If you still need proof that the American press today is beyond lame, take a look at, or listen to, news coverage of last night’s press conference by Pres. Obama. Around 90-95 percent of the presser was devoted to detailed aspects of health care reform, so you’d think most news outlets would be dissecting the Prez’s statements this morning, right? Most newspapers, to their credit, seem to be doing that, but not without giving nearly equal weight to what TV news shows and Internet news sites are focusing on, namely, Obama’s answer to a question about the arrest of Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates.
Oh, the TV and Internet news people are pretending to care about their journalistic responsibilities — in other words, they grit their teeth and talk a bit about health care, albeit in their usual superficial way. But their eyes really light up when they get to jabber away like so: “Should Obama have said the police acted ‘stupidly’?” “Did Obama go too far in criticizing the police?” “Is Obama playing the race card?” and on and on and so forth ad nauseam. It’s enough to make you cry; that is, if you’re someone who thinks that plans to reform health care — which would affect, well, pretty much everybody in the United States — just might be a teensy bit more important than a solitary question about a guy getting arrested.
I quoted my dear old dad yesterday, and I’ll do it again now: “Hasn’t anybody around here got any sense?” I would just add, “Do these people have any sense of perspective left? Or has the 24-hour jumble of filler and bullshit, celebri-news stories they peddle permanently wrecked the way they see journalism?” Unfortunately, I think my question has already been answered.
This article appears in Jul 21-28, 2009.
Amazing how the press conference regarding health has been completely forgotten over the biased opinion (the President said it – he’s a friend of the professor) of Obama. The President had no business having an opinion on an investigation that he was not fully engaged in (as he also admitted). This actually helped get time on our side instead of a piece-mealed unintelligent health bill being forced down our throats by Obama’s “deadline” of the end of August. (Excellent article Tara 7/21/09). This professors’ racism case, the cause of M Jackson’s death, and the demise of Jon & Kate’s marriage should take care of the news for the rest of the year. Perhaps by January, the Obama administration and Congress will have put in a good day of work… just have to worry what they will f*$k up next! I don’t know how in the world we end up with the most dysfunctional government officials representing our country every single year. Can’t they all get along on the playground?? Time Out for all of them!!
Common sense and logical thinking are traits that very few people possess in this country as well as the traits of being fair and reasonable. I am tired of hearing both the democrats and republicans play the blame game. Politics is not some kind of sporting event where you have to pledge your allegiance to a team and no matter what you have to support whatever crazy ideas and comments made by extremists within your party. You should be able to think freely and see the points of both sides, with the ability to RESPECTFULLY disagree.
Republicans- Obama won. Get over it and move on. At this point, our country is going down fast. Now, you can either be a part of the solution and offer genuine ideas that will help us progress or if you are going to just have town hall meetings wanting to see Obama’s birth certificate (please excuse my French) then you need to back the F– up and make room for people who are trying to help the situation. (i don’t care what party these people come from)
Democrats- You can not blame Bush for everything. Yes, he messed some stuff up (and none of you Repubs can dispute that), but once again it is time to move on.He won twice. He messed up the first 4 years and was re-elected again. That’s your fault. Though Bush clearly disregarded the Constitution and anything that would check his executive power, Democrats along with Republicans in the Congress passed some bills and didn’t check up on some stuff that they should have. point blank.
We need to seriously stop this division of our country and move forward so we can rebuild our economy.
Non-partisan logic between logical and sound minded people will work. The unfortunate part is it is hard finding the adults that are able to think in this way (don’t worry Frank Griffin I wouldn’t burden you with the prospect of putting you in the category as a logical adult thinker when it comes to politics)
I see two great things here. The president criticizing an overzealous police officer and more roadblocks to keep us from having that stupid socalist universal healthcare.
Yall keep on fightin’!
Here’s the deal. Obama spent 55 minutes droning on about something that a majority of Americans understand is just another step in Obama’s socialist agenda. The sad part is that the only time Obama himself got energized and excited about answering a question was when he was talking about race. What was worse was that after admitting bias and ignorance of the details, the President of the United States, arguably the most powerful man in the world, who is in charge of two wars, a rapidly dying economy, rising unemployment, and more, decided to stoop so low as to ridicule a police officer for doing his job. Pathetic, pathetic, pathetic. THAT is why people care so much about it. If Obama had been jazzed up about the health care stuff for 55 minutes, and just happened to make the “stupidly” comment in passing at the end, it would have been a different story. Instead, he got all fired up when jumping on the “racism” bandwagon, with absolutely no reason to.
What makes it worse is that Sgt. Crowley has accepted Obama’s invitation to the White House. I’d have politely refused.