Jarrett will stay in job 'until the lights go off'

It's unusual for White House aides to stay all eight exhausting years of a two-term presidency, but President Obama's senior adviser Valerie Jarrett says she plans to go the distance.

"Oh, my goodness, I intend to stay until the lights go off," Jarrett told The New York Times Magazine. "Why would I miss a single second of this?"

Jarrett also downplayed reports that her close friendship with the president and first lady Michelle Obama makes some other White House aides uncomfortable.

Said Jarrett to the Times: "In a town where access is so important, initially it probably made people a little uncomfortable. I think that has faded. I just want to do my job, and part of my job for the president is to be his friend."

She also shot down the Times' suggestion that her influence is similar to that of Vice President Dick Cheney during the George W. Bush administration.

"Stop right there," Jarrett said. "The president listens to people who have interesting things to say — that could be the most junior person on the staff or it could be a senior adviser or it could be a person who whispers something to him across a rope line."