"The Buck Stops With Me"

A lot of people are impressed by this:

“I am less interested in passing out blame than I am in learning from and correcting these mistakes to make us safer. For ultimately, the buck stops with me. … When the system fails, it is my responsibility.”

I'm not, and was talking about it with cobloggers (similarly unimpressed) and figured why talk about it in email.

He dodged responsibility for a week. He minimized it and claimed it was just an independent actor, unconnected to anything bigger, even when it was pretty firmly established it was Al Qaeda.

I don't think he made this statement because he believes it, or because he wanted to. I think he made this statement because polling and focus-groups told him that if he didn't make it, he was risking an even bigger loss in his poll numbers than anything he'd seen before.

So it's a case -- I am 99% confident -- of "doing the right thing when there are no other options left."

posted by Ace at 06:11 PM

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