up to us to choose wisely.

So, here's my C list:

A leader has to show CURIOSITY. He has to listen to
people outside of the "Yes, sir" crowd in his inner
circle. He has to read voraciously, because the world
is a big, complicated place. George W. Bush brags
about never reading a newspaper. "I just scan the
headlines," he says. Am I hearing this right? He's the
President of the United States and he never reads a
newspaper? Thomas Jefferson once said, "Were it left
to me to decide whether we should have a government
without newspapers, or newspapers without a
government, I should not hesitate for a moment to
prefer the latter." Bush disagrees. A s long as he
gets his daily hour in the gym, with Fox News piped
through the sound system, he's ready to go.

If a leader never steps outside his comfort zone to
hear different ideas, he grows stale. If he doesn't
put his beliefs to the test, how does he know he's
right? The inability to listen is a form of arrogance.
It means either you think you already know it all, or
you just don't care. Before the 2006 election, George
Bush made a big point of saying he didn't listen to
the polls. Yeah, that's what they all say when the
polls stink. But maybe he should have listened,
because 70 percent of the people were saying he was on
the wrong track. It took a "thumping" on election day
to wake him up, but even then you got the feeling he
wasn't listening so much as he was calculating how to
do a better job of convincing everyone he was right.

A leader has to be CREATIVE, go out on a limb, be
willing to try something different. You know, think
outside the box. George Bush pr ides himself on never
changing, even as the world around him is spinning out
of control. God forbid someone should accuse him of
flip-flopping. There's a disturbingly messianic fervor
to his certainty. Senator Joe Biden recalled a
conversation he had with Bush a few months after our
troops marched into Baghdad . Joe was in the Oval
Office outlining his concerns to the President-the
explosive mix of Shiite and Sunni, the disbanded Iraqi
army, the problems securing the oil fields. "The
President was serene," Joe recalled. "He told me he
was sure that we were on the right course and that all
would be well. 'Mr. President,' I finally said, 'how
can you be so sure when you don't yet know all the
facts?'" Bush then reached over and put a steadying
hand on Joe's shoulder. "My instincts," he said. "My
instincts." Joe was flabbergasted. He told Bush, "Mr.
President, your instincts aren't good enough." Joe
Biden sure didn't think the matter was settled. And,
as we all know now, it wasn't.

Leadership is all about managing change-whether you're
leading a company or leading a country. Things change,
and you get creative. You adapt. Maybe Bush was absent
the day they covered that at Harvard Business School .


A leader has to COMMUNICATE. I'm not talking about
running off at the mouth or spouting sound bites. I'm
talking about facing reality and telling the truth.
Nobody in the current administration seems to know how
to talk straight anymore. Instead, they spend most of
their time trying to convince us that things are not
really as bad as they seem. I don't know if it's
denial or dishonesty, but it can start to drive you
crazy after a while. Communication has to start with
telling the truth, even when it's painful. The war in
Iraq has been, among other things, a grand failure of
communication. Bush is like the boy who didn't cry
wolf when the wolf was at the door. After years of
being told that all is well, even as the casualties
and chaos mount, we've stoppe d listening to him.

A leader has to be a person of CHARACTER. That means
knowing the difference between right and wrong and
having the guts to do the right thing. Abraham Lincoln
once said, "If you want to test a man's character,
give him power." George Bush has a lot of power. What
does it say about his character? Bush has shown a
willingness to take bold action on the world stage
because he has the power, but he shows little regard
for the grievous consequences. He has sent our troops
(not to mention hundreds of thousands of innocent
Iraqi citizens) to their deaths-for what? To build our
oil reserves? To avenge his daddy because Saddam
Hussein once tried to have him killed? To show his
daddy he's tougher? The motivations behind the war in
Iraq are questionable, and the execution of the war
has been a disaster. A man of character does not ask a
single soldier to die for a failed policy.

A leader must have COURAGE. I'm talking about balls.
(That even goes for female leaders.) Swagger isn't
courage. Tough talk isn't courage. George Bush comes
from a blue-blooded Connecticut family, but he likes
to talk like a cowboy. You know, My gun is bigger than
your gun. Courage in the twenty-first century doesn't
mean posturing and bravado. Courage is a commitment to
sit down at the negotiating table and talk.

If you're a politician, courage means taking a
position even when you know it will cost you votes.
Bush can't even make a public appearance unless the
audience has been handpicked and sanitized. He did a
series of so-called town hall meetings last year, in
auditoriums packed with his most devoted fans. The
questions were all softballs.

To be a leader you've got to have CONVICTION-a fire in
your belly. You've got to have passion. You've got to
really want to get something done. How do you measure
fire in the belly? Bush has set the all-time record
for number of vacation days taken by a U.S.
President-four hundred and counting. He'd ra ther
clear brush on his ranch than immerse himself in the
business of governing. He even told an interviewer
that the high point of his presidency so far was
catching a seven-and-a-half-pound perch in his
hand-stocked lake.

It's no better on Capitol Hill. Congress was in
session only ninety-seven days in 2006. That's eleven
days less than the record set in 1948, when President
Harry Truman coined the term do-nothing Congress. Most
people would expect to be fired if they worked so
little and had nothing to show for it. But Congress
managed to find the time to vote itself a raise. Now,
that's not leadership.

A leader should have CHARISMA. I'm not talking about
being flashy. Charisma is the quality that makes
people want to follow you. It's the ability to
inspire. People follow a leader because they trust
him. That's my definition of charisma. Maybe George
Bush is a great guy to hang out with at a barbecue or
a ball game. But put him at a global summit where the
future of our planet is at stake, and he doesn't look
very presidential. Those frat-boy pranks and the
kidding around he enjoys so much don't go over that
well with world leaders. Just ask German Chancellor
Angela Merkel, who received an unwelcome shoulder
massage from our President at a G-8 Summit. When he
came up behind her and started squeezing, I thought
she was going to go right through the roof.

A leader has to be COMPETENT. That seems obvious,
doesn't it? You've got to know what you're doing. More
important than that, you've got to surround yourself
with people who know what they're doing. Bush brags
about being our first MBA President. Does that make
him competent? Well, let's see. Thanks to our first
MBA President, we've got the largest deficit in
history, Social Security is on life support, and we've
run up a half-a-trillion-dollar price tag (so far) in
Iraq . And that's just for starters. A leader has to
be a problem solver, and the biggest problems we face
as a nation seem to be on the back burner.

You can't be a leader if you don't have COMMON SENSE.
I call this Charlie Beacham's rule. When I was a young
guy just starting out in the car business, one of my
first jobs was as Ford's zone manager in Wilkes-Barre
, Pennsylvania . My boss was a guy named Charlie
Beacham, who was the East Coast regional manager.
Charlie was a big Southerner, with a warm drawl, a
huge smile, and a core of steel. Charlie used to tell
me, "Remember, Lee, the only thing you've got going
for you as a human being is your ability to reason and
your common sense. If you don't know a dip of
horseshit from a dip of vanilla ice cream, you'll
never make it." George Bush doesn't have common sense.
He just has a lot of sound bites. You
know-Mr.they'll-welcome-us-as-liberators-no-child-left-behind-heck-of-a-
job-Brownie-mission-accomplished
Bush.

Former President Bill Clinton once said, "I grew up in
an alcoholic home. I spent half my childhood trying to
get into the r eality-based world-and I like it here."
I think our current President should visit the real
world once in a while.

The Biggest C is Crisis

Leaders are made, not born. Leadership is forged in
times of crisis. It's easy to sit there with your feet
up on the desk and talk theory. Or send someone else's
kids off to war when you've never seen a battlefield
yourself. It's another thing to lead when your world
comes tumbling down.

On September 11, 2001, we needed a strong leader more
than any other time in our history. We needed a steady
hand to guide us out of the ashes. Where was George
Bush? He was reading a story about a pet goat to kids
in Florida when he heard about the attacks. He kept
sitting there for twenty minutes with a baffled look
on his face. It's all on tape. You can see it for
yourself. Then, instead of taking the quickest route
back to Washington and immediately going on the air to
reassure the panicked people of this country, he decid
ed it wasn't safe to return to the White House. He
basically went into hiding for the day-and he told
Vice President Dick Cheney to stay put in his bunker.
We were all frozen in front of our TVs, scared out of
our wits, waiting for our leaders to tell us that we
were going to be okay, and there was nobody home. It
took Bush a couple of days to get his bearings and
devise the right photo op at Ground Zero.

That was George Bush's moment of truth, and he was
paralyzed. And what did he do when he'd regained his
composure? He led us down the road to Iraq -a road his
own father had considered disastrous when he was
President. But Bush didn't listen to Daddy. He
listened to a higher father. He prides himself on
being faith based, not reality based. If that doesn't
scare the crap out of you, I don't know what will.

A Hell of a Mess

So here's where we stand. We're immersed in a bloody
war with no plan for winning and no plan for leaving.
We're running the biggest defi cit in the history of
the country. We're losing the manufacturing edge to
Asia , while our once-great companies are getting
slaughtered by health care costs. Gas prices are
skyrocketing, and nobody in power has a coherent
energy policy. Our schools are in trouble. Our borders
are like sieves. The middle class is being squeezed
every which way. These are times that cry out for
leadership.

But when you look around, you've got to ask: "Where
have all the leaders gone?" Where are the curious,
creative communicators? Where are the people of
character, courage, conviction, competence, and common
sense? I may be a sucker for alliteration, but I think
you get the point.

Name me a leader who has a better idea for homeland
security than making us take off our shoes in airports
and throw away our shampoo? We've spent billions of
dollars building a huge new bureaucracy, and all we
know how to do is react to things that have already
happened.

Name me one leader who emerge d from the crisis of
Hurricane Katrina. Congress has yet to spend a single
day evaluating the response to the hurricane, or
demanding accountability for the decisions that were
made in the crucial hours after the storm. Everyone's
hunkering down, fingers crossed, hoping it doesn't
happen again. Now, that's just crazy. Storms happen.
Deal with it. Make a plan. Figure out what you're
going to do the next time.

Name me an industry leader who is thinking creatively
about how we can restore our competitive edge in
manufacturing. Who would have believed that there
could ever be a time when "the Big Three" referred to
Japanese car companies? How did this happen-and more
important, what are we going to do about it?

Name me a government leader who can articulate a plan
for paying down the debt, or solving the energy
crisis, or managing the health care problem. The
silence is deafening. But these are the crises that
are eating away at our country and milking the middle
class dry.

I have news for the gang in Congress. We didn't elect
you to sit on your asses and do nothing and remain
silent while our democracy is being hijacked and our
greatness is being replaced with mediocrity. What is
everybody so afraid of? That some bobblehead on Fox
News will call them a name? Give me a break. Why don't
you guys show some spine for a change?

Had Enough?

Hey, I'm not trying to be the voice of gloom and doom
here. I'm trying to light a fire. I'm speaking out
because I have hope. I believe in America . In my
lifetime I've had the privilege of living through some
of America 's greatest moments. I've also experienced
some of our worst crises-the Great Depression, World
War II, the Korean War, the Kennedy assassination, the
Vietnam War, the 1970s oil crisis, and the struggles
of recent years culminating with 9/11. If I've learned
one thing, it's this: You don't get anywhere by
standing on the sidelines waiting for somebody else to
take action. Whet her it's building a better car or
building a better future for our children, we all have
a role to play. That's the challenge I'm raising in
this book. It's a call to action for people who, like
me, believe in America . It's not too late, but it's
getting pretty close. So let's shake off the horseshit
and go to work. Let's tell 'em all we've had enough.


Excerpted from Where Have All the Leaders Gone?.
Copyright © 2007 by Lee Iacocca. All rights reserved.