Secreatary-Designate Chu, Meet Congress...

Last week we linked to a blog post questioning the ability of the admittedly brilliant scientist Steven Chu, to manage the cuthroat bureacracy of the Energy Department. In today's Wall Street Journal, Stephen Power offers a glimpse of Chu's on-the-joh training-- before he even takes office.

Chu had a meet and greet with the formidable Illinois congressional delegation, which was pushing for a piece of the money pie to fund a coal plant in the Land of Lincoln. Chu had previsously indicated that expansion of coal energy was his bete noir, but politics demanded that he take this meeting.

It's a telling look into what his job is going to be like and it only reinforces the notion that perhaps this man's talents are going to be stymied by inside the beltway politics.

Politics Tests Energy Goals [Wall Street Journal]