Savage on Obama choice for CIA director: “[M]aybe Bill Ayers picked Leon Panetta - Barack Obama”
Responding to reportsthat President-elect Barack Obama has chosen former congressman and ClintonWhite House chief of staff Leon Panetta as CIA director, Michael Savageasserted on the January 5 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio showthat “maybe [former Weather Underground member] Bill Ayers picked LeonPanetta,” later asking, “Is it Bill Ayers and his crowd in Chicagowho said ‘Pick Panetta. He’s a man we can trust’?”
Earlier, responding to a caller’s assertion thatPanetta will be a “puppet” for Obama, Savage stated: “Allright, so you’re saying Panetta was appointed by Obama becausehe’ll be a useful puppet. And then the CIA, instead of being anindependent agency, will wind up being an arm of the executive branch.That’s what worries me. That is Hitlerism.” Savage continued:”Shall I be very clear? When Hitler aggrandized all the power in Germanyand all of the agencies reported to him and there was no independence, it wascalled a dictatorship. Panetta must not be confirmed as the director of theCIA.”
Talk Radio Network, which syndicates Savage’s show, saysthat Savage is heard on more than 350 radio stations. The Savage Nation reaches morethan 8 million listeners each week, according to Talkers Magazine,making it one of the most listened-to talk radio shows in the nation, behindonly The Rush LimbaughShow and The Sean Hannity Show.
From the January 5 broadcast of Talk Radio Network’s The Savage Nation:
CALLER: Yes, Doctor Savage, acomment on the new appointee for the CIA. I believe that that’s exactlywhat they want is someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing. Ibelieve — the word Ican only think of now is “puppet” — but I believe no matter what –
SAVAGE: All right, so you’resaying Panetta was appointed by Obama because he’ll be a useful puppet.And then the CIA, instead of being an independent agency, will wind up being anarm of the executive branch. That’s what worries me. That is Hitlerism.Shall I be very clear? When Hitler aggrandized all the power in Germanyand all of the agencies reported to him and there was no independence, it wascalled a dictatorship.
Panetta must not be confirmed as thedirector of the CIA. This is an outrage. Outrage. Biggest story — biggest story of theyear. Biggest story of the year, picking an unknown hack. An unknown hack. Nointelligence experience to run the CIA in an age of terror. I’ve neverseen anything like this. Even Dianne Feinstein was caught off guard. Shedon’t believe it herself. She doesn’t believe it herself.
CALLER: And that’s what gotme, is when someone like Feinstein herself is even surprised at it.That’s what got me. I believe –
SAVAGE: Right. Now, if Feinstein, acertifiable, bona fide liberal, was not consulted — and she’s the headof the Senate Intelligence Committee — who, then, picked Leon Panetta?
CALLER: [unintelligible] I believeAyers, Farrakhan, and the whole rest of that gang is –
SAVAGE: Yeah, maybe Bill Ayerspicked Leon Panetta. Maybe everything we feared about Obama can be seen in thehead of a pin here.
CALLER: Absolutely, you know –
SAVAGE: Something is wrong. The CIAposition is the most important selection of all, perhaps next to the secretaryof state — even more important. Becausethe CIA has access to secret data that I don’t even think the StateDepartment has. Why would they pick a hack like Panetta? A college teacher.Why?
CALLER: ‘Cause –
SAVAGE: Because — because Obama wants all information flowingonly to him, and he wants a useful puppet in the CIA, and this man must not beconfirmed.
You know, what’s interestingand very important for the American people to know — because thus far, theyhaven’t heard this story because it just happened today — is this: Theman originally selected by Obama to be the head of the CIA was a good man withgreat experience. He was rejected by the left-wing blogosphere. Obama then goesand picks a man with no experience? Who is advising Obama on this? Who? Who? Isit the very left wing that we feared in the background? Is it Bill Ayers andhis crowd in Chicagowho said, “Pick Panetta. He’s a man we can trust”? This is nogood.
Thanks for the call.
Move along, folks, the Lieberman hanging’s canceled by Obama executive order - Obama,Barack
The new White House chief of staff-designate Rahm Emanuel is a Chicago-style representative known for his tough politics, his tough language and the occasional unfriendly finger gesture.
But just weeks before the start of the historic Barack Obama administration, the last thing the boss-elect wanted was a public hanging of Connecticut’s sort-of Democrat Sen. Joe Lieberman for his outspoken support of the Republican ticket of John McCain and Sarah Palin the last several months.
There was some support for revenge (Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid) among those (Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid) who wanted to slice away Lieberman’s committee chairmanship of Homeland Security and membership on the important Armed Services Committee with McCain and Hillary Clinton.
It was the Democratic Party, you may remember, that started this fight by supporting an insurgent primary challenger of Lieberman in 2006 over the senator’s support of the Iraq war in general and the Bush administration’s troop surge in particular.
The insurgent won the primary but was blown away in the general, where Lieberman ran as an independent and drew on his longtime statewide name recognition as a former attorney general and senator who suits the state’s moderate-to-conservative Democratic mind-set. And the Republicans tacitly supported Joe by putting up a nobody and not supporting him.
So jolly Joe returned to the Senate and the Democratic caucus, where his vote was the leverage that gave the party the 51 votes necessary to control that body.
It’s one thing to support the war. It’s another, however, to support Republicans, which Lieberman did big time, even speaking in prime time at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul.
With a newly-enlarged Democratic majority now, Joe’s lone vote is less important. It came time to take him to the woodshed during this week’s brief congressional session before another vacation. But how would that look as a pre-inaugural first step for a new administration pledged to change the way Washington doesn’t work?
So Lieberman keeps his Homeland chairmanship, his Armed Services membership and loses a minor subcommittee chairmanship, which is like detention for a week. And life goes on.
Lieberman told reporters he appreciated colleagues’ respect for his "independence of mind."
"That’s who I am," said the 2000 Democratic party vice presidential nominee.
The overwhelming majority of Democrats in the caucus wanted to keep Joe on, Reid said, looking like he was not a member of that overwhelming majority but got the word from Chicago. "It’s all over with," he said.
A little rump-session drama that may give an inkling of the Obama-Emanuel style to come. (For an entertaining video of a roast of Emanuel and his kick-em-between the legs political style, click here and see what Obama had to say about him way back in 2005.)
– Andrew Malcolm
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Photo credit: Chris O’Meara / Associated Press
The week in Roland Burris - Barack Obama
AP Photo/Paul Beaty
Roland Burris, Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s designate to fill Barack Obama’s Senate seat, reacts to a speech by Rep. Bobby Rush, D-Ill., at the New Covenant Baptist Church during a rally in Chicago Sunday.
Since Illinois left our universe for somewhere more surreal about a month ago, it’s gotten a little difficult to keep abreast of political twists and turns in the Land of Blago. If wondering whether we can expect a Sen. Roland Burris has left you hopelessly confused, you’re not alone. Here, then, is an update, so you too can speak expertly about the situation.
As of the end of last week, things were at a standoff. Burris was saying he’d be a senator, while the Democrats already in the Senate were saying he wouldn’t, and were warning that if Burris were to show up, they might enlist the sergeant-at-arms to keep him out of the chamber. That’s a scene nobody wants to see: Burris ends up looking illegitimate, and after getting compared (no matter how unfairly) to Bull Connor, do the Democrats really want to use a police officer to keep the Senate’s black population at zero?
The pseudo-senator-designate is getting on a plane to D.C. today, but he told the Chicago Tribune that he was “not going to create a scene in Washington.” So, for now, the Burris-gets-cuffed-in-the-rotunda scenario is looking unlikely, especially because the secretary of the Senate has now rejected Rod Blagojevich’s letter of appointment, which was missing a signature from Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White, who last week refused to sign it. Burris is hoping the Illinois Supreme Court will order White to reconsider; without that signature, he can only sort of claim to have been appointed.
Sunday, Burris attended a send-off rally with ministers and local black leaders at New Covenant Church on Chicago’s South Side, where Rep. Bobby Rush called the Senate “the last bastion of plantation politics.” Meanwhile, Majority Leader Harry Reid seemed to soften his position, saying on “Meet the Press,” “I’m an old trial lawyer. There’s always room to negotiate.” Reid may feel more vulnerable to charges of racism than he originally might have been, as allegations have emerged that he pushed Blagojevich to appoint either Tammy Duckworth or Lisa Madigan over African-American options Jesse Jackson Jr., Danny Davis and Emil Jones.
It’s still unclear whether Reid was deliberately opening the door to Burris or not. His deputy, Illinois’ Dick Durbin, said yesterday that there are no plans to seat Burris provisionally. However, Democratic leaders do plan to meet with him on Wednesday.
If the Senate does try to keep Burris out, we can expect a lawsuit, Burris lawyer Timothy Wright says. And, though there’s precedent (Powell v. McCormack) for forcing Congress to seat a duly elected member with dubious ethics, the meaning of that case for this situation is debated.
Writing at Slate, professors Akhil Reed Amar and Josh Chafetz say that a simple majority in the Senate has the power to reject Burris. Because the Constitution makes the Senate “the Judge of the Elections, Returns, and Qualifications of its own members,” appointments fall under its jurisdiction just as much as elections. The spirit of Powell, write Amar and Chafetz, is that the people’s unambiguous choice ought to be respected, but if no such will has been expressed, the Senate gets to exercise its authority; as with impeachment, senators don’t need a criminal conviction to judge someone unsuitable for office.
But, law professor Eugene Volokh writes on his blog, Powell makes clear that the judgment of suitability for office is an exclusively objective question. The Senate, he writes, has the power to reject someone who has been legally compromised, is not a citizen, or is not old enough. “But if the argument is simply that Blagojevich is generally a criminal, and not that the appointment of Burris was done criminally, I don’t see how that can fit within the Senate’s power.”
We’ll be keeping an eye on developments, naturally, and doing our best to discern and relay what they mean.
How Happy Harry Reid lost his groove - Barack Obama
This was not a happy holiday season for Happy Harry Reid.
Normally, the guy from Nevada is a laugh-riot. He’ll turn 70 this year but doesn’t look a day over 78.
It just seems the Senate majority leader has encountered one problem after another in recent days. Things looked so rosy right after the Nov. 4 election with his enhanced Democratic majority and a shot at a Republican-proof 60 seats. He even got rid of that old crank, GOP Sen. Ted Stevens from Alaska.
But the warm feelings melted quickly after the loss of the Georgia runoff when the has-been ticket of Bill Clinton and Al Gore went down there to campaign for Jim Martin and helped overwhelmingly reelect Republican Saxby Chambliss.
With Barack Obama winning the White House and the president-elect’s Senate seat opening up, Harry blithely phones Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, a few days before the governor’s arrest, to helpfully offer his collegial thoughts on the strongest nominees out there and, oops, soon finds himself on a federal wiretap whose full contents the world awaits.
To help counter any whispers about a developing Democratic culture of corruption, Reid was among the first to denounce the unconvicted Blagojevich, to demand his resignation and to state flatly that …
… his Senate would never seat a Blago appointee. In fact, he’s alerted Senate guards should such a culprit attempt entry.
Our good blogging buddy with the better memory, Carl Lavin over at Forbes.com, has come up with a forgotten Harry Reid quote from a time when another prominent Democrat was accused of wrongdoing and up before the Senate. The accused was President Clinton. We won’t spoil the entire Reid quote; you can find that here.
But here’s part of what Harry said about flawed people with great dreams back in 1999 concerning another accused Democratic officeholder:
"Great dreams are dreamed by people with human flaws. Great policies and actions are sometimes set in motion by those with broken souls. Great deeds are not always done by good men."
In the true Illinois political tradition of an elbow to the mouth just for fun, Gov. Blagojevich deftly leaks that Harry’s Senate recommendation was not to pick any of the three black possibilities but to go with the white woman or the Asian American one. But like many Chicago pols, Rod’s played hardball since pre-K. He proceeds to nominate another black, Roland Burris, an experienced statewide officeholder who’s never lost to a Republican.
So Harry, who denies opposing blacks like Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., finds himself in the public perception of lobbying against three blacks and threatening to bar a fourth from taking the seat of a fifth black and becoming the only African American senator.
On Sunday, Reid, the federal government’s highest-ranking Mormon, wa
s denying that he’s against blacks and in fact, he said, he once helped get one appointed to a court.
Mr. Burris goes to Washington. Blagojevich’s pick is a year older than Harry, and he’s been around the ballot box a few times himself in Cook County, which keeps a lot of spare ballot boxes on hand.
Burris says all reasonable and friendly-like that he’s been legally nominated by an as yet unimpeached governor and intends to show up for the new Congress come Tuesday to give the people of Illinois the full representation they deserve as any decent public servant would do. What could possibly be wrong with that?
Which sets up a scenario of guards or Harry barring the door to a black just like Gov. George C. Wallace down in Alabama lo those many years ago.
But it won’t come to that. That’s not change to believe in. Harry let slip Sunday something about being an old trial lawyer and knowing that, goshdarnit, in politics everything is open to negotiation. Show of hands here; who’s betting on Blago’s guy?
Now, after these 22 long years in the exclusive Senate (and four years before that in the House gang), now Reid can’t call the president dumb and the worst one ever anymore.
He’s got to actually work with him. The new chief executive is a young fellow, who barely spent a half-term in the club, much of it campaigning for another job elsewhere.
And Harry’s got to explain to the popular president-elect early this week why his economic stimulus package is mired in the legislature, despite an enlarged Democratic majority, and can’t be ready in time for the historic inauguration on Jan. 20. How does that work again?
Not to mention Harry’s own reelection next year.
And we all remember what happened to the last Senate Democratic leader, whose name is Tom Daschle. Not only did he lose reelection to a Republican, but now he’s gotta work as the secretary of Health and Human Services.
–Andrew Malcolm
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Photo credits: Harry Reid on a good day. Associated Press. Reid, almost smiling, and Barack Obama. Getty Images
Ticket Replay: A double O moment — Oprah and Obama at the same inaugural - Obama,Barack
The Ticket is republishing this weekend some of our favorite items from recent campaign months. This one looking toward the Obama inauguration on Jan. 20 originally appeared in this space on Dec. 5, 2008:
Shortly before the Nov. 4 presidential voting closed, noted Obama-backer Oprah Winfrey announced that she’d already picked out her inaugural ball gown, a sign of overconfidence that she did not have to pay for in the end.
Now that Barack Obama’s inauguration is virtually certain (unless the Supreme Court’s ponderings lead it to get involved), Oprah has announced she’s taking her Chicago talk show to W
ashington, which is also famous for lotsa talk. (And that’ll allow her to write off the gown cost as a business expense.)
She’s rented the 2,300-seat Kennedy Center to do two shows there right around Jan. 20.
You may remember Oprah came out early for her fellow Chicagoan. She held a huge celebrity fundraiser for him at her Montecito house.
And she emceed giant primary rallies for him in Iowa and North Carolina, which he won, and New Hampshire, which he lost to Hillary Clinton, the first serious female presidential candidate who many former Oprah fans thought she should support. Winfrey’s ratings took a hit.
We don’t want to let anything out of the bag and spoil the screaming.
But wouldn’t it just be a perfect television moment if, while Oprah is talking to the excited Kennedy Center audience in January at inauguration time, a certain someone who’s about to become president and maybe his wife too walked out on the stage behind the show host?
Everyone would cry, except those execs watching the ratings.
–Andrew Malcolm
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Photo credit: Oprah.com
Ticket Replay: Obama team probe of Obama team finds no Obama team impropriety - Obama,Barack
The last few days The Ticket has republished some items from recent months. This one originally appeared in this space on Dec. 23, 2008, when you probably weren’t paying much attention to politics, which was probably the goal of releasing the study then:
The Barack Obama presidential transition office today finally released its own report on its own internal investigation of its own contacts with legally challenged Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. And you’ll be comforted to know the Obama folks found no impropriety whatsoever by Obama folks.
So go back to wrapping holiday presents or pretending you’re working at your d
esk and checking out Obama’s important abs. All is well with the coming World of Change. (UPDATE: How much credibility would the world give a Bush administration internal report on any Bush administration wrongdoing during the Bush administration?)
Speaking of tidy packages, the five-page report was not released in the morning as things are when public attention is desired.
It was released at 4:30 Eastern time to provide minimal exam time before the network news. But that’s probably a coincidence. (A complete text of the memo is available on the jump, along with a news video; just click the "Read more" line below.)
According to the report by Greg Craig, an incoming White House attorney, Obama personnel had numerous contacts with the governor’s office but no one ever suspected that Blagojevich, who’s been under federal investigation for three years now, was doing anything wrong.
Craig said the feds have interviewed Obama’s new chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, who inherited Blagojevich’s 5th District House seat, and Valerie Jarrett, a newly named White House aide, as part of the governor’s investigation. Emanuel did suggest some names but there was never any bargaining.
None of these Obama-Blagojevich contacts is a shock. It would be surprising if an exiting senator’s office was not in touch with a nominating governor’s office of the same party on his/her successor, although Obama promised immediately after Nov. 4 he would not be involved.
But given the *&#$%# excerpts read aloud two weeks ago by Chicago U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald apparently showing the governor demanding money for state business, aid and the "golden" revenue opportunity of peddling a Senate nomination, the media world was curious to know what did Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, a longtime political pal of Blagojevich, say on those wiretaps.
Fitzgerald has said Obama is not involved in the investigation.
Pulling together all of the Obama contacts apparently took longer than expected because days passed. Then out of the blue Obama’s team said that Fitzgerald’s team had provided perfect cover by asking them to hold off a week so as not to threaten interviews in the the federal investigation of the governor. Why? Because Blagojevich still didn’t know he was bugged?
On Friday, Fitzgerald’s off
ice reportedly asked Obama’s team to push the report release day back to Tuesday from Monday.
At the time we suggested politicians prefer to release not positive news when people aren’t paying attention, like John Edwards doing his TV affair confession on a summer Friday night when 14 people are watching the tube.
Oh, look, here we are 24 hours from Christmas Eve. Few are paying attention. The world has moved on. Looks like Mark Teixeira has been bought by the Yankees for $180 million.
Obama is in Hawaii working out in a Secret Service bubble, so he certainly won’t be talking. He’ll leave the political world to watch wannabe senator Caroline Kennedy pull a Sarah Palin with the media.
Emanuel, the transition team told Huffington Post today, has just a little bit ago — in fact, we just missed him — left for a long-planned family vacation in that place that every North Side Chicago family dreams of visiting for the year-end holidays, somewhere in Africa. We’re not told the area code. Likely on a safari. With no cell coverage, of course. So he’s not around to talk.
So, amazingly, there won’t be any Obama person on news video to run in endless tube loops over the slow holiday. Just the five report pages, which makes for poor TV video.
There may, however, be some future amendments. The Obama team did not keep phone logs, so their contact list was developed from memory, which may or may not match the federal wiretap chronology if it’s ever released.
Fitzgerald, who so helpfully asked Obama to hush up his internal report when people were most interested, is busy doing his job as the only really investigative arm perusing Illinois politics. Now that his hand was forced by the alleged impending sale of Obama’s vacant Senate seat, the clock is running on an indictment of Blagojevich and his chief of staff, John Harris.
Oh, and did we mention, four weeks from today a little before noon Eastern time, Obama becomes boss of Fitzgerald and all the other U.S. attorneys? What do you want to bet that despite the Democratic Cook County clamoring Fitzgerald stays on a while? See video below. Also the full text of the Obama team’s report.
– Andrew Malcolm
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Photo credits: Associated Press (Blagojevich, Obama and Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, top); Charles Rex Arbogast / Associated Press (Emanuel and Obama, bottom).
Here’s the text of the internal review memo prepared for President-elect Obama by attorney Gregory Craig:
At your direction, I arranged for transition staff to provide accounts of any contacts that you or they may have had with Governor Blagojevich or his office in which the subject of your successor came up.
The accounts support your statement on December 11, 2008 that you “have never spoken to the Governor on this subject [or] about these issues,” and that you “had no contact with the Governor’s office.” In addition, the accounts contain no indication of inappropriate discussions with the Governor or anyone from his office about a “deal” or a quid pro quo arrangement in which he would receive a personal benefit in return for any specific appointment to fill the vacancy.
One member of the transition staff, Rahm Emanuel, did have contacts of the type covered by your request. I discuss the nature of those contacts in the attached report. David Axelrod and Valerie Jarrett, two other individuals on the transition staff, did not have any contacts with the Governor or his office but are included in the report to address questions raised by the press.
These accounts were communicated to the Office of the United States Attorney in interviews that were conducted last week. At the request of the Office, we delayed the release of this report until such time as the interviews could be completed. The interviews took place over a period of three days: Thursday, December 18, 2008 (the President-Elect); December 19, 2008 (Valerie Jarrett); and December 20, 2008 (Rahm Emanuel).
One other individual, Dr. Eric Whitaker, a family friend, was approached and asked for information by a member of the Governor’s circle. I have included an account of this contact even though Dr. Whitaker is not a member of the transition staff.
Report to the President-Elect
On December 11, 2008, the President-Elect asked the White House Counsel-designate to determine whether there had been any staff contacts or communications – and the nature of any such contacts of communications – between the transition and Governor Blagojevich and his office relating to the selection of the President-Elect’s successor in the United States Senate. The results of that review are as follows:
The President-elect
The President-elect had no contact or communication with Governor Blagojevich or members of his staff about the Senate seat. In various conversations with transition staff and others, the President-elect expressed his preference that Valerie Jarrett work with him in the White House.
He also stated that he would neither stand in her way if she wanted to pursue the Senate seat nor actively seek to have her or any other particular candidate appointed to the vacancy.
After Ms. Jarrett decided on November 9, 2008 to withdraw her name from consideration as a possible replacement for him in the Senate and to accept the White House job, the President-elect discussed other qualified candidates with David Axelrod and Rahm Emanuel. Those candidates included Representatives Jan Schakowsky and Jesse Jackson, Jr., Dan Hynes and Tammy Duckworth.
The President-elect understood that Rahm Emanuel would relay these names to the Governor’s office as additions to the pool of qualified candidates who might already be under consideration. Mr. Emanuel subsequently confirmed to the President that he had in fact relayed these names. At no time in the discussion of the Senate seat or of possible replacements did the President-Elect hear of a suggestion that the Governor expected a personalbenefit in return for making this appointment to the Senate.
Rahm Emanuel
Mr. Emanuel had one or two telephone calls with Governor Blagojevich. Those conversations occurred between November 6 and November 8, 2008. Soon after he decided to accept the President-elect’s offer to serve as Chief of Staff in the White House, Mr. Emanuel placed a call to the Governor to give him a heads up that he was taking the Chief of Staff’s position in the White House, and to advise him that he would be resigning his seat in the House of Representatives.
They spoke about Mr. Emanuel’s House seat, when he would be resigning and potential candidates to replace him. He also had a brief discussion with the Governor about the Senate seat and the merits of various people whom the Governor might consider. Mr. Emanuel and the Governor did not discuss a cabinet position, 501c(4), a private sector position for the Governor or any other personal benefit for the Governor.
In those early conversations with the Governor, Mr. Emanuel recommended Valarie Jarrett because he knew she was interested in the seat. He did so before learning — in further conversations with the President-Elect — that the President-elect had ruled out communicating a preference for any one candidate.
As noted above, the President-elect believed it appropriate to provide the names of multiple candidates to be considered, along with others, who were qualified to hold the seat and able to retain it in a future election. The following week, Mr. Emanuel learned that the President-elect and Ms. Jarrett with the President’s strong encouragement had decided that she would take a position in the White House.
Between the time that Mr. Emanuel decided to accept the position of Chief of Staff in the White House and December 8, 2008, Mr. Emanuel had about four telephone conversations with John Harris, Chief of Staff to the Governor, on the subject of the Senate seat. In these conversations, Mr. Emanuel and Mr. Harris discussed the merits of potential candidates and the strategic benefit that each candidate would bring to the Senate seat.
After Ms. Jarrett removed herself from consideration, Mr. Emanuel –- with the authorization of the President-elect –- gave Mr. Harris the names of four individuals whom the President-elect considered to be highly qualified: Dan Hynes, Tammy Duckworth, Congresswoman Schakowsky and Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. In later telephone conversations, Mr. Emanuel –- also with the President-elect’s approval –- presented other names of qualified candidates to Mr. Harris including Attorney General Lisa Madigan and Ms. Cheryle Jackson. Mr. Harris did not make any effort to extract a personal benefit for the Governor in any of these conversations.
There was no discussion of a cabinet position, of 501c(4), of a private sector position or of any other personal benefit to the Governor in exchange for the Senate appointment.
Although Mr. Emanuel recalls having conversations with the President-elect, with David Axelrod and with Valerie Jarrett about who might possibly succeed the President-elect in the Senate, there was no mention of efforts by the Governor or his staff to extract a personal benefit in return for filling the Senate vacancy.
Valerie Jarrett
Ms. Jarrett had no contact or communication with Governor Blagojevich , with his Chief of Staff, John Harris or with any other people from the Governor’s office about a successor to replace the President-elect in the United States Senate or how the decision should be made. Nor did she understand at any time prior to his arrest that the Governor was looking to receive some form of payment or personal benefit for the appointment.
Her only contact with the Governor was at the Governor’s Conference in Philadelphia on December 2, 2008, over three weeks after she had decided not to pursue the Senate seat and had accepted the President-elect’s offer to work in the White House. She had a brief conversation with him on that occasion. He wished her well.
On November 7, 2008 — at a time when she was still a potential candidate for the Senate seat — Ms. Jarrett spoke with Mr. Tom Balanoff, the head of the Illinois chapter of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). Mr. Balanoff is not a member of the Governor’s staff and did not purport to speak for the Governor on that occasion.
But because the subject of the Governor’s interest in a cabinet appointment came up in that conversation, I am including a description of that meeting.
Mr. Balanoff told Ms. Jarrett that he had spoken to the Governor about the possibility of selecting Valerie Jarrett to replace the President-elect. He told her that Lisa Madigan’s name also came up.
Ms. Jarrett recalls that Mr. Balanoff also told her that the Governor had raised with him the question of whether the Governor might be considered as a possible candidate to head up the Department of Health and Human Services in the new administration. Mr. Balanoff told Ms. Jarrett that he told the Governor that it would never happen. Jarrett concurred.
Mr. Balanoff did not suggest that the Governor, in talking about HHS, was linking a position for himself in the Obama cabinet to the selection of the President-elect’s successor in the Senate, and Ms. Jarrett did not understand the conversation to suggest that the Governor wanted the cabinet seat as a quid pro quo for selecting any specific candidate to be the President-elect’s replacement. At no time did Balanoff say anything to her about offering Blagojevich a union position.
David Axelrod
Mr. Axelrod had no conversations with anyone outside the President-elect’s immediate circle about who should replace the President-elect in the United States Senate. No one ever came to Mr. Axelrod to propose a deal involving the selection of a replacement, and nothing came up in any of his conversations with the President-elect or the members of the President-elect’s immediate circle that suggested that the Governor was seeking some kind of quid pro quo for the appointment.
Mr. Axelrod recalls that, after the election, the President-elect discussed –- with Mr. Axelrod and Mr. Emanuel –- a number of individuals who were highly qualified to take his place in the Senate.
Mr. Axelrod was under the impression that the President-elect would convey this information to the Governor or to someone from the Governor’s office, which explains why Mr. Axelrod gave an inaccurate answer on this subject to questions from the press. He later learned that it was Mr. Emanuel who conveyed those names to the Governor’s Chief of Staff, John Harris.
Dr. Eric Whitaker
Dr. Whitaker had no contacts or communications with either the Governor or his Chief of Staff, John Harris. He did have contact and communication with one individual purporting to act on behalf of the Governor.
In the period immediately following the election on November 4, 2008 – on either November 6, 7 or 8 – Deputy Governor Louanner Peters called him at his office and left a message. When he returned the call, Ms. Peters asked who spoke for the President-elect with respect to the Senate appointment. She explained that the Governor’s office had heard from others with recommendations about the vacant seat. She stated that the Governor’s office wanted to know who, if anyone, had the authority to speak for the President-Elect. Dr. Whitaker said he would find out.
The President-elect told Dr. Whitaker that no one was authorized to speak for him on the matter.
The President-elect said that he had no interest in dictating the result of the selection process, and he would not do so, either directly or indirectly through staff or others. Dr. Whitaker relayed that information to Deputy Governor Peters.
Dr. Whitaker had no other contacts with anyone from the Governor’s office. ###
Obama taps Virginia’s Gov. Tim Kaine as part-time DNC chair - Barack Obama
Back in 2001, President-elect George W. Bush named Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore as part-time chairman of the Republican National Committee. Richmond was close to the party’s Capitol Hill headquarters and, as a governor himself, Bush liked to put chief executives in chief executive positions.
Plus the fact, to be honest, the chairman of the party holding the White House has less to do because so much of the political direction and operations is handed down to the party functionaries from the big house, from close presidential associates and political strategists such as Karl Rove and, soon, David Axelrod.
However, within a year Bush fired Gilmore, although publicly it was described as a Gilmore resignation. The reason: The Virginia governor’s job — any governor’s job — is simply too demanding and time-consuming to allow a second job as demanding as being the public face of a national political party. Gilmore simply wasn’t doing sufficient party work.
Now, just two weeks before his inauguration, comes word from Democratic sources that President-elect Barack Obama later this week will name Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine as part-time chairman of the Democratic National Committee.
The appointment will reportedly come with the understanding that next year, when Kaine loses his governor’s job due to the state’s one-term limit, facing unemployment, he will become the full-time face of the DNC, which has a dual responsibility of frequent partisan attack dog in the media and prolific national party fundraiser.
In an intriguing weekend twist, former DNC chair Terry McAuliffe announced Saturday that he….
… will turn his prolific fundraising prowess (there are no limits to individual giving in Virginia) into his own campaign to replace Kaine and keep the Commonwealth Democratic.
With the departure of Bush, the Republicans will also pick a new chair this month. Several candidates are vying for the top spot including Sal Anuzis, the Michigan state chair; Katon Dawson, the South Carolina state chair; Ken Blackwell, former Ohio secretary of state, an African American favored by conservatives; another African American, Michael Steele, former Maryland lieutenant governor, who stresses the need to broaden the party’s reach; plus current chair Mike Duncan, who must overcome major election defeats in both 2006 and 2008.
Chip Saltsman, the magic Tennessean who ran Mike Huckabee’s unsuccessful GOP presidential campaign last year, is still running despite a major gaffe distributing a satirical CD that made fun of Obama as the "magic Negro." He’d already raised some concerns among party faithful since Huckabee is a likely 2012 contender for the party’s presidential nomination and has made calls in support of Saltsman in recent weeks.
National GOP committee members will hold preliminary consultations this week to discuss the situation in advance of their regular meeting at month’s end.
In recent times there have been numerous part-time national party chairs, often in short terms, such as ex-RNC chair Florida Sen. Mel Martinez. Former Montana Gov. Marc Racicot succeeded Gilmore and went on to successfully chair Bush’s 2004 campaign.
The few full-time ch
airs like McAuliffe and the outgoing Howard Dean, another former governor, work hard at fundraising. One former RNC chair named George H.W. Bush even turned that job into the vice presidency with Ronald Reagan, and ultimately the Big Job.
Kaine, you may remember from last summer when most everyone knew he’d be Obama’s VP pick, is a St. Paul native and another of those Ivy League guys that Obama favors. The 50-year-old father of three graduated from Harvard Law School, like Obama, Michelle Obama and Kaine’s wife, Anne. Both Kaine’s and Obama’s mother were native Kansans.
While Obama spent formative years in Indonesia and then as a community organizer on Chicago’s South Side, Kaine, a Roman Catholic, spent a year with Jesuit priests in Honduras, becoming fluent in Spanish.
Although an opponent of capital punishment, Kaine has presided over eight executions as governor. He has no great gubernatorial achievements to tout after three years in office. But his 2006 election and 56% approval rating showed he can attract Republican votes in the once-staunchly-GOP, now drifting-Democratic Commonwealth. Not insignificantly, Kaine endorsed Obama within days of his campaign announcement in February 2007.
Perhaps indicating where Obama intends to stress political development, Kaine also gives the Democratic Party a Southerner as chair.
The new party assignment will give Kaine Washington experience and national exposure, which he lacks, and would be valuable for any future political plans. Not to mention years befriending donors and building a national network of rich people.
But at least for the next year the chairmanship opens Kaine to attacks back home that he’s putting patisanship ahead of the state’s welfare, including serious budget problems.
But, hey, what can Virginia voters do about it? Un-elect him?
– Andrew Malcolm
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Photo credit: Steve Helber / Associated Press (top with Obama); Office of the Governor (bottom).
Ticket Replay: 3 papers endorse McCain; coincidentally, they’re kicked off Obama’s plane - Obama,Barack
This weekend The Ticket is republishing some items of particular interest from the past political season. This one appeared here originally on Sept. 31, 2008:
The Barack Obama for president campaign has kicked off its campaign plane three newspaper reporters.
The campaign says it was a tough decision deciding to boot the working reporters for the New York Post, the Dallas Morning News and the Washington Times. But, they say, there are only so many seats on the plane that the spunky new Christian Science Monitor politics blog calls "O-Force One."
And somebody had to go for these last few campaign days.
It’s probably just a simple coincidence that all three newspapers recently endorsed Obama’s Republican rival, Sen. John McCain, for the White House job.
"It feels like the journalistic equivalent of redistributing the wealth," quipped John Solomon, executive editor of the Times, which lost its seat after three years of travel with the candidate and just 72 hours after endorsing McCain.
That newspaper’s website this afternoon headlined a report that Obama spent nearly $700,000 in U.S. campaign donations just on staging and lights for that Berlin victory rally last summer and those 200,000 Germans who can’t vote over here. Gee, you could dress more than four Republican vice presidential candidates with that much money.
What’s not to like in that news for the Obama campaign?
The Dallas paper reported no evidence its plane departure was political. Think about it: Why would a political campaign take retribution on reporters for a decision made by their publication’s separate editorial boards? The publications, after all, pay their own way on the charters.
That would be a cheesy hardball — and quite possibly counterproductive — Chicago kind of thing for a frontrunner to do, especially one on a national unity ticket. A candidate’s organization would have to reflect an enormous ego and over-confidence to pull something like that.
Next thing you know such a campaign might urge supporters to clog a radio station’s phone lines or e-mail boxes just because it gave air-time to an Obama critic.
And it’s certainly not the kind of hands-across-the-aisle, bipartisan change we need and/or can believe in a national capital that could use a large dose of both.
True, the Obama campaign has buttoned itself up from most press access, apparently fearing some kind of late-minute gaffe that might threaten its lead in most polls.
A reporter could choose to travel instead on the Joe Biden plane, plenty of seats there, and perhaps really exciting, except the old-time senator who ad libbed that Hillary Clinton might have been a better Democratic VP pick coincidentally hasn’t done a media availability since right after the Republican convention in early September.
Amazingly, as Howard Kurtz points out, two seats did suddenly open up on the Obama campaign plane this weekend to accommodate Ebony and Essence magazine reporters. Another coincidence.
–Andrew Malcolm
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Ticket Replay: Obama’s speech so moves Oprah her eyelashes fall off - Obama,Barack
This weekend The Ticket is republishing some favorite items from the past 2007-08 political season. This story originally appeared in this space on Aug. 29, 2008 immediately after Obama’s stadium speech in Denver:
Daytime TV celebrity and billionaire businesswoman Oprah Winfrey, who played a crucial early primary role in raising the prominence of her fellow Chicagoan Barack Obama, was so moved by her man’s Democratic acceptance speech Thursday night that she cried off her false eyelashes.
Winfrey, who had previously said she would play a small behind-the-scenes role in Obama’s speech to 84,000 close friends at Invesco Field, was herself mobbed by enthusiastic fans after the address.
"I thought the speech was transcendent," she said. That’s "what I thought. I thought the speech made us all feel we can do better, be better, walk taller, be higher. I just have never experienced anything like that.”
And she said "ANYTHING" as if it was ALL capitalized.
Winfrey hosted several huge rallies for Obama at the start of the primary season in Iowa and South Carolina, which he won, and New Hampshire, which he lost. As reported here in The Ticket, her daytime TV audience, while remaining the largest, did shrink after her first involvement in partisan politics.
Many women expressed strong disappointment that the woman had abandoned the first serious female candidate for the White House, Sen. Hillary Clinton, in favor of Obama.
Did Obama win the election as a result of the speech? "I think what he won was everybody wanting to go out and make sure he wins the election,” she said.
Then came the fashion admission: "I cried my eyelashes off just when he walked out. What was the best part? Every part of it. Everything he said. I thought it was the promise of democracy fulfilled tonight.”
"You can make him win,” an admirer shouted.
"We can make him win,” Winfrey replied.
With the crowd closing in, Winfrey shouted: "Excuse me. This is Obama’s staff, and we would love to take a picture.” So they did.
– Peter Nicholas
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Photo credit: Joe Raymond / Associated Press
Ticket Replay: No need to vote today, Oprah’s so sure of Obama she’s already got her inaugural gown - Obama,Barack
This weekend The Ticket is republishing some of our favorite items from the recent political season. This one anticipating the Jan. 20 inauguration originally appeared in this space about lunchtime on election day, Nov. 4, 2008:
Well-known Chicagoan and constant cover subject of "O" magazine Oprah Winfrey shed her nonpartisanship this presidential election cycle and not only endorsed her man Barack Obama.
She also actively campaigned for him in the primary, drawing huge crowds in Iowa (which he won), North Carolina (which he won) and New Hampshire (which he lost to another Democratic woman).
This despite a dip in her show’s ratings among women who’d rather not get politics there or were disappointed that a woman who built her empire on women did not support the first serious woman candidate for president, Sen. Hillary Clinton.
But that’s ancient history now.
According to our pals over at TMZ, the female big O called into Chicago radio station Power 105 this morning and told host Ed Lover that she’s so sure her guy is gonna win, she’s already picked out her Obama inaugural gown.
So now you don’t need to vote or even watch the results tonight.
–Andrew Malcolm
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Photo credit: Associated Press
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