Proof That Almost No One Will Work for Obama

The forcible resuscitation of the politically dead Susan Rice highlights a flaw in the Obama presidency that I identified early on - he has an incredibly shallow network where he can only choose from a small cadre of extreme loyalists.

Finally, and this is not a blunder but rather a fundamental flaw, Obama's legislative support is only as good as his public sheen. The reason he had to stack his administration with Clintonites is that he had no decent network to speak of. His limited experience in government, and life actually, has left him lacking in broad and deep connections to people who can achieve things and stand by him.

Why is this bad?  It means that the talent pool is small and limited.  The government's top posts are going to the worst brand of mediocrity or worse because the talent pool is so small.  Thus John Kerry, thus Jack Lew, thus Eric Holder stays and stays and stays.  Now, we have Susan Rice back from the dead.  This has been going on for awhile, causing Obama difficulty in filling key posts, especially security and intelligence posts as any sensible potential candidate would know that Obama cares not one iota about intelligence and security, so why take the job.  Or it could be joining an administration tainted by scandal.  Obama re-election notwithstanding, this analysis still seems to hold up well:

Is It the Boss Rather Than the Job?

A story at WSJ.com caught my eye with the lede "Obama Struggles to Fill Intelligence Job." When I clicked through I encountered the title "The Job Nobody Wants." Let me posit an alternative title based on what may be closer to reality: "The Boss Nobody Wants." Yes, I think that precious few people are clamoring to serve in an administration whose approval rating is setting land speed records in the southerly direction and that may be on the cusp of getting obliterated into lame-duckdom at the polls. Remember, Obama didn't have deep connections coming into his term so he resorted to ex-Clintonites and his academic cronies. Given the tax troubles of many, he has resorted to some pretty appalling B-Teamers, but it was the dawn of a new age for America and there was no shortage of true believers to fill posts under The One. Can the same be said now? I think any available Clintonites have been given the secret signal to stay away from the cratering Obama administration. So beyond this loyal party core, are there really people out there looking to sign up with an administration that could go down in history as so feckless as to bring the world into wars, an administration that encouraged the most crooked distortions of the legislation process to pass a 2,700 pack of lies that will ruin healthcare for the majority of Americans, an administration that is nothing remotely close to what it billed itself to the American people? Are there really those people out there? Maybe.

And then, of course, is the case of Samantha Power, an Obama administration hanger-on if there ever was one.  Memo to all the Jewish Americans who voted for Obama (which is pretty much all of you):  Samantha Power said we should invade and occupy Israel even if it upsets all of you rich and powerful Jooos...