Are There Any Other Qualified People In America Other Than Clintonites?

Posted by David Sirota, Open Left at 4:12 AM on November 19, 2008.

I ask this question without making a value judgment - are there any other qualified people in America other than permanent Washington, D.C. dwellers who were part of the Clinton administration?

I ask this based on the Obama appointments - my back-of-the-envelope estimate is that they are 90 percent Clinton administration officials.

Now, I don't think this means that the Obama administration will automatically be Bill Clinton's third term, with all the corresponding incrementalism and triangulation.

But it is kind of creepy. For all the talk of "change," I'm really curious whether Barack Obama thinks there are any worthy, smart, well-qualified people who aren't part of permanent Washington and who didn't serve in the Clinton administration? Certainly, his campaign apparatus appreciated that. But it doesn't seem like his transition team does (a transition team, of course, dominated by former Clinton officials).

Tagged as: clinton, obama, white house, washington d.c.