With Gregg nomination for Commerce, is Obama outsmarting GOP or is he getting bilked?

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS
by Meg White

President Barack Obama officially nominated Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) to be his new commerce secretary at a press conference this morning, setting off a renewed flurry of speculation about the bipartisan replacement for the failed nomination of New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson. Some are calling it a win-win, others say it's a lose-lose, but do any of us know the rules or even the prize of this political game?

The first question that needs to be asked is what is the logic in offering the position of commerce secretary to a man who has repeatedly questioned the department's very existence?

Congressional Quarterly reported yesterday that in his vote for the 1996 fiscal budget resolution, Gregg approved of getting rid of the U.S. Commerce Department entirely. He also fought President Bill Clinton's increase in the department's budget in preparation for carrying out the 2000 Census. The article goes on to note that "Gregg's commitment to basic functions of the department has been questioned."

Aside from suggesting the department disappear entirely, Gregg seems to see the pain of CEOs before that of the American worker. In a 2007 Senate hearing featuring Microsoft Chair Bill Gates, Gregg suggested we raise the cap on the number of H-1B visas granted to workers allowed to come into the country to work for American companies such as Microsoft. Gregg either ignored or was unaware of the abuses common with this practice, where companies bring skilled workers from other countries to do Americans' tech work for lesser wages.

After Microsoft's recent layoff announcement, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) sent the company a letter urging layoffs begin with foreign workers hired under the H-1B program to spare American jobs. No word yet on what Gregg thinks about these visas under the threat of a growing domestic unemployment rate, but perhaps someone will ask him about it in his confirmation hearing. 

There are countless stories of American workers being forced to train their own foreign replacements in cost-cutting procedures by companies, such as this one about Pfizer. Furthermore, a recent report from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services indicates that 13 percent of H-1Bs are fraudulent, and one-fifth of applications were found to be filed in one form of violation or another.

How close is support for H-1B expansion to support for offshoring our economy? I don't know. I'm not an economist. But neither is Gregg. (He's a tax lawyer. Is that supposed to inspire confidence?) I just hope his congressional colleagues aren't too blinded by bipartisan warm fuzzies to ask difficult questions such as that one in the confirmation process.

While David Rogers recently described Gregg on Politico.com as having become increasingly independent over the years, in the same breath, he calls the veteran senator a fiscal conservative.

And the post to which Gregg has been nominated is undeniably fiscal in nature. As commerce secretary, Gregg would control a wide swath of our economy both domestically and overseas. Reaching across the aisle is one thing, but putting a conservative such as Gregg in charge of a commercial system that is in a moment of crisis, and on the precipice of great change, seems like the wrong move.

As David Sirota points out, Gregg champions free trade over fair trade and favors corporations over labor, the environment, and human rights. He goes on to call Gregg's nomination a "straight-up sell out on all the issues that Commerce oversees" and on Obama's campaign promises on trade.

Really, the only good thing that can be said about the situation from a progressive point of view is that Obama is removing a big-time player in the Senate. Gregg can do somewhat less damage to Obama's overall plan in the cabinet than he can in the Senate.

However, if Obama wants to get Gregg out of his congressional hair, maybe he should consider a different appointment. Hell, I'd even swap him out for former Sen. Tom Daschle at this point, who just withdrew his name from consideration for Health and Human Services Secretary this afternoon. 

OK, Gregg as Secretary of Health and Human Services is a joke on my part, but it's not that huge of a stretch. After all, he was the chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee from 2003-2005 and remains a high-ranking member of the committee to this day. He's also been on several task forces and committees looking at how to save Social Security, and has introduced legislation on the matter on several occasions.

Compare that with his supposed expertise in the commercial sector and you'll see what I mean. What makes Gregg the best and the brightest when it comes to commerce?

So the big question here is what are progressives getting in the Gregg trade-off? As we addressed yesterday, we're not getting another Democratic senator. While the idea of a Democratic supermajority in the Senate remains a myth, every vote counts and extra support is always a positive, whether it's number 59 or 60. But, after Obama asked the governor of New Hampshire to appoint a Republican to Gregg's seat, we kissed goodbye to even that small change.

Gregg's replacement, Republican Bonnie Newman, will no doubt be easier to beat in 2010 than Gregg would be, if she even runs. When elected for his third term in 2004, Gregg received the second highest number of votes in any election in his state's history, according to the bio on his Senate Web site. But that's certainly not enough to elevate Gregg to running a department he wanted abolished. At best, all it does is level the playing field in a toss-up state.

So Gregg and the GOP are getting what they wanted, and so far all that is clear is what we're not getting: someone who is a champion of progressive ideals or even of Obama's views on trade and the commercial sector.

Maybe Obama is getting something from the GOP or Gregg that the rest of us don't see. Perhaps Gregg has secured an easy, bipartisan passage of Obama's stimulus package, or tough new legislation, such as executive salary caps. And it doesn't sound like a great deal, either.

We hope we're proven wrong. We hope Obama has some master plan that we can't see from the outside. Because otherwise, it seems like the progressive agenda is being subsumed, at least in the commerce department.

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS

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