As my NewsBusters colleague Scott Whitlock pointed out on January 9, networks such as ABC and CBS, slammed the president for a lack of diversity in his second term administration, particularly with women. Whitlock wrote the “correspondent Jon Karl chided, ‘Well, some critics are looking at that emerging second-term cabinet and wondering, where are the women?’ He touted a New York Times article fretting about the "all-male look" of the new picks.
Oddly enough, concerns over diversity don't seem to be a problem for liberal Obama cheerleader and Washington Post In the Loop columnist Al Kamen. Now, with some major news outlets slamming for his apparent abandonment of women within his inner circle, Kamen asks for us to view this within the context of ‘musical chairs’ in his January 11 post – with fellow WaPo colleague Emily Heil.
But perhaps we should pause to ruminate on what — in the context of cabinet musical chairs — “staying” actually means. It doesn’t, for example, mean staying for four years — or four months for that matter. One wise source offered that it meant: “The White House is not nominating anyone now to fill those jobs.”
But that, of course, begs the question of the meaning of “now.”
Merriam-Webster’s third definition of “stay” is “remain,” but then offers as an example: “stay put till I come back.”
So, for example, when we hear Attorney General Eric Holder is likely staying that, as we have noted, most likely means he’s at Justice maybe until he goes to Martha’s Vineyard in August or perhaps by the end of the year — not that he’s going to be there for another four.
Ditto with “going,” which means “likely going in the near future.” (Raising the question of the meaning of “near.”) Kind of like “anon."
This isn’t Kamen’s first time throwing himself in front of Obama criticism. He touted Obama, albeit incorrectly, as a superb ‘commander-in-chief- in the aftermath of Sandy and who can forget that he thought it was out ‘civic duty’ to pick the ‘First Family’s’ next vacation spot.
On some level, it is amusing to watch liberals lament a lack of diversity -- and by that they mean in terms of race and gender -- on the president's Cabinet. But on the other hand, there is a legitimate criticism that, given the president's heavy reliance on the phony "war on women" meme that he seems intent on heading into a second term with a predominantly male inner circle.
Rational journalists might wonder if pandering for the women's vote was little more than that, a cynical ploy. Another question worth exploring might be what conclusions Obama drew from his cynical "war on women" strategy: if women voters seem to be voting on abortion and contraception, what difference does it make if a man or a woman is the principal officer at State or Treasury or Defense? After all, the Obama campaign concluded that women are not voting on foreign, economic, or national defense policy.
Pod people must run the Washington Post because that can only be the explanation to the blatant omission of Fast and Furious from their editorial board warning that Biden must not overreach on this new anti-gun crusade the administration has undertaken.
