Obama’s pool

Random thoughts after watching the Monday press conference…

The ever resourceful president-elect is widening his cabinet, shifting his emphasis and controlling the message. Two of those things are new.

The media are all on point, using unoriginal buzz phrases as new announcements are made. Like, the “team of rivals.”

Both choices, Robert Gates to stay on as Defense secretary and James Jones as national security adviser, reflect Mr. Obama’s stated desire to build a bipartisan cabinet that is also effective.

In Secretary Gates, Obama chooses a Defense secretary popular with both parties who will temper his ambitious campaign pledge to get out of Iraq in 16 months. The choice of Mr. Jones, a retired Marine general with deep Washington roots, will help Obama to establish his own national security identity in a town wary of his military inexperience.

Smart moves, both of them. Interesting that Gen. Jones has a history and familiarity with Sen. John McCain, far more than Obama. Like his economic advisers, who share some core values with conservatives.

In making his choices, Obama said he sought foreign policy pragmatists who may not agree with one another but who “share a core vision.”

He also claimed to prize vigorous debate over “groupthink.”

“I am a strong believer in strong personalities and strong decisionmaking,” Obama said Monday.

Couple of things here….

The transition team is using a number of key words in their talking points, and the ever-complicit and unoriginal media are parroting them. One of them is “pragmatic” or some variation of pragmatism, ever since it was first put out in a sound bite, probably by either Rahm Emanuel or John Podesta. Interesting choice of words.

Also, though Obama eschews ‘groupthink’, the media are stuck on it, and he mocked them today in the press conference after his cabinet announcements. It’s his form of ‘command and control’, and it’s always worked for him (speaking of pragmatic). Today, when members of the press started quoting things Obama said during the long campaign about ending the war…and about Hillary Clinton’s lack of foreign policy experience….and how those things square with his choices today….Obama scoffed at them and said they were playing a little game, and having fun plucking out things he said in the middle of a campaign when the atmosphere was different. He effectively played defense by going on offense. Which is a continuation of how the media and Obama handled each other during the campaign. There’s little to no serious scrutiny in this particular press pool, which is another measure of how much control Obama has maintained over information.

Last thought on the above snip is this…Obama has believed in “strong decisionmaking” as long as we in Chicago have known him. A Tribune piece on him nearly a year ago said Michelle Obama asks him, at the end of the day, to ignore polls and do his homework and after due diligence, to do the right thing.

A lot has changed since then, and now he is about to become president of the United States. Imagine the strength of the decision he can make if, after doing his due diligence on health and human rights issues to the fullest, he chose to uphold the Hyde Amendment, the Mexico City policy, and the laws that have so diligently been passed over the years to maximize the protection of life.