Obama makes picks official

Yesterday was a busy day for the Obama transition team, as he officially announced his foreign policy and national security picks:

President-elect Barack Obama's cabinet choices for his national security team were made official today, as he announced Hillary Clinton as secretary of state, Robert Gates as defense secretary, and Eric Holder as attorney general.

Other appointments Obama made public this morning were Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano as homeland security secretary, his campaign's foreign policy adviser Susan Rice as United Nations ambassador, and former Marine Gen. James Jones as national security adviser.

He reportedly has also chosen former Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle as health and human services secretary and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson as secretary of commerce.

I think I'd rather see Richardson as Secretary of State and Clinton disappear, but the rest of these picks are all solid enough. Unfortunately, I know the Clintons aren't going anywhere, so Obama's forced to put Hillary in a position where she can't undermine his administration without ruining her own credibility.

Back from vacation

I hope everybody had a good Thanksgiving holiday.

Audrey from Palin's Deception had a busy holiday it seems.

Over the Thanksgiving holiday, one of my very hard working research assistants has uncovered a piece of evidence which may well turn out to be the final nail in the coffin. I believe it demonstrates conclusively that Gov. Sarah Palin was never pregnant. It has nothing to do with Bristol, or Willow, or anyone else. Because it is so critical, I am proceeding slowly with this one... talking to my attorney among other things. But watch the blog over the next 24-48 hours. You won't be disappointed.

It's about time one of Palin's weird lies was exposed. With any luck, the veil will be pulled from some people's eyes, and we can stop talking about Palin's run for the White House in 2012. With Sarah Palin as their Presidential nominee, the Republican Party becomes about as relevant as the Whig Party.

Lieberman wins; Stevens loses

Mark Begich was finally declared the winner in Alaska's Senate race, defeating incumbent and rat bastard Ted Stevens. Also, after absentee ballots and early votes were counted, the turnout in Alaska actually turned out to be quite high. There's still no explanation for why the polling was so wrong in Alaska, but nowhere else.

Also in the Senate, Democrats voted 42 to 13 to allow Joe Lieberman to retain his chairmanship of the Committee on Homeland Security. Sure, allowing Lieberman to stay is a great bipartisan move. It also rewards him for his committee's complete lack of oversight on homeland security.



I guess making out with John McCain was punishment enough.

Holder gets AG nod

It appears that Eric Holder is probably going to be the first black US Attorney General. On the positive side, he prosecuted Dan Rostenkowsk. On the other hand, he was involved with the Clinton pardon of Marc Rich.

The Boston Globe discusses what we can expect from an AG Holder:

In a June speech to the American Constitution Society, Holder said the Bush administration had taken many steps that "were both excessive and unlawful" in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

"I never thought I would see the day when a Justice Department would claim that only the most extreme infliction of pain and physical abuse constitutes torture and that acts that are merely cruel, inhuman and degrading are consistent with United States law and policy, that the Supreme Court would have to order the president of the United States to treat detainees in accordance with the Geneva Convention, never thought that I would see that a president would act in direct defiance of federal law by authorizing warrantless NSA surveillance of American citizens. This disrespect for the rule of law is not only wrong, it is destructive in our struggle against terrorism," Holder said in the speech.

Holder also advocated closing the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, transferring the remaining prisoners to the US and adopting an "expedited and procedurally fair" review process.

"It is our task over the next several years to reverse the disastrous course that we have been on over the past few years," Holder said in his conclusion.

Yo ho ho and a barrel of oil!

This story doesn't have anything to do with American politics, but damn!:

Pirates have seized a Saudi-owned supertanker fully laden with oil off east Africa, capturing the biggest vessel yet in a shipping zone where Somali pirates strike almost daily, the U.S. navy said.

...

The Sirius Star held a cargo of as much as two million barrels of oil -- more than one quarter of Saudi Arabia's daily production.

The Somali pirates have been completely out of control for a while, but they just took piracy to a whole new level.

Over the weekend

Over the weekend, Barack Obama officially resigned his Senate seat, and some new appointees were chosen:

Washington lawyer Gregory B. Craig will be White House counsel, according to a person involved in the transition, and Obama's Senate chief of staff, Peter M. Rouse, 62, was officially announced as a senior White House adviser. Two deputy chiefs of staff were also announced: Jim Messina and Mona K. Sutphen.

Thus far, Obama's selections have been mostly a mix of Washington veterans -- many with ties to the Clinton administration -- and trusted campaign aides. Late last week, the president-elect named close friend and adviser Valerie Jarrett as a senior White House aide. Campaign strategist David Axelrod will also hold a senior advisory role.

Gregory B. Craig defended Bill Clinton during his impeachment trial.

Are the Clintons causing problems already?

According to the Politico, Bill's Clinton Global Initiative might cost Hillary the job at State:

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) is President-elect Barack Obama’s first choice for secretary of State but his aides are becoming exasperated by the Clinton camp’s pokey response to demands for extensive information about former President Bill Clinton’s finances, according to numerous Democrats involved in the process.

...

it could prove problematic for Obama if the former president continues to arrange donations from foreign countries at the same time that his wife, as secretary of state, is asking them for diplomatic concessions. The Clinton Global Initiative, which has raised more than $30 billion since 2005, has matched several foreign governments with projects, including a $1 billion pledge from Norway in 2007.

Clinton under consideration

I've been keeping my fingers crossed for a Bill Richardson selection as Secretary of State, but it looks like I might be disappointed. Apparently, Hillary Clinton is now under consideration.

Now I don't think Hillary would necessarily be a bad Secretary of State. I'm just generally sick and tired of the Clintons. After 20 years of Bush-Clinton politics, I'm ready for both families to go away. We have an opportunity to move away from the hyper-partisanship that's characterized politics under these two families, and elevating Hillary to the State Department jeopardizes that.

Barack Obama's in a bad spot, however. On one hand, I'm sure he'd like to avoid rewarding the Clintons, both of whom were fairly nasty during the primaries. On the other hand, making Hillary part of the administration ties her to the success or failure of the Obama administration. Leaving Hillary in the Senate leaves her (and Bill) in a position to undermine Obama for the next four years, then make another run for President in 2012.

Extensive or invasive?

Potential appointees to the Obama administration are undergoing unprecedented scrutiny. Not only is the Obama transition team looking to avoid situations that caused embarrassment to past administrations, it's also looking closely at potential conflicts of interest that might be caused by spouses or children working as lobbyists. According to Wednesday's New York Times:

A seven-page questionnaire being sent by the office of President-elect Barack Obama to those seeking cabinet and other high-ranking posts may be the most extensive — some say invasive — application ever.

The questionnaire includes 63 requests for personal and professional records, some covering applicants’ spouses and grown children as well, that are forcing job-seekers to rummage from basements to attics, in shoe boxes, diaries and computer archives to document both their achievements and missteps.

Only the smallest details are excluded; traffic tickets carrying fines of less than $50 need not be reported, the application says. Applicants are asked whether they or anyone in their family owns a gun. They must include any e-mail that might embarrass the president-elect, along with any blog posts and links to their Facebook pages.

A shift in foreign policy

It appears that Barack Obama's already making a difference.

Since 2006, Iran's leaders have called for direct, unconditional talks with the United States to resolve international concerns over their nuclear program. But as an American administration open to such negotiations prepares to take power, Iran's political and military leaders are sounding suddenly wary of President-elect Barack Obama.

And now?

In recent interviews, advisers to Ahmadinejad said the new U.S. administration would have to pull U.S. troops out of Iraq, show respect for Iran's system of rule by a supreme religious leader, and withdraw its objections to Iran's nuclear program before it can enter into negotiations with the Iranian government.

Obviously, Iran's not going anywhere, but the fact that promised changes under an Obama foreign policy is already making them uncomfortable is a good start.

Counting continues in Alaska

As the vote count continues in Alaska, at least a few people are asking about the low turnout. The answers aren't convincing:

According to the Division of Election's projections, the election will end up drawing the second most voters in an Alaska presidential election, next to 2004, but far from the blockbuster numbers you might expect in an election that saw Stevens found guilty in a federal court just days before the voting and Gov. Sarah Palin running for vice president.

Pundits at home and across the country said the turnout numbers smelled fishy. Fenumiai said Monday that there's no evidence of fraud or irregularities.

"I can't speculate as to why people just didn't show up to vote," she said.

Also, the Washington Post is reporting that Mark Begich has taken a three-vote lead over Ted Stevens.

A Gates Scowcroft connection

Could Brent Scowcroft play a role in shaping the Obama administration's foreign policy?




Obama could do worse than listen to one of the architects behind a pretty successful H.W. Bush foreign policy. Especially if today's Iran has something in common with the Soviet Union, as Thomas P.M. Barnett suggests.

Gates to remain?

According to the Wall Street Journal:

President-elect Barack Obama is leaning toward asking Defense Secretary Robert Gates to remain in his position for at least a year, according to two Obama advisers. A senior Pentagon official said Mr. Gates would likely accept the offer if it is made.

First, he extended an olive branch to Joe Lieberman. Now, Barack Obama's at least thinking about rewarding one of the few bright spots from the last administration. Granted, it's only been a week, but it sure didn't take that long for any hope of bipartisanship to bite the dust in post-election 2000.

Obama vs. the Taliban

Changes are brewing in Afghanistan. The Obama foreign policy team is looking at new strategies in the fight against the Taliban.

Bail out Detroit?

Obama wants to include automakers in the federal bailout program. Is yet another bailout really going to save Detroit this time? Obviously, from a laissez-faire point of view, throwing more money at a failing industry is a bad idea. And, at this point, are GM and Ford really "American" car manufacturers? Nowadays, Japanese cars represent more American labor than those purported to be "American."

No harm, no foul

Despite his participation in the McCain campaign, Obama wants Joe Lieberman to remain in the Senate Democrat caucus. This is certainly a good sign for Obama's promise of a new politics in Washington.

Voting oddities

From last Wednesday, Nate Silver from Five ThirtyEight details some voting strangeness in Alaska:

So far, about 220 thousand votes have been processed in Alaska. This compares with 313 thousand votes cast in 2004. After adding back in the roughly 50,000 absentee and early ballots that Roll Call accounts for, that would get us to 270 thousand ballots, or about a 14 percent drop from 2004. It seems unlikely that turnout would drop by 14 percent in Alaska given the presence of both a high-profile senate race and Sarah Palin at the top of the ticket.

But even if Begich were to make up ground and win a narrow victory, this would seem to represent a catastrophic failure of polling, as three polls conducted following the guilty verdict in Stevens' corruption trial had Begich leading by margins of 7, 8 and 22 points, respectively.

The emerging conventional wisdom is that there was some sort of a Bradley Effect in this contest -- voters told pollsters that they weren't about to vote for that rascal Ted Stevens, when in fact they were perfectly happy to. Convicted felons are the new black, it would seem.

The problem with this theory is that the polling failures in Alaska weren't unique to Stevens. They also applied to the presidential race, as well as Alaska's at-large House seat. In each case, the Republican outperformed his pre-election polling by margins ranging from 12 to 14 points.

So what the hell did happen in Alaska?

Linda Kellen Biegel explains why it's premature to jump to the conclusion that some kind of fraud is involved.

Shutting down Guantanamo

Barack Obama's transition team has expressed a desire to reverse some of the Bush administration's more controversial policies. First up: Guantanamo Bay.

President-elect Obama's advisers are quietly crafting a proposal to ship dozens, if not hundreds, of imprisoned terrorism suspects to the United States to face criminal trials, a plan that would make good on his promise to close the Guantanamo Bay prison but could require creation of a controversial new system of justice.

I'll be posting more on this plan as details are divulged.

Back in Alaska

Tom Kizzia at the Anchorage Daily News outlines the challenges facing Sarah Palin between now and 2012.

Rahm Emanuel

Barack Obama's first big decision after winning last Tuesday was to designate Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff. That appointment should put to rest any notion that Obama's got some kind of anti-Israeli agenda in mind. Emanuel's also a notoriously pushy asshole, which makes him a perfect bad-cop enforcer to Obama's good-cop. And while his experience in the fledgling Clinton administration doesn't ensure a mistake-free early presidency, it does at least ensure that the Obama administration probably won't repeat the exact same mistakes.

Welcome to the blog

Welcome to the new blog. I'm one of those Obamacons you've heard so much about during this last Presidential election. I'm a fiscal conservative and social libertarian that supported Barack Obama in 2008. Far from being a traitor to conservatism, as people like me have been portrayed by some in the conservative media, I supported Obama over John McCain for two reasons:

* It was time to reboot the Republican party

* Barack Obama was the better candidate

Under George W. Bush, the Republican party has become a big-government, nanny-state party. Conservatism waved bye-bye to the Republican party years ago. After a thorough defeat in 2008, it's time to wander in a wilderness for a bit. After some time in the minority, my hope is that true conservatives are ready to make a comeback.

Despite the fact that I don't agree with Obama on many specific policies, he really was the better candidate. When I look for a President, I'm looking specifically for someone who can lead the nation, and for someone who can conduct foreign policy competently. Cool and collected throughout his campaign, Obama, through his behavior, proved that he was the better of the two candidates. Honestly, he was the best candidate that ran in either party. Everyone else had such major flaws that it was difficult to really ever get behind any of them.

That leads me to my purpose in starting this blog. I plan on keeping track of the state of conservatism in the Republican party. I also plan on taking a look at the conduct of the Obama administration. And I'm sure I'll do some general rambling, as is my wont.