Bill Daley's Real Agenda: Obama's Reelection

[Hannah Bell]

The president's new chief of staff will be focused on 2012, insiders tell Jonathan Alter. Plus, why Rahm Emanuel, David Axelrod, Valerie Jarrett, and Pete Rouse see Bill Daley as their fixer.

The coverage of Bill Daley’s appointment as White House chief of staff has focused mostly on how he’ll use his stature as a grownup to work with Republicans on a growth package and help President Obama mend his relations with the business world. But White House insiders say these are all in service to a more baldly political goal: to get Obama reelected.

Bill Daley, son and brother of Chicago’s most legendary mayors, is the consummate political executive. That’s an occupation that’s a little different than politician or political operative—think Jim Baker (chief of staff under Ronald Reagan) or Sam Skinner (another Chicago lawyer, under George H.W. Bush), not Karl Rove or Rahm Emanuel, who as Daley’s much less polished protégé urged Obama to make this choice. Like Baker and Skinner, Daley served in the Cabinet (as Commerce secretary under Bill Clinton). He understands the interplay of politics and policy and how to preside over a political organization.

The most relevant job he’s held was as chairman of Al Gore’s presidential campaign. When he took over in 1999, Gore, once the frontrunner, had slipped more than 20 points behind Bill Bradley in the contest for the Democratic nomination. A year and a half later, Gore was, in a manner of speaking, elected president. “He’s deliberate and analytical but can also make a decision,” says Carter Eskew, Gore’s chief strategist and a founder of the Glover Park Group. “It’s a nice, and unusual, combination.”



http://news.yahoo.com/s/dailybeast/11724_williamdaleyobamaneedshimfor2012reelectioncampaign

[BzaDem]

1. And this is a bad thing?

Republicans control the House now. The next 2 years are going to be similar to the second 2 years of Clinton's administration. The main goal will be to limit the damage they can cause, and continue to develop regulations to implement the legislation that passed over the previous two years. Obviously, if Obama loses re-election, the damage Republicans can cause will be limitless, and the legislation passed over the previous two years will be scrapped.

So if the "real agenda" of the new COS didn't include Obama's re-election, I would be quite disappointed.

[Hannah Bell]

2. i don't see anything saying this is a bad thing.

[old mark]

3. K&R - Good. We don't have another Democrat who can win in '12,

and I really don't want another republican president-never again, if I can help it.


mark