This AP story about alleged "cracks" in President-elect Barack Obama’s foreign policy team is making the rounds of liberal blogs, where Clinton distaste lingers despite Obama’s entrusting the State Department to the former first lady and current New York senator.
Sorry, I don’t see ’em. The cracks that is.
The AP’s only substantial news – and even this is based on anonymous sources – is that Susan Rice, Obama’s nominee for U.N. ambassador, wants the State Department to set up a separate transition team for her.
Nothing in the story remotely suggests that Hillary Clinton objects to Rice’s request, which is not so untoward – Obama wants Rice in the Cabinet..
The writer also makes much of "strained" relations between Rice and Clinton stemming from Rice’s decision to join Obama’s team, and between Rice and Madeleine Albright, the former secretary of state who was Rice’s mentor and who backed Clinton in the primaries.
But there’s no real evidence of such "strains" aside from the obvious fact that they were on rival teams during the primaries. The AP does not show – does not event attempt to show – that whatever differences they had as political rivals have survived the clear cooperation between Obama and Clinton.
A lot of the alleged Obama-Clinton "rifts" have dissipated into nothing. Obama offered Clinton the job; she accepted it. Period. Bill’s cooperation with the vetting process was so thorough that Obama was able to announce Clinton’s nomination more than a week before he nominated as commerce secretary New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, who dropped out of the primaries early and endorsed Obama.
The "Clinton drama" meme is getting tiresome. Let’s leave it alone – unless there’s genuine, you know, proof.
