Miss President Obama's press conference last night? Go here.
Last night, America witnessed something they have not seen in over 8 years…..an extremely intelligent and engaged President of the U.S.
A true American leader.
The Rumpelstiltskin press, awakened on Nov. 5, 2008 from their 8 year slumber and now fully rested and prepared to rip up another Democratic president…..got taken to school last night by the most intelligent and articulate American leader in my lifetime.
This is the same press whose bias recently has been seen in their amplification of Republican and conservative objections to Obama's stimulus/recovery plan……a press obsessed with some fictitious notion of bipartisanship…..a press basically silenced last night by President Obama's mastery of the issues and unvarnished descriptions of Republican obstructionism.
An example: Mara Liasson of NPR, also seen on Fox Freaks and Friends, opened her question to Obama last night with a lie, and had that lie launched right back at her by a much more intelligent and quicker debater, Obama. Liasson, wringing her hands with pseudo-concern over the failure of Republicans to vote for Obama's stimulus bill, asked…."are you going to need a new legislative model bringing in Republicans from the very beginning?"
"Old habits are hard to break," Obama responded. "Now, just in terms of the historic record here, the Republicans WERE brought in early, and were consulted. And you'll remember that when we initially introduced our framework, they were pleasantly surprised and complimentary about tax cuts that were presented in that framework. Those tax cuts are still in there……but there was consultation, there will continue to be consultation."
But Obama didn't settle for just one bitchslap to Mara Liasson's obviously phony question….he took it one step further….
"People have to break out of their ideological rigidity….a prime example….when it comes to how we approach the issue of fiscal responsibility. Again, it's a little hard for me to take criticism from folks about this recovery package after they presided over a doubling of the national debt. I'm not sure they have a lot of credibility when it comes to fiscal responsibility."
See how simple it is? Obama not only slapped Liasson down for repeating a totally fictitious Republican talking point about how poor GOP'ers weren't consulted on the stimulus…… he also went on to review recent history for those in the room stricken by some weird amnesia. Republicans, contrary to Mara Liasson's frame, have lost credibility in the fiscal conservancy arena because of their "presiding over a doubling of the national debt."
As Obama closed his press conference last night, he said this, "Although there are some politicians arguing we should do nothing, there are very few economists who are making that argument. You've got economists who advised John McCain, economists who were advisers to George Bush 1 and 2, all suggesting that we actually needed a serious recovery package. And so when I hear people saying aww…we don't need to do anything…this is a spending bill not a stimulus bill…without acknowledging that, by definition, part of any stimulus bill would include spending. That's the point. Then what I get a sense of is that there's some ideological blockage there that needs to be cleared out."
Now, The Reverend has dealt with arterial blockage, requiring major surgery, and, like most everyone else, household drain blockage which required Drano or a roto-rooter. I'm thinking that the ideological blockage currently diseasing the Republican Party will require even more extensive electoral surgery, say, in 2010. After which, Republicans can rest comfortably and recuperate from their quiet spots on the sidelines.
Just what I'm thinking.
