Obama's Machine Millionaires
Pay cuts no sacrifice
MSNBC
The Obama administration is so rich the water is turning green.
"For many of the Chicagoans serving in the White House, their new high-powered jobs have also come with a sizable pay cut," the Tribune reports.
All together now: Waaaaaah!
Many of the Chicagoans serving in the White House are already stinking rich.
And they'll only be there a couple years at most, if history is any guide.
And then they'll get even richer.
So don't cry for them.
David Axelrod, for example, "collected a 2008 salary of roughly $1.5 million from two political consulting firms in Chicago that he sold before moving to the White House," the paper reports.
Let's face it: unless he pulls an MC Hammer (or an Eddy Curry), Axelrod is set for life.
And Desiree Rogers?
"Desiree Rogers, the White House social secretary, also took a significant pay cut from what she was making at Allstate Insurance Co., where she was working on a financial social networking program before leaving for Washington," the Tribune reports. "She now earns $113,000 a year."
Left out? The $1.8 million Rogers made in the first half of 2008 as CEO of Peoples Gas, which we all know is a supremely well-managed enterprise.
Valerie Jarrett?
"Jarrett, a senior adviser to Obama, resigned her position as chief executive of Habitat Co., one of the Midwest's largest property-management firms, to move to the White House."
Jarrett made more than a million bucks last year from that job and various board seats and even, at least as of April, was still drawing a paycheck from the CTA, where she was the mayor's hand-picked chairwoman for eight years of that supremely well-managed enterprise.
And don't even get started with Rahm Emanuel.
The Tribune reported it last spring: "President Barack Obama's Team Virtually All Chicago Millionaires."
(And they are all loyal Daleyites.)
Working in the White House is hardly a sacrifice for these folks; it's the least they can do.
Steve Rhodes is the proprietor of The Beachwood Reporter, a Chicago-centric news and culture review.
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Posted Tuesday, Jul 14, 2009 - 2:04 AM CST
