Obama's Secretary of HHS won't be Tom Daschle

Tom Daschle has withdrawn his name from consideration as Barack Obama's Secretary of Health and Human Services.  He was expected to be confirmed by the Senate, but damaged by his failure to pay $140,000 in personal income tax until after Obama nominated him.  More coverage.

Daschle is a former Senator from South Dakota (1987-2005), former Senate majority leader (2001-2003), and co-author of a book on reforming the US health care system.  As far as I can tell, he had no public track record on OA issues.

The OA connection:  The National Institutes of Health (NIH) belongs to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), giving the next HHS Secretary significant control over the future of OA in the US federal government.  The position of NIH Director is also vacant and will probably remain vacant until we have a new HHS Secretary.  Stay tuned.