罗姆尼vs.奥巴马：领导力对决

    同样大相径庭的还有两位候选人的领导风格。

    过去三年，奥巴马采取了类似于“划分阵营、各个击破”的方式，四处树敌，名单囊括了银行家、医疗保险公司、石油公司、富有的纳税人、美国国会以及最近的美国最高法院（the Supreme Court）。这份名单或许就连当年的尼克松总统也会为自己感到欣慰。当然，奥巴马的支持者们肯定认为这一策略是有效的，但不可否认的是如今的美国比奥巴马上台时更加对立。

    罗姆尼毫无疑问并不是什么模范领袖（他显然缺乏信赖感，这一点非常扎眼），但他具备一种品质，非常适合当总统——美国人传统的实用主义。或许这是他的商人本性。又或者，这是这位共和党人在担任马萨诸塞州州长期间以及拯救丑闻缠身的盐湖城冬奥会这段经历教会他的东西。假如罗姆尼多年的从政经验能说明什么问题，那就是他知道如何管好人员和机构，在没有太多内耗的情况下做成事情。

    看，奥巴马可能是一位出色的竞选人，罗姆尼（迄今为止）差不多正好相反。但两人要竞选的并不是“竞选长”这个职位。

    政界和商界，领袖的工作需要由一位真正的领袖来承担。而不管抱持哪种意识形态，没有一位真正的领袖会刻意树敌。

    译者：老榆木

    Stark, too, is the difference between the candidates' leadership styles.

    Over the past three years, Obama has taken a sort of divide-and-conquer approach, amassing a list of enemies that would make Richard Nixon proud -- bankers, healthcare insurance providers, oil companies, wealthy taxpayers, Congress and, most recently, the Supreme Court. Surely, his supporters must think this particular tactic is effective, but there can be no denying that the country is more polarized than when Obama took office.

    Without doubt, Romney is not the model leader (his apparent lack of authenticity can be jarring), but he has a quality that would serve him well as president -- good old American pragmatism. Perhaps that's the businessman in him. Or perhaps you just learn to do what you've got to do when you're a GOP governor in the People's Republic of Massachusetts or the man charged with salvaging the scandal-ridden Salt Lake City Olympics. If Romney's long record suggests anything, it's that he knows how to manage people and organizations to get things accomplished without a lot of internecine warfare.

    Look, Obama may be a great campaigner and Romney (to date) somewhat the opposite. But neither man is running to be Campaigner-in-Chief.

    In politics, as in business, the leader's job needs to be filled by a leader, and no effective leader, regardless of ideology, keeps an enemies list.