Where Have All the Leaders Gone?

by Lee Iacocca

  Once we have the candidates’ priorities, then we’ve got to ask, “What are the three actions you’re going to take to address each of your priorities?” Let’s have those in writing, too.

  Look, this isn’t rocket science. It’s only complicated because the candidates want to make it complicated. We have to push for simplicity. And then, when we elect the candidate whose priorities we agree with, we have to make sure those priorities actually get addressed.

  Accountability is a slippery business these days. How do you know what’s actually being accomplished? Well, you have to start by looking at whether the policies and priorities are working. You know, getting results.

  The job of a leader is to accomplish goals that advance the common good. Anyone can take up space. Here’s the test of a leader: When he leaves office, we should be better off than when he started. It’s that simple.

  III

  Can you show me where it’s working?

  Talk is cheap. Where I come from, in the auto industry, you were held brutally accountable for your programs and products. The response to any idea was, “Show me where it’s working.” Well, that’s kind of obvious, isn’t it? For example, it took us a long time to install air bags in cars because we had to figure out how to build an explosive device that didn’t take your head off in the process of trying to protect you. It had to work. That’s not happening in the political or economic realms today. Where’s the accountability for results?

  If you’re like me, you spend a lot of time scratching your head and wondering what they’re doing up there on Capitol Hill. Well, we already know that they’re only working 27 percent of the time. You’d think there would be a sense of urgency when they do come to Washington.

  Is it too much to ask our elected officials to actually solve a problem once in a while? How about even taking a stab at an issue that matters to Americans? When pollsters ask ordinary people what they really care about, in order of importance, here’s what they say: (1) the war in Iraq, (2) jobs, (3) health care, (4) education, and (5) energy. Those seem like reasonable priorities to me. But in 2006, although there was plenty of posturing about the war and the economy, when it came to legislative priorities—that is, actually doing something—the liveliest debates were about side issues. In one three-month session in the United States Senate these were the priorities: a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, a constitutional amendment to ban flag burning, and cutting the capital gains tax. Our senators had time to debate flag burning for three days, but no time to tackle health care, energy, jobs, or anything else Americans care about. Since 1777, there have been only forty-five documented cases of flag burning. But since 2000, nearly three million manufacturing jobs have gone up in smoke, and it wasn’t because people were burning flags. No wonder only 25 percent of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing.

  It’s too soon to say whether or not things will improve under Democratic leadership. But neither side has shown a commitment to breaking gridlock in recent years, so I’m not very optimistic.

  The Constitution of the United States was drafted in fewer than one hundred working days. That was quite an accomplishment. It’s fair to ask our legislators, “What have you done for us lately? What can you show us that’s working?”

  CAN YOU SHOW ME WHERE IT’S WORKING?

  Nobody even asks the question, so I guess I will.

  Homeland security. Where is it working?

  The permanent tax cut. Where is it working?

  No Child Left Behind. Where is it working?

  The Patriot Act. Where is it working?

  Welfare reform. Where is it working?

  That’s just the short list. And whatever happened to Social Security reform? Immigration reform? Health care reform? Why is it so hard to find out what’s actually getting done? Could it be because nothing is getting done? I hope not, but I’m not too sure.

  WHEN IN DOUBT, BUILD A BUREAUCRACY

  There’s one thing the folks on Capitol Hill do seem to be good at: building bureaucracies. I have to tell you, I really threw up my hands in despair the day they announced the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. At the very moment when we most needed to be lean and mean, we decided to undertake the largest government reorganization in fifty years! The DHS consolidated twenty-two agencies and nearly two hundred thousand federal employees under its vast umbrella.

  What kind of job is the Department of Homeland Security doing? How is it spending its fifty-billion-dollar-a-year budget? Are we safer now than we were before 9/11? Yes or no? The bipartisan 9/11 Commission has given the Department of Homeland Security a failing grade (five Fs, twelve Ds, and two incompletes) for not making headway on the commission’s key recommendations for keeping us safer. Specifically, the commission cites:

  No headway on federal agencies sharing intelligence and terrorism information.

  No improvement in airline-passenger prescreening.

  No improvement on nuclear power plant security. (In mock terrorist incidents, over half the plants failed.)

  Little improvement in border security.

  If I’d brought home a report card like that, my father would have taken me to the woodshed. He insisted on straight As and accepted no excuses. He taught me that striving for excellence was my ticket to the American dream. Maybe that ideal has been lost.

  For most of us, the only experience we have with the Department of Homeland Security is when we go to an airport. After 9/11, air safety was job one. Right? Well, they took away our nail clippers and our liquids. They reinforced cockpit doors—which was actually a smart thing to do. And they put air marshals on planes. We all feel safer knowing there might be an air marshal on our plane.

  But wait a minute. According to a group of air marshals who publicly complained about the program, it’s so transparent that even little kids can identify them. Maybe it’s the dress code. Or maybe it’s the fact that air marshals have to publicly check in and show their credentials twice before they get on the plane. First at the metal detectors, and then at the gate. And once they get on board, they have to visit the cockpit and show their credentials to the pilot. They do everything but personally introduce themselves to the passengers. By the time an air marshal takes his seat, the only people on board who haven’t pegged him are either zoned out on their iPods or asleep.

  The biggest problem with airport security is that it’s reactive, not proactive. Threat of shoe bombs? Everyone takes off their shoes. Threat of liquid explosives? Everyone dumps their mouth-wash and deodorant. I hope nobody tries to get past security with explosives hidden in a book, or you won’t be reading this on your flight to Cincinnati.

  PLENTY OF RHETORIC, LITTLE ACTION

  I’m starting to get the suspicion that maybe the point of government is the bureaucracy, not the results. I started thinking about all the great crusades we’ve had in the last forty years. Politicians like to wage these so-called wars with great fanfare. We’ve declared war on poverty, war on drugs, war on big government, war on crime—just to name a few. That’s in addition to our real wars. But have you ever noticed that once the big campaign is rolled out and the politicians have all patted each other on the back, we never hear about it again? Did we win? Did we lose? Does anybody know?

  The war on drugs was launched thirty-six years ago. If they’re not careful, it’s going to turn into the hundred-year war. How’re we doing? We spend around $40 billion a year fighting the war on drugs. A conservative estimate of the total amount we’ve spent would be around one trillion dollars. So, are we winning? Well, we lock up about two million people a year—mostly drug users. But every expert analysis of our progress shows the same thing: After thirty-six years, we have not reduced the quantity of drugs or the consumption of drugs one lousy percentage point.

  Wake up, fellas. We’ve lost the war on drugs. But let any politician even suggest that we try a different strategy and he gets accused of being soft on drugs. It’s a hell of a way to run a war.


  A RADICAL PROPOSAL

  In Congress they pass law after law. They never really stop to look at the effects of the laws they pass. They just pass another one. They keep grinding out that sausage, and no one goes back and says, “Last year we budgeted $2 billion for that program. Did it work? Did we get a bang for our buck?” There’s no time for oversight. They’re already moving on to the next $2 billion. Is anyone surprised that 80 percent of Americans say our government is broken?

  So I have a proposal, and I know it’s a little radical, but hear me out. I’d like to give Congress a year off. That’s right. One year. I’d send them to a quiet place where they wouldn’t be distracted—maybe a nice convention center on Lake Michigan. And I’d tell them, “For the next year your job is NOT to pass any new laws or spend any new money. Your job is to evaluate what you’ve already done. Take each one of the hundreds of bills you’ve passed in the last three years, and show where it’s working. And if it’s not working, pull the plug on it.

  “Don’t worry about being away from Washington for a year. Most people won’t even know you’re gone. We’ll have someone answer the phones and take messages. We’ll call you if anything really urgent comes up.” But come to think of it, what could be more urgent than figuring out how to run a country that works?

  IV

  Aren’t we supposed to be the good guys?

  I’ve had a new word added to my vocabulary. The word is waterboarding. I kind of wish I’d never heard of it. No, it’s not a new sport. It’s a method of torture that involves dunking a prisoner underwater until he almost drowns, then pulling him up for air—and repeating the process until he talks. It can give you nightmares if you spend too much time thinking about methods of torture. But what really gives me nightmares is finding out that the United States is the one doing the torturing.

  Hey, aren’t we supposed to be the good guys?

  Look, I’m not naïve. I know war is hell. As General George Patton used to remind his troops during World War II, war is about killing. It’s bloody. But even in war, our nation has always chosen to uphold a certain moral code. We have declared that we are not going to become the evil we are fighting. I’d like someone to explain to me how torturing prisoners has become the American way.

  And don’t try to sell me that line of bull about how September 11 changed the rules of the game. September 11 was a horrible day. It was an act of unimaginable evil. But I just don’t buy it that because a group of terrorists attacked us on September 11, we’re suddenly justified in torturing people. I don’t buy it that it’s patriotic to pull people off the street and hold them indefinitely—and maybe forever—without even having to tell them why. Or ship them off to secret prisons in Eastern Europe. That might be worse than torture.

  It’s pretty sad to think we’ve come to this point. It makes you nostalgic for the leaders of the past.

  I can still remember how things were right after we defeated the Nazis in World War II. We had captured some of Hitler’s top henchmen, and everyone was wondering what we were going to do with them. These were guys who had ordered the murder of millions of innocent people in concentration camps. These were guys who had conducted cruel medical experiments on little children. They were evil, in the truest sense of the word. A lot of people thought we should just line them up and shoot them, or turn them over to the concentration camp survivors and let them be torn apart. Emotions ran pretty high. Would anyone really have objected to torturing those sons of bitches? I doubt it. But we had leaders then who reminded us of our higher ideals. Winston Churchill and Harry Truman insisted on holding the Nuremberg Trials. Think about it. We took the worst criminals of our times and we put them in a court of law. We gave them lawyers. We didn’t become the evil we were fighting.

  I also remember a few years later when the United States signed on to the Geneva Conventions. Who were the most enthusiastic supporters of the Geneva Conventions? Well, it might surprise you to know that they were two great military heroes—General Douglas MacArthur and Dwight D. Eisenhower. You wouldn’t call them pansies or bleeding hearts. They were speaking from experience. They’d seen how American soldiers were tortured and murdered in Japanese prison camps. The Geneva Conventions were meant to protect our soldiers in captivity. From that day forward, even during the Vietnam War when the North Vietnamese refused to abide by the Geneva Conventions, we always did.

  Until now.

  Vice President Cheney has argued in favor of torture. He said, “We have to work through, sort of, the dark side.”

  Sort of the dark side? Hey, I have news for Cheney. There’s no sort of about it. Torture is the dark side.

  I can’t believe we’re even having a discussion about whether it’s okay to torture prisoners. The people who think torture is okay seem to get most of their examples from the movies or TV dramas. They always give some outlandish example, like, if you were holding a guy who knew of a plot to blow up America, wouldn’t torture be justified to get information? The problem is, that’s not what is really happening. What’s really happening is that you’ve got a bunch of guys who were rounded up in Afghanistan, handed over to the U.S. military by locals, and shipped off to Guantánamo. To my knowledge, there’s not one leader of Al Qaeda in the bunch. Am I the only one who’s embarrassed that they call Guantánamo the American gulag?

  By the way, morality aside, I think we have to ask this question—even when we’re talking about torture: Does it work? Most experts on the subject say that under torture a prisoner will tell you anything you want to hear. But it won’t necessarily be true. And that’s what’s really pathetic about this whole mess. We’re trashing our principles, and we’re not even getting anything in return.

  I WANT MY COUNTRY BACK

  When I say I’m proud to be an American, what I mean is that I’m proud to live in a nation that is a force for good in the world. I’m proud to live in a nation that values human life. I’m proud to live in a nation where we “hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

  We don’t say “some” men. We don’t say “except when we decide you’re evil.” How did we lose our way?

  LET’S START BY TONING DOWN THE RHETORIC

  Words matter. Winston Churchill, one of the great orators of the twentieth century, put it this way: “Of all the talents bestowed upon men, none is so precious as the gift of oratory. Abandoned by his party, betrayed by his friends, stripped of his office, whoever can command this power is still formidable.”

  Words can inspire. They can lift us to heights we never dreamed possible. Words can also provoke fear and rage. They can pound people into the ground.

  A true leader always strives to inspire. That doesn’t mean he can’t express outrage. But he motivates people to act by appealing to the good in their hearts, not the evil in the hearts of others. He motivates people with possibility, not with threats. President Dwight Eisenhower once said, “You don’t lead by hitting people over the head. That’s assault, not leadership.”

  If you want to know how we got to the point of condoning torture, all you have to do is look at the trail of rhetoric from our leader:

  Axis of evil

  Mushroom cloud

  Shock and awe

  Wanted, dead or alive

  Ticking time bombs

  Enemies of freedom

  The forces of darkness and tyranny

  You’re with us or against us

  Bring ’em on

  Do you start to see a theme here? We can’t bully the world into submission. We can’t expect to win cooperation by calling people evil. You don’t have to talk tough in order to be tough. I have a simple piece of advice for President Bush: Fire the goddamned speechwriters!

  Look, this planet is a crowded place, and the only way we’re going to survive is to learn to get along with one another. Now, you can decide that
the way to lead is to knock off all the people you think are against you, but that’s never really worked, has it? And it’s not what democracy is all about.

  It’s time to get back to basics. What is democracy, anyway? Who are we as a people? Are we willing to do what it takes to be the good guys?

  V

  How much do we love democracy?

  My parents, Nicola and Antoinette Iacocca, belonged to that amazing wave of Italian immigration that helped transform America into the land of prosperity. As immigrants, my parents had a reverence for this country that you seldom see today. When my sister Delma and I were kids, Mom and Pop took us to visit the Statue of Liberty twice. We piled into Pop’s beat-up old Ford and drove from Allentown, Pennsylvania, to New York City—which took a long time in those days. I remember walking with my father up the 354 stairs to the crown, huffing and puffing a little, but excited about the adventure. Standing in the crown of the Statue of Liberty, Pop pointed down at the harbor and told me about the thrill of seeing America for the first time.

  I’m ashamed to admit that when I became a father, I didn’t think to take my girls to see Lady Liberty. When we visited New York City, we were too busy going to Broadway shows, eating at great restaurants, and touring museums.

  It’s a sad thing that complacency can set in so fast. As I look around me today, I see that our democracy has become a little worn, a little shabby. The rhetoric is still there, but the passion has wilted. Do we still love democracy? Do we have any idea what democracy really means?