Now, I’m completely behind Yglesias for Commerce (assuming he’s willing to reciprocate and support me for head of the Office of Urban Policy), but I read things like this a lot and always end up scratching my head:

Yet Richardson is a former U.N. ambassador and energy secretary and is currently the governor of a major southwestern state. The only non-demotive cabinet posts he can accept are at State and the Pentagon. Neither appears to be in the cards.

This is often implied — that big time Washington actors won’t take jobs that are lower on the totem poll than jobs they’ve already had. My question is, why? Now, I used to be an associate at a consulting firm. Then, I got promoted to senior associate. I think it’s fairly reasonable to feel conflicted about moving back down to associate. It implies that one has stalled out and regressed on one’s career path (please do not ask whether the shift from senior associate to blogger implies a regression).

But as Spencer says, “Richardson is a former U.N. ambassador and energy secretary and is currently the governor of a major southwestern state.” Does anyone think that taking another cabinet post really implies something about his status in Washington? Cabinet positions are important! And unique! He wouldn’t be some deputy somewhere, he’d just be the head of a different department! Is he going to sit around doing nothing until he gets one of the four positions in the country that might reasonably considered a promotion for him?

I’m not necessarily saying that Spencer is out of his head; he surely knows more about how Washington works than I do, and maybe this is how Washington works. But if that’s how it works, well, that’s really stupid.