Obama's Declaration Of Independence

The president-elect's appointments reflect his confidence in his own idiosyncratic blueprint and his ability to hold together an eclectic administration.

Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2008
by Ronald Brownstein
National Journal

The most intriguing trend in Barack Obama's early appointments is the absence of a conventional political design.

There's been no pattern of placating party constituencies or even of consistently favoring early supporters. Obama hasn't tied himself in knots, as Bill Clinton did, by self-consciously trying to appoint an "administration that looks like America." Yet women and minorities are steadily moving into key positions. Obama has mixed long-standing confidantes with people he might not have recognized a year ago in the Senate elevator.

If there is a diagram to Obama's choices, it's idiosyncratic and personal. Obama doesn't seem to be responding to anyone's vision of what his inner circle should look like except his own. And that may provide a much larger clue to his thinking as he nears the presidency. These first decisions could be read as a declaration of independence. They suggest that Obama feels unusual latitude to set his course without overly deferring to his party's traditional power centers, or even to the expectations of those who helped elect him.

That attitude ripples through Obama's first personnel decisions. Yes, he's already tapped for key White House jobs prominent campaign aides such as David Axelrod, Robert Gibbs and Valerie Jarrett, and he's slated for Cabinet positions some high-profile supporters from the Democratic primaries, including Tom Daschle and Janet Napolitano.

(More here.)