The McChrystal/Obama Side Show

In my work we use the metaphor Center Ring versus Side Show. It's a circus image implying that the real work of the organization takes place in the Center Ring and, unfortunately, we spend too much of our time being drawn off into the Side Show - rumors, self-justifying stories, dramatic irrelevancies, finger-pointing (always away from ourselves) that keep us entertained while drawn away from the real work in the Center Ring. Fine, except that one of our clients in a Southeast Asian nation that has no circuses has had difficulty with the metaphor. We've offered alternatives, but nothing may do better than the current dust-up between general Stanley McChrystal and the Obama administration. General McChrystal is making all the required apologies for his mis-spoken mis-statements, but none of that will cover up the dramatic conflict between him and president Obama and others in the Obama administration. So here is where the Side Show unfolds: Who side do you take? Are your for McChrystal or Obama? As is the case with all Side Shows, feelings run high and righteousness reigns. But, so long as we remain glued to and entertained by this drama, we remain firmly embedded in the Side Show and blinded to  the real work of the Center Ring: the war in Afghanistan. To me there is an obvious truth about that war that Side Shows blind us to, and that is that that war is un-winnable. It is only a matter of time - and so many deaths and casualties of NATO troops and deaths of Afghanis - before we find some way to save face and call it quits. Obama versus McChrystal is the Side Show; the Center Ring is the business of ending this hopeless war, a challenge neither of them is ready to assume.