Tough-talking White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel is the only member of President Barack Obama's Cabinet, other than Vice President Joe Biden, who did not shoot a video "report card" of his/her accomplishments during the first year in office.
Released today, the video snippets run about a minute. They are accessed by clicking on your favorite Cabinet member in a group shot. The curious can find out what Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis or Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Shaun Donovan have been up to.
Power hitters -- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Attorney General Eric Holder -- are front and center in the picture.
Embattled Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner also gets front row placement. In his video, Geithner takes credit for reviving an economy that was "falling off the cliff" and heading for a replay of the Great Depression. He pointedly says the big banks have paid back the "vast bulk of assistance that was provided by the Bush Administration."
Here's a prediction: pushed by populist outrage Geithner will be the first Cabinet member to walk the plank.
It's a shame that shy Rahm doesn't have his say. His video absence comes on the day the Wall Street Journal runs an item headlined "Chief of Staff Draws Fire from Left as Obama Falters" on its front page. Cenk Uygur, the lefty talk radio host, had the ultimate put down of Emanuel, calling the former Chicago Congressman "Barack Obama's Dick Cheney."
The WSJ piece reports that salty tongued Emanuel didn't win many friends in the liberal wing of the Democratic party when he told a group of them that their idea to air ads attacking Blue Dogs for opposing healthcare reform was "f….ing retarded."
A colleague at O'Dwyer's speculated that Rahm did make a video, but it had to be bleeped out. My guess is that Rahm's list of accomplishments would be embarrassingly short.
The cabinet video report cards are pretty cool, but a mere warm-up to the ultimate report card tomorrow -- Obama's State of the Union.
