House of Eratosthenes

Our first National Pharoah is “heckled”…as He announces that He’s going to change the rules by Executive Order in a way He couldn’t, by doing it the right way, which would be going through Congress.

Tucker Carlson defends the heckler, pointing out — hey, actually, that’s a reporter, Neil Munro, doing what reporters are supposed to be doing, getting answers to the questions.

Money quote:

I don’t remember Diane Sawyer scolding her colleague Sam Donaldson for heckling President Reagan. And she shouldn’t have. A reporter’s job is to ask questions and get answers…

Mr. Donaldson is still among us, and he has something to say about the comparison:

Never once did I interrupt a president in any way while he was making a formal statement, a speech, honoring awardees or in any other way holding the floor.

Oh, okay. Bad comparison then. Point made, Mr. Donaldson.

But then he continued…

Yes, almost always when he was finished in the Rose Garden or in the Briefing Room or at a photo opportunity with other world leaders I tried to question him (only rarely was it a shout on the rope line, more often a more normal tone of voice) and other reporters of course did the same thing along with me.

Oh, okay…so you shouted at him in what you thought was a normal tone of voice…the tone of voice is what invalidates the comparison? Or it was that Reagan was nice enough to allocate some time for you to do this, something He Who Argues With The Dictionaries pointedly refused to do on Friday. That’s what makes it a bad comparison? Now I’m a bit confused. Maybe you should’ve stopped at the “formal statement” thing.

Then he continued some more…

What this man did yesterday is something new, to me wrong and unusual. I think it is probably the result of the growing incivility of the times, the competition among reporters and news organizations to be noticed not only for the work product but for the theatrics of the gathering…

*sigh* I do have to say I grow weary of these “Old Jedi” news people lamenting the passage of “a more civilized age” with more elegant weapons and so forth…you know what, it all comes down to this Sam. If I want to educate some youngsters on proper decorum around dignitaries and how to behave in public, in spite of your noble efforts, footage of 1980’s encounters between the Press Corps and President Reagan, don’t rank real high on the list. I’m sure every pit bull gnawing on a bloody rag thinks he’s doing it more daintily than all the other pit bulls, but a lot changes with perspective, y’know?

Then we get to the heart of the matter: Because Mister Civility spoke some more!

…and there is one more factor, let’s face it: Many on the political right believe this president ought not to be there – they oppose him not for his polices [sic] and political view but for who he is, an African American!

Would it be racist of me to say “Whoomp! There it is!”?

Alright, my first reaction is a raspy sigh, and so is my second & third. But I’m all raspy-sighed out by now, so let’s do Sam the favor of taking his complaint seriously and see how well it holds up under the pressure.

Donaldson delivers nothing to provide any foundation of support for this. None at all. The continuation of his remarks is

These people and perhaps even certain news organizations (certainly the right wing talkers like Limbaugh) encourage disrespect for this president. That is both regrettable and adds, in this case, to the general dislike of the press on the part of the general public.

…right. They disagree with the President and do the best they can to proliferate their sentiments and influence others…up to and beyond the point where they inflame the irritation of those whose sympathies the President has found. That’s called dissent. It’s supposed to be allowable. As Carlson pointed out in the first place, you should understand this before all others Mr. Donaldson.

But where do we get to the part where this has something to do with the President’s skin color? I remember the litany that America “might not be ready for a black President”…when that was proven not to be the case, myself and others were called upon to join in on the celebrations whether we approved of Obama’s vision & policies or not, because “He’s still your President” and besides, “Republican or democrat, it’s still a great day that the ceiling has been broken” or some such. I never quite followed this, because to me it looked like an iron-clad rebuttal of an ugly “truth” in which I never believed in the first place. America wasn’t ready? America had only see one black candidate from a major political party for that office, ever, and that was Jesse Jackson…seriously, a crackpot like Jesse Jackson didn’t come out on top back in ’84, so that means America wasn’t ready? I never followed the logic. No, sorry, I don’t think anything changed in November of 2008. Nothing got fixed that was actually broken. Certainly, no racial division was healed.

Thanks to airhead twits like Donaldson and their inflammatory rhetoric, that’s becoming more and more clear by the day. We who didn’t like Obama, at least had some hopes for that much; some complaining, classifying, human-layering would stop. Our expectations were bargain-basement low, and we’ve been disappointed nevertheless.

Professor William Jacobson, under cover of a marinade of sarcasm, presents a tasty question — he is far more thought-provoking than the dinosaur Donaldson:

I agree that the President should be allowed to finish reading statements without being interrupted, even when thumbing us in the eye. After all, it’s not like he works for us.

We must respect the Office of the Thumber in the Eye in Chief.

What I don’t understand is why reporters show up at statement readings where they can’t ask questions.

Exactly why were the reporters there?

Here we come to the real problem, and regrettably, it is bigger than Barack Obama, who is merely a symbol of it. Since our balanced, objective, unbiased free press has begun to become chummy with the progressive side, generations ago, there has been an steepening uphill incline of a situation which is now reaching some kind of a crest. The Jacobson question highlights this apex, I think. The reporters gather around the President — to offer support. To create an appearance that the policies the President is handing down (unilaterally, in this case) have been met with some purifying scrutiny of some kind. Even when, in fact, that isn’t happening in the slightest.

This whole thing about President Obama’s skin color? That’s the issue, true, but it is only a minor variant of it. Obama’s darker skin is nothing more than a gimmick. It is a pre-meditated, pre-calculated way of dealing with the dissenters — “Ah HA! You don’t agree with Him because He’s black!” Foundation for this observation you’ve made? Justification? Support? Research? Facts? Logic? Who needs those. It is that way because we say it is that way. It’s the cow-catcher device on the front of the locomotive, now…the big heavy metal thing that shoves obstructions aside.

Hillary Clinton is not black; but, she would be part of the problem too…dissenters of President Hillary Clinton would be told “You don’t like what she did just because she’s a WOMAN!”

President Kerry is too nuanced for your simplistic thinking. President Gore is just too smart for you. You’re jealous of President John Edwards because he’s better looking and bags more women.

See, we’re supposed to be living in a place that does not make gods out of its leaders, a place that respects this dissent. Why, just yesterday, it seems that Texas dimbulb was in there and I was being instructed to believe that dissent was equal to patriotism, in fact, was the highest form of it. Donaldson says “let’s face it” people don’t like President Obama because He’s black…well…I’ve got another “let’s face it” for him. It’s rather embarrassingly obvious: Dissent is being “strobed,” methodically, now-it’s-good, now-it’s-bad, to make sure progressive ideas are always more fashionable. They have to be in style, you see. They can’t win any other way. They dehumanize people, they don’t make sense and they’re just plain bad! So if they’re not more “chic,” then how do we get large numbers of idiots to support them?

President Obama’s skin color? It’s nothing more than a gimmick, a way for the left wing to win more arguments, when the facts are not on their side. This is why He was chosen as their representative four years ago. Everyone who was paying attention, knows this. The democrat party was having a huge knock-down drag-out fight four years ago, trying to figure out if it should be Obama, the black guy, or Hillary the girl. The fight was all about who had the best gimmick. Their positions on the issues were not noticeably different. It was all about who had the best weapon.

…to become our nation’s “Argument Winner In Chief.” Obama won, and hey, maybe we’re finding out that wasn’t a bad outcome at all. For the democrats, anyway.

Meanwhile, the economy is going to continue sucking ass, until such time as we get some politicians in charge who win arguments by having wise and good ideas. Yeah, yeah, that’s just crazy talk, I know…you may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one…

Cross-posted at Right Wing News and Washington Rebel.

[…] at House of Eratosthenes and Right Wing […]
- The Argument-Winner-In-Chief | Washington Rebel | 06/17/2012 @ 07:58
Yeah, I got nothin’.

I gave money to Herman Cain’s campaign because I’m a racist. (And, by the way, weren’t we going to find out what a terrible lothario he was? Wasn’t he shtuping white chicks? Something?)

I’ve been a racist my entire life, I guess. I’ve always expected that others, regardless of their faith, their skin colour, their education or party, to be as concerned about the value of truth, and the necessity of divining truth, as one of the fundamental responsibilities of inclusion in the greatest nation on earth. Citizenship has its rewards.

Watching Jonah Goldberg on C-Span tonight. Funniest comment, so far, is his take-down of Bloomberg’s “No Labels” campaign. “…no lables, like labels are, what? Words?”

Three more showings coming up. TIVO time.
.
- TMI | 06/17/2012 @ 19:36
Home run, Morgan. And thank goodness that Sam Donaldson is still in love with the sound of his own voice; it’s so much easier blowing up a bad argument when the person who makes it does all the work in setting the charges and wiring the plunger.
- nightfly | 06/17/2012 @ 20:25
until such time as we get some politicians in charge who win arguments by having wise and good ideas.

Too bad such a politician doesn’t exist. There are people whose ideas are invariably wise and good, of course…. problem is, they’re called “your grouchy Uncle Charlie,” and instead of running for office, he ruins Thanksgivings. He’s the guy who tells your sister that cutting her hair into a purple mohawk and dating the 43-year-old bassist from a Dokken tribute band is a bad idea. He’s the one who asks you what kind of job you expect to get when you inform him that you’re majoring in art history. Etc. etc.

As a society, we’re fixated on the idea of “intelligence.” Unfortunately, “intelligence” has come to mean “the ability to win arguments,” which has come to mean a very specific form of verbal agility — If you can, with a straight face, tell someone that their [plain, straightforward] statement X really means [obtuse, diametrically opposed notion] Y, you no doubt consider yourself exceedingly smart…. and vote Democrat on a regular basis.

“Intelligence,” in other words, is the direct opposite of what we denigrate as “common sense,” which is both a) extremelyuncommon, and b) the only thing that will get us out of this mess.

Being the possessor of much horse sense, though, Uncle Charlie will never run for office. He has no patience for the kind of superficially clever teenagers (and late-middle-age teenagers) political campaigns rely on.
- Severian | 06/18/2012 @ 06:46

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The Argument-Winner-In-ChiefSunday, June 17th, 2012

The Argument-Winner-In-Chief
Sunday, June 17th, 2012