I Have Come to Praise Him….

07/18/2007

Paul Munnis


Whoever the next President of the United States is they are going to need a top flight Cabinet to run the affairs of State for the USA. The team assembled to come to Washington has got to be a class act and one that knows how to resolve their issues in the back room. We have had twelve years of government by spin and now we need a competent government that can run our nation.

Whoever is in charge of the Treasury has got a flagging dollar to support, a trade deficit a mile long, and foreign exchange challenges to face.

The next Secretary of State will have to repair our American image across the globe having to be tough but fair with some yet cooperative and giving to others. Aside from cleaning up the mess in the mid-east there is a matter of setting a new U.S. foreign policy, including a new nuclear policy.

The next Secretary of Labor is also faced with a huge task of leading America to an enlightened labor policy while replacing the retiring Baby-Boomers. They will need to deal with the lack of trained workers to replace the Baby-Boomers and the current angst over illegal immigrant labor as one small example. Against all of that is dealing with Labor Unions who rightly observe that for the last twelve years they have been hurt by GOP government and have lost power as a result.

Whoever gets the job of Secretary of Defense has a military to rebuild from top to bottom and it will be hard to do since every branch of the service wants more money than exists on the face of the earth. There is more at stake than money, there is also a need to stand in support of the other cabinet members and to phase-in the rebuilding of our military so it is interlocked with other urgent needs of America.

We could go on like this through every cabinet post but you get it – the next President will have to pick strong people who can administer their Agencies and back them, and run the nation not as a monarch but as a CEO. And over-all there must be good rapport with Congress and the UN.

So when Bill Richardson derides the Vice President’s job I think we have to take him with a grain of salt. The next President is going to have to delegate a lot to the next VP in terms of overall supervision and inter-Agency coordination. The next VP might seriously consider an office in the Capitol Building to save him from trips back and forth to Congress where he will wear out the carpet. A successful VP could become the next president of the United States. Yes -- it’s that important.

No amateurs need apply.

The VP used to be a guy kept inthe wings, muzzled, and allowed to come out only on State occasions to remind the nation there was a successor if needed. Now it's different. VP's are tasked by the President with jobs to get done for our government and they can and do make a difference in an Administration. Some like Al Gore made a huge positive difference and some like Dick Chaney have made a huge negative difference.

Bill Richardson brings one heck of a resume to the Washington scene. Not only does he have the credentials, he has a long string of successes and the smell of gun-smoke about him. He’s a laid back guy in public, a sort of cuddly teddy bear, but he is tough as nails in negotiations and in terms of his principles he is an honest and forthright guy. Even the tough negotiating North Koreans respect Bill Richardson. For that to happen he has to be first a good man, then a good politician, in that order.

We hope that Bill Richardson takes the job when it’s offered as it will surely be. The others: they will all play major roles in the next Administration but Bill Richardson was born to be the VP of a Democratic Party government who is rebuilding our nation after a disaster, we need him as our national sparkplug.

In the meantime I understand that this perception of being right for the VP job clouds him as a presidential candidate and its okay with me because as a VP he will be simply magnificent.