'Gloria Arroyo' has dinner with 'Barack Obama'

Ilham Anas is a photographer in Indonesia who has won new fame as a Barack Obama lookalike,
His resemblance to Obama is uncanny - see photo here.

Here he is in a advertisement that shows “Philippine president Gloria Arroyo” hosting a dinner with “Barack Obama” who in turn experiences dyspepsia from overeating.

About the Personalities of Joe Biden and Barack Obama, and about Etiquette

THE QUALITY OF MERCY IS NOT STRAINED is the frequent quote of a gentleman lawyer friend of mine, a man with real social grace, emotional intelligence, and etiquette. It has to do with the exercise of power and the example one sets. Mr. Valdez, you see, is named partner in a law firm.

The article, by Maureen Dowd, is called Oval Newlywed Game. It uses old terminology - the superego and the id:

It can’t be easy, for someone with a highly defined superego to be bound to the wacky Biden id, for one so disciplined to be tied to one so undisciplined, for a man so coolly unsentimental to be paired with someone so exuberantly sentimental.

I love Dowd. οἱ πολλοί ... id ... Jane Austen ... all in one article. And hoi polloi is spelled correctly, not surprisingly.

The article points the different personalities of these men, which is to say, their brains are different. Is this about right-brain, left-brain and whole-brain? Personality, they say, resides in the reptilian brain - our early-learned and ever-enduring (unless one wants to change) ways of perceiving the world, reacting to it, and relating to it. We can ameliorate these ancient patterns, with the higher brains - the limbic and the neo-cortex (right-brain and left-brain, with corpus callosum joining). I might say that Obama has more of an observing ego. And who has the higher emotional intelligence here? The better etiquette?

But the POINT of Dowd's article is all about emotional intelligence and etiquette. For Obama will have to deal with these aspects of Biden's personality, and how he does this will say more about him (superego notwithstanding) than about Biden. Obama has been noted to respond, in interviews, with what Dowd calls "snarky comments" (like "not surprisingly"). Writes Dowd:

It was the “not surprisingly” that was surprisingly snarky.

So snarky, that it's being parodied on SNL, which is brutal about that sort of thing. What more can I say?

The remedy, the etiquette, how a gentleman behaves? What we all know about situations like these. Dowd closes with:

Still, the president should brush up on his Jane Austen. When Emma
Woodhouse belittles Miss Bates, an older and poorer friend, at a picnic, Mr.
Knightly pulls her aside to remonstrate. “How could you be so insolent in your
wit?” he chides, reminding her that it is unfeeling to humble someone less
fortunate in front of others who will be guided by the way she behaves.

That’s how it works ... not surprisingly.

Jane Austen? I'm afraid many readers won't have read Jane Austen, the author of "Emma." This is from the time of 'comedies of manners.' From wikipedia:

Also, it turns out, [Emma] ... is rather spoiled; and, she overvalues her personal judgment and skills...and, she is naive —clueless, even— about the effects of her social machinations on others. Prior to starting the novel, Austen wrote, "I am going to take a heroine whom no-one but myself will much like."

Unlike me, as well, I hope. And you?

Remember ... others are watching. Especially when you're the Leader. They will be "guided by the way [you] behave."

Executive coach, Susan Dunn, M.A., Dallas

Obama Inauguration, Nonverbals

Obama's nonverbals - gestures, expressions, postures - are definitely unique and definitely a a part of his appeal.

There is nothing threatening about his gestures - no fist banging, no hard finger pointing. They are carefully orchestrated. They are almost delicate. And very restrained. Like his "friendly face" as my international friends describe it, this is man who is centered, and invites you to join him.

This video talks about something called "finger healing" - maybe yes, maybe no, but it's a great look at the gestures and expressions of Obama.



To learn moe

Can Obama Do It?

Now you know when an article from the UK leads off with Churchill, you'd better pay attention! Kennedy is mentioned. I throw in Abraham Lincoln. Let's do it. We need some inspiration right now!

From Can Barack Obama fix it? Yes, he can, London Times, Andrew Sullivan, is all about emotional intelligence. For instance:

At several points in the gut-wrenching emotional rollercoaster of last year [Obama] simply disappeared alone into a hotel room for a few minutes to gather his thoughts and restrain his feelings.

This is pure and simple EQ. In fact Abraham Lincoln said ...

"A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall ... If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend ... On the contrary, assume to dictate to his judgment, or to command his actions, or to mark him as one to be shunned or despised, and he will retreat within himself, close all the avenues to his head and his heart.... "

And there is some quote by Lincoln I can't find - though many have said it it many different ways about stopping to think before you speak. It's part of emotional intelligence.

Leading paragraphs from the article:

Magnanimity in victory: that was Churchill’s advice. And since his precocious victory last November, Barack Obama has walked that Churchillian walk. It is not common in politics, especially after a meteoric rise past every prejudice, every smear and every Clinton, but Obama has an old soul’s perspective and an intellectually secure man’s confidence. Perhaps he has too much confidence — except that every time his friends feared that in the campaign, he proved them wrong.

From the shallow brittleness of George W Bush to the supple strength of Obama is a revolution in temperament and style not seen since Jimmy Carter gave way to Ronald Reagan 28 years ago. It signals the kind of administration that now looms before us: a conciliatory, inclusive, pragmatic form of liberalism. It’s a liberalism eager to learn from the insights of conservatives, and it is pioneered by a president-elect shrewd enough to know that generosity of spirit means more leverage and influence, not less.

I was talking to a client the other day who lives in the UK and he said, with that British politeness and restraint that I love -- you know, without mentioning any names -- that America "needed a friendlier face." Look at the photo included with the above article (which has Barack Obama's name spelled wrong, but we'll be seeing that a lot).

In this article, Sullivan reviews Obama's domestic and foreign policies and their chances for success. We all wish the best for Obama and hope and pray that he can, as we await the Inaugural speech tomorrow, and the coming 4 years.

The article is sprinkled with those qualities which can make a leader effective, and qualities that we associate with emotional intelligence:

• He shows every sign of meaning what he said (Intentionality)
• leaving divisive, destructive froth behind
• (During the past 16 years) the press learnt that cynicism was the only reliable guide to understanding politics and that world-weariness was the same as wisdom
• (getting out of) an emotionally familiar and comfortable rut
• Gave his chief rival and fierce competitor "the biggest job in his government"
• Has asked some Bush appointees to stay on
• Obama acts like a kind of antacid to the American stomach
• He has walked through the churn of racial and cultural and religious polarisation and somehow calmed everyone down
• Obama's speech re: Jeremiah Wright: "That Obama wrote and delivered it as he heard in his ears every racial stereotype that had pummelled his psyche for his entire life bespoke an emotional maturity that still shocks."
• He even managed ... to suck the drama out of the Clintons
• He never took the Sarah Palin bait (As I say over and over in my Handling Difficult People ebook -- don't take the bait!)
• Doesn't charm like Clinton did or Bush tried to ... he appears to have no need to be loved by everyone in the room
• Often finds it hard to disguise how tired he feels (emotional expression ... )
• At several points in the gut-wrenching emotional rollercoaster of last year he simply disappeared alone into a hotel room for a few minutes to gather his thoughts and restrain his feelings.
• More of a strategist than a technician
• Blend of pragmatism and realism
• Has the unerring instincts of a conciliator
• Has the rhetorical skills of a Kennedy or a Churchill
• Willingness to give others credit
• to approach issues with dispassionate pragmatism
• shift by symbols and speeches the mood and tenor of an entire country

Well that's just a taste. Read the article in its entirety; it's a good one. It ends with

Even now, as the outlook seems so dark, and as the inheritance seems so
insuperable, three words linger in the mind.

Yes he can.

And two words echo back at me.

Can we?

Which leads me, your blogger to sigh and pray:

Let's hope so.

What are you doing to get to the next level?

"It's going to be an interesting lunch," Bush told an interviewer recently. When asked what the five men would talk about, Bush said: "I don't know. I'm sure (Obama's) going to ask us all questions, I would guess. If not, we'll just share war stories."

The Huffington Post called it "extraordinary."

The photo of the historic meeting of the presidents made the front page of many papers. President Bush met with President-Elect Obama and former Presidents Jimmy Carter, George H. W. Bush, and Bill Clinton. Prior to their luncheon meeting they held a photo opportunity for the press in the Oval Office.

Obama said graciously:

"All the gentlemen here understand both the pressures and possibilities of this office," Obama said. "For me to have the opportunity to get advice, good counsel and fellowship with these individuals is extraordinary."

How smart to get together with others who know the territory.

What a wonderful way to get started - healing divisions, getting advice, getting support, talking with others who have done the job and now what it entails. And doing something most people think was A Good Thing, well actually extraordinary.

Now what are YOU going to do to get your level? Let me coach you to success. Email me at sdunn@susandunn.cc .

Web 2.0 Politics and Obama

Tories and Obama embrace web 2.0 while Labour lags behind
an article written by Charlotte Leslie who is the Conservatives' parliamentary candidate for Bristol North West, posted today, Nov. 17.


Says Ms. Leslie:

Gordon Brown's statistical virtual worlds are not the only virtual world in politics....There is another – which New Labour interestingly seems less at home in.

That is the virtual world of web 2.0 – brought to political life recently by the web-world-wizard, the BlackBerrying star with his own social networking website, Barack Obama. And it is completely changing the way politics – and candidates like me – work.

As a candidate in the web-2.0 age, I am instantly connectable to friends and many potential voters. That means people demand very different things from their politicians. They want to know them in ways that were not possible before – they want to know them with their emotional intelligence as well as analyse what they say with their rational faculties.

President, Leadership, Emotional Intelligence

President Barack Obama will soon begin a process that is part of leadership -- disappointing people. Because the constituency is deeply divided, and because he needs more support to push his legislation through, he will have to win over some of those who voted against him (build a broader political base) and in so-doing, will lose some of those who voted for him.

And because he now has to 'put feet' to his idealistic promises he will do the same - disappoint many.

What will he do and how will he do it?

Or course I'm concerned about the election. Who isn't. Whichever way you voted we have some monumnetal work to be done.

So I've been reading.

I went back to LBJ, who pushed some major US-changing legislation through - to say the least. Many reading this blog may not have lived through "integration" or have an inkling what it meant at the time. I remember my husband and I pondering a trip from N. C. to Florida, and being afraid to drive that route at the time.

At any rate, about leadership, from an article on LBJ:

He was fond of quoting Sam Rayburn as saying that ''A man who can't size up another person when he walks in the room had better be in another profession.'' No one could do that better than Johnson. His greatest gifts of leadership - the ability to understand, persuade and subdue - depended on connections and relationships that existed on a human scale.

The part we seem to forget, in our negotiations, is the "subdue" part. Big emotional intelligence thing there. It could be re-phrased as the flip side of "don't leave them wounded."

To continue:

''I always believed,'' he once said, ''that as long as I could take someone into a room with me I could make him my friend. And that included anybody, even Nikita Khrushchev. From the start of my Presidency, I believed that if I handled him right he would go along with me. Deep down, hidden way below, he too wanted what was good, but every now and then this terrible urge for world domination would get into him and take control and then he'd go off on some crazy jag, like putting those missiles in Cuba. I saw all that in him and knew I could cope with it so long as he and I were in the same room.''

Later, as the enigmatic Ho Chi Minh loosed forces that threatened to destroy him, he would remark: ''If only I could get Ho in a room with me, I'm sure we could work things out.''

And then:

It was true that there were few who could totally resist the influence of Lyndon Johnson's personal presence.

''I can't stand the bastard,'' Robert Kennedy once told me after a private meeting with the President, ''but he's the most formidable human being I've ever met.''

From Dick Goodwin's President Lyndon Johnson: The War Within .

What will happen now is we will see if he can be a leader as well as someone who can win an election.

May God bless him in his endeavors, and the U. S. as well.