Cabinet

Mitt Romney has been accused of revealing something in a hot-mike moment that perhaps he didn't want to reveal ("Dems: 'What's Mitt hiding?" April 17). I understand the desire on the part of the Democrats and The Sun to catch Mr. Romney in a similar "gotcha" moment to what President Barack Obama had during his meeting with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, but Governor Romney repeated several times in the early primary debates in front of millions of viewers, apparently none of then Democrats or Sun employees, that he would consider cutting departments but didn't have enough information to decide which ones.

Republicans accuse Thomas E. Perez, President Barack Obama's nominee for labor secretary, of twisting the legal process in three cases in St. Paul, Minn., to suit his political purposes. But it is they who are twisting the Senate's role to "advise and consent" on presidential nominees for their own political ends, and in so doing they have smeared the reputation of a talented public servant and damaged the institution in which they serve. Mr. Perez made it out of committee on a party-line vote Thursday, but Republicans are still suggesting they may try to block his nomination on the Senate floor.

Gov. William Donald Schaefer and Dr. Nancy S. Grasmick will address Maryland's Kinder-Cabinet at 3 p.m. today at the State House, in Annapolis.Students representing Anne Arundel County in the Kinder-Cabinet are Lauren Bloom, Porscha Offer and India Pruitt.The Kinder-Cabinet is composed of elementary school children fromMaryland's local jurisdictions and meets biannually in the governor's Reception Room.The Kinder-Cabinet members will discuss issues that concern Maryland's children.

The most common complaint from people who email me about my columns is that the federal government is horrible: Too big and growing too fast, too corrupt and wasteful, and providing too many benefits to too many Americans. If we just shrink the government, they claim, the economy will boom. Unfortunately, readers often apply these critiques to governmental spending so insignificant as to barely matter. Grants to ACORN or for the so-called "Obama phone" program are so minuscule they're laughable, no matter how incessantly the conservative media echo chamber reports and re-reports on these so-called "scandals.

Is Gov. Parris N. Glendening falling into the "Schaefer trap"? It looks that way, based on his top-level appointments.Back in 1987, Gov. William Donald Schaefer loaded his administration with people who had worked for him in Baltimore City. They knew how to run things in the city and thought they could simply duplicate their successes in Annapolis.It didn't turn out that way. Running state government is far more complex and multi-dimensional than operating a county or city.Now Mr. Glendening has loaded his administration with aides he worked with in Prince George's County.

You've really got to admire Bill Clinton for rushing to appoint his Cabinet before Christmas.I do?Yes, it shows a commitment to, uhm, something or other.Yeah, it shows a commitment to giving the press something to write about at a time of year when depression, shopping and don't-eat-the-mistletoe are our usual subjects.Picking a Cabinet is important!Not really. It's an inside-the-beltway story. Because unless they really screw up or get indicted, it doesn't really matter much who is in the Cabinet.

WASHINGTON -- Perhaps the most striking thing about the second-term Cabinet and White House staff being assembled by President Clinton is how unstriking it is.With all due deference to Madeleine Albright, William Cohen, Anthony Lake and the rest, there is no one who stands out, on paper anyway, as a real heavyweight in terms of achievement or reputation. As a result, the president is likely to seem even more than in his first term to be the top dog.All presidents, to be sure, wear a cloak of supreme authority and power by virtue of the office they hold.

Q: This is a picture of our oak kitchen cabinet. I would like to know who manufactured it, date of manufacture and current retail value.A: Since your kitchen cabinet is unmarked, it is impossible to identify the maker; it was made in the early 1900s and would probably sell in an antique shop for $800 to $900 in good condition.Q: The attached mark is on the bottom of a hatpin holder that is 6 inches tall and 3 inches in diameter. It is fine porcelain and hand painted with daisies and poppies.

Washington. -- Bear with me for one more column, please about the social-racial-political ''miracle'' that Bill Clinton and Al Gore are producing with regard to this nation's new leadership.The changes I see these two white Southerners provoking have deep personal meaning to me. When I joined the Kennedy administration in 1961, the Cabinet was all-male and all-white. My getting a relatively middle-power job of deputy assistant secretary of state was front-page news across America.When I became director of the U.S. Information Agency in 1964 and President Johnson decreed that I sit in meetings of the tTC Cabinet and the National Security Council, I walked into Cabinet meetings noting that there was not another black face, nor a Hispanic or female one in view.

JERUSALEM -- Ariel Sharon's outsized brown leather chair sat empty at his Cabinet's table for the last time yesterday as government ministers formally ended the stricken Israeli leader's tenure as prime minister. By a unanimous vote, the Cabinet declared Sharon, who has been in a coma since suffering a devastating stroke Jan. 4, to be permanently incapacitated. The vote was a formality, spurred by legal necessity. Sharon's deputy, Ehud Olmert, assumed the duties of office the night the 78-year-old leader suffered a massive hemorrhagic stroke.

Any manager working in private business has, most likely more than once, made cost reductions. When doing so, they try to achieve the savings with the smallest impact on the central business of the company. Listening to members of President Obama's Cabinet and others in his administration talk about the upcoming very small percentage reductions in spending, it is apparent they are doing the exact opposite ("Obama is lying about the sequester" Feb. 27). Small reductions mean an end to essential services.

Susan Rice has not demonstrated the qualifications needed for the delicate position of U.S. Secretary of State, particularly when our foreign policy in Syria, Egypt and Libya is in such disarray ("Obama's conundrum," Nov. 30). Approval of nominees to cabinet positions is by law the prerogative of the Senate. Certainly the president is entitled to his opinion as to who the nominee should be, but at the same time the Senate is required to state that he has made a mistake. The president is not omnipotent; he is human in his choices which may involve political considerations and even bias.

Mitt Romney has been accused of revealing something in a hot-mike moment that perhaps he didn't want to reveal ("Dems: 'What's Mitt hiding?" April 17). I understand the desire on the part of the Democrats and The Sun to catch Mr. Romney in a similar "gotcha" moment to what President Barack Obama had during his meeting with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, but Governor Romney repeated several times in the early primary debates in front of millions of viewers, apparently none of then Democrats or Sun employees, that he would consider cutting departments but didn't have enough information to decide which ones.

Gov. Martin O'Malley's guests in the state's private skybox at Ravens games this past season included key politicians, campaign donors, and the family and friends of government officials, records show. It's a mix of people designed to forge political alliances and bolster economic growth, but also to allow the Democratic governor a chance to spend more time with those close to him, said Rick Abbruzzese, O'Malley's director of public affairs. O'Malley uses his box at the Orioles' stadium in a different manner, the records show.

"Laws were most numerous when the state was most corrupt. " - Tacitus, The Annals III.27 Texas Gov. Rick Perry came in for much ridicule for his televised failure to remember which three federal agencies he has pledged to eliminate if elected president. More embarrassing for Mr. Perry, however, is the fact that he thinks any federal agency could be eliminated (much less three) - and that he says so with a straight face. Such a thing is beyond the realm of possibility, and to believe otherwise is to labor under hopeless delusion.

In response to Thomas F. Schaller's recent opinion piece on Republican criticisms of federal agencies ("Cabinet agencies in the cross-hairs," Nov. 16), readers may recall that the mission of the U.S. Department of Energy was ostensibly to free us from foreign energy dependence. It has failed in that mission. The mission of the U.S. Department of Education was not so clearly defined, but nonetheless, by any account, has also been a wasteful failure, not to mention a blatant affront to our Constitution.

PARIS - President Jacques Chirac, under pressure to show results before next month's crucial legislative elections, named a conservative interim Cabinet yesterday, putting a steel magnate in charge of the economy and creating a powerful new security chief to get tough on crime. The 21-member Cabinet, proposed by Chirac's new prime minister, Jean-Pierre Raffarin, was unveiled at the Elysee Palace two days after Chirac's landslide victory in the presidential runoff election over far-right leader Jean Marie Le-Pen.

BEIRUT, LEBANON -- Pushing ahead despite threats of street violence and unrest, a depleted and defiant Lebanese Cabinet unanimously approved yesterday a U.N. plan for an international court to try the killers of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The vote was another small step toward clearing up a mystery that has shadowed and destabilized this country for more than a year. It was also the latest stroke of political brinksmanship between two bitterly divided political factions in Lebanon.

Let me see if I have this right. We are going to pay $60 million for a solar project at Mount Saint Mary's University for which the kilowatt hour rate is "well-above current cost" ("Largest solar power project under way," Sept. 30). The solar panels may well be made in Malaysia or Germany, and a grand total of two permanent workers will be added to the payroll? I'm no rocket scientist, but I can divide $60 million by 2 employees and figure out the latest boondoggle promoted by Gov. Martin O'Malley is costing $30 million per employee.

Keith Myers Brown, a retired Carroll County builder and big-game hunter, died Saturday of a cardiac arrest at Carroll Hospice Dove House in Westminster. The longtime Taneytown resident was 86. The son of a schoolteacher and a homemaker, Mr. Brown was born and raised in Union Mills. He was a graduate of Charles Carroll High School. A lifelong trumpet player, during his teenage years he played with the Westminster Municipal Band, William F. Myers Band, and the Lyric Concert Band of Hanover, Pa. During the 1940s and 1950s, he was a member of several Carroll County dance bands.