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A bit of political musical chairs is about to annoy some Republicans. National security adviser Thomas E. Donilon is resigning from his post; as Obama announced Wednesday, he “has decided to step aside at the beginning of July,” and the president is setting Susan E. Rice into his place. She opted out of being considered for secretary of state, after her role in what Republicans say was to misrepresent the Benghazi attack in 2012. The secretary of state role is Senate chosen, but she needs no Senate approval to take the current position, and she has been a longtime confidant to the president, who said, of her, she is “the consummate public servant…she is fearless. She is tough,” and he also mentioned, in a statement entirely besides the point, “It runs in the family,” as her brother, when playing basketball with the president, sometimes is known for “throwing the occasional elbow.”
Well, elbowing with the president can get you a neat position as “the consummate public servant,” but meanwhile Rice’s position will be replaced by Samantha Power, perhaps, who is being nominated for a place on the United Nations. Power, who won a Pulitzer for “A Problem from Hell,” criticized in her book what she sees as U.S. inconsistency in protecting the world from genocide, especially in modern genocides such as Africa and the Balkans.
Following Power’s nomination, Keith Urbahn, former chief of staff to Donald Rumsfeld, tweeted Wednesday morning: “I don’t know about you, but it might be helpful to have somebody rep’ing America at UN who doesn’t think we are the source of the world’s ills.”
