The response to President-elect Barack Obama’s Cabinet choices remains very positive, with 83 percent of respondents in a Marist survey Wednesday saying they approved of his performance so far. Politico.com called the Cabinet “a middle-of-the-roader’s dream.” Even Bush guru Karl Rove has called Obama’s choices “reassuring.” Some perspective, though, can be gained with two flashbacks:
George W. Bush’s initial picks looked good, too, especially all-stars Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld and Christine Todd Whitman. (Though reflecting the contested election result, an Associated Press poll in January 2001 found that just 52 percent approved of his handling of the transition.)
In a Gallup poll in December 1992, 67 percent approved of Bill Clinton’s transition. Yet, as the Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza recalled, “most politicos believe that to be the most unorganized – and mismanaged – handover of power in recent memory.”
It was no surprise to Kansans, but Sen. Sam Brownback’s formal announcement Thursday that he’s giving up his seat in 2010 has the national political media talking. Washington Post blogger Chris Cillizza said it “gives Democrats a real chance at a pickup.” And if the term-limited Gov. Kathleen Sebelius runs for the Senate, he writes, “she would start the race as the favorite with Reps. Jerry Moran (R) and Todd Tiahrt (R) both far less well known than Sebelius. Still, Democrats haven’t won a Kansas Senate seat since 1932. That’s, um, 76 years.”
“The budget is the No. 1, 2 and 3 issue. We’re not going to waste a lot of time and protracted debate on issues du jour.” – Incoming House Speaker Mike O’Neal (in photo), R-Hutchinson, on 2009 legislative priorities
“There are very few clean hands here. Everybody in this building knew that 9 percent (spending) increases were unsustainable.” – Alan Cobb, state director of Americans for Prosperity, as Kansas borrowed $250 million last week to pay its bills
“They’ve always been fat and happy over there compared to other agencies.”- Rep. Tom Sawyer, D-Wichita, on a report that the Kansas Department of Commerce is more top-heavy with managers than at least five other state agencies
“How much does a guy have to pay for a mistake of personal proportions? You can beat a dead horse forever but for what purpose?” – Former Kansas Attorney General Robert Stephan, hoping people will move on now that former Attorney General Paul Morrison has been cleared of criminal wrongdoing in a sex scandal
President George W. Bush’s artful dodging of an Iraq journalist’s hurled shoes brought back memories of other infamous podium assaults. Strangely, former Wichita congressman Dan Glickman was the target of a number of them. At a food conference in Rome in November 1996, then-Agriculture Secretary Glickman was pelted by nongenetically modified soybeans thrown by three naked protesters. At other times, he was variously splattered with rotten bison entrails and showered with carbonated soda and glass (the last as a protester threatened to kill himself with a broken bottle). After a tofu cream pie narrowly missed his head at a 2000 nutrition summit, Glickman famously turned to former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole and quipped, “I think we’re not in Kansas anymore.”
The response to President-elect Barack Obama’s Cabinet choices remains very positive, with 83 percent of respondents in a Marist survey Wednesday saying they approved of his performance so far. Politico.com called the Cabinet “a middle-of-the-roader’s dream.” Even Bush guru Karl Rove has called Obama’s choices “reassuring.” Some perspective, though, can be gained with two flashbacks:
