Demonizing the President

[usmcstinger]

Eric Boehlert: From "Racist," to "Dick," to Heckling: How the Press Treats Obama

Bill O’Reilly has also stood up against ugly insults against the sitting President of the United States. And the conservative columnist Michael Medved wrote that, with respect to smearing President Obama personally, “it’s particularly unhelpful to focus on alleged bad intentions and rotten character when every survey shows more favorable views of his personality than his policies.” I couldn’t agree more. It also happens to be mean and unbecoming of any self-respecting American.

/snip

The Times' "crybaby" crack wasn't an anomaly in terms of how some in the Beltway press treat Obama. Last month, Washington Post's Dana Milbank mocked Obama as the "first female president" who "brazenly flaunted his feminine mystique."

And last year Halperin, who is seen as something of a megaphone for the Beltway media elite, called out the president as a "dick." (Obama's sin? Being too partisan.) Previously, the pundit had claimed insiders considered Obama to be an "ignorant" "wimp" who's "incompetent and overwhelmed." Also, Obama and his team were "arrogant and clueless."

I don't remember those kind of nasty putdowns from Halperin during the Bush years. Back then, Halperin edited ABC News' The Note, a daily political tip sheet that read like a de facto in-house RNC newsletter, worshiping the supposedly super-savvy ways of Bush and his Republican colleagues.

And isn't the press guilty of encouraging bitter right-wing disrespect by helping to feed its phony smears, like the birther charade. Although dutifully skeptical of the claims regarding Obama's birthplace, that didn't stop the press from covering the story, often extensively, for years. By contrast, I don't recall people who fostered wild conspiracy theories about Bush being paraded around in the mainstream media in order to spread irresponsible claims. Or did I miss all the TV interviews with 9/11 truthers?

The Beltway press has also helped amplify disrespectful, right-wing attacks on First Lady Michelle Obama, by adopting its view that she be covered as a political player, in a way Laura Bush never was.

By repeatedly interrupting the president and yelling caustic questions at him during a nationally televised event, the Daily Caller's Munro reflected how little respect the conservative press now has for the office of the presidency. There's a danger the run-away contempt and casual taunting rubs off on the real press, too.

Smears by conservatives against President Obama and prominent Democrats and liberals |

I’d keep posting examples but I have to now go through all the nasty personal attacks and threats of violence in my Inbox thanks to my radio exchange with Ms. Malkin. Meanwhile, if Michelle Malkin wants to attack the left’s smears while contorting to justify smears from the right and simultaneously try and smear me for attempting to draw an equivalency and hold us ALL to a higher standard, well, I certainly celebrate the right to free speech that allows her to spread such sad nonsense.

I fully expect half the forum to now fall in on my head and explain that blah-blah, Bush first, yada-yada. So I'll just be polite and inform you ahead of time that unless you are willing to discuss the articles at hand, we won't be chatting at all.

I have no desire to enter your delusional world.

 

[BDBoop]

Rich. That is ... just so rich.

 

[Amelia]

I'm having trouble with the bias of the article.

There's increasingly widespread agreement that Obama is a whiner who throws around blame to explain away his failures but it's wrong to use commonly understood vernacular to describe what he is doing?

If "crybaby" is the wrong word to describe Obama, what is a good word befitting the office of the presidency but which adequately conveys the observation of Obama's buck-passing way of dealing out blame?

Widespread agreement among right wingnuts..

It has reached the mainstream media. Haven't you noticed? That was part of the OP. It's in the Times and the Washington Post.

However frustrating it might be for us internet forumites when leftwingers claim it is just a rightwing phenomenon, I suppose I should be content for you to ignore how that impression is growing across the nation. If Democratic strategists ignore it long enough they won't be able to combat it.

Of course, I don't really think Democratic strategists are ignoring it. Or we wouldn't have articles such as the OP's. The challenge now is damage control, spin and deflection to the attempts to define Romney before Romney has a chance to take control of the national messaging.

 

[Amelia]

Vicious lies are never justified, which is why Obama needs to be reminded that everyone who disagrees with him is not a racist. The man is a narcissist, and needs to be reminded that he is not a fracking god.

only right wing lunatics, who can't think for themselves say that Obama acts like or thinks he is god!

yur being irrational and at this moment a real looney tune! you right wing nutjobs are funny, i'll give ya that!

time to grow up quantum!

"We have an amazing story to tell," she said. "This president has brought us out of the dark and into the light."

-- Michelle Obama

"Obama is, of course, greater than Jesus."

-- Politiken (Danish newspaper)

"No one saw him coming, and Christians believe God comes at us from strange angles and places we don't expect, like Jesus being born in a manger."

--Lawrence Carter

"Many even see in Obama a messiah-like figure, a great soul, and some affectionately call him Mahatma Obama."

-- Dinesh Sharma

"We just like to say his name. We are considering taking it as a mantra."

-- Chicago] Sun-Times

"A Lightworker -- An Attuned Being with Powerful Luminosity and High-Vibration Integrity who will actually help usher in a New Way of Being"

-- Mark Morford

"What Barack Obama has accomplished is the single most extraordinary event that has occurred in the 232 years of the nation’s political history"

-- Jesse Jackson, Jr.

"This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal."

-- Barack Obama

"Does it not feel as if some special hand is guiding Obama on his journey, I mean, as he has said, the utter improbability of it all?"

-- Daily Kos

"He communicates God-like energy..."

-- Steve Davis (Charleston, SC)

"Not just an ordinary human being but indeed an Advanced Soul"

-- Commentator @ Chicago Sun Times

"I'll do whatever he says to do. I'll collect paper cups off the ground to make his pathway clear."

-- Halle Berry

"A quantum leap in American consciousness"

-- Deepak Chopra

"He is not operating on the same plane as ordinary politicians. . . . the agent of transformation in an age of revolution, as a figure uniquely qualified to open the door to the 21st century."
-- Gary Hart

"Barack Obama is our collective representation of our purest hopes, our highest visions and our deepest knowings . . . He's our product out of the all-knowing quantum field of intelligence."

-- Eve Konstantine

"This is bigger than Kennedy. . . . This is the New Testament." | "I felt this thrill going up my leg. I mean, I don't have that too often. No, seriously. It's a dramatic event."

-- Chris Matthews

"[Obama is ] creative imagination which coupled with brilliance equals wisdom . . . [He is] the man for this time."

-- Toni Morrison

"Obama's finest speeches do not excite. They do not inform. They don't even really inspire. They elevate. . . . He is not the Word made flesh, but the triumph of word over flesh . . . Obama is, at his best, able to call us back to our highest selves."

-- Ezra Klein

"Obama has the capacity to summon heroic forces from the spiritual depths of ordinary citizens and to unleash therefrom a symphonic chorus of unique creative acts whose common purpose is to tame the soul and alleviate the great challenges facing mankind."

-- Gerald Campbell

"We're here to evolve to a higher plane . . . he is an evolved leader . . . [he] has an ear for eloquence and a Tongue dipped in the Unvarnished Truth."

-- Oprah Winfrey

“I would characterize the Senate race as being a race where Obama was, let’s say, blessed and highly favored. That’s not routine. There’s something else going on. I think that Obama, his election to the Senate, was divinely ordered. . . . I know that that was God’s plan."

-- Bill Rush

Racist! How dare you show the cult-like attitude liberals proudly displayed before we started scoffing at them for treating a down-and-dirty politician like a messianic figure and they had to start pretending no one did that!

 

[Liability]

You said it better than I ever could. Thanks, mister.

Drunks farting in an insane asylum "say it" beter than you ever could.

But Peach is wrong. So your accolades are just praising her with faint damn.

It really is the truth, L. You are one of the few half way reasonable conservatives on this site. To disagreee with policy is one thing, but the out and out hate and disrespect shown this president is just wrong.

What part or parts of it are "really the truth?"

The part that says,"Thank you, Mr and Mrs President and Mr and Mrs Vice President - for setting an excellent example for the rest of us. You are truly special people and we're luck to have you on our side." ?

'Cause from where I am sitting, THAT looks a lot like a mere statement of opinion. One I certainly do not share.

Or perhaps you allude to this snippet: "What we see from our president, vice president and their wives is that they just keep on working for the people of the United States. President Obama just keeps right on working for jobs and for economic growth." Because again, I say that's just another statement of opinion and it's another one with which I disagree. I don't see the President working for any such thing. I see him borrowing shitloads of money on credit we can't afford with damn little to no prospect of paying it back unless we radically alter our course. So, no. That's not a factual assertion either. It was just another opinion.

Indeed, the majority of Peach's post was pure opinion. And I find most of it horribly misguided.

 

[Liability]

To disagreee with policy is one thing, but the out and out hate and disrespect shown any president is just wrong.

Either you agree with this, or you are a hypocrite.

I don't happen to hate the guy. In fact, on a personal level, I think he's a loving dad. It appears he is a faithful husband.

But I do not respect him much. I mean, sure. I respect a good family man. And I have publicly endorsed a couple of moves he has made.

But he vast majority of his policies, actions and rhetoric are just plain wrong -- dangerously wrong-- for America, in my estimation.

And now he is acting exactly like the liberal bogeyman, Richard M. Nixon. The question is not why I don't respect him. The question is how can so many liberals still even pretend to.

 

[Dot Com]

Please, obama has had nothing compared to Bush and his administration

​

 

[Liability]

Please, obama has had nothing compared to Bush and his administration

Absolutely true.

 

[Rinata]

Drunks farting in an insane asylum "say it" beter than you ever could.

But Peach is wrong. So your accolades are just praising her with faint damn.

It really is the truth, L. You are one of the few half way reasonable conservatives on this site. To disagreee with policy is one thing, but the out and out hate and disrespect shown this president is just wrong.

What part or parts of it are "really the truth?"

The part that says,"Thank you, Mr and Mrs President and Mr and Mrs Vice President - for setting an excellent example for the rest of us. You are truly special people and we're luck to have you on our side." ?

'Cause from where I am sitting, THAT looks a lot like a mere statement of opinion. One I certainly do not share.

Or perhaps you allude to this snippet: "What we see from our president, vice president and their wives is that they just keep on working for the people of the United States. President Obama just keeps right on working for jobs and for economic growth." Because again, I say that's just another statement of opinion and it's another one with which I disagree. I don't see the President working for any such thing. I see him borrowing shitloads of money on credit we can't afford with damn little to no prospect of paying it back unless we radically alter our course. So, no. That's not a factual assertion either. It was just another opinion.

Indeed, the majority of Peach's post was pure opinion. And I find most of it horribly misguided.

Thanks for responding.

 

[Zoom-boing]

Eric Boehlert: From "Racist," to "Dick," to Heckling: How the Press Treats Obama

Bill O’Reilly has also stood up against ugly insults against the sitting President of the United States. And the conservative columnist Michael Medved wrote that, with respect to smearing President Obama personally, “it’s particularly unhelpful to focus on alleged bad intentions and rotten character when every survey shows more favorable views of his personality than his policies.” I couldn’t agree more. It also happens to be mean and unbecoming of any self-respecting American.

/snip

The Times' "crybaby" crack wasn't an anomaly in terms of how some in the Beltway press treat Obama. Last month, Washington Post's Dana Milbank mocked Obama as the "first female president" who "brazenly flaunted his feminine mystique."

And last year Halperin, who is seen as something of a megaphone for the Beltway media elite, called out the president as a "dick." (Obama's sin? Being too partisan.) Previously, the pundit had claimed insiders considered Obama to be an "ignorant" "wimp" who's "incompetent and overwhelmed." Also, Obama and his team were "arrogant and clueless."

I don't remember those kind of nasty putdowns from Halperin during the Bush years. Back then, Halperin edited ABC News' The Note, a daily political tip sheet that read like a de facto in-house RNC newsletter, worshiping the supposedly super-savvy ways of Bush and his Republican colleagues.

And isn't the press guilty of encouraging bitter right-wing disrespect by helping to feed its phony smears, like the birther charade. Although dutifully skeptical of the claims regarding Obama's birthplace, that didn't stop the press from covering the story, often extensively, for years. By contrast, I don't recall people who fostered wild conspiracy theories about Bush being paraded around in the mainstream media in order to spread irresponsible claims. Or did I miss all the TV interviews with 9/11 truthers?

The Beltway press has also helped amplify disrespectful, right-wing attacks on First Lady Michelle Obama, by adopting its view that she be covered as a political player, in a way Laura Bush never was.

By repeatedly interrupting the president and yelling caustic questions at him during a nationally televised event, the Daily Caller's Munro reflected how little respect the conservative press now has for the office of the presidency. There's a danger the run-away contempt and casual taunting rubs off on the real press, too.

The bolded? None of that is "mean" or "unbecoming", what it is, is the truth. He's a thin-skinned, arrogant, narcissistic elitist who was in no way experienced enough to assume the role of POTUS. He is a clueless, untrustworthy liar. I do not believe that he has the best of intentions with regards to seeing things get better in America; he'd like things to get worse so he can impose even more government on us.

He really needs to put on his big boy pants and stop his incessant whining when someone says something he doesn't like.

Please, obama has had nothing compared to Bush and his administration

Yes, he does not have the tragic death toll, the poses. the stupidity, nor the greed. Still the economy will finally be the focus, instead of WAR, WAR, DEATH, SADDAM, SADDAM.......and bin Laden "when we get around to it".

Thanks for reaffirming that Obutthead was anything but qualified for this job. His focus from the day he took office should have been the economy . . . not Obamacare, not birth control for college students, not gay marriage, certainly NOT referring to Republicans 'the enemy' and demonizing them at every turn. wtf? Is he 12? Why the hell can't he act like a grown-up instead of resorting to actions that are far beneath a president? No wonder he gets called a dick.

 

[BDBoop]

Thanks for reaffirming you despise the President of the United States of America.

You mad, bro? You're acting all Obutthurt.

 

[Liability]

Thanks for reaffirming you despise the President of the United States of America.

You mad, bro? You're acting all Obutthurt.

It remains perfectly okay to criticize the inept incumbent even though this causes Bloop to whine and pitch a hissy fit.

Bloop's butthurt is epic.

 

[Dot Com]

Wonder if they'll tone down the whining down a tad if/when the President is reelected?

 

[Liability]

Wonder if they'll tone down the whining down a tad if/when the President is reelected?

Booooooooosh has been out of Office for 3 1/2 (+/-) years and you libs still blame him for anything and everything that has ever gone wrong -- in human history.

 

[The Infidel]

Wonder if they'll tone down the whining down a tad if/when the President is reelected?

Stick around... November ought to be interesting.

 

[Dot Com]

Wonder if they'll tone down the whining down a tad if/when the President is reelected?

Booooooooosh has been out of Office for 3 1/2 (+/-) years and you libs still blame him for anything and everything that has ever gone wrong -- in human history.

There isn't a rug big enough to sweep under two unpaid-for wars, tax-cuts during those wars, trillion $ unpaid-for Rx plan, and a Repub sanctioned orgy on Wall St that contributed to the 2nd worse econ downturn in history that we're STILL trying to dig ourselves out of so yes....

 

[BDBoop]

Wonder if they'll tone down the whining down a tad if/when the President is reelected?

Booooooooosh has been out of Office for 3 1/2 (+/-) years and you libs still blame him for anything and everything that has ever gone wrong -- in human history.

There isn't a rug big enough to sweep under two unpaid-for wars, tax-cuts during those wars, trillion $ unpaid-for Rx plan, and a Repub sanctioned orgy on Wall St that contributed to the 2nd worse econ downturn in history that we're STILL trying to dig ourselves out of so yes....

Oh, so sorry. La-la-la-la-la-la-la; they can't HEAR YOU!

 

[The Infidel]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQBSTomBWls]Obama says he's responsible for economy. "Give it to me." - YouTube[/ame]

 

[The Infidel]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaQUU2ZL6D8&feature=related]Obama will cut deficit in half FEB 2009 - YouTube[/ame]

 

[The Infidel]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmRgaKfWMPA&feature=related]Obama said he should serve only one term - YouTube[/ame]