Friday, February 13, 2009

More transition


President Obama now faces searches for two Cabinet post nominees who withdrew partly due to tax reasons (Health and Human Services department head and also chief performance officer) and now a second Commerce Secretary head nominee - while he tries to take on freeing up the capital markets, reforming finance sector regulation, and health care reform with a rejuvenated GOP trying to hold him back. Both of his Commerce Secretary appointments (including the appointment of Republican U.S. Senator Judd Gregg) were bold, and it's hard to know who will come next. Names bandied about before earlier picks were announced were former Vermont Governor, presidential candidate, and Democratic Party head Howard Dean (also a doctor) for the Health post (also White House health reform czar) and former IBM and Symantec chief executive John Thompson (a big Obama backer pictured above) for Commerce Secretary head. It's hard to know if the Administration would pick someone they'd already passed over. Picking another Republican (one who won't withdraw) would be nice. Picking interesting people (like an African American business executive like Thompson?). Picking a woman (like the initial chief performance officer nominee) would be good. The Commerce head would also oversee the 2010 Census - and Obama pushed back criticism of the stimulus package saying he was very committed to deficit reduction and entitlement reform - which means this CPO position should not be an after thought.

-- Perry

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

So why are the republicans complaining about govt spending too much now with the stimulus bill and not during the bush administration when trillions were spent and wasted on the iraq war?