First three Nixon Cabinet members zip through Senate
Sombody must have pressed the “easy” button.
Kelvin Simmons, Karen King Mitchell and Steve Danner became the first three members of Gov. Jay Nixon’s Cabinet to win Senate confirmation this morning. The voice vote was unanimous.
Barely a question was asked at their confirmation hearings, which preceded the vote of the full Senate. All three were showered with praise, mainly from Republicans, who control the Senate.
Simmons, a former utility regulator and economic development chief, is the new commissioner of administration. He’ll oversee a grabbag of duties such as accounting, budgeting and personnel.
Mitchell, formerly chief deputy to Nixon when he was attorney general, is the state’s new tax collector. As director of the Department of Revenue, she also is in charge of one of Nixon’s first goals: getting patronage politics out of the offices that issue drivers licenses.
Danner, a former state senator, is the new adjutant general. He will oversee opperations of the Army and Air National Guard.
Helping smooth the way for Nixon’s appointees was Daniel Hall, a former assistant attorney general who is now the governor’s lobbyist with the Legislature. Asked whether all the appointees would have such an easy time, Hall said: “Hope so.” He chalked it up to having “good candidates.”
These so-called Republicans are nothing more than gutless cowards and Jay Nixon is going to absolutely roll over them for eight years. This band of sissy’s doesn’t have fighter among them.
Some of them have been getting calls from their big donors telling them to grow a spine and start hitting back on some Nixon’s whack-job picks. I guess these wimps just like their heads flushed down toilets everyday.
Does whack-job = democrat or did you have some substantive objection in mind? And if so, to which pick?
Griffin
This is not the fight to pick unless you have evidence that these people are unqualified.
A more reasonable query may be how Nixon seems to be hiring mostly attorneys who worked in his office. This is not the broad range of experience you need in state government.
Don’t worry. If you give Nixon enough rope my suspicion is that he will be a failure.
In other words, these Republicans aren’t Republican enough? Not the first time I’ve heard that. The last time was from a one-term Republican governor’s chief of staff.