Team Of Rivals?

[BigAnth]

Doris Kearns Goodwin's book details Lincoln's political savvy in assembling his administration from his fiercest competitors for the Republican nomination in 1860. Seward and Salmon P. Chase both thought that they had a clear path to the nomination and the conventional wisdom at the time was that one of them would be the nominee. Many took Lincoln to be a naive bumpkin who would not be able to rule effectively and his rivals all thought that they would be able to manipulate him to suit their own purposes. Obviously, Lincoln proved them wrong and showed great deal of political savvy and was extremely effective in managing his administration under very difficult conditions. As Goodwin describes it, one of his most useful traits was the ability to put past political quarrels behind him and work together with his most bitter enemies.

I think that this is the type of approach that Obama will take. He realizes that he will need support from a broad cross-section of the Democratic party. I'm hoping that he'll be able to do it.

[TooBigaTent]

1. He looks to be soliciting support from republics and conservative Dems, but not

the liberal wing of our party.

If he takes the tact of including these supporters, we will wind up with something very similar to the current cabal of criminals.

[LSparkle]

4. I agree -- simply being the first African-American president won't be enough

That alone won't appease the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party -- I'll be looking for him to appoint some unabashed liberals to his Cabinet. Especially if (God forbid) Dennis Kucinich loses his primary, I'd hope there'd be a place for him in an Obama Administration.

[movonne]

2. I hope so too...and he is telling us to hope....

[Larry in KC]

3. One reason I hope he might reach out to Wes Clark for VP