"For example: the dead fish he sent to a Democratic pollster he blamed for misjudging a House race, accompanied by a note that read: "It's been awful working with you. Love, Rahm." Or the celebratory dinner in Little Rock, Arkansas, after Bill Clinton's 1992 victory, when Emanuel repeatedly stabbed the table with a steak knife as he named those who'd betrayed the campaign and decreed them, one after the other, "Dead! Dead! Dead!""
""One: Distinguish the caricature from the character," he told me, reading from a scrap of paper with a short list of what I must understand about him. "I get all the caricature-I played into it or whatever-but there's principle behind it. I don't just fight for the sport of fight." I had arrived a few minutes early for our 8 a.m. breakfast at the Park Hyatt in Washington, D.C., but Emanuel, who hates being late,"
Rahm Emanuel projects a combative, theatrical political persona illustrated by incidents such as sending a dead fish to a pollster with a cheeky note, stabbing a table with a steak knife while declaring betrayals "Dead! Dead! Dead!", and briefly displaying a White House nameplate reading Undersecretary for Go Fuck Yourself, a gift from his brothers. He emphasizes a distinction between caricature and character, asserting that his confrontational methods are rooted in principle and specific goals rather than gratuitous aggression. He keeps a rigorous daily routine, arrives early to meetings, and directs associates forcefully while describing past efforts to vanquish Republican opponents.
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