The American Idol president is running his own reality show and we are picking up the tab. Mr. Obama seems to think that he and his wife are the most fascinating part of the American narrative. Last Friday, the IOC clarified the butter for the Obamas. In the past months, we have published many articles reporting on Kool Aid drinkers who have lifted their heads from the pink trough, dazed and confused, wondering where the “Change” is. The list is long: Peggy Noonan, Frank Rich, Susan Estrich, Andrew Sullivan, Camille Paglia, Robert Reich. Feel free to add your own. Today I add three more to that growing list.

First WaPo’s Richard Cohen complains Obama Doesn’t Seem Ready to Lead:

Barack Obama’s trip to Copenhagen to pitch Chicago for the Olympics would have been a dumb move whatever the outcome. But as it turned out (an airy dismissal would not be an unfair description), it poses some questions about his presidency that are way more important than the proper venue for synchronized swimming. The first, and to my mind most important, is whether Obama knows who he is.

This business of self-knowledge is no minor issue. It bears greatly on the single most crucial issue facing this young and untested president: Afghanistan. Already, we have his choice for Afghanistan commander, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, taking the measure of his commander in chief and publicly telling him what to do. This MacArthuresque star turn called for a Trumanesque response, but Obama offered nothing of the kind. Instead, he used McChrystal as a prop, adding a bit of four-star gravitas to that silly trip to Copenhagen by having the general meet with him there.

Mr. Cohen is blaming Gen. McChrystal for someone else leaking his report to the President. The more important point is, as Gen. Wes Clark or anyone else who’s actually been in this position will tell you (and as he did say in an interview this weekend), you’d better listen to your commanders on the ground. Cohen is right that the 25 minute meeting with McChrystal on Friday was merely a photo op. He’s still deliberating. How many more months of ‘deliberating” are required while our soldiers are dying in Afghanistan?

This is the president we now have: He inspires lots of affection but not a lot of awe. It is the latter, though, that matters most in international affairs, where the greatest and most gut-wrenching tests await Obama. If he remains consistent to his own rhetoric of just last August, he will send more troops to Afghanistan and more of them will die. “This is not a war of choice,” he said. “This is a war of necessity. Those who attacked America on 9/11 are plotting to do so again. If left unchecked, the Taliban insurgency will mean an even larger safe haven from which al-Qaeda would plot to kill more Americans.”

President Obama has the disastrous example of Iraq where Bush’s Generals told him from the outset that an overwhelming force was needed. They did not get it. You saw the result. Obama himself admitted that the belated 2007 surge was wildly successful. How much more evidence does he need? Define the mission, and either send the forces in to get the job done or pull all our men and women out of there. Choose. Lead. That’s the job description. Date night I don’t care about. Dog walking I don’t care about.

Cohen concludes:

But the ultimate in realism is for the president to gauge himself and who he is: Does he have the stomach and commitment for what is likely to be an unpopular war? Will he send additional troops, but hedge by not sending enough — so that the dying will be in vain? What does he believe, and will he ask Americans to die for it? Only he knows the answers to these questions. But based on his zigzagging so far and the suggestion from the Copenhagen trip that the somber seriousness of the presidency has yet to sink in, we have reason to wonder.

Has the seriousness of the presidency sunk in? Now there’s a question.

You may be surprised to note that NY Times columnist Bob Herbert is wondering the same thing. A huge cheerleader for Obama, Herbert cried racism and even saw phallic symbols in the leaning tower of Pisa in a misguided attempt to defend his chosen hero last year. Now he wonders Does Obama Get It? Well, Mr. Herbert, don’t feel bad. This question has been keeping me up nights, too. He states:

The big question on the domestic front right now is whether President Obama understands the gravity of the employment crisis facing the country. Does he get it? The signals coming out of the White House have not been encouraging.

Clearly Mr. Herbert, if you have to ask, then Obama does not understand the gravity of the situation. Where is his good judgment? How can one not understand 9.8 unemployment – in reality it is a much higher number when one includes Americans out of work for so long they have fallen off the rolls.

The Beltway crowd and the Einsteins of high finance who never saw this economic collapse coming are now telling us with their usual breezy arrogance that the Great Recession is probably over. Their focus, of course, is on data, abstractions like the gross domestic product, not the continued suffering of living, breathing human beings struggling with the nightmare of joblessness.

Even Mr. Obama, in an interview with The Times, gave short shrift to the idea of an additional economic stimulus package, telling John Harwood a few weeks ago that the economy had likely turned a corner. “As you know,” the president said, “jobs tend to be a lagging indicator; they come last.”

The view of most American families is somewhat less blasé. …

Nearly one in four American families has suffered a job loss over the past year, according to a survey released by the Economic Policy Institute. Nearly 1 in 10 Americans is officially unemployed, and the real-world jobless rate is worse.

It is a nightmare. No one is blasé when they are worried how they are going to feed their families. What about the porkulus package? Is this administration waiting to release most of the funds in 2010 to help them at the polls? If that is the case, shame on them.

Why should Obama understand when he isn’t spending his own money? Half million dollar pizza parties, an obscene amount spent on the inauguration and several million on this reckless Copenhagen junket show a frightening disconnect between Obama’s priorities and his fiduciary responsibility to the American people. Herbert continues:

The Obama administration seems hamstrung by the unemployment crisis. No big ideas have emerged. No dramatically creative initiatives. While devoting enormous amounts of energy to health care, and trying now to decide what to do about Afghanistan, the president has not even conveyed the sense of urgency that the crisis in employment warrants.

If that does not change, these staggering levels of joblessness have the potential to cripple not just the well-being of millions of American families, but any real prospects for sustained economic recovery and the political prospects of the president as well. An unemployed electorate is an unhappy electorate.

Mr. Herbert, they are already crippled, but instead of addressing the urgency of the economy and Afghanistan head on, we get what George Will calls The Obamas’ Narcissism on Display. Speaking of Mr. and Mrs. Obama’s speeches before the IOC last week,

…Their separate speeches to the International Olympic Committee were so dreadful, and in such a characteristic way, that they might be symptomatic of something that has serious implications for American governance.

Both Obamas gave heartfelt speeches about … themselves. Although the working of the committee’s mind is murky, it could reasonably have rejected Chicago’s bid for the 2016 games on aesthetic grounds — unless narcissism has suddenly become an Olympic sport.

George Will suggested that since the Obamas used so many “I” and “me” references in their speeches, Obama’s genius speechwriters (Favreau et al) should have substituted the words I and me with “sauerkraut” to underscore the ‘antic nature of their excessive appearances.’ Someone needs to tell the Obamas that what is compelling about America is all Americans – all colors of the rainbow, all states, all social strata – together. All of us. Not just the two of them. And all of us are hurting out here. Our soldiers are hurting, too.

Will also points to Obama’s excessive use of cliché:

“At this defining moment,” a moment “when the fate of each nation is inextricably linked to the fate of all nations” in “this ever-shrinking world,” he aspires to “forge new partnerships with the nations and the peoples of the world.”
…
Does our Cicero even glance at his speeches before reading them in public?

All this is indicative of a man not connected to his words or not caring enough about either his audience or the subject at hand to come up with anything better than patented brand phrases that some focus group told him “resonate” with the public.

Our soldiers and our economy need a coherent plan. Now. He has had ample time to figure this out, as has Congress. Too much energy is focused on infighting for a health care plan that is such an incoherent monstrosity that they should trash it and start over. This is not even supposed to take effect until 2013, after the next election. Hmmm I wonder why. All things considered, that leaves health care the least urgent issue of the three.

On Afghanistan and the economy, pressing matters where lives, jobs and homes are on the line – where is the president? Will concludes:

Unhappy will be a president whose defining adjective is “vain.”

In keeping with the vanity of this man’s administration, we also see that nothing President Obama does is his own fault. This is the job he wanted. And a majority of the electorate voted him in to do it. What is he waiting for? There is no one else to blame if he hems and haws so long that Afghanistan is lost. There is no one else to blame if he insists on focusing on parts of an agenda that are not helping put the American people back to work. This is his presidency now. So I’ll ask again.

Mr. President, why did you want this job?

In honor of that (in)auspicious occasion, I would like to share this happy little tune with you, one I am sure you will be singing the rest of the day (H/T to NQ writer Ani for this), to celebrate a different kind of Happy Hour:

Now, don’t you just feel better about everything that as been going on for the past 7 months? Make that 17 months? I knew it would. Go have a drink of Kool Aide, and I am sure you WILL feel better in no time!

By the way, Sgt Crowley avoided the rays of Hope and Change emanating from President Obama. He said that they “agreed to disagree.” Hmmm – I wonder if he has some kind of antidote to the Kool Aide? Now THAT would be a study on which I would be willing to have my tax dollars spent, wouldn’t you??

Consider this an Open Thread. Have at it!

Tonight’s special event is sponsored by the National Pork Producers Council because you can’t get enough pork and, besides, it’s good for you. (TOTUS claims that Joe Biden wanted to rename the flu “‘The Squeeler from Tequiler’ or ‘Montezuma’s Revenge Part Dos’.”) NPPC is grateful to “Bruno Napolitano” for renaming the bug “H1N1.”

The Council’s sponsorship is also part of our recognition of the pandemic known as Obamabotism, a virulent strain of political fever that causes severe mental confusion sometimes leading to psychosis and/or paranoia towards anyone who doesn’t share the disease. Obamabotism has recently been discovered to be an environmental hazard, given the increased production by Obamabots of greenhouse-gas emissions, exactly like the hazard created by flatulent cows.

Join us promptly at 8:00 p.m. ET, or drop on by at any time. We’re welcoming submissions of YouTube videos that you’d especially like to share with the crowd. In particular, we’re looking for YouTube videos pertinent to Obamabotism.

There’s nothing you need to do and no software to download. Simply show up at the blog and click the big arrow to enter the chatroom. It’s even easier than having ACORN vote for you.

Is “the American dream” over? For most Americans? For you?

John McLaughlin asked the question of his panel the other night on his PBS program, The McLaughlin Group. Eleanor Clift, the Obamabot on the panel, had the rosiest outlook. McLaughlin ended the discussion with this:

I think it’s permanent. I think the party’s over. And there’s probably a big hangover.

The Washington Post had a profoundly moving story of the struggles of two Obama supporters.

Call them dreamers or fools, but they really hoped, I’m sure, that Obama would make a difference in their lives and the lives of those they help.

Trust me when I tell you that, after you read their story, you’ll find it impossible not to empathize with them, or to respect them, particularly 60-year-old Edith Childs who is so generous and kind to everyone she knows who needs help.

From “A Hundred Anxious Days“:

On Day 4 of his presidency, the Solutia textile plant laid off 101 workers. On Day 23, the food bank set a record for meals served. On Day 50, the hospital fired 200 employees and warned of further job cuts. On Day 71, the school superintendent called a staff meeting and told his principals: “We’re losing 10 percent of our budget. That means some of us won’t have jobs next year, and the rest should expect job changes and pay cuts.” On Day 78, the town’s newly elected Democratic mayor, whose campaign was inspired partly by his admiration for Obama, summarized Greenwood’s accelerating fragility. “This is crippling us, and there’s no sign of it turning around,” Welborn Adams said.

On Day 88, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that South Carolina had set a record for its highest unemployment rate in state history, at 11.4 percent. Greenwood’s unemployment is 13 percent — more than twice what it was when Childs first started chanting.

“We have a lot of people who live in cold houses, with no jobs and no food,” Childs says.

Hundreds of them call her, and the most desperate travel to Childs’s single-story house on Old Ninety-Six Highway outside of town and knock on her front door. A retired nurse living with her husband on modest savings, she makes $725 a month for serving on the county council and uses that money to pay other people’s bills: $240 for her brother’s electricity, because he can’t find a job; $300 for a young family’s rent in a two-bedroom apartment, because they have a 5-year-old boy and no income; $168 for a friend’s water bill, because the county threatened to shut it off. When the $725 runs out — and it always does — Childs dips into savings and tells Charles she spent the money on a new outfit. …

If only Edith got $725,000 per month, instead of $725, she could buy into Geithner’s toxic assets plan and have the government add taxpayers’ money at six to seven times her investment — around $4,350,000. Even if Edith’s deal doesn’t pan out, she’s only out that one-month’s investment of $725,000, and doesn’t owe the nation’s taxpayers a dime. But that’s for the big players. Not the little people like Edith and those she’s helping.

Read all of “A Hundred Anxious Days.” You may feel irritated at times, but you’ll also feel just plain sad that these people really thought he was “the one.”

WE ARE LIVE NOW! CLICK ON THE ARROW TO JOIN US!

Come on by and let your hair down. You’ll be free to RANT about what you REALLY think about Michelle and Barack’s destruction of the once-unparalleled position of the United States as the globe’s clear superpower, both real and symbolically. I, for one, can’t take it anymore. Be sure to share what you’ve been saying and e-mailing to friends and family. Copy and paste any especially Obama-damning e-mails or blog comments you’ve written.

DAVID GERGEN: I just disagree with the Wagoner decision. And people say, well, you’re — it’s it’s a double standard. You know, you’re treating the banks much better. This is going to send a shudder through the banking community, “If the government can be capricious here, they will be capricious in dealing with us,” and make them even more, I think, reluctant to play.

COOPER: And, Vince, that’s your fear?

VINCE CREW: And that’s it. That’s absolutely it, agreeing with David here.

When the president of the United States can — can fundamentally interject his — his power, his authority, his — his advisers’ ideas into the private sector, we are on that proverbial slippery slope, the — the — this is not the audacity of hope. This is the audacity of power.

And those of us who — who voted for this man had no idea that this was what we were hoping would happen. And those of us who didn’t vote for this man feared that it would.

COOPER: Very briefly, Stephen.

STEPHEN LEEB: OK. He’s doing now what he has to do in order so he doesn’t have to do a lot more later. If he lets GM fail, you will end up seeing the government so much part of everyone’s life, it will make today look like a picnic.

Susan again: “… so he doesn’t have to do a lot more later. …” Well, of course. Obama’s MO is to make a swift, and easy (aka lazy ass) move that shifts responsibility onto others. Maybe the idea was that a shake-up would wake up GM’s management, but it’s also unsettling. Worse, it’s very unsettling to ALL business executives, including any who may contemplate investing in Geithner’s toxic assets plan, which is supposedly a “one-way bet,” as Krugman calls it, that leaves TAXPAYERS holding the bag for every toxic asset purchase that fails to increase in value.

Obama’s move has also unsettled the auto workers, who fear, more than ever, that GM’s last-gasp effort at restructuring is sure to fail and that bankruptcy comes next, in which a judge will demand hard-nosed benefits cutbacks to workers.

Obama’s move has further pissed off the auto companies who haven’t needed or asked for government help: Ford and all the foreign companies who make cars/parts in the U.S. Why give GM an advantage their company won’t get?

Here is the full discussion segment, from the transcript:

As we mentioned, President Obama is taking heat tonight for demanding Rick Wagoner’s resignation. There’s that kind of anger. Then there’s the kind that has nothing to do with presidents or CEOs or beltway politics.

It’s the kind of captured by local station WWMT outside a Chevy dealership in Wayland, Michigan, that had just announced it was closing and that everyone was losing their job. Take a look what happened, employees fighting each other. It’s actually the second fight of the day there. A short time later, one of the men involved came and spoke to the camera.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It doesn’t really matter how hard that you work, because there’s always somebody a little bit above you that has the right to control every decision, every ounce of energy that you put forth effort to. Don’t you have the right to be a little bit mad when somebody says, hey, we’re all done?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: “Digging Deeper” now with senior political analyst David Gergen, economist Stephen Leeb, author of “Game Over,” and ethics guru Vince Crew, author of “Everyday Ethics, Everlasting Consequences.”

David, what do you make of this? I mean, it has happened before. But we’re kind of in unchartered waters. Firing of CEOs by the government?

DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: We sure are.

And I think that we’re going to see more of it, Anderson. The — the toughest part of this is that the government had no good choices. President Obama had no good choices. And what they have decided is, we couldn’t get the bondholders to agree to any kind of out-of-court settlement.

We couldn’t get the UAW, the automobile workers. We’re going to force them. We’re going to give them 60 days to do this or we’re going to take them into bankruptcy and do it through a court.

I — all of that is understandable. It’s tough. It means more layoffs are coming. I think the surprise was firing Rick Wagoner, a man who, as CEO, had done a very good job restructuring the company. And a lot of the congressional delegation, Republicans and Democrats, expressed surprise.

And there is this question now of a double standard about, why do you treat the automobile companies in one way and treat the banks in another way? I think that’s going to be very tough politics for the Obama administration.

COOPER: Vince, what about that? I mean, there are lot of — I was just in Detroit two weeks ago. And a lot of the autoworkers there are saying to me, look, there’s a complete double standard. A lot of these CEOs on Wall Street have cost the government a lot of money. They have gotten more bailout money. Their companies are tanking probably even more than some of these auto companies. They’re not being fired.

VINCE CREW, AUTHOR, “EVERYDAY ETHICS, EVERLASTING CONSEQUENCES”: Well, you’re right, Anderson. That’s happening.

And, also, when — when people are looking at these complex situations about the economy, and the economists come out and they say, well, something had to be done, people go, wait a second. In my own personal life, if — if I have a failed business or if I make bad decisions, there are repercussions for that. Why aren’t these guys having repercussions? And when it comes to dismissing a CEO, that’s the job of a company board, not the president of the United States.

COOPER: Steven, is there a double standard here?

STEPHEN LEEB, ECONOMIST: Not really, I don’t think.

I mean, basically, I don’t think the government had much choice. I mean, it’s really AIG fallout, Anderson.

The public, I think, would be furious if we were giving ever more money to a company, and sort of rewarding, in a way, the CEO who at the helm when the company basically went under and required all this money. I mean, it has to be publicly acceptable.

And in answer to letting the company fail, that’s just not an alternative. I mean, how many more home foreclosures would you have if you have a million people out of work? That’s just not doable.

COOPER: I know David wants to disagree with you here, but I — but I have just got to take a short break.

Read all.

BELOW, you and I time-travel back to March 2008, to the sweltering primaries, to Hillary and Barack battling the “brain-spattering, windpipe-slitting art” of presidential primaries warfare. There, we see economics professor and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, in March 2008, sizing up and dressing down Barack Obama: “Why has Mr. Obama stumbled when it comes to economic issues?” (And has anything changed, or has he learned anything, in one short year?)

First, here’s the Nobel Laureate as a blunt instrument hammering the plan on PBS’s Charlie Rose Monday (March 23rd) for “an update on the economy with Andrew Ross Sorkin, Paul Krugman and Joe Nocera.” Krugman’s condemnation of Geithner’s recycled-from-Paulson “zombie” plan is stunning:

Paul. You’re the man. You nailed it yesterday. And, Paul, one year and 16 days ago (March 8, 2008), you had it all figured out:

Why has Mr. Obama stumbled when it comes to economic issues? Well, on health care — which is closely tied to overall concerns about financial security — there is a clear, substantive difference between the candidates, with the Clinton plan being significantly stronger.

More broadly, I suspect that the Obama mystique — his carefully created image as a transformational, even transcendent figure — has created a backlash among those unconvinced that he’s interested in the nuts-and-bolts work of fixing things.

Ohio voters were more likely to say that Mr. Obama inspires them — but more likely to say that Mrs. Clinton has a clear plan for the country’s problems.

And Mr. Obama’s attempt to win over workers by portraying himself as a fierce critic of Nafta looked, and was, deeply insincere — an appearance particularly costly for a candidate who tries to seem above politics as usual.

Isn’t that remarkable. Paul predicted — perfectly — the central problems of an Obama presidency:

1. A lack of interest in the “nuts-and-bolts work of fixing things”; and
2. A lack of sincerity — in fact, he comes across as “deeply insincere.”

That sums it up for me. The major question is why the hard left, which had adored Paul Krugman for years, turned on him immediately when he dared to criticize Obama as unreal and disinterested in WORKING at governance.

Hell, during the Tuesday night press conference, he didn’t even want to be bothered with working at explaining what he’s not doing.

Here’s a second segment from Charlie Rose’s show Monday night. “The economy continued with Daniel Alpert is a managing director of Westwood Captial and Thomas F Steyer is Co-Managing Partner of Farallon Capital Management.”

FOR INVETERATE READERS ONLY: Boy, if you want to see some historic predictions made, glance through our archives from Spring 2008 on the primary battles involving Hillary, Barack and John (Edwards), and Paul Krugman’s and our commentaries on all three.

Paul Krugman had Obama pegged, and so did we at No Quarter.

And, you know, we’re not pleased that we’re correct. For the sake of this country, we wish we had been wrong.

But you can’t take a guy who’s never worked hard at anything — except campaigning so he can win something — and turn him into an intense, involved chief executive of the most powerful nation on earth and in history.

The guy either has the work ethic, or he doesn’t.

This guy doesn’t.

Worse than his laziness are his disinterest and his disconnectedness. Which showed during the March 24th press conference, as he got restless and his answers became more and more mechanical, and it was clear he wanted to be anywhere but there because the reporters’ questions bored him. It’s hard, make that impossible, to work hard at anything if you don’t care.

The guy either has the passion, or he doesn’t.

Most certainly, they cannot be feigned. Every sentient American has the sniff and scratch ability to detect a FRAUD.

P.S. Unless they wear rose-colored glasses, but those people don’t count because they’re hopelessly clueless, and rational dialogue is impossible until they rehabilitate themselves and rediscover their critical thinking capabilities.

"President Obama has accomplished more in 30 days than any president in modern history," a senior White House official said this morning in a background briefing for TV reporters.

Pointing to legislation on children’s health insurance and the "Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act," and most especially the stimulus bill, the official compared President Obama favorably to Presidents Reagan, Clinton and Bush, pointing out that the previous presidents’ major economic bills were all months away from becoming enacted into law at this point in their presidencies.

"He has a set of wins under his belt" as he comes to address a joint session of Congress this evening, the senior White House official said, contrasting the president with Bill Clinton, …

(Boy, was that a vague campaign speech, or what??? DID DAVID AXELROD WRITE THAT SPEECH??? Methinks so. God, he even had me going for a while, I hate to admit … that optimism, those promises … then it hit me [with some therapeutic assistance from the acerbic Larry Johnson] that there was NO THERE THERE. No specifics. Nada. LATER TODAY, I will give you a round-up of bloggers’ reactions, both pro and con. The “pro” responses are ALWAYS worth a laugh …. I cannot wait to look up Andrew Sullivan’s adulatory commentaries ….)

BELOW, more from the always alert Jake Tapper:

This one is just interesting; and I have to hand it to President Obama for adopting this practice — I just WORRY about who is sorting through those letters and WHICH LETTERS he is reading. After all, THE ONE needs those strokes from the folks, doesn’t he. So my bet is that there are far more “oh i love you” than the Rush Limbaugh-generated HATE mail):

“Political Punch: The Impact on a President of Reading Citizens’ Letters”

CHECK OUT MORE TAPPER here. I’m stopping now because I just discovered a gem that deserves its own post.

So, tune in at any time between 10 and 11:30 p.m. ET tonight to share your thoughts, your opinions — on both Obama and how the media are covering his address. LIVE CHAT WILL START at 9:50 p.m. ET.

Before the show, you can send your questions or comments to nocturnalwarriorshow@gmail.com. During the show, call in at (347) 677-0792 to speak up on The One and his big speech.

The Warrior has rallied some of No Quarter’s experts, including LD, himself “the only and only” on economics. LD will be calling in to the show shortly after 10:00 p.m. Tune in early so you won’t miss LD.

The other night I dreamt of Barack Obama. He was taking a shower right when I needed to get into the bathroom to shave my legs, and then he was being yelled at by my husband, Max, for smoking in the house. It was not clear whether Max was feeling protective of the president’s health or jealous because of the cigarette.

The other day a friend of mine confided that in the weeks leading up to the election, the Obamas’ apparent joy as a couple had made her just miserable. Their marriage looked so much happier than hers. Their life seemed so perfect. “I was at a place where I was tempted daily to throttle my husband,” she said. “This coincided with Michelle saying the most beautiful things about Barack. Each time I heard her speak about him I got tears in my eyes — because I felt so far away from that kind of bliss in my own life and perhaps even more, because I was so moved by her expressions of devotion to him. And unlike previous presidential couples, they are our age, have children the same age and (just imagine the stress of daily life on the campaign) by all accounts should have been fighting even more than we were.” … [emphases mine]

DAMN! I forgot to warn you to grab a bucket. Hope you made it to a barf bag in time! But wait. There’s more, and it’s even WORSE. Like this much worse: “Many women — not too surprisingly — were dreaming about sex with the president.” …

[...]

Many women — not too surprisingly — were dreaming about sex with the president. In these dreams, the women replaced Michelle with greater or lesser guilt or, in the case of a 62-year-old woman in North Florida, whose dream was reported to me by her daughter, found a fully above-board solution: “Michelle had divorced Barack because he had become ‘too much of a star.’ He then married my mother, who was oh so proud to be the first lady,” the daughter wrote me.

There was some daydreaming too, much of it a collective fantasy about the still-hot Obama marriage. “Barack and Michelle Obama look like they have sex. They look like they like having sex,” a Los Angeles woman wrote to me, summing up the comments of many. “Often. With each other. These days when the sexless marriage is such a big celebrity in America (and when first couples are icons of rigid propriety), that’s one interesting mental drama.”

[...]

One woman wrote that when she couldn’t get to sleep at night, she “lay in bed and thought about the Obama girls in their rooms at the White House. I thought about Marian Robinson up on the third floor. And about Barack and Michelle, a couple who clearly have a ‘thing’ for each other, spooning together in bed. It helped me relax.”

I understood perfectly where these cozy dreams of easy familiarity came from. It was that sense so many people share of having a very immediate connection to Barack Obama, whether they’re black or biracial, or children of single parents or self-made strivers; or they’re lawyers or community organizers or Ivy League graduates or smokers or basketball players or Blackberry users or parents or married or Democrats. A lot of people share the fantasy that having the Obamas over for “dinner and a game of Scrabble,” as one daydreamer put it to me, is something that really could just about happen. …

And these poor people have “Obama anxiety” and WISH they had lived HIS life, and given themselves SO unselfishly to the betterment of mankind! Why hadn’t THEY been community organizers like he? Why, why, why, why, why????? Why hadn’t they sacrificed like he did?

Why didn’t they make sordid deals on pensions to benefit their crooked cronies like Tony Rezko? Why hadn’t their wives used their position on the historic preservation board to find and grab a mansion and then used Rezko’s money to enable them to buy it, no matter that they knew that Rezko was already being investigated and followed by the Feds everywhere?

Why hadn’t they tipped off their rich buddies like Cullen and Allison Davis so they could rip off millions and millions from taxpayers and let Mssrs. Davis do NOTHING about the appalling conditions in the former public housing, and allow the gentrification of such properties, even though the original intent was to preserve low-income housing?

Why hadn’t they given a stirring speech to terrified workers at the Maytag plant in Illinois, promising those workers their jobs would be saved and taking their hard-earned money as campaign contributions, and then going to visit the patriarch of the billionaire Crown family, with controlling stock in Maytag, and never once mentioning to patriarch Lester Crown the plight of those workers, while sucking up all the campaign contributions he could from Lester Crown as well as every member of the Crown family and all of their extremely wealthy friends and allies? (Oh yes, all those jobs went to Mexico, but the Crowns said that Obama never asked them about saving those jobs, according to Chicago newspapers.)

Watch this infuriated union leader instead of indulging your sex fantasies, you boobs:

– From “Machinists Union Tells It Like It Is” (about Obama)

Why, oh why?

Oops. Did I just ruin the sex fantasy for you? I’m so sorry. Not.

A teaspoon of knowledge about who this man REALLY is would sober these people up plenty fast, and they’d no longer be plagued by their insanely goofy obsessions with him and his supposed fantastic sex life. Good god almighty. I just shake my head.

That stimulus package should include counseling and psychiatric help for all of these still-delusional Obamabots living in their unreal Obamatopia.

:::::

For those stout enough to take it, the full “article” is here: “Sometimes a President Is Just a President.”

Consider, for example, that The One promised a new way of doing business in Washington but is responsible for managing the vetting of prospective nominees that green-lights not one but three tax cheats. Instead of showing them the door and finding someone smart enough to know that, if they make more than $200,000, they ought to hire an accountant, Barack signs off on their nominations. (Maybe it is okay to not pay taxes and hold public office in Chicago).

It is only when the press gets wind of the facts that Barack and his team realize they have a problem. Sorry, this is not a “new way of doing business in Washington.” It is the same damn thing.

Barack and his team are acting like every other politician who has taken up residence in the White House–they initially decided to look the other way and excuse the inexcusable. While I credit Barack for admitting his mistake, it is a mistake he should not have made. Unfortunately, it appears that this is not an isolated event.

Victor Davis Hanson, in his typically understated fashion, offers up a list of warning signs and lays part of the blame laser-focused on the lap of the media for abetting the disastrous choice of the American people, so desperate for a “savior” from the Republican disaster, that they bet it all on a naive political neophyte:

Some of us have been warning that it was not healthy for the U.S. media to have deified rather than questioned Obama, especially given that they tore apart Bush, ridiculed Palin, and caricatured Hillary. And now we can see the results of their two years of advocacy rather than scrutiny.

The proof is so obvious:

No matter his protestations that he alone made the decision, it’s clear that former Senator Tom Daschle was summarily dumped, and Steve Clemons hints that Rahm Emanuel had a hand in it (”Many of Daschle’s camp are quite furious with Obama’s chief of staff.”) Clemons also argues that, in typical Democrats’ fashion, they gave up the fight long before they needed to.

General Anthony Zinni, who was already preparing for his departure to Iraq as its new ambassador, is left hanging by the White House. The puzzled general finally called up Gen. Jones, Obama’s National Security Advisor, and “was told that Christopher Hill, the outgoing assistant secretary of State for East Asia, was getting the job.” [SEE ALSO: Laura Rozen's "General Zinni gets undiplomatic treatment from Obama team" and related Memeorandum-listed stories.]

Gen. Zinni said no explanation was given. “That kind of bothered me,” he said. “I was told that I had it.”

What the hell? And now we have more distressing news coming out on Obama’s nominee to head Commerce, Sen. Judd Gregg.

The arch-conservative New Hampshire senator, as I wrote yesterday about a report in CQ Politics, “voted in favor of abolishing the agency as a member of the Budget Committee and on the Senate floor in 1995.”

Now we find out, via Time’s Mark Halperin, that Gregg had “ties to the disgraced lobbyist” Jack Abramoff. The White House is sloughing off the problem, even though Halperin points out that “a former legislative aide [of Gregg] is allegedly ‘Staffer F’ cited in a guilty plea last week by a former Abramoff deputy.”

The left hand is clearly not in touch with the right hand.

How did General Jones know that General Zinni was not the choice for Ambassador to Iraq, yet no one in the White House disabused Gen. Zinni of his justified assumption that he had the job?

How did no one in the White House and the very large vetting staff not clear Daschle’s tax problems and his relationships to for-profit health care companies?

How did no one in the White House not know that Gregg had voted to demolish the agency that he’s now been picked to oversee? Or that he has ties to Jack Abramoff?

Larry Johnson made a great point last night in his story, for which he took some heat, “Let’s Give Barack Credit“:

Did you catch Barack telling CNN’s Anderson Cooper, “I screwed up.” Damn, is that refreshing. After eight years of George Bush never admitting to any mistakes (even though they were numerous and glaring) it does appear that President Obama may be serious about this change thing.

However, the sole thing that matters after you admit you made a mistake is if you change your OWN behavior and that of your staff.

It’s disturbing to read Steve Clemons’ report about (1) the ease with which Democrats concede defeat and (2) the behavior of Rahm Emanuel, the man on whom Obama must most depend:

Obama seems to be replicating the pattern — conceding defeat on Tom Daschle, one of the people most responsible for actually creating the Obama political machine — and on the very same day yielding a senior cabinet position at the Department of Commerce not to a leading business official or Democratic Congressman or Governor — but rather giving it to Judd Gregg who voted 14 years ago to abolish the Commerce Department.

People will be parsing for some time Tom Daschle’s missteps with his taxes, and why he wasn’t vetted more by the Obama team, and whether Rahm Emanuel was part of the game knifing Daschle from behind, and what the political upper crust in Washington sees as “normal” when they leave office — but mostly, this was about the opposing team taking down one of Obama’s most important chess pieces.

This was all about Obama, about humbling him, about dividing progressives over whether to support or oppose Daschle.

What we see are two interesting things. First, we see that the divisions between the political franchises inside the Obama camp are fraught with tension and anger now. Many of Daschle’s camp are quite furious with Obama’s chief of staff.

Yes, Obama has been humbled. Perhaps. If he’s learned.

But the news about the “tension and anger” within the Obama camp is disturbing. For that to be cured, a strong and experienced leader is needed, and is Obama up to the job?

And if he isn’t, is his staff? Hell, his press office can’t even get out their daily press briefing videos and transcripts. You try to get one promptly, and you’ll see what I mean. (Meanwhile, over at State, Hillary’s press staff, like clockwork, posts the daily press briefing video and the transcript with lightning speed.) Victor Davis Hanson declares Robert Gibbs a “nightmare”:

Gibbs as press secretary is a Scott McClellan nightmare that won’t go away, given his long McClellan-like relationship with Obama (McClellan should have been fired on day hour one on the job). Blaming Fox News for Obama’s calamities is McClellan to the core and doesn’t work. He already reminds me of Reverend Wright’s undoing at the National Press Club—and he will get worse.

And the Columbia Journalism Review’s blog, Campaign Desk is as skeptical about Obama’s press office as I am:

Who’s Undercutting Obama?
For the moment, at least, it’s his press office

[...]

While it is too early to judge just how this will work out, the early signs are troubling. And interviews with a dozen Washington reporters indicate that the Obama press operation tends to embrace friendly questions, while treating skeptical questions as not worth their time or, worse, as coming from an enemy. [...]

Questions about whether Shapiro [a White House press office staffer] knows the difference between off-the-record, background, deep background, and on-the-record did not get asked, because Shapiro made it clear he had no interest in answering anything about how the Obama press secretary’s office is operating and what its tone will be. He said questions should be submitted in writing by e-mail to nshapiro@who.eop.gov. I sent Shapiro an e-mail outlining the contours of what would be covered in an interview, but have not received a response as of this writing, the following day.

Shapiro did say that there are press office numbers to call beside 202-456-2580, which has been the main White House press office number for decades. “You should have used one of them,” he said.

And those numbers are? Shapiro said these numbers would be made public soon. (Thoughts of the illogic made famous by Kafka, Catch-22, and Lewis Carroll’s King of Hearts come to mind here.) But there is more to this than just the answering, or not answering, of telephones and questions. [...]

The Obama administration is also editing briefing transcripts. So far it posts only snippets of some White House briefings at whitehouse.gov. Shapiro promised that would be corrected soon.

Politicians make choices and have to live with them. How they deal with journalists—especially whether they are candid and direct about dealing in facts—sets a tone that will influence the administration’s ability to communicate its messages, especially those Obama messages that run counter to deeply ingrained cultural myths about the economy, taxes, and the role of government. … [Read all -- it's worth it.]

Victor Davis Hanson has a litany of Obama’s failures.

One which struck me was Obama’s utter naivete in expecting the Republicans, over a series of luncheons, cocktail parties and Superbowl chips and dips, to warm to him — to find him inescapably charming and the answer to their prayers too. But these grizzled GOP veterans know far too much about D.C., about legislation, and about how to manipulate the malleable Democrats to ever be “touched” by the Obamatopia that sadly overcame millions of dreamy-headed Americans.

Obama seems to be the kind of guy who loves the campaign, the chase, the hunt, and the all-glorious win. But he is most definitely NOT the kind of guy who likes the day-to-day tough drudgery and decision-making.

Like many of his adoring fans at Daily Kos, he wants what he wants when he wants it. The hard work part of governing — the grinding job of building longterm alliances and forging sensible compromises and the long hours involved in accomplishing all of that, just do not appeal to these people. They want to snap their fingers, and have what they want.

I have never seen in Obama the capacity for that kind of work. I still do not.

I think that that is one reason that Obama made the disastrous decision to let Nancy Pelosi and David Obey control the writing of the stimulus packaging bill. That bill should have been closely overseen and scrutinized in the White House, and have received the most cold-hearted “due diligence” possible.

But Obama and team did not want to do that hard work. They thought they could pass off the job to Nancy and crew, a truly frightening decision given Nancy’s penchant for pet far-left projects that drew immediate criticisms from so many that the Republicans voted a unanimous NAY and even 11 Democrats in conservative districts also had to vote NAY in order to keep their seats.

Now, we have a mess of a stimulus plan that is so bad that Obama is not likely, at present, to even bring in the few Republicans he needs for the bill to pass the Senate. Even reliable types like Olympia Snow are rejecting the bill in its present form. She has directly asked Obama to remove the unnecessary and pork-driven parts of the bill; he’s said he did, but he has not. And she knows it.

And, while they fiddle, and Obama doesn’t do the hard work necessary, the American people — and the world’s people — are left with a worsening recession and increasing joblessness and worsening opportunities for small-, medium-, and large-sized businesses of all types.

You’ll have to read Victor David Hansen’s article in full, but here’s the closing:

This is quite serious. I can’t recall a similarly disastrous start in a half-century (far worse than Bill Clinton’s initial slips). Obama immediately must lower the hope-and-change rhetoric, ignore Reid/Pelosi, drop the therapy, and accept the tragic view that the world abroad is not misunderstood but quite dangerous. And he must listen on foreign policy to his National Security Advisor, Billary, and the Secretary of Defense. If he doesn’t quit the messianic style and perpetual campaign mode, and begin humbly governing, then he will devolve into Carterism—angry that the once-fawning press betrayed him while we the people, due to our American malaise, are to blame.

Have we anointed a messiah who sinks the minute he’s put out on the water? Have we hired a weatherman who can’t tell which way the wind is blowing? Have we chosen an orator who can only parrot the words of hired scribes, but lacks the depth of experience to understand the peril that lies before us? When I look at Barack I fear I am seeing a younger, but equally feckless clone of Jimmy Carter.

Perhaps this explains why he ended up in an elementary school. The naive, joyous laughter of schoolchildren provided a welcomed escape from the burdens of poor decision making.

Now, here’s a video of Obama greeting Beyonce on January 18th at the Lincoln Center concert. To view the particular video, you have to scroll back to January 18th – by putting your mouse cursor in the middle of the LEFT side of the video screen and clicking back, back, back to January 18 — to see the video that the TV news networks are a’twitter about. Wait for Obama to show up and chat it up with Beyonce about her song and his daughters.

The gospel truth? I’d never heard of John Legend until I saw this video on TV today, but I made it to his Web site and figured out how to post this video! I’m so proud of myself! But I still haven’t heard John Legend perform, and doubt I will.

Obama’s reference to Justin is to Justin Timberlake’s spoof performance on Saturday Night Live, when Timberlake apparently wore an outfit like Beyonce wears in her music video of the song.

It’s kind of amusing to see these people thrilled out of their minds while they wait for Obama to show up. Then it’s even more amusing to listen to Obama talk like the folk. Boy oh boy. (Do you think he ever talks like that in other settings? Surely not in the Sit Room briefings, right? I’m laughing.)

NOW BACK TO THE BEST PART, Ann Lewis’s letter today (and, yes, that’s a photo of Ann Lewis):

Because you were such a strong supporter of Hillary’s presidential campaign, I wanted you to be among the first to know about an exciting new, non-partisan organization: NoLimits.org.

Inspired by Hillary’s speech in Denver, when she said “With our ingenuity, innovative spirit and creativity, there are no limits to what is possible in America,” we formed NoLimits.org so that we can continue working together on the issues that are important to us.

NoLimits.org is a new community dedicated to speaking up, sharing ideas and solving problems in our communities, our cities, our states, and our world. It is about empowering one another through our common experiences to address the challenges before us.

We’ll keep you up to date with news about issues on which Hillary took a lead and we know you care so much about, like health care, equal pay, an economy that works for the middle class.

But NoLimits.org isn’t a political organization — it’s a community. And that means we need your voice to make it a success!

Click here to join today.

Since the campaign, we have heard from so many of you that you want to stay in touch with the friends you made. Whether we worked close to home or traveled across the country, we came away with a renewed sense of what we could do to make a difference.

You told us you want to go on making a difference, and you know we can all do more when we share ideas and find ways to work together. (It does take a village, after all.)

We’re at the beginning of a new era for our country. We have come so far! Let’s keep working toward the values and goals we share – a better future for every child, from every family; a world in which No Limits is not just our goal, but a reality.

Let’s take this journey together. Join us!

Sincerely,
Ann Lewis

What else is going on in your hip little world?

Special thanks to Catlibber for sending me this cartoon! This ‘toon brings to mind a link that Larry sent me earlier today, about Obama’s performance to date — if he’s kept his campaign promises, or not, and which ones he has yet to do anything about:

It’s from the St. Petersburg Times, and it’s called “The Obameter: Tracking Obama’s Campaign Promises.”

Here’s the outline and graph:

Then click here to see the specific promises that the newspaper is tracking in its “Truth-O-Meter.”

I don’t see stem cell research, which is one that I’m personally tracking. Since Obama aggressively used stem cell research against McCain, it’s one promise that I want to use to “hold his feet to the fire” to make sure he follows through and doesn’t, as some suspect, leave it to Congress, which will take far too long.

Last night, PatRacimora acknowledged that Obama did keep his promise on lifting the worldwide gag rule.

That’s just as important: We need to give President Obama credit when he’s got it coming, and the action that PatRacimora describes is VERY important to women around the world.

Is this relationship only based on the idea that Larry Johnson and others validated your interest in hating Obama and his supporters? Or Are you interested in anything positive or even rational discourse?

If this relationship is based solely on hatred then I’m afraid there are some who never really appreciated who Larry Johnson really is. They adored him when he seemed to be singing their song, apparently validating their hatred, but then when they found out he wasn’t validating their hatred, they turned on him. Haven’t we heard this tune before? I have.

Just last year Larry Johnson dared question Obama’s qualifications and wherewithal and the supporters for Obama cried, “I thought I knew you. I used to enjoy your blog. Stick to your anti-terrorism commentary!” They attacked him repeatedly because he didn’t validate their biases. When he came out in support of Clinton he was challenged on his integrity and called a “shill” based on their assumptions and bias against Clinton. I can tell you that I wasn’t surprised when Larry came out in support of Hillary Clinton as the Obama supporters ran away to their Daily Kos meetings to validate their feelings.

It is ironic that those who now proclaim their hatred for Obama mocked the Obama supporters who turned on Larry last year when he didn’t validate their bias? Remember those days? “Where’s the Larry I knew?” they yelped when he didn’t read their script. The mantra around here was that the Daily Kossacks were ‘kool-aid’ drinkers because their reactions seemed completely irrational.

I know what Larry is aiming for; rational, fact based, analysis and criticism. Hate does not provide; rational, fact based, analysis and criticism. It is an emotion, thats all. It is entirely selfish and irrational. One can hold contempt without being hateful. All of the worst crimes against humanity are rooted in hatred and joined with justifications that are entirely self-serving. So many despots and leaders have destroyed their country and others with hatred. Many critics of policy are written off when it is clear they are coming from hatred instead of principle.

In my case, I want George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and others to go to prison for KNOWN crimes, not just believed ones, and yet, I don’t harbor hatred for them. I got scolded today for not saying I hate them, and that person who I love just couldn’t convince me that I had to hate these men. In the end they had to realize that we just don’t agree about ‘hating’ people.

I too will stand with Larry in the coming years to challenge Obama on his decisions, to share news of his actions, and demand accountability. My children’s’ future requires that I remain vigilant. I am not a Democrat and have no such loyalties to their party. I voted for someone else to be the nominee. I voted for someone else to be President. And after 8 years of the last administration the good news is I am growing immune to the irrational blather of those who place hate as some sort of principle.

And despite the projected expectations of the leaderless among us, Larry didn’t tell anyone to think or feel anything. It is his blog and he gave his opinion on the line of discussion going on here. He called for reasoned and civil comments so people can understand the pain that runs beneath the hatred.

“Farewell my fair weather friend…” – Johnny Rotten, the former singer for the Sex Pistols, sang in his group, Public Image Limited.

If you “know” Larry Johnson, how is it that the mercurial nature of these comments reflects that you don’t know him at all?

I don’t even want to say I know Larry well, but I can say, after we were damaged by Hurricane Ike, Larry was sure to wish us well before and check in afterwards. When I had other pressing matters to deal with, Larry showed legitimate concern. When I’ve dealt with him, he’s been a fair player each time. And I will stand with him no matter what fire you guys throw at him. I feel the same about Susan. I often disagree with them, but we handle the disagreement with respect. I’ve even had them ask to make sure I am keeping my criticisms to the facts instead of getting caught up in the person. I agree with them on this and it has helped to clarify my goals in discourse.

Good luck to those of you who have a different opinion than Larry. But insulting those who are different than you with hyperbole ridden comments like, “oh yeah, let’s just sing Kumbaya” really does more to discredit your own appearance than it suddenly makes me break out a guitar and sing that tune. It is your projection, not mine.

I will learn to forgive the hostilities, not for their sake, but for my own sanity. And this exercise in expression makes my values even more clear.

Thank you Larry; for showing principle and backbone. I appreciate your honesty and integrity.

Then I have been mislabeling myself for the past 36 years. See, I thought a feminist was someone who believed in women’s equality, who believed that women’s rights were human rights, who believed that women had the right to make decisions about our own bodies, that women had the right to equal pay, and that women had the right to self-determination, not being ruled by a man, to name a few. See, that’s what I thought it meant. What a surprise to discover at this late date that, at least according to Ms. Magazine, I have been WRONG, WRONG, WRONG.

Evidently, in their opinion, a feminist is someone who plays songs like, “99 Problems But a Bitch Ain’t One” when he enters a hall (and I intentionally picked the link to go to Huffington Post since so many of those people claim there is no way this happened. Hell to the yes, it DID.). A feminist is someone who flips off – in public – in a speech that is televised – a female US Senator who is also a Former First Lady of the US and a Former First Lady of Arkansas who, coincidentally, believes women’s rights are human rights. She even gave a little speech about it. But I digress…

Apparently, a feminist is someone who chooses for the chair of the Democratic National Committee a man who is anti-choice (oh, and as a bonus, anti-gay). A feminist picks a pastor, Rick Warren, to give a major prayer who equates abortion to Nazism. Once again, as a bonus, is tremendously anti-gay, comparing homosexuality to incest and pedophilia. So much so that he will not ALLOW gay people into his church.

A feminist, as it turns out, believes that women who are “feeling blue” should not be able to have an abortion. And a feminist believes any real discussion of abortion is above his pay grade.

A feminist, at least the one Ms. Magazine is revering, is free to make sexist comments about his competitor, allow vulgar, degrading sexual statements to be made and WORN on t-shirts (forget it – I’m not linking to those despicable shirts) without uttering ONE WORD against it, and pays the women on his staff less than the men.

And, lastly(but by no means the end), a feminist is someone who not only has retained on his staff, but ELEVATED to the top speech-writing post in the White House, this young man, Jon Favreau, who demonstrates his “affection” (read: sexist pig incredibly inappropriate actions) for Senator-Soon-To-Be-Secretary-Of-State, Hillary Clinton in the photo below:

Yep – no doubt about it – all my adult life, I have been completely and utterly wrong about what it means to be a feminist. Turns out, it is the exact opposite of what I always believed it to be.

I thought, I hoped, I prayed that after Bush was out of office, our country, our media, our leaders, our organizations, would return to the reality based community. Sadly, it seems that too many are continuing to perpetrate the charade of who Obama is. I guess it would just be too embarrassing to admit they, like so many others, had been completely duped by him (hey, if you want to know what it is like for all of those people who gave everything for Obama only to be dissed by him, just ask that sexist pig Jesse Jackson, Jr., Obama’s campaign manager who threw not just Hillary but his own FATHER under the bus for Obama; or Jay Rockefeller; or John Kerry who shilled for Obama, hoping for that Secretary of State position; or HOWARD DEAN, who wasn’t even invited to the introduction of the new DNC chair, what it is like to realize they’ve been had. Frankly, it couldn’t have happened to more deserving people, especially Howard Dean, who allowed the Rules Committee to proceed in a completely unethical, immoral way all the while making it very clear who the DNC wanted for its nominee. So, Howie – what are you doing with your time under the bus?? Just wondering…). But to promote Obama, the most sexist, MISOGYNISTIC candidate I have ever seen as a FEMINIST is grotesque. Ms. Magazine has lost all credibility. Its editors have lost their minds. And they have sure lost me.

If this is what it means to be a feminist, freakin’ count me out. I don’t want to be lumped in the same group with a misogynistic (homophobic) pig like Obama. Clearly, we need another name for those of us who DO care, and work for, rights for women because as of this date, “feminist” has become a disparaging word, at least for me.