Well, enough with the intro, let’s have at it.
Neil Munro and Tucker
(Bowtie) Carlson. It should come as
no surprise to anyone that President Obama has been thoroughly disrespected by
a multitude of people from the right-wing media to members of Congress (bet you
thought we’d forgotten about you, Joe Wilson), but this latest affront was so
egregious and so over the top, it left even me speechless, and that takes a
lot.
In case you missed it – and you would’ve had to have been
off the planet or in a coma to miss it – Neil Monro of The Daily Caller repeatedly interrupted the President while he was
delivering a speech to a press gathering.
Despite several attempts by Obama to explain that it was not the time
for questions, Monro persisted in his heckling.
How bad was Monro’s conduct?
Former spokesman for George W. Bush, Tony Fratto, along with Fox News
anchors Shepard Smith and Chris Wallace condemned it, that’s how bad. All three said that Monro should have his
White House credentials revoked. You
know you’ve stepped in some pretty deep shit when a former member of the Bush Administration
and two Fox employees end up defending this president over you. I’m pretty sure it’s a crime punishable by torture
[or being forced to watch Gretchen Carlson and Steve Doocey try their hand at
journalism. Oh wait, that’s the same
thing] to side with Obama on anything over at Fox, so trust me, Monro really
screwed up here.
But, as atrocious as Monro’s insolence was, it was equaled only
by his boss, Tucker Carlson. Seems old
Bowtie couldn’t understand what all the hubbub was about. Not only did he defend Monro, he dug the hole
deeper by insisting “This is what
reporters are supposed to do. They're
supposed to get their questions answered.”
To emphasize his
point, Carlson brought up Sam Donaldson, who was often an aggressive White
House reporter during the Reagan years.
Of course, Bowtie conveniently forgot to mention that while Donaldson
was aggressive in his questioning of Reagan, he never interrupted one of his
speeches. To do so would’ve been
disrespectful and you just don’t do that to the President of the United States.
But therein lies
the real crux of the matter: respect.
There’s just something about this President that somehow allows the
Right to believe it can get away with virtually anything it wants with no
consequence at all. Even as unpopular as
George Bush was, I don’t ever recall him being so thoroughly dissed. Yes, he was fodder for the late-night comedians;
yes his decision making was often fair game for his opponents. But while the Left blasted him for his
policies, it never pulled the kind of stunts that Neil Monro pulled at this
briefing. I don’t recall one Senator or
Congressman shouting out “You Lie,” during a Bush address. And if ever there was a president who
deserved to have those words shouted at him, it would’ve been old W for
sticking us with the a trillion dollar illegal war.
I guess that’s the price you have to pay when you’re the
political equivalent of Jackie Robinson.
You have to take the barbs and the slights so that you don’t come off as
an angry black man. Except for one
thing. While Robinson had to walk and
act like a gentlemen in public, even while being called every despicable name
possible, it was on the playing field that he exacted his revenge. Robinson was merciless towards his
opponents. He was one of baseball’s most
fierce competitors. He was more than
just the first of his kind; he raised the standard by which all ballplayers –
black and white – are measured. That’s
why he’s in the hall of fame.
Obama, by contrast, has adopted Robinson’s public persona, with
none of his fiery competitiveness in the field of play. The result has been that his opponents often
consider him an easy mark. In his zeal
not to be seen as merely a black man – as though that were even possible – he has
ironically unleashed the worst vestiges of a segment of the population that
sees nothing but his skin color. No
matter how hard he tries, he can’t hide the fact that he is a black man in a
white man’s world.
And because he naturally wants to prove he is above those
who hold such views, he ends up enabling idiots like Neil Monro and his asinine
boss Tucker Carlson to imply with a straight face that they are only doing
their jobs.
They may not think their actions are racist, but they are. And the longer this President keeps
pretending he can take the high road, the more emboldened they become. I have said this on more than one
occasion. Obama needs to get his dander
up. No he doesn’t have to go all gansta
on his opponents, but he needs to stop being a human piñata.
I was certainly no fan of George Bush, but there was one
trait of his that I did admire. He had
the ability to completely ignore any criticism that was levied at him and just
go with what his gut told him. In fact,
every president I can think of from Clinton to Reagan to Johnson to Truman had
an innate ability to both drive a narrative while at the same time damning the
torpedoes. Not one of them would’ve
allowed themselves to be treated in such a humiliating fashion.
By comparison, Obama seems like the college professor who is
desperately trying to persuade the miscreants in his class that they should
study harder so they can get better grades.
You don’t reason with hatred and ignorance; you call it out for the
world to see.
Is there a possibility that by standing up to it that Obama
might be seen as overreacting and playing the race card? I submit it’s a little late in the game to worry
about that. The Right has been playing
the race card for four years. It’s high
time this President called them on it.
Jackie Robinson was black; so was Curt Flood. Right now the country needs the latter more
than the former.
Americans love a fighter.
It’s time Barack Obama learned to put up his dukes.
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/fox-news-anchors-condemn-daily-caller-reporter
Comments
If he called them out on it, he'd come across as a whiner. Better to ignore it--there a lot of people who will say it for him, anyway. You say he is "enabling" Monro and Carlson, and I think that is just what he means to do--make them keep getting more and more brash until they finally say something so outrageous that the majority of people are taken aback by it.
That's my opinion, and while I definitely can see where you're coming from, I think Obama is doing the right thing.