Vexing Questions Raised By Daschle’s HHS Crash And Burn

Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle’s announcement that he was withdrawing his name to be to be President Barack Obama’s Health and Human Services secretary amid growing controversy over past tax problems raises several vexing questions:

1. He’s a political pro: was he dense? How could someone who had been Majority Leader, demonized by Republican activists and talk radio when he had that post, targeted and defeated by Republicans, and experienced in the ways of not just Washington but the new and old media get himself in that situation? Did he think it wouldn’t come out? Or that he could smooth it over?

2. Would President Barack Obama have been well served by Daschle if he had gotten the post and become the health care czar? If he had either forgotten about it, underestimated it, or felt he had the political savvy to smooth it over, just think about how he would have fared when he took up health care and ran into Congressional and lobbying opposition to whatever Obama proposed? He was naive, politically unskilled, had a political tin ear, overconfident — or any mixture of all of them.

3. Exactly who has been placed in charge of the Obama vetting process? The manager of a Swiss cheese company? Will there be other examples of sloppy vetting that poorly serves a new President who needs to use the clout he got from the election and his high poll numbers to get through an agenda that is already meeting stiff partisan opposition?

All of the above are raised by today’s events, as reported by the AP:

Tom Daschle withdrew his nomination on Tuesday to be President Barack Obama’s Health and Human Services secretary, faced with problems over back taxes and potential conflicts of interest.

“Now we must move forward,” Obama said in a written statement accepting Daschle’s request to be taken out of consideration. A day earlier, Obama had said he “absolutely” stood by Daschle.

Daschle, the former Senate Democratic leader, said he would have not been able to operate “with the full faith of Congress and the American people.”

“I am not that leader, and will not be a distraction” to Obama’s agenda, he said.

His stunning statement came less than three hours after another Obama nominee also withdrew from consideration, and also over tax problems. Nancy Killefer, nominated by Obama to be the government’s first chief performance officer, said she didn’t want her bungling of payroll taxes on her household help to be a distraction.

Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and Daschle’s former Democratic colleagues had rallied to his defense in the wake of questions about a series of tax issues. Last month, Daschle paid $128,203 in back taxes and $11,964 in interest.

“Tom made a mistake, which he has openly acknowledged,” Obama said. “He has not excused it, nor do I. But that mistake and this decision cannot diminish the many contributions Tom has made to this country.”

But that isn’t the issue…or rather the issues.

Re-read 1, 2, and 3 again.