Let me finish tonight with a bright sign from the White House. Every leader must have three elements: motive, passion, spontaneity. We need to know why he or she is there, why moves them, and, this other thing, this sign that they are alive, awake, thinking, looking for and responding to new ways to grow.
President Obama's appointment today of William Daley as his chief of staff is solid evidence that the lights are on at the White House and somebody's home.
He's needed a good rep with the business world. Now he's got one.
He's needed a chief operating officer, a ram-rod in the White House to carry out his orders, to get the Cabinet cracking. Now he's got one.
He's needed a clear chain of command on domestic matters parallel to the one he's got on defense and foreign policy. Now he's got one.
He's a Democratic president who needs to show the Democrats are as good at government as they are committed to it. He's needed to show that he's got more than press secretaries, communications people and speechwriters, that the Presidency is an executive operation. Now he has and has got himself a top kick to do it.
This brings us to the key to the Daley appointment.
President Obama no longer controls the Congress. To dominate politically, he will need to do his heaviest lifting from the Executive Branch. He will need to be forceful, effective and impressive. Daley can be for him what Jim Baker was for Ronald Reagan, a chief of staff who brings discipline, focus and tough, consistent, professional enforcement to what the President decides are his most vital goals between now and when he faces the people in 2012.
This is a good day for the Obama administration. It's good, always good, to show you're alive, thinking, growing, surprising your opponents, bracing your believers.
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Mischelle Bachman on the Intelligence Committee? talk about an oxymoron!
God have mercy on the poor souls in Tucson and especially those dead and wounded....but will Chris make clear that people like Sharon Angle and Michelle Bachman have blood on their hands with all their hateful rabble rousing about second amendment remedies??? I hope he will....
FYI Chris , as a resident of the city of Detroit, Michigan, I feel that your staff has mis-informed you on one fact concerning the city of Detroit and grocery stores. There are many grocery stores in the city limits, there is no major chain, (meaning Kroger). There are several independent stores as well as vegitable markets which sell fresh produce.
It's about time that President Obama got someone on board who can speak with authority to the business community, understand their perspectives, and not be seen as a shill for the banking and financial services industry, as happened with Treasury Secretary Geitner. If business is about getting things done, then Bill Daley knows the drill; his father and brother were Mayors of Chicago, long renown as, "the City that Works". I also suspect that Daley is no man to cross, and at this stage of his career, I doubt if he will be inclined to pull punches. Unlike so many working within the Beltway, Daley already had an enviable career outside of government, and made a lot of money doing so. I would also suspect that this assignment is about legacy, honoring himself and his family, and being a moral force within the government and the Administration within which he has chosen to serve. Daley's family made good governance their patented specialty, and I strongly believe that Bill Daley wants to be in the same place of honor of those who devoted their lives to effective public services, as his father and brother did. Money cannot buy reputation, and even prior service as a Cabinet Secretary is too tightly focused on the mundane duties attending that job. Above all, Bill Daley has signed up to make the Obama Administration work, and work well, no matter at what cost to himself. That's his family business.
Chris Prof Juan Cole (who I have been trying to get you to have on about Iran, the I/P conflict) has a great one up over at Informed Comment about Sarah Palin Pac map. "Sarah never does anything wrong"
Over at Raw Story
Democrats on Palin ‘crosshair’ map received death threats
By Eric W. Dolan
Monday, January 10th, 2011 -- 2:10 pm
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Two former Democratic representatives from Arizona reportedly received numerous threats during their time in office after being placed on Sarah Palin's "crosshairs" map.
"I cannot tell you how much I wish a panty bomber would come in and just @!$%#ing blow your place up," one constituent told former Arizona Congressman Harry Mitchell, a Democrat who lost his reelection bid last year.
Another former Arizona representative, Ann Kirkpatrick, received emails calling her a "whore" and had a sewer cap thrown through her office window, The Daily Best reported
When oh when are you going to have Prof Cole on your program?
Sarah Never Does Anything Wrong
Posted on 01/10/2011 by Juan
Sarah Palin’s aides are claiming that the crosshairs marking the targeted Democratic candidates (including Gabrielle Giffords) on her infamous poster (scroll down) were not crosshairs but a ‘surveyor’s symbol.’
But Palin called the symbols ‘bull’s eyes’ in a tweet, so the surveyor symbol business is just b.s.:
There are a lot of people killed by nuts every years, blam it all on Sarah.