ESA gets new boss, Mike Gallagher

There's a new captain on board the S.S. ESA: Former Assistant Secretary of Commerce Mike Gallagher, who'll be stepping into the shoes left by former president Doug Lowenstein last year. Gallagher most recently served as the "chief telecommunications and policy advisor to the Bush Administration," which, for those of you who never watched The West Wing, means he had to program the Oval Office TiVo to never miss "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?".

Though he's new to the industry, Gallagher told GameDaily BIZ that he's a lifelong gamer and thinks "the business is poised for tremendous growth." And, no, before you ask, he says he has no plans to bring back the old E3. Gallagher is stepping in to an awfully big shadow cast by Lowenstein, who took the ESA from a two-person operation to 32-employee effort that supports a $10 billion video game industry. But we're hopeful that his Capitol Hill experience will make him a force to be reckoned with when the attorneys-at-lawl come calling.