“Blunt charm”. One way to describe Rahm Emanuel?

The ever-evolving picture of the new White House chief of staff is getting more fascinating the more his friends, colleagues and sometimes political foes reveal about his background and his personality.

This piece captures quite a bit of it, and the headline alone explains his appointment. President-elect Obama is known for cool, calculated rhetoric. Emanuel is known for….”Rahm bombs”?

Emanuel’s flair for the well-timed verbal hand grenade — or epithet or insult or, in one case, an actual dead fish — has grown legendary during his 16-year career in politics. His explosive style, and midnight work habits, have fueled a noisy migration up Pennsylvania Avenue, from White House fixer under Bill Clinton to a House leadership position on Capitol Hill…mixing one of Washington’s most combustible temperaments with President-elect Barack Obama’s celebrated cool.

Somewhere I saw it referred to as the ‘good cop-bad cop’ routine. It worked like a charm during Obama’s campaign, between him and his campaign manager.

“He is that rare breed who can engage in a back-alley fight but also understands that there’s a time to set aside bare-knuckle fights and attempt to move an agenda,” said Rep. Adam Putnam (R-Fla.), who has battled Emanuel in the House.

Remember when George H.W. Bush came into office and called for a “kinder, gentler America”? If you were hoping for that in this administration, Emanuel’s position as the White House traffic cop quickly re-shapes that thinking.

But it’s Emanuel’s congressional Rolodex that may be most of use to the Obama administration. With Joe Biden’s intimate lock on Senate relations, Emanuel’s three terms in the House could prove invaluable. Despite the egos he bruised along the way, Democrats hail Emanuel as an electoral Moses. As chairman of the 2006 Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Emanuel delivered the party from 12 years in the minority wilderness.

But his accomplishment came at the cost of bitter feuds with party Chairman Howard Dean, Congressional Black Caucus members and several candidates he pushed off the ballot in favor of his favorite centrists.

Centrists? Here’s an interesting part of how he did that:

Many of the candidates Emanuel recruited are now members of the fiscally conservative Blue Dog caucus, a group of Democrats Obama will badly need for any of his pricier initiatives.

“These are folks that know that Rahm looked out for them both in the campaign and in their first term in Congress,” said Amy Walter of the Hotline political report.

The Blue Dogs were the conservatives who put Democrats over the top in their ’06 win of a narrow congressional majority. Their conservative values was what won. Conservatives wondered how much they would be heard (or heard from) once the Democratic controlled congress got down to business. The answer turned out to be…no much. But then, that turned out to be a do-nothing Congress in general.

Emanuel’s close work with the Blue Dogs is good to hear, and the Americans with conservative values who elected them hope that relationship continues.

Here’s how a former business associate describes working with Emanuel:

“He could go from the politics of the deal to the economics of the deal to the corporate strategy of the deal, and he just goes back and forth like quicksilver,” …

Hopefully, he’ll deal with Congress keeping a healthy respect for his Blue Dog recruits. Some worry Emanuel will give no ear to conservatives with pro-life views. But….it’s a new day. And anything can happen.