Obama Favors Republicans With Scowcroft Ties

[DogPoundPup]

WASHINGTON -- Many of the Republicans emerging as potential members of the Obama administration have professional and ideological ties to Brent Scowcroft, a former national-security adviser turned public critic of the Bush White House.

Mr. Scowcroft spoke by phone with President-elect Barack Obama last week, the latest in a months-long series of conversations between the two men about defense and foreign-policy issues, according to people familiar with the discussions.


The relationship between the president-elect and the Republican heavyweight suggests that Mr. Scowcroft's views, which place a premium on an Israeli-Palestinian peace accord, might hold sway in the Obama White House.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who was deputy national-security adviser under Mr. Scowcroft in the George H.W. Bush administration, is almost certain to be retained by Mr. Obama, according to aides to the president-elect. Richard Haass, a Scowcroft protégé and former State Department official, could be tapped for a senior National Security Council, State Department or intelligence position. Mr. Haass currently runs the Council on Foreign Relations.

Other prominent Republicans with close ties to Mr. Obama include former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who endorsed the Democrat in the final days of the campaign, and Indiana Sen. Richard Lugar, a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Read more at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122747548224451435.html

[Hippo_Tron]

1. Obama is smart to rally the entire foreign policy establishment against the crazy neocons...

But I still wish that if he were to keep Gates on it would be in an emeritus position and not as Secretary of Defense. The KBR negligence that led to our troops being electrocuted in the showers occurred under Gates' watch and nobody has been held accountable. Maybe that is due to Bush's White House overriding Gates in that area but it still bugs the hell of out of me.

[Max_powers94]

4. Keyword: NO Neo-Cons

[Cha]

2. Uber interesting..thanks

DogPoundPup!

There's nothing wrong with republicans who aren't fascist warmongering rove types.

[FrenchieCat]

3. Well if any Republican ties are to be had, Gen. Scowcrofts are probably

the most preferrable ones to have on the issue of Foreign policy.

Scowcroft was a leading Republican critic of U.S. policy towards Iraq before and after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which war critics in particular have seen as significant given Scowcroft's close ties to former President George H.W. Bush. Scowcroft supported the invasion of Afghanistan as a "direct response" to terrorism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brent_Scowcroft

[hlthe2b]

5. Yup.... cleaning house of neocons may require the likes of

Scowcroft.... Seems like he's been simmering away the past 8 years and now primed to go.

[Thrill]

6. Josh Marshall said Hagel is close to Scrowcoft too

I would rather have Hagel than Gates

[jenmito]

7. Good for him. He's the one who will set the agenda that he wants these people to implement and

he's living up to his constant refrain that, "There is not a 'red' America nor a 'blue' America. There is the United States of America."