Free-Trader for Commerce Secretary?

[BobRossi]

This just sucks:

"WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama on Wednesday nominated former Washington state Governor Gary Locke to be U.S. commerce secretary, turning to a West Coast politician with a history of working with China after his two previous nominees backed out.

"It's not lost on anyone that we have tried this a couple of times. But I'm a big believer at keeping at something until you get it right," Obama said.

Locke was the first Chinese American governor in U.S. history. During his two terms as governor from 1997 through 2004 he led eight trade missions to China and opened a Washington state trade office in Guangzhou."


http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090225/pl_nm/us_obama_nominee_locke_1

[Aloha Spirit]

1. I think Lok Ga Fai is an excellent choice.

As far as working with China, as a governor of a coastal state with a huge port who has some strong accomplishments for US industries, I think he will turn out to be a good pick for commerce secretary.

"As governor, Locke helped preserve the state's aerospace industry by winning the bid for the new Boeing 7E7 plant.
He pushed a plan to raise sales taxes by $1 billion to fund education, but voters defeated it.
Analysts describe him as a pro-business Democrat, fond of trade missions to market the state's products.
David Olson, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Washington, said: "He was extraordinarily successful in working with business - Boeing, as well as labor and machinists.''

http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2009/02/obamas_commerce_secy_gary_lock.html

[BobRossi]

2. However.....

"Democrats criticized Locke for embracing the Republican Party's no-new-taxes approach to dealing with Washington's budget woes during and after the 2001 economic turmoil. Among his spending-reduction proposals were laying off thousands of state employees; reducing health coverage; freezing most state employees' pay; and cutting funding for nursing homes and programs for the developmentally disabled. In his final budget, Locke suspended two voter-passed, pro-school initiatives while cutting state education funding. That same state budget, though, had record-high allocations for construction projects."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Locke

[RepublicanElephant]

3. "...a pro-business Democrat..."

again?
*sigh*

[Jennicut]

4. As long as he has paid his taxes and is not under investigation and its not a Rethug

At this point I don't care! Commerce does not do much anyways.

[Occam Bandage]

5. He worked with China? Oh no. Oh God no. We're all going to die. nt

[pscot]

6. Lok was a very popular Gov

He's squeaky clean, works his butt off and is an effective administrator. Foreign trade was his avocation, but I don't recall that he was ever accused of shipping jobs offshore. He may be charismatically challenged, but he's also very low maintainance. He should quietly do a great job at commerce.