Tag Archives: Biden Cabinet

Joe Biden, national security

Senate steepens Biden’s hill to climb

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

As if President Biden doesn’t already have a steep hill to climb when he takes office in 10 days …

The U.S. Senate will not have confirmed a single one of his Cabinet nominees by the time he assumes the presidency. Why? Well, senators have been consumed by matters involving the hideous antics of Biden’s immediate predecessor, Donald Trump.

The president-elect has been rolling out his nominees systematically since winning the election. He has completed that task, along with naming top staff-level appointees who do not require Senate confirmation.

It would be in the nation’s best interest for senators — who return to work no later than Jan. 19 — to focus immediately on confirming the president’s national security team. That would include the secretaries of defense, state and homeland security along with the director of national intelligence and the CIA director. We also might want to toss in the treasury secretary for good measure, given that our economic strength remains a key component of our national security.

Too many Republican senators, I am saddened to point out, have swallowed the “widespread voter fraud” lie that Donald Trump fed them as he fought to cling to power. hey have taken their eye off the task at hand, which is to help ensure a smooth transition of power. One of those senators happens to be the majority leader, Mitch McConnell, who now surrenders that title to Democrat Chuck Schumer when the next Congress returns to work.

I don’t have any doubt that President Biden, with his vast government experience, will be able to navigate through the initial stages of the presidency without a full complement of Cabinet officials on hand.

The onus belongs to the Senate, though, to ensure that the new president is staffed fully as soon as is humanly possible.

Because, unlike Donald Trump, the new president will actually listen to and heed the advice he receives. The national security team is foremost among the advisers on whom he will rely.

national news

Biden feeling the heat

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

President-elect Biden is getting pulled in multiple directions by multiple political interests.

It gives me cause for concern.

Joe Biden is a center-left Democrat. I believe that’s how he portrayed himself. He moderates his views on occasion, seeking compromise when possible with politicians with differing views. So, when I hear that progressives want a more progressive Cabinet than what they’re getting to date, I am left to wonder: What do they expect from a man who campaigned as a moderate?

The president-elect is getting pressure from African-American interests, from Latinos, from Asian-Americans. They, too, want more people who look like them at the highest levels of government.

I’ve declared already that I am a “good government progressive.” One of the ways I determine “good government” is whether we are being served by the best possible individuals. Does their ethnic or  racial background rise to the level of critical importance? Well, I guess not. Then again, I am a white male, grandson of immigrants. I don’t fit into any particular racial or ethnic minority … unless you include Greeks in that category.

The president-elect has pledged to craft a government team that resembles the country he was elected to govern. I believe so far he is on the way to keeping that pledge. He has a long way to go. I hope he can resist the temptation to buckle under to every ethnic, racial or socio-economic group that tugs at him.

I am keeping faith with the promise he brings to repair the damage done by his predecessor.