Chris Bowers dissects Ben Smith’s assertion that the passage of HCR will vindicate Rahm:
The last tow months clearly followed Andy Stern’s recommendation, not Rahm Emanuel’s. Or really, everyone’s advice except Rahm Emanuel’s:
Senior Congressional aides said that lawmakers and the White House were increasingly focused on a plan by which the House would adopt the health care bill approved by the Senate on Dec. 24, with any changes made in a separate bill using the budget reconciliation maneuver.
Instead of scrapping the Senate health care bill and passing something stripped down, Congress is moving to pass the Senate health reform bill with improvements through the reconciliation process. Which is what almost everyone except Rahm Emanuel wanted.
It beats me how someone can have the exact opposite of his recommended path forward come to pass, and still be vindicated. Emanuel wanted to water down the Senate bill further, but instead it will be getting stronger through the reconciliation process as progressives were demanding. Yeah, Emanuel really paved the way forward after the Massachusetts debacle.
And that is why I continue to wonder why most everyone on the progressive left keeps freaking out about Rahm. He is the chief of staff, not the President. He offers his input, and as his been pointed out repeatedly, the President then makes his own decision. On some issues I am sure he agrees with him. On many others, it is clear he does not.
It is like there is no middle ground- either you think Rahm is the master of the universe or Satan incarnate, and if you point this out, you get accused of being a “Rahm defender.” Maybe he’s just the Chief of Staff and he works at the will and pleasure of President Obama?
Mnemosyne
Magic penis. Only possible explanation.
Mnemosyne
Yeah, I’m in moderation, but it was worth it!
Guster
Don’t they call the Chief of Staff ‘The Second Most Powerful Man in Washington?’* Is that just wild hyperbole?
*Offer only good when the VP is not named Cheney.
Corner Stone
Yes.
Kennedy
lol, sorry if this is a delayed reaction on my part, but that is hilarious.
demo woman
The last few months have been rough but I’m still not sure what a tow month is..
Kryptik
I think it has to do with the expectations that someone’s gonna ratfuck us. Rahm is perfectly placed to, and using the same kind of concern trolling that usually results in us getting ratfucked. Unfortunately, as much as ‘when all you have is a hammer’ is apt, so is the reverse: when you keep getting nailed, everything looks like a hammer.
It doesn’t help that we get fellatists who seem to wish Rahm instead of Obama was prez. Most of them happen to be on WaPo’s payroll, too.
williamc
@Mnemosyne:
I’m with you, and I think the magic penis got to Massa too…
BTW, how topical is the hilarious new header? Have you been planning this topic all day JC?
RedKitten
I think it’s just a prime example of how Obama and Rahm are playing “good cop, bad cop”. Think about it: if he was a more behind-the-scenes, unremarkable figure, all of the vitriol out there would be directed at Obama (with a little helping for Pelosi). This way, Rahm takes a shitload of the heat and the spotlight, while Obama quietly gets to work.
He’s Marty McSorley to Obama’s Gretzky.
anonymoose
The president can only make his own decision if Rahm allows him to.
SiubhanDuinne
A couple of weeks ago I posted a rant about someone calling me from the DNCC (or one of those acronyms) asking for $, and I said Call me back once HCR passes, and she started screaming at me?
Just got another call, this time from a pleasant, sensible young man. I said, Let’s not waste your time or mine, I’m not giving or even pleding a cent until they PTDB and it’s on the President’s desk for signature, call me back when that happens. Then I said I was encouraged that both Kucinich from the lefy and Kildee from the right had come around. He knew about Kucinich but not Kildee. Then we agreed that if Kildee was voting yes, there might be hope for Stupak and Blue Dogs. Then I reiterated my position on contributing to the Dems, told him to make a note to phone me back the minute the bill is passed and I would give money and volunteer my time.
His response? “I think that’s a very reasonable position, and I look forward to calling you back in a few days.”
Wow. So nice.
srv
Yeah, I always had a problem with those folks who didn’t think Ronnie was in charge.
I mean, f, George Bush was the “chief” executive of Texas for six years. More than competent to be leader of the free world.
Pete
Firebaggers and the like – that’s just their shtick. Sully just hates him for being moderately associated with the Clinton administration.
Rahm seems ok. This may be my O-bot programming speaking, but I’m mostly satisfied with the plays that have been made. But then, who in this world who expresses such an opinion will have it aired?
BarbF
If this bill vindicates Rahm, with all the warts it has, he better celebrate with a glass of vinegar.
I don’t know that I’ve heard anything more ludicrous.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
The increasingly tiresome Lawrence O’Donnell, who apparently took an extra smarmy condescension pill for St Paddy’s Day, was proposing the same idea just now, that RAHM! has been vindicated. I’m on the Who The Fuck Cares About RAHM! list.
Just Some Fuckhead
Man, I don’t even know how you got from there to here. You still on the happy pills?
This post shoulda been entitled “Oops, I Guess We Were Wrong” based on the way you assholes have spent the last uncounted weeks gushing about how awesome Emanuel is and savaging anyone that dared question his awesomeness.
Roger Moore
@Guster:
I don’t know. The chief of staff might well have been the second most powerful man in Washington. Somebody must have been #2 to Mr. Cheney.
L. Ron Obama
Maybe they are mad that Rahm marooned them in the center of a dead planet.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
Because they are cowardly and not even as bright as the wingnuts who would recognize the wasted effort that it is .
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Just curious: Which post was that? And which Asshole(s) wrote it?
Ruckus
JC
Why is it that sometimes the answer that has been staring everyone in the face is not only the simplest but the correct one as well? And the first one to be discarded?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Just Some Fuckhead:
This is what I’m talking about, and it is a trick that anyone who has been around alcoholics is familiar with. A sort of way to transfer blame from the guilty. First they start a fight and drag you down into their fools pit, then at the right moment, jump out and point down and ask what is wrong with that person I drug into my hole. Classic type of bait and switch, and wingers do use it often, but just not on something so stupid as attacking a POTUS;s Chief of Staff.
Annie
Wait. You mean all of the work this week to pass HCR, including Obama going on Fox News, isn’t about the “Rahm Vindicated Rahm’s Health and Care Bill?” Or, as we like to say, the RVRHACB…
I thought this was all about how Rahm stays healthy showing in the nude (image that showing in the nude), and how the American public should support this…
Midnight Marauder
@Just Some Fuckhead:
What fucking site have you been reading the past few weeks?
Mnemosyne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Not howling about how Rahm is the source of all evil = gushing about him being teh awesome
freelancer
Kinda like the concurrent, yet paradoxical memes that Obama is both a usurping tyrant who will lead this country into becoming the next North Korea, and at the same time, he is a stupid pussy who is all celebrity, no substance, and can’t talk without teleprompters?
Keith G
John, serious inquiry here. Do you think its possible the this freak out (if indeed it is one) is due to the terra incognita in which we find ourselves?
By that I mean we have the ball, Obama is on our side and has claimed fealty to much that we hold dear. *And* we have the blogosphere. That’s a completely new galaxy for us. This net thingy accelerates and leaves unfiltered silly emotional responses and gives megaphones to many whose cognition has seemingly not yet left adolescence. When they encounter an “ouchy” their cries reverberate across the www.
I used to get all up tight about, well, the usual suspects, but as I look back, they are just playing inside baseball and losing badly. What they do and say seems to have mattered not one damn bit.
As I recall, things got along rather well when we were the voices of strident opposition. I am not certain we have learned how to modulate what we say, hear and do as pioneers on this lefty-net frontier when our allies have the reins.
This was stream of conscious. I hope it made some sense.
@Mnemosyne: Yes. Very well worth it.
CalD
A lot of people seem to be able to think of politics only in very orthogonal terms; a black and white art practiced by one-dimensional caricatures who are either all the way evil or all the way good. Since Democracy isn’t supposed to be about any one person or group getting everything they want, anyone actually governing one is bound to do things you don’t like some of the time. Obviously some evil entity has to be responsible those things so that the players you identify with more can be all the way good.
Tom
John: It’s like I used to tell my first boss (way back in 1975). My job is to come up with 10 ideas. His job is to pick the one good one. Obama is President – if he takes bad advice it’s his problem – if he takes good advice it’s to his credit. People need to get off the chief of staff – Credit Obama or blame him for decisions as they are his, not theirs.
themann1086
Chris Bowers is the only reason Open Left remains on my blog list. The comment sections there are a wretched hive of… well, you know.
Chris Gerrib
Rahm is the inside guy, the details guy. Obama is the outside guy, the ideas guy. The ideas guy gives the details guy ten impossible things to do, and the details guy (grumbling all the way) goes and does them.
It’s not pretty but it works.
jl
Ben Smith and his ilk worship power, and people whose main job is directly related to wieding power itself, with no connection to other values. So they always fall in Big Wuv with chief of staff types.
I said before, Daffy Duck could be chief of staff and you would read the same nonsense. Or a fire hydrant, or moldy dog turd, or a brick, whatever. You would read the same stuff.
Dimmic Rat
I know why some dislike Rahm so much. His job is to be a dick and draw fire from his boss.
Politics is ugly bizness.
Brian J
Clearly he’s gotten to you and is using you to throw us off his tracks. How evil.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Brian J:
At least he admitted to the quid pro quo.
WereBear
I don’t remember anyone carrying on about Andy Card.
Are we talking about the Chief of Staff? Why don’t I remember much talk about the Chief of Staff?
Is this just a crappy way of implying the President isn’t really running things? If so, bull.
Brian J
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
This.
jl
@WereBear: Cheney and Rove were the real chiefs of staff during Bush II. Andy Card got the coffee and took the sandwich orders.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@WereBear:
Yes, absolutely. It is the only purpose for this tactic, and why it is cowardly. And unforgivable coming from democrats with the first democrat black president who is also being attacked by wingers for being incompetent. And infuriating when they then claim we object due to being Rahm lovers, or some silliness like that.
It is why I am rapidly getting to the point of treating them as no better than people who cut farts during moments of silence.
Velvet Elvis
Rahm was involved in the whole DLC “New Democrat” thing, plus as head of the DCCC in 2006 he opposed Dean’s 50 state strategy. That’s what all the anti-Rahm hate is about, IMHO.
BTD
Weak hippie punching this. I mean, Rahmbo runs a press operation to aggrandize himself and Cole gets mad at pushback to it?
Want to not be called a Rahmbo defender? Not defending him would be a good first step.
cat48
I don’t love Rahm, but he is sorta cute! Guess he didn’t read any of the columns about how if Obama had only followed Rahmbo’s advice, everything would be swell now; but O’s hardheaded and he made his own decisions/mistakes. Rahm has worked hard (the entire admin. has) but he is NOT running things!
Davis X. Machina
The Cossacks work for the Tsar.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@BTD: You guys started the attack which I believe is really an attack on Obama, and a cowardly one. I don’t give a shit about Rahm, but will be damned if I won’t do what I can to thwart nihilistic shit slingers like you. So bring it on motherfucker.
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
Maybe he’s just the Chief of Staff and he works at the will and pleasure of President Obama?
The important thing is, you think he’s up to getting us some cheeseburgers?
BTD
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
I have not written about Rahmbo since March 3, and in that post I wrote:
Emma
BTD: And you know this because? If you’re that close to Rahm, why are you commenting in a blog rather than talking to the New York Times?
Me, I don’t particularly like Rahm, but I don’t particularly like any politician. The problem for me is that it’s not only “Rahm is strong” but “Obama is weak.” It’s a way to paint Obama as somebody’s puppet, because, you know, that kind of person can’t possibly think for himself. They’re not intelligent enough. Didn’t you read The Bell Curve? (nudge wink nudge wink say no more say no more)
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@BTD: I called you a nihilistic shit slinger and does not necessarily have anything to do with directly attacking Rahm Emmanuel, or for that matter include being for or against anything. But does always include slinging shit for one reason or another. It is what you do BTD.
BTD
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Yes. Because Cole and Co. at BJ are all erudite and civil exchange of thoughts on deep policy issues.
Sheesh. Are there no mirrors in BJ world?
BTD
@Emma:
Talking to the Times? That’s Rahm’s job. On deep background of course. This forced ingenuousness is amusing.
Corner Stone
@cat48:
I used to fuck guys like him in prison.
BTD
@Emma:
On the Bell Curve, I am certain it is THIS blog, not me, that loves Sully so.
But of course recognizing Rahm’s failings is a race thing. Reaching for that card in one easy step.
Turgidson
@BTD:
I can’t remember a single post where Cole defends something Rahm actually said or did. I think he’s just fed up with people hitting the fainting couches and attributing every bump in the road to Rahm’s evil machinations, often without any proof he was even involved.
Rahm’s kind of a dick and all, but I don’t think he has as much power or influence on Obama or the events of the day as he gets “credit” for. I think that was kinda Cole’s point, too.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
I don’t know what gave you that impression. But before last years election all our wrath and shit slinging was directed toward wingnuts and their bullshit lies.
Now the bullshit comes from our own side, and it is the height of jackassery for those who spend their days looking to attack the president from their own party by proxy thru his CoS, and then have the gall to come here and whine about why were are mean to them and protecting Rahm. Makes me want to puke. I don’t care about Rahm, I do care about this blog becoming a cesspool of watb liberals delivering horseshit and calling it relevant facts. Obama is president, not Rahm. Tell your friends.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
Next on Mythbusters: Does saying ‘Rahm’ at the mirror three times really summon a Pup Tent Democrat?
BTD
@Turgidson:
True that. Cole just attacks people who criticize Rahm.
The idea is the same – leave Rahm alone! It is pretty inane stuff.
Never before has the idea that a top aide to a President might in fact have some power been forwarded before. Unprecedented stuff!
It is all just a nasty plot to get Rahm. Or a racist plot to get Obama. Or something.
BTD
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
The whining is all from the BJers as far as I can see.
Cole takes a pretty innocuous point that has been made frankly, everywhere (from Yglesias to Atrios to Krugman to Kos to well, everyone) and decides that another “Poor Rahm!” post is in order.
I guess you are hating on just about everybody on this one.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@BTD: Glad to get under your skin BTD, please return for more when it suits your fancy.
BTD
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: @General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Heh. If you say so.
KCinDC
How do Rahm and Rove manage to convince the press to fawn over them like this? As Yglesias says, if health care fails, the story will be that Rahm was right to says Obama shouldn’t have tackled major health care reform but just instead tinkered around the edges. But now that it seems to be succeeding, that’s somehow down to Rahm as well.
I guess if the 2006 elections had gone badly, the story would have been that the Democrats should have listened to Rahm more rather than that horrible Howard Dean. But since they went well, it was all Rahm’s doing, and let’s not mention Dean’s fifty state strategy.
Mnemosyne
So does BTD have “Rahm” in his Google feed, or does he just refresh Balloon Juice all day waiting to see if the topic comes up?
Liberty60
Often its the people who can’t bring themselves to criticize “their” President, who then convince themselves a bad decision must be the work of an evil Svengali.
I like Obama, but he is dead wrong on some decisions (civil liberties) with no help from Rahm, or the magic p. enis
capt
“He is the chief of staff, not the President. He offers his input, and as his been pointed out repeatedly, the President then makes his own decision. On some issues I am sure he agrees with him. On many others, it is clear he does not.”
That is exactly what I always say. More to the point, if Rahm had more sway it would be on Obama.
I think the Rahm haters fail to realize by calling Rahm the spawn of satan they are really saying the president has very poor judgement, is so weak minded he is run over by his COS.
I’m not of that opinion. I agree with you 100%.
gwangung
@BTD:
That’s a mirror you’re using, son, not a peephole.
@Liberty60:
Oh, hell, yes….
RareSanity
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
HEY!
It’s a bodily function and I said excuse me!
Midnight Marauder
@Mnemosyne:
Yes.
SATSQ.
+7
Yutsano
@The Sheriff’s A Ni-: I saw what you did there.
R. Johnston
There is a middle ground. That middle ground is believing that Rahm’s not very bright, has a completely undeserved reputation for being a skilled manipulator of others, has no business holding the job he does, and that the fact that he continues to be employed by Obama reflects poorly on Obama.
Rahm’s not the devil. He’s just a schmuck and a schlemiel, but that’s reason enough to be worriesd about the position he holds.
R. Johnston
There is a middle ground. That middle ground is believing that Rahm’s not very bright, has a completely undeserved reputation for being a skilled manipulator of others, has no business holding the job he does, and that the fact that he continues to be employed by Obama reflects poorly on Obama.
Rahm’s not the devil. He’s just a schmuck and a schlemiel, but that’s reason enough to be worriesd about the position he holds.
mclaren
I think what’s going on here is that many millions of people who put their desperate hopes and faith in Barack Obama only to see him systematically betray just about every campaign promise he ever made find themselves unable to give up that last desperate belief in Obama as a guy who will produce “transformative change.”
So instead they point the finger at Rahm. It’s a psychological mechanism, the same kind of transference mechanism that went on when Dubya’s presidency crashed and burned and the Republicans couldn’t admit they’d been betrayed by a corrupt ignorant incompetent sociopath. Instead, they declared that Dubya was never really a conservative at all, and that was why his presidency blew up and trashed the entire country.
I feel for liberals. They put all their hopes and dreams on Obama, and they believed what he said when he promised genuine change. And now that Obama has betrayed them, they can’t bear to admit it. They just can’t give up their desperate hopes that somehow, some way, Obama will actually follow through on his campaign promises.
So they convince themselves everything that’s gone so terribly wrong in Obama’s presidency is the fault of somebody else in Obama’s inner circle. The evil Rahmbo, or the Rasputin-like Tim Geithner hypnotizing Obama into bailing out Wall Street, or the evil Svengali named Lawrence Summers who shoots mind-controlling beams from his eyes to force Obama to do all those things he promised he wouldn’t do, like sign the Patriot Act and authorize unconstitutional wiretapping and keep Gitmo open and widen the war on drugs in Mexico and jack up penalties for marijuana possession to “crack down” on the Mexican cartels and invoke anti-terror laws to keep the details of the Goldman Sachs bailout (AKA bribe) secret, and make a secret deal that eliminates the public option from the health care bill long before the bill ever got to the senate floor.
No, no, noooooooooooo, it’s can’t be Obama doing those terrible things. Not Obama. Not the savior Obama. Not the wonderful messiah Obama. Not Obama, the hope of the world and the light of American politics. It’s someone else doing all those terrible things, it’s Rahm, it’s the all-powerful senate, it’s evil generals conspiring in the Pentagon, anyone, everyone….but Obama.
Bill E Pilgrim
Wow.
Honestly? I don’t know of any blog that’s as seemingly obsessed with Rahm as this one is.
I actually agree with what you wrote, John, in general terms.
However as far as others being obsessed with posting about him, good grief. I read a lot of blogs on the Democratic side, and I think this one wins on that score. I don’t read FDL that much but I’d say even they’re in second place. Could be wrong there of course, a completely unscientific survey.
bob h
Obamacare up to 75% on InTrade, thanks to Kucinich and the nuns.
media browski
I find it fascinating that the left spends so much time worrying over what Rahm *advised* (and Geithner) when a fair reading of their actual quotes (not the third-hand progblog telephone game that has so mangled their actual meaning) is that both men have been saying whàt the facts are. The facts, unfortunately, have put a crimp in the hippie fantasy of Obama’s election heralding an age of magic unicorn rides.
I observed back in August that what Rahm was telegraphing was that there aren’t votes for the PO, and that to pull this thing we’d have to go reconciliation, so the frakking hippie poutragers needed to buckle down and prepare to fight the conservatives. He was going around DC being entirely honest about the Admin’s simple strategy: leþ Congress negotiate with itself to find the range of available outcomes, then pick among those for the best solution the body politic can bear. You know, exactly what has come to pass.
But, we also got months of underpants gnome strategies from Markos and Hamsher, the former now claiming that this was his grand plan the whole time, and the latter still trying to undermine the whole deal so that she can shamelessly tell that idiot Ed that her predictions of Obama not having the votes and secretly hating HCR are true. Those two morons, if anything, helped drag this whole kabuki out further with their self-aggrandizing theatrics.
Which is a long way of saying I was right about Rahm, Rahm was right about everything, and most prog bloggers spend way too much time playing Dawson’s Creek.
brantl
I don’t think Rahm’s controlling the president, but I do think Rahm is in too critical a role not to fuck things up, when he is bent on it, and I think his instincts really suck.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Bill E Pilgrim: You are joking of course? We have been inundated with Rahm stories from every angle the past month or so. And this post was referencing a Politico story, not a blog. It started in the blogs, but spread to various MSM outlets as well, which there is no doubt in my mind where they got the idea, from the blogosphere.
And pointing out that Rahm Emmanuel is not the president to those conducting this mental masturbation over his purported Rasputin like influence, is not defending Rahm, nor being a Rahm supporter, nor being obsessed by the dude. It is just pointing out a basic fact to those who keep flogging the meme. So your comment is not only wrong, but intellectually dishonest, or just plain lazy.
media browski
@Bill E Pilgrim:
FDL and Dkos are insanely Rahmsessive. If anything JC is just observing the madness and commenting on it.
Katherine
“like Obama, but he is dead wrong on some decisions (civil liberties) with no help from Rahm”
Have you read Jane Mayer on that? Emanuel was one of the major forces undermining GTMO closure and Holder’s decision to try the 9/11 conspirators in civilian courts. He is in talks with Lindsey Graham about an indefinite detention bill. Also a strong advocate of “not looking backward”, who inappropriate pressured Holder on that score–though I’m not sure Obama needed much help on that one.
Emanuel has called a lot of plays on health care too.
It is perfectly rational to go after high ranking advisors, while remaining aware that the Cossacks work for the Czar. They are often influential, and their influence is often harmful. When that’s true firing them can make a major difference–especially given that we can’t trade in Obama for a more liberal president, but he could trade Emanuel in for a more liberal chief of staff. You don’t have to absolve Bush of responsibility for anything that DoD did under Donald Rumsfeld to believe that replacing Rumsfeld with Gates had real, substantial, positive effects. Emanuel is no Rumsfeld, of course, but he is very influential and his influence is harmful. Obama could, and should, fire him.
I assume this argument has been posted dozens, if not hundreds of times in your comments by now. I’m not sure why it’s so confusing, but if it is, it would be good to at least respond to that instead of caricatured hyperbole about Rahm being “the devil incarnate” (or even actual hyperbole from progressives about Rahm).
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Katherine: Did you even read the thread post by Cole. The one that says.
Or, he is one of many advisors, and likely not the only one who take this or that position on issues. Obama hired him basically as an enforcer of congress, especially the House. We are about to get HCR, so it sure looks like he is doing something right along the lines of why he was hired as CoS in the first place.
But thank you for admitting the real reason for these attacks by internet left wing ideologues. And that is to get at Obama by going after members of his staff. Because,
What makes you think this blog doesn’t think Obama is liberal enough? He may not be for you, but it would be nice if your ilk would be honest enough to attack Obama directly for not be liberal enough to your liking. Otherwise, it looks like slimey politicking that has the effect of painting Obama as feckless and unable to make his own decisions.
Katherine
I realize Cole doesn’t comment much, but I really wonder if he agrees more with 77 or 78.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
And I do want to apologize to BTD for this, that crossed my own personal line of over reaction name calling.
manwith7talents
I like Rahm, mostly because he likes to say the F-word a lot, and so do I.