Axelrod to Leave White House Soon?
Posted: November 23, 2010 Filed under: Democratic Politics, Elections | Tags: 2012 presidential election, David Axelrod, Democratic party, White House shakeup 28 CommentsPresident Obama’s senior advisor David Axelrod is planning to move up his departure to sooner than originally planned, a senior White House official told Fox News on Monday, heading out in late January or early February.
The purpose is “to leave enough time to spend time with family before the next project begins,” the official said.
As recently as Nov. 14, Axelrod told “Fox News Sunday” that he’d probably stay about six more months before leaving to work on the president’s re-election bid.
Really? You mean this has nothing to do with the “shellacking” Obama received in the midterms?
CNN’s Ed Henry reports that:
President Obama is planning to bring former campaign manager David Plouffe onto the White House staff at the beginning of January to work alongside senior adviser David Axelrod for a brief time before Axelrod moves on to help run the re-election campaign, according to a senior administration official and a senior Democratic strategist familiar with the plan.
The sources added that Axelrod is now planning to leave his White House post as soon as immediately after the State of the Union address, which is an earlier departure date than originally expected and could be part of a new round of departures at the White House.
While there have been reports suggesting Plouffe will directly replace Axelrod, the working plan right now is actually for the two veterans of the 2008 campaign to work together for at least a short period as sort of a handoff, as the White House continues to reshape itself to deal with a Republican-controlled House and a shrunken Democratic majority in the Senate.
Well, there’s no time to lose with the President’s approval rating at 39% in the latest Zogby poll and only 28% strongly supporting him in the Rasmussen daily tracking poll today.
Yikes! Look at those disapproval numbers.
Meanwhile, at Huffpo, Sam Stein continues his reporting on disgruntled Democratic donors:
In the wake of an electoral drubbing and fearing another one in two years, some deep-pocketed Democratic donors have decided to essentially go rogue with respect to the Obama White House.
In meetings this past week, some of the top financiers in the party advanced discussions about building a third-party apparatus to counter that on the Republican side of the aisle.
I’m not sure how “rogue” these donors are really willing to go, since they are mainly talking about David Brock’s new project. James Carville sounds skeptical too:
“There probably is some kind of need [for a third-party outlet]. The one thing about us though is when we lose we have a lot of meetings. We are not even getting started on the retreats or retrospectives,” said James Carville, a longtime Democratic strategist, during an unrelated breakfast sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor. “There is probably going to be one now, it is just the nature of what it is. Undoubtedly the Democrats will have symposiums and retreats.”
Big whoop.
Still, at least the Dems are recognizing that things don’t look so rosy for Obama. It appears that David Axelrod is worried too.
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Axelrod wants to spend some time with his family. Yeah, right.
I thought Axelrod was supposed to go manage Rahm’s mayoral campaign. Is that his next big project?
Really? I missed that. Maybe he is.
It was rumor a while back, just after Rahmbot left.
I think he was supposed to leave because he wanted to shift his focus to Obama’s reelection campaign of 2012. I read that some time ago.
That’s what I read too. Plouffe is coming into the West Wing.
Yes, but then he was going to leave in 6 months. Now it sounds like his departure is immanent.
Where he lands post WH will be of significance…
Is it only 2 years since we were subjected to the marching bands, waving flags, white pillars, airplane insignias, weeping crowds, magazine covers, wild eyed comparisions, “tingles up the leg”, sweeping gneralizations, songs, poems, plays, that accompanied this election with this “historical victory”? Seems like a lifetime ago.
Oh how the mighty have fallen in just 24 months when what lurked beneath was an empty shell without a lick of conviction who firmly believed that “charisma” was all that was needed to convince the “rubes” that this is what we were waiting for.
Tragic.
It’s like a Shakespearean drama. The character flaws dooms each one in the cast.
Your description makes for good comedy. It has me ROFLOL.
The only thing not funny about it is the results.
Axelrod must be looking at the same map I am. If he is, it doesn’t take a genius to see that Obama is toast in 2012. The state legislatures in the South were decimated this past election, which means the Democrats lost the means to support from the inside to any Democratic candidate for the presidency.
If he stepped aside – which he won’t – I would love to see a fire breathing, take no prisoners, nail spewing Leftie emerge from the crowd and stick it to the disgraceful GOP who has done nothing but obstruct the lives and futures of those in this nation who are truly in need of help. That’s what government is for: not what this present band of thieves are attempting to do by standing firm against any form of governance as they play out the next two years.
Who that person is remains to be seen as there are few who have stood up to this mess and the inactions of both President Indifferent and the creeps who have made his tenure insufferable for the rest of us.
Reality tells me this won’t happen and the government will more than likely revert back into the hands of the GOP with both Houses firmly in their power. This is the stupidity of what “hope and change” has wrought. A repeat of those geniuses who brought us this far and are hoping on another bite at the apple as they hurl us over the cliff.
I know what you mean. I’d love to see a Sarah Palin type who articulates the position of the left wing. Someone who unapologetically puts down the idiotic right wing policies and compares both policies with knowledge.
Pat, I don’t think that will happen either. It’s clear from Carville’s comments about having meetings that none of them is prepared to do (or really wants to do) the actual work of creating and implementing policies that work to improve people’s lives. All the “rogue” talk so far is centered around big money and the media. Which means they’re still stuck on this whole ‘messaging’ fallacy – that the 2010 problem was about inadequate communication, not inadequate action. (as if people need to be told whether they have a job or not). Even the 3rd party talk is just really MOTU-speak for “Well, THIS media-Manchurian candidate didn’t work out so we have to start looking for another.”
That’s what it sounds like. A bunch of talk.
As we head into another bleeding form of the Great Depression, we can thank the feckless leaders from both sides of the aisle who have been governing since the last 30 years. It is going to take much more than soundbites and marching bands to get this country back on track and I thinking that will take at least one generation from now to achieve it.
When the middle class is as broken as this one seems to be, and the empathy for helping another human being out of the misery has been tabled in favor of enriching the rich even further, then these policies will be felt for decades to come.
What is needed is another FDR type who recognizes that when the middle and lower class sinks even further into the mire, they will take the oligarchy down with them as well.
Meaningless and endless conflicts across the globe to “spread democracy” should be the number one priority right now to reduce this disgusting budget overlap and put that money where it can do some positive things. Instead we are at the mercy of the merciless whose one and only aim is to take back every last dime of the public and restore power to those whose chief concern is guarding their stake in these elections.
Obama is a complete failure in standing up for those he duped in the first place and is now forcing us all to suffer in the interim. Do I think the GOP is evil in its intent? Absolutlely.
When you can vote to withhold even the miminal amount of unemployment benefits on behalf of the neediest among us while upholding the rights of the rich to gain even more than you are truly evil.
No other way to say it.
as if people need to be told whether they have a job or not
Heh.
I’m sure my job is in here somewhere, let me just check this messy counter…
Um – on another network this morning, it was identified that Axelrod had a teen age daughter with serious form of epilepsy (sp?). He was in the piece with his daughter and his wife who looked like hell from the obvious 24/7 care required.
I would not be surprised to see him drop rom the scene. Who knows, but we might temper our thoughts with him. Kind of another Lee Atwater situation.
It is well known that Axelrod’s daughter has epilepsy. But I don’t think he is going to disappear.
Yeah, I saw that too…(I think if I was married to Axelrod, I would look like hell too.) Sorry that was uncalled for…I have epilepsy myself, so I know what it can be like.
I wonder why he would take a job as campaign manager with a 24 – 7 care situation at home. That is hell on the wife. She needs his support outside his job which keeps the health insurnce going.
So Axelrod has to stay employed to keep his daughter on health insurance. If only he had been in a position to influence the decision makers on opening up teh path of single-payer. Oh, wait ….
Does a parent’s health insurance cover a child of 29 with disabilities? I’m not sure.
According to this story, Axelrod’s daughter is 29 and lives in a facility called Misericordia. She isn’t cared for at home.
Yeah, I used to know someone who has a family member in the same facility, they like it a lot. Although, I remember they worried about state cutbacks and being able to afford things related to his care quite a bit.
So….the wife looking like hell has nothing to do with 24-7 home care for a very sick and disabled daughter…maybe I was right after all.