Say it ain't so, O.

Obama might keep Defense Secretary Gates

Joe KLEIN in the new Time magazine – “Obama says he wants to hire a Team of Rivals for his Cabinet. He should start by keeping Robert Gates”:
“Obama said he'd be particularly interested in having high-ranking Republicans advising him on defense and national security. ‘I really admire the way the elder Bush negotiated the end of the cold war—with discipline, tough diplomacy and restraint ... and I'd be very interested in having those sorts of Republicans in my Administration, especially people who can expedite a responsible and orderly conclusion to the Iraq war—and who know how to keep the hammer down on al-Qaeda.’ When I asked him specifically if he would want to retain Robert Gates as Secretary of Defense, Obama said, ‘I'm not going to let you pin me down ... but I'd certainly be interested in the sort of people who served in the first Bush Administration.’ Gates was George H.W. Bush's CIA director—and he has been a superb Secretary of Defense … Associates say Gates might stay if he believed the security of the troops was at stake.”

Just when I start getting excited and hopeful this comes out. And then we read...

In recent weeks, he toughened his stance on Iran and backed an expansion of the government's wiretapping powers. On Wednesday, he said states should be allowed to execute child rapists. When the Supreme Court the next day struck down the District of Columbia's ban on handguns, he did not complain...

So should I give up hoping?