Pragmatists and not Ideologues
So far, lots of egg on the faces of Limbaugh and Hannity as they were screaming that flaming left wing, communist-like radicals would be assigned to the Obama Cabinet. So far, that has not proven to be the case at all.
President-elect Barack Obama won the Democratic nomination with the enthusiastic support of the left wing of his party, fueled by his vehement opposition to the decision to invade Iraq and by one of the most liberal voting records in the Senate.
Now, his reported selections for two of the major positions in his cabinet — Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state and Timothy F. Geithner as secretary of the Treasury — suggest that Mr. Obama is planning to govern from the center-right of his party, surrounding himself with pragmatists rather than ideologues.
The choices are as revealing of the new president as they are of his appointees — and suggest that, from its first days, an Obama White House will brim with big personalities and far more spirited debate than occurred among the largely like-minded advisers who populated President Bush’s first term.
But the names racing through the ether in Washington about the choices to follow also suggest that Mr. Obama continues to place a premium on deep experience. He is widely reported to be considering asking Mr. Bush’s defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, to stay on for a year; and he is thinking about Gen. James L. Jones, the former NATO commander and Marine Corps commandant, for national security adviser, and placing Lawrence H. Summers, the former Treasury secretary whom Mr. Obama considered putting back in his old post, inside the White House as a senior economic adviser.
[...]Now the question is less one of ideological differences than whether a Clinton State Department could become something like Colin L. Powell’s: an alternative, though weak, power center that made little secret of its differences with the White House.
“Anyone who tells you they really know how this is going to work out,” one senior transition official said Thursday, “is telling less than the truth.”
If Mrs. Clinton is taken from the “Team of Rivals” model, Mr. Geithner, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, is from the Team of Neutrals.
“He’s no liberal,” said a former colleague at the Treasury Department, where he managed the American response to the Asian financial crisis in the 1990s.
At the time Mr. Geithner developed a reputation as the ultimate pragmatist, putting together a package of more than $100 billion in aid to halt the financial contagion. That turned out to be a training session for his role, a decade later, in the bailouts of Bear Stearns, A.I.G. and the injection of nearly $350 billion in Congressionally authorized money, whose exact use has become something of a political football.
Mr. Geithner grew up in Asia — in Tokyo, New Delhi and Bangkok — and keeps his ego well in check. He asks a lot of questions, but does not have Mr. Summers’s overwhelming — some say overbearing — personality.
“He clicked with Obama,” one outside adviser said. “If you think about it, their sort of cool, distant styles are alike.”
Even Mitch McConnel says he is off to a good start
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[...] Pragmatists and not Ideologues Pragmatists and not Ideologues Posted on November 22, 2008 by Tariq Nelson So far, lots of egg on the faces of Limbaugh and Hannity as they were screaming that flaming left wing, communist-like radicals would be assigned to the Obama Cabinet. So far, that has not proven to be the case at all. President-elect Barack Obama won the Democratic nomination with the enthusiastic support of the left wing of his party, fueled by his vehement opposition to the decision to invade Iraq and by one of th [...]
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I guess when they talk about communism/communist, one does not have to go to far to look at the people who fit that description.
It looks hard and it will be hard work for him, but I’m not going to doubt him. When McCain said twisting Joe Biden’s words about the ” test”, the truth is that he will have to go through it, but everybody will have to go through it before they leave this world. Yes, the economy will be a challenge for him as it would be for any other president regardless of party affiliation, but a strong person is one who doesn’t surrender to it,which is exactly what Obama is doing.
Honestly, I’m cautiously optimistic about what I’m seeing and hearing from the people. Like he said, he’s not expecting a quick fix with it, but I didn’t even expect those quick words of encouragement from the people and the economists as so many of his opponents have( and still predict )doomsday for him. I hoping that all goes well for him.
As our new President I hope BO is successful as that will mean we are all successful.
However, from the point of ‘Yes We Can’ and ‘Real Change’ how does putting folks from the Clinton Admin back in place equate to ‘change’. How does this equate to difference and not business as usual?
Not all of those folks are from the Clinton Administration. Even if they were, you must admit, Clinton had this economy up to a T. You didn’t hear about an economy crisis as large as this one, you didn’t hear about the hemorrhages of jobs losses , foreclosures,.etc. It’s so bad that there is a possibility that without a bailout, public transportation may go bell up in many major cities because of it. This is what Bush and many of his cronies did for us. I’ve never seen anything as ridiculously bad as this.
I’m not seeing Obama sitting on his butt and just whistling Dixie. He haven’t even made it in the Whitehouse yet and he’s at work. He’s actually trying to do something about this economy and a lot of people seem to be encouraged by one of his choices. Even if a Republican or what ever political party they come from ,would have became president, I do not think they they will do no more/less than Obama as they are people that screwed us up.
I do not see how Obama’s critics can criticize him bringing in supposedly people from the Clinton administration into his presidency. Nobody felt that way when Bush brought in the many people he knew, but that was ok? Now we’re paying for his sins.It just seemed the some of the people he brought in either knew him or his father.
Right now ,whether it being Clinton or Obama, anything is better than Bush’s administration.
Frankly I would like to see more new faces but the US is a crisis you need people who have been there before to guide us through this mess.
So far alot rumors but no real confirmation if Hilary is going to be Secretary of State. I hope not. I don’t believe with Bill’s connects and her feminist agenda she can effect real change. Obama is better off having someone new to position preferbaly somone who is not caucasian nor has ties or has ever been to israel.