Has Barack Obama any more candidates for his government

Barack Obama will need them because more of his nominations for key government positions have withdrawn from the running on just one day. This time it is Annette Nazareth who has withdrawn from the running for deputy in the United States Treasury Department. Meanwhile Dr Sanjay Gupta has withdrawn from the process to be Surgeon General.

So that means Barack Obama has lost, amongst others, Tom Daschle (putative Health Secretary), Governor Bill Richardson (Putative Commerce Secretary), Senator Judd Greg (Putative Commerce Secretary) and Nancy Killefer (putative chief performance officer).

The White House Transition Project, which tracks appointments, say that there are 1,200 government jobs that require Senate confirmation of which around 360 are considered policy jobs; so far only about 70 of those jobs have been filled.

The chaos in Washington leaves Timothy Geithner, the US Treasury Secretary, battling the worst economist crisis since the Great Depression with none of his 17 deputies even named. Each one has to be confirmed by the US Senate, a process that usually takes weeks.

Meanwhile Paul Volcker, an Obama economic adviser and a former Federal Reserve chairman, called the situation at the Treasury "shameful" last week. Mr Geithner has a 50-person "shadow cabinet" of intended appointees but they have no authority to take any decisions.


Chaos in Washington as the socialist amateurs try to run the US.