Badass. Eric Shinseki is now officially the first Asian American to be appointed onto the Obama Cabinet. Although I was having some doubts before about whether or not Obama will make more concerted efforts towards a diverse cabinet like Bill Clinton did back in the ’90s, this reassures me that Asian Americans will not be overlooked. However, of course, merely sticking an Asian American into your executive cabinet doesn’t mean that you’re totally looking out for Asian American interests. But still, it’s definitely a step up for Asian Americans who are interested in politics to have someone get appointed to such a high position in federal government.
Other cabinet positions don’t seem to have a very diverse set of potential appointments, but hopefully that still will not affect how Obama will execute policy. However, to an extent, I think representation up at the very highest levels of government is so important, especially in terms of empowerment. I mean, how many large Asian American communities actually have Asian American representation at the federal level?
Read up more on Shinseki here.
[UPDATE 12/10/08 @ 9:50PM] WHOA!!
UC Berkeley faculty member Steven Chu, a former Nobel Prize winner, is now nominated to be Obama’s Energy Secretary. That’s good news! Not only is he Asian American, but he’s from BERKELEY. Yeah-yuh!
Quality > Race.
Very interesting bio, btw. However, what’s with your emphasis over a diverse cabinet, in terms of race?
I think it’s important for the cabinet that Obama picks to represent the demographics of the community, because they’re going to be executing policy of the country which is made up of these people. Yes, I agree quality is important and you shouldn’t just choose someone because they are of a certain race, however, I think appointing someone to cabinet who is Asian American illustrates a recognition that Asian Americans too make up part of the community and their voices in the cabinet are important.
Also, judicial appointments are not excluded from this– I think it’s important for presidents to consider diversity in ESPECIALLY the judicial system, because too often in history have judicial decisions have perpetuated prejudices and racism within our legal system. Diverse voices are important, and we can’t ignore the fact that our country consists of a whole range of people.
Thank you for your comment! I’m always encouraged and challenged by your critical questions.
I think quality and diversity are talked about as if they’re two discrete things, as if one can’t feed into the other. But I think what gets lost in these sorts of discussions, especially around affirmative action, is that quality can be defined in a lot of different ways, one of which is the ability of the candidate to be representative of the interests of large portions of the population.
I also like how much this pick is an FU to Bush and Rumsfeld for what they did to Shinseki because of his stance on the war.
But the big question: how do folks feel about Bill Richardson’s appointment in light of his gross mishandling of the Wen Ho Lee case?
Obama has done a great job, as good as any president who are seeking common ground, and prosperity for this nation, his bipartisanship has been excellent.