« previous | MUCK HOME | next »
Top Pentagon Official: Obama Team Still "The Opposition"
The Hill reports today:
Despite keeping Defense Secretary Robert Gates in the Pentagon, President-elect Obama's transition team informed 90 Bush appointees their services will not be needed after Inauguration Day.
It's worth pointing out that another roughly 160 political appointees were kept on. But here at TPMmuckraker, we were more interested in what came next.
The paper reported that, in response to the Obama team's move, Jim O'Beirne, the special assistant to the secretary of defense for White House liaisons, sent an email to the dismissed DOD staffers, in which he suggested that they were being removed by political opponents as a result of their effectiveness in carrying out Bush administration policies.
Reports The Hill:
In the email, O'Beirne tried to assure the soon-to-be displaced employees that the decisions were based on "policy change in the Obama administration" and not based on performance.However, he said, if employees "harbor residual doubts" then they can "content yourself with the likelihood that it was your outstanding performance as a Bush appointee that drew the opposition's attention to you."
"In that regard, you may take justifiable satisfaction that you were among the first to be chosen," O'Beirne wrote.
Now, this way of thinking -- that being removed by "the opposition" (that is, the man who'll be our president) is a badge of honor, because it shows that you were committed to implementing the policies of the previous president -- is misguided coming from anyone.
But The Hill doesn't note that in the case of O'Beirne, a longtime GOP operative who's married to the conservative commentator Kate O'Beirne, it's perhaps not surprising. Consider this excerpt from a Washington Post story from 2006:
After the fall of Saddam Hussein's government in April 2003, the opportunity to participate in the U.S.-led effort to reconstruct Iraq attracted all manner of Americans -- restless professionals, Arabic-speaking academics, development specialists and war-zone adventurers. But before they could go to Baghdad, they had to get past Jim O'Beirne's office in the Pentagon.
To pass muster with O'Beirne, a political appointee who screens prospective political appointees for Defense Department posts, applicants didn't need to be experts in the Middle East or in post-conflict reconstruction. What seemed most important was loyalty to the Bush administration.
O'Beirne's staff posed blunt questions to some candidates about domestic politics: Did you vote for George W. Bush in 2000? Do you support the way the president is fighting the war on terror? Two people who sought jobs with the U.S. occupation authority said they were even asked their views on Roe v. Wade.
In other words, O'Beirne led the disastrous process in which key posts in the Coalition Provisional Authority were given to Heritage Foundation research assistants who knew nothing about Iraq but were loyal to the GOP. And we all know how that turned out.
So perhaps it's to be expected that O'Beirne would continue to see government only through the prism of politics. Still, it's an outlook that's rarely expressed so crassly.
Thanks to reader W.M. for the tip.
Josh
Zachary
Wait is he keeping his job? That would royally piss me off.
December 31, 2008 6:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
lets see, you lose your job for doing it to well for bush but obama keeps you for not doing your job well for bush so he wants you to keep doing your job not well for him.
December 31, 2008 6:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
What a sick person this O'Beirne is.Anyone noticed that his wife,Kate O'Beirne stopped appearing on CMatthews' hardball after Ravi Chandrasammy(sp?) came out with his book detailing the partisan hiring practices at State & Dod championed By Mr.O'Beirne.But she will be back on the Tv shows like Matthews' soon after Obama is sworn in hoping by then all her husband's skulduggery will be forgotten to attack the Obama WH.What a sick couple.
December 31, 2008 6:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
So much for defending the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic.
How may copies of Barack the Magic Negro are floating around O'Beirne's friends at the Pentagon?
December 31, 2008 7:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
I didn't realize that Americans were the enemy, err, the opposition.
Maybe this bozo should travel with Bush the Lesser on an ANNOUNCED visit to Baghdad rather than a "surprise" (code for scared shitless) visit. Then maybe he'll understand who is the opposition.
December 31, 2008 7:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Obama really needs to fire this guy. Not for disloyalty to Obama, but to the country. And also to show that he won't be punked by a third-rate political hack.
December 31, 2008 7:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hmm. Promoting disloyalty to the incoming Commander in Chief and fomenting disloyalty in the ranks during wartime. Good thing for him he never had the guts to sign up for actual service.
December 31, 2008 8:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
No, Obama should not fire him. Instead he should send the copies of the missives to Robert Gates, and ask him to clarify. One point of Gates is to let him do the housecleaning vis a vis any new policy. As part of that, O'Beirne needs to do very public contrition for his comments -- and then find that Obama has a more competent person for his post.
The whole point of putting Gates in place at DoD in the Obama administration is to let him execute the changes. It is to preclude stab-in-the-back arguments, "Who Lost China" movements. O'Beirne is playing that old game -- and the way you call him on it is to make him contrite -- in public.
December 31, 2008 8:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yup! Make an example out of him, a very public example. The point to be pressed is above-noted by paulw. Is this the way to refer to the Commander-in-Chief during wartime? the opposition? Or is treason only relevant when Republicans have the helm?
January 1, 2009 2:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
Exactly right. The hatefulness should NOT be returned in kind. He should be noisily FIRED by his direct REPUBLICAN boss, and that boss should make a public statement as to why, as concerns Mao-Stalinist-Fascist loyalty to cult of personality instead of that required under our Constitution:
To Constitution/system of laws/country, regardless who is president.
And after that Congress should enact a draft statute specifically directed at arrogant America-hating cowards named O'Bierne.
January 4, 2009 12:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
As my blood pressure rises and the knots appear again in my neck and shoulders, I repeat the mantra that has gotten me through these last weeks of the Bush administration: "It's almost over. It's almost over." And it is. Yet soothing though the thought may be, I am aware that the poison of this administration will contaminate our government and our public discourse for years to come. It will never be over until all those in the Bush-Cheney vanguard are doddering or dead, like Nixon's old men.
December 31, 2008 9:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
What a piece of crap! The guy is just like many in the GOP that think anyone who doesnt think like them is the enemy. This guy would have a great NAZI.
December 31, 2008 9:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
And then he'd have a huge cow!
January 1, 2009 4:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is sick. Thanks for posting.
Scandal fatigue has us all worn down.
Prosecute Cheney, and the message will get sent to everyone down the line. Let Cheney go scott-free, and he will go down in history as an idol to these scum.
December 31, 2008 9:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
1000% agreed.
Obama's approval ratings mean nothing, just as W's sub-Nixonian ratings likewise mean nothing, as they have not triggered impeachment, nor are either approval ratings likely to motivate Obama's DoJ to seek the necessary war crimes prosecutions.
I absolutely comprehend and understand "scandal fatigue," and yet these men must be indicted for torture, warrantless data mining, treaty abrogation, lying to Congress, obstruction, profiteering, rackiteering....all of which is tantamount to treason.
Let it go and doom Obama and all his successors into making the same tragic errors in judgment. How many months will Obama be president before HE is the one also guilty of these crimes? Where doth the buck stoppeth?
And commissions will not do. Tick-tock, the statute of limitations clock is already running.
Pax,
M.
January 2, 2009 11:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think it's wonderful that on their way out, these guys are doing everything they can to marginalize and regionalize their party. My hats off to them for doing a spot on job.
December 31, 2008 9:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
There's always a silver lining if you look hard.
January 2, 2009 4:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
In my opinion, one of the primary reasons they got away with so much is their concerted effort to inure the public to their commissions. This is straight from the neo-con playbook (my take): to confuse and/or overwhelm the public to the point that they either tune out, buy in, or give up.
There were times the past eight years when it was hard to keep up with the scandals and outrages, let alone put them in any meaningful context. The way the Bush mouthpieces addressed the scandals fomented even more confusion which was precisely their aim.
O'Beirne will be the dutiful neo-con soldier and stick with the playbook until the ship goes down. His behavior is not surprising to me at all.
January 1, 2009 8:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Am I the only one who read that as totally passive aggressive. I mean how could anyone take "your outstanding performance implementing bush policy, which is why you're getting fired" as anything other then an insult?
I thought it was hilarious.
January 1, 2009 2:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
If Jim O'Beirne is kept on after what is known about his politicizing of staff choices for Iraq, and now this, somebody on Obama's team has their head up their arse.
January 1, 2009 4:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
So..Presdient elect Obama and the Democrats are the opposition...(including most of the citizens of this country who do not believe in their war for oil, profit and entertainment?)..... does that mean that Jim O'Beirne is the Enemy of the State?....And they say the "lefties" are partisan, unpatriotic and hateful...Watch them howl like a mashed cat over at the DOJ..when Obama cleans house there...ought to be halirious...? Got to get some popcorn for that show..!!
January 1, 2009 5:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
So..Presdient elect Obama and the Democrats are the opposition...(including most of the citizens of this country who do not believe in their war for oil, profit and entertainment?)..... does that mean that Jim O'Beirne is the Enemy of the State?....And they say the "lefties" are partisan, unpatriotic and hateful...Watch them howl like a mashed cat over at the DOJ..when Obama cleans house there...ought to be halirious...? Got to get some popcorn for that show..!!
January 1, 2009 5:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
So..Presdient elect Obama and the Democrats are the opposition...(including most of the citizens of this country who do not believe in their war for oil, profit and entertainment?)..... does that mean that Jim O'Beirne is the Enemy of the State?....And they say the "lefties" are partisan, unpatriotic and hateful...Watch them howl like a mashed cat over at the DOJ..when Obama cleans house there...ought to be halirious...? Got to get some popcorn for that show..!!
January 1, 2009 6:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
It may be just a series of typographical errors. O'Beirne meant to write "abject incompetence of a political hack" but it was all misspelled and came out as "outstanding performance as a Bush appointee."
January 1, 2009 9:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
If Gates can't realize O'Beirne is asking to be fired so he can be carried out on his petard like a Republican hero instead of The cretin he is then Gates isn't a 'master of the obvious.' He should go anyway just because of his past practices. One thing to be grateful for; it is he who is married to Kate and that is scheudenfreude.
January 2, 2009 10:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
It is no surprise the leftovers that need to be either trashed or digested are anti-Obama. After all, the rational, reasonable and dedicated public servants in the military were either fired or, after dealing with the Bush administration for 7 years, quit.
As a former army person myself, I know not a few ex-officers who quit their posts -- after patiently waiting through the accompanying stop-loss -- even while realizing that those left behind are either: (1) strong political supports of bush policies; or (2) crazy. Think of it this way: Wes Clark wasn't political when he was in the Army. But, after leaving, there was only one party left to him. The same may be said of many generals. As my boyfriend, an ex-infantry captain, put quite succinctly: "anyone still in NOW, when everyone's contract should have come up for renewal at some point in the last seven years, is NUTS, stupid or a conservative idiot."
I expect nothing but insanity from the leftovers. Not even worth worrying about.
January 2, 2009 1:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
It is no surprise the leftovers that need to be either trashed or digested are anti-Obama. After all, the rational, reasonable and dedicated public servants in the military were either fired or, after dealing with the Bush administration for 7 years, quit.
As a former army person myself, I know not a few ex-officers who quit their posts -- after patiently waiting through the accompanying stop-loss -- even while realizing that those left behind are either: (1) strong political supports of bush policies; or (2) crazy. Think of it this way: Wes Clark wasn't political when he was in the Army. But, after leaving, there was only one party left to him. The same may be said of many generals. As my boyfriend, an ex-infantry captain, put quite succinctly: "anyone still in NOW, when everyone's contract should have come up for renewal at some point in the last seven years, is NUTS, stupid or a conservative idiot."
I expect nothing but insanity from the leftovers. Not even worth worrying about.
January 2, 2009 1:23 PM | Reply | Permalink