Obama’s changing guard

A major shake-up of the White House staff continued this week, with Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel leaving to run for mayor of Chicago. Emanuel, a hard-charging former congressman who tried to steer the administration to the pragmatic center, reportedly had grown frustrated with Washington politics and other members of the staff. Last week, top economic advisor Lawrence Summers resigned, and before him, chief economic forecaster Christina Romer and budget director Peter Orszag also moved on. The exodus is expected to grow, with political strategist David Axelrod confirming that he will leave the White House in the spring to focus on Obama’s re-election. The high-level departures give the president a chance to reshape his administration as he faces a difficult midterm election.

Are the staffers jumping, or were they “made to walk the plank”? asked Robert Smith in AmericanThinker.com. Well, consider the context. Sensing that voters will reject the “gargantuan spending and debt” that the Obama brain trust has foisted on the country, “the shrewder ones are diving and swimming like heck.”

Obama’s choice of a replacement for Lawrence Summers will say a lot about the president’s priorities, said Dan McGinn in HBR.org. Some supporters are touting former Xerox CEO Anne Mulcahy, as a “signal that Obama isn’t really as hostile to business as some conservatives might think.” But CEOs are used to running the show, not being team players working for someone else.

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Despite criticism that Obama’s White House is too “insular,” said Glenn Thrush and Mike Allen in Politico.com, the leading candidates to replace Emanuel—deputy security advisor Thomas Donilon, vice presidential advisor Ron Klain, and senior Obama advisor Pete Rouse—“are already on Obama’s team.” Don’t expect an outsider—Rouse will likely fill the spot on an interim basis. “Insularity is a fancy word for losing touch with the electorate,” said Ed Morrissey in HotAir.com. Emanuel is said to have warned against the dangers of succumbing to “interminable debate” over Obamacare. His White House colleagues and potential successors “apparently didn’t see the dangers.”