Rahm Emanuel: The Man From Delta
Within seconds of the news of the appointment of Rahm Emanuel as White House chief of staff, all Washington was quoting an anecdote from an article in last year’s Rolling Stone:
Friends and enemies agree that the key to Emanuel’s success is his legendary intensity. There’s the story about the time he sent a rotting fish to a pollster who had angered him. There’s the story about how his right middle finger was blown off by a Syrian tank when he was in the Israeli army. And there’s the story of how, the night after Bill Clinton was elected, Emanuel was so angry at the president’s enemies that he stood up at a celebratory dinner with colleagues from the campaign, grabbed a steak knife and began rattling off a list of betrayers, shouting “Dead! … Dead! … Dead!” and plunging the knife into the table after every name. “When he was done, the table looked like a lunar landscape,” one campaign veteran recalls. “It was like something out of The Godfather. But that’s Rahm for you.”
Of the three stories, only the second is a myth …
Wow! That is intense. Or is it? The people quoting the steak-knife anecdote have all overlooked the possibility that Emanuel was not re-enacting The Godfather but rather a very different American film classic.
Bluto: What the f--- happened to the Delta I used to know? Where’s the spirit? Where’s the guts? This could be the greatest night of our lives … but you’re gonna let it be the worst. ‘We’re afraid to go with you, Bluto. We might get in trouble.’ Just kiss my ass from now on. Not me! I won’t take this! Wormer is a dead man! Marmalard: dead! Neidermeyer …
Otter: Dead.
The movie of course is Animal House — and Rahm Emanuel is not the first senior White House official to be inspired by it.
In the investigation of the leak of Valerie Plame’s identity, federal attorneys uncovered a baffling piece of code. One of the journalists who published Plame’s identity was Matthew Cooper, a writer for Time magazine. Under threat of jail, Cooper surrendered his notes to investigators. The notes revealed that Cooper’s source for his information was White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove, who spoke to Cooper on “double super secret background.”
Washington insiders were puzzled. Some speak to reporters on background. Others prefer deep background. More nervous officials will sometimes request “deepest background.” But only Karl Rove — that nefarious man! — could ever have invented anything as murky and sinister as “double super secret background.”
Er … no so fast.
Dean Wormer: This year we’ll grab the bull by the balls ... and kick those punks off campus!
Greg Marmalard: What do you intend to do, sir? Delta’s already on probation.
Wormer: They are?
Greg: Yes, sir.
Wormer: Oh … Then as of now, they’re on double secret probation!
Coincidence? Yes probably … but maybe not. There is something about the spirit of Animal House that speaks to everybody involved in practical politics. Journalists who cover campaigns use language that conjures images of military precision: “organization,” “targeting,” “an army of volunteers,” “field offices,” etc.
Anybody who has ever done any canvassing — and especially anyone who has ever had responsibility for organizing a canvas — knows that the reality is barely controlled chaos: volunteers who don’t show up, who show up in the wrong place, who go to the wrong street, talk to the wrong voters, and say the wrong thing.
Once elected, politics becomes a matter of egos, vanities and petty personal quarrels, summed up by that ancient British political joke:
New MP: I cannot wait to enter the House of Commons and get my first glimpse of the enemy!
Veteran MP: Young man, those are your political opponents. Your enemies will all be found on your side of the House.
Sloth, stupidity and petty authoritarianism are all integral to the political experience — and what movie depicts them better?
Dean Wormer: Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
A few years ago, I had my own equivalent of an Animal House experience. During the battle over the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, I got a call from a White House friend. His mood was sad. He told me I had badly let down the old team by my oppositional attitude.
And then he said: “You had better forget about that invitation to the White House Chanukkah party.”
Buck Henry could not have written it better. The new Obama team will fit right in.
Originally published in the National Post.