Daschle withdraws as nominee for HHS secretary Daschle withdraws as nominee for HHS secretary WASHINGTON (AP) - Tom Daschle has withdrawn his nomination to be Health and Human Services secretary. That's according to a joint White House statement from President Barack Obama and his former nominee. Obama said Tuesday he accepted the withdrawal "with sadness and regret." Daschle has been battling for his nomination since it was disclosed he failed to pay more than $120,000 in taxes. He said he's withdrawing because he's not a leader who has the full faith of Congress and will be a distraction.
so much for the Dems getting a free ride from the press. basso earns another egg on the face tally mark. His total now is 3.
After all this hoopla about Obama's supposedly awesome vetting process and/or requirements... sheesh.
Not really sorry to see Daschle out. The failure to pay his taxes was bad enough, the millions he earned various companies in the health care industries is even worse. I don't want a head of HHS, who is going to play a major role in health care reform, to have serious conflicts of interest like that.
well yeah, but I seem to recall a few threads in here complaining that the Obama vetting scheme was almost too extreme. How can you forget to have: Do you owe tax money? Yes/No On the freakin' form? Hilarious? Pathetic? Absurd? (all of the above)
Yeah, if they repeatedly missed that, what else did they just completely whiff on? I'll go with a touch of B and C.
Obama knew about the mistakes though, and is the likely reason that both ultimately got corrected. I think he wanted to test how far his popularity would get him. I'm sure he also knew these were the guys he wanted.
If it was just the tax issue, he may not have withdrawn, but combined with the potential for conflict of interest, withdrawing was probably the better option.
That's actually an excellent idea. Since we've lost yet another genuine liberal in the Cabinet and Obama intends to put a freakin' conservative Republican in as Commerce Secretary, he damn well better put smart liberal Democrat in at HHS. In my opinion! Dean would be a terrific choice. Do it yesterday!
As long as they have good ideas that will really reform the healthcare system, I don't care if they are conservative or liberal. Get the job done right! Oh, can we get smart people who do not thing they are above the law while we are at it?
i think there are problems between dean and rahm. there's jurisdiction issues between dccc and dnc. dean has gotten completely snubbed by obama thus far...hopefully this daschle fiasco will be serious enough to make this happen.
Whatever happened to "being bi-partisan and reaching across the aisle?" Ask the House Republicans. Honestly, I'm all for bipartisan-reaching across the aisle stuff. I just happen to be a liberal Democrat who expects my party, which just won a massive victory, to govern like it. While I'm not crazy about parts of the stimulus bill, what I would expect is President Obama calling out those in the House who larded it up, not spending so much time attempting to placate Republicans who appear to have little interest in his efforts. Just my opinion. It does seem odd that one of the major architects of the Democratic victory seems to be "left out in the cold." I must have missed reading about the problems between Rahm and Dean. If they exist, Emanuel should get a grip and let the President use a great asset.
