Source: AP via Yahoo News
And now next in the long line of "we aren't shaking things up" administration shake-ups, we say good-bye to Scott McClellan, whose replacement has yet to be named (Wonkette had a tip-off earlier last month that it could be Dana M. Perino, but now there's just a lot of speculation since Bolten doesn't think she's ready yet). Supposedly, he made the decision himself, but it really looks like Bolten made the decision for him.
Appearing with Bush on the South Lawn, McClellan, who has parried especially fiercely with reporters on Iraq and on intelligence issues, told Bush: "I have given it my all sir and I have given you my all sir, and I will continue to do so as we transition to a new press secretary."
Bush said McClellan had "a challenging assignment."
"I thought he handled his assignment with class, integrity," the president said. "It's going to be hard to replace Scott, but nevertheless he made the decision and I accepted it. One of these days, he and I are going to be rocking in chairs in Texas and talking about the good old days."
Just like Andy and Barney in Mayberry! Except I'm not sure which one should be Barney Fife.
Also, another interesting change has taken place: Rove has been pulled out of his policy development job so he can "focus more on politics with the upcoming midterm elections".
A senior administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the president had not yet made the announcement, said Wednesday that Rove is giving up oversight of policy development to focus more on politics with the approach of the fall midterm elections.
Just over a year ago, Rove was promoted to deputy chief of staff in charge of most White House policy coordination. That new portfolio came on top of his title as senior adviser and role of chief policy aide to Bush.
But now, the job of deputy chief of staff for policy is being given to Joel Kaplan, now the White House's deputy budget director, said the official.
The move signals a possibly broad effort to rearrange and reinvigorate Bush's staff by new chief of staff Joshua Bolten. Bolten moved into his position last week; Kaplan was his No. 2 person at the Office of Management and Budget.
At least for the time being, the promotion of Kaplan would leave Bush with three deputy chiefs of staff: Rove, Kaplan and Joe Hagin, who oversees administrative matters, intelligence and other national security issues.
Uh oh, Karl. You know what they say: three's a crowd.
(Ah, what the hell--according to this report, you handed in your resignation, too, but the article writer didn't specify if they were talking about your move back to "just politics" or if you are, indeed, totally gone from the White House.)
Tags: [Scott McClellan], [McClellan says that's all folks], [supposedly McClellan decided for himself that he should resign], [though Bolten probably had a hand in helping him make that decision], [Karl Rove], [Karl Rove, come on down!], [you're the next contestant on the White House Shake-up!], [Rove gets taken off policy development to focus on politics]
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