President-Elect Obama appears to be attempting to stack his cabinet with Senate colleagues. His overtures are causing embarrassment.

First, Senator Lugar (ranking Republican member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee) declines to join Obama’s cabinet. Then, Senator Conrad (chairman of the Senate Budget Committee) declines to join Obama’s cabinet. Their reason should be obvious — these men wield great power in the Senate, and their power would greatly diminish were they to join Obama’s cabinet. President-Elect Obama should have known that, but he appears to be oblivious to how his overtures are causing embarrassment to his Senate allies.

President-Elect Obama probably thinks he is being nice to them when he is in fact offering them demotions in rank. They don’t want to be beholden to him; they want him to be beholden to them. Congressmen are notorious for having minds of their own. If President-Elect Obama expects to rule over them, he will have a tough fight on his hands.

Meanwhile, Senator Lieberman is going through a good cop/bad cop routine with Majority Leader Reid acting as the bad cop and President-Elect Obama acting as the good cop. If Senator Lieberman can’t see how he is in danger of becoming beholden to President-Elect Obama for his good standing in the Democratic caucus, there’s not much that can be done to help him.