Nomination problems continue to plague the Obama administration.
The latest flap involves the treatment of Anthony C. Zinni, a retired four-star Marine general and former special envoy to the Middle East in the George W. Bush administration.
Zinni, 65, is a Vietnam War veteran and a former head of the U.S. Central Command. He came out against the Bush conduct of the war in Iraq after supporting the invasion.
In a story broken Wednesday by The Washington Times, Zinni revealed that he was offered the position of ambassador to Iraq, only to learn after the fact that the job was going to Christopher R. Hill, a career diplomat.
“I don’t have a problem if they change their mind, but no one even bothered to call me,” Zinni later told The New York Times. “This is Leadership 101. To this day, no one has told me what happened.”
Others have criticized the new administration for failing Leadership 101, at least when it comes to nominating people for high posts.
Former Sen. Tom Daschle’s nomination to be secretary of health and human services collapsed after the revelation of his late payment of over $100,000 in taxes.
Nancy Killefer withdrew her name from consideration as the government’s chief performance officer because of her husband’s tax issues.
And the ultimately successful nomination of Timothy F. Geithner to be secretary of Treasury was made difficult by the news that he had been late in paying some of his taxes.
No one has suggested that Zinni had any tax problems.
And, by his account, his recent ties to defense contractors - he was the executive vice president of DynCorp International - didn’t come up when the ambassadorship was discussed.
Zinni also seemed to have the support of his long-time friend, James L. Jones Jr., Obama’s national security adviser and a retired Marine general.
Zinni said that Jones offered him the Iraq position on Jan. 26.
After that, Zinni met with Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton and later got a call from Vice President Joe Biden thanking him for taking on the Iraq assignment.
Zinni heard nothing until Feb. 2 when he called Jones and learned that Hill was going to be named the ambassador.
Zinni was not tempted by a subsequent proposal that he serve as ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
“I told them to stick that where the sun don’t shine,” Zinni told the Times.
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