The Hagel nomination is dumb. Democratic presidents shouldn’t nominate Republicans as Secretary of Defense. The perception is that their party is soft. The more prominent Democrats with solid security credentials the better it is for them and it doesn’t get any better than SecDef. Bill Clinton had Cohen and now this. In politics it doesn’t pay to play into the negative stereotypes about you. If I were conservative I’d use every opportunity to point out that the Dems were so weak on national defense that they had to borrow a Republican to run it for them.
Aside from the fact that this is the least of the “issues” with Hagel’s nomination, I’d only comment that the approach suggested above is why the whole political process is eff’d up. I mean, if that is your only argument against his nomination that only shows your position is weak as you have nothing but some divisive rhetoric to offer. Which is one of the things Dems want to remove from the political process. And I’m sure Obama would scorn you if he read this.
I dunno. It’s a way to look like Obama’s reaching across the aisle while pissing off Mitch McConnell. Chuck Hagel is not an idiot enough that I used to have to check for the ® and I think he’ll be a good SecDef.
I think it is a savvy political move. Hagel is already seen a a moderate Republican, and this could increase the perception of him as a RINO. Perhaps it is an attempt to manipulate the Republicans into forcing him out of the their party and into the Democratic party. If they are determined to whittle themselves down to nothing but True Believers, there is some logic to speeding up the process, by compromising all their moderates. Think John Huntsman.
That’s an interesting conclusion you’ve jumped to from nothing more than my limited interest in this nomination. This is the aspect of it that I’d like to discuss. It would be nice if we lived in less contentious political times but it’s folly not to suit your tactics to your current situation.
Unless Hagel is uniquely qualified for the job I don’t see it’s reason to offer him the job. Presidents do usually include a member of the opposing political party in their Cabinet as a nod to bipartisanship. That’s smart. But there are other cabinet posts. Ones that appointing a Repub too doesn’t contribute to a negative trope about the Dems.
You might have a point here. The perception that moderates have no place in the GOP is a strong pro-Democratic trope and something they should be reinforcing.
And the Democrats would say “Bin Laden’s dead” and you’d lose the argument. Then the Democrats would go further and talk about Obama’s renewed focus on counterterrorism and his aggressive use of drones and you’d lose the argument in an embarrassing way.
One of the surprising results of Obama’s first term is that Democrats don’t have to worry about being seen as weak on defense anymore because he’s been very successful at handling these issues. For example Romney criticized Obama’s foreign policy but couldn’t find anything to criticize in his handling of terrorism. He’s totally outflanked the Republicans there, and that’s one reason he can nominate a Republican without worrying about this. In the meantime I guess he’s picked Hagel for the bipartisan value and because in Congress Hagel spoke up in favor of cutting the Pentagon’s budget, which Obama may want to do.
Well… does he have to find a Republican to do the job? Who do we have on the Democrat side who’d be able to do the job?
Yes, there are Democrat or non-Republican options. And the outgoing Secretary of Defense (Panetta) is a Democrat, so it’s not like Obama has exclusively relied on Republicans for this job.
Perception is more important than fact sometimes. As you say, Obama has been very hawkish and the Bush Jr’s foreign policy was an embarrassing disaster but that makes the Dems Are Weak trope even more important. If the GOP simply shut up they concede foreign policy to the Dems… who can’t run Obama again after all.
This is circular logic. Ultimately, nobody cares about the party affiliation of the Secretary of Defense, and if you don’t believe me, ask Senate Republicans- they’re poised to give Hagel a hard time. I don’t like this nomination, but Obama isn’t giving anything away or hurting himself here.
There’s certainly a persuasive case for saying enough is enough in terms of Democrats giving away plumb Cabinet posts to Republicans. I can agree this was a pernicious trend driven by the weak-kneed post-McGovern era insecurity of Democrats on National Security. The main thrust of this argument is well made - it was certainly a dubious practice that was unreciprocated by any kind of matching gesture by Republicans in office, and it is doubly asinine when you have genuine internal talent sitting on the bench and now Democrats beat Republicans on perceptions around foreign policy competence anyway.
However, I think applying this argument to the Hagel nomination wrongly assumes Obama doesn’t actually have a genuine relationship of trust with Hagel that has led him to float the name in the first place. This isn’t about trying to get token Republican bipartisanship, I think Obama genuinely believes he would be capable and have the military cred necessary to achieve difficult reforms.
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One of the surprising results of Obama’s first term is that Democrats don’t have to worry about being seen as weak on defense anymore because he’s been very successful at handling these issues. For example Romney criticized Obama’s foreign policy but couldn’t find anything to criticize in his handling of terrorism. He’s totally outflanked the Republicans there, and that’s one reason he can nominate a Republican without worrying about this. In the meantime I guess he’s picked Hagel for the bipartisan value and because in Congress Hagel spoke up in favor of cutting the Pentagon’s budget, which Obama may want to do.
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Yes, exactly. I honestly think this was the move of someone confident and shows that Obama (and by extension the Dems, though obviously some don’t get it) are working from a position of strength on defense. Obama kills several birds with a single stone here, and frees himself up to focus on more important domestic things. If he can get us out of the current recession, despite the perception of the Pubs holding things back, I’d say the Dems will have been brought, kicking and screaming, into a very solid position for the next election cycle. Oh, you never know if the Dems will snatch defeat from the very jaws of victory, but Obama is doing his best here…
Not to mention making Senate Republicans look even more like intransigent idiots considering that Hagel is one of their own.
Hagel hasn’t held elective office for four years now, so it’s unlikely that Obama is trying to force a change of party for him. He’s not a sitting senator and hasn’t been for a while.
The Washington Post editorialized against the Hagel nomination, claiming Hegel’s defense policies are too liberal for Obama.
Yeah, even the Republicans don’t like him. If the Ds and the Rs both dislike the guy, then I like him a lot, and think he’d be excellent in the job. Nothing really addressing his qualifications there, but I’d be more suspicious of anyone either party really liked for the job.
As others have said, Obama’s National Security credentials are strong enough at this point that he doesn’t have to worry about any appearance problems. Sure, some people will attack him on this issue but these people will attack him on anything he does. This isn’t an issue that’s going to gain any traction among the general public.
It’s also a good political move. As the Republican base gets more narrow and conservative, Obama is making a bipartisan gesture. Democrats want to start making the argument that they’re more in line with moderate Republicans than the current Republican party is.
It also puts Congressional Republicans in a hard place. If they attack Hagel, they’ll end up looking so obstructionist that they’re even willing to attack a fellow Republican to get at Obama. If they support Hagel and oppose other nominations, they’ll look like they’re just following party lines. And if they back off and let the nominations slide, then the Obama administration gets what it wants with minimal fuss.
I found this very informative. In fact it made me feel better about Hagel’s candidacy in spite of his disgusting comments about James Hormel years ago. Spoiler alert: the conclusion is that Republicans don’t have a problem with Hagel. They have a problem with Obama and this is the only thing they can do about it.
You need to change your username because you don’t make too much sense. Your two cents are worthless to me. As a matter of fact zero sense would make more sense since you make no sense.
This is insulting and not appropriate for Great Debates. Don’t do this again.
How so? If your line of attack is weakening, shoring it up seems pretty logical to me.
If Hagel is uniquely qualified then that certainly should override the perception problem I’m highlighting.
It’s not about Obama. He’s not going to nominate himself for SecDef and can’t run for POTUS again so his credentials are immaterial. It’s about the perception that the defense of the nation is safer in the hands of a Republican.
Again, there are other nominations.
This though, looks like smart politics. I’m not saying that reinforcing the “Weak Democrats” stereotype is the most important thing. If there is something to be gained then it’s not dumb.