TRANSITION WATCH
OUTBOUND: Sources expect most Bush Cabinet members to wind up joining corporate boards, legal firms, communications companies or universities--high-profile posts from which they can write memoirs, play golf or even run for President. “Corporations are looking for prominent people to assist them in gaining notoriety,†said an executive headhunter. . . . Defense Secretary Dick Cheney is sizing up college presidencies and corporate posts. . . . All-purpose Bushite James A. Baker III appears headed for a Washington law firm. . . . Former White House Chief of Staff Samuel K. Skinner wants to run a company. . . . Several businesses are looking to hire presidential Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater as a communications wizard. . . . Pentagon spokesman Pete Williams, a former TV newsman, is being pursued by ABC and NBC. . . . Ex-State Department spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler, now a White House aide, is said to be scouting public relations jobs but may have to allow time for congressional testimony on possible involvement in the passport-search scandal.
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FURTHERMORE . . . : Treasury Secretary Nicholas F. Brady and Budget Director Richard G. Darman may return to Wall Street, but their wealth opens other options. . . . Michael J. Boskin, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, is mulling an offer to join the faculty at UC Berkeley instead of returning to Stanford. . . . And Solicitor General Kenneth W. Starr is a seven-figure prospect to return to his old law firm, Los Angeles’ Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher--or to accept reported offers from other prominent firms.
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TO OMB OR NOT TO OMB? Democratic Rep. Leon E. Panetta of Carmel Valley knows what it’s like to work in an Administration: Richard M. Nixon’s. As a Republican. After being fired for taking a strong civil rights stand at Nixon’s Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Panetta wrote an interesting book about it--and turned Democrat. Now he may have to choose between being President-elect Bill Clinton’s budget director or continuing as chairman of the House Budget Committee. . . . Clinton recently spoke on the phone with Panetta before having his economic adviser, Robert B. Reich, pay a visit. The contacts have continued. . . . But Panetta, who says he likes it where he is, is unsure whether he would move to the Office of Management and Budget, if asked. . . . Upside: He’d be in the best position to deal with his two big concerns, the deficit and budget priorities. Downside: He might slide off Clinton’s wavelength and wind up with no power post at all.
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BORE WAR: House Republicans are launching guerrilla warfare even before the new Congress takes office. . . . GOP leaders are urging their 47 new members to skip a December briefing given for the last 20 years to newcomers of both parties at Harvard University. They are asked to attend instead a first-ever briefing sponsored by the Heritage Foundation and two other conservative groups in Annapolis, Md. . . . “The Harvard program has been criticized for one-sided policy presentations,†said Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands). A Harvard spokesman denies it: “We struggle mightily to be bipartisan or nonpartisan.†. . . Most if not all of the 63 new Democrats are expected to choose the Harvard bore-a-thon. A Republican aide vows that the Annapolis event will not be a one-sided GOP brainwashing. “Just a light rinse,†he quipped.
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