Steve Jobs bio sheds light on Obama relationship
He "was among the greatest of American innovators," President Obama said in a statement marking the death of Steve Jobs last month. "Brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world, and talented enough to do it."
It's not clear to what extent Jobs might have returned the compliment. He was, according to the biography written by Walter Isaacson, highly critical of Obama, at one point telling the president to his face, "You're headed for a one-term presidency." He also offered to help create ads for Obama's re-election campaign.
The account of Jobs' relationship with Obama, which comes toward the end of Isaacson's book, takes up little more than four of its 571 pages. But it sheds light on both men - not always flattering - and on the relationship between U.S. business and the U.S. government; again, not always flattering.
The relationship certainly got off to an unpromising start. Jobs initially balked at a suggested meeting of the two, which White House aides were trying to set up.
"I'm not going to get slotted in for a token meeting so that he can check off that he met with a CEO," Jobs told his wife, Laurene Powell. The least the president of the United States could do, Jobs added, was to invite the Apple CEO personally.
Jobs relented, but at their 45-minute meeting at the Westin San Francisco Airport hotel in Millbrae, he tore into Obama from the get-go, telling him he would be one-term president unless he got a lot more business-friendly. He railed about how hard it was to open a factory in the United States - as opposed to Apple's experience in China - in large part because of high costs and burdensome regulations.
Jobs then "offered to put together a group of 6 or 7 CEOs who could really explain the innovation challenges facing America," according to Isaacson. White House aides expanded the list to 20. Jobs balked again, this time at the "bloated list," and told the White House he wouldn't attend.
"In fact, his health problems had flared anew, and he wouldn't have been able to go anyway," Silicon Valley venture capitalist John Doerr, a close friend of Jobs, "privately explained to the president."
Jobs did attend a Silicon Valley dinner for Obama with local CEOs, hosted by Doerr in February, but not before objecting to the menu, particularly "a cream pie tricked out with chocolate truffles." The White House overruled the objection on the grounds that "the president liked cream pie."
Sitting next to the president, Jobs started the proceedings by saying, "Regardless of our political persuasions, I want you to know that we're here to do whatever you ask to help our country."
There followed a "litany of suggestions" from the other guests, including Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Google's Eric Schmidt, Yahoo's since-fired Carol Bartz, Oracle's Larry Ellison and Cisco Systems' John Chambers.
Chambers raised his pet hobby horse - repatriating U.S. profits earned overseas at a much reduced tax rate, about which the White House had already expressed skepticism.
"The president was annoyed," Isaacson writes, "and so was Zuckerberg, who turned to (senior Obama adviser) Valerie Jarrett, sitting to his right, and whispered, 'We should be talking about what's important to the country. Why is he just talking about what's good for him?' "
When it came to his turn, Jobs talked about the United States' lack of software engineers, and said that any foreign student who got an engineering degree at a U.S. university should automatically be offered a green card. Obama responded that such a change had to be part of the proposed Dream Act - allowing undocumented immigrants who graduated from a U.S. high school to become legal residents - which Republicans had blocked.
"Jobs found this an annoying example of how politics can lead to paralysis," according to Isaacson. " 'The president is very smart, but he kept explaining to us reasons why things can't get done,' he recalled. 'It infuriates me.' "
That resonates, as does Jobs' plea at the dinner for a crash program to train U.S. engineers. "You can't find that many in America to hire," Jobs said. "If you could educate these engineers, we could move more manufacturing plants here."
Less than two weeks after Jobs' death, a report by the National Association of Manufacturers and the consulting firm, DeLoitte, estimated there are 600,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs going unfilled because of the country's "skills gap."
Apparently, Jobs' relationship with Obama ended on an up note, with the two talking by telephone several times after the dinner, including one call in which Jobs reportedly offered to help out Obama's re-election campaign on the ad front.
"Jobs had been in pain, but the talk of politics energized him," Isaacson continues, quoting Jobs as saying, "Every once in a while a real ad pro gets involved, the way (the late San Francisco adman) Hal Riney did, with 'It's morning in America,' for Reagan's re-election in 1984. So that's what I'd like to do for Obama."
We don't know if Obama took Jobs up on his offer. We do know Jobs never got the chance. Whether Obama turns out to be a "one-term presidency," with or without Jobs, we'll have to wait a year to find out.
Read more: sfgate.com |
