Government: Washington’s Worst Jobs

Politics and patronage go hand in hand, but some presidential appointments in the next administration may be hard to fill. The nonpartisan Center for Excellence in Government catalogs them in The Prune Book, a just released guide to 116 of the toughest jobs in the capital. Some examples: a former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs admits that sometimes “stamina was more important than intelligence” in keeping pace with the travel and social demands of his post. At the Office of Management and Budget, the challenge is “not to cave” in to demands for money. Says a former OMB associate director: “A lot of people are not willing to be unpopular.”

The directory, a takeoff on the traditional “plum book” of political patronage, has a serious purpose: to stress “the consequences of failure to perform effectively” in sub-Cabinet Government offices. Explains former State Department spokesman John Trattner, who wrote the book: “A prune is a plum with experience.”