Is He Rahm-Boned?

Cenk Uygur argues that last weekend's Dana Milbank "Leave Rahm alooooone!" special was Rahm's "Screw you!" on the way out the door.

Since Rahm is obviously feeding this to Milbank, that is very revealing. You don't throw these kinds of bombs unless you've already lost. This is an act of desperation. It's bound to make mortal enemies of these people inside Obama's inner circle. You can't really work with these people anymore. That means you're already finished there.


This is basically Rahm saying on his way out, I was right all along and these guys were wrong. Maybe it's a last minute attempt at a Hail Mary to swing the decision in his favor if he can start a conversation in DC about how he had offered better advice than the other three to Obama (by the way, everything he claims to have been right about inside the article was disastrous advice that led Obama further and further away from his voters). But either way, that means he thinks he is very close to being on his way out the door.

For my part, I don't think it will work at all. It seems desperate, vindictive, political and obvious. If Obama was still considering which direction he was going to go, I think this will certainly cinch it. He hates these kinds of leaks and this kind of internal dissension. Rahm is done. Thank God.

I'm not entirely convinced still.  I think it's Rahmbo trying to look like the bad guy here in order to take the heat off Obama among the Dems so that his boss can get health care reform done.  I'm also entirely sure Rahmbo likes being the heavy.

There's also the theory that this is Rahm serving very public notice to the rest of the West Wing that he's not leaving, but that he's pulling an Alexander Haig and stating "I'm in charge here."  He clearly has the ability to play Dana Milbank in the attack position at will.  He may be looking to see if anyone's got the stones to check his raise, especially after the recent article earlier this month on Obama's inner circle leading him astray.  This could be Rahmbo setting a firebreak by taking out part of the forest himself.   The message could be "Anybody else want to leak?"

Still Uygur does have a damn good point:  if this is Rahmbo being subtle, he's doing it wrong to the point where it looks like he's setting his own house on fire.  It's unusually ham-handed and nasty even for Rahm, and it smacks of desperation.

Either way, it's taking attention off Obama right now and is giving him some breathing room from the left.  He's going to need it with this public option thing.