As the transition team for President-Elect Barack Obama makes announcements regarding White House appointments, the reality of what an Obama Administration will look like is starting to set in. Although his slogan was "Change we can believe in," does it seem his first few appointments will be willing to support that credo?
Take for example his soon-to-be Vice-President, Joe Biden. This 30 plus year veteran of D.C. politics at one point in the primary denounced Barack Obama's "poor foreign policy judgment" and strongly argued that "Barack Obama is not ready to be president." Or Hillary Clinton, Obama's soon-to-be Secretary of State and former First Lady, who questioned Obama's readiness to answer a crisis phone call at 3am and who disagreed with him on a wide-range of foreign policy issues. Then consider Bill Richardson, Tom Daschile, Larry Summers, Eric Holder and Rahm Emanuel. All have been longtime power-players in our nation's capital, where "change" is often a dirty word.
Obama has stated that these first few appointments were selected specifically to offer their wide-ranging "experience and expertise." My central question is that if these individuals were brought into the adminstration to use their wealth of "experience," would they be able to bring about the type of "change" to our nation that Obama promised on the campaign trail?
Obama talked of fundamental change - not just moving from Right to Left. In many ways, the only "change" these appointments demonstrate is a desire to bring back the Clinton years. That's not change - that's nothing more than the same old thing.
So did Obama hire these people for their "experience" just to tell all of them they've been wrong all these years and we need to go in a different direction? Is Obama asking us to believe that he hired an "experienced" team just to ask them to discard their experience in favor of his new course for America? Does he expect us to believe that strong personalities like these will toss aside their opinions on issues they have been intimately involved in for decades, absorb Obama's "vision" and become loyal soldiers to the new Adminsitration for the next 4 years?
I would suspect that these appointments are being made due to the difficult position Obama is in right now. Being as inexperienced as he is, Obama has little choice but to surround himself with experienced individuals who have a long track record in Washington and around the world. If Obama is to bring true "change," he'll now need to not only overcome his own personal obstacles and the ones we have no idea are going to occur in the natural world, but he'll need to overcome and convince those who he is appointing now to follow a new, change-oriented path.
I would liken this situation to that of President Bush, who appointed a former Defense Secretary and strong Congressional leader in Dick Cheney to be his Vice-President. By all accounts, Cheney was running the White House for the first few years - sometimes without the President's direct knowledge. And although Bush certainly wasn't coming into the White House looking to bring wide-spread "change" to America, he couldn't have been able to enact change because of his own leadership experience gap and the fact that he tried to fill that gap with strong-minded, "experienced" people in his administration. Experienced insiders like Cheney and Rumsfeld don't take orders well and neither will Hillary, Richardson, Daschile and Emanuel.
With these appointments, I would argue that Obama's inexperience is clearly starting to show. The more powerful folk he puts into his inner-circle, the less his chances will be in bringing substantial change to the country.
As i've discussed previously, maybe he's trying to avoid being the next Jimmy Carter, who did the opposite of Obama and brought in outsiders to fight against "the system" and establishment in D.C. Like Obama, Carter came to power with a similar mandate for "change." Yet in large part due to his cabinet's outsider status, Carter ended up fighting the leaders in his own party and the likes of House Speaker Tip O'Neil. Obama's transition advisors seem to be trying to avoid that aspect of the Carter-syndrome and have chosen to directly hire people like O'neil into the adminstration.
I would agree that hiring insiders is good for avoiding in-fighting, but I believe that it will end up backfiring on him by blocking Obama's ability to bring about real "change." In the end, I predict that Obama will be firing a number of these people after about two years on the job out of frustration with their obedience to his central campaign pledge and tremendous dissatisfaction from those who elected him to the highest office in the land...
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written by spunky , November 25, 2008
People will be calling for Obama's resignation within two years of taking office. He's a clueless, liberal hack who won the election by default. All of his competitors ran horrible campaigns. Hillary blew it. McCain has the political sense of a dead animal.
Our country is headed towards destruction.
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written by Jay Golub , November 26, 2008
http://www.dailykos.com/story/...575/666595
Take a look at this thread from DailyKos. The Left is up in arms over the appointments being made. Many are trying to calm Obama's critics from the Left down, but it seems not to be happening fast enough.
Obama will be chased out of town from both sides in short order. This guy is proving how dangerously inexperienced and unprepared he is to be President of the United States...
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written by Alibaba , November 26, 2008
the Kos loons. He wants to get "centrists" on board with him. What are the crazies going to do anyway? Support a Republican? Ask Hillary to run again? They have nobody to run to. He will toss them a bone by either signing FOCA or by socializing medicine. Or by appointing a radical lefty to the Supreme Court.
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written by Jay Golub , November 26, 2008
from his appointments, it doesn't appear he's going to do any of those liberal-pleasing things. Hey, ya never know, Ali. Maybe he'll start appointing Judges who oppose the Roe v. Wade decision.
And the Kos loons are furious right now. There are numerous posts trying to quell the anger towards him. The appointment of all these centrists to his cabinet is not what they were expecting.
This morning in Obama's THIRD press conference since winning the election (at least he knows there's only ONE president...LOL) he said HE decides on policy, not his appointments. He basically implied that we should read nothing into his selections for advisors and he'll drag these experienced centrists back to his left leaning positions.
And if you believe that i have a bridge i'd like to sell you...
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written by Alibaba , November 26, 2008
The next election - even the midterm one - will be a referendum on B. Hussein Obama. If he goes too far to the left, the squishy people whom he managed to flip his way and the people who stayed home in 2008 had better think very carefully. What was that about "you can't fool all of the people all of the time"?
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written by Daniel Peterson , November 26, 2008
Or pointing out that Obama can't be trusted because he's not really a left-leaning loon that he sold himself as? Because if he's surrounding himself with folks who are "blue dogs" or traditional liberals instead of 'Kos Leftists, I'm not gonna complain as much.
The Left believe they elected Obama so he should cater to them. Shows how small their reasoning is, because it is the Centrist voters that gave this election to Obama. It is those folks in the center who are the swingers every four years. If he's doing anything right, he's actually pleasing the most important demographic in voters.
I have to say, the one man who interviewed Obama and said he'll govern from the middle was .... Bill O'Reilly from Fox News Channel. Not bad insight.
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written by Jay Golub , November 26, 2008
I'm not complaining at all. I'm laughing at the Left because either way they are fools.
If Obama lied to them - using Left-wing promises to get thier votes - and will govern as a centrist, I'll be pleasantly surprised and Obama could be as successful as Bill Clinton. The Daily Kos/moveon.org crowd will want his head on a platter.
If Obama told them the truth - a plans on governing from the Left, but just appointed a few centrists just to please the "most important demographic - then he will fail as President like Jimmy Carter did and will ensure a conservative victory in 2012.
I personally don't know which direction he will go, but either way, GOP activists should be planning accordingly.
And, BTW, I don't agree with you that the centrist voters put him in this office. He got as many of those votes as McCain did in the end.
the swing demographic this cycle was the mass amount of new registrants - many of whom were young people and African-Americans. Those people, if Obama turns out to run away from him campaign pledges, will just disappear from the voting map by 2012 out of dissatisfaction. That is why it is so critical to keep a running tab on Obama as he prepares for and enters office. With every misstep is an opportunity to increase the cynacism surrounding "change we can believe in"...
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written by Jay Golub , November 26, 2008
some more DailyKos comments - these are in relation to Obama selecting another in a long line of insiders - Paul Volker.
"Volker is dangerous To workers, to the middle class, to all Americans...I can only assume that Obama is not his own man at this point, or is ignorant of the real persons he is nominating. Volcker is an advocate of Americans "trimming" their standard of living. He is wall street bankers personified, a plutocrat. Google Volcker and standard of living...Look at John Brennan, and other Obama choices. I know some Kossacks applaud Rahmbo but I think he is the problem...Same song second verse same as the first..."
there is a revolt brewing....I love it!
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written by Jay Golub , December 01, 2008
Hillary is appointed to take over at State and the responses keep on coming at Dailykos...
"My beef isn't stritcly against Hillary, Rice or Janet. I like Susan Rice and Gov Napotliano. I just wanted to see that a democratic was offered the position of sec of def. Gates would have been my second choice if good solid democrats rejected the post. Why can't a democrat lead the defense department. We haven't had a democrat in that post since 1996. It's disgusting."
"Not one Progressive anywhere to be found. Very disgraceful. At some point another democratic president will come to believe a democrat can lead the defense department."
"seems to me that he'd rather have her on his team than 2nd guessing him for the next 4 years. Much like: Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer."
This guy Obama has just lied his way to the White House and now the far Left is upset. Yet, there are many in thier movement trying to explain away his decision...
"he is using reverse psychology because in reality all the republicans fear the ever living shit out of hillary. she is a huge notch on obamas belt to have her around, and its gonna be damn hard to defeat a team like his in 2012."
"This is going to sound corny, but here goes. I think Obama has figured out the peace-making thing, which as Lincoln, Gandhi, and MLK said, is to make your enemy your friend. Obama has helped me to get over my Bush hatred, and now with Clinton, he's showing us how to really get over competition and infighting. I can't say enough how much Obama's leadership-by-example has helped me deal with my political, unhelpful anger."
Gandhi???? For appointing Hillary to be Secretary of State Obama has become MLK??? These guys are AWESOME.
If you don't read DailyKos, you really don't know what you're missing....
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written by spunky , December 02, 2008
it's official - Hillary won! I think being President right now is a disaster for anyone. Obama's going to wish he lost and came back again in 2012. Between the economy and the foreign turmoil that will occur due to the bad global economy, Barack will look like a deer in the headlights.
Actually, i think he looks like that now. I read some of those DailyKos posts - those guys are nuts. They sound like conservatives trying to explain away Bush's signing of the Medicare Drug Benefits legislation.
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written by Jay Golub , December 03, 2008
http://www.salon.com/opinion/g.../23/obama/
"So many progressives were misled about what Obama is and what he believes. But it wasn't Obama who misled them. It was their own desires, their eagerness to see what they wanted to see rather than what reality offered."
So Obama promising the "redistribution of wealth," univeral healthcare, direct negotiations with Iran/North Korea without preconditions, re-negotiating NAFTA, Card Check Legislation passage and i could go on, were just imagining things?
These promises were on Obama's website the day of the election, and the media of the Left wants liberals (this guy calls them "progressives"...lol) to admit they imagined all of this?
This just re-inforces the addage believed by the left (and the mainstream media) that liberals can never do any wrong...
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written by Jay Golub , January 05, 2009
http://www.nypost.com/seven/01...147256.htm
awesome stuff from the guy who invented the word "hope." I'm wondering whether this guy realizes how much garbage he'll have to wade through to work with his own cabinet.
This is why his selection of superstar Democratic D.C. insiders will be his undoing...
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written by Jay Golub , January 31, 2009
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...62708.html
Ahhhh....the hits just keep on comin'!
Now it's Dashle's turn at "oops, did i do that?"
so much for "change we can believe in." This will make the third nominee to Obama's cabinet that has significant trouble.
Richardson, who appears to be in big trouble right now, removed his name from the process; Geithner slid through after a number of issues came up and now Daschle. I can't wait for the next one.
What does it say about this transition team and Obama's decision making processes that so many of his picks have clear vetting problems? did these nominees hold back the information and if they did how is it that Obama and Americans can trust them going forward? If they told Obama the truth, why did he still pick these people?
"Mr. Daschle concluded that he owed the taxes for free use of a car and driver that had been provided to him by Leo Hindery Jr., the founder of a private equity firm known as InterMedia Advisors, the officials said.
Mr. Daschle was chairman of the firm's advisory board. In a financial disclosure statement filed this month with the Office of Government Ethics, Mr. Daschle reported that he had received large amounts of income from InterMedia, including more than $2 million for consulting and $182,520 in the form of "company-provided transportation."
What could Tom Daschle "consult" on that would be worth $2 million?
It is so obvious that they paid him to lobby, not consult. And if Obama is selecting people who are multi-million dollar lobbyists, what benefit does his rule have that his cabinet "can't lobby" while he's still in office? THEY ALREADY ARE ON THE PAYROLL OF BOTH THE ADMINISTRATION AND THE SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS.
Funny as well is that the Democrats are pushing for things that are "worker friendly," yet Richardson, Daschle and Clinton (via her husband) represent and have been "consulting" for major industries all over the country.
If this is "change we can believe in," I'd like to see us go back to the old stuff....
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written by swmirsky , February 01, 2009
Jay wrote: "What does it say about this transition team and Obama's decision making processes that so many of his picks have clear vetting problems? did these nominees hold back the information and if they did how is it that Obama and Americans can trust them going forward? If they told Obama the truth, why did he still pick these people?"
More important, what does it say about the media which, had this been people in the Bush administration, would have gone into a frenzy with attendant cries for impeachment, repetitive allegations of a "culture of corruption," and demands to know "what did the president know and when did he know it?" Calls for investigations would have been the barest minimum we could have expected from the big media like the NY Times, CNN, etc.
So isn't it incredible that the media, which so damaged a Republican presidency by such tactics, simply seems to have no sense of its own double standard here or how its admiring stance toward the new administration simply makes it all "go away" for the new president and those around him?
Sure they report it. But what's missing this time is the blood crazed, piranhas in the water style of destruction that routinely accompanied the slightest whiff of even the mildest sort of wrongdoing on the part of any members of the now departed Bush administration!
It seems that it's not justice that's blind in our society. It's the press.
SWM
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written by Jay Golub , February 01, 2009
"Sure they report it. But what's missing this time is the blood crazed, piranhas in the water style of destruction that routinely accompanied the slightest whiff of even the mildest sort of wrongdoing on the part of any members of the now departed Bush administration!"
Great point, Stu. And if you point it out accurately enough, the media will just laugh it off as sour grapes.
Yet, maybe we need to accept what I wrote about Barney Frank, that the "average American" wants a larger piece of the economic pie. Those in favor of more public support for American's "needs" will certainly be favored in the media as they are favored politically. Even the most accurately prudent politician will certainly risk losing re-election if he crosses public opinion in this area.
Think about what that means to the political process in America. I hope we can get some momentum on our side to stall this move...
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written by spunky , February 02, 2009
Of course the average American wants a hand-out. Who wouldn't if given the choice? We are doomed to become just another social welfare state with high unemployment and lower standards of living - largely because the GOP gave up its principles.
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written by Jay Golub , February 04, 2009
http://www.nypost.com/seven/02...153469.htm
I love this guy. He's only a few weeks into his adminstration and the list of failures is already starting to stack up.
Here's the scoreboard: Two picks who had to drop out of the process because they are potential thieves (Daschle and Richardson) along with a few who were just caught committing petty larcecy (Geithner and Holder).
The funniest part about his vetting process is that the one person who sailed right through is Hillary and her world-traveling, millionaire husband. No wonder they hit it off so well.
All of these "screw ups," as Obama admitted yesterday, and they haven't even started to put policy ideas together.
Change we can believe in, huh?....
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written by spunky , February 04, 2009
that picture of Obama in the slideshow has him looking really tired and almost beaten. He's only a few weeks into this thing - I hope he can handle it.
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written by Jay Golub , February 17, 2009
http://www.nypost.com/seven/02...155536.htm
now it's Rahm's turn...
"The SEC later fined Freddie $50 million for its deliberate fraud in 2000, 2001 and 2002.
Meanwhile, Emanuel was paid more than $260,000 for his Freddie "service." Plus, after he resigned from the board to run for Congress in 2002, the troubled agency's PAC gave his campaign $25,000 - its largest single gift to a House candidate.
That's what friends are for, isn't it?"
is there anyone in this adminstration who ISN'T ethically challenged? Who's next to resign?
Like I've been saying since Obama threw his "pastor" under-the-bus last year, this is not "change we can believe in." It's the same-old, same-old that we've grown used to in Washington D.C....
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written by Jay Golub , February 27, 2009
http://www.google.com/hostedne...TcRz90MSjw
Another aspect of Mr. Obama's deception. He states that Bush did not reflect the real expenses within the Federal budget by hiding certain expenses. Obama calls his budget an "honest accounting" of the cost of the federal operation.
Yet, his assumptions - especially the ones that help him to his stated goal of reducing the deficit within his own term in office - include GDP growth of 3.5% in 2010 and 4% in 2011 - predictions that are not supported by any analyst I've heard speak.
In reality, many are citing that the economy may not be growing at all by the end of Obama's term in office. And if that's the case, not only will he be unable to reduce the deficit, he probably will not be able to balance the budget under the already increasing tax environment.
My prediction is that by the end of this year, new tax increases will be needed to pay for the spending this administration will be supporting.
Change we can believe in?
No....just the same old thing...
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written by Jay Golub , February 28, 2009
http://www.nypost.com/seven/02...157314.htm
Another instance of the same-old, same-old.
Obama's pullout is not a pullout at all. As Peters puts it...
"Consider his big sound bite: "Let me say this as plainly as I can: by August 31, 2010, our combat mission in Iraq will end." What does that mean?... We're not going to leave 50,000 support troops in Iraq without combat units to protect them. We'll just ban the word "brigade" and call our shooters "task forces"...The reality all along has been that Obama can't cut and run."
And the funny part is that the liberals actually believed he was going to pull the troops out as soon as he took office...LOL!
Instead, he'll effectively bring home less than 10% of the troops by the end of this year and then slowly bring troops out over 2010, with the goal of leaving 50,000 troops behind until THE END of 2011 - just in time for him to run for re-election.
Of course, this all depends on our enemies playing by the rules and there being no set-backs in Iraq. Which in that case, it's doubtful we even get that far in troop removals.
Obama, like all Presidents, can not afford to just walk away from Iraq or other military committments.
Either way, saying our "combat mission" will be over at least one year before all of our troops come home - 50,000 of them, BTW - is parcing words as a manner Bill Clinton would be proud of...
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written by Jay Golub , March 10, 2009
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...73645.html
can't anyone who Obama appoints to work for his administration stand scrutiny?
The President's inability to fill his cabinet, especially at the Treasury, is becoming a risk to the fiscal state of our country. This guy really isn't ready for prime time...
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written by Daniel Peterson , March 10, 2009
And the American People will begin to see this and if the GOP is smart, we'll run strong Republican candidates in the House and take back Congress.
Divided Government with the GOP in the House will definitely help this country.
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written by Jay Golub , March 11, 2009
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200...a_spending
"He acknowledged that the system of influential lawmakers inserting earmarked projects has bred cynicism, and he declared, "This piece of legislation must mark an end to the old way of doing business."
you gotta' love a hypocrite. So NEXT time he will stop earmarks....LOL!
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written by Jay Golub , March 21, 2009
http://www.politico.com/news/s...Page2.html
Obama blows up the budget deficit...
"President Barack Obama’s new budget will produce a string of annual deficits averaging in excess of $926 billion over the next decade and more than triple what taxpayers pay each year in interest charges on the national debt, according to new estimates released Friday by the Congressional Budget Office."
funny, but when the Huffington Post was covering this topic in July, they were implying that it was McCain who was the reckless spender and Obama's people were saying ...
"We can't afford not to invest in some major initiatives such as health and energy and middle-class tax cuts," said Obama economic adviser Jason Furman. "And we also can't afford not to pay for those initiatives."
...I guess we can "afford" not to pay for these initiatives now?
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written by Jay Golub , March 25, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03...f=business
So much for Obama improving our stance with our European allies, something Bush was blamed for not enhancing while in the White House. It's funny how reality and theoretical campaign rhetoric don't match...
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written by Jay Golub , April 18, 2009
http://www.nypost.com/seven/04...164821.htm
"HAVING clearly shaken the pro tectionist promises he made to labor unions during his campaign, President Obama embarks on a trade tour of our closest neighbors, and appears ready to embrace this opportunity to dramatically alter the American hemisphere."
I love this stuff. He says one thing, does another - so different than the rest of the political world, huh?
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written by Jay Golub , May 11, 2009
http://www.nypost.com/seven/05...168603.htm
Speaking of Darfur during the campaign, Obama said: "As president of the United States, I don't intend to abandon people." Yet he is. About genocide, he said, "We can't say 'never again' and allow it to happen again." But it is happening again.
Worse, some worry that the mastermind of all this suffering, Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, is manipulating Obama's special envoy to Darfur, retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Scott Gration. Bashir has charmed outsiders who believe (erroneously) that he sincerely desires to work to end the suffering. Activists were especially alarmed when Gration provided an overly sunny report of Darfur's ground situation and told some privately that it could be time to ease sanctions and remove Sudan from the list of state sponsors of terrorism.
Activist Shannon Sedgwick Davis dismisses the idea that Obama is too busy with the economy to address Darfur. "That's an easy out," Sedgwick Davis says. "He has an amazing team that surrounds him for issues just like this and he needs to empower them to do much, much more. That's what they are there for. Hillary Clinton isn't sitting in her office trying to balance the budget."
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