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plus ça change you can believe in

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
Obama enlists Bush's defence chief
US President George W. Bush's Defence Secretary, Robert Gates, has been asked to stay in his post by Barack Obama, the first time in American history a Pentagon chief has been carried over from a president of a different party.
yep, he's all about "firsts"

<insert evil republican "i told ya so" laugh here>
 

J-Dubs

Monkey
Jul 10, 2006
700
1
Salem, MA
Smart move in my opinion.
We are currently in two wars and it is valuable to have someone who has intimate knowledge of the previous administrations thought processes(or lack there of). Briefings do not replace the experience of direct involvement, and Gates can provide better insight.
Also, he works FOR the President and not WITH him, so his ideology does not shape the mission. Besides, it'll only be for a year or so, and then he will be replaced.
 

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
while it may be a smart move - and i'd rep obama if i could - there's a not so insignificant left who must be apoplectic over this, for ironically superficial reasons.
 

Zark

Hey little girl, do you want some candy?
Oct 18, 2001
6,254
7
Reno 911
while it may be a smart move - and i'd rep obama if i could - there's a not so insignificant left who must be apoplectic over this, for ironically superficial reasons.
We're a more pragmatic bunch than you think:biggrin:
 

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
We're a more pragmatic bunch than you think:biggrin:
by "we", i expect you don't mean daily kos, or huffington post

my snarky remark was directed toward the less pragmatic anti-war hard left, not dems in gen'l. and it's not so much that gates is the old guard, but he's also been the DHS head, cia director under the prev bush, and has been on the record as pooh-poohing nato leadership in afghanistan, favoring an all-u.s. led coalition.

i think the mccain campaign could've made political hay by mocking obama's mantra of "change" if they so chose. isn't like this wasn't floated until after the election. i think back in june the first peep of this was made known when hillary was leading obama.
 

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
back in june, and w/o conditions, big-0 said:
RALEIGH, North Carolina (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said on Monday he would impose a windfall profits tax on U.S. oil companies as he sought political gain from Americans' pain over high gasoline prices.

Launching a two-week focus on the economy after clinching the Democratic presidential nomination, Obama drew a sharp contrast between his economic policies and those of John McCain, his Republican rival in the November election.

"I'll make oil companies like Exxon pay a tax on their windfall profits, and we'll use the money to help families pay for their skyrocketing energy costs and other bills," the Illinois senator said.
source

above & beyond various cabinet posts of which i approve, we now have this:
Obama has shelved a proposal to slap the oil and gas companies with a new windfall profits tax because oil prices have dropped so much in recent months, the transition team confirmed today.

"President-elect Obama announced the policy during the campaign because oil prices were above $80 per barrel," a transition aide said. "They are currently below that now and expected to stay below that."
source

must say i didn't see this coming.
 

sanjuro

Tube Smuggler
Sep 13, 2004
17,373
0
SF
while it may be a smart move - and i'd rep obama if i could - there's a not so insignificant left who must be apoplectic over this, for ironically superficial reasons.
Well, I think the torture fallout will hit a lot of people, assuming the Dems investigate this fully.

Gates will probably receive some of the splatter, and since he is still in office (as opposed to Rumsfield, who is mostly to blame).
 

Plummit

Monkey
Mar 12, 2002
233
0
must say i didn't see this coming.
With all the campaign smearing and spewing (on both sides) is it really any surprise that the hardcore left and right will be disappointed (aren't they almost always?) The man's a centrist on a lot of issues, and he appears to be gathering smart people to do the hard work and advise him. The "Party of Rivals" references have probably been beaten to death at this point. Whether they can find a way to work together (extremely bright/talented folks don't always play well with one another), corral congress, and overcome some or any portion of the standard political biz as usual crap in DC remains to be seen.
 
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Westy

the teste
Nov 22, 2002
54,227
20,003
Sleazattle
I think it is hilarious that with some right wing nutters thinking Obama was secretly a far left closet case so far the hand he has show is farther to the right than he campaigned on.

Of course anyone who really paid attention knew he was a middle of the road kind of guy.
 

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
Obama Upholds Detainee Policy in Afghanistan
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has told a federal judge that military detainees in Afghanistan have no legal right to challenge their imprisonment there, embracing a key argument of former President Bush’s legal team.

In a two-sentence filing late Friday, the Justice Department said that the new administration had reviewed its position in a case brought by prisoners at the United States Air Force base at Bagram, just north of the Afghan capital. The Obama team determined that the Bush policy was correct: such prisoners cannot sue for their release.

The Bush administration had argued that federal courts have no jurisdiction to hear such a case because the prisoners are noncitizens being held in the course of military operations outside the United States. The Obama team was required to take a stand on whether those arguments were correct because a federal district judge, John D. Bates, asked the new government whether it wanted to alter that position.

The Obama administration’s decision was generally expected among legal specialists. But it was a blow to human rights lawyers who have challenged the Bush administration’s policy of indefinitely detaining “enemy combatants” without trials.

The power of civilian federal judges to review individual decisions by the executive branch to hold a terrorism suspect as an enemy combatant was one of the most contentious legal issues surrounding the Bush administration. For years, President Bush’s legal team argued that federal judges had no authority under the Constitution to hear challenges by detainees being held at the military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and elsewhere.

The Supreme Court rejected the Bush administration’s legal view for prisoners held at Guantánamo in landmark rulings in 2004 and 2006. But those rulings were based on the idea that the prison was on United States soil for constitutional purposes, based on the unique legal circumstances and history of the naval base.