Christmas at the White House

I am lucky enough to have visited the White House three times so far. The first time was with my grandfather, just weeks before I entered Basic Training. The second was about 5-6 years ago while I was an Intern at the Pentagon. The third time was last week!

I was able to get an invitation to the White House Press Event on 30 Nov 11 from the National Military Family Association. I was a little nervous because I wasn't really sure where to go or what to do. My wonderful husband took me to brunch at the Old Ebbett Grill and then walked me to the White House. He even waited with me for a bit until I got up the nerve to attach myself to a few other people who were waiting to go in.

Once inside, we were allowed to walk around on our own and really take our time looking at the decorations and other exhibits. I think because it was the press event, we were even allowed to take pictures.

Washington's Plate

We got to see several rooms that aren't usually open to the public (as far as I know). The Vermeil Room had six or seven official portraits of former First Ladies, including a very haunting portrait of Jackie Kennedy. Secretary Clinton's portrait was out in the hall. I don't think I saw Laura Bush's portrait - wonder where it is or if I just missed it...The China Room had a beautiful table set with china from the Bush presidency. It also had pieces from each previous china set on display including some pieces from George Washington's presidency.

Theme for this year

I could have spent a lot more time in the library looking at the books. They had some old White House Christmas cards on display including a really cool one with the 8th Air Force insignia on it. They were replicas, but still neat to see. Speaking of old White House cards, in one of the hallways, they had all of the previous cards on display. It's interesting that for Eisenhower all of his cards were very simple - just the Presidential Seal.

Official White House Tree

The official Christmas tree (one of 37 trees!) in the Blue Room was huge. I couldn't get a picture of the whole thing. It was decorated with pictures from military children around the world as well as ornaments made out of the material used for military medals. Interesting idea, at the same time I felt as if it were somehow trivializing what those medals stand for to use them as decorative material. One neat detail was that the tree skirt had buttons from military dress uniforms.

400 pound White House Gingerbread

There were so many cool things, such as the traditional White House gingerbread house (400 lbs!), the many different "Bo" decorations including a large one made with felt, one out of buttons and another one made from marshmallows and licorice, and one somewhat dark and scary nativity scene.

First Lady Michelle Obama

The highlight was seeing/hearing First Lady Michelle Obama speak in person. What an amazing surprise. Although the bigger surprise may have been that I liked her speech. The only thing I didn't like was that she said something along the lines of not wanting anyone to ever have to ask again what a Gold Star family is but then never actually told people what it was. (In case you are wondering, Gold Star families have lost a family member in the service. Blue Star families have a family member in the service.) Mrs. Obama mentioned that we were the first group to go through the White House of the over 85,000 visitors expected this season - neat to be part of that. Overall, it was pretty cool to see how a "press conference" happens. 

The large felt Bo

I met another Association volunteer and had a nice time walking around with her and talking with her. It's so much nicer to share an event with someone instead of walking around by yourself. We also met a Gold Star wife and walked around with her a bit. She was nice enough to share some of her pictures since she had brought an actual camera and not just her phone.

There are quite a few articles and probably much better pictures on the Internet if you want to read/see more.

WW - Beautiful Mount Vernon

Eventful Weekend

First there was the royal wedding on Friday...full of excitement, pomp and history...

Then there was the mass at the Vatican to beatify Pope John Paul II...

Now, the news that Osama bin Laden has been killed by US forces...

I watched TV most of the morning on Friday, about 30 minutes of the beatification mass early Sunday morning, and then missed Obama's speech by about 15-20 minutes. I had gone to bed and then saw a tweet that he was going to give a rare Sunday night press conference. Since there has been so much in the news about his birth certificate (which I am sick of hearing about and question his timing for releasing information....), I decided to stay in bed and not get up to watch his announcement. I kind of wish I had - it's quite a historical moment. On the other hand, my husband had his PT test this morning so it's probably good that I let him sleep...I wonder if they will still air the originally scheduled interview with Obama on Oprah this afternoon - from what I have seen he's discussing - yup, you guessed it, his birth certificate...Based on articles on the web, I'm not the only one (or the first) to question what Oprah might do...

Regardless, it has definitely been an eventful and historical weekend....

Blame Game

Yesterday our gas prices went from $3.69 to $4.09! Crazy!
So, just a quick question...
Why is it that everyone went through the roof back when President Bush was in office if the gas prices went up 5-10 cents, yet all of a sudden gas is well over $4.00 and it doesn't seem as if anyone has a problem with it...?
I don't get it. How can everything bad be one President's fault but for the next guy there's always someone else to blame?
Maybe I'm missing something - anyone able to help me out and/or explain this...?

Too Familiar?

I read a blog post today simply because the title caught my eye. The title was "Familiarity Breeds Disrespect." The funny thing is, the post itself was about treating yourself and others right. What I thought it was going to be about it completely different.

When I read "Familiarity Breeds Disrespect" I immediately thought of President and Mrs Obama. Why? Because I feel that in their quest to be the everyman's First Family, they have degraded the office of the President. The President, like any good leader, is not there to make friends. The President's job is to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States." No where in the oath does it state the need to be liked by everyone, to be on late-night TV shows, to be on the cover of magazines every month, etc. Seeing our President on a late-night show with no tie on as if he is just some community organizer instead of the President of the United States was a sad moment for me. (I won't even get into my thoughts on the First Lady being on magazine covers or in ads for Talbots...)

Maybe it is the military part of me coming out, but to me a leader shouldn't be part of the masses. If a leader is part of the masses, the masses tend to stop following and start saying "yeah, but" or "how come?" or "why should I?" a lot more often. And why not, if the leader is part of the group, then what makes them so special? What makes them able to make decisions better than anyone else?

Being "just one of the guys" and allowing, even encouraging, familiarity takes away from the specialness of the office. The man was elected to lead our country. He should remember the Presidency is an office to be held in high-esteem and if he doesn't see it that way, soon enough, others won't either.

20/20 Hindsight or Cognitive Bias?

In a survey by 65 historians, former President George W. Bush was ranked 36th out of the 42 men who have served as US President through 2008. The survey participants ranked each former president on a scale of one, "not effective" to 10, "very effective," on a list of 10 leadership qualities including relations with Congress, public persuasion, moral authority, international relations, economic management, pursuing equal justice for all and crisis leadership.

Within the article, one of the survey participants, Dr. Edna Medford (Associate Professor and former director of the Department of History’s graduate and undergraduate programs at Howard University) made a statement that really resonated with me. She said “Today's concerns shape our views of the past, be it in the area of foreign policy, managing the economy or human rights.” This statement made me think of one of my previous posts, as well as a follow-up post from a friend of mine.

When I chose the words “20/20” and discussed former President Bush being judged based on hindsight – I should have included a discussion concerning some of the more obvious cognitive bias that may have led to where we are today.

There are many to choose from, though I suspect that “experts” out there may have more to say on the subject than I ever could. Hindsight bias, outcome bias, historian’s fallacy, and the fog of war technique seem to fit the bill here. Very basic definitions from Wikipedia show that hindsight bias is “filtering memory of past events through present knowledge, so that those events look more predictable than they actually were.” The example they use is the attack on Pearl Harbor – looking back, with what we know now, it seems impossible to believe such a surprise attack was possible. Outcome bias is the tendency to judge a decision by its eventual outcome instead of based on the quality of the decision at the time it was made. The historian’s fallacy occurs when one assumes decision makers of the past viewed events from the same perspective and having the same information as those subsequently analyzing the decision. Finally, as stated in Wikipedia, in the “fog of war technique” approach, “the actions and decisions of the historical subject (such as a military commander) are evaluated primarily on the basis of what that person knew at the time, and not on future developments that the person could not have known.”

The fog of war technique and historian’s fallacy seem to fit very well with what I discussed in my post about judging fmr Pres Bush’s decisions regarding his actions following 9/11. In the present, we have considerably more information and different information than what was available immediately following September 11th, 2001. It is a mistake to judge decisions made 8+ years ago using today’s perspectives and today’s information.

I am not saying those decisions were right or wrong, simply that those decisions should be judged based on what the decision maker knew at the time. I choose to believe that George Bush, as our President and as an elected official, made the best decision he was able to for the good of our country, based on the best information available at the time. If one does not, or cannot, believe that about our elected officials in the highest office in the land, what does that say about our election process and democracy in general?

20/20

Making a decision is a funny thing. We expect people in leadership positions to make the tough decisions. Sometimes, all we want is for them to make any kind of decision - good or bad. While I was in the Air Force, I was told several times that as an officer, part of the job is to make a decision. Even if it turns out to be wrong, a bad decision is better than no decision. At least you acted to try and make the situation better.

It seems as if in the last several months, the favorite topic in the news was former President Bush and his decision making over the last 8 years. History will judge him better than we can at this moment. It is almost too easy to judge him knowing what we now know. We may never know exactly what information he had at his disposal ("need to know" and national security being what they are), however, I am sure he made the best decisions he could based on the information he was given. As an elected official, our highest elected official, we must believe he made decisions based on the information at hand and what he believed was best for us and our country.

In a recent article describing the unveiling of his official portrait, Gen Pete Pace (USMC, Ret) made a comment that fit right along with this. Gen Pace said he "certainly made some recommendations that if I could take them back and change them, I would, given the knowledge of today, but I also know that given the exact same data, at the exact same time in history, I would give the exact same advice.” Given the "knowledge of today" I think we would be hard pressed to find any decisions from any point and time in history that we wouldn't change in some way. As easy as it is to do that, it is important to think of the knowledge at the time instead of the knowledge of today (taking into account the whole hindsight being 20/20 thing). Most would prefer to wait until they have 100% of the information required to make a fully informed decision. However, the majority of the time, you cannot wait until you have 100%, and at other times, the information is continusously changing and it isn't possible to ever have 100%. It takes courage and bravery to make a decision knowing you will be judged on both the decision and the outcome.

History may prove me wrong, but right now, with the "knowledge of today," I am proud of former President George Bush and Gen Pete Pace. Proud of the decisions they made in their quest to keep our country safe; proud of the men they are and the leadership and service they gave to our country; proud they are men we can look up to and respect.

I hope and pray the men and women leading our country today put the country first in all their decision making, regardless of the consequences only history will show.