Via
"Mugsy's Rap Sheet":
Many pre-inauguration decisions & statements made by President-elect Barack Obama have me seriously concerned. Mindful though, after eight years of George W. Bush, Barack Obama could be caught red-handed drowning a sack of puppies in the Potomac and I'd still wait for him to explain before condemning him.
With that said, listening to Obama repeat such questionable Bush-era assertions like "
Iran is still pursuing a nuclear weapon" when much of the intelligence we've received up to this point
all argue otherwise, and trying to
expand his tax cuts... which run a serious risk of
derailing any economic recovery... simply to attract Republican support that he doesn't even need (not with the huge majority in the House and a near filibuster-proof 59-vote majority in the Senate), gives me great pause. Americans voted those Republican clowns out of office for a reason. They've seen what Republican policies do to the country and
they want change. Why Obama is so desperate for their approval is beyond me. Perhaps he seeks to be the "Uniter, not a Divider" that Bush promised to be in 2000, but abysmally failed at becoming?
(...)
Then there are his appointments. While I could... if pressed... make a case defending each choice, on balance, I see more downside than up with so many of these choices:
- West Virginia Gov. and V.P. finalist Tim Kaine to head DNC. - That's right. Obama will be replacing Howard Dean, the man whose "50 State Strategy" led to...
- Leon Panetta to head the CIA. - While I can definitely make a case FOR choosing Panetta (...) the biggest negative is that he is a bureaucrat with no experience in intelligence gathering or operations...
- Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State: This pick just makes no sense all the way around. While Hillary and Obama were closest in agreement on domestic policy, the thing they probably differed on most was foreign policy...
- Bill Richardson as Commerce Secretary: Long-time readers of Mugsy's Rap Sheet know what a fan of Richardson I am. (...) appointing Richardson to Commerce Secretary seemed a huge waste and little more than a "consolation prize"...
- Rick Warren to give the invocation: This one probably received the most public outrage. I can understand Obama "reaching out"...
- Sanjay Gupta for Surgeon General: Every bit as bad a choice as Warren above, but worse because this is no two-minute gig. We're talking about making a Conservative critic of National Health Care to be Obama's chief adviser on health care issues...
- Allowed Joe Lieberman to keep his chairmanship of the Senate Security Counsel: There are few people outside the Bush White House that Democrats outright despise more than "Traitor Joe" Lieberman...
- Cass Sunstein as "Regulatory Czar": Though it hasn't been publicly announced yet, it now appears that Obama will be nominating someone that repeatedly puts feux financial concern over much needed, reasonable and rational government regulations...
- The nomination of Timothy Geitner to be Treasury Secretary, who is currently answering question about failing to pay taxes, is still a giant question mark...
(...)
Postscript funny: I caught this image as it whizzed by on the side of a Turkish bus during the Oct 10th edition of
BBC World News but never got around to posting it:
Photo on the side of Turkish bus (10/10/2008)
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