So, because someone has to start this thread: Let’s have rampant speculation about Obama’s Cabinet. (President-elect Obama. President Obama! I’m still in shock.)
I think Bill Richardson has a great shot at Secretary of State, and Chuck Hagel at Secretary of Defense. I also think they’d both be excellent choices. Beyond that…
Is there a position Obama can offer Hillary that would suit her many talents and wouldn’t be a step down from the Senate? She doesn’t have the background to be Attorney General, and there’s no reason at all to think that she’d make a good Supreme Court Justice. Would she accept HHS? Would she be wasted there?
Is it safe to assume that John Edwards won’t be playing a significant part in the Obama administration?
Bill Clinton: UN Ambassador?
Speculation is that Rahm Emanuel is the frontrunner for Obama’s Chief of Staff position, which I think works well. He’s going to be a force in the party for awhile. (Schweitzer/Emanuel 2016!)
Speaking of which, would Brian Schweitzer leave Montana to become Secretary of Energy? Does Kathleen Sebelius come to Washington in some capacity?
I know I said this in there too, but people here keep predicting the cabinet will be made up of big names and other politicians - that’s probably not how it’s going to work. You’d have too many ball-hogs and not enough bureaucrat specialist team players. In particular, no way is Hillary Clinton going to become a cabinet-level secretary: with Ted Kennedy’s illness, she is set to be the Senate leader on health care, always her biggest issue. She wouldn’t give that up, and she’s said she doesn’t want to be on the Supreme Court or do something else. Schweitzer just got re-elected as Governor, so I don’t think he’s leaving Montana. Richardson as a Secretary of State is a real possibility. Edwards is toast.
Hegel might be a logical defense pick, but Obama has indicated he might ask Robert Gates to stay on board. No idea if he’d take that offer.
I think Geithner will be the pick in treasury, and we’ll probably get the official word in a few weeks.
I’d be willing to take a bet on this. While it’s possible that he leaves Gates in place, I gotta believe that Chuck Hagel is a near-lock to be offered a spot in the administration, and Defense is the overwhelmingly logical place for him.
Marley23:
I agree with pretty much all of this, although I think that Schweitzer coming on board at Energy is at least a possibility. It’s his pet issue, and if he’s at all interested in establishing a national presence for 2016 (not to mention doing some good on a larger scale), I think he’d consider it. But yeah, I don’t see Hillary or Edwards as being realistically in the mix.
Huffpo says Emanuel was offered chief of staff. I like Wesley Clark for Defense. I do not want one of the thieves who made a fortune to touch Treasury. Paulson should be on Survivor Palau or some other place far away. There are plenty of good economists out there. Hedge fund managers should be spending all their money on defense lawyers.
Didn’t I read somewhere that he was planning to appoint people like Louis Farrakhan, Jerimiah Wright, and Michael Jordan to his cabinet? Or was that some Freeper’s fevered dream?
Probably not… He’s currently none too keen on the idea of entering the world of Washington politics. In eight years, that might change, but probably not right now.
In another thread, I saw someone float the idea of Al Gore as energy secretary, and at least on the surface, it looks like it makes a lot of sense.
Very interesting thought; I agree it makes some sense. By the way, Chronos, as a Montana resident, what are your thoughts on Schweitzer? Is he really the way he comes across in the speeches that I’ve seen? That is, kind of a white rancher version of Obama, super-articulate and personable with a folksiness that belies a broad awareness of global affairs (not to mention a fluency in Arabic)?
Neal Katyal for Solicitor General. He’s also a guy that should be getting serious Supreme Court consideration, should a vacancy open up later in Obama’s (first?) term.
Akhil Amar is likely to be on any Supreme Court shortlist that Obama puts together (although it’s virtually certain that the first vacancy on the Court, and maybe the first two vacancies, will be filled by women, if he can find suitable candidates).
Fareed Zakaria for National Security Advisor, perhaps. He’s certainly got the credentials, but it’s unclear whether there would be any lasting effects from McCain’s attempt to tar him during the campaign.
Schweitzer is the kind of guy who can express a complex, nuanced position in a single sentence, and have it make so much sense that it’s hard to see how it could be any other way. He’s also a reasoned, well-educated intellectual, who also manages to seamlessly be a down-to-Earth, “just folks” guy. We’re very fond of him around here: He won his re-election bid by nearly a 2 to 1 margin.
Secretary of Veterans Affairs - Max Cleland
Secretary of Defense - Wesley Clark
Secretary of Agriculture - Bill Richardson
Dept of Homeland Security - Richard Clarke
FEMA - Rudolph Guiliani
EPA - Al Gore
Secretary of the Treasury - Warren Buffet
Secretary of State - John McCain
Secretary of the dept of Information Technology (new dept!) - Linus Torvalds
Secretary of the dept of Health and Human Services - Howard Dean
Secretary of the Interior - Bill Clinton
Press Secretary - Hunter Thompson (shh, I SAID fantasy!)
Does he have any expertise at all in agriculture? Regardless, this would be on par with his SecEnergy days under Clinton, and I don’t think there’s any way he’d accept it.
Triple yikes. And Giuliani burned any goodwill he might have had with Obama when he sneered about community organizers (in what was possibly the single most gratuitously dickish moment of the entire campaign).
Huge step down for him and a spectacular misuse of his talents. Zero chance of it ever happening.
Awful, terrible, terrible, terrible, awful idea.
Again…what possible expertise does he have with the kind of things Interior does? No way.
That would be a good choice, actually. His biggest selling point going into the election was a proven ability to keep his cool in a crisis, to figure out what can be done, and to get started doing it. That’s a positive quality in a president, of course, but it should be the defining quality in the guy in charge of FEMA. It’ll also be good for Obama to be seen picking a few Republicans for his cabinet, and Guiliani would be a decent choice for that.
I’m not saying he’d take it. If I was, I wouldn’t have thrown the word “fantasy” in there.
This is not about Obama’s goodwill. This is about healing the partisan fissure in U.S. politics. Whether you personally think Guiliani is a dick (and honestly, I think he’s kind of a dick), he’s been a man of the people, he’s Republican (I think a bi-partisan cabinet is essential) and the public believes he’s strong during moments of crisis. This selection is as much about appearances as anything, but I think that appearances and showing inclusiveness mean a lot right now. I stand by this choice.
This isn’t about what our country can do for Al Gore… but what Al Gore can do for our country.
I know, I fought back and forth on this one. I want him in an esteemed and important position. I want him to be the other end of the bridge, really. BUT! This may not be the place for him. I’m subbing Colin Powell.
I do like your idea of Clinton as UN Ambassador. I will look into your recommendation of Jay Inslee.
My second choice was to split the position between Sergey Brin and Larry Page.
Giuliani is inflammatory and condescending. There are any number of decent Republicans out there who Obama would be perfectly well-served to install in his Cabinet. Giuliani ain’t one of them. If he hadn’t dripped venom at the RNC, it might be a different story…but he did.
America is awesome.