Southerners Snubbed?

The Associated Press reported on December 20, 2008, "The South may have inched toward Democrats in November, but that progress isn't showing in President-elect Barack Obama's Cabinet selections. Obama hasn't nominated a single Southerner among his 15 Cabinet secretaries."

A very few with Southern roots have made it onto Obama's appointment list. Former Dallas mayor Ron Kirk has been tapped for U.S. trade representative, a relatively obscure post. Lisa Jackson, Obama's choice to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, grew up in New Orleans. However, she has lived and worked in the Northeast for most of her life. Obama's press secretary, Robert Gibbs, is from Alabama and has worked for several Southern representatives on Capitol Hill.

Nonetheless, this is the first administration since President Dwight Eisenhower without a Southerner in a cabinet post. Southerners need not apply," said disgruntled Rep. Jack Kingston, R-Ga. "It's hard to believe that there wasn't anybody qualified for something from the South." It was a region Democrats held without dispute before the Reagan revolution, and they hope to return to their majority status in the South. Does snubbing Southerners make sense, then?