The press is filled with talk about the next secretary of State, the next secretary of defense, the next secretary of Treasury. About the next secretary of commerce, there is hardly a peep.
Who is the secretary of commerce now? Rebecca Blank has been the acting secretary since John Bryson resigned on June 21, 2012. Have you missed having a permanent secretary of commerce rather than an acting one for seven months? Has the economy suffered as a result? Has commerce been crippled?
As I wrote here back in June 2012 when Mr. Bryson resigned, America didn't have a separate commerce department until 1913, yet somehow Americans managed to engage in commerce before that time without a federal government bureaucracy to assist them in doing so.
Back in June I recommended that President Obama refrain from replacing Mr. Bryson. The president appears so far to have taken my advice on the matter. It's about the only thing on which he has done that. Maybe if Mr. Obama can go his entire second term without a commerce secretary, the next president will work up the courage to eliminate not only the cabinet job but the entire department, whose functions can easily be redistributed either to other departments or to the private sector.