The Hillary Gamble

President-Elect Barack Obama has chosen Senator Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State (SS). She is the third woman to be chosen for the post out of the last four; Colin Powell was only male. She has eight years of experience in dealing with foreign leaders as First Lady plus almost another eight years of dealing with foreign policy issues as a senator. In addition, as a presidential candidate she issued foreign policy position papers and spoke out on numerous related issues. She is well prepared for the post, and her appointment could also go along way toward healing whatever animosity toward the winner that may remain among her erstwhile supporters .

Yet the appointment is fraught with risks. Here are three:

1. The Bill Factor
Bill Clinton is not only a former president, but an active author, speaker, and consultant. What he says and does is big news. Given his record for self-restraint, would you bet heavily that he will say and do nothing that might undermine or embarrass the Obama Administration in the next four years? Obama just did.

2. Presidential Ambition
Does Hillary Clinton still have hopes of becoming president someday?
Of course, she won't say so now, but my guess is that she has one eye on the year 2016.
Although in the early years of our Republic many Secretaries of State went on to become president, the last one who made it all the way was James Buchanan, elected in 1856. Former SS James G Blaine won the Republican nomination in 1884, but lost to Grover Cleveland. (1) The most recent SS to try for president, Alexander Haig in 1988, got nowhere. On the other hand, Colin Powell might have won the 2008 Republican nomination, but he has shown no interest in seeking elective office.
Like Hillary, William Jennings Bryan, Charles Evans Hughes and Edmund Muskie became SS after losing presidential campaigns, but they were then in the twilight of the their political careers, and I do not see Mrs Clinton as viewing herself that way now.
If Hillary wants a future Democratic nomination, she will have to avoid being associated with any seriously unpopular decisions or policies. If Obama someday wants to make a "Profiles in Courage" type of move, Hillary just might bolt out the door. ( A conflict of this type is far more likely to occur in a second Obama term than in the first, since presidents in their last term become more interested in their place in history than in current public approval. )

3. An irrevocable appointment
Barack Obama did not have to hire Hillary Clinton, but once he does it will be virtually impossible to fire her, especially since she is giving up a safe senate seat to the take the job. Most presidents dismiss one or more cabinet members per term, and usually nobody much cares. (Do you recall any massive protests the day Donald Rumsfeld was dumped?)
Unlike most cabinet members, Hillary Clinton has her own substantial base of supporters in the Democratic Party, and dumping her could ignite a firestorm of opposition that could split the party down the middle and trigger an insurgent challenge for the 2012 nomination.
President Truman had good cause to fire General Douglas MacArthur in 1950, but the decision cost him politically, even though the General was not especially popular among Democrats (2). Presidents Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon all had problems with FBI Director J Edgar Hoover, but none of them had the temerity to oust him, even when he passed the statutory retirement age of 65.
Conclusion: Hillary Clinton will be Secretary of State as long as she wants to be while the Democrats hold the White House. Live with it.

Of course Barack Obama knows all this, and is going ahead anyway. Maybe he is trying to reassure the Jews, many of whom were concerned that he would give major foreign policy roles to men like Robert Malley or Zbigniew Brzezinski, both considered hostile to Israel. If Hillary Clinton, elected with the blessing of the top rabbis in Brooklyn and Monsey (Rockland County), is not pro-Israel enough for some people, no one who could possibly become Secretary of State would be. I mean, whom were you expecting, Morton Klein or Daniel Pipes, maybe?
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(1) Blaine was the only Republican presidential nominee in fifty years (1856 to 1916) who never became president. (Benjamin Harrison and William Howard Taft won, then lost bids for a second term.)

(2) MacArthur permitted his name to be entered on some state Republican presidential primary ballots in 1948, but did not campaign and got nowhere.