The Op-Fed Page?

Since it was announced a few weeks ago that this New York Times op-ed by Bill Kristol would be his last, there's been considerable speculation about what the Times will do with the column space. Gawker proposed the increasingly-ubiquitous Former Bush Person; Slate's ever-curmudgeounly Jack Shafer suggested 'Nobody'. It's quite a quandary: What do you do with the print equivalent of dead air?

If I may make a modest proposal: How about someone who knows about federal government? The op-ed page has some great writers; Paul Krugman in his non-partisan mode is a genuinely lucid explainer of economics, and Nick Kristof is bravely using his column space to report on things that, frankly, no one else wants to talk about. But there's no one there who really understands how federal government works, from the inside and at a detailed level, and how to explain that in a relevant way to the average reader. Particularly given the more active role that government is likely to begin taking in our economy and our lives, at least in the short-term, I think we would all benefit from having a voice on that page that demystifies the black box here in D.C. for the 300 million citizens (and counting!) that it serves.

Okay, so who? Well, the obvious candidate would be FedBlog's own Alyssa Rosenberg! (And that's how you make sure you get invited back.) But assuming she's unavailable, I think there are a few good candidates. Paul Light, the Paulette Goddard Professor of Public Service at NYU's Wagner school, has been a visible and prolific writer about how the sausage is made. Also from NYU Wagner, Rogan Kersh, who I've had the privilege of knowing personally, is a similarly gifted writer with a true grasp of the nuance of how law becomes policy becomes reality. Don Kettl, the Director of UPenn's Fels Institute of Government, has just written a great book on how to bring government into the 21st century, and it's full of ideas that deserve a broader audience.

These are just a few good candidates; there are tons more. Who do you think belongs in the Op-Fed slot?