Blogs and Stories
How Rahm Is Reviving the GOP
Scott Olson / Getty Images
Republicans are once again ascendant—and for this they can thank Rahm Emanuel. John Batchelor gets the scoop from gleeful conservatives on the trail of Democratic destruction left by Obama’s bullying enforcer.
Suddenly the disgraced and demoralized Republican Congress has an unearned future, thanks to the superhuman clumsiness of a man who has made himself indispensable to the Obama administration and insufferable to the Democratic Congress, chief of staff Rahm Emanuel.
The GOP always knew that Emanuel was a problem that could not be solved and could only be endured while he served three tempestuous terms in the House. But now the beleaguered Democratic majority is learning painfully that Emanuel’s talents for bullying, whimsical favoritism, cheerful power-grabbing, and self-congratulatory earthiness have transformed the first hundred days of the Obama administration’s seamless accomplishment into a second hundred days of blame and gloom.
First, Emanuel used frontman Senator Max Baucus (D-Mont.), the Finance Committee chair, to ditch the health-care public option, while sending President Obama to speak softly at dinner at the home of prickly Senator Charles Grassley (R-Grant Wood). The latest Emanuel co-authored ploy—forcing health-care legislation through in the fall with Democratic-only votes—underlines that the White House has become as deaf, daring, and driven as the fabled Democratic machines of Tammany Hall or Emanuel’s own Cook County, where he was a once and future fundraiser for the Daleys.“We suck,” a blunt Republican partisan reports, “but they suck more right now.”
“I saw one [Democratic] member walk up to him and ask, ‘So how did you make $18 million in an afternoon sitting at a table in Chicago?’ And Rahm just turned and walked away. It gets to him.”
Polling supports this cynical summary. The still lifeless Republicans, who have avoided any credible renovation or even contrition for their decades of swinishness, now enjoy their largest generic lead over the Democrats in years. Trusted touts like Charlie Cook speak of a Democratic loss of at least 20 seats in the House. Republican Party fundraising is up, Republican recruitment is up—even in blue New Hampshire, where a potential loss of Judd Gregg’s U.S. Senate seat is now a likely win with the recruiting of the popular Attorney General Kelly Ayotte—and the GOP’s cheeks have a glow not related to shame.
“It’s Rahm,” a Republican partisan tells me. “The cowardly, brain-dead Republicans are claiming they’ve done something. But it’s Rahm. If Rahm goes, the Dems will not do worse. But it might be hard to undo the damage.”
Like the gifted and overwrought Maximilien de Robespierre once upon a time, Rahm Emanuel has taken control of a revolutionary movement he did not help create nor much contribute to while it was gathering strength under the oppression of the ancien régime of George W. Bush. And just like Robespierre, Emanuel has turned the president’s kitchen cabinet of trusted ex-campaign workers, led by David Axelrod (whose ex-PR firm has enjoyed $12 million in fees so far from fronts controlled by the administration-directed Democratic National Committee), Mark Lippert, and Denis McDonough (a dynamic duo of hatchetmen on the National Security Council), into a Committee for Public Safety that terrorizes Washington’s royals willy-nilly.
The victims are everywhere, and the Republicans know best how brilliantly brutal Emanuel’s methods can be. “Rahm puts people on a string,” a cautious Republican told me. “He did it to Dennis [Hastert, former speaker of the House]. We always knew Rahm had something on him. Maybe it was earmarks. Maybe it was something like classic car-flipping. Dennis never went after Rahm and never allowed us to go after him.”
Emanuel’s methods in the House are now writ large throughout the government. Not one of the House Democrats is suicidal enough to push back in public against what amounts to his extortion and protection racket for each successive piece of partisan legislation—witness the 219 beaten-up votes for cap and trade in the House, or the pummeled Blue Dogs during the health-care brouhaha during recess. One Democratic wag comments that Rahm Emanuel is to the Blue Dogs what Michael Vick was to pit bulls. In the beginning he feeds them steak, then they get torn apart.
However, the Republicans are not as gun-shy—though none is unwise enough to reveal his own name—since they have no financing to have ripped from them; and some Republicans point to the strange quiet of GOP House Minority Whip Eric Cantor as evidence that he may be a victim of Emanuel’s Black Hand style.
How Rich People Smoke Pot
Paul Schrodt is a writer living in New York City. He has contributed to New York magazine, Radar, and Esquire.com.
Justice Clinton?
As vice chairman of Public Strategies and president of Maverick Media, Mark McKinnon has helped meet strategic challenges for candidates, corporations and causes, including George W. Bush, John McCain, Governor Ann Richards, Charlie Wilson, Lance Armstrong, and Bono. McKinnon is co-chair of Arts & Labs, a collaboration between technology and creative communities that have embraced today's rich Internet environment to deliver innovative and creative digital products to consumers.
The Michael Steele Debacle
John Batchelor is radio host of the John Batchelor Show in New York, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, and Los Angeles.
Mike Huckabee's End Times
John Batchelor is radio host of the John Batchelor Show in New York, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, and Los Angeles.
The Unsinkable Sarah Palin
John Batchelor is radio host of the John Batchelor Show in New York, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, and Los Angeles.
neverlate
He will be Obama's Dick Cheney
allonfla
I think people should stop using that type of analogy. The swine flu was to be Obama's Katrina or was that the stimulus? Afghanistan is now his Vietnam, Rahm is his Cheney? These whatever-you-wanna-call-it comparisons are getting ridiculous. Everyone seems to be looking for failure at every turn.
daniel66
I don't think so...but he could become the scapegoat if healthcare isn't passed.
piktor
Batchelor's all wee weed up.
dana64
i also think the analogy of Obama' vietnam and other criticism of OBAMA are grossly exaggerated.
BUT this RAHM has done NOTHING GOOD for Obama.
Can you imagine he did not like GOV DEAN ?? so that was a sign for me that this man will not do anything but destroy Obama.
BUT the REPUBLCANS have NOTHING TO BE PROUD Of and although they Have again started THE BULLYING style ...........they are ABSOLUTELY NOT TRUSTED and even their Polls show it.
SO do NOT DESPAIR but we must WORK HARD to get things well done.
Bulldoglover100
Oh Johnny B Johnny B..if only wishing and saying would make it so....ALL polls other than rasmussen show that the Republicans are still swirlling the bottom of the bowl. Obama is still at 58% favorable and 38% unfavorable....Republicans as a whole are still at only 21% of the people identified as Republicans in the WHOLE country....but hey just keep pushing that meme...shows your readers that you think they are as uneducated as the nut jobs screaming about health care while chanting "Leave my Medicare Alone"! LOL For those of us who see through your propaganda? Your good for a laugh.
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
cbl99201
Certainly overwritten.
JohnnyAces
Sarcasm aside, Rahm's abrasive style, temperament, and FU attitude can only result in the heel-digging and trench-building of his adversaries. He needs to focus more on strong-arming his own party if anything is going to be accomplished. Otherwise he's useless and should be disposed of.
dana64
ARE YOU JOKING???
the Republcans have NOTHING to be proud of......to return to POWER
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
Wong23
Pundits inside the beltway always believe that inside the beltway, Machiavellian machinations drive the political machine. If health care passes and the economy rebounds, Rahm will be a genius and Republicans will get kicked a little harder. Those are the issues, not Rahm's personality quirks.
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
BullMoose
Rahm is just a 30's Chicago style thug and real Americans have woken up. Only the anarchist and college Pell grant "students" fall for obam's smooth lies.
And those "students" will just be useless even if they graduate, another waste of taxpayer money. No Pell grant if your grade is not at least 3.0
incognito-ergo-sum
I think I will send Eric Cantor a teddy bear, he needs something to hug.
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
BullMoose
vcharis No meds today? What good would a Pell grant do a left wing lunatic like you? Zilch.
mcmchugh99
What a bunch of BS. Rahm is a DLC-er. He IS a Republican in everything but name. Naturally, the far-Right Republicans hate him, but they also hate other moderate Republicans like Powell and McCain.
I suspect that Rahm and Obama are far more concerned with reaching out to Republican voters than they are in keeping their progressive base. Bill Clinton was the same way.
Now, Obama has his own Alan Greenspan at the Federal Reserve, and I wouldn't be surprised if he hired Dick Morris to advise him on triangulation.
I have that old sinking feeling that the Democrats have squandered another chance to make real reforms, and they will not get another one for a generation. That's too bad. It will be very bad for the country, which has become very corrupt and dysfunctional.
bademus
Hey, stop the hand-wringing! Stop with the sinking feeling already. Democrats are standing up, being vocal and not allowing themselves to be drowned out by the angry, noisy minority right-wing. This is not your mamma's Democratic party and we are not rolling over.
Maezeppa
Another right winger trying to sell this story? Nice.
idicula1979
Neverlate that is ridicoulus and so is this article so stupid I stoped half way, but in any case they should have let Howard Dean have a seat in the cabinet, even if it meant no Rahm.
idicula1979
Neverlate, that is ridiculuos and so is this article I stoped half way it is so stupid, but in any case Howard Dean would have made a much better White house chief of staff.
nickatdabeach
I like Rahm - a passionate man - I understand where he comes from - I'm opposed to his policies in general, but I can respect him nevertheless. WIsh some RINOs had guts.
dailyplanet
You respect Rahm... for his, uh...PASSION?! Well, in the history of humankind there exists a whole list of people whose unrelenting "passion" almost destroyed the world.
Whose running the "shop" anyway? I sure as hell didn't vote for Rahm Emanuel to be President! As for Howard Dean, HE should be President. Again and again the Democrats blow it.
This user is no longer registered.
n--Y--charles116santosgotlucky
He is decisive...He is a motherfucking genius...But decisive
acm925
I've never seen so much space taken up to say absolutely nothing.
ellemarz
...and Mr. Dick (Cheney) is STILL trying to control things from the sidelines. Obama's albatross will not be any person in his cabinet...it will be his inability to stand up to the bully-Republicans on issues that hit home, like healthcare, a two-front trillion dollar war, a largely criminal banking system, global climate change and energy alternatives. Sometimes toes need a-steppin' on to get things done and Rahm seems well-suited for this task. Republicans don't seem to mind such in-your-face aggression when it comes from their side...maybe it's time the Dems grew a couple...
OffenbachStutz
More overwritten, specious blather from Batchelor.
GOPBossLimbaugh
Exactly Correct, Offenbach!
You nailed it! What a political hack-job!
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
rpopstar
quite right...batchelor is a second string talk radio hack..he spent a bunch of time obsessing about bill ayers last fall....crackpotterry, wingnuttery, etc
This user is no longer registered.
n--Y--charles116OffenbachStutz
More overwritten, specious blather from Batchelor.
headlight
When Batchelor says "a few dozen months work," does that mean "a few years?" I've never seen anyone use "dozen months" to refer to a year, but the math is indisputable. Seems like the upshot of the article is that Emanuel gets the President's agenda done, but it's not pretty. Hope he can deliver health care.
johnstafford
o.k., i'm confused [again].
we've been hearing lately, vis-a-vis health care reform, that president obama is too hands-off in promoting his agenda;
he lets congress carry the ball while he stands on the sidelines.
now, this story seems to be saying just the opposite:
rahm emanuel, obama's alter ego, is aggressively managing & controlling congress, incl. even some republicans (albeit behind-the-scenes). and, to a degree that is actually destructive of the president's initiatives!
which is it?
allonfla
be prepared to be confused for the 4-8 years. Depending on who you talk to, Obama is too weak
He's a bully
He's doing too much
He's doing too little
He's Carter
He's Hitler
He's a genius
He's naive
He's a radical hard left Liberal
He's a corporate centrist whore
He doesn't know what he's doing
He's conspiring with big business to sell out the American people
And on and on and on and on.......................
GOPBossLimbaugh
Well said!
Obama haters are SOOOOOO contradicting themselves every second!
Humor-In-Uniform
Howabout, he and his staff are lacking executive leadership....and it's showing?
blondy
I cant say it better.
Obama's haters are so conflicted
Chuckv
Johnstafford and allonfla wrote what I was going to write so I will just add a comment on one of Bachelor's allegations. If Emanual were interfering with diplomacy like a bull in a china shop, would we not have heard from the Secretary of State? Love her or hate her, Sec. Clinton is not the sort of person to take infringement on her authority lying down. Nor is Obama the kind of person to undercut her.
Bachelor can find Senators and Congressmen willing to criticize Emanual off the record? My word, what a surprise!
mcmchugh99
I don't hate him at all. I'm disappointed in him, since I think he had the potential to be a truly great president like FDR, but I think he is squandering that chance and will settle for being another Bill Clinton.
He seems content enough to be a very timid, moderate reformer who ignores his own supporters and defers a great deal to the Republicans. It doesn't help him much, either, but he keeps doing it.
I think the Democrats have squandered another chance to make some real reforms, and are not going to get another one for decades. This is the fault of DLC-ers like Rahmn, Geithner and the rest.
vchaircis
McHugh, the guy has been in office for 7 months. You're disappointed that he's not FDR? FDR wasn't even FDR after 7 months. Please.
BullMoose
vchair or whatecer it is only need open it's mouth, and walla, left wing lunatic comes out.
milarepa
Oh please. I mean seriously. Republicans are whining now that they're being bullied? The same people who disgracefully used 9/11 as an excuse to shove their agenda down our throats?
At least Batchelor admits that "The still lifeless Republicans ... have avoided any credible renovation or even contrition for their decades of swinishness"; thus this delusion of ascendency is based solely on the cluelessness of the idiots who support them.
Natural-Selection
Nope, he's bullying the democrats....the Republicans don't need to give him the time of day.
connie47
Wow, the arrogance of that remark is mind-boggling.
BullMoose
You are right . The dems can read, which is good, they do not see the polls showing Obama dropping like a rock.
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
This user is no longer registered.
n--Y--charles116allonfla
yeah, okay. i think not. if the right is ascending, they have the media to thank. the media has coddled them, pushed every lie they could come up with and given airtime to some of its most disgraced members.
flyoverland
Robespierre or Rasputin?
Embers
Robspierre, or Cardinal Richilieu (sp?), I think.
Embers
I say that because Rasputin had way more flair and showmanship, so I wouldn't really compare him to Rahm.
flyoverland
was referring to power behind the throne, not flair
This user is no longer registered.
n--Y--charles116Ronin58
Harry Hopkins...he was ill most of the time ,but he could punch way above his weight and crush FDR's opponents like bugs...and that's a good thing.
If you want perfect characters in politics and history,consult Tom Clancy.
jorge999
Batchelor is a winger. What he writes should be understood as a right-wing wish list.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Batchelor
North49
To understand the fetid swamp engulfing the country and the rest of the world check out David Rockefeller. Although to the manor born and with a silver spoon in his mouth he to is a product of American education. Indoctrinated to become to become leftist in his thinking enough to write a post graduate thesis on Fabian Socialism. Selected to become a member of the Council on Foreign Relations the Rockefeller Foundation even donated the land on which the United Nations stands in Manhattan. The idea of world government is a pet doctrine of the wealthy enslavers who understand that the concept of freedom and individual rights embraced by the true revolutionary thinkers of world history - those who wrote and signed the American Declaration of Independence - had to be undermined for the new slave masters to succeed in creating their new American and world plantation.
mavenuniversity
Obviously, North49 is not a product of American education: It's "He too," North, with two o's. I guess if you can spell, you must have your sites set on world domination.
QuixoticStranger
"the true revolutionary thinkers of world history - those who wrote and signed the American Declaration of Independence - had to be undermined for the new slave masters to succeed in creating their new American and world plantation."
I'm pretty sure (in fact, positive) that a great number of people who signed the declaration of independence, these true supports of real freedom and individual rights, were themselves slave masters and plantation owners. Seriously, can you write more than one paragraph without contradicting yourself?
speakingout101
Not to diminish the founding fathers or anything, but they weren't the ones that came up with the idea of democracy and individual rights. They pretty much just took the ideas of John Locke and other European philosophers and applied them.
They can definitely be credited with being the first ones to successfully put these ideas into the context of a working government.
vchaircis
Yeah speakingout, If you were a white land owner.
speakingout101
haha tru dat to the slave owner and white land owner comments.
WHY IS HYPOCRISY SO RAMPANT THROUGHOUT HUMANITY!?
tarryh
Republicans are ascendent? You wish!! All the latest poll information shows the Republican brand continuing to decline. On health care the polling indicates a strong DISapproval of how the party is handling this issue. Here in outside the beltway Virginia there are loads of Republicans and none that I know plan on returning to the party. Not for Senator or Representative or President. They may vote in a Republican governor but only because the Dem so far is not running a great campaign. They are most upset with the likes of Palin, Newt, and Fox whackadoodles being the face of the party. The birthers, deathers and the calling out of the white militias particularly bother them. Senator Grassly's foolish lying didn't help. They are searching and ripe for the pluck'en by centrist candidates or by a third party. I guess this is just another one of those BEAST opinion pieces designed to create controversy and generate page views. Watch it BEASTIES less you become too tabloidy. I am already beginning to wander away and I was a loyal follower in the beginning.
milarepa
You're right; this site's MO is becoming tiresome: hire some hacks to toss out some half-baked "observation" designed to incite faux controversy, and feed the trolls. It might be better if they had a real discussion forum like Plastic.com, but as it stands, it's all hit and run, with no real depth.
Boring unless trolling devoid of in depth discussion is your thing.
rpopstar
if anybody thinks the republicans are ascendant, check out this chart on party id patterns from pollster: http://www.pollster.com/polls/us/party-id.php
JohnnyAces
the numbers you are looking at are for "all adults". If you look at the "registered and likley voters only" the picture is much different.
rpopstar
@ johnny aces: while it's true that the second group has more republicans that the first, the number of "registered and likely voters only" identifying as republican is basically unchanged over the last year.
lorijen
Yeah, my loyalty is fading too, DB. Whatever happened to exposing the truth rather than making it up? Batchelor wrote this piece without checking out his hunches...er, fantasies.
CitizenBloggerX
Republicans ascedent again ? LOL !! From what primortal ooze ?? LOL !! If I read that 100 times in a row will I start to believe it ?? LMAO !!
OhSuzanna
Oh, John, your politics are showing....Nothing would make you happier than to see the Democrats go after Rahm so you write an article that suggests that the Dems are in freefall and the blame lays squarely on the shoulders of Rahm Emanuel. Come on.
artymom
Rham is going to bring down Obama and make the lying dog Republicans ascend? I think not.
What a bunch of gobbollyguck, almost indecipherable!
Where does Mr.Batchelor get his information?
vchaircis
From a Sarah Palin blog.
larryfromkansas
Even though I'm a schlub out here in Kansas, allow me to reinvent the words of Bill Hickey to Jack Nicholson in Prizzi's Honor as advice to the President about Rahm.
"He gotta go, Barack."
I've been saying this ever since the climate change bill passed. Just as guys like Blount and Holder are bad for the Republicans, Rahm is very bad for Democrats. He's poorly counseled the president into screwing up health care reform to the point he looks beyond cold, but toothless.
This ineffectiveness has pretty much dithered what good will was created by the election. Where the hell are all those folks screaming "Yes we can" these days, eh? They're out being young and well and not giving a rat's ass about health care, which is what they're going to need 50 years from now. How to get them excited?
About Afghanistan and the Middle East? Wither those hot spots? All the snark and cursing isn't going to fix those problems.
These are serious times. The president and the GOP, too, for that matter, needs to stop campaigning and start governing, start leading the nation.
The place for politics may be MSNBC, but the time for it isn't now, when we're in one big stinkpile trying to find the pony inside. The time is now for good governance, not the games that Rahm plays and the GOP plays back.
GOPBossLimbaugh
NONSENSE!
Dave1959
Well .. WJ Clinton did call him a thug !!
This user is no longer registered.
n--Y--charles116vchaircis
Real major league thugs don't wear bling my friend, they wear three piece Brookes Brothers suits.
BullMoose
Who cares what they wear? You can take the Negro out of the ghetto, but you can't take the ghetto out of the Negro.
You know what i be sayin?
Thank you.
As a first time user, your comment has been submitted for review. It can take anywhere from a few hours to a day or two for your comment to be reviewed, depending on the time of week and the volume of comments we receive.