As we see the beginning of the re-election campaign of President Barack Obama, the President faces the daunting task of replacing his top two cabinet members in the crucial fields of foreign policy and defense.
Hillary Clinton has now made it clear that she does not wish to be Secretary of State in a second Obama term, and Robert Gates was making such a declaration long ago, and intends to leave late this year.
Both have been excellent and talented members of the Obama cabinet, and they will both be sorely missed, and their planned leaving presents major headaches for President Obama, at a time when the war in Afghanistan is not going well, and the nation is faced by massive overseas problems, including the unsettled situation in Libya with the civil war there raging, and the possibility of a no fly zone being declared by the United Nations and NATO, which would entail US participation; and also the shocking earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear power plant crisis in Japan, the third leading economy in the world, which will have ripple effects on the American and world economy.
This President has had to deal with multiple problems beyond any that earlier Presidents have had to face, and now the quest for the best, most competent successors to Clinton and Gates must begin in earnest, and this on top of the massive number of other domestic issues and problems, and a full scale battle for the Presidency not far off!