Obama can set excellent example for CEOs by forgoing his salary

President-elect Barack Obama has already demonstrated a sensible impulse: to make haste slowly as he prepares to tackle the nation's pressing issues in a pro-active, bipartisan manner. His next steps will be most effective if they captivate, inspire, energize and assist Americans.

Obama has no choice about the No. 1 priority, the economy, and he cannot avoid great expectations, however unrealistic those might be. Preoccupied with rising unemployment, business failures, the home-mortgage morass, tight credit and general uncertainty about the future, Americans want answers. And they have little patience.

Fortunately, opportunity knocks from the conversation on the most recently spotlighted ailing sector: the auto industry. Obama favors swift emergency help; I am certain that some kind of bailout will emerge. As I have said in the past, federal-government financial props for suffering businesses are hardly ideal, but the nation cannot afford to sit idly by as unusually turbulent circumstances ravage economic icons. It is essential, though, for Obama to set the tone for these and other debates about bailouts by underscoring his own commitment to cut spending and willingness to sacrifice. He should start by voluntarily reducing his own presidential salary.

Some have argued that Obama would ensure the greatest impact by entirely waiving his compensation for at least a year. Others, such as presidential-studies scholar Stephen Wayne of Georgetown University, contend that Obama is not really a rich man by today's standards. Thus, Wayne says, a partial reduction would be sufficient. Either way, Obama would provide a leadership path for others to follow. Indeed, should he agree to a salary reduction, he would be positioned to press the heads of businesses seeking government bailouts to cut their personal salaries by the same percentage. Not only would such a decision impress employees, shareholders and consumers, it would save jobs.

Wayne adds that Obama, in his inauguration speech, should include some of former President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's nothing-to-fear-but-fear-itself language. Although today's crisis falls well short of The Great Depression, Americans are no less in need of a remedy for their jittery nerves.

Beyond rhetoric, Obama should display his trademark can-do optimism by outlining ideas to stimulate the economy during the long term, including a strategy much bolder than any presented in the campaign to rebuild the "infrastructure of America." To me, that concept, broadly defined, means not only transportation systems, communications and public utilities but schools, military capabilities devoured by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and energy alternatives.

Along the way, an overarching goal should be to respect and protect the environment. That kind of initiative would put people back to work and leave the nation in an enhanced position once the recovery comes. Regarding other matters, Obama should use the inauguration to signal that one of his major, first-year goals will be to revitalize U.S. global leadership. Much of that effort will be political: sending out the right signals, underscoring multilateral intentions, taking advantage of good will and getting dialogues going. But it also will require taking the initiative, in cooperation with other countries, to facilitate peacemaking, combat threats such as terrorism and climate change, and promote globally beneficial economic practices, particularly freer trade.

Although he cannot issue an Emancipation Proclamation for the world, he can declare the realistic objective of substantially ending slavery within a generation. Finally, Obama must reach across the political aisle early and often, and not simply in terms of a bipartisan selection process for his Cabinet and other key positions. He is, I believe, too smart to pursue much of the intensely liberal agenda that so many people fear, especially those who declined to vote for him. To succeed and make a difference sooner rather than later, he must govern from the middle.