Richardson bails from Commerce

This morning I visited the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum. More on the later.

For most of the 1920s, the Department of Commerce was a backwater agency of the federal government. Hoover put quite of bit of his vigor into the department, and quickly earned a reputation for getting things done, which is why governors of states along the Mississippi called on President Calvin Coolidge to put Hoover in charge of relief efforts when the river flooded.

I was thinking about Gov. Bill Richardson while in the museum, and I told myself that Barack Obama's Secretary of Commerce-delegate won't be a Hoover-type.

How right I was. Well, sort of. We won't know what kind of Commerce secretary the New Mexico governor will be. In another embarrassment for the president-elect, Richardson is connected to a Land of Enchantment "pay-for-play" scandal.

Richardson has not been charged with wrongdoing, but he backed out of being Obama's commerce secretary.

A California company, which donated to Richardson's campaign fund, was awarded a $1.5 million transportation contract--something a grand jury is investigating.

So long, Secretary of Commerce Richardson. We hardly knew ye.

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