Building Success with Business Ethics: Advice from Business Leaders (Collection)

5. Initiative, Maneuver, and Disproportionality

On July 22, 2009, President Barack Obama launched his single-most-important legislative initiative: a proposed reform to the United States healthcare system. He knew that healthcare reform would be a tough sell. President Bill Clinton had tried and failed to reform healthcare in his first term.

President Obama wanted to seize the initiative and control the terms of debate. So he launched his campaign using all the magisterial authority of his office: an hour-long, prime-time press conference in the East Room of the White House. He strode confidently down a red carpet, through an oversized doorway that served as a proscenium arch, up to the presidential lectern. An American flag stood stage right; ...