Competence Comes First

Our political differences have grown so profound, and become so nasty, that we’ve lost sight of the one thing that matters more than policy: competence. Even the wisest, most carefully conceived policy will end in failure if the officials who execute it have no idea what they’re doing.

To point out the obvious, President Obama and his team are utterly, completely incompetent when it comes to executing national policy. The catastrophic launch of Obamacare is only the latest example. Whatever that gun-running operation to Mexico called Fast-and-Furious was really about, it’s clear the administration made a mess of it. The president and his national security team failed to protect our consulate in Benghazi on September 11, 2012. And when the attack came they failed miserably, and fatally, to rescue our Ambassador and his three colleagues.

I’m not asserting that the president and his team are totally incompetent. They do a better job of getting their base out to vote than any group of politicos have ever done before in our country’s history. Their efforts to trash their political opponents are unfair and often vicious but — alas — they are astoundingly successful. Their talents for deflecting blame and stonewalling investigations of their criminal mid-deeds are extraordinary.

It’s just that they have no idea how to run a government — which is what they were elected to do.

Author’s note to those readers who are already jumping out of their chairs and starting to type comments-to-the-editor suggesting, not very politely, that Herb Meyer is so stupid he doesn’t even realize that all these “failures” are actually brilliant maneuvers by the President and his team to destroy our country:

Yes, I know it’s a mistake to underestimate one’s enemies. But it’s an even bigger mistake to overestimate your enemies and give them more credit than they’re due. And this bigger mistake happens in politics all the time.