Can an old Blob learn new tricks?

What did Biden's veteran foreign policy team learn in exile?

Joe Biden.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock)

Joe Biden's election pitch leaned heavily on predictability and a return to the familiar. In his major foreign policy picks, the president-elect has certainly delivered.

With Antony Blinken at state, expected to be joined by Jake Sullivan as national security advisor, Michèle Fluornoy at defense, and Linda Thomas-Greenfield at the United Nations, Biden has picked a team with extensive experience across multiple administrations, dominated by figures with whom he has a long and close personal relationship. These are not political picks, designed to reward key supporters (sorry, Mayor Pete), nor do they constitute a team of rivals whose clashes could offer Biden a diversity of perspectives to choose between or reconcile. Rather, they are exemplary representatives of The Blob, the bi-partisan foreign policy establishment that Donald Trump ran so memorably against in 2016.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Noah Millman

Noah Millman is a screenwriter and filmmaker, a political columnist and a critic. From 2012 through 2017 he was a senior editor and featured blogger at The American Conservative. His work has also appeared in The New York Times Book Review, Politico, USA Today, The New Republic, The Weekly Standard, Foreign Policy, Modern Age, First Things, and the Jewish Review of Books, among other publications. Noah lives in Brooklyn with his wife and son.