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Protecting the Obama Brand (Salon's Joan Walsh to "Whiny and Juvenile" Obama: "Grow up"
Salon ^ | Sunday, June 13, 2010 | Joan Walsh

Posted on 06/13/2010 3:10:46 PM PDT by kristinn

Two stories about President Obama this weekend pushed my growing unease with his recent moves into full-blown anxiety. They come on the heels of Tim Dickinson's devastating Rolling Stone piece laying out concrete problems with Obama's response to the BP oil spill – from delays in cleaning up the Minerals Management Service, distrusting scientists who correctly reported the spill was much bigger than BP said, waiting more than a week to declare the crisis "an Oil Spill of National Significance," which corralled new services. Maybe the most damning, to me, section of Dickinson's piece comes when he quotes the president proudly announcing he'd reversed his stand against offshore oil drilling "It turns out, by the way, that oil rigs today generally don't cause spills," the president said. "They are technologically very advanced." Dickenson notes: "Eighteen days later, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, the Deepwater Horizon rig went off like a bomb."

Of the weekend's worrisome Obama stories, the first was Politico's Roger Simon's interview with Obama, published in full today, in which his self-defense about how he's handled the BP oil disaster sounded whiny and juvenile, and raised big questions about whether he's capable of fighting the battles he needs to enter and win to move the country forward. The other was Matt Bai's "President in Chief?" in the New York Times Magazine, which showed that Obama and his team seem more focused on protecting the "brand" that they believe galvanized millions of new voters, young voters and independents in 2008, to potentially realign American politics, than with helping Democrats hold the House and Senate.

SNIP

I don't know where to start with that cavalcade of complaint. First, it sounds like the president has been spooked by the Tea Partiers and their shrill, silly claims he's a socialist. I'm alarmed that he seems to have internalized their crazy charges that he's been over-zealously expanding government. And is he really claiming that he would have loved to crack down on the oil companies with tougher regulations before the explosion, but he didn't, because he was afraid of what his opponents would say? I honestly don't believe that's true, and I don't know what's worse, that he's dissembling here, or that the excuse he's dissembling with is so lame.

SNIP

Between the BP oil disaster and the near-collapse of the world economy thanks to the finance industry – both have in common a corporate arrogance that big risks to make big money were worth taking, no matter the impact on the rest of us – Obama has the perfect context for laying out why government matters, and why Democrats run the government best. Instead he's carping about "folks up there" in Washington and complaining that if he'd tried to regulate the oil industry before the spill, people would have said bad things about him. Grow up, Mr. President.

SNIP


TOPICS: Editorial; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: epicfail; fail; joanwalsh; kenya; kenyan; muslim; obama; olympicfail
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To: mom4melody

Well, congrats. Good to know!

I don’t remember the Lenin/Hitler birthday dates well. They’re not on my card list.

But you will be, mom4...


61 posted on 06/13/2010 5:22:43 PM PDT by combat_boots (The Lion of Judah cometh. Hallelujah. Gloria Patri, Filio et Spirito Sancto.)
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To: kristinn
That's not a brand one would be proud of. Also, the author is clearly nothing more than an idiot liberal, because it wasn't corporate arrogance that caused the economic crash - it was crony corporatism and arrogant, know-nothing politicians - of the same ilk as Obuttocks - that cause the economic crash.


62 posted on 06/13/2010 5:25:53 PM PDT by Oceander (The Price of Freedom is Eternal Vigilance -- Thos. Jefferson)
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To: combat_boots

My best friends B-day is Dec. 25th....the running joke between us is that while she shares a b-day with Jesus, I share a b-day with Hitler.....


63 posted on 06/13/2010 5:50:01 PM PDT by mom4melody
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To: combat_boots

I definitely think there was foul play - the timing alone is enough to guarantee that people would become suspicious and start looking into it, no matter what Obama says. I’m looking into other stuff at the same time and I’m finding really weird and unexpected connections.

You know Obama just basically shut down NASA (conveniently Houston is also on the Gulf shore). I came across these videos and I’ve just started watching them; I’m maybe 6 or 7 minutes into them. I paused it just long enough to google a family member that he mentioned. So far, that checks out. Some of the Project names he has given are also familiar to me. I think that Project Camelot is Richard Hoagland’s thing and I’m familiar with his work too.

This guy is talking about the Gulf of Aden - see what you think: (he identifies himself as a veteran)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QML3xDbyMEY&feature=related


64 posted on 06/13/2010 5:57:39 PM PDT by nolongerademocrat ("Before you ask G-d for something, first thank G-d for what you already have." B'rachot 30b)
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To: nolongerademocrat; combat_boots

okay, the magnetic anomalies in the Gulf of Aden are apparently real:

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v298/n5870/abs/298149a0.html

So far I’ve checked him on three things that I didn’t already know and he’s telling the truth (so far).


65 posted on 06/13/2010 6:10:35 PM PDT by nolongerademocrat ("Before you ask G-d for something, first thank G-d for what you already have." B'rachot 30b)
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To: 4rcane

“... environmental terrorists ...”

If I wrote suspense, that would be a great hook for a story


66 posted on 06/13/2010 6:18:04 PM PDT by Cloverfarm (This too shall pass ...)
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To: kristinn

Tee Hee


67 posted on 06/13/2010 6:58:40 PM PDT by CPT Clay (Pick up your weapon and follow me.)
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To: chris_bdba

Yep. Lenin’s B-day, not Hitler’s.


68 posted on 06/13/2010 7:35:01 PM PDT by BenKenobi (I want to hear more about Sam! Samwise the stouthearted!)
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To: BenKenobi

Edit, Earth day is on the 22nd. The 20th, is indeed Hitler’s birthday. Lenin’s birthday is on the 22nd.


69 posted on 06/13/2010 7:36:31 PM PDT by BenKenobi (I want to hear more about Sam! Samwise the stouthearted!)
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To: combat_boots

This guy was talking about an upcoming ‘false-flag’ attack against the U.S. in February. He also talked about magnetic activity in the Gulf of Aden. Interesting stuff really.


70 posted on 06/13/2010 7:45:40 PM PDT by nolongerademocrat ("Before you ask G-d for something, first thank G-d for what you already have." B'rachot 30b)
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To: kristinn

Yeah the claims he’s a socialist who is over zealously expanding government are crazy talk! Utter nonsense.

On what planet do these idiots live?


71 posted on 06/13/2010 7:50:02 PM PDT by GatorGirl (Eschew Socialism!)
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To: combat_boots

What your link describes is mind-boggling.

It will kill the Gulf.

Please consider posting it as a separate post.


72 posted on 06/13/2010 7:59:54 PM PDT by happygrl (Continuing to predict that 0bama will resign)
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To: 4rcane

...not to mention “Beyond Petroleum” BP, which has put millions of dollars behind its campaign to get cap-n-trade passed.


73 posted on 06/14/2010 2:43:05 AM PDT by oblomov
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To: kristinn

I stumbled onto “The McGlaughlin Group” and saw Eleanor Clift pretty much deranged about BP. Then it struck me. The left is not mad at BP because the leak is going to wreck the coastline, they are mad at BP because the leak is going to wreck the President.


74 posted on 06/14/2010 9:09:33 AM PDT by reaganrevolutionin2010
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To: Jeff Chandler



75 posted on 06/14/2010 9:17:19 AM PDT by Lancey Howard
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To: jocon307
Oh puhleeze, this poor woman. She sounds like that rare bird, a principled liberal. She should throw in the towel right now and admit she got rolled by a Chi-town shyster.

"Principled?" So long as she gets what she wants, maybe.

But, like the rest of the left's heavy thinkers, Walsh refuses to come to grips with the real problem: They elected an incompetent.

A "transcendent" incompetent, perhaps. But incompetent, nonetheless.

76 posted on 06/14/2010 9:25:52 AM PDT by okie01 (THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA: Ignorance on Parade)
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To: freespirited

Now you’ve got me thinking about Rick Lazio in NY and Crist in Florida...holey moley!!!


77 posted on 06/15/2010 2:48:08 PM PDT by foreshadowed at waco
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