What We Can Learn from Elizabeth Warren

The GOP has of course exploded the Guinness World Record over the past 2 years for blocking presidential appointees for positions nobody usually knows or cares about - Obama could try to appoint Ronald McDonald Chairman of Fast Food Clowns, and Republicans would explode with outrage over Mr. McDonald's "lack of expertise," and would "need to find out more about him."

The best example so far is when he considered selecting Elizabeth Warren for Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and of course the GOP immediately scrambled the jets and made it clear they would filibuster her nomination for an indefinite length of time. Now, Warren was practically BORN to run such an agency. And I doubt very seriously those most vocal about being "outraged!!" at her nomination were very well-versed in either Warren's career or what the hell the agency itself was set up to do. Obama wanted to nominate her, so it didn't matter: filibuster!

So of course what does Obama do? Instead of sitting around waiting for the filibuster to magically end, he sidestepped the entire process by making her Special Adviser to the Secretary of the Treasury on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Which is French-ese for "the same job, just without having to go through this ridiculous pretend dance of being approved by Congress." And of course once this happened the Republicans couldn't care less, since they didn't REALLY care who ran the agency, or what the agency even did - once their opportunity to go on tv and feign indignation about one of Obama's picks was removed from the equation, they lost interest.

The point is, after two years of having his nominations repeatedly held up for..."somewhat less than genuine concerns"...isn't it time Obama started having fun with this? He KNOWS they're gonna hold up any official nomination anyway, and he KNOWS that if he really wants the person he can just make them a "Special Adviser" like he did with Warren and get on with the work, so why not simply have fun by picking someone ridiculous for the official nomination?

"For the position of Deputy Attorney General, I'd like to nominate Fozzie Bear. He has no career record of working with the law, but I think he's funny as hell, and his 'wocka, wocka, wocka!' bit never fails to kill me." Oooooh, even better - Jesus!!!! How can you NOT win the political game when you can say "I wanted to appoint Jesus ambassador to Syria, but I guess the GOP doesn't like Jesus..."  Hell, even better: Baby Jesus!  Why not God? Who would filibuster God for the job of US Public Printer?

"For the position of Ambassador to Turkey, I'd like to nominate someone who certainly is NOT a turkey, and is, in fact, the COOLEST...Fonzie. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayy!!!!!" 

Camon, Barry, have some fun with this!!!!!