of stories about Obama’s demise about which I am skeptical.
Fred Barnes of The Weekly Standard argues that the media lovefest for Obama has weakened Obama by making him lazy:
As a rule, the press is the scourge of presidents. They’re expected to endure unending scrutiny, mistrust, and badgering—plus hostility if they’re Republicans—by a hectoring herd of reporters and commentators in the mainstream media. But there’s an exception to the rule: President Obama.
It’s counterintuitive, but Obama has been hurt by the media’s leniency. Both his presidency and reelection prospects have suffered. He’s grown lazy and complacent. The media have encouraged him to believe his speeches are irresistible political catnip, though they aren’t. His overreliance on words hasn’t helped….
Absent pushing and prodding by the press, the Obama presidency has atrophied. His speeches are defensive and repetitive and filled with excuses. He passes the buck. With persistently high unemployment and a weak economy, Obama recently declared, in effect, “I have a plan. See you after my vacation.” The press doesn’t goad him to lead.
I agree with everything Barnes has said except the conclusion.
Obama was elected president because of media love, and the only reason he still has a strong shot at reelection is because of media love. That’s bad enough for me to conclude that the media love is a net benefit to Obama, because he can’t exist without it.
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I don’t know if he can’t exist without it, but he certainly can’t win elections without it. Which, I suppose, is the same thing at this point.
There seem to be a few rebels in that MSM love fest, but as the election gets closer, they will close ranks and march in lock step. As usual: rally behind the Democrat. Those breaking ranks are only permitted at this point, as a feint – an attempt to convince people that the MSM isn’t REALLY biased. Not really.
Whoever the Republicans nominate….it will be a bloodbath, I predict. Even if it’s Sarah Palin, who they have done everything they know but outright violence to take her down…..well, they might use some of that old time Chicago muscle to “convince” people. The left are more than capable of violence, framing people, using the “persuasion of power” to get what they want.
I hope I’m wrong. I fervently pray I’m wrong. But I have a sickening feeling in the pit of my stomach telling me that I’m right.
Naaah, he was always lazy. He’s been getting the love his whole life – publish much at the Harvard Law Review, did he?
Exactly.
Obama has a character fault. He has never had to actually man up. He wasn’t a good student so his academic record is sealed off from scrutiny. He wasn’t able to cut it in the real world so he heads for the easy path of “community organizer”.
Without affirmative action he might have actually earned something in life and be a much better person for learning the lessons of the real world. I’ll bet that he wouldn’t be so interested in putting taxes on people earning money.
Barnes is channeling his inner ‘earth mother’ and is showing his concern for the spiritual side of Obama and his personal struggle to come to grips with his inner demons.{snicker}
He’s right; Obama’s personal growth is not being done any good by the pandering, slobbering media. {boo freaking hoo}
Of course, as you say, that has nothing to do with whether that slobbering and pandering won’t help him get re-elected.
Barnes needs to stop check and see if he’s been taking his wife’s birth control pills by accident and stop. Then maybe he’ll grow a pair.
If you’ve been following Ulsterman’s White House Insider posts, here’s the latest…
White House Insider: Obama Rushed to Hurricane Irene “Photo-Op”
“Lastly, someone high up in the Obama team earlier in the week openly expressed a hope that Irene would be “A real big one.” Meaning they are desperate for an opportunity for the president to appear “presidential”. Apparently media outlets have already been contacted to assist in this effort of portraying Barack Obama as the “anti-Bush” regarding the current hurricane response.”
Read more: http://newsflavor.com/politics/us-politics/white-house-insider-obama-rushed-to-hurricane-irene-photo-op/#ixzz1WSYKqkJV
I’ve seen a number of analysis that attempt to quantify the benefit Democrats get from media bias. The conclusions are always in the 15-25 point range. The last one I saw came to the conclusion that, without the massive aid given by the media, Obama would’ve lost to McCain by 18 instead of winning by 7.
Agreed. He’s nothing without his MSM media shills.
The latest from the MSM … about the “Obama in Charge” glorified photo-op:
“CBS’ O’Donnell: Obama Displayed Engagement To Irene Relief by returning from vacation.
“CBS White House correspondent Norah O’Donnell said President Obama displayed his engagement to the federal government’s response to Hurricane Irene by returning a day early from vacation and meeting with the head of FEMA. O’Donnell says the administration wanted to make sure no comparison to the government’s handling of Katrina was made.
“I think it’s important to note too that the Obama administration was really determined to avoid any comparisons to the failed federal government response to Hurricane Katrina. So, President Obama made a very public display of his engagement on this issue. He returned from his vacation a day early. Yesterday, he went to the headquarters of FEMA where he talked not only with the head of FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security, but also all the Governors and state and local officials. So, that was key certainly for this President,” O’Donnell reported.”
How do you like that? He even “… talked not only with the head of FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security, but also all the Governors and state and local officials.”
Presumably without teleprompters.
While Barnes’ choice of word “atrophied” is imprecise, his conclusion is, in my book, spot on. Since Obama’s 2004 Democratic National Convention speech, he has been treated with a willfully ignorant hunger for a different kind of President. (And yes, the yearning for a visible suave that comforts their self-imposed guilt plays large amongst the left in public, and the legacy media in everything.)
The Obama Administration (and campaigns) have always been complacent, insofar as they know that the media was infatuated with the IDEA of a Barack Obama Presidency; and are the media is horrified of the revelation of their (willfully ignorant) infatuation, and what it has wrought. They have to cover for this President (to cover their own ineptitude). But Obama’s lame answers to softball questions that the media was so obvious in downplaying will not be as invisible to the unwashed voting public as both Obama and the MSM would like this time around.
And here is where Barnes’ point is valid. Obama is obviously smart, but his persuasive skills have never been tested; not even honed. He always had a media issued “Get Out of Jail Free” card. Now, that card will not be as “free”.
“Obama is obviously smart”
On what do you base this?
Accomplishments? Community organizer. What communities did he organize? How can you tell they are organized? Are they still organized? What benefits accrued to them or the rest of us due to their being organized?
Lawyer. What cases of note? Clients of note? as a adjunct law instructor, what articles did he publish?
As a legislator–more questions along same line.
Went to some fancy schools. Academic record? You can be quite certain that if he was an academic standout, we would know. Curious how the MSM can always dig up the GOP candidates grades, never quite can find the Democrats.
Many cite his rhetoric as evidence. First, he has speech writers, but lets give him credit for ownership. I find most of his speeches facile, full of bad logic and cheap rhetoric. Without the teleprompter the poor fool is lost. The MSM makes fun of Palin for making a speech with notes on her palm (a device I have often used); Obama can’t say “Hello” if the teleprompter isn’t working. Which one is smarter–if that be the measure?
I see nothing “obvious” about his intelligence.
Otherwise, I agree with your post.
I said smart, not accomplished, nor capable, nor worthy.
My whole point is that his intellect has been wholly unprepared by a lifetime of coddling by coastal elites so ashamed of, and apologetic for, their own good fortune. He is, and has been, entirely unprepared for the live of imperial adjudication I’m sure he has been told he should dream of – and so wanted to occupy. His ego, built by so many in his well-meaning but willfully ignorant teachers in his educational stream, is thus incapable of acknowledging that his plans, and his dreams of the perfect world, are pure leftist fantasy.
I am quibbling, but it is a pet peeve of mine. What set me off was the word “obviously”. What is obvious about his intelligence? “Obvious”, to me, pretty much equates to “accomplishments.”
Obama may be smart, but I have no way of knowing. He has shown me no evidence of same.
IMO, intelligence without accomplishments is a “so what”. In my professional career (technology) I have known a number of accomplished people that would not impress most as “smart”. I have also known a LOT that would impress most as “smart” but were functionally dumb as rocks.
Most of the time it comes down to verbal facility. If a person talks well and talks a lot, he/she gets the “smart” tag, even if the content of all the talk is lacking. IMO, that is the case with The One.
I almost agree that the MSM will do anything short of..well I can’t actually think of a line they won’t cross.
But…. The “almost”? I am old enough to remember when the POTUS was a Texas DEMOCRAT. ??? Last Democrat to win in a landslide. The MSM was in the tank for him, as well. But, when they turned they turned with a vengeance. To the point that the fact that we HAD a POTUS with the initials LBJ is almost out of the history books. It certainly isn’t mentioned in polite company.
Of course, LBJ was from Texas, didn’t go to the right schools, etc. He wasn’t naturally part of of the East Coast elite. He didn’t like them much and they moved to their natural state–which was hatred of him, even if he was a liberal Democrat.
If this worm turns, look out.
I’m totally looking forward to the first mainstream media figure to offer up a balls-out mea culpa: “We lied to you, America, and I’m sorry.”
They like to be the center of attention, so I’m sure one of ’em will do it.
I’m thinking most of the media has several pair of finely embroidered kneepads all proudly proclaiming I BLOW THE O
The 2012 election will not be about Obama. Bank on it. Conservatives have not been able to communicate a vision that resonates with the population. The TEA Party message has been outflanked by the Leftists and their media friends. If the election were about Obama, he would lose his ass. But this will be about this:
Do the majority of Americans want their country to be based on self-reliance; that everyone can be what they want to be based on their own hard work? Or do the majority of Americans want to sit around and wait for the government to take care of their every need?
I fear it is the latter.
After extensive research, Dr. Tim Groseclose, an economics and political science professor at UCLA, has written a book on the media bias in our nation. Left Turn, the book, seemed interesting enough for me to order.
But it wouldn’t be the first time that bias toward the right has been found to be true. I believe that there was a lenghty study done a few years back by a couple of UCLA professors who showed that most journalists are extremely liberal.
I wonder if those professors got paid to prove in a study something we have known for a long time.
While the MSM’s influence is almost certainly a net benefit for Obama, it might not be enough of a net benefit to win him re-election. Obama is like a young man over-coddled by a loving mother.
A bit of tough love from his fanboys in the media might do Obama a world of good.
Think of it as a live by the sword, die by the sword” proposition. The bad economy and the MSM dropped the presidency in Obama’s lap, but the economy and Obama’s MSM enablers just might unwittingly take it all away.
It looks to me like the Democrats will try to make the election about: eeek Medicare; eeeek anti-abortion judicial appointees; eeek racism; and Obama he got bin Laden and did a war in Libya right.
Suddenly, by the way, Michelle Obama has transmogrified into a “key abortion rights activist”. http://weaselzippers.us/2011/08/29/michelle-obama-holding-fundraiser-with-feminazi-icon-gloria-steinem-and-other-abortion-fanatics-to-raise-money-baracks-reelection/ and see
http://wonkette.com/452164/michelle-obama-suddenly-a-feminist-hosts-abortion-themed-luncheon
Prof.Jacobson ….have you seen this
http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2011/08/28/new-blue-nightmare-clarence-thomas-and-the-amendment-of-doom/
FTA: “Thomas has been pioneering the techniques and the ideas that could not only lead to the court rejecting all or part of President Obama’s health legislation; the ideas and strategies Thomas has developed could conceivably topple the constitutionality of the post New Deal state.”
God bless Justice Thomas.
Yes. I’ll link in a new post, everyone needs to read it.
This next election is for the “NOT-Obama” to lose.
I’ll go with the model put forth by Kerrvillian and Yackums. I believe Obama has been isolated from the negative consequences of his negative behaviors all of his life by programs such as affirmative action. As Barnes mentions, the press is now complicit in failing to properly vet him, scrutinize his actions, etc. Has this been to his detriment? Yes. The damage to his character, however, was done long ago.
One of the unintended consequences of giving people a pass because of their race is that all of their other attributes also get a pass when this is done. Thus, if Obama was a charlatan (which I think he is), that character flaw would also be overlooked when he was allowed to walk around the turnstile everyone else has to walk through.
Since Obama, like many others, has been granted exemption from scrutiny, due to programs like affirmative action, he never had to deal with negative feedback and thus he never learned how to modulate his behavior to satisfy others or to meet the performance criteria for any portion he held. We see this in government to a large extent. Even people other than designated minorities gravitate towards government jobs where they know they will never have to sing for their supper because they will work for an entity that will never have any competition. We also see it in the field of medicine where doctors have little concern about an ample supply of sick people to treat. In medicine, this can be seen in doctors who have poor communication skills and in administrative practices (have you ever had to wait in a doctor’s office or spend hours in the ER?) where there is no concept of customer satisfaction that most other businesses have to deal with.
Obama developed his speaking skills because he learned early on that if he simply showed up (voting present) and he spoke without a “Negro dialect” (Thank you Harry Reid) he would advance. The problem now is that we have allowed him to advance into the Presidency, and he is simply not qualified for the job. Since Obama has little in the way of qualifications and abilities, he must resort to manipulative language to convince people of his worth. The gap between his rhetoric and his accomplishments is now just too wide to bridge. The press may have helped him, but their actions were much more beneficial than detrimental.
The MSM or legacy journalism is absolutely terrified to be called “racist” in any way shape or form. It’s the third rail of political correctness to criticize liberal blacks like Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Charlie Rangel, or anyone else they want to place under their unmbrella of protection, like Franklin Raines. I suspect it has something to do with many of them coming of age during the Civil Rights era, or being mentored by others who did.
Notice that if a black leader is conservative, the media is astonished, and often portrays them as “traitors to their people”, or at the very least, as dupes.
It will take overcoming a huge mental hurdle for the media to really start putting O through the guantlet he deserves.
1. Obama was elected president because of media love, and the only reason he still has a strong shot at reelection is because of media love.
Media love, and Republican overconfidence.
The GOP Establishment’s response to the losses of 2006 & 2008 was to hope that the Left would make fatal mistakes, after which Bush/Rove/DeLay/Lott business as usual would resume. IMO November 2010 probably made them feel like geniuses; never mind the too-big-for-its-britches Tea Party.
Despite some unforced errors, the Tea Party has been successful at the state and local levels, but is it ready for the prime time of a national election?
2. The venom in politics has become pervasive. Opinions are formulated not to persuade the other side’s voters, but to insult & repel them; even independents are castigated as Unbelievers. In this atmosphere of self-reinforcing polarization, conservatives may be underestimating Obama’s prospects.