The country voted for the Chicago way. Now we’ve got it.
If you are surprised that means you weren’t paying attention.
Suddenly the president has gone before the press to try to back off, suddenly instead of being stupid Mr. Gates and the police are both good people and might have over reacted.
The policeman in question has apparently been called by Obama and there is a great exchange over getting the press off his lawn.
It is interesting to note that it was after the Gates incident that his polls dropped below 50%.
This was actually a smart move by the president, this was going to bleed until they backed up, what will really be interesting will be how the liberal media which was all over the police over this will now react to the president’s sudden volte face.
This is now the only story on every Boston network.
Update: MSNBC is the funniest thing I’ve ever seen they are saying that Obama has handled this exactly right. I’m hope Patterico & Sister Toldjah weren’t drinking when they saw that.
Hotair comments it is a good distraction from Healthcare, but I don’t agree since it was a lead balloon to his popularity. 40 years ago Johnson figured if he lost Cronkite he lost middle America. Obama must have figured that if he lost Jon Stewart then it was time to cut bait, Rosa Parks not withstanding.
Question: If MSNBC and the other Obama media were all ready to lynch the police over this as little as a few hours ago, how are they going to re-spin themselves now that the president has backed off?
Update 2: Here is the actual video:
…during today’s impromptus here is the whole section:
In preparing to write about this, I was looking at a news article, which had a photo of Dr. Benjamin. And I thought, “Hang on, I think I know this person.” I had forgotten her name. I had not forgotten her act. Some years ago, I was at a large conference, dominated by liberals. I was one of the handful of conservatives there. And, at a big plenary session, I made some statements about race: I said I thought the country was too soaked in race; that we could use a rest from race; that race-consciousness was killing us; that separate graduation ceremonies, and separate proms and so on, were heartbreaking and wrong; that we should not give up on the integrationist ideal; that we should cling to E pluribus unum; that we should not be black and white but Americans and human beings; etc. You know: my usual anti-racialist spiel.
These remarks fell pretty flat, I figured. And, when the session was over, I made a beeline out of the hall. And as I was leaving — racing — someone was chasing after me. Running, I think — in high heels, I think. It was a woman, and one of the few blacks in attendance. When I turned to greet her — not knowing what was coming — she said, “I just wanted to thank you. That was great. It really needed to be said.” Do you think I was touched?
And I realized, looking at the news article, that this was Dr. Regina Benjamin. Which has nothing — nothing — to do with my feeling about the “fat” controversy. Just so you know. I was going to write what I’ve written about the controversy before I realized that I had encountered this woman.
I must say, I will love Regina Benjamin forever.
Now this is a nice feel good piece about Dr. Benjamin and I’m very pleased that she had this reaction to Jay’s words, but when I read this two particular sentences jumped out at me, from paragraph 1:
I was at a large conference, dominated by liberals. I was one of the handful of conservatives there.
So we have a large conference of liberals with a token conservative or two and his remarks on race fell flat but as he was leaving one person rushed to say something to him about those remarks…
It was a woman, and one of the few blacks in attendance.
One of the few blacks in attendance.
So you have a statement suggesting that we should treat blacks not like “blacks” but like the Americans and human begins that all of us are and the mostly white liberal crowd didn’t like it, after all blacks are NOT like us, they need to be cared for, they need to be shepherded, and only only person to agree with the idea that all needed to be created equal was one of the FEW blacks in attendance.
The modern liberal would be the kinder gentler plantation owner, they would “care” for their blacks and provide them with a living wage as they support the owners, and to raise their standard of living they would make sure that abortion very available so that say 1/3 of the costly black children. And maybe the smartest who see things the owner’s way would be able to attend the big parties and conferences with the rest of the beautiful people.
It reminds me of the reference to Augustus Caesar in this poem from I Claudius:
He shall give Rome marble in place of clay
And fetter her fast with unseen chains,
Augustus governed wisely and temperately for his times and reconciled Rome to monarchy instead of a republic. Our liberal friends through their kind intervention are fettering people of non-white race to dependence on government so they will be able to take care of them from seats of power and privilege that they will be able to hold for life.
There is a simple reason why Matthews is focusing on the Birther stuff. It’s a variation of the reason why MSNBC spends all its time focusing on the minority republicans.
If they fail to focus on Republicans they have to focus on Democrats as the people in charge and thus the people who are at fault for the current situation.
The end result of focusing on attacks on Rush etc have created an additional demand for Rush and the arguments against Obama’s programs. Since public opinion is starting to turn they want to avoid featuring what is basically a series of successful republican arguments.
So if you won’t focus on what the democrats are doing and you don’t want to focus on republican arguments that have resonance what do you do?
You focus on the one argument that is off the wall, the argument that has the least credible supporters and are the easiest to be used to make their supporters look like fools, the “birther” argument.
The ultimate goal is to paint the tea party people with the same brush as the birthers so they will attempt to forge a link. I suspect the Ron Paul supporters will be an excellent tool for this.
Paul is mostly awful but his is correct on two significant issues, abortion and spending, many of his supports were at the Boston Tea Party that I attended. If I was Matthews et/al I would not miss a chance to paint all tea parties as an extension of this.
Update: Even worse it forces people like Charles Johnson to agree with Matthews. If the GOP chooses to embrace this then we are shooting ourselves in the foot.