US president-elect Barack Obama said that selecting his national security team is a top priority.
“I think it’s important to get a national security team in place because transition periods are potentially times of vulnerability to a terrorist attack,” Obama told CBS’ 60 Minutes in an interview broadcast on Sunday. “We want to make sure that there is as seamless a transition on national security as possible.”
In his first television interview since his historic election win, Obama said he has spent the days since the election from doing “whatever it takes” to stabilize the economy, restore consumer confidence and create jobs to getting sound health care and energy policies through Congress.
The president-elect also said that as soon as he takes office he will work with his security team and the military to draw down US troops in Iraq, shore up Afghanistan and “stamp out al-Qaeda once and for all.”
While investors are still riding a rollercoaster on Wall Street, Obama said the economy would have deteriorated even more without the US$700 billion bank bailout. Re-regulation is a legislative priority, he said, not to crush “the entrepreneurial spirit and risk-taking of American capitalism” but to “restore a sense of balance.”
“There’s no doubt that we have not been able yet to reset the confidence in the financial markets and in the consumer markets and among businesses that allow the economy to move forward in a strong way,” Obama said. “And my job as president is going to be to make sure that we restore that confidence.”
Obama comes to the Oval Office with an ambitious list of campaign promises that will require Capitol Hill’s cooperation and approval, and the team he has been announcing in recent days is heavy on the legislative experience that Obama is lacking.
Obama resigned his Illinois Senate seat on Sunday after just under four years of service, half of which he spent out on the presidential campaign trail.
During the campaign, Obama had Pete Rouse as his Senate chief of staff to take care of his business on Capitol Hill. On Sunday, Obama named Rouse to be a senior adviser in his White House. Rouse has 24 years of experience as a top Senate aide, also running the offices of former Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota and Obama’s Illinois colleague, Democrat Senator Dick Durbin.
Other names that have begun to roll out recently come with varying degrees of Washington experience. Obama is drawing on accomplished Chicago friends, longtime congressional aides and former Clinton administration officials, including some with ties to the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
The new chief of staff, Representative Rahm Emanuel, combines the Chicago roots and the legislative connections. Vice president-elect Joe Biden’s chief of staff Ron Klain held the same role for former vice president Al Gore.
Obama has picked Mona Sutphen and Jim Messina as his deputy chiefs of staff. Like Rouse, Messina has served as chief of staff for three different lawmakers and has a vast network of relationships to show for it that he can tap on Obama’s behalf.
Philip Schiliro, who has more than 25 years experience working for Congress, is Obama’s liaison to Capitol Hill.
Biden has said he intends to be a frequent voice on the Hill and use his 36 years of experience as a lawmaker to promote the administration’s agenda. That’s a departure from Vice President Dick Cheney, who only appeared occasionally on the Hill to meet with Republican members and cast a tie-breaking vote.
Obama also said Americans shouldn’t worry about the federal deficit for the next couple of years.
“The most important thing is that we avoid a deepening recession,” he said.
He said there hadn’t been enough done to address the plight of homeowners facing foreclosure.
“We’ve gotta set up a negotiation between banks and borrowers so that people can stay in their homes,” Obama said.
The president-elect also urged help for the auto industry.
Obama also confirmed reports that he intends to close the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, and “make sure we don’t torture” as “part and parcel of an effort to regain America’s moral stature in the world.”
Obama also said he plans to put al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in the crosshairs.
“I think capturing or killing bin Laden is a critical aspect of stamping out al-Qaeda,” Obama said. “He is not just a symbol, he’s also the operational leader of an organization that is planning attacks against US targets.”
EXPRESSING GRATITUDE: Without its Taiwanese partners which are ‘working around the clock,’ Nvidia could not meet AI demand, CEO Jensen Huang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and US-based artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Nvidia Corp have partnered with each other on silicon photonics development, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said. Speaking with reporters after he met with TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) in Taipei on Friday, Huang said his company was working with the world’s largest contract chipmaker on silicon photonics, but admitted it was unlikely for the cooperation to yield results any time soon, and both sides would need several years to achieve concrete outcomes. To have a stake in the silicon photonics supply chain, TSMC and
‘DETERRENT’: US national security adviser-designate Mike Waltz said that he wants to speed up deliveries of weapons purchased by Taiwan to deter threats from China US president-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for US secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, affirmed his commitment to peace in the Taiwan Strait during his confirmation hearing in Washington on Tuesday. Hegseth called China “the most comprehensive and serious challenge to US national security” and said that he would aim to limit Beijing’s expansion in the Indo-Pacific region, Voice of America reported. He would also adhere to long-standing policies to prevent miscalculations, Hegseth added. The US Senate Armed Services Committee hearing was the first for a nominee of Trump’s incoming Cabinet, and questions mostly focused on whether he was fit for the
IDENTITY: Compared with other platforms, TikTok’s algorithm pushes a ‘disproportionately high ratio’ of pro-China content, a study has found Young Taiwanese are increasingly consuming Chinese content on TikTok, which is changing their views on identity and making them less resistant toward China, researchers and politicians were cited as saying by foreign media. Asked to suggest the best survival strategy for a small country facing a powerful neighbor, students at National Chia-Yi Girls’ Senior High School said “Taiwan must do everything to avoid provoking China into attacking it,” the Financial Times wrote on Friday. Young Taiwanese between the ages of 20 and 24 in the past were the group who most strongly espoused a Taiwanese identity, but that is no longer
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake and several aftershocks battered southern Taiwan early this morning, causing houses and roads to collapse and leaving dozens injured and 50 people isolated in their village. A total of 26 people were reported injured and sent to hospitals due to the earthquake as of late this morning, according to the latest Ministry of Health and Welfare figures. In Sising Village (西興) of Chiayi County's Dapu Township (大埔), the location of the quake's epicenter, severe damage was seen and roads entering the village were blocked, isolating about 50 villagers. Another eight people who were originally trapped inside buildings in Tainan
RSS