Those Cabinet appointments

As expected, President-elect George W. Bush is trying to be all
things to all people with his Cabinet appointments.

The best pick to date has been

Sen. John Ashcroft for attorney
general -- a constitutionalist who will be a breath of fresh air following eight years of Janet Reno, a political hack who did anything and everything, including exterminate about 80 men, women and children at Waco, for her presidential benefactor.

But there have been some disastrous selections, too.

One of those is Paul O'Neill for treasury secretary. The better known right-fielder for the New York Yankees of the same name would have been a superior choice to this Alcoa Aluminum executive.

TRENDING: Is this what you voted for, America?

Why is he so bad? In 1992, the nominee met with Bill Clinton and embraced a proposal for a new energy tax. He has never renounced this wacky idea publicly.

Another bad choice was New Jersey Gov. Christie Todd Whitman for the anachronistic position as head of the Environmental Protection Agency.

The EPA is on the forefront of government agencies exceeding any legitimate federal authority provided in the Constitution. It's a rogue agency -- not unlike the Internal Revenue Service. Whitman is not a likely choice to dismantle this abusive, coercive office.

In accepting her nomination, Whitman explained one of her goals is to ensure an end to "suburban sprawl." In other words, she thinks an appropriate use of the federal government is to tell you where you can and cannot live and if and how you can use your private property.

Many other critics of this selection have focused on Whitman's extreme view of abortion on demand. She believes there should be no legal restrictions on killing unborn children, up to and including the hideous procedure known as "partial-birth abortion." That is, indeed, an extreme position. While she may not have any direct say over federal abortion policy at the EPA, her stance is a prime indicator that she is not a strong advocate of human rights -- a dangerous trait in a position that has, too often, given more weight to spotted owls, bugs and vermin than to the legitimate rights of sovereign citizens.

"Oh, Farah," some of you are saying, "don't worry about Whitman. She still has to report to George W. Bush. It's his will that will shape executive branch policy for the next four years, not Whitman's."

That may be true. But Bush has not distinguished himself as either a champion of property rights or as a critic of the kind of pseudo-science that has set the pace for Washington's style of command-and-control regulations of our lives in recent years.

Remember, Bush lost the state of Michigan because he refused to criticize Vice President Al Gore's extreme position that the internal combustion engine must be banned. He has not shown he has even a cursory understanding, nor appreciation, of the limits on power the Constitution places on the federal branch of government.

Let me tell you about a meeting a friend of mine had with Bush during the campaign.

My friend asked Bush what he would do as president if faced with congressional legislation that was clearly unconstitutional. His response?

"How would I know if it was unconstitutional?" Bush asked.

The president is sworn to uphold the Constitution. It is not, strictly speaking, the purview only of the U.S. Supreme Court to interpret whether laws and regulations are constitutional. It is the job of every person who takes an oath of allegiance to the Constitution. Bush either does not understand this simple principle or is part of an effort to subvert our system of constitutional checks and balances.

These two prominent choices -- O'Neill and Whitman -- give me no confidence that we are building an administration that will take the steps necessary to reform or eliminate massive, out-of-control federal bureaucracies that continue to diminish our personal, inalienable, God-given liberties.

The Republicans have two years to demonstrate to the American people that they have a better grasp of governance than the Democrats. They have nominal control of the Congress as well as the executive branch for the first time in half a century. In 2002, the smart money is already on the Democrats to take back control of the Congress. Only a dramatic, corrective course change will prevent that swing.

Choices like O'Neill and Whitman do not make for an auspicious start.