This is Change? 20 Hawks, Clintonites and Neocons to Watch for in Obama's White

[NicholeW.]

This is Change? 20 Hawks, Clintonites and Neocons to Watch for in Obama's White House
By Jeremy Scahill, AlterNet. Posted November 20, 2008

A who's who guide to the people poised to shape Obama's foreign policy.

http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/107666/?page=1

U.S. policy is not about one individual, and no matter how much faith people place in President-elect Barack Obama, the policies he enacts will be fruit of a tree with many roots. Among them: his personal politics and views, the disastrous realities his administration will inherit, and, of course, unpredictable future crises. But the best immediate indicator of what an Obama administration might look like can be found in the people he surrounds himself with and who he appoints to his Cabinet. And, frankly, when it comes to foreign policy, it is not looking good.

Obama has a momentous opportunity to do what he repeatedly promised over the course of his campaign: bring actual change. But the more we learn about who Obama is considering for top positions in his administration, the more his inner circle resembles a staff reunion of President Bill Clinton's White House. Although Obama brought some progressives on board early in his campaign, his foreign policy team is now dominated by the hawkish, old-guard Democrats of the 1990s. This has been particularly true since Hillary Clinton conceded defeat in the Democratic primary, freeing many of her top advisors to join Obama's team.

"What happened to all this talk about change?" a member of the Clinton foreign policy team recently asked the Washington Post. "This isn't lightly flavored with Clintons. This is all Clintons, all the time."

[tekla]

I think that the 'change' was as in regime change, not some huge shift to a Progressive government.  I'm happy his is not a republican, having said that, I only hope he can be less bad.  The appointments so far have been middle of the road, nothing outstanding.

[NicholeW.]

And, to tell the truth, American admins tend to go back and select a lot of folk from the last regime made by their own party, Bush back to Bush/Reagan, and Clinton back to some Carter people and now Obama back to Clinton.

Wonder what Washington did? Or Adams I or Jefferson? None of them really had any political party pre-servers to chose from! Suppose they just picked who they thought best and prayed?

N~

[gennee]

I'm a little concerned about it myself. The question is who else was there? While I liked Bill Clinton, I'm not that warm towards Hillary. I have something to say about the type of independent party we really need but that's for another post.

Gennee