While most of America searches for a Tickle Me Elmo doll or a Nintendo 64, the capital is gripped by its own holiday-gift obsession: who gets what administration job. This isn’t about ideology. The liberals are long gone, and Clinton insists that h is second four years will be a centrist affair aimed at balancing the budget.
Holbrooke, it turns out, was swimming upstream. First he forgot that Clinton still wants a team that “looks like America.” He was bested for State by Madeleine Albright; he lost the United Nations to Rep. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, who is Hispanic. Clinton the Boss also values “team” spirit in his administration. Holbrooke was seen as too self-promotional, even by Washington standards.
As Clinton plays hiring director, here are tips on how to get and keep a job:
While the president kept silent, his aides all but demanded that Attorney General Janet Reno quit. She ignored them. Last week, after a staged “interview,” Clinton asked her to stay. (This method works only if your departure would create a firestorm over ethics.)
In the winter of 1992 Chicago lawyer Bill Daley was thought to have a cabinet job sewn up. But, in the old Washington parlance, he was left “twisting in the wind” by a fickle Clinton. He never publicly complained. Instead, he bided his time and did other chores, including shepherding the NAFTA deal through Congress. Now comes the reward. Last week he was nominated secretary of commerce–although the wait may have taken its toll. At the announcement he fainted, apparently as a result of fatigue and the heat of the lights.
Clinton remains serious about “diversity.” One beneficiary was Charlene Barshefsky, the “acting” U.S. trade representative whom Clinton nominated for the permanent post. Clinton was determined to name a Hispanic because the only two Hispanics in his first-term cabinet–Henry Cisneros and Federico Pena–are leaving. If the diplomatic community had been unwilling to accept Richardson at the United Nations, NEWSWEEK has learned, he would have been offered Commerce–and Daley would have been nominated for secretary of transportation. Now the president is free to do what he wants at DOT, which is to pick Rodney Slater, an African-American who is now the federal highway administrator.
It’s important to play nice, at least within the confines of the administration. White House counsel Jack Quinn wanted to leave–to make money, see his family and begin setting up Al Gore’s presidential campaign. He has been a finalist for chief of staff. He didn’t get it, in part because he was known for his hardball approach to rivals–not a plus with the president.
Clinton is the king of the all-nighters, so he’s especially fond of Gene Sperling, 37. A workaholic lawyer, Sperling started as an “issues” spin doctor in Clinton’s first presidential campaign. In the White House he’s famous for his mastery of economic issues. Last week Clinton rewarded him by naming him head of the National Economic Council. The president had one word of advice for his new hire. “Sleep,” he said. Now that Sperling has a job, he probably will.
