The New York Times also is good to emphasize the Wall Street lobbyist thing:
He is a top executive at JPMorgan Chase, where he is paid as much as $5 million a year and supervises the Washington lobbying efforts of the nation’s second-largest bank. He also serves on the board of directors at Boeing, the giant military contractor, and Abbott Laboratories, the global drug company, which has billions of dollars at stake in the overhaul of the health care system.
And now William M. Daley, the son and brother of Chicago mayors and a behind-the-scenes political player himself, will hold one of the most powerful jobs in Washington: chief of staff in the White House, where he will help decide who gets into the Oval Office and what President Obama’s Capitol Hill agenda should be.
Might be time to go re-read Simon Johnson’s “The Quiet Coup.”
I liked the corrente wire's approach on this:
http://www.correntewire.com/which_i_eventually_dump_obama_appointing_bill_daley
"OK. You all know that Obama's new Chief of Staff was most recently employed at JP Morgan Chase & Co. where he was, among other things, Head of Corporate Responsibility. If you read JPMC's latest corporate responsibility report you will learn that the bank's primary reason for existence is to foster the painting of rainbows and the raising of unicorns. What you will not learn is how this responsible corporation actually conducts its business.
Today, my wife received an e-newsletter from an attorney in the Sacramento area who specializes in real estate law. It was essentially a notification to people in the business about a new tactic Chase is using to squeeze blood from its erstwhile mortgage customers. Bear with me as I attempt to explain, I'm not a professional and I hope this isn't going too far into the weeds."
*Cue foreclosure horror stories and all the other stuff that gets Marcy Kaptur in a tizzy*
*PS, this isn't my salty language*
"Which bring us back to the president and today's announcement concerning his new BFF, Bill Daley. I've been holding off commenting on the "Obama's a conservative" meme because I find it less than satisfying. Obama is not a conservative. My 82 year old father is a conservative. Despite a few less-than-enlightened views on things in general, he is at heart a well intentioned and generous person who has lent a hand on numerous occasions to individuals in need. There is nothing well intentioned or generous about Obama. Neither is there is anything classically conservative about him. What is he conserving? Traditional values? Bullshit. Political comity and collegiality? Only if you share his belief in the superiority of the ruling class. The whole vocabulary of "liberal versus conservative" is utterly inadequate for describing the current dynamic of how we are ruled. The appointment of Daley as his caporegime puts this dynamic on display and shows, without doubt, Obama's true colors [Ha! Colors! I'm a racist]. It doesn't matter which party is in charge. Either way, the powers-that-be will attempt to rob us blind.
Obama is a blood sucking corporatist scumbag marking time as the imperial manager, doing the will of our owners, until he can retire and take his place on various boards of directors, go on the speaking circuit, maybe do a little discreet lobbying here and there, etc. You know, make some real money. So what if some little people have to suffer and die as a result of his actions. It's the way the big boys do business."
When the administration has moved to far to the right for Paul Volcker to stomach,
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40937185/ns/business-eye_on_the_economy/
forget it. The revolution is over, the coup was long since successful.
#1 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Sat 8 Jan 2011 at 05:48 PM
Ryan, Obama's cabinet has far fewer businessmen than that of any president since before Taft. You count 5 appointments in your "long line", none of whom are cabinet level. That's hardly selling out to business. There's a good reason businesses distrust Obama, and Daley is but a small step - reconciliation is a long, long way away.
Thimbles, if you or any other lefty loon thought Obama was ushering in a "revolution" or a "coup" then we can all thank God it was not a success.
#2 Posted by JLD, CJR on Sun 9 Jan 2011 at 01:57 AM
Make that one cabinet level appointment, but still...
#3 Posted by JLD, CJR on Sun 9 Jan 2011 at 05:58 AM
JLD, assuming you read the link Mr. Chittim left for you in big letters at the top:
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/05/the-quiet-coup/7364/
if you thought that we were talking about an "Obama coup", you're a moron.
#4 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Sun 9 Jan 2011 at 07:18 AM