Rahm: Valet or Hitman

The Washington Post approvingly profiles Rahmbo's dealing on the $3.6 TRILLION budget bill, with this aside:

Emanuel's theatrical style, ballet training and "Rahmbo" nickname, along with the well-worn story about a dead fish he sent to a rival, are duly noted on his Wikipedia page. But in his new job, Emanuel is overhauling his image, becoming more valet than hit man, and his formula for moving Obama's agenda through Congress is beginning to resonate.

Oh, yeah, it's The One who's the tough guy, Rahm's just his humble servant. The thug backing up the cult leader is more like it. And this:

Even Republicans concede that given Obama's early victories, thornier tasks such as landmark health-care, energy and education bills may not be out of reach.

Well, Democrats have the majority, they don't need Republicans--unless enough Democrats defect. As far as these other bills, where will the money come from after the generational theft of this budget--added to the ongoing bailouts and the porkulus bill? And Congress hasn't even tackled entitlements, which threatened to bankrupt the country even before this latest ObamaRahmbo massive spending binge.

But the most disturbing of all is the plan to push health care through as a budget bill, taking a shortcut up until now reserved for budget matters, requiring only a simple majority rather than 60 votes--reordering a huge chunk of our economy with little debate or bipartisan consensus--a prescription for costly failure, delaying much needed reform.

Both Obama and Rahm won victory (for the blue dog moderates he recruited in 2006, more in 2008) at the ballot box talking like fiscal conservatives and moderates. But they govern from the hard left. Rahm's a hitman for Big Brother O.

UPDATE: Moderate Robert Samuelson, WaPo, "Obama's Economic Mirage":

What Obama proposes is a "post-material economy." He would de-emphasize the production of ever-more private goods and services, harnessing the economy to achieve broad social goals. In the process, he sets aside the standard logic of economic progress.

Since the dawn of the Industrial Age, this has been simple: produce more with less. ("Productivity," in economic jargon.) Mass markets developed for clothes, cars, computers and much more because declining costs expanded production. Living standards rose. By contrast, the logic of the "post-material economy" is just the opposite: Spend more and get less.