A Heretic's Advice To Obama

Democratic insiders point to Carter administration pratfalls caused by a lack of reliance upon, well, people like themselves. Bill Clinton's first-year mistakes were chalked up to the naiveté of out-of-towners. George W. Bush heard some of the same slams against his team of Texans when he first hit town.

To be fair, and balanced, I acknowledge that insiders have a point when they say political novices don't know their way around Washington, that they are quite likely to get lost. Nothing like having a guide dog around when the territory is hard to see, the insiders will tell you.

Here's another point in their favor:

Both Democratic and GOP power brokers contribute an impressive amount of time, treasure and talent to their party's fortunes.

They are sincere adherents to their party's beliefs. Many have served in government, occupying positions of great responsibility. Some of them go back to the administrations of Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon.

Insiders also come to the table with experience in the ways of Washington gained through their own mishaps and the mistakes of others.

But here's my problem with putting that crowd in charge. They live by the old rules of Washington politics and, simply stated, they are in it for themselves.

To be sure, as dedicated partisans, they want their new president to succeed. But unlike untried recruits and enlistees eager to go the distance for their leader, Washington insiders will go to the ground at the first sign of a threat to their own eminence.

Having acquired the status of "mover and shaker" -- which guarantees lucrative clients and consulting contracts, along with invitations to A-list gatherings -- Washington insiders can't afford to be associated with losers, especially anything resembling a bumbling failure.

Retaining their lofty standing among Washington's political, social and artistic intelligentsia ranks über alles.

Thus, when the new president hits a rough patch -- and they all do -- Washington insiders are usually the first to duck and cover, and undergo a conversion from out-front cheerleader to inside backbiter.

They do it in a time-honored Washington way. They cover their derrières by indulging in the blame game over lunch with their Capitol Hill contacts, with K Street lobbyists, with Massachusetts Avenue think-tankers and with those of us in the media -- all on background, of course.