There's something egglike about the concept of experience as a qualification for the highest office. At first blush, the idea appears to be something you can get your hands around. Presidential experience means a familiarity with the levers and dials of government, knowing how to cajole the Congress, understanding when to rely on the Joint Chiefs of Staff and when to call on the National Security Council--that sort of thing. But bear down even slightly, and the notion of experience is liable to crack and run all over.12
The Time correspondent then poses this question: "Was it Frank- lin Roosevelt's experience as governor of New York that gave him the power to inspire in some of the nation's darkest hours? Or was that gift a distillate of his dauntless battle with polio?"13
The core of it: Experience may or may not matter, but for Barack, it doesn't matter. He's Barack, after all.
Newsweek has had some of the most embarrassing, slobbery covers of Obama yet. That weekly definitely gets the Nina Bur- leigh award! After his victory in Iowa, Newsweek carried an iconic photo of Obama smiling with this quote from him: "Our time for change has come." In it, the editors called Obama an "icon of hope" who won't "kneecap" his foes. His campaign, Newsweek ogled, is "not about Red America or Blue America, but Obama's America."14
Other fawning cover stories on Obama included one with him stepping into what is presumably Air Force One with the caption "How to Fix the World." Another with him praying and the caption "What He Believes." But probably the most outrageous and the most prescient of how badly the media would be biased toward him during the presidential campaign was the December 20, 2004, Newsweek cover story with Obama: "Seeing Purple: A Rising Star Who Wants to Get Beyond Blue vs. Red." The entire premise was built off one speech, the speech Obama gave during the 2004 Democratic National Convention. Bear in mind that this speech was one giant heap of nothingness, offering little detail.
Astonishingly, many "reporters" were open about their bias. At an Obama rally, Lee Cowan, the NBC correspondent assigned to cover B.H.O. on the campaign trail, had this exchange with Brian Williams: "From a reporter's point of view, it's almost hard to remain objective because it's infectious, the energy, I think. It sort of goes against your core to say that as a reporter, but the crowds have gotten so much bigger, his energy has gotten stronger. He feeds off that."15
If that weren't unbelievable enough, Cowan doubled down on his bro-mance, confessing to the New York Times that it's "especially hard" for him and his colleagues "not to drink the Kool-Aid."
"It's so rapturous, everything around him. All these huge rallies," he added.16
Hey, at least this dude's honest about his love affair with Barack. I'll give him that much. As the 2008 election demonstrated, our fearless journalists' cup runneth over with "Kool-Aid." In a Time cover story (yes, another one) titled "Why Barack Obama Could Be the Next President," Joe Klein described Obama as "the political equivalent of a rainbow--a sudden preternatural event inspiring awe and ecstasy."17 I'm sure being compared to a rainbow was even a first for Obama. Klein's exaltation really had no limits. In fact, B.H.O. would eliminate all discord in America, according to Klein.
There aren't very many people--ebony, ivory or other--who have Obama's distinctive portfolio of talents. . . . He transcends the racial divide so effortlessly that it seems reasonable to expect that he can bridge all the other divisions--and answer all the impossible questions--plaguing American public life.18
The Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journal- ism picked up on the bias. Before the Iowa caucus, Pew noted that Obama had gained nearly double the favorable coverage that Hillary Clinton had received, and nearly four times more favorable coverage than John McCain.19 I wonder what tipped Pew off? Perhaps the comparison of Obama to a rainbow?
In a similar study, Pew found that in the time period from the Republican National Convention to the final presidential debate, John McCain was getting pilloried by the press: negative stories outweighing positive ones by a factor of more than 3 to 1.20
Politico's John Harris was asked on CNN whether he thought journalists were, in fact, rooting for Obama. Harris said yes, relaying this monumental gem from his days at the Washington Post: "a couple years ago, you would send a reporter out with Obama, and it was like they needed to go through detox when they came back--'Oh, he's so impressive, he's so charismatic,' and we're kind of like, 'Down, boy.' "
It turns out "reporters" at the Washington Post never did get those detox sessions. On Christmas Day of 2008, the paper ran a front-page story on Obama's workout routine that highlighted his "chiseled pectorals." I kid you not. Meet Eli Saslow:
Between workouts during his Hawaii vacation this week, [Obama] was photographed looking like the paradigm of a new kind of presidential fitness, one geared less toward preventing heart attacks than winning swimsuit competitions. The sun glinted off chiseled pectorals sculpted during four weightlifting sessions each week, and a body toned by regular treadmill runs and basketball games.21 (Emphasis added.)
For more than thirty years now, study after study has shown that, by an overwhelming majority, the journalists we rely on to give us the news straight vote for liberal candidates.22 Even MSNBC.com noted the newsroom is filled with a bunch of lefties. The website identified 143 "journalists" at prominent news outlets across the country who made political contributions during the previous two presidential campaign cycles. Of them, 125 "gave to Democrats" and other "liberal causes," while only "16 gave to Republicans."23 Liberals are indeed covering liberals.
IN ADDITION TO devouring B.H.O.'s talking points like manna from heaven, the lapdogs in the press felt it was their duty to protect Obama's fanciful image. During the primaries, all the big three networks covered Obama marking the forty-second anniversary of the 1965 Bloody Sunday march for voting rights in Selma, Alabama. "There was something stirring across the country because of what happened in Selma, Alabama, because some folks are willing to march across a bridge. So they got together and Barack Obama, Jr. was born,"24 Barack recounted. "This is the site of my conception. I am the fruits of your labor. I am the offspring of the movement. When people ask me if I've been to Selma before, I tell them I'm coming home."25
There's one problem with Obama's claim: It was total bunk. He was actually born three years prior to the march. No worries for him, though. The media cleaned up the mess. CBS's Gloria Borger acknowledged that Obama was born three years earlier but, "Even so, [Obama] says, he's still the product of Selma."26 Oh come on, Gloria! Obama can't even tell the truth about his own birth, and all you can do is make excuses for him? ABC and NBC ignored the gaffe altogether.27
CHRIS MATTHEWS, WHO may be the mother of all zombies, is an anchor at the faux news network MSNBC. In an interview with the New York Observer, Chris Matthews compared B.H.O. to . . . the New Testament!
"I've been following politics since I was about five," said Matthews. "I've never seen anything like this. This is bigger than Kennedy. [Obama] comes along, and he seems to have the answers. This is the New Testament. This is surprising."
It gets better (worse). Matthews even compared Obama to . . . Mozart!
I really think there's a Salieri-Mozart thing going on here. . . . Salieri was the court composer who did everything right. He was impressive. Along comes Mozart. And everybody couldn't get the music out of their heads. Hillary is really good at doing what she is supposed to do. She's impressive. He's inspirational. That's the difference. One's the court composer. And one is the genius. There's something he does. I don't know what. Oprah said it. It's not that he's black. It's that he's brilliant.28
Matthews himself embodies the revolving door of the news media and liberal circles, having worked for Jimmy Carter and Democrat Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill.
Did I say that Matthews takes home the prize for the mother of all Zombies? Well, I may have spoken too soon. Martin Snapp of the Contra Costa Times, located near San Francisco, may give Matthews a run for his money. Snapp compared Obama to Moses, King David
, and the Jedi warrior Luke Skywalker. And as if that weren't bad enough, Snapp writes that Obama's biggest draw among supporters is that "they love him because he's taught them to love themselves--specifically, that part of themselves that is responding to the better angels of their nature."29
Do you think I'm kidding about erotic coverage? One contributor to the Huffington Post postured that Hope and Change stimulated a new generation of lovemaking! Yes! As the writer exclaimed, "Barack Obama is inspiring us like a desert lover, a Washington Valentino . . . couples all over America are making love again and shouting 'yes we can' as they climax!"30
One young Obama supporter named Noah Norman, a twenty-five-year-old tech consultant, captured the liberal media's irrational exuberance for Obama when he candidly told the Washington Post, "Obama has this almost irrational following and I myself can't sometimes explain why I'm supporting him. He's all things to all men. At least that's how I put it."31
Did the fawning dry up once Obama got elected? Yeah right. I bring to you this gem, courtesy of Politico:
During his first 100 days as president of the United States, Barack Obama revealed how different he is from all the white men who preceded him in the Oval Office, and the differences run deeper--in substance and style--than the color of his skin. Barack Hussein Obama is the nation's first hip president.32
And why is B.H.O. our first "hip" president? "See the body language, the expressions, the clothes. He's got attitude, rhythm, a sense of humor, contemporary tastes," blathered Politico.
The message was that if you were not down with Barack, it meant "you were not hip--you were square." Exactly the point. It's about image and not ideas. And if not being down with Obama's socialist power grab is "uncool," well then, I will settle for that label.
Obama is apparently so hip that some Zombies have coined the term Baracking, and even embrace each other by saying "What's up, my Obama?" Instead of "God bless you" or "Gesundheit" after a sneeze, the Zombie, er, hip, response is now "Barack you." No joke, people!
Got beef with your people? Well, "Barack's in the White House" now means "Show some respect."33
Deborah Tannen, professor of linguistics at Georgetown University, approves of the new Obama lingo. She told Politico it's "the most emblematic, positive thing that kids could say. It's connecting them to him, saying that there's something special in the connection between them."34
When I think of terms of endearment, "What's up, my Obama?" doesn't come to mind. It sounds cultlike and creepy.
In promoting Obama's "hipness," CNN may have had one of its more embarrassing segments to date. To mark his first hundred days in office, the network's T. J. Holmes and Kyra Phillips had an entire segment "assessing" Obama's "swagga."35 Seriously! Kyra enters the segment with Jay-Z's "Swagga Like Us" hip-hop song in the background, chuckling that the "white" cameraman is "trying to swagga" with the camera. After that, she wants to make it clear to the CNN audience that "swagga" is different from "swagger" (it's "swagger" with "a lot bit more flava"). Kyra then goes on to introduce the "swagga guru," her fellow anchor T. J. Holmes, a black male who has just concluded a panel discussion with black men to celebrate their perception of Obama as another "brotha" who has "swagga."
Kyra has this unbelievable exchange with T.J. And remember, this segment is meant to fit into the meme of Obama's first hundred days in office.
Kyra: "So bottom line, every white president has had absolutely no swagga. Is that what you're saying? They're stuffy, uptight presidents." She laughs, as this is all a big game.
The resident black man, swagga guru T.J.: "Some would say that . . . and maybe it's not one of these things you're supposed to say, but you can go to Billy D. Williams to Shaft to whomever you want to talk about, there's just a bit of a swagga sometimes that people associate with black men." Swagga guru T.J.'s proof of Obama's swagga? "He sits courtside at basketball games; he goes out on the town; he goes out to nice dinners; he's not scared to be this young, hip guy."36
Kyra finishes off the segment by giving T.J. a fist bump. How "down" you are, Kyra. Holla!
But Obama's connection to reporters hits much closer to home. David Axelrod, B.H.O.'s chief political strategist, was himself a Chicago Tribune reporter before he segued into political consulting. His clients have ranged from the Clintons, to liberal U.S. senator Chris Dodd of Connecticut, to John "I may or may not be yo' baby daddy" Edwards, to Obama's current chief of staff, Rahm "Ballet Dancer" Emanuel (Rahmbo used to be a ballet dancer . . . Kid you not . . . Google it). David Plouffe, Obama's campaign manager, was also an embedded Democrat operative since his college days, having worked his way from Congressman Dick Gephardt's staff to Axelrod's Astroturf (artificial gassroots) operation, AKPD Message and Media. This gang knows politics, that's for sure. But they don't represent change. The mainstream media embarrassed themselves, prostituting their journalism and surrendering their professionalism to cozy up to the "cool campaign."
But those who saw Obama close-up in Chicago knew that he came from a thugocracy and was no reformer. Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass, a straight-shooting newspaper writer and an expert on Chicago's political machine, had this to say: "Why is Obama allowed to campaign as a reformer, virtually unchallenged by the media, though he's a product of Chicago politics and has never condemned the wholesale political corruption in his home town the way he condemns those darn Washington lobbyists?"37
Kass pointed out that B.H.O. backed Mayor Richard Daley, Jr., and the thoroughly corrupt Chicago machine, never making "waves," so that he was in a position to move up the political ladder. That ladder was mounted by Illinois state Senate president Emil Jones. Just so you're aware, the Associated Press described Jones as Obama's political "Godfather" and as an "old-school politician" who "has relatives on the state payroll, steers state grants to favorite organizations and uses his clout to punish enemies and bury GOP legislation."38
B.H.O. was anything but a reformer, even though the media carried that narrative for him to high heaven. In fact, some of B.H.O.'s colleagues in Illinois were pissed that Obama was allowed to take credit for nearly every high-profile piece of "reform" legislation even though he would have very little to do with it. In Chicago, such action was called "bill jacking."39 One colleague described "bill jacking" as carrying "the ball 99 yards all the way to the one-yard line, and then give it to the halfback who gets all the credit and the stats in the record book."40 Obama was the halfback.
B.H.O., you may have figured out, was allowed to bill-jack because he needed a record to run on for the United States Senate. Sounds like Obama learned under quite the reformers, eh?
And in regard to his running for president, how can we forget Obama promising to accept public financing of the campaign, then reneging on that promise because he said the financing system was broken. Make that before Obama's campaign realized they could rake in historic levels of financing, he was all about aggressively pursuing "an agreement with the Republican nominee to preserve a publicly financed general election." Not so much when he opted out.
The point is that Obama is not a man of integrity; he's a man of callousness and calculation; he and his advisers are ruthlessly savvy in getting what they want, and the mainstream media went right along like the prostitutes they are. Not only was and is Obama a doctrinaire liberal, but he's prone to mind-blowing lies and deception. The media gave Obama a pass. And they continue to do so.
At an online forum on health care, Obama said this: "There's something about August going into September where everyone in Washington gets all 'wee-weed' up." And he used wee-weed up the same way you might say you "tinkled" the bed as a toddler. While Obama instantly became the butt of jokes within the blogosphere, Katie Couric took a different approach: a defense of the phrase wee-weed up!
The aging CBS anchorwoman did a segment on "neology," which, as she defined it, is the invention of a word, or breathing new life into an old one. She then went on to give a history of presidents who've coined new terms, includin
g Teddy Roosevelt's lunatic fringe and George W. Bush's misunderestimate. Barack Obama, she noted, introduced Americans to wee-weed up. Couric wondered if the phrase would make it into pop culture and the dictionary, as past presidents were "proud" neologists.41 You know it: Couric gets the Nina Burleigh award as well!
Or what about Obama's increasing power grab on private capital? Americans are voicing frustration and alarm as he hits us with record deficits and national debt, car company takeovers, and liberal, big-government forays into health care, the economy, and the environment. Americans want to be left alone, with Uncle Sam out of their wallets. Conservatives have accurately pointed out that the Messiah's policies toward nationalization are socialist. Heck, his key influences were committed and outspoken socialists. But did you know that, according to MSNBC, when conservatives call Obama a socialist, what they're really doing is calling him the n-word? If you didn't know that, have no fear, because MSNBC's Carlos Watson is here! He can find a racial epithet in an empty room. Here's good ol' Carlos doing the tired ol' race-baiting two-step:
Today I want to talk about a word that we're hearing more and more, and that's the word socialist. You hear it from a lot of conservatives these days, that's usually critiquing the President, or more broadly Democrats. And while that's certainly a legitimate critique, there certainly is an ideology that can and should be critiqued at certain times, it also sometimes is just a kind of a generic conservative bludgeoning tool. And that's all right, too, because you hear it on the Democratic side as well: rightwingnut, what have you. But what concerns me is when in some of those town hall meetings including the one that we saw in Missouri recently where there were jokes made about lynching, etc., you start to wonder whether in fact the word socialist is becoming a code word, whether or not socialist is becoming the new n-word for frankly for some angry upset birthers and others.42