Rahm Emanuel leaves the White House 2010-Oct-02 at 08:08 PDT
Posted by Scott Arbeit in Blog.Tags: Obama, Pete Rouse, Rahm Emanuel, White House
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This has been an interesting time in Washington the last couple of years. We had an incredible combination at the helm… perhaps the smartest man in our history as President, and the best Washington political operator in a generation, with experience at both ends of Pennsylvania Ave., as the Chief of Staff. I believe we’ll look back on these first two years of the Obama Administration in awe of how much was accomplished in the face of the most polarized Congress we’ve seen in decades.
I remember two days after the 2008 election, when President-elect Obama made his first staffing announcement, and it was to announce that Rahm Emanuel had agreed to leave Congress, and what surely would have been a future as the Speaker of the House, to become White House Chief of Staff. I remember thinking… you know, I was a big fan of Obama already, but now I’m really a fan. Wow… Obama and Emanuel together, that’s a combination that works.
And it has. We’ve seen more significant legislation passed by a supposedly unpopular President in the last two years than anyone ever could have expected, and this during the worst economic crisis – not created by him, but managed well by him – in generations, and during two wars. Really impressive stuff.
I know that Pete Rouse has been an incredible behind-the-scenes Capitol Hill player for many years, and the main job of the Chief of Staff under President Obama is to get legislation passed, so I’m hopeful that we’ll not see a significant drop-off in effectiveness in this position.
Chicago’s gain is our loss. I can’t wait to visit a Chicago run by Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
And I hope that, one day, he decides to run for President himself. We’ll be a fortunate nation when that happens.
The Dawn of the Integral Age 
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