Remember just the other day, when I said how I despise the corporate media? Here they are, in all their Mean Girl finest! Ed Kilgore at the Washington Monthly:
Well, it doesn’t get much more official than this: an VandeHei/Allen “Behind the Curtain” column announcing that D.C. (“the town”) is “turning on” Barack Obama, and there will be nothing but venom coming from any direction for the foreseeable future:
Republicans have waited five years for the moment to put the screws to Obama — and they have one-third of all congressional committees on the case now. Establishment Democrats, never big fans of this president to begin with, are starting to speak out. And reporters are tripping over themselves to condemn lies, bullying and shadiness in the Obama administration.
Buy-in from all three D.C. stakeholders is an essential ingredient for a good old-fashioned Washington pile-on — so get ready for bad stories and public scolding to pile up.
Too bad, voters, and all those who have an interest in their federal government doing something constructive; Obama has to have his spanking from “D.C. stakeholders,” so enjoy it or look the other way.
What amazes me the most about this column is the forthright announcement that the MSM are going to make explicit common cause with the GOP:
Obama’s aloof mien and holier-than-thou rhetoric have left him with little reservoir of good will, even among Democrats. And the press, after years of being accused of being soft on Obama while being berated by West Wing aides on matters big and small, now has every incentive to be as ruthless as can be.
Kilgore is amazed? I’m not. The media is nothing more than junior-high lunchroom cliques!
This open partisanship is excused by the fact that in “this town” (among the “Establishment Democrats” who are a “D.C. Stakeholder”) Democrats aren’t bothering to defend Obama. Which Democrats are we talking about here? Here you go:
The dam of solid Democratic solidarity has collapsed, starting with New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd’s weekend scolding of the White House over Benghazi, then gushing with the news the Justice Department had sucked up an absurdly broad swath of Associated Press phone records.
Yes, MoDo is your representative Democrat. When you’ve lost her, you’ve clearly lost the Blue States altogether. And if that’s not enough, we have the Anonymous Insider Democrat:
One Democrat who likes Obama and has been around town for many years said elected officials in his own party are no different than Republicans: They think the president is distant and unapproachable.
“He has never taken the Democratic chairs up to Camp David to have a drink or to have a discussion,” the longtime Washingtonian said. “You gotta stroke people and talk to them. It’s like courting: You have to send flowers and candy and have surprises. It’s a constant process. Now they’re saying, ‘He never talked to me in the good times.’”
Yep, this is what it’s all about: the fucking egos of the Beltway press corps. It’s not about paralyzing government, or shortchanging the voters, or destroying the environment. Uh uh. It’s about whether Obama gave them their fucking strokes.
Thanks, Colleen Kirby!
What some of us would like to know from the press is why Hillary hired Dick Cheney’s principle deputy on foreign policy, Victoria Nuland, to be her spokesperson at the State Department? Why would any rational human being hire anyone who had ever worked for Dick Cheney? Weren’t there any other qualified women available to fill this job? It certainly speaks volumes about Hillary’s judgement though.
Maureen Dowd? Oh, hell, I am going to laugh all day about that…..
The corporate Left’s spin machine is working overtime trying to explain away Hillary’s incompetence and inability to prioritize, Holder’s anti-democratic and intrusive Department of Justice, and the IRS’s longstanding policy and practice of taxpayer intimidation. Had Obama not been reelected none of this “stuff” would have seen the light of day. Which was why it was so important to get him reelected. It’s obvious that for the first four years of his tenure Obama farmed everything out. That’s called delegating in the corporate world. The problem with delegating is that you’re only as strong as your weakest link. And Obama hired some pretty weak links. On Benghazi the WH says that it took days and weeks to fully understand what really happened on September 11. In the IRS matter the WH says that it had “no prior knowledge” of the audits. In the AP matter again the WH had “no prior knowledge” of what Holder, who had recused himself, had told his deputy to do. The only conclusion that can be drawn is that Hillary, Holder, Shulman, and others were acting as independent agents whose decisions and actions were based on their own political judgemets. Judgements which turned out to be defective and actions that may be criminal. The “librul media” has been sitting on its hands for far too long when it comes to what the Obama administartion has been up to. And the corporate, faux-leftist media is doing the job that it’s paid to do. Which is to save Hillary’s ass for 2016.
Washington is a sea of self-serving reprobates. And yes, they need their egos stroked or to have their asses politically whupped with lead pipes and blackjacks to get anything done. No one knew this better than LBJ. Barack Obama on the other hand, is a compromised, dithering dilettante who sucks up and kicks down. No one on the left has any reason to deal with him, and no one on the right does either. He betrayed the people in his own political party, and the people who voted for him, so they don’t owe him jack shit. And he never laid a finger on the people from the right, so they can move right along with their agenda with impunity. Just a few months into his second term he’s a lame duck. Quite an accomplishment. What a ridiculous, pusillanimous chickenshit poultroon who slaps hippies around to prove he’s a “big man.” If he were smart he’d spend the rest of his term making the Koch brothers and Goldman Sachs miserable, ignoring congressional subpoenas, and closing military bases in Republican congressional districts. But you know, political incompetence and administrative incompetence go hand in hand. With corruption. He’s way out of his league and the vultures will be picking at his liver for three more years until they can declare victory and install “a man of moral clarity” like George Bush’s brother.
A very good overview, Jay.
But as far as the next GOP pres. nominee goes, isn’t it more likely to be a svelte Chris Christie (I bet he can lose 175 pounds by Labor Day of 2015), than a pudgy Jeb? Or will Jeb get some surgery too?
A very good overview, Jay.
But as far as the next GOP pres. nominee goes, isn’t it more likely to be a svelte Chris Christie (I bet he can lose 175 pounds by Labor Day of 2015), than a pudgy Jeb? Or will Jeb get himself some some surgery too? And then Knut Gingrich can be next.
I think the MCMers take their cues from their Corporate paymasters, not just their hurt feefees. But, given the that the Powers That Be seem to be preparing the public to elect a freakin’ Republican, I think the MCMer, from toddlers to high school bullies, are just dying to light out after Obama.
And, if their paychecks depend on it, Hillary as well.
Ack.
When the revolution comes, my knives are sharpened for these complicit propagandists first. While it sucks for the country, it’s good for the villagers that they never make it outside the beltway.