White House Staff Shakeup: Who Stays, Who Goes

Choices narrowing down as who leaves or who stays on the White House staff.

From Denny: President Obama's Closed Inner Circle Model is really not serving the President well at all. Sometimes, you just have to bring in outside people who were not part of the original campaign that got you into the White House. Within the first six months it is evident which staff members do not transition well from campaign mode to governing mode. With this White House the President has taken far too long - two years - to consider the obvious changes.

The one most in need of leaving and returning to the campaign trail is David Axelrod. He just can't get his head into the governing game, putting off needed legislation and actions that should have been started by the time the President when he first took office. Most notably, Axelrod never took it seriously the economic condition of the country and how  necessary it was for the government to respond faster.

Axelrod is said to be leaving his senior advisor role "sometime in the Spring." Are you kidding? This guy has been destructive to the progressive-liberal agenda in favor of placating corporate  money.  He is also slower than molasses in everything he does.  It's how he rolls - or doesn't roll.

What he should be doing to prepare for the President's re-election campaign is to leave now. He has no time to lose, given the mood of the country. To get him into campaign mindset he should go back to Chicago and help Rahm Emanuel get elected to mayor. Then it will be the holiday season and before you know it, then the New Year is upon us. There is a lot to organize for such a massive campaign.  He has been out of the campaign harness for two years now.

Axelrod has no sense of urgency and it is precisely that cavalier attitude that hurts him - and especially those around him. Send him on his way, Mr. President so he can get into gear and be on time for your re-election campaign. Follow your instincts and don't allow Axelrod to yet again "spin" you.

As to former Senator Daschle as the top pick for a permanent Chief of Staff: get him.  The Republicans may grouse a bit but they will get over it.  In comparison they will much prefer Daschle's smooth style to Rahm's abrasive style - and so will the progressive and liberal wings of the Democratic Party.

As to Press Secretary, perhaps Gibbs will be happier as a senior advisor - but he will have to watch his temper in public.  Working with Daschle could teach him the studied finesse he needs to be more effective - especially in the area of  "thinking on his feet."  No easy task and it takes time to hone that skill but Gibbs is up to the task.

And while you are at it, get a lot more women on your team.  A sprinkling just doesn't get it.  Also, quit backing down like you did on Elizabeth Warren when Wall Street squawked.  They are a selfish greedy bunch who do not have the country's best interest - or yours. "Can you hear me now?" :)

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

*** THANKS for visiting, feel welcome to drop a comment or opinion, enjoy bookmarking this post on your favorite social site, a big shout out to awesome current subscribers – and if you are new to this blog, please subscribe in a reader or by email updates!

*** Come by for a visit and check out my other blogs:

The Social Poets - news, politics
The Soul Calendar - science, astronomy, psychology
Visual Insights - photos, art, music
Beautiful Illustrated Quotations - spiritual quotes, philosophy
Best Spiritual Posts - my own best as well as links to other spiritual posts from all viewpoints
Poems From A Spiritual Heart - poetry
The Healing Waters - health news
Dennys People Watching - people in the news
Dennys Food and Recipes
Dennys Funny Quotes - humor

Editorial Cartoons 5 Dec 2009

From Denny: The Secret Service took a beating this week as well they should have, how lame can you get? Tiger Woods took another beating, this one from his irate wife fed up with his sleeping around. You go, girl! Send her to Afghanistan to win the war suggests one cartoonist. :) Obama announces his controversial plans to escalate in Afghanistan while the rest of us are war weary. And plenty of Santa cartoons to get you in the mood for the holiday season...

Secret Service and their lame excuses as to why they did not protect the President or the Prime Minister of India adequately... It might as well have been Bart Simpson in charge of security.

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Dave Granlund - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by R.J. Matson - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Gary McCoy - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

Health care:

See Cartoons by Cartoon by R.J. Matson - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

Iran dilemma of thumbing their nose at world and going ahead and building now 10 times the number of nukes:

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Eric Allie - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

Obama's Afghan War controversial strategy that's just wearing out the public patience after eight years of expensive wars burdening the taxpayers and costing jobs:

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Monte Wolverton - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Bob Englehart - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by John Darkow - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Jimmy Margulies - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

Tiger Woods getting beat up by his irate wife for having an idiot affair. It's bad enough the guy is known for being a bad tipper, emotionally stingy and cheap on philanthropy. "Do ya think?" Karma is on his case...?

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Brian Fairrington - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Pat Bagley - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Randy Bish - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Cameron Cardow - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

And to get you in the mood for Christmas...

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Joe Heller - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by J.D. Crowe - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by David Fitzsimmons - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by John Darkow - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Brian Duffy - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Dave Granlund - Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com - Email this Cartoon

*** Thanks for visiting and keep laughing!

Video: The New Yorker Examines the Financial Crisis

From Denny: The story takes a look inside the Obama economic team and defines more who they are and how they look at the problem. He summarizes their positions. Right now the President meets daily with five of his economic advisors. There's a lot of arm-chair quarterbacking going on here but it is still interesting to examine the original positions and conflicts on the economic team and the outcome we all now know.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Obama Headlines 25 June 2009

GOP: Barack Obama too political

Obama: Immigration bill coming soon

Video: Luau at the White House



Video: Michelle hulas, Barack ogles

Visual Racist Propaganda From The GOP

From Denny: Have you seen the latest racist garbage coming out of the GOP? They claim this is actually funny and refer to it as an "Historical Keepsake Photo." Unbelievable. Look at the "photo" in the bottom right hand corner to catch the visual propaganda.

I live in a Republican state AND it's the South. I know damn well what they are really saying here. CNN calls it white eyes on a dark background. How tame can you get? What the GOP racists are really saying is "Look at the spook in the White House!"

Some fool actually had the stupidity to write a comment into CNN claiming "everyone should just get over it because he thinks it's funny." He's from Arizona, a GOP state. Hmmmm...

This GOP war room is quite active these days and as nasty as ever. With them it never is about real issues but rather about character assassination. Hate speech has to be stopped dead in its tracks. Blowback! If you agree, write CNN and complain like thousands of other bloggers!

Cheeky Quote Day! 13 May 2009

From Denny: From the ABC network show This Week’s host, George Stephanopoulos, comes his evaluation of the best cheeky quotes from President Obama at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner that raises money for charity by roasting the politicians.

Best lines from last night's White House Correspondents' Association dinner:

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA:

-"In the next 100 days I will learn to go off the prompter, and Joe Biden will learn to stay on the prompter."

-"In the next 100 days our bipartisan outreach will be so successful that even John Boehner will consider becoming a Democrat ... After all we have a lot in common. He is a person of color... although not a color that appears in the natural world."

-"In the next 100 days we will house train our dog Bo. Because the last thing Tim Geithner needs is someone else treating him like a fire hydrant."

-"We had been rivals during the campaign. But these days we could not be closer. In fact, the second she got back from Mexico, she pulled me into a hug and gave me a big kiss. Told me I had better get down there myself."

--"Tomorrow is Mother’s Day. I do have to say, this is a tough holiday for Rahm because he is not used to saying the word 'day' after 'mother.'"


President Obama:






From YouTube, Comic Wanda Sykes:

From This Week: Roundup of Sunday Funnies

Funnies: Toxic Assets and Other Wall St. Treats

Late Night

Fallon: Michelle Obama's planting a vegetable garden on the White House lawn. You know the economy is bad when the Obamas are afraid of running out of food.


The Tonight Show

Leno: President Obama met with the CEOs of all the major U.S. banks. A lot of these big-bonus guys. The CEOs looked around the White House and said, "You live in this dump?"


Real Time

Maher: Treasury Secretary Tim Geither, a.k.a "Little Tim" … he broke out his big plan this week to buy up all those toxic assets that the banks are holding … and if you don't know what a toxic asset is, it's a piece of paper that's worthless now, but could be worth something some day ... the same way Confederate money could be.


Late Night

Fallon: Former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is writing a book about his role in the Bush administration during the economic crisis. It's weird. The book starts on chapter 11.


The Tonight Show

Leno: Very -- very strange incident at JFK airport in New York City today. An AIG executive going through security had to empty out all his pockets. You know what fell out? Senator Chris Dodd. Yeah.

Cheeky Quote Day! 15 April 2009

Franklin D. Roosevelt (via last.fm)

President Roosevelt was often set upon by the conservatives as is President Obama today. Poisonous politics rather than good government were the Republican songs 60 years ago. It seems they choose to still sing with a deaf ear toward the public’s desire for a new song. Here are a few of FDR’s frustrated replies in answer to the Republicans’ toxic politics when the country was in dire straits then as we are today:

“True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.”

Here FDR planted an "in your face" punch to his political opposition. FDR had his equivalent of corrupt big business guys and greedy CEO's.

“The hopes of the Republic cannot forever tolerate either undeserved poverty or self-serving wealth.”

And when FDR was not lecturing the Republicans on their amorality, he would turn to defining them in his own cheeky manner:

“A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who has never learned to walk.”

And here’s one quote echoing from decades past, shouting into the present, that really applies to the latest poisonous unproductive politics for the past eight years:

“Repetition does not transform a lie into the truth.”

Here's a funny video about the latest political doings, just in time for Tax Day today!

Conservatives Teabagging the White House on Tax Day April 15th

What this video should be subtitled: Rich People Complain About Paying Their Fair Share of Taxes

OR

BTW, Let the Middle Class Folks Pay Our Way for Us!

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

***

Now for some humor videos! There is nothing better than when truth and humor collide in real life. For some reason those stories make us laugh the hardest. Enjoy!


Turkeys Torment Mailman – true life is funniest!






News of the Absurd Episode 90: Dog Ate the Cash, Math Dog, Shoplifting Siberian Husky

Video: Meet the Mom Dog of Obama's New Puppy

From Denny: OK, I love fur people and am just as smitten with the new White House puppy as the rest of the animal lovers in America! CBS had this more interesting video and interviews the dog breeder too.


Watch CBS Videos Online

First Family To Plant White House Veggie Garden

Will the Obama veggie garden planted on the White House grounds look like this hanging garden?



Photo by me'nthedogs' @ flickr

Or will it look like this of a more formal attire?



Photo by Joe Shlabotnik @ flickr

From Denny:

Hey! This IS Cheeky Quote Day at The Social Poets blog! What's better than a real news story?

Went looking over at flickr creative commons for regular veggie garden photos and then the humor bug poked me so I put up these cute photos. Thanks to the great photographers over at flickr's creative commons for making their photos available to online writers like me!

"ABC News' Brian Hartman Reports: President Obama's latest shovel-ready project is close to home -- in fact, right in his own yard. In an effort to promote healthy eating, the first family will be planting a vegetable garden right on the White House grounds.

ABC News' Ann Compton and Sunlen Miller report that the new White House vegetable garden will be dug up and planted on the South grounds of the White House -- near the fountain but out of view of the main house.

Though the 16-acre complex is maintained by the National Park Service, one worker who preferred to remain anonymous assured ABC News that National Park Service staff won't do the sowing and planting. The White House residence staff will handle that.

As first reported online by food writer Eddie Gehman Kohan, who reports on food issues related to the Obamas, First Lady Michelle Obama told Oprah Winfrey's "O" magazine, 'We're … working on a wonderful new garden project.'

In the April issue of the magazine, Mrs. Obama tells Winfrey, 'We want to use it as a point of education, to talk about health and how delicious it is to eat fresh food, and how you can take that food and make it part of a healthy diet.'

A variety of organic food and sustainable agriculture advocates have been pressing the Obamas to plant such a garden."