Rahm Emanuel

[AggieDave 6]

So Rahm Emanuel has been asked and has accepted the Chief of Staff spot for BO.

Thoughts? I don't know a whole lot about him. All I know is that he did initially support GWB in the Iraq war, that he's socially pretty liberal and he's Jewish. That and he's from Chicago. Beyond that, I'm kind of in the dark.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[quade 3]

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So Rahm Emanuel has been asked and has accepted the Chief of Staff spot for BO.

I dunno. Looks more like a "get me re-elected" Chief of Staff than a run "The White House" one but . . . we'll have to see though. There is a lot of cross over. My only reservation would be that he doesn't look like he has a lot of the balance experience that would help Obama fill in some gaps. Again, we'll see. He's just a rumor at this point I think. Where are you seeing that this is a done deal?

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[AggieDave 6]

Well, it was an article on Time's website. That page is gone now. I knew it was rumored earlier today, but when I posted it had been published as a fact. Now that its missing, maybe its still in rumor mill?

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[quade 3]

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Well, it was an article on Time's website. That page is gone now. I knew it was rumored earlier today, but when I posted it had been published as a fact. Now that its missing, maybe its still in rumor mill?

That would be my guess. I'd expect an official announcement within the week, but today certainly seems premature.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[skydyvr 0]

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Well, it was an article on Time's website. That page is gone now. I knew it was rumored earlier today, but when I posted it had been published as a fact. Now that its missing, maybe its still in rumor mill?

That would be my guess. I'd expect an official announcement within the week, but today certainly seems premature.

This doesn't seem official, but it's out there.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081105/ap_on_el_pr/obama

. . =(_8^(1)

[rushmc 18]

Seems to be more than a rumor

http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/11/05/president-elect-obama-faces-difficult-transition-period/

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[quade 3]

Yeah, but it's not official until it's announced.

Again, today was simply too early to make that as an announcement. It's been less than 24 hours since the polls closed. It just wouldn't happen today.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[JerryBaumchen 1,046]

Hi Dave,

This may be totally nutzy but I 'think' that I heard that he had been, at one time, a member of the Israeli army (?), secret service (?), something.

Anyone else have an idea?

JerryBaumchen

[alw 0]

Emanuel is a mover and shaker in the Democratic party who is seen as a key fund raiser and hot property. He's the #3 man in the Democratic Congress. He is not a friend of the NRA or second ammendment. He is an advocate for military medical rights.

Emanuel was part of the Bill Clinton campaign and had an advisor job in the White House. He seems to be on opposite sides from Obama on some trade issues but pols bend with the wind so he may be willing to adapt. Most Chiefs of Staff son't last much more than a couple of years, so good luck Rahm. I doubt he'll be well received by middle eastern governments, but then , he doesn't have to be.

Other staff possibles are Chet Edwards, another party insider in Congress and one of the rumored VP candidates eaaroier in the campaign. James E. Clyburn of South Carolina Majority Whip and another party insider is one more name being tossed around for "something".

The names being kicked around are for the most part the old guard Clintonians and liberal leaning Democrats. Almost all are Washington insiders. All in all I'd suggest we wait and see, but it's hard to read any change in the old way of Washington so far. Pelosi's rhetoric has been the most vocal and it will be interesting to watch the interaction between her and the transition team during the lame duck session.

---------------------------------------------
Every day is a bonus - every night is an adventure.

[Remster 24]

Its more than a rumor now!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081106/ap_on_go_pr_wh/obama

Remster

[quade 3]

Yep! Done deal. That's faster than expected by two days. The Obama team is in front of the traditional Friday announcements.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[normiss 619]

Yay!
Gimme "four"!

[AggieDave 6]

Well, looks like he's all kinds of "change" for BO's staff:

http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2008/20081106133228.aspx

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Obama's Chief of Staff Pick a Freddie Mac Alum - Will Media Notice?
Rep. Rahm Emanuel held paid position on troubled GSE's board from 2000-2002, when Freddie Mac was accused of accounting and campaign finance irregularities.

By Jeff Poor
Business & Media Institute
11/6/2008 1:50:59 PM

He’s President-elect Barack Obama’s new chief of staff, according to various Nov. 6 media reports, but Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill., also has some baggage pertaining to the financial crisis. Will anyone in the media take note?

Emanuel, who was a senior adviser for former President Bill Clinton throughout the 1990s, was appointed to the board of Freddie Mac upon his departure from the Clinton administration.

“Clinton’s going-away gift to Emanuel was a seat on the quasi-governmental Freddie Mac board, which paid him $231,655 in director’s fees in 2001 and $31,060 in 2000,” Lynn Sweet wrote for the Chicago Sun-Times on Jan. 3, 2002.

During the time Emanuel spent on the board, Freddie Mac was plagued with scandal involving campaign contributions and accounting irregularities. Freddie Mac and its sister organization Fannie Mae were taken over by the federal government in September 2008 after years of mismanagement and scandal. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson put the two beleaguered GSEs into a conservatorship, stripping common stock shareholders of their rights to govern the companies.

In 2006, Freddie Mac was forced to pay a $3.8 million fine to the Federal Election Commission to settle allegations it illegally contributed to congressional candidates between 2000 and 2003 – while Emanuel was on the board and running for and serving in Congress.



“Freddie Mac was accused of illegally using corporate resources between 2000 and 2003 for 85 fundraisers that collected about $1.7 million for federal candidates,” an Associated Press story from April 18, 2006 said. “Much of the fundraising benefited members of the House Financial Services Committee, a panel whose decisions can affect Freddie Mac.”

And, since his successful run for the House of Representatives in 2002, Emanuel has been the beneficiary of campaign cash from Freddie Mac and its sister organization Fannie Mae – $51,750 according to the Center for Responsive Politics Web site OpenSecrets.org.

Emanuel received $25,000 in contributions from Freddie Mac during his first run in 2002, right at the end of his tenure at the government-sponsored enterprise. Freddie Mac was his third largest overall contributor that year.

However, there was an even larger conflict of interest that Sweet pointed out in an editorial column published in the Chicago Sun-Times on Aug. 14, 2003.

“Emanuel’s trust is supposed to be blind, not stupid,” Sweet wrote. “Freshman Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), a former Freddie Mac board member, sits on the very House subcommittee that has oversight of the federal government-sponsored enterprise at the same time that he has outstanding options for 2,500 shares of the company.”

Emanuel told Sweet there was no conflict of interest because he put his financial stake in Freddie Mac into a blind trust and would recuse himself from any votes relating to Freddie Mac.

However, while Emanuel’s was on the Freddie Mac payroll in an overseer capacity, the government-sponsored enterprise was cooking the books. According to a Forbes magazine article from Dec. 11, 2003, the GSE was fined $125 million for understating its earnings by a whopping $5 billion.

“Handed down by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, the regulator of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the fine was in response to the company’s admission of almost $5 billion in understated earnings over the past several years,” Ari Weinberg wrote for Forbes.

Although he was compensated handsomely, Emanuel told Sweet his job on the Freddie board was to attend quarterly board meetings and take part in committee meetings, either on the phone or in person.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[JohnDeere 0]

Thats great so one of the guys that helped get us into this mess is suposed to help us get out of it Can you say job security

Nothing opens like a Deere!

You ignorant fool! Checks are for workers!

[kallend 1,618]

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So Rahm Emanuel has been asked and has accepted the Chief of Staff spot for BO.

Thoughts? I don't know a whole lot about him. All I know is that he did initially support GWB in the Iraq war, that he's socially pretty liberal and he's Jewish. That and he's from Chicago. Beyond that, I'm kind of in the dark.

He's a Cubs fan.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[algboy 0]

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06/11/2008 Israeli media on Thursday hailed Barack Obama's choice of Rahm Emanuel to be his chief of staff, with one daily calling the Democrat of Israeli descent "our man in the White House."

Radio stations and newspapers pointed out Emanuel's occupied Jerusalem-born father was once a member of Irgun, an underground, ultra-nationalist Jewish movement that fought British troops before the 1948 existence of Israel.

Emanuel himself volunteered to serve in the Israeli army and did a two-month stint at a base in northern occupied territories during the 1991 Gulf War, public radio reported.

"It is obvious he will exert influence on the president to be pro-Israeli," Emanuel's father, who moved to the United States in the 1960s, told the Israeli daily Maariv.

The newspaper headlined the article: "Our man in the White House." Democrats say Obama has asked Emanuel, a combative congressman and former Bill Clinton White House aide, to be his chief of staff, a vital post that helps set the tempo of the administration.

http://www.almanar.com.lb/NewsSite/NewsDetails.aspx?id=62671&language=en

Looks like it's payback time for BO.

“Keep your elbow up!"

[FreeflyChile 0]

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So Rahm Emanuel has been asked and has accepted the Chief of Staff spot for BO.

Thoughts? I don't know a whole lot about him. All I know is that he did initially support GWB in the Iraq war, that he's socially pretty liberal and he's Jewish. That and he's from Chicago. Beyond that, I'm kind of in the dark.

He's a Cubs fan.

Checks and balances. Can't have a Sox fan run around the White House without control.

[TheAnvil 0]

By style and reputation, he'll probably be a good choice for CoStaff. He seems to have the personality for it, at any rate. Inside from the Clintonista era. Doesn't fit the 'change' mantra, but he would probably do well. I hope he's not Borked and gets a floor vote in the Senate rather quickly.

Vinny the Anvil
Post Traumatic Didn't Make The Lakers Syndrome is REAL
JACKASS POWER!!!!!!

[flyhi 24]

The LA Times says about his brother, Ari:

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Ari -- model for the caustic agent Ari Gold in the HBO series "Entourage" -- has a reputation similar to his brother's, but he wears better suits and has a phone with everyone in Hollywood you'd want to know on speed dial.

Bottom line appears to be, don't piss Rahm off.

Shit happens. And it usually happens because of physics.

[Amazon 7]

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Inside from the Clintonista era.

You do realize that the current president has or has had people who have been in and out of the White House Administrations since the Nixon Administration

[TomAiello 25]

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Inside from the Clintonista era.

You do realize that the current president has or has had people who have been in and out of the White House Administrations since the Nixon Administration

Each party recycles their past operatives continuously, because (a) they're party faithful, and (b) they have experience. This is both good (because they have experience) and bad (because it just brings the same people back time and again).

-- Tom Aiello

[email protected]
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[rushmc 18]

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Inside from the Clintonista era.

You do realize that the current president has or has had people who have been in and out of the White House Administrations since the Nixon Administration

Each party recycles their past operatives continuously, because (a) they're party faithful, and (b) they have experience. This is both good (because they have experience) and bad (because it just brings the same people back time and again).

So much for change........

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[quade 3]

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So much for change........

When you take off skid marked underwear and replace it with freshly laundered, even if it's not completely new, that's still change.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[rushmc 18]

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So much for change........

When you take off skid marked underwear and replace it with freshly laundered, even if it's not completely new, that's still change.

Damn man, that is a vision I coudl do without


Understand, I fully expected what is happening. One has to pick who they think to be the best, and they have that right.

Now excuse me, I have to do my laundry

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[tbrown 26]

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By style and reputation, he'll probably be a good choice for CoStaff. He seems to have the personality for it, at any rate. Inside from the Clintonista era. Doesn't fit the 'change' mantra, but he would probably do well. I hope he's not Borked and gets a floor vote in the Senate rather quickly.

Vinny, I don't think Chief of Staff needs Senate approval. It's not a Cabinet post or an official government office. He's the chief office manager & bottle washer and the Prez can pick anyone he wants to run the shop. Anyway, with a Demo majority in the Senate, I don't think Obama's going to have any trouble with his Cabinet or judicial appointments.

Scot Simon on NPR is from Chicago and has profiled Obama and Emmanuel both as typical Chicago style politicians - charming, cunning, ruthless, and knowing when and where to pick their fights. I guess Emmanuel's got quite the reputation for his knife work. Which is probably just what the job calls for.

You coming out to Perris anytime soon ?

Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !