Keep your friends close. Keep your enemies closer.
An_American_Karol
· 10 months ago
I don't have a problem with George Will; he came out early against McCain and his choice of Palin, not to mention his anger with Bush, but Kristol? Really?
Bubbles
· 10 months ago
Here's the point: Obama is a heavy weight. He's all substance. He shows up with as much intellect and background as anyone in the room. And he has been grandly gracious to boot.
And here you have some of the most petty minds in the country with access to widespread media who have been cherry picking through history and civics to discredit or undermine him. Now he showing them real courtesy.
Imagine how small someone one like George Will must feel, after he's spent the last two months trying to persuade everyone and their brother, including Krugmann and Kuttner that Keynesian economics didn't work in the 1930s.
I agree, this is just brilliant stuff on Obama's part. He's buying political capital with this, these guys will turn down some of their rhetoric, and some, the smart ones, will keep it down until Obama does something really stupid. But the smart ones know when they are in the presence of their betters - I mean in intellectual terms in the field of civics.
And the really smart ones, will acknowledge that Bush would never have sat down and broke bread with the likes of Obermann, Dion, Maddow -- because in Bush's case, he would be the mental midget in the room, breaking bread with his betters. If Karl Rove would have left Bush in a room with Obermann, Dion and Maddow, long enough they might have talked Bush into rolling back tax cuts and signing the Kyoto protocol.
Gridlock
· 10 months ago
"Imagine how small someone one like George Will must feel, after he's spent the last two months trying to persuade everyone and their brother, including Krugmann and Kuttner that Keynesian economics didn't work in the 1930s. "
You're assuming these.. people... have a conscience, that they care what anybody else thinks.. that they feel any kind of remorse at all.
Where have you been for the last 8 years? These people are pitiless vipers. They don't give one whit wtf Obama thinks of them, nor the American public whom they dismiss out of hand.
Bubbles
· 10 months ago
I am well aware of these peoples contempt and lack of conscience. That's not my point.
These people do know humiliation. They do know what its like to be bullied. That's what they are all about. They're even more intimidated by courage, which, when they compare to Bush, they realize how inadequate they are on their side, because he didn't have the courage or the intelligence to do this kind of thing. That is humiliating.
He's making them feel small - in a subtle passive aggressive way. That undermines them, no matter what they do or how they choose to react.
The smart ones won't bite back at that, the dumb ones will and it will undermine them even further. It is an abyss for them, either way.
This is part of a long term campaign on his part to "rumpify the rump of the rump of the GOP to where it is of dwindling significance.
My take, anyway.
SkippyFlipjack
· 10 months ago
Potential reward: Obama does indeed make a connection with one or two of them (he already has with David Brooks) and they're a bit more charitable to him in the early days of his presidency, or at least don't spend every waking moment trying to bring him down. Potential risk: I'm not seeing one. That he'll have two too many glasses of Macallan 17-year and walk away from the house wanting to dismantle social security?
lucky hussein
· 10 months ago
I don't believe the reich-wing gives a crap about whoever their 'betters' are. I don't know about this strategy, I just hope the void doesn't look back at Obama as he stares into it...
Older_Wiser
· 10 months ago
Why?
benb
· 10 months ago
Speaking of conservatives, Ed Rollins slices up Bush at his last press conference:
"President Bush is not a crook either. And even more importantly, I don't believe he is dishonest or an incompetent. The mistakes of his presidency were caused by overconfidence, bad information or a certain arrogance that was still fully on display yesterday."
F ed rollins. F cnn. typical corporate media f-ing bs story...
High Crimes & Misdemeanors
· 10 months ago
BenB - you have misconstrued the cnn post. rollins is merely shifting the responsibility from the bush crime family to bad information, overconfidence and arrogance? hardly slices. The propagandist like rollins knows which side of his bread is buttered.
ComradeRutherford
· 10 months ago
This is where is Republican masters give him his orders on what he's allowed to do and what he is forbidden from doing. Every president goes through this, since Nixon's day, at least.
High Crimes & Misdemeanors
· 10 months ago
or - since the media is the mouth piece of the oligarchy, maybe Obama is getting his marching orders from the right wingers like will and such.....???
Not sure, but I wouldn't doubt it...
tlsintx
· 10 months ago
if it's true, Obama better watch his back. it won't be the bloggers he needs to watch, btw...
Chris From Maine
· 10 months ago
so Obama had a meeting with the cheerleaders of the people who have helped run this country into the ground these past few years... Apparently Will, KRISTOL!, Krauthammer, and David Brooks were there. Why in god's name would Obama even sit in a room with these slime?
Oh, and he is keeping most of Bush's war people in their jobs, and isnt going to prosecute any of the Bush regime..
I thought that finally we had a real President. Someone I could believe in. How horribly naive of me.
SkippyFlipjack
· 10 months ago
I don't have a problem with this. We wanted "change", and we're looking at it. Bush famously courted the press pool by giving them affectionate nicknames. McCain invited them all tire-swinging. What's so wrong with Obama trying to dull the knives of the blowhards of the right?
It's really not that different from the time that Bush shared a pool cabana with Frank Rich, Maureen Dowd and Keith Olbermann. (Oh right...)
Chris From Maine
· 10 months ago
but the fact is those "knives" are always aimed at him, no matter how much he will try to "dull" them. If Obama thinks having dinner with right wingers will convert them to Obama's side, he will quickly learn that no Republican can EVER be trusted. The last 8 years have proven that.
It's not time to "come together" IMHO. It's time to completely eliminate those who have wrecked this country. We can never allow them to get any kind of power ever again.
truebluecoondog
· 10 months ago
But, Chris, you overlook an important point; these guys already have power. They are journalists (or what passes for one these days) who are consistently given air time and press space. I would think that BO may have set some ground rules, let them get to know his intellect a little bit and also got a feel himself of what these folks think about him and the current situation. Smart move actually. Ignoring them or trying to cut them off completely would just encourage them to try to damage him.
Indigo
· 10 months ago
So many possible takes on an event like that. Obama gets his marching orders? George Will does penance? Kristol learns his new boundaries? The shoot out comes later? The Illuminati hold a policy conference? A pack of smokers puff away together? What matter here isn't what happened, what matters is the powerhouse writing from the pool. Awesome report! To the point! Clear! No BS! What if print papers wrote like that?
PJ
· 10 months ago
It's refreshing to see that teh gay's aren't demanding equal munchy time.
Peace!
John Aravosis
· 10 months ago
Anybody else you'd like to gratuitously insult while you're at it?
elizabethcostello
· 10 months ago
He wants them to make nice, even though they're probably still convinced that he's a white-hating Muslim apostate who wants to have Reverend Wright preach on the White House lawn, hold fried chicken and chitlin (with a crack pick-me-up) dinners every other Saturday, turn all the civil service jobs over to black people and latinos, let gays marry and have orgies in the West Wing, and auction off pretty blonde white suburban girls to various Arabs across the Middle East with Osama bin Laden acting as the auctioneer. I guess breaking bread with these ghouls can't hurt, but he should watch his neck, make sure someone tastes the food first, and not ever turn his back towards any of them.
lark83
· 10 months ago
After years of the likes of Tom Delay and George Bush, we are shocked at this tactic. We shouldn't be though. All intelligent men do these kinds of things with their ideological opponents.
Bubbles is right. Obama is a heavyweight and all substance. He is not "intellectually" afraid of these guys, or anyone else.
High Crimes & Misdemeanors
· 10 months ago
Lark83, you are right, Bubbles has made some good points....
We shall see how this pans out in the first 100 days.
But we are already seeing the blame game from the media. Looks what they have said: If his stimulus plan "doesn't work out, he may very well be a one-term president," said Jeff Zeleny,
"Everyone should calm down. Barack Obama's dinner with George F. Will, William Kristol, David Brooks, and Charles Krauthammer doesn't mean that he's selling out to the right. Quite the contrary. It indicates that Obama is completing the job of detaching the conservative intellectual elite from the GOP itself."
even more interesting:
"No, what's remains troubling isn't Obama, but the reaction of the Senate leadership to his presidency. Something has gone deeply awry when Obama has to threaten to issue a veto on Tuesday to Democrats, warning that he will not allow them to prevent him from using another $350 billion in bailout funds. It's amazing that the Democrats, who rolled over for George W. Bush for much of eight years, including passing his prohibitively costly tax cuts early in his first term, have now suddenly found the courage to oppose a president who comes from their own ranks. "
truebluecoondog
· 10 months ago
I agree completely on both counts.
ComradeRutherford
· 10 months ago
It is so blatantly obvious: The Democratic Leadership is under the direct control of the Republican Party, that is the ONLY explanation that fits. The Dems do nothing to stop even the worst of the GOP agenda, and fight tooth and nail against every single Liberal or Progressive idea that even comes close to Congress.
And the Democratic party works hard to run actual Democrats out of Congress. Look at how the Democratic Leadership torpedoed Ned Lamont and bolstered GOP operative Lieberman. That's just one example.
There is no other explanation that makes any sense. The Democratic Leadership has been fully controlled by the GOP since Reagan's time, when the Democratic leaders in Congress made a public statement that all Republican Presidents have legal immunity from Congress to commit any war crimes or all direct and treasonous violations of the US Constitution. They pledged back then at the start of the Iran-Contra Treason that the Democratic Leadership would do everything they could to prevent any GOP President from being accountable to the law or the Constitution.
Look at how Pelosi has fought every shred of accountability of Bush.
jaja
· 10 months ago
he'll need to coat his stomach with pepto-bismol, then convince his tablemates that the country really IS in trouble this time and the usual pundit-tated status quo won't cut it this time. stuborn,rightwing b.s. is what led this country over the cliff and they shouldn't have or be given any charitable capital. or credence for that matter.
Brock Ducharme
· 10 months ago
Aravosis, do you think GW Bush ever would have had the sack to go to dinner with YOU? Could he have survived an evening at EJ Dionne's house with the staff of Buzzflash? In their tiny, scared minds, it would have been unthinkable. That's why I find this to be great Washingtonian display of testicular elephantitis. Somebody who honestly isn't afraid of an intellectual argument - this is what we fought for.
paulbe
· 10 months ago
Ya'think?? Seriously? I'm glad your glass is always half full.
renegademom
· 10 months ago
I agree with Mr. Ducharme. And, I would rather see my glass as half full, and then work to fill it up to the tippy tippy top.
MNUSA
· 10 months ago
Good point. It's hard to get exposed to different ideas when all you want around you are "yes-men."
LuZenMyMnd
· 10 months ago
I find it so interesting that so many decide to panic when they think Obama isn't kow-tailing to what they THINK he should do and who he should be having dinner with. This is absolutely ridiculous. Obama is NO dummy.
It amazes me that so many THINK they have THE RIGHT to try to tell this Man HOW he should try to negotiate and work the other side of the aisle. All these opinions are just like a$$holes. Everybody's got one. Good grief....give the man a break. Let him try to find commonality where he can. There's enough time for big fights later on. Not on whether we THINK he is compromising. (And there Must be compromise somewhere) We've got huge fish to fry....but let's catch them all first. We really need as many hands on deck as we can get. The detractors will always be there.....I find it amazing that all of a sudden all these dems have heart and courage and want to criticize the man they voted in and attempt to tie his hands at every angle.
Obama is NObody's BOY. He has a very intelligent mind and in quite a few instances is capable of out-thinking and out-reasoning the best.
Anon
· 10 months ago
The three people named, Will, Brooks and Kristol, are certainly representatives of a political philosophy antithetical to Obama's, but they are not demigogic, strident, propagandists. If anything, these people are closer to what true conservatism is. It is possible to dialogue with such people and have good honest intellectual discussions. They are very different from the Bill Oreilly's, the Sean Hannity's and the Rush Limbaugh's. The latter three are buffoons.
truebluecoondog
· 10 months ago
I'd love to have been a fly on the wall - but then, I wouldn't eat in a place that had flies on the walls.
MNUSA
· 10 months ago
I really am proud that we elected Obama. He's the flip side of the coin from George Bush. The Repubs have to be so envious. Who in their party even comes close to having his attributes? Yesterday Hillary Clinton blew them away with her knowledge and intellect. And who do the Repubs have - Sarah Palin?
All Comments
And here you have some of the most petty minds in the country with access to widespread media who have been cherry picking through history and civics to discredit or undermine him. Now he showing them real courtesy.
Imagine how small someone one like George Will must feel, after he's spent the last two months trying to persuade everyone and their brother, including Krugmann and Kuttner that Keynesian economics didn't work in the 1930s.
I agree, this is just brilliant stuff on Obama's part. He's buying political capital with this, these guys will turn down some of their rhetoric, and some, the smart ones, will keep it down until Obama does something really stupid. But the smart ones know when they are in the presence of their betters - I mean in intellectual terms in the field of civics.
And the really smart ones, will acknowledge that Bush would never have sat down and broke bread with the likes of Obermann, Dion, Maddow -- because in Bush's case, he would be the mental midget in the room, breaking bread with his betters. If Karl Rove would have left Bush in a room with Obermann, Dion and Maddow, long enough they might have talked Bush into rolling back tax cuts and signing the Kyoto protocol.
You're assuming these.. people... have a conscience, that they care what anybody else thinks.. that they feel any kind of remorse at all.
Where have you been for the last 8 years? These people are pitiless vipers. They don't give one whit wtf Obama thinks of them, nor the American public whom they dismiss out of hand.
These people do know humiliation. They do know what its like to be bullied. That's what they are all about. They're even more intimidated by courage, which, when they compare to Bush, they realize how inadequate they are on their side, because he didn't have the courage or the intelligence to do this kind of thing. That is humiliating.
He's making them feel small - in a subtle passive aggressive way. That undermines them, no matter what they do or how they choose to react.
The smart ones won't bite back at that, the dumb ones will and it will undermine them even further. It is an abyss for them, either way.
This is part of a long term campaign on his part to "rumpify the rump of the rump of the GOP to where it is of dwindling significance.
My take, anyway.
Potential risk: I'm not seeing one. That he'll have two too many glasses of Macallan 17-year and walk away from the house wanting to dismantle social security?
"President Bush is not a crook either. And even more importantly, I don't believe he is dishonest or an incompetent. The mistakes of his presidency were caused by overconfidence, bad information or a certain arrogance that was still fully on display yesterday."
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/13/rollins....
Not sure, but I wouldn't doubt it...
Oh, and he is keeping most of Bush's war people in their jobs, and isnt going to prosecute any of the Bush regime..
I thought that finally we had a real President. Someone I could believe in. How horribly naive of me.
It's really not that different from the time that Bush shared a pool cabana with Frank Rich, Maureen Dowd and Keith Olbermann. (Oh right...)
It's not time to "come together" IMHO. It's time to completely eliminate those who have wrecked this country. We can never allow them to get any kind of power ever again.
Peace!
Bubbles is right. Obama is a heavyweight and all substance. He is not "intellectually" afraid of these guys, or anyone else.
We shall see how this pans out in the first 100 days.
But we are already seeing the blame game from the media. Looks what they have said: If his stimulus plan "doesn't work out, he may very well be a one-term president," said Jeff Zeleny,
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/mediaculture/119135/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jacob-heilbrunn/i...
"Everyone should calm down. Barack Obama's dinner with George F. Will, William Kristol, David Brooks, and Charles Krauthammer doesn't mean that he's selling out to the right. Quite the contrary. It indicates that Obama is completing the job of detaching the conservative intellectual elite from the GOP itself."
even more interesting:
"No, what's remains troubling isn't Obama, but the reaction of the Senate leadership to his presidency. Something has gone deeply awry when Obama has to threaten to issue a veto on Tuesday to Democrats, warning that he will not allow them to prevent him from using another $350 billion in bailout funds. It's amazing that the Democrats, who rolled over for George W. Bush for much of eight years, including passing his prohibitively costly tax cuts early in his first term, have now suddenly found the courage to oppose a president who comes from their own ranks. "
And the Democratic party works hard to run actual Democrats out of Congress. Look at how the Democratic Leadership torpedoed Ned Lamont and bolstered GOP operative Lieberman. That's just one example.
There is no other explanation that makes any sense. The Democratic Leadership has been fully controlled by the GOP since Reagan's time, when the Democratic leaders in Congress made a public statement that all Republican Presidents have legal immunity from Congress to commit any war crimes or all direct and treasonous violations of the US Constitution. They pledged back then at the start of the Iran-Contra Treason that the Democratic Leadership would do everything they could to prevent any GOP President from being accountable to the law or the Constitution.
Look at how Pelosi has fought every shred of accountability of Bush.
It amazes me that so many THINK they have THE RIGHT to try to tell this Man HOW he should try to negotiate and work the other side of the aisle. All these opinions are just like a$$holes. Everybody's got one. Good grief....give the man a break. Let him try to find commonality where he can. There's enough time for big fights later on. Not on whether we THINK he is compromising. (And there Must be compromise somewhere) We've got huge fish to fry....but let's catch them all first. We really need as many hands on deck as we can get. The detractors will always be there.....I find it amazing that all of a sudden all these dems have heart and courage and want to criticize the man they voted in and attempt to tie his hands at every angle.
Obama is NObody's BOY. He has a very intelligent mind and in quite a few instances is capable of out-thinking and out-reasoning the best.