McCain Adviser "Gobsmacked" By Obama's Cabinet

Max Boot, a violently hawkish neoconservative blogger and McCain campaign staffer, professes himself surprisingly impressed by Barack Obama's staff picks:

As someone who was skeptical of Obama's moderate posturing during the campaign, I have to admit that I am gobsmacked by these appointments , most of which could just as easily have come from a President McCain. (Jim Jones is an old friend of McCain's, and McCain almost certainly would have asked Gates to stay on as well.) This all but puts an end to the 16-month timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, the unconditional summits with dictators, and other foolishness that once emanated from the Obama campaign. His appointments suggest that, if anything, his administration will have a Reapolitiker, rather than a liberal, bent, although Clinton and Steinberg at State should be powerful voices for "neo-liberalism" which is not so different in many respects from "neo-conservativism". Both, for instance, support humanitarian interventions in places like Darfur and Bosnia. ...

Only churlish partisans of both the left and the right can be unhappy with the emerging tenor of our nation's new leadership.

Michael Goldfarb, another McCain blogger, agrees. Conservative Ross Douthat predicted recently that "on an awful lot of issues, the Obama foreign policy will end cutting to the right of Bill Clinton's foreign policy, which was already more center-left than left." He also wrote that "Obama already made fans of Niall Ferguson and Eli Lake; by 2012, I wouldn't be surprised if he's converted Max Boot as well." Apparently, it didn't take nearly that long.

Comments

[chronic]

Everything is "ideology" with these repubics.


Its almost as if they are mentally sick!

[latinopride]

Democrats and Republicans are the same thing, there are only minor differences. Obama, like bush supports our corporate run society and he supports our imperialistic foreign policy. Just look at his cabinet, full of neocons and capitalists. And for all of you clinton lovers, he was probably the second worst US president in history, just behind Bush. He ended welfare, and was arguably more imperialistic than bush was! What this country really needs is socialism, making people not corporations our number one priority and bringing an end to the American empire "project".

[NoMercy]

Europe, the Commonwealth, and countries like South Korea are not yet ready to see the US leave its post-WWII role as "world protector" yet. A socialist US wouldn't be rich enough to do this job.

[NoMercy]

O, I forgot Eretz Yisrael as well.

[cplKlyde]

Yep. i've always said when it comes to foreign policy there is not a dimes worth of difference between the two parties. Obama will tinker at the margins but on the big issues there will be no change. If O is reelected at the end of his eight years there will be no Palestinian state, the US will still have 700+ military bases world wide and NATO will have expanded to meet a threat that doesn't exist.

[madisonhack]

I supported Obama because of the hope of change and his commitment to intelligent curiosity. McCain's myopic worldview left me NO hope for a change in our nation's foreign or domestic policies. Obama may disappoint me but McCain would have been predictably disastrous. Most Presidents try and fulfill their campaign promises; you have to listen to what those promises are.

[eqactor2]

Somebody should smack him in the gob and shut him up.

[rob2007]

Oh goody! The right approve of Obama's choices! Little late to the party, boys, but keep sucking up since you don't have any original thought yourselves. Palin? The standard bearer for your party? Don't you see and hear how stupid that sounds on so many levels? You don't? Well then, not only Palin but the entire party has to go back to school--and get a tutor this time.

[chronic]

Exactly! LOL

[lizr]

I personally hope they run Palin from now til forever.

Keep O in power for a long long time.

Repeal the 22nd (23rd?)

[Crozier]

21st ratified 2/27/1951

[rock2casbah]

Personally I do not care if they approve of PE Obama's choices or not. They are his choices and will serve at his will. That is how it is done. If he tells them he wants a withdrwal in 16 months, all Gates better do is to say yes Mr. President and get to work on it. He is the change we selected The others serve his administration, not the other way around.

Don't confuse him with Dubya.

[Frenchy9]

Very true. He is our choice. He is the 'directeur". He has done very well so far: not only the primary campaign against Clinton was genius like. against Mcain it was noble and powerful, and now, he is creating his team with experienced people so that they don't wreak it, and this people, who ever they are, are under his supervision.
PLus he is making his Cabinet fast like to one before (another historic aspect...) and he is intervening in spite of himself but very efficiently in the economy, even he is not President yet!

Are we lucky?! For me, it helps forget I lost 75% of my savings! I am still happy.
Give Obama a chance!

[Crozier]

Salut mon ami francophon­ne.....nou­s sommes d'accord avec vous.

Bonne fete d'action de grace.............

[beartrack]

Good point. Obama is The President. No one else. Read in an article that Gates and the Generals are all aware what The Commander in Chief wants and are ready to carry the plan out. Could be that these experienced military folks have known all along that this war was wrong and are ready for some new leadership.

[KickerBoard]

Yes, we'll wait and see. And yes, BO has not yet assumed office. But, yes, it is also disappointing that the initial signs suggest bending over backwards to accommodate naysayers, skeptics and conservatives at the expense of progressives who've supported the BO campaign from the start. Of course there's a place for the competent of any political stripe - I just don't buy into the notion that competence is the sole preserve of people who've already been involved in stuffing this all up and the "experienced" people associated with spectacularly incompetent losing campaigns - that were specifically NOT voted for. Unfortunately, the wimpish Democratic tendency of turning a strong mandate into a weak one is too long established for anyone with a brain to rest easy at these perplexing early signs. But... we'll wait and see.

[chronic]

You don't even know what you are talking about.


Sit back and take notes!

[KickerBoard]

Wow - very thought-provoking. You've convinced me. Congratulations.

[KarateKid]

Actually, he needs to go back to middle school.

[realtalkingnow]

Obama wants to find SOLUTIONS to the problems we face, so he is not childishly going to play the same political games that every politician who becomes president has been playing for decades, and decades, which is only hiring people with D's or R's behind their names. Instead what Obama is doing is being a responsible leader, a responsible president, and hiring the people he feels would perform the best at their job. OBAMA IS THINKING FIRST AND FOREMOST ABOUT THE COUNTRY --- HE IS ACTUALLY PUTTING COUNTRY FIRST! HE IS PUTTING THE NEEDS OF THE PEOPLE OF THIS COUNTRY FIRST!!! THAT IS WHAT A GOOD PRESDIENT DOES, THAT IS WHAT A GOOD LEADER DOES!!! We are now in times which call for our leader to pick the people he sees as the best and the brightest to work on behalf of the Ameriacn people, and that is exactly what Obama is doing
I feel like this: just like we expect business owners in this country to NOT discriminate when they are hiring employees, to hire the best person with the best qualifications to do the job, so too should we want Obama to not discriminate (based on political party affiliation), but instead we should want him to hire the best people to serve in the government to find solutions to the problems we face, people who in the end are working for all of us, the citizens of the USA !!

[elliegrl]

AGREED! I think people just took "There are no Red states, there are no Blue states, there are the UNITED States.." as only soaring rhetoric..

[refah]

Oh Max, today you joined the elite club of opinionated hacks who can transmit their stench through the written word. You are drip, drip, dripping some kind of ooze all over the place. Did you come up with this all by yourself or did your mommy help? Why don't you find something constructive to do, huh? And in case you are going to accuse me of anything -- just remember -- you went first.

[beyobi]

Wouldn't it be nice if Barack could actually take the oath of office before all the pundits pronounce judgment on his administration?

[realtalkingnow]

It seems that the only people who ARE NOT living in the real world are the neocon war mongerers, because EVERY SINGLE Secretary of State (still living), and even BOTH Petreaus, and Gates have said that diplomatic talks needs to be pursued with Iran, I believe that just a few days ago, Gates even said that in order to see an improvement in Afghanistan, that perhaps less radicalized factions of the Taliban may need to be spoken to, to see if they can be peeled away from the control, or propaganda of AlQueada, inorder to find a way to weaken AlQueada's influence in Afghanistan, and over innocent Afghanistan civilians.

[kasinca]

Max Boot is another chickenhawk coward, like Jonah Goldberg, who doesn't have a clue about leadership. Obama will be the boss, not Gates or Jones.

[DonCosenza]

Could it be that Obama is actually interested in hearing from advisors who will share different viewpoints from his own? Could he be confident enough to incorporate constructive criticism from others while maintaining and advancing his own vision?

[Passenger57]

I think so, Don - Obama's said before that he doesn't want a bunch of "yes men" around him ; that he wants differing opinons and suggestions from all sides - but he's still the Boss.

[inluvwkeitholbermann]

who says "gobsmacked" anyway?

[cwhig1848]

Isn't Max Boot a character in an Evelyn Waugh novel anyway?

[eqactor2]

It's a primarily British phrase, I think. I heard it quite a bit when I lived in London. Perhaps it makes him feel a little more educated than the rest of us. Personally, I don't care if he approves or not.
I wish the media would stop assuming that Obama is going to be led around by the nose and that his appointees will be the ones in charge.

As rock2casbah put (above):

don't confuse him with Dubya

[truelie]

These idiots still think "talking" means weakness. Idiots! Barack will show them how it's done. Just a bit of wisdom and humility can save thousands of innocent lives. When will they ever learn?

[strandwolf]

They will not. You are speaking truth to cretins.

[Bitsko]

Ain't falling for it, gob shite.