Liberal Talk Radio

The former Clinton Aide turned House Representative turned DCCC chair is an interesting cat. Via Kos via Rolling Stone we learn:

And there’s the story of how, the night after 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.”

Damn. We also learn:

His younger brother, Ari, is a Hollywood talent agent who served as the inspiration for Ari Gold, the fast-talking agent played by Jeremy Piven on HBO’s hit series Entourage. (In a recent episode shot at a Lakers game, the lead actors sat in Ari Emanuel’s $2,000 courtside seats.) “After about the sixth episode, I finally caught it,” says Rahm, who himself was the model for the character Josh Lyman on The West Wing. “I called Ari the next day and said, ‘Hey, I finally saw the show, and you know what? I like that guy better than I like you.’”

Interesting. I love Ari on Entourage. But I always assumed the Lyman character was based on George Stephanopolous. But I guess George is too low-key, now that I think about it.

Finally, Rep. Emanuel is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, where he attended hoping to become a ballet dancer. If it helps you rectify the image, I’ll add that one of the most intense, aggressive theater troupes i’ve ever seen perform also came out of Sarah Lawrence. The beat the crap out of each other on stage. Seriously.