Axelrod didn't like Rahm's health reform deal making

[Enrique]

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2010/09/27/axelrod-stabs-rahm-runs-from-wreckage-of-health-care-bill/

Noam Scheiber writes a lengthy portrait of David Axelrod in the latest issue of the New Republic. Axelrod is apparently not having fun, bemoaning Washington DC as place where “too many people spend too much time kneecapping each other to certify their own importance.”

I guess Axelrod likes to aim a little higher, because he then pulls out a giant knife and plants it right between Rahm’s shoulder blades:

Last spring, chief of staff Rahm Emanuel began pursuing a series of deals with interest groups—insurers, pharmaceutical manufacturers, hospitals—to grease the passage of health care. When Axelrod eventually turned to the issue, he became frustrated. The deals Emanuel was negotiating were moving the legislation forward. But they risked provoking a public backlash. “During the campaign we fought against insurance companies,” Axelrod said in discussions with Emanuel and the president. “After the deals with insurance companies, the deals with Pharma—all these people are supposedly our friends.”

Ouch. I guess they need a sin eater, and after Durbin’s pointed refusal to endorse Rahm on CNN yesterday, looks like it might be him.

(...)

[Hell Hath No Fury]

1. This is how Rahm works --

it always has been, from the very beginning. Which is why whatever "hope" I had about this Administraion flew out the window when I heard his name as COS. :(

Rahm represented exactly what is wrong with the Democratic Party today.

[harun]

4. Mine too.

[kenfrequed]

6. He has his uses...

though they are very few. As campaign staff he isn't a bad tactician but he should not be allowed within ten miles of policy, and as a large scale strategist he is a screaming disaster.

His importance and reputation are completely out of scale with what he actually does and his supposed 'tough guy' crap is a construct invented out of how often he beats up his own damned party. No GOP guy in his position would spend so much time kicking and spitting and sneering at their own base.

[young but wise]

2. Wow, interesting.

[Autumn]

3. I'm not too fond of it

either.

[golddigger]

5. Rahmpus can't leave fast enough for me.

One of Obama's biggest mistake was this guy in the WH setting policy.

[Peregrine Took]

7. Ya, but now he's coming back to Chicago. Like we want him here. n/t

[Inuca]

11. Setting policy?

I seriously doubt that's part of a chief of staff's job description.

[speppin]

14. Obama listened to him. Lots of blame to pass around.

[saracat]

8. Nevertheless, he is COS, and the one the President wanted. It isn't as if Rahm

acted without the authority of the WH. He could only do what he was allowed to do. he serves at the pleasure of the President.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

9. Yup.

His appontment told me probably more about O than all those months of campaigning.

[alsame]

10. Yep. Seems to me like they are using Rahm as the

scapegoat since he's leaving. Realizing that not everyone is thrilled with insurance reform rather than healthcare reform, they are blaming Rahm.

[KoKo]

15. What a terrible time for Axelrod to give that interview, though...

Before the Mid-Terms? :shrug:

[alsame]

17. Very odd. Not a good time to remind people how much the

legislation was shaped by the for-profit industries.

[speppin]

13. Well said.

[Phx_Dem]

12. I bet he liked the fact that it got passed though. n/t

[Kall]

16. Thanks, David

Thanks for keeping your mouth shut like a good soldier while the backroom deals were being made, and later trying to distance yourself from what the horrible bill the special interests wrote against the drug-crazed professional leftists.

Speaking out when it counts is all that matters. Blaming others after you stayed silent is what cowards do.

Anyways, what does he think about the guy who hired and stands behind Rahm?