So far all we’ve gotten is more DLC and AIPAC.
But where is the DNC and J-Street?
It was the Progressive-minded Dems that built the base, did the work, worked the phones and hit the streets, got the vote out, brought the conservatives over. Progressives are the ones that made, earned, and deserve the mandate that brought Obama into office; not further capitulation to corporate and hawkish interest.
This better not be the real okey-doke Obama was talking about.
“When he gets elected I will dance. I will dance on the morning of his inauguration and I will break dance in the evening, BUT the next day I will become his biggest critic. He must be held accountable.”
-Dr. Cornel West
No shit. The man can’t win. If he appoints people who have been in Washington for years, it’s “that’s not change.” If he appoints political tyros it’s “they don’t have the chops.”
He said his administration would change things, not that his administration would be made up of people you never heard of before.
Obama cabinet members named so far: Zero. Again, people are jumping to conclusions based on reports about who has supposedly spoken to whom about what and who is allegedly under consideration.
So far, about all we know of Obama’s administration is that Rahm Emanuel will be Chief of Staff, Robert Gibbs will probably be press secretary and David Axelrod will probably be a senior adviser. Some other announcements are supposedly coming today, but none will be cabinet posts.
For what it’s worth… which is probably very little since this is coming from the mouth of a politician… here’s an excerpt from an interview on CNN after the third debate:
*BLITZER: One final question, Senator Clinton, before I let you go. I know you’ve got a tough schedule over there. If he’s elected, Barack Obama, president, and he asks you to give up your position as a United States senator and join him in the Cabinet, is that something you would consider doing?
CLINTON: Well, I really want to stay a senator. I am committed to being in the Senate, working with President Obama. I think we have a real chance to break the gridlock, get things done, start progress going again in America. And I want to be part of that in the Senate.
And one of the lessons that I took away from my husband’s administration is don’t take senators out of the Senate. You need every Democratic senator that you possibly can have. You know, we still might have to face a filibuster if we don’t get to 60 Democratic senators.
We can’t afford to whittle down the majority that President Obama will need to make some very hard decisions that will be in the best interest of our country.
So I am looking forward to being a senator, continuing my life- long work, to try to come up with ways that will help every person live up to his or her God-given potential. And I’m excited about working with President Obama on health care, energy, and all of the other important matters before our nation.*
McCain is a phony. He wouldn’t speak out against the flying of the Confederate flag at the South Carolina statehouse in 2000, but after he lost the nomination what did he do? Give a speech where he apologized for that. “Oh, boo hoo hoo hoo hoo hoo hoo! I was wrong, and I’m just so gosh darn sorry about it.” Give me a break. Does anyone seriously believe he would have made that apology if he had gotten the nomination?
Out of curiosity, what does “change we can believe in” look like?
If Obama nominates Bush cronies who helped perpetrate the Iraq debacle, that’s not change. If Obama nominates Democratic insiders from his Chicago days, that’s not change. If he nominates any Clinton allies, that’s not change. Basically, he can’t nominate Democrats or Republicans. Who’s left?
Again, Al Giordano has some unique insight into the situation at The Field.
First of all, you above saying that Obama has sold out on his message, how about you wait until he actually does something? According to Giordano, this is an attempt by the Clinton folks to put her name into the hat and to also diminish the chances of Bill Richardson and John Kerry, who are already on the Clinton shit list. It reeks of Clintonian overstepping of power yet again. I expect Obama to ignore it, and you will notice that the Obama camp has already pushed back against these rumors (quoted in the above link). It is exactly the same way in which they floated her name out there for a potential Vice Presidential pick to try to force his hand. It will backfire again.
Kerry is the obvious choice here, and I’d bet dollars to doughnuts that he’ll be the next Sec State. The Clintons have again made it clear that they have their own agenda. Unfortunately they are so ineffectual these days that they telegraph their intentions before they manage to get into their position of power.
So do you really think you’ll see Hillary at Sec. State? Think about it from Obama’s perspective. Give the Clintons a microphone and a spotlight? No thank you. Bill Clinton has yet to fully get over being butt-hurt about the election, and Hillary is trying, yet again, to bigfoot Obama into giving her the position that she wants while simultaneously demonstrating exactly why she’d be a poor choice for the position. So he’s going to have Bill Clinton, the husband of the Secretary of State flying off on “Air Fuck One” to Dubai and Kazakhstan to collect the big bucks? Get a grip, people.
Hillary is going to get a marginally important cabinet post if she’s offered one at all. Her people just essentially locked her out of the Sec. State job by floating that rumour out there. Obama likes message control, and you might have noticed that the Clinton people can’t seem to shut the fuck up.
No, if he appoints a Clinton, that’s not change. Don’t go putting words in my mouth.
If he said that he wanted to go back to the halcyon days of the Clinton administration I would have taken him at his word. Instead he stumped for “change”, and Hillary Clinton does not constitute change.
And further, Obama successfully campaigned on the idea that Clinton would NOT bring change because she was a Washington insider. So pointing out that appointing her would be inconsistent with his campagning is entirely valid. But I think Merkwurdigliebe’s cite is informative, and makes more sense that the idea that he’s really going to make her Secretary of State.
Why not? It’s not like he’s trying to appoint Bill to be the new president in his stead. Why would appointing Hillary Clinton to a cabinet post be automatically pigeon holed as “not change”, while appointing virtually any other Democrat would?
Hillary Clinton is a senator in good standing with a solid grasp of the way things work. Fuck man, she was almost the Democratic nominee. But according to you she can’t be involved in anything to do with the new administration because she’s got “the taint”, or something.
Now if Obama was trying to appoint Condoleeza Rice as Secretary of State … fine, then I’ll admit that’s not a change.
I agree completely with Airman Doors, and I think that if Obama appoints Hillary, it’ll be the first mistake that he ends up regretting.
Bill Clinton is now a political liability for Hillary. If she’s ever up for a job interview, why would anyone pick her when her husband is a very powerful man with his own agenda? He refused to show any true conviction that Obama should be President, and in fact seemed to be pissy about the fact that Obama has the potential to have a greater legacy than him. Bill Clinton will go down as a good President, but will never be a Lincoln or a FDR like Obama has the chance to be.
That’s Hillary’s problem. Bill will never be under control. He can’t get over the fact that he’s no longer the big dog of the Democratic party. He’s going to further isolate himself if his people keep up with these tactics. Also the fact that she has her people leaking that she’s in the running for Sec. State probably just clarified it to Obama. If Obama were really clever, he’d have told her that she was under consideration, just to see if it leaks out or not. Maybe this was a test?
And if Obama eventually names HRC as Sec. State then I’ll freely admit I think this was his first mistake. Sec. State is one of the most powerful cabinet positions. Now granted he could fire her if he wanted to, but I’m sure she’d try to put him in a position of “damned if you do / damned if you don’t” if he tried to do so. Do you people not remember how the Clinton people reacted about the VP speculation?
The Clintons threw her name in the hat and then threw a tantrum when she wasn’t chosen, “SHE WASN’T EVEN VETTED! :mad:”. Why the hell would any intelligent person reward that kind of behavior? To get what they want, they go public with their expectations then when they don’t get it they later bitch in the media? If Obama wants to run a mature, respectful campaign, this is the exact kind of crap he needs to avoid. Can you imagine the ammount of undermining of President Obama there would be? Can you imagine even more opportunities for Bill Clinton to damn him with faint praise?
Bill Clinton is simply too big for any role less than President. It’s one thing to have a cabinet of rivals, but it’s another to be undermined by your appointees.
Lieberman? sorry
We have sixty some-odd days til January 20th. The man hasn’t even issued his statement on domestic policy yet. The nay-sayers here seem to be saying that the changes being implemented aren’t really going to be changes because NONE of these people will follow the President’s policy and decisions, that because they’re people they already know and loathe those people will do things their way. Get a grip. The man ran an extremely well organized campaign. He seems to have a knack for choosing the right (wo)man for the job at hand. What makes you think he’s going to run his administration any differently? What do you know that I don’t which leads you to believe that because he’s offering posts to politicians you don’t like regardless of their bona fides this is all going to fall apart before it even begins? So far no cogent reasons have been offered beyond ‘that’s not change’ pout pout pout.
Sorry, left the window open too long and missed all this before I hit post
Why wouldn’t he choose a senator whose husband is a very powerful man in his own right? The international community respects both the Clintons a great deal. This may well go far to cement foreign relations.
I’m not sure if we’re talking about the same Hillary Clinton. Why does Bill need to be “controlled”? The post is SoS, not POTUS. He isn’t going to be making policy decisions, he isn’t going to be involved in delicate negotioations. Hillary would be negotiating and furthering the policy of the Obama administration, not her own. What is it about the man that terrifies you so much you’re willing to let go of reason and make these leaps of panicked deduction?
Okay. Again, maybe you know something I don’t. What sort of uncontrollable situation do you foresee her pushing President Obama into a corner on as it relates to foreign policy?
Bill Clinton would not be SoS. Hillary would. You people really are convinced the man is trying for a third term, aren’t you? Relax. It isn’t going to happen. Of course, if I had my 'druthers, Bill would end up Sec. General of the UN.
Bill Clinton’s “charity” has 200 million dollars in surplus from anonymous foreign donors including people who have paid him to advance agendas that don’t necessarily jibe with that of the US.
Secondly, the media loves drama. And nothing spells drama more than an unruly Bill Clinton with a microphone. Oh yeah, the Clintons are also the biggest drama queens in the Democratic party. The press referred to it as the Clinton psychodrama during the primaries. We don’t need more of that.
The reason why he needs to be controlled is because he’d be undermining the Obama administration whenever he felt like it. If Obama wants to be in control of his government, then he’ll have to control Clinton, and he probably can’t. He was very weak in his praise of Obama as the nominee. There’s definite bad blood between them because Bill Clinton is no longer the bride at every wedding and the corpse in every casket. That’s why he shouldn’t want Hillary for Sec. State. Sure it might be beneficial to have Bill on his side. But the potential for Bill going against him is simply too great. How do you think it will reflect on an Obama presidency when the “Big Dog” is undermining his will? It could easily screw up his entire first term by labeling him as weak.
You seriously don’t understand Bill Clinton if you think he’s willing to take a servile attitude towards an Obama administration. Hillary couldn’t reign him in from inside her own campaign. He essentially had his own staff and his own agenda. Not to say he wasn’t working to get Hillary elected, but he sure as hell wasn’t staying on message for Hillary. His “Jessie Jackson” comment is a prime example of this.
Bill isn’t running for a third term, but the man craves attention more than anything else. He’s already proven he doesn’t really give a shit about what Obama is promising more than what he’s obligated to do as a member of the Democratic party. He couldn’t keep his mouth shut during the primaries even if it would have helped his wife. It’s not that he wanted a third term, it’s that he couldn’t stop talking about himself during the primaries. When you have a man who all but scuttled his own wife’s primary challenge by his failure to stay on message, what allegiance do you think he’d have to Obama?
You give the Clintons an inch and they take a mile. Obama would be wise to remember that.
ETA:
Just wanted to add that I don’t consider “allegiance to Obama” as a primary factor in choosing appointees. I think that’s actually a bad idea. But when you have a powerhouse like Clinton looming in the background, the potential for damage is too great. You piss him off and he’ll undermine Obama. And it’s a lot different if Bill Clinton is doing it vs. John Kerry. Bill Clinton would be an asset in this situation, but the potential for it to blow up is too risky.
Fair enough. You’re right, I am probably jumping the gun on this way too early; especially in light of Merkwurdigliebe’s cite. I also am admittedly biased against having either Clinton in the Administration, for more than a few reasons. However, just after Rahm Emanuel’s name was “leaked”, it soon became confirmed; that’s made me anxious about this similar feeling “leak”.
Like I said in the Cabinet thread, real “Change” would have been a Howard Dean as Chief of Staff. Though I do understand the Rahm pick(Chicago, pitbull, strong armer, etc…), I’m not a fan of his security policies, nor his attitude toward helping build a more progressive/liberal Democratic Congress.
Those two, coupled with this whole “lets forgive Lieberman” meme supported by Obama have just got my political heartburn rising. Makes me miss the days before I started caring about politics.
In the interest of fairness, looking around the web today for a list of DLC members, I’m disappointed to learn that some of the people I have been in strong support of for roles in the administration, specifically the Govs (Sebelius, Napolitano, Richardson, Schweitzer), have been given prominent voices by the DLC. Well I can’t find a cite saying they’re actual DLCers and not just speaking as Democratic Governors, I’m forced to at least admit that being DLC can’t be an automatic dismissal, though it does still immediately raises my suspicions/cynicism in regards to the whole ‘Change’ theme.
The buzz around Emanuel was more believable and I don’t think anyone put out a report saying it came from his own camp. It was raliably confirmed by Obama’s people, I think. Anyway, there’s still no immediate timeline on Obama naming a cabinet and this would be pretty surprising.
I don’t see what in Dean’s experience would make him a good chief of staff. Emanuel had those kinds of roles in the House and for the Clintons. I do wonder what Dean will do next, since he’s resigned from the DNC.
That cracks me up every time.