Obama has picked Arne Duncan as his education secretary, according to Ambinder.
David Brooks will be pleased. Duncan is the CEO of Chicago Schools, a reformer who gets results, who can make some of the tough changes America's education system needs, even in the teeth of institutional resistance. He's also a good friend of the Obamas which means, as Brooks points out, that he's likely to be able to keep education near the top of the president's agenda.
It's a very Obama-esque choice, signaling change but at a careful pace. There were more radical choices - like Joel Klein, head of schools in New York. But the teaching unions would have thrown a massive hissy fit and then dug in for a fight. Obama has chosen someone with a record of reform but also of collaboration and conciliation.
UPDATE: fuller story here. He's a basketball player, natch.
He also bears a positively startling resemblence to Dick Van Dyke (at least in that picture.) Shame we couldn't get Mary Poppins for Secretary of State.
Posted by: Chim-Chimeroo, indeed | December 16, 2008 at 03:41 PM