While it seems that the Obama White House is a mixed bag, it looks like pressure from progressive groups will have an easier time penetrating the halls of power. It turns out Rahm was a strong bulwark against outside activism.
But it wasn't just staff. Members said he had a phenomenal knowledge of their districts, and he kept up to date well after the campaign ended. Rep. Tim Walz (D-Minn.) said one of his supporters wrote a letter to the editor of a small paper in his district, complaining about his vote on a rewrite of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
Walz mentioned the letter to the editor to Emanuel on the floor and was stunned by his response.
"You mean the one about how you should caucus with the Republicans?" Emanuel shot back. "That's a good letter. Makes you look bipartisan."
To this day, Walz is still amazed. "He had read the letter."
The full article discusses how Emanuel injected a 'pro-business' point of view into House leadership fights, and features Blue Dogs and New Democrats fretting about the caucus moving to the left. And they should be worried, they lost a big ally. Emanuel is an extraordinarily talented conservative organizer and he set his sites on making sure the freshmen class of 2006 operated according to his perceived political sensibility, which was to blur distinctions between them and Republicans. Regardless of what you think about this as a political strategy, he probably won't have time to keep up his House duties, and other people will take over to fill the vacuum.
Rahm is going to focus on keeping the House organized, as it is very clear that Obama is running the most Congress-friendly transition in history and has ample links to both the House and the Senate. So I don't expect Rahm's influence to go away entirely from the House, but with more responsibility in governing and just a lot more work to do, there will be new centers of power that will have to emerge.
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