The Hermitage 3.0 (Beta)

Mainstream media is going nuts over the election of Scott Brown over Martha Coakley and what that means for health care reform and Obama’s agenda and blah blah blah. While I’ll agree that this probably doesn’t bode well for having Congress accomplish anything important in the foreseeable future, they seem to be missing the point:

Why has “government” become an arena for our two political parties to posture and preen and strut and vie for power instead of a place where, y’know, actual governing takes place.

*ahem* They seem to be missing the point as well as contributing to the problem.

Read this: 177 out of 631 political appointments still unconfirmed

(for comparison, Bush II had 70 unconfirmed appointees after 1 year)

Ugh, the fact that political parties(y) and special interests are playing games with our government sickens me.

What kind of games? I’ve already showed you that the filibuster game has experienced a dramatic increase in popularity lately, so let’s look at another game. A game called “let’s not appoint government officials and then blame government for not working”

It might have been useful, perhaps to have a someone in charge of the TSA in the aftermath of the Christmas terrorist attempt. Having someone in a position like that might have even helped to say, thwart the attack. (Ok, probably not, but let me stand on my soapbox here.) What? You say that there is a position like that? And that someone highly qualified has been appointed? And that a vote on his nomination has been put off for 4 months?!?! (Southers has since withdrawn his nomination)

You would figure that in this terrible economy it might be important to have a full complement of assistant secretaries at the Treasury Department. Clearly, not everyone thinks that, since 4 out of 10 are still awaiting confirmation. (Though, to be fair, Obama, what took you so long to nominate them?)

You might also think that maintaining strong diplomatic relationships with Brazil, only the largest economy in South America, the 8th largest country in the world, and one of the the four fast-growing BRIC countries, would be well-advised. Unless, of course, you were an American Congressman and decided to ice the nominee for over seven months.

I’ll be upfront and say that I can’t comment on the quality of the nominees. There could very well be a legitimate concerns (I’m looking at you, Harriet Myers.) However, don’t pull crap like this and expect me to give you the benefit of the doubt in the future.

The most absurd hold of 2009, perhaps, was on Miriam Sapiro, whom the Obama administration appointed to become a U.S. trade representative. Sen. Jim Bunning, a Republican from Kentucky, held up the respected Internet policy specialist’s nomination over — really — candy-flavored cigarettes. Big Tobacco, with Bunning on its side, wanted the Obama administration to lobby against Canada’s banning of flavored cigarettes like cloves, which are particularly popular among underage smokers. According to the New York Times, Bunning lifted the hold only when Democrats agreed to put a Republican, Michael Khouri, on the Federal Maritime Commission. (In the end, Bunning didn’t even attend the vote that confirmed Sapiro.)

Ok. I’ll step off the soapbox now.

Partial list of held appointments below the cut.

The full list @ whitehouse.gov
This post brought to you by Foreign Policy Ezra Klein and Matt Yglesias

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