Axelrod: No "Potted Plants" In Obama's Cabinet

by The Huffington Post News Team [courtesy of Politics on HuffingtonPost.com]

David Axelrod, senior adviser to President-elect Barack Obama, appeared on ABC's This Week Sunday morning. Axelrod affirmed that Hillary Clinton would have Obama's full confidence and backing as Secretary of State, saying all of Obama's nominees will have have such support because there will be no "potted plants" in Obama's cabinet. Watch the clip from This Week below, and read more about Obama's Cabinet here.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Clearly, as president of the United States, thequestion, though, a lot of people have -- and I think that SenatorClinton may have had it herself -- is how much authority will she haveas secretary of state?

According to our reporting, she was fairly reluctant mid-week to
take the job, but she had a conversation with the president-elect on
Thursday, I believe, where he did convince her and got everything back
on track.

And the question is, given the recent history of secretaries of
state, we saw that Secretary of State Powell did not seem to have the
full backing of the president, President Bush, and it hurt him --
unlike Secretary of State James Baker under the president's father.

Will Secretary of State Clinton, if, indeed, she is nominated and
confirmed, have the full backing of the president? And will she have
a direct line to the White House?

AXELROD: Look, I think it's fair to say that all of these
appointees will have the full backing of the president. That's why
he's selecting them.

And the one thing I can tell you, from working for six years with
Barack Obama, that he is someone who invites strong opinions. He
enjoys that. He thinks it's an important element of leadership.

And I think that he'll have a great working relationship with his
secretary of state, his secretary of Treasury, and his entire Cabinet.
They are not going to be potted plants in their departments. They are
going to be partners with him in governance, and he is going to
encourage that.

And I'm sure that that's the message that he's given to everyone
he's spoken to about potential positions in the administration.