{"id":1381,"date":"2004-03-11T10:28:05","date_gmt":"2004-03-11T15:28:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/1381.html"},"modified":"2004-03-11T10:28:05","modified_gmt":"2004-03-11T15:28:05","slug":"the-gang-that-cant-shoot-straight-screws-up-another-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/the-gang-that-cant-shoot-straight-screws-up-another-one\/","title":{"rendered":"The gang that can’t shoot straight screws up another one"},"content":{"rendered":"

I used to fall for the hype surrounding the Bush White House’s political operation. These guys are evil geniuses, I thought, always one step ahead with a brilliant strategy in mind.<\/p>\n

As if this notion needed further debunking, consider the fact that Bush was prepared to pick a “manufacturing czar” who laid off U.S. workers<\/a> after opening a cheaper plant in China.<\/p>\n

First, a little background. In September 2003, nearly seven months ago, Bush announced<\/a> that he was troubled by our hemorrhaging manufacturing job sector. To address the problem, Bush proposed the creation of a new post in his administration — the assistant secretary of commerce for manufacturing and services.<\/p>\n

It was a largely meaningless gesture, creating a post with nebulous responsibilities and virtually no power. Demonstrating just how seriously the administration took the idea, Bush didn’t even try to actually fill the position for over six months after he proposed it.<\/p>\n

Then the White House decided to turn a minor embarrassment into a full-fledged debacle.<\/p>\n

As was reported on the front page of today’s Washington Post<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Six months after promising to create an office to help the nation’s struggling manufacturers, President Bush settled on someone to head it, but the nomination was being reconsidered last night after Democrats revealed that his candidate had opened a factory in China.<\/p>\n

Several officials said the nomination may be scrapped because of the political risk but said that had not been decided. Bush’s opponent, Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), has made job losses his chief point of attack, and some administration officials feared the nomination could hand him fresh ammunition.<\/p>\n

In late afternoon, the administration announced that the new assistant secretary of commerce for manufacturing and services would be named at a ceremony this morning. Industry officials were told that the job would go to Anthony F. Raimondo, chairman and chief executive of a Nebraska company that makes metal buildings and grain silos.<\/p>\n

But Kerry’s campaign, tipped off about the impending nomination several hours earlier, hastened to distribute news reports that Raimondo’s firm, Behlen Manufacturing Co. of Columbus, Neb., had laid off 75 U.S. workers in 2002, four months after announcing plans for a $3 million factory in northwest Beijing.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n


\nIn Raimondo’s defense, the guy oversaw hundreds more manufacturing jobs domestically than were eliminated after the China plant opened.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, this is exactly the kind of political controversy that hands Kerry all the ammunition he needs to hammer Bush on his jobs record. It’s also the kind of thing that can be easily avoided by routine vetting.<\/p>\n

The White House had almost seven months to find a qualified person to fill this post. They came up with a guy who fired workers and opened a plant in China? Either the administration knew about this and didn’t think it would matter (severe naivet\u00e9) or they were caught off guard yesterday on an obvious flaw in Raimondo’s record (carlessness). Neither are encouraging.<\/p>\n

At this point, the charges have the White House exactly where it’s been for weeks: on the defensive.<\/p>\n

Seventy-five minutes after the administration announced a news conference with Commerce Secretary Donald L. Evans to name the official, an advisory went out saying the event had been “postponed due to scheduling conflicts.”<\/p>\n

By last night, three senior administration officials said Raimondo’s nomination might be scuttled but said they did not know for sure.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I used to fall for the hype surrounding the Bush White House’s political operation. These guys are evil geniuses, I thought, always one step ahead with a brilliant strategy in mind. As if this notion needed further debunking, consider the fact that Bush was prepared to pick a “manufacturing czar” who laid off U.S. workers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1381","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1381"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1381\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}