Energy Secretary... Schwarzenegger??

[Pangloss]

Some chatter today about the possibility of Schwarzenegger accepting a cabinet post as energy secretary -- in the Obama administration!

 

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0708/11714.html

 

The chatter was entirely Schwarzenegger's, not coming from the Obama camp, but I think it's an interesting idea, and I'd love to see a Republican, especially one of Schwarzenegger's variety, in the Obama cabinet. I think he bring excellent balance and even some useful realpolitik experience to a challenging arena.

 

One down side is that he's not a scientist or engineer, and it would be nice to see Bush's appointment of Samuel Bodman (who has a PhD in Chemical Engineering from MIT) become a trend for that post, which has traditionally gone to career politicians.

 

What do you all think?

[iNow]

The chatter was entirely Schwarzenegger's, not coming from the Obama camp, but I think it's an interesting idea, and I'd love to see a Republican, especially one of Schwarzenegger's variety, in the Obama cabinet.

I don't think your estimation of the situation is entirely valid. I don't personally think that the chatter was coming entirely from the governor's camp (I do, however, concede that I'm not very clear on the chronology of the comments from Obama versus the comments from Arnold).

 

Schwarzenegger had a significant amount of time this morning on This Week with George Stephenopoulis, where this was discussed (specific to your comments, just about half way through the first link):

 

 

http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=5364742

http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=5364853

 

 

Interesting comments about opening offshore drilling rights to the states as well.

 

 

Back to your primary question, I think he could play a very valuable role in an Obama cabinet, he is very articulate on the issues that matter, and he's shown to be a good leader. I respect him a lot more now than I did when he ran back in 2004, and that's entirely due to the things he's achieved and the track on which he's put his state.

[Pangloss]

I've got "This Week" tivo'd but it may be a couple days before I get to it. I'll definitely watch for the drilling comments, thanks. It was interesting week before last when he came to Florida and met with Charlie Crist, and they issued very different statements. I wondered if Ahnold felt undermined by that event, but he's probably gotten used to being undermined by Republicans by now.

[CDarwin]

Well, his performance on energy issues in the Simpsons Movie wasn't very impressive, so I think we have to take that into consideration...

 

But anyway, Schwarzenegger has shown a good-faith willingness to listen to expert opinion, and I think that might be more important for an Energy Secretary that than being simply a PhD. Being as Energy is our sort-of Ministry of Science, it seems like what it needs is a courageous, knowledgeable politician who's going to be able to fight for the funding and the priority that American science needs. Schwarzenegger is high profile enough, if nothing else, to get some attention in Washington.

[Pangloss]

That's a good point -- he would certainly bring a lot more attention to that role than it's generally received in the past couple of decades.

[Phi for All]

I like Arnold's competitiveness and his commitment to alternative fuels. Though not a scientist himself, he listens to them and feels we're not doing enough to curb emissions and move to alternatives. He's proven that partisanship is far down his list of priorities.

 

And since he has plenty of fame and fortune already, I'm hoping he would rather that history remember him as the guy who helped the US move towards the future rather than the guy who helped us reach status quo... again.

 

My only reservation is that, while I share his socially liberal, fiscally conservative political stance, I haven't seen enough concern with cost-effectiveness in his actions. His insistence on having Tesla Motors manufacture in California seemed to come at a fairly high price incentive-wise and I'm a bit worried that he picked Tesla just because their cars are so sexy. On the other hand, being on the cutting edge can have it's rewards in other non-monetary ways, and just establishing a green and progressive attitude in the population may turn out to be priceless in the years to come.

[DJBruce]

I really doubt that Obama would appoint Arnold but I might be wrong. But I would like to see a specialist in that post.

[iNow]

The challenge is often that specialists don't have the skills required to influence the actions of others. It's all well and good if you know everything about a topic, but the purpose of this particular post is to encourage others toward action.