Spotlight on National Security Team
December 2, 2008 by Gee Carol
Things will get less crazy — Monday was a big day for the cause of sanity in U.S. foreign policy. President-elect Barack Obama announced his choices for the new administration’s national security team. The news for this post is drawn from foreign newspapers in order to provide a flavor of what those outside our borders are thinking about the Obama team. The sources include The Financial Times, the BBC News, Aljazeera and the International Herald Tribune.
Three “heavyweights” lead the list. And they will need to be big and strong because they could be called upon to lead Obama’s promised foreign policy redirection. They could be asked to look at turning some of the U.S. Defense Department’s kinetic “swords” into State Department diplomatic “plowshares.” It is an amazing possibility, that three who were seen by many as “hawks,” would be willing to sign on to such a long overdue shift within the national security enterprise . David Sanger explains in an excellent analysis for the International Herald Tribune. He begins,
. . . all three of his choices — Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton as the rival turned secretary of state; General James Jones, the former NATO commander, as national security adviser, and Robert Gates, the current and future defense secretary — were selected in large part because they have embraced a sweeping shift of resources in the national security arena.
With the economic crisis in the forefront as the highest priority, the themes running through the group’s qualification include bipartisanship, experience, self-confidence, intellect and willingness to speak the truth to power. That means that their strong leadership, informed by Barack Obama’s vision, will guide the nation along the right path from early on. Not named, but part of the solution, is former President Bill Clinton, who will be making significant sacrifices to clear the way for his wife’s appointment to her former rival’s administration.
Of the six choices that were announced Monday, three of them are women. Each appointee made a statement, Clinton speaking first and longest. In addition to Senator Clinton, President-elect Obama named Susan Rice as U.N. Ambassador (raised to a Cabinet level position) and Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano as Secretary of Homeland Security. Rounding out the team is Eric Holder as Attorney General. The group is diversity personified, as Holder and Rice are African-Americans. Vice-President-elect Joe Biden was present on stage and also made a good statement reinforcing the sophistication and depth of his knowledge of foreign affairs.
The “Wow factor” is quite astonishing as I think about it. For years I have admired Hillary Clinton, Bill Gates, Janet Napolitano and Jim Jones. I have been more recently impressed by Holder’s courage and evident constitutional bent, as well as Rice’s towering intellect.
The appointments will not be without criticism, as Aljazeera reports. To quote their good story’s conclusion,
‘Moving backwards’
Critics have told Al Jazeera that the appointments were a move backwards.
“What we’re seeing here is that Barack Obama is once again taking us back to the 1990s in terms of the people he’s assembling,” said Jeremy Scahill, the author of Blackwater.
“It’s the old guard people who have been so wrong about so much from the beginning.”
However, some say that the old guard blamed for past mistakes have gained valuable experience from those very errors said to have put the US in its current tenuous financial and military situation.
“There’s a hope that he is using very experienced people with centrist credentials to drive a very bold, progressive programme,” said Robert Borosage of Campaign for America’s Future.
Mondays at this blog have usually been set aside for Republican rants, stories of their latest failures, scandals, indictments or trials, and rounding out with a sigh of relief as we are more and more able to say, “Goodbye to all that!” Sanity will be coming back to Foggy Bottom; the adults are again going to be in charge.
(Cross-posted at The Reaction.)
My “creativity and dreaming” post today is at Making Good Mondays.
Technorati tags: news news and politics obama national security presidential transition foreign policy
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I have to tell you I love Abraham Lincoln’s concept of picking the best and the brightest and not necessarily those that agreed with each other or him because he was a leader and was smart enough to figure out which idea was the best exactly as Obama is. I do fear what I have feared from the beginning! When Obama was first compared to JFK and Teddy and Caroline endorsed him as being a unifier along the lines of JFK I feared his assassination! With MLK, JFK, and RFK, in mind I feared this unifier too would be assassinated. Now he is being compared to Abe Lincoln who was also assassinated my fear still alive has been rekindled! We must keep hope alive *Obama) and he will make the right decisions based on advice from the best of all views but he must have his chance. We need him to have his chance!
Jim, thanks for your heartfelt comment. I don’t think you are alone in your fears for our president-elect’s safety. Some thoughts:
The Secret Service is dedicated and each would give their life to protect him.
Millions of us feel protective of Obama. Being a grandmother, I worried when he stood out in the rain during the campaign. That energy from all of us goes into the universe as, I believe, an antidote to hatred. If we “surround him with white light,” or remember him in our prayers, or whatever, that is all we can do. If he and Michelle can be brave, we must also.
And I do think times have fundamentally changed.
Carol
Likewise! Love your thought! I share your sentiment but can not forget the past some of it recent in the lie we live today. Also all the assassinations never solved of those that would unify! Lest we forget! Forever vigilante!