Today is the day Obama settles all family business.

POTUS with Jay Carney – announcing Carney's departure as WH Press Secretary. "I'm going to miss him a lot." pic.twitter.com/HqIbiuDgCS

— Major Garrett (@MajorCBS) May 30, 2014

Meet your new White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest – he's the one smiling broadly. pic.twitter.com/7ZuHb3vJtd

— Major Garrett (@MajorCBS) May 30, 2014

Gotta give The One his due. He may not know much, like how to keep sick veterans from dying while they wait endlessly for government health care, but he knows what the media likes. Having Carney step down today is a neat way to help crowd out some of the Shinseki news, as there’s nothing the press finds more interesting than the press. Well played, Mr. President. Tough break for conservative writers, though, in landing Josh Earnest as a replacement. There’s only one person in the White House’s mouthpiece food chain who might have provided us with as much blogworthy haplessness as Jay, and it ain’t Earnest. But then, realistically, Jen Psaki never stood a chance. You know why.

As for Carney, whose departure has been expected for months, the sky’s the limit — book deal, MSNBC contributor, maybe even an occasional guest-host spot on “Crossfire” if he plays his cards right. Rumor had it that he wanted to be ambassador to Russia; critics claim he wasn’t qualified to deal with a character as slippery as Putin, but I don’t know. He seems pretty qualified to me. (Plus, he’s already got the art to decorate the embassy.) Ah well. As Dan McLaughlin says, he’ll be back to fair ‘n balanced “objective journalism” in no time. Just like he used to do before he went to work for the White House, you see.

Exit question: Dude, what happened here?

https://twitter.com/BrettLoGiurato/status/472442722557886464