Political appointments have more to do with looks than substance.  The weakest link in the chain is the authority who appoints, which apointee in turn continues the weak link to his hires.  Everybody looks good from the P.R. perspective strategized by the advertising firms, now rebranded as "pr firms," but reality rears its ugly head as result oriented.  As you know, project finance is a moving target, unlike project accounting, and so is purely result oriented.  Politics only rises to take credit and simultaneously explain away the inevitable failures.  This is how the political industry succeeds.  However, their proteges (the project managers) cannot similarly talk from two sides of their mouths without failing.  Our local "experts" don't even know why they consistently fail even though they "succeed"!  It's been this way since the 1820 arrival of the New England mission.