GE's Immelt on the Hot Seat

Immelt is a registered Republican who contributed to both Hillary Clinton and John McCain during the 2008 campaign.

GE, like many large multinational companies, does most of business (55% overall; with financial division, GE Capital, comprising one third of its total sales) overseas and is often subject to regulations and whims of politicians (see Paul Kanjorski boasting about "sticking his thumb into Jamie Dimon's eye" and being able to "make millions on Wall Street"). So while Jeffrey Immelt is a lousy business executive - no match to Jack Welch - he is a "better politician" than Jack was... not that it's gotten GE far from the bottom where Immelt drove it from the heights that Welch took it.

Many business people wanted senior executives in the White House, and now they have two -- with GE's Immelt joining William Daley, the former banker and new chief of staff

They are finishing the reconstruction of post-1994 Clinton's White House, keeping Chicago Way as the home base. They already had quite a few Clinton retreads, now they shuffle the deck with Richard Daley making space for Rahm in Chicago Mayor's office and his brother Bill moving back to D.C.

Poor Bill Daley. In order to "serve the public" he is making a "sacrifice" by selling his 189,190 shares in JPMorgan for approximately $8.3M and resigning from the Boeing and other boards.

Good analysis in President serving 'third term' of Clinton White House, claims Gingrich - TheHill, by Michael O'Brien, 2011 January 21

President Obama is acting out a kind of third term of the Clinton administration, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) said.
Gingrich, the former Republican Speaker who sparred with President Clinton between 1995 and 1999, noted the string of Clinton administration alumni who have re-entered the White House as Obama begins a pivot toward the center.
It's sort of fascinating: You're sort of seeing the beginning of the third term of the Clintons, because the first two years of Obama was such a failure, in popular acceptance, Gingrich told the conservative magazine Human Events in a video interview.
Gingrich noted the selection of William Daley, the former Commerce secretary under Clinton, as Obama's new chief of staff and Obama's choice of Jack Lew to serve as director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). Lew held that job in the Clinton administration.
The very cost of ramming through left-wing spending and left-wing bills and creating left-wing bureaucracies has been a repudiation on such a scale that the president finds himself drawn more and more - at the Office of Management and Budget, now chief of staff - to people who are Clintonites, Gingrich said.
The former Speaker's observation will likely ruffle some Democratic feathers as he considers his own bid for the Republican nomination to challenge Obama in 2012.
Obama's experience mirrors Clinton's to an extent, too. Clinton lost control of the House and Senate to Republicans in his first midterm election, just as Obama lost control of the House to the GOP after two years on the job. Clinton spent much of the rest of his administration pivoting toward the center, and Obama seems to be doing the same.
Gingrich seemed amused when noting that the Clinton administration redux that Democratic activists sought to avoid by supporting Obama over Hillary Clinton in the 2008 Democratic primary seemed to be happening anyway.
It must be fascinating to be one of those left-wing activist groups that spent so much time and energy beating Hillary Clinton, because they didn't want to see this kind of an administration, to now watch a member of the famous Daley machine in Chicago emerge, he said.

The major differences, of course, is that, armed with 1993-1994 Clinton's experience, Obama was steered to avoid Clinton's political mistakes in implementing the leftist agenda - he front-loaded by starting with health, energy and financial "reforms" and saved the easy but essential for the base "gays in the military" and START treaty after the election's "shellacking". Clinton's inauguration "honeymoon" disappeared fast after he was forced to accept DADT because of his disastrous first executive moves, and he never could make up for lost good will and lost time. Also, GOP doesn't have the Senate majority or even a strong working minority, with Maine Sisters, Lisa Murkowski, Scott Brown etc. So now, instead of building on their mandate, Republicans are still in the process of getting rid of the old and new laws and regulations from previous Congresses and recent administrations.

Obama's plan was to reverse and do the heavy lifting first, with the help of the economy and overwhelming majority and liberal leadership in the Senate and the House, due to dismal political incompetence of George W. Bush and RNC / Republican leadership.

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