Nominations

By Jonathan Bernstein

I definitely need more practice at this group-blogging thing. While I was busy writing my own post on appointments, I failed to notice that Dylan Matthews had an excellent post right here on Ezra's blog on ... exactly the same topic! Oops . . . although not because two on the topic is too many. To the contrary, this is something that is given far less attention than it deserves.

So, Dylan takes on Paul Light, who this morning proposed a gimmick to end the logjam:

Any presidential post that remains vacant for six months should be automatically abolished as a presidential appointment. Once removed from the appointment's roster, it should be filled instead by a member of the career Senior Executive Service. This career executive should be given a 10 year fixed term and be removable only for serious cause.

I'm with Dylan in lacking a lot of enthusiasm for this particular idea. On the other hand, I don't really agree with his reform idea, which is to "Giv[e] department secretaries total discretion in picking subcabinet officials." I don't know that the mix of political appointees vs. civil service jobs is exactly correct, but in general I think that the American system of heavy political influence on the bureaucracy is a good one, and keeping the current balance in the rules under which the White House and Congress compete to influence them is also a good thing.

What to do, then? Some Senate reform would be nice, but the real problem here is an old one of politicians being overly risk-averse. No one wants to be caught nominating or voting to confirm someone who is later caught in scandal. And that's a great instinct; in fact, I strongly suspect that much of the responsiveness of government in large democracies actually depends on elected officials who are half-paranoid about the dangers of bad publicity. In this particular case, however, the combination of paranoia and large numbers of positions that must be confirmed isn't working. What would change that? Our old friend, energy in the executive.

President Obama should realize that his risking more from understaffing than he is from another dread episode like the Van Jones one (yes, Washingonians remember that one -- but practically no one in the rest of the country noticed). If he made it a high priority to get his administration fully operational -- and while he was at it, fill the judicial openings as well -- it would happen. I don't think this is primarily a problem with the system. It's just a mistake by the president.

Jonathan Bernstein blogs about American politics, political institutions, and democracy at A Plain Blog About Politics, and you can follow him on Twitter here.