Jonah Goldberg– Longwinded and boring!
Andrew Malcolm– I slept through my college classes and last night was bored!
Rove, Hannity, and O’Reilly: The press conference was boring!
Hugh Hewitt– Snorefest!
by John Cole| 81 Comments
This post is in: Clown Shoes, I Read These Morons So You Don't Have To
Jonah Goldberg– Longwinded and boring!
Andrew Malcolm– I slept through my college classes and last night was bored!
Rove, Hannity, and O’Reilly: The press conference was boring!
Hugh Hewitt– Snorefest!
Comments are closed.
[…] || navigator.userAgent.indexOf("WebTV")>= 0) { document.write(”); document.write(”); } Chucking Another Quarter in the Wurlitzer 25 Mar Memewatch: Obama is really a poor […]
Dull…
DULL…. The New York Times, reflecting on the president’s news conference last night, described Obama as "placid and unsmiling," sounding too much like "the teacher speaking in the stillness of a classroom where students are restlessly waiting for…
[…] Dougj at Balloon Juice5 says: It’s not an accident that so many righties settled on the “Obama is boring” meme this morning. The idea of attacking what is perceived to be Obama’s greatest strength—his […]
[…] you use what you can. John Cole here covers what the right had to say of the press […]
neil
Boring is good.
4tehlulz
It’s like they’re not even trying to not even try.
Zifnab
Amazing how you can keep up your ratings by going on an hour long rant about how bored you were.
schrodinger's cat
Wonder what these people were saying when Bush gave his oh so exciting news conferences.
John PM
I think those responses pretty much sum up why the Republicans are no good at governing. Too much reading and thinking, not enough confetti and ice cream. Politicing is so much more fun!
DougJ
It’s simply amazing to me — Obama roles out an important plan to stabilize the banks, it’s greeted with brutal criticism from two Nobel prize winners….and all we get are questions about “sacrifice” and whining about boredom.
It’s fucking amazing.
jibeaux
Huh. I wonder why they didn’t pick up on the intimidation.
The Moar You Know
Bush wasn’t boring. I watched quite a few of his pressers, waiting for him to either maul the English language, snicker at someone less fortunate than himself, sneer at those who thought the Constitution was not toilet paper, or announce that we were going to be bombing the shit out some country.
Bush did not disappoint.
I’ll take "boring" any day.
T Paine
"Dude, somebody fly an airplane into a skyscraper, already. Credit default swaps? YAWN."
slaney black
Jesus. It really is Idiocracy out there…
jrg
Maybe Obama should have showed up to the press conference in a flight suit and announced plans to start another war in Vietnam. That would not have been boring.
Cat Lady
As Atrios would say, Journamilism!
dmsilev
When I saw the title, I was sure that you’d have a link to Larry’s House Of Crazy, and their reaction to the press conference.
Must. Resist. Temptation.
Aaagh.
We start with the minor comedy of SusanUnPC doing the blogging equivalent of tapping the mike and saying "is this thing on" for a good 15 minutes. Then there’s this suggested question:
A lovely comment explaining why the conference started a whole 2 minutes after the hour:
SusanUnPC again:
(and later, in response to a question from her commenters, says "I think it is d-r-u-g-s")
After that, it got pretty repetitive. Lots of "teleprompter!", a few "ACORN!"s, and a couple of returns to the birth certificate thing.
And now, if you’ll excuse me, I need a drink and some brain bleach.
-dms
YellowJournalism
I’m sorry…could someone explain again to me why a presidential press conference has to entertain people?
The Moar You Know
If, during these "boring" pressers, Obama and Rahm would take a pundit and beat the shit out of them with garden hoses full of lead shot, it would be the highest-rated program in the nation.
I, for one, would be willing to shell out a lot of money if it were pay-per-view.
dmsilev
Oh, and one other thing about Larry’s House of Crazy. It seems that their new favorite way of referring to Obama is TOTUS (instead of the normal POTUS). I assume that it means The One The United States (or possibly That One TUS), which proves that they’re not only crazy but ungrammatical as well.
-dms
The Moar You Know
@dmsilev: Thanks, I guess, for wading into that shitpit.
I guess some people are just extremists. I hated Bush but never was one of those types calling for a treason trial or buying into the Raw Story crap or anything like that. And now we’re seeing the madness from the other direction.
I guess these people don’t have enough to do.
Persia
It’s another Rove tactic– Obama’s a good communicator, so we’ll say he’s boring!
But you’d think they’d come up with something better than that.
EEH
@The Moar You Know:
I was going to say of course it was boring, he spoke in actual sentences and paragraphs that were relevent to the topic at hand but you said it so much better than I ever could.
ksmiami
Yes, retarded right commentators: Competence IS boring and that is a really great thing. Bush was incompetent and had us on a constant rollercoaster.
Bob In Pacifica
At the SF Chron this a.m. was a piece about whether it was worth delaying "American Idol" to have a Presidential presser.
Unfortunately, this only showed SF readers that this piece was written by someone not watching television here on the West Coast.
This is today’s propaganda round being sung by the reactionaries.
cleek
i actually thought it was pretty interesting.
but then i’m not paid to shill for the GOP, so i’m free to evaluate it without wondering what reaction will best satisfy my paymasters.
Rob in Denver
After eight years of Decider the Jumbling Clown’s press interaction, this one would seem a bit dull.
DougJ
You beat me to it.
MattF
The winger-alternate universe continues to recede towards the omega-point. In quantitative terms, the reality-to-WTF ratio is now at the point where someone who is not immersed in right wing fantasy has a real problem in figuring out what they are talking about. It’s all false alarms.
Montysano (All Hail Marx & Lennon)
@dmsilev:
I believe that it’s Teleprompter of the United States. The leader of the GOP, Rush Limbaugh, came up with this. SNAP!
Shinobi
Being entertained is what shows like "Tool Academy" and "Dancing with the Stars" are for. Someone tell these idiots they should be reporting for "e!"
bago
Admittedly, talking about subjects that you have researched isn’t prone to the kind of free-wheeling debate that puts food on your family.
dmsilev
@Montysano (All Hail Marx & Lennon):
That makes sense, I suppose. Or at least as much sense as anything emanating from the fever swamps.
-dms
KevOH
@YellowJournalism: It started with Abraham Lincoln, he was known to juggle and wear clown shoes at his press conferences. The Gettysburg Address is widely regarded as one of the most fun speeches of all time.
SLKRR
@Shinobi:
Come to think of it, "Tool Academy" would be a great nickname for the Washington press corps.
geg6
Gawd, I don’t know how anyone can read that shit. I try, but I either burst into peals of laughter or my blood pressure heads into stroke territory.
But the more I see of this sort of thing, I almost feel sad for them. It’s got to be rough seeing everything and everyone you believe in completely rejected in what must seem like lightning speed. I mean, it was just four years ago that W and the congressional GOP seemed to have reached the mountaintop where that elusive permanent Republican majority was almost in their grasp. They thought 2006 was an anomaly due to the bad news out of Iraq and that little hiccup would be solved by the Surge! and we’d be back to sewing up their hegemony over us all. And then 2008…and the horror of the black man, their worst nightmare come true. And they simply can’t adjust to the new reality. And every time they go with what they just know works to distract the public from all their horrible policy, they lose more and more of their more reality based supporters. All they can think of at this point is how to hang on to the few still willing to listen to them. I remember well how I, as a liberal Dem, felt when Reagan won. It took me several years to absorb what had happened and why. And then many years further to see a way to change the entire process in a way that would benefit my side. And it took a candidate like Obama to implement it.
The right and the GOP are going through a similar process. The difference I see is that during those Reagan years and all the years until 2004, the Democratic party and liberal thinkers started right away analyzing what happened and questioning the thinking that led to the debacle the party and the left/center left found themselves. I simply don’t see the GOP doing this with a few exceptions like Sullivan. And they have no leadership worthy of the name. Even in the worst of Reagan mania, we had keepers of the flame like Ted Kennedy who reminded us of what our goals were when no one else had the courage to do it. I don’t see that the GOP has anyone with that sort of ideological integrity and political standing right now.
And so, while I applaud all instances of their stupidity, I also am sad for them because I empathize with their frustration and confusion. And I hope in a few years they find a transformative figure like Dean or Obama to get them back on the right track. Because we need two parties in order to have a balance. And despite my liberal bona fides, I’m old and wise (I hope) enough to value balance.
And everything I just said about the GOP above, goes double for the Village and their media overlords.
gbear
The only reason that Bush’s press conferences weren’t boring is because you could feel the nation, the world, time and life itself disintegrating into the void as he spoke. They were often too scary to watch. They were anti-meaning.
bago
@SLKRR: Would Tool Academy offer cources in Lacrimology?
Seriously, everything before the anchor tag is f’d in preview.
Zifnab
What? No commentary on Governor Jindal’s stellar rebuttal? (Did he even give one, or was that shit-canned lest he open his yap about volcano monitoring again?)
bago
function wptexturize(text) { text = ' '+text+' '; var next = true; var output = ''; var prev = 0; var length = text.length; while ( prev -1 ) { if ( index == prev ) { index = text.indexOf('>', prev); } index++; } else { index = length; } var s = text.substring(prev, index); prev = index; if ( s.substr(0,1) != '
/g, ‘“’); s = s.replace(/’s/g, ‘’s’); s = s.replace(/'(\d\d(?:’|’)?s)/g, ‘’$1’); s = s.replace(/([\s”])’/g, ‘$1‘’); s = s.replace(/(\d+)"/g, ‘$1″’); s = s.replace(/(\d+)’/g, ‘$1′’); s = s.replace(/([^\s])'([^’\s])/g, ‘$1’$2’); s = s.replace(/(\s)"([^\s])/g, ‘$1“$2’); s = s.replace(/"(\s)/g, ‘”$1’); s = s.replace(/'(\s|.)/g, ‘’$1’); s = s.replace(/\(tm\)/ig, ‘™’); s = s.replace(/\(c\)/ig, ‘©’); s = s.replace(/\(r\)/ig, ‘®’); s = s.replace(/”/g, ‘”’); s = s.replace(/(\d+)x(\d+)/g, ‘$1×$2’); } else if ( s.substr(0,5) == ‘]*>)/g, '\n$1'); p = p.replace(/(]*>)/g, '$1\n'); p = p.replace(/\r\n/g, '\n'); p = p.replace(/\r/g, '\n'); p = p.replace(/\n\n+/g, '\n\n'); p = p.replace(/\n?(.+?)(?:\n\s*\n)/g, '
$1
‘); p = p.replace(/
\s*?/g, ”); p = p.replace(/
\s*(]*>)\s*/g, ‘$1’); p = p.replace(/
Sooo not decontextualizing those unicode refs.
However while viewing the code I would susbpect that this fragment:
while ( prev -1 ) { if ( index == prev ) { index = text.indexOf('>', prev); } index++; } else { index = length; }
is the culprit of the preview cutting off everything past the last legitimate tag in a post.
It’s a non-recursive function that really just analyzes one block of text and not the entire thing in a functional manner. However It is 8:30 am and I need some sleep. This is in commentPreview.js, so good luck.
bago
Ok, how that got parsed into the above is several hours of work. Not touching it, just asking whoever your web people are to look at it and they will know what I mean, especially involving the reverse while loop at the bottom causing the parsing error.
bago
Thirdly, a non-recursive parsing function when trying to manipulate TREE based content. Even if it is a limited DOM tree? Seriously. WTF?
camchuck
@YellowJournalism:
When you preempt American Idol, you better bring some wow factor.
Simon thought the presser was a total bore; something you would see at a city council meeting.
Randy says Obama was pitchy in the middle but solid.
New girl thought he picked the wrong questions.
And Paula said he gave a great effort and loved it from start to finish. Of course, Paula was high and didn’t understand a goddam word of it.
forked tongue
Hm. Well, I guess it takes all kinds. I, for one, read of their heartache and pain in pieces like "Why I Am Depressed" on PowerLine (no link) and feel like skipping down the lane!
LD50
Indeed. I read such things, and I think "Hmmm. The wingnuts are so unhappy now. Is there some way I, as a private citizen, can piss on their heads and make it worse for them?"
But I’m only one man.
John Moltz
All those reporters there and no one got a nickname!
BOR-ING!
geg6
@forked tongue:
But I’m a bleeding heart liberal. I simply can’t help but empathize.
Let me just say I find it sad in the same way I find Michael Jackson sad these days. Doesn’t mean I don’t find his misfortunes and complete lack of relevance and any sort of shame hilarious and beneficial to world. But it’s sad, too, when I step away from my usual cynical and sarcastic nature.
inkadu
Maybe Obama should start with a tap dance and sing a jubilee to close.
Jesus h. christ.
bootlegger
I’m going to make one comment and then ignore these fools. If the worst thing our president does is bore us with smart answers, then we’re miles above being entertained by a tongue-tied clown. Seriously, these morans truly believe that "he’s boring" is a criticism for someone who is suppose to be smart? Bring on the Clowns!!
Oh, and don’t forget your 2nd Chance Balloon Juice tourney pool brackets.
LV-426
Teleprompter? They’re bitching about a teleprompter? the last guy called on his favorite gay escort to throw him some softball questions, ‘why are democrats so out of touch with reality?" (now that question is Rovian).
Ash Can
@Zifnab:
Actually, he wasn’t giving a rebuttal, he was just speaking at a GOP fundraiser while the press conference was taking place. A few folks in the blogosphere were reminded of Jindal’s actual crash-and-burn rebuttal and humorously reminisced, and the rebuttal meme got picked up (ironic given the thread directly above this one).
jamie
KevOH
@YellowJournalism: It started with Abraham Lincoln, he was known to juggle and wear clown shoes at his press conferences. The Gettysburg Address is widely regarded as one of the most fun speeches of all time.
Beautiful !
btw; WTF is bago talking about ?
r€nato
a major problem with the GOP and the right-wing is that they have spent over a generation building and refining the noise machine and the reality distortion sphere.
They’ve long ago lost the ability to think for themselves. It’s like how your muscles atrophy if you don’t use them.
Put another way: one of the great strengths of the US military is that they teach soldiers to improvise and take charge when necessary; an Army soldier doesn’t need an officer to tell him what to do when the situation calls for taking the initiative.
On the other hand the Red Army was based on a rigid command-and-control structure; Soviet troops were considered like the fingers of the hand. They weren’t supposed to think for themselves if the situation called for it, they were just supposed to loyally execute orders at all times. "Taking initiative" was actually considered dangerous and undesirable (a troublesome sign of individualism in a Communist society).
Extreme troop discipline might work well when things are going according to plans, but reality has a nasty habit of disrupting plans.
This is why the GOP is running around like a chicken with their head cut off. They have no relevant message, no real leadership. So they just run around spouting off cliches which have lost their punch after 8 years of GOP misrule (who takes them seriously on the matter of Obama’s deficit spending after the binge of Bush deficit spending they went on?) or are just hopelessly outdated (‘communist!’ ‘soc*ialism!’ ‘tax-and-spend liberal!’).
Broken
I tried to watch an entire Bush press conference once. Couldn’t do it.
JenJen
This morning, some blonde GOP pundit who I didn’t recognize was on MSNBC, and was asked why, as the President said last night, don’t the Republicans have their own budget to offer up in comparison?
Her answer? "Well of course we have our own budget, but the reason it hasn’t been put forward is because the President isn’t interested in our ideas, he’s interested in having another political target. It’s become obvious what this President is about, and he’s in trouble, that’s clear."
Granted, I had only had my first cup of coffee, but WTF was that? Is this really the kind of argument the GOP is going to push forth? "We have a budget but neener neener neener we’re not going to show it to you because that’s exactly what the President wants and we’re not going to walk into his trap!!"
Ash Can
@JenJen: Wow, she couldn’t even bullshit her way through that one, could she?
JenJen
@Ash Can: It truly should be nominated for an Awful Moments In Political Punditry Award: 2009.
gwangung
Thing is, this is what the 101st Chairborne THINKS this is how the military should work—top down command, with little personal initiative needed. They don’t know better because they never served.
bcinaz
Bored = We are the party of no ideas and are not able to, you know, articulate a cogent thought on the same level, so we are bored. And besides, no gaff means the teleprompter thing is a BIG DEAL.
F&%K the economy!
Andrew
[Scene: the right wing blogosphere]
Captain Renault: I’m shocked, shocked to find that stupidity is going on in here!
[memorandum hands Renault a bunch of hyperlinks]
Memeorandum: Your blog posts, sir.
SLKRR
@JenJen:
A secret plan to end Vietnam got Nixon elected. Talk about having only old, worn-out ideas…
Napoleon
@SLKRR:
But it didn’t work for McCain as to Iraq. He did say during the campaign that he had a plan, which of course he didn’t share with the public or the sitting President of his own party.
TenguPhule
Somewhere in a bar, Irony is gettng drunk and weeping.
buggy ding dong
Remember how these guys always blasted Clinton for being long-winded and boring after every speech or presser?
His numbers went up, too. People forget just how high Clinton was in the polls prior to the Lewinski story. The GOP was essentially on the run and Clinton was getting what he wanted.
They are falling into a trap if they think this will help them. Clinton’s bj was the only thing that saved that failed strategy.
TenguPhule
Two birds, one stone.
Zifnab
@SLKRR: A "plan" got Nixon elected. Whatever may be said of him and his cabinet, they had a plan – something Johnson simply lacked. Simply standing up and saying, "I believe I have a solution to the problem" was enough to win votes when the opposition wasn’t fielding anything the country wanted to hear.
By contrast, McCain wasn’t. People didn’t want a plan to "win Iraq" if it meant sticking around for a Korean amount of time. McCain’s solution wasn’t going to fix the nation’s problem. Clinton fell to the same trap, trying to "solve" Iraq rather than promising to end the occupation.
Obama has been interested in solving the nation’s problems. The GOP has been interested in inventing problems, ginning up interest, and selling their own prepackaged solutions. Obama’s job, from a salesman’s standpoint, is a lot easier.
binzinerator
@Andrew:
Good one.
binzinerator
@SLKRR:
Amazing, isn’t it? It’s been 40 years of conservative fuckers saying ‘Trust us’….
It’s even more amazing that for 40 years so many people in this country actually believed them. Pathetic. Forty years of fools believing 1) their hat wasn’t going to be shat in, and 2) if it was it wasn’t their own shit.
Col. Klink
Frankly I’m bored off my ass as well. I can’t wait until election night 2012 when I get to vote for Obama again. Heady days! This time I promise to take more pleasure in watching the Wingnuts freak though.
Ottovbvs
These guys long ago abandoned the pretence of objectivity or even intelligent criticism from the right. Rejoice democrats. It’s destroying any cred they have outside the right wing echo chamber, not that they have much. That’s the point really….these guys exist to service the prejudices of the far right, that’s where their paychecks come from. The fact that like the Limbaugh rant it’s destroying the GOP doesn’t occur to them or if it does they don’t care. My attitude is give us more Bachmanns, Limbaughs, Cantors, Becks, Goldbergs, Lowry’s, Boehners, Inhofe’s…they are collectively gods gift to Obama. After all whose going to chuck him out to put these buffoons in.
Jbird
Economy? BORING! Budget? DULLSVILLE! Mexican drug war? I’D FALL ASLEEP DURING ONE OF THOSE!
I think we’ll benefit a lot from Republicans’ extreme distaste for detail or complexity in 2010 and 2012. None of their spokespersons seem to have the attention span necessary to actually talk about the problems that concern the majority of Americans.
bago
What, no response into the detailing of the script bugs? I spent MINUTES looking them up!
bago
Also, what is a wurlitzer? I’ve chucked quarters into Street Fighter 2 machines, but I honestly have no pre-wikipedia idea of what a wurlitzer is. I should go down to Gameworks and play some SF4. But wurlitzer? What?
JL
The White House staff must have laughed this morning when they realized that all the whackos could say is that he’s boring.
Douglass
Hannity-BillO-Rushbo-Beck-et al
YOU ALL ARE IRRELEVANT SO STFU!!
Bill C.
@4tehlulz:
All the ‘boring’ commentary was written hours before the presser. They must have planned it out and coordinated its delivery, and aren’t they just the clever ones!! It’s too cute, inna-it?
These clowns can have nothing else to say, since to comment on the content of Obama’s answers to even the basest of questions would be inviting disaster their way. If that were the case, they’d have to explain themselves, and lord knows they won’t do that.
When fools like these question only the ‘packaging’ and not what’s in the package, then they have run the course, the race is over and it’s time for them to retire.
To quote the American President: We have real problems that deserve real solutions. Why can’t these jerks join up with the rest of us Americans and try to help solve these problems. Sad…so sad.
Bill C.
@bago:
Heh…it’s a jukebox, dude. Apparently playing only one song…"Boring"
Julia Grey
Also, what is a wurlitzer?
Originally, a theater organ (big pipes, etc.), later a jukebox.
And if you ask me what a jukebox is, I’m gonna shoot myself.
bdc
Shorter Pundits:
"Feeling things is much more fun then knowing things."
Shorter Jonah Goldberg:
"One hour press conference: Longwinded and boring!
500 pages of tortured historical analogies: Riveting!"
Shorter Andrew Malcolm:
"My smartness does not require me to know things."
Shorter O’Reilly et al.:
"NEEDED MORE YELLING AND OUTRAGE!!"
Shorter Hugh Hewitt:
"I find Mitt Romney interesting and compelling. Consider my opinions accordingly."
JWW
John,
You listed a lot of views, why don’t you give us your view?
John's Minyuns
Oops, sorry boss, forgot to put out the Troll traps last night…
C’mere boy, I’ll lay out a trail of cheetoes for you to follow all the way back to your hole..