He’s Doing Something Right
President-elect Barack Obama is drawing a fair amount of flak from various and disparate single-issue groups over his Cabinet appointments. Multiple special interest groups are complaining that they’re not appropriately represented in Obama’s incoming Cabinet.
The Feminists – in the form of the National Organization of Women (NOW) – are bitching about President-elect Obama’s Cabinet choices. They’re complaining that he only appointed five (5) women to his Cabinet.
The Blacks – in the form of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) – are ranting about President-elect Obama’s Cabinet choices. They’re complaining that he only appointed four (4) Blacks to his Cabinet.
The Latinos – in various informal forms since they don’t have a central or primary PAC – are railing against President-elect Obama’s Cabinet choices. They’re complaining that he only appointed three (3) Latinos to his Cabinet.
The Homosexuals – again in various informal forms since they don’t have a central or primary PAC – are whining about President-elect Obama’s Cabinet choices. They’re complaining that he didn’t appoint any openly queer people at all to his Cabinet.
Now, as any regular reader of Reflections From A Murky Pond already knows, I’m fairly close to the last American one would expect to defend Obama from his detractors or praise his actions. But just because I think that electing Obama was a horrible – and possibly nationally suicidal – mistake doesn’t mean that I’m going to side with special interest groups who are attacking him for no good purpose.
There are fourteen (14) Cabinet Secretaries. Of that 14 Obama has selected: 5 women, 4 Blacks, and 3 Latinos. That’s a quite diverse grouping of gender and races. Of course there is some overlap in the demographics of Obama’s Cabinet selections, cases such as Obama’s new Secretary of Labor, Rep. Hilda L. Solis, who is a Latino woman.
What I see is a bunch of single issue, self-serving enemies of American democracy and American meritocracy who are puling about not getting enough of their respective sorts into key positions in the US government. President-elect Obama has drawn their ire because he has apparently made a certain amount of effort to place the best qualified – for his agenda at least – people into the Cabinet positions. In other words, he’s doing something right!
Don’t get me wrong; I dsilike most of Obama’s Cabinet picks as well. They’re mostly from the Far Left and many seem to be Global Warming dupes.
So Obama has turked off a lot of people in the US with his Cabinet selections. Conservatives are unhappy about- but unsurprised by the political ideology of his Cabinet, and various groups who identify themselves solely or primarily by gender, race, or sexual proclivities are unhappy because Obama didn’t seemingly meet their expectations for increased power under his regime.
I hate to say it, but anytime a Liberal President declines to appease these groups in favor of appointing who he thinks is best qualified for the job he’s probably doing the right thing.
Tags: Blacks | Feminism | Hispanics | Leftists | LGBT | Liberals | Obama | Politics
December 23rd, 2008 at 7:52 am
I’d like to know your source for reporting that those groups are complaining. I’m a pretty thorough follower of the news and have seen no such thing.
(Now going to check and see if those were perhaps links.)
December 23rd, 2008 at 8:20 am
So, of course I must be lying? Fine.
BTW: It is rather rude to come to a blog and post only a requirement for sources. If you doubt the author’s creditability that much, do your own research and refute them.
December 23rd, 2008 at 9:10 am
Sorry, but I’m new to your blog and don’t know yet which sources you customarily draw from. Also, since I live in the UK, my standard sources tend to be different from those of US bloggers. In my blog, when I post such statements, I usually provide the reference as a link, but I understand that it breaks the flow of a blog. I certainly wasn’t accusing you of lying, just trying to get a handle on whether the links would include the context of the quotation.
For example, the CNN link gives no clue of when Ms. Gandy made that statement or whether she was talking about Obama’s cabinet specifically or not, nor does it provide any way for me to find that out.
The context of black disappointment is significant, for example. Your link says they were disappointed that there were not black appointees to positions that they consider of particular significance in the lives of many blacks.
The third is a blog, the opinion of one person who could or could not be representative of hispanics in general, who uses all of four hispanics as his source. So we really don’t know what most hispanics think at all.
Again, with respect to the gays, we have one gay leader outspoken in his unhappiness.
Given these things, I think it was inaccurate to say The Feminists, The Blacks, etc. In other words, the links are significant to my interpretation of what you have said.
I’m sorry if that seems unreasonable to you.
December 23rd, 2008 at 9:25 am
As a meritocrat myself, I can only agree. Incidentally “token” in Swedish means “the silly person” or “the idiot” : ) The sad part is that Obama himself was elected largely as a token. Thankfully, though, Obama is far from an idiot. I think you’ll have to admit in a not too distant future that it was not national suicide to elect him.
December 23rd, 2008 at 9:35 am
DJCNOR,
I cited some easily findable sources. There are others, both in the MSM and in various parts of the blogosphere. I think that disgruntlement from the SBC and the President of NOW is significant, though not surprising. The Hispanics and Gays have a less defined political presence, so the sources are a bit less powerful.
In any case, I made sure to put “in the form of…” to show that it was prominent groups within those demographics who were getting attention paid to their complaints by the media.
One can accurately say that not all of any of these groups is complaining, but one could say the same thing about any large group of people. There are always ones that don’t feel the same way as their vocal leadership.
P.S.: I understand your original request now. I actually use sources from all over the world. I’ll even use Al Jazeera on occasion, even though they’re the enemy of my country in the sense that they cater to the Islamics’ stereotyping of America.
I also tend to check a lot of sources surrounding an issue and blend the data together. Citing a single reference as I did in response to you gives only a part of the picture. I admit that this does make proving the “provenance” of my presented information.
Paradigm,
Maybe, maybe not. The problem – to my mind – is not Obama himself, but the Socialism, Egalitarianism, Secularism, and such that he is a token of. Yeah, he identifies as Black, and that went a long way towards getting him elected. He’s also something else though and that is what is dangerous to this country if left unchecked.
Frankly, his failure to appease the special interests groups so far does go a wee bit towards assuaging my fears. On the other hand, his overly Leftist and Global Warming believer choices don’t.