Electric Politics | Status Quo Ante (1993)

human weathervane The political cartoonist KAL once drew a strip of Warren Christopher dancing around foot outlines representing U.S. policy (in its many guises) toward the former Yugoslavia. A very funny cartoon — I have the original somewhere, KAL sent it to me. The point being, Warren Christopher is 'Mr. Cautious.' And probably that's why Mr. Obama chose him to head up the transition team for the State Department: Warren isn't likely to break anything. But neither will he do anything interesting. It now seems, unfortunately, that the across-the-board priority of Obama's transition, as it was for much of his campaign, is flawless execution. At the expense of substance. And that's a pity because the person who never makes a mistake never learns anything really useful.

[This post may be OBE, as the Obama campaign now denies an AP story reporting Christopher's role.]

Think about it for a second. Eight years of lousy foreign policy under Clinton. Eight years of catastrophic foreign policy under Bush. Sixteen years of foreign policy heartache. That means that essentially every single senior foreign service officer now on active duty has been corrupted by the system, with a tiny minority of possible exceptions. If "Change" were the watchword then the first thing to do would be to get ready to clean house, not to re-brand the status quo.

I'm not suggesting it would have been easy. To be honest, I can't think of a good person to handle the State Department's transition. Not one. But I can think of people I'd ask for advice and I'd have been optimistic that I could find somebody moderately seasoned, in their early 40s, who could make the transition, well, a transition.

The question now is who gets tapped for Secretary. If it turns out to be another Clinton retread then all bets are off.



Home FAQ Contact Archive EP Store EP Alerts © 2012 ElectricPolitics	Status Quo Ante (1993) The political cartoonist KAL once drew a strip of Warren Christopher dancing around foot outlines representing U.S. policy (in its many guises) toward the former Yugoslavia. A very funny cartoon — I have the original somewhere, KAL sent it to me. The point being, Warren Christopher is 'Mr. Cautious.' And probably that's why Mr. Obama chose him to head up the transition team for the State Department: Warren isn't likely to break anything. But neither will he do anything interesting. It now seems, unfortunately, that the across-the-board priority of Obama's transition, as it was for much of his campaign, is flawless execution. At the expense of substance. And that's a pity because the person who never makes a mistake never learns anything really useful. [This post may be OBE, as the Obama campaign now denies an AP story reporting Christopher's role.] Think about it for a second. Eight years of lousy foreign policy under Clinton. Eight years of catastrophic foreign policy under Bush. Sixteen years of foreign policy heartache. That means that essentially every single senior foreign service officer now on active duty has been corrupted by the system, with a tiny minority of possible exceptions. If "Change" were the watchword then the first thing to do would be to get ready to clean house, not to re-brand the status quo. I'm not suggesting it would have been easy. To be honest, I can't think of a good person to handle the State Department's transition. Not one. But I can think of people I'd ask for advice and I'd have been optimistic that I could find somebody moderately seasoned, in their early 40s, who could make the transition, well, a transition. The question now is who gets tapped for Secretary. If it turns out to be another Clinton retread then all bets are off. Posted by George Kenney on November 12, 2008 4:08 AM « International Calling \| Main \| Human Rights Versus Corporation Rights » Share this post: Leave a comment Name Email Address URL Remember personal info? Comments (You may use HTML tags for style)

Status Quo Ante (1993)

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