Will Obama be the most nationalist prez ever?, Let's look at history...

AND WHILE WE'RE ON THE SUBJECT OF THE WASHINGTON POST...


Obama's dumb war with Fox News

There’s only one thing dumber than picking a fight with people who buy ink by the barrel -- picking a fight with people who don’t even have to buy ink. The Obama administration’s war on Fox News is dumb on multiple levels. It makes the White House look weak, unable to take Harry Truman’s advice and just deal with the heat. It makes the White House look small, dragged down to the level of Glenn Beck. It makes the White House look childish and petty at best, and it has a distinct Nixonian -- Agnewesque? -- aroma at worst. It is a self-defeating trifecta: it distracts attention from the Obama administration’s substantive message; it serves to help Fox, not punish it, by driving up ratings; and it deprives the White House, to the extent it refuses to provide administration officials to appear on the cable network, of access to an audience that is, in fact, broader than hard-core Obama haters.

Sure, it’s legitimate -- and standard practice -- to dispense access and coveted interviews to favored reporters and news outlets. So is subtly doing the opposite: letting a reporter who’s filed a tough story know that he or she is in the doghouse by leaking a scoop to a competitor. The Bush administration routinely briefed conservative columnists before a big presidential speech; the Obama White House tends to call in ideological sympathizers. This is the way the game is played.


Where the White House has gone way overboard is in its decision to treat Fox as an outright enemy and to go public with the assault. Imagine the outcry if the Bush administration had pulled a similar hissy fit with MSNBC. “Opinion journalism masquerading as news,” White House communications director Anita Dunn declared of Fox. Certainly Fox tends to report its news with a conservative slant -- but has anyone at the White House clicked over to MSNBC recently? Or is the only problem opinion journalism that doesn’t match its opinion? On "Fox News Sunday," host Chris Wallace replayed a quote from an Obama interview: “I don't always get my most favorable coverage on Fox, but I think that's part of how democracy is supposed to work. You know, we're not supposed to all be in lock step here.”

Maybe he should tell the rest of the team.

By Ruth Marcus | October 19, 2009; 4:59 PM ET

Not now, chief. I'm in the ****in' zone.

There was a post here. I'll finish it later.

Oh, no, an editorialist editorializing. He's not right-wing, and therefore, everyone not a right-winger hates Obama, too!

'Sides, the Post ain't what it used to be. Woodward and Bernstein no longer roam the halls. Not really a bastion of left wingers anymore; it has Democrats and Republicans in their editorials.

Everyone has criticisms of Obama, just like everyone had criticisms of Bush, just like everyone had criticisms of Clinton, etc.

The one thing that keeps coming to my mind is that Obama has the mandate from the American voters that Bush never had in either term. He was elected by a sound majority. The Republicans control neither the Senate nor the House. Why is this so hard to understand?

Someone clarifies the point of the guy in the first article quoted. 'Cause what I get from my bleary eyes is, "Obama should be ashamed of criticizing his own country when out in the world". And, as a "my country, right or wrong" type of thinking, that wouldn't make any sense whatsoever. Come on, "the goodness of America" ? Countries - any countries - aren't good. They might follow more or less democratic principles, given their histories, but that doesn't prevent them from being entities ready to do any dirt for what they consider their own interest. So either you acknowledge a country has to do that, and then you don't choose to live in the fairytale land of the pure of hearts...

... Or you want to be ethical, and you want to help your country act as ethically as possible, in which case you bloody need to see when it does shit, you need to criticize it.

Not defending Obama in any way there - indeed, I don't even know the speech the guy is talking about, so how could I attempt it. Just commenting the guy's prose.

Editorialist editorializing, indeed.

*edit* Second article quoted makes sense, tho. Criticism against Fox is 150% justified, but a gov does look petty making it. I can't rant bout Sarkozy interfering with the press but think it works for Obama. Again, Fox news is pretty ridiculous, but for good or for bad, you let the press fly.

There was a post here. I'll finish it later.

America has been very selective with where it decides to enforce it's will - Iraq but not Palestine, Bosnia but not Rwanda or the Sudan. And what about last year with the Olympics and China's human rights violations? Did the US boycott the games or even protest them? Nope. It's cliche but we're a ruthless democracy and a superpower that only acts when it's for the benefit of the bottom line and I don't see one President turning that around, especially in a first year that has been racked with a debate on health care, solutions on the two ongoing wars we have and an economic crisis.

You don't have to worry about America being a superpower that's only concerned with itself much longer, mate.

Emphasis on the "superpower" and "no longer" parts maybe ?

Aye. China, for sure. India, maybe.

I thought I heard the other night that they wont actually last unless they can develop their domestic markets...



Also, The 11/3 Project: SAVE GLENN BECK