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The Upshot – With Rahm Emanuel reportedly announcing Friday that he’s leaving the White House to run for mayor of Chicago, President Obama is expected to name his senior adviser, Pete Rouse, to serve as acting (and perhaps permanent) White House chief of staff. In choosing Rouse, Obama would be tapping a near-opposite of his outgoing chief of [...]

NYT’s Michael Shear and Jeff Zeleny report:

President Obama will give his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, a send-off Friday as Mr. Emanuel officially announces his departure from the West Wing to run for mayor of Chicago, officials familiar with the decision said.

The White House press secretary, Robert Gibbs, at his daily briefing on Thursday afternoon said that the president will give two personnel announcements on Friday morning from the East Room of the White House. Mr. Gibbs, admitting that he was being purposely “oblique,” would not confirm whether the announcements would concern Mr. Emanuel.

The two officials, who declined to be named in advance of the official announcement, confirmed that Mr. Obama plans to name Pete Rouse, a senior adviser, to replace Mr. Emanuel. Mr. Rouse has been at the president’s side since Mr. Obama arrived in Washington nearly six years ago as a senator, serving as his chief of staff.

Mr. Rouse will not be an interim appointment, but rather will formally take over Mr. Emanuel’s title. While Mr. Rouse has expressed reservations about holding the chief of staff job for an extended period, he has agreed to do the job – for now.

In addition to serving as Obama’s chief of staff in the Senate, Rouse was chief of staff for former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle. He’s worked in the West Wing since Obama’s inauguration as a special adviser to the President and was co-chair of the transition team.

On a sort of a funny side note, @SarahPalinUSA (a Twitter-based cyborg rumored to be plotting a Presidential bid) tweeted some anger in Rouse’s direction earlier this week:

Alaska media slept on the job for how many years re: Obama senior advisor Pete Rouse’s claim to be AK resident and “local” voter? For shame.

Of course, as is the case with many things Twittered (and otherwise uttered) by the former half-term Governor (and complete nitwit), Alaska media actually has done a solid job reporting on Rouse, who moved to Alaska in 1978 — 17 years before Joe “Kansas Farm Subsidy” Miller.

Indeed, thanks to the Anchorage Daily News, perhaps the most amusing trivia tidbit of all about Rouse is that his office is located between Rahm’s and Axelrod’s, which as the ADN points out is where Josh Lyman sat in television’s version of the West Wing. Of course, on the TV show Lyman had to elect Matt Santos before becoming Chief of Staff, so Rouse is ahead of schedule in that department.

You know that intensity gap we’ve been worried will bite us in the ass come election day? The one that convinced everybody and their brother that John Boehner should start measuring the drapes in the Speaker’s office?

Well, about that intensity gap (from PPP’s Tom Jensen):

Republicans have been extremely excited about voting in this election all the way since the summer of 2009. GOP voters really can’t get any more enthused about voting this year than they already are. Democrats have been significantly lagging on this front for most of the cycle but there are indications it’s getting better. For instance our July national poll found 51% of Democrats ‘very excited’ about voting this fall. In September that figure had increased to 59%.

Not only has Democratic enthusiasm jumped to 59% being “very excited” (up from 51%), but in key races around the country, there are far more undecided Democrats than Republicans. For example, in Wisconsin’s Senate race, 40% of undecideds are Democrats compared with just 16% who are Republican.

This of course doesn’t mean everything is copacetic for Dems, but it means that (a) things are heading in the right direction and (b) there’s fertile ground to win undecideds back to the Democratic column. It also suggests that if there’s one thing that Republicans could change about this campaign cycle, it would be to eliminate September and October. They’d have loved nothing more than jumping straight from August to election day.

The top Republican in the House of Representatives on Thursday said lawmakers should be forced to make cuts in federal spending if they want to add new programs.

Groups pushing for progressive policies will gather in the nation’s capital this weekend for a march aimed at recapturing momentum for their agenda and mobilizing supporters before next month’s midterm elections.

Politico’s John Harris talks about the mudslinging between Carl Paladino and Andrew Cuomo. (Other)

Politico – South Dakota senator says her decision will affect him and all other potential GOP contenders.

The Tea Party Express makes a big deal about how Murkowski feels “entitled” to her Senate seat, that she some how “owns” it. Well, how about these tweets that Mudflats found?

Hmmm, maybe he ought to think about actually letting the people of Alaska vote before he announces he’s going to go house-hunting in DC. Someone must have pointed that out to him, because not too long after this image was captured by a Murkowski supporter, the tweets were deleted.

But you’ve got to ask, who has the sense of entitlement here?

How fun would it be to see that arrogance squashed on election day? Help out Scott McAdams and maybe, just maybe, we can see it.