Commenter Upper West points me to Peggy Noonan’s latest: a meditation on the reg’lar guy charm on W and the creepiness of Barack Obama.
Coverage of the opening of his presidential library Thursday was wall to wall on cable, and a feeling of affection for him was encouraged, or at least enabled, by the Washington press corps, which doesn’t much like Mr. Obama because he’s not all that likable, and remembers Mr. Bush with a kind of reluctant fondness because he was.
[…]What was nice was that all of them-the Bush family, the Carters and Clintons-seemed like the old days. “The way we were.” They were full of endurance, stamina, effort. Also flaws, frailty, mess. But they weren’t . . . creepy.
Yes, “creepy” is probably a synonym for “black”. But it would be wrong to reduce this to racism. Nooners is on the Sunday shows every week, Bri-Wi thinks she deserves a Pulitzer, and her columns consist primarily of speculative psychologizing and third-grade name-calling.
I wonder if this is what French establishment pundits sounded like in early 1789.
kc
That woman is fucked up.
Zam
Ah yes the good ole days, that fictional reality in the minds of people who watch too many tv shows and movies that showcase the simple wisdom of old racists.
srv
edited.
The meteor can’t hit the east side soon enough.
Elie
“creepy” ?
well– that is HER
Creepy is having a simpleton as President –one who is now painting his feet instead of articulating any coherent thoughts about his tenure…
Villago Delenda Est
That’s the problem with the Washington Press Corpse. They like a deserting coward whose head should be on a pike somewhere, providing entertainment for ravens.
Joel
How much money will it take to supply Nooners with enough valium so that she can retire?
fuckwit
FUCKING MAKE IT STOP!!!! AUUUUGGGH!!!!
Chris
That… is BLATANT. “The way we were.” Heh. Yeah.
Kay
Did they talk about how they liked or didn’t like Clinton all the time?
I don’t remember.
They didn’t like Gore. Not one bit. That was clear.
Can we say they mostly like Bushes, members of that family. That’s creepy right there.
amk
It’ll be fun watching the wingers go completely stark raving mad by 2016 because of kenyan muslin.
Biff Longbotham
May the fate of our present day pundits match that of those in the ancien régime.
West of the Cascades
@Biff Longbotham: there aren’t enough tumbrels for the Washington establishment press.
Jeremy
Why do these right wing pundits claim Obama is not liked when he continues to have high likability numbers in the polls. Even reasonable people who don’t always agree with the President like the guy. Michelle, Barack and kids are very likable.
These people live in another world and disregard the facts. Peggy never liked the Clinton’s or the Carter’s.
pokeyblow
I think George W. Bush should face war-crimes prosecution. Lots of people, despite the efforts of Noonan and others, agree with me.
Obama doesn’t, and by doing whatever he can to prevent a full airing of W’s criminality, can partly blame himself for the mainstreaming of Noonan’s revisionist bullshit.
Villago Delenda Est
Corrected for accuracy.
NotMax
“reluctant fondness”
Sort of like a masochist has for yesteryear’s abscessed tooth?
Chris
Also, I love how the “liberal media” that supposedly “didn’t vet Obama,” “got him elected,” and “won’t tell us the truth about him” is now being held up by Peggy as “not liking Obama…” and somehow that’s supposed to prove something. Despite how we’re repeatedly told that they’re elitist, out of touch and we shouldn’t listen to a thing they say.
Frankensteinbeck
@Kay:
They liked Clinton in the way they like scandal-ridden stars. They thought he was a train wreck fun to rubberneck. Even then, they lived in their own little world.
@Jeremy:
Because they don’t like him and the Republicans they barbecue with don’t like him. They seriously believe they’re completely representative of average Americans, and their experiences in the Village are what matter.
Villago Delenda Est
@Chris:
Well, the liberal media hasn’t done a thorough vetting of where exactly this Kenyan usurper was born, for example.
Redshirt
Olives with frilly toothpicks through them used to mean something!
Steve Crickmore
For George W. Bush, as always it is still all about his ‘Alice in Wonderland’ concept of freedom, which can mean almost anything and almost nothing at the same time: “But when future generations come to this library, and study this administration, they’re going to find out that we stayed true to our convictions — (applause) — that we expanded freedom at home by raising standards in schools, (presumably, No Child Left Behind, which is proving to be a fraud) and lowering taxes for everybody — (applause) — that we liberated nations from dictatorship and freed people from AIDS”… (really)!
g
@Chris: Good point, Chris.
And “creepy?” WTF is she talking about.
penpen
fantastic post title, A+
Villago Delenda Est
@Steve Crickmore:
More corrections for accuracy.
Mike in NC
Peggy Noonan should be reporting on race riots in the ghettos.
Villago Delenda Est
@Mike in NC:
Would have been nice if she was in the same HMMWV as Michael Kelly.
NotMax
@g
About the uppity darkies taking up residence in the massa’s house.
Kay
@Frankensteinbeck:
I always thought the reluctance to mention the obvious advantage of the Bush family was weird, because people talk about it.
Imagine if Obama’s sister had been governor of OH in ’12. It would have been all we heard about.
Redshirt
Peggy Noonan is a useful symbol.
What kind of last name is “Noonan” anyways? Seems ethnic. Vaguely Italian. Also, miss it!
Chris
@Frankensteinbeck:
I thought they hated Clinton. Didn’t he come in and trash the place when it wasn’t his place?
Zam
@Jeremy: I think they claim he isn’t popular just because the hatred for him by a certain segment of the population is much greater than anything put out by his supporters. They just hate him so much that it tips the scales. Everything he does makes these people go nuts, no matter how non-controversial it is, and therefore we always have people just out there willing to say he is some sort of evil tyrant. Because it never ends he never gets those moments of relative calm, there is always some controversy that must be discussed or else the liberal media is covering it up.
Villago Delenda Est
@Chris:
That’s a direct quote from “Dean” Broder.
I hope he’s having fun in the heat down there, giving Stalin a blow job.
John Biles
Most pundits in 1789 France were shouting to call the Estates General and push back royal power, while blissfully oblivious they were about to unleash forces which would overcome them in turn.
GregB
Noonan is long overdue to have a drink thrown in her pompous face.
Biff Longbotham
@West of the Cascades:
No doubt yet another failure of this presidency.
Tokyokie
@GregB: She’d just lap it up and figure she spilled it herself.
hamletta
@Villago Delenda Est: I always thought it was from that slut Sally Quinn (h/t my mom and Godmother), but I believe you’re right.
Chris
@John Biles:
Yeah. Interestingly, I believe the aristocracy was hoping to use the Estates General convocation to weaken the throne and gain back some of the privileges they’d lost under Richelieu and Louis XIV. Unfortunately for them, there was a new game in town.
Emerald
Close to what I was thinking about last night’s little gathering: these are the courtiers at Versailles.
As self-important, vain, and insular, but with less intellectual accomplishment (there were at least salons then) and no manners.
lojasmo
When you moderate conservatives call this stuf RAAAACISM, you just distract from real racism.
Douche and Bag, liberalist of liberals.
You’re welcome.
hamletta
We can joke about tumbrels all we like, but the American public is not going to rise up any time soon; not as long as they can watch Lucille washing her car. (I’m watching Cool Hand Luke right now.)
NotMax
Dowd’s not-so-veiled statements reminded this oldster of Lenny Bruce’s routine:
How to Relax Your Colored Friends at Parties
While mentioning Bruce, on the off chance you’ve never heard it, a real gem of a black/white bit.
TaMara (BHF)
I would like to be the 40th person here to say Noonan is ‘creepy’.
And yes, Barack Obama is black. And he is the coolest man in politics today. So fuck off and crawl back into your hole Miss Piggy…oops, I mean Peggy.
Edit: 42nd
Hal
@Chris:
Per Charlie Pierce, Noonan on Hillary:
Hal
Oh, and the Charlie Pierce article is full of win in the comments section:
Per DKOS:
Jeremy
@Zam: Yeah. You and Frankensteinbeck made some good points. It’s just like the 2012 election where they believed that Nate Silver and the polls were wrong and then came up with the unskewed polls nonsense.
These people live in a bubble even after the 2012 election. Also, If Obama was so unlikable he wouldn’t have had a million plus people at both of his inaugurations, he wouldn’t continue to draw borderline obsessive media attention from all sides, and people from many countries wouldn’t have high approval of him.
Frankensteinbeck
@Chris:
Like I said, they liked him like a rubbernecker likes a traffic accident. They didn’t respect him at all. Obama is just completely Not Their Kind, and worse is cooler than they are. The Village is a giant clique of mean girls trying to come up with the catty comment that will finally put the popular nonconformist in his place.
Hill Dweller
Noonan and the social crowd she runs with, which includes a big chunk of the Village, are irrelevant to the Obama’s both socially and professionally.
These are people that have been around, and courted by, power for years, regardless of administration. But no one in Obama’s inner circle gives a shit about them. I suspect they find it both infuriating and terrifying.
NotMax
Oh, and something actually “creepy?”
Remember the multiple occasions when Dubya rubbed the heads of bald men for luck?
Suffern ACE
@Frankensteinbeck: they invented scandals for Clinton and made sure to include reference to those scandals in every article. With Obama, its pretending even mundane and well established ordinary acts are seen as unprecedented. If Obama gives a speech about how important children are for our future, they would pretend that no president has ever said anything about children before. If Bill did tgat, they’d write an article about the speech and pretend that he was only giving it to distract from criticism for replacing the White House barber or whatever.
mikefromArlington
Wonder if she still farts in jars and inhales it.
Chris
@Emerald:
I read an interesting theory from Hannah Arendt that the aristocracy going from being absolute lords of their fiefdoms to being the king’s court in Versailles after he pulled their teeth was the final nail in their coffin as far as the public was concerned. Instead of seeing the nobles as harsh bosses like they used to, they now saw them as an idle parasite class with no function whatsoever.
Redshirt
For reals, I’m SO glad Obama is our President. Thank FSM, truly!
magurakurin
@Chris:
Indeed, bloggers like Jean-Paul Marat were riling up the unwashed masses….
And those wishing for the guillotine, remember, it was the firebaggers who ended up in charge and even ole Tom Paine narrowly missed having his neck shaved.
srv
Does Peggy have any black friends, and if we asked them, would they agree?
jrg
While I agree that historians will have the final word on junior’s presidency, can you really call yourself a historian if you’ve been too drunk to remember writing anything since the late ’90s?
Mark B
I pretty much have the opposite reaction to Nooners. Bush always struck me as a sneaky bastard who could be devious and mean as a snake. Obama strikes me as a straight shooter whose main fault is an inability to kick his enemies when they are down. They would never do the same if the positions were reversed.
hamletta
@Hill Dweller: And not giving a shit is true cool.
NotMax
@NotMax
re: #41
Have no idea why brain said Noonan and fingers typed Dowd.
Not that is creepy.
GregB
If only Barack Obama were an uncreeeeeepy Black man like the great, humble saver of lives Dr. Ben Carson.
White Trash Liberal
http://gothamist.com/2010/03/24/video_bush_thinks_haitians_are_like.php
The not creepy one
MikeJ
@magurakurin: Yeah, but our firebaggers couldn’t organize a piss up in a brewery. I have no fear of them ever being in charge of anything.
Scott S.
@magurakurin: Feh, the few firebaggers who say they want to kill everyone are (1) mighty few and (2) already working for the FBI.
Tokyokie
@hamletta: Just look at Bob Mitchum. Nobody was ever cooler or gave less of a shit.
eemom
Jayzus H.C., isn’t there any point at which regurgitating the worthless shit these worthless hacks spew, even for the purpose of mocking it, itself becomes nauseating?
GOD. Peggy fucking Noonan — srsly, who the fuck CARES?
max
@Chris: I thought they hated Clinton. Didn’t he come in and trash the place when it wasn’t his place?
Yeah, but it’s OK now, because Clinton didn’t act all smart, just like Bush, whereas Obama insists on talking like an intelligent person which is totally unbelievable in a… a… a… socialist!
max
[‘Plus Bush kicked the sauce, and Nooners would like everyone to know how tough and hard and difficult not drinking every day, because Lord knows she has… a friend!… who has to have that martini by noon or the creative process is just dead as Reagan. And her poor friend can’t ever just put the bottle down and God it’s so terrible trying to write all those little words about Karl Rove and make it all sound so… important, and Dear God, someone bring me a vodka on the rocks! So. Where was I? Oh, yes, isn’t George W. just the most admirable, honest and decent man you ever met? And his wife! So quiet! You never see HER arms! OMG!’]
gnomedad
@Elie:
Perhaps he understands that his only hope for any kind of “comeback” is keeping his mouth shut.
A lot of wingers try to say they didn’t really like W either. Bullshit.
Eric U.
Nooner would know creepy, she is famous for fondling Reagan’s feet when he was sleeping and writing about it. And also magic dolphins for some reason I don’t remember
magurakurin
@MikeJ: @Scott S.:
hahahahaha. Fair enough and true enough, I reckon. But I guess I was referring more to their ever narrowing view of political and ideological purity than to their ability to get the Committee for Public Safety up and running.
gnomedad
@eemom:
You have a point. It’s kinda like a road accident, especially with someone like Nooners.
NotMax
Lest we forget, Noonan’s claim to fame was working as a speechwriter and confidante under this president:
Xenos
@Eric U.: Mein gott, you have not forgotten Elian, have you? That whole episode was a mini-Schaivo, with the GOP nattering class demanding we throw a large set of legal and diplomatic principles out the window in the name of their political correctness.
Cacti
Old white lady Nooners, writing old media columns for old white people, dislikes the negro buck in the WHITE(s) House.
The impotent rage of the white right is so yummy and sweet.
Mister Papercut
Full marks on the post title.
Greatly looking forward to “President Homeboy” or “A Blaffair to Rememblack” when you’re feelin’ fancy…
Ash Can
WHAT? I’M SORRY, DID YOU SAY SOMETHING? PEGGY NOONAN JUST BLEW A FUCKING TRAIN HORN RIGHT IN MY EAR AND NOW I CAN’T HEAR A THING. BY THE WAY, I HOPE I’M NOT SHOUTING.
Cacti
@Chris:
They pretend to remember Clinton fondly.
They hated his ass and considered him white trash when he was in office.
Chris
@gnomedad:
Yep. I remember what they were like when they had a president they loved.
jl
@Hal:
Thanks for the trip down memory lane.
Noonan types and the DC village media celebs liked the Clintons in any way? That’s news to me.
I think the deal is, for that crowd, any Democrat currently in political office is creepy by definition. The more power they have the creepier. So any Democratic president is super creepy.
Edit: and current office holder being anything but white makes it worse.
NotMax
@Cacti
And tried mightily to tar with the same brush when he left.
Remember the ‘stole all the W keys from the keyboards’ and other related nonsense being spewed?
Jeremy
@Mark B: What would be the point of Obama kicking his opponents when they have already failed. Even with the obstruction and all of the effort to make him a one term president he won re-election in an electoral landslide and most of the things he campaigned on in the 2008 election he has achieved or is currently working on.
The democratic primaries between Obama and Clinton were full of specific policy details on health care, energy, immigration. Though there were no serious policy disagreements between Edwards, Clinton, and Obama, the guy got some serious things done. For example, ACA being the exact thing that was campaigned on in 08 (minus the public option).
burnspbesq
Honky grandma be not worth your, my, or anyone else’s time and trouble. Dontcha got anything more worthwhile than this?
Just sayin’
mouse tolliver
My definition of creepy is a full grown man with grey in his hair going on the Tonight Show and gushing (in every sense) like a 12-year-old girl at a Justin Bieber concert because the president calls him “Stretch.”
One day Noonan’s grand kids will go to a bar for the first time, and they’ll realize Tanqueray smells exactly like the perfume gamma likes to wear.
hamletta
@Jeremy: Oh, there were serious policy disagreements early on. Edwards was the most lefty.
People horrified by his affair, that he would put the Dems in that kind of jeopardy, don’t know that he wasn’t running a serious campaign in 2008.
There was no Edwards presence at the Davidson County (TN) chili supper. Edwards did his early law work at one of the big white-shoe firms here. If they weren’t out to support him, it wasn’t going to happen.
jl
Noonen should make herself useful and write a political thriller. She has stereotypes down, and I think could sling some leitmotifs like a pro. It would be so good, I would overlook the fact that all the villains would be Democrats.
“Celia Hinton, the squat, ugly, fat fingered vulgarian stomped into the office, her inhumanly iron discipline barely able to contain her harpy rage. Moe Boramo looked up, coolly. His awkward attempt to present a thin veneer of casual calm did not really hide his unlikeable reptilian contempt for humanity. Celia’s white trash luxurious ‘husband’ tried to hide his constant prowling for a fresh nubile conquest by fidgeting as an intern walked by, unaware of the danger. Bo Jayden, drunk again, and descending into the halfwit blather that accompanied that constant wont, was oblivious to the sinister drama that was about to unfold, like as to a vampire about to unfold his cape to suck the blood of the body politic.
fraught
W crying. That’s creepy.
Noonan on a bender. That’s creepy.
“You go get a drink with Mitch McConnell!” That’s right up in Noonan’s and Dowd’s and Rubin’s faces!
catclub
I think Obama refuted her drunken musings pretty well.
“You are confusing an Aaron Sorkin liberal fantasy television show with how the world works.”
Bob In Portland
I’m getting a little teary-eyed for the good ol’ Iran-contra days myself.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Nooners in August, 1992, in a piece proffering advice to George H.W. Bush:
LINK
The rest of the piece is a paean of praise for Bus per. The good’l days are always good in retrospect.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Um, that’s Bush père.
SiubhanDuinne
@Cacti:
Noonan wrote a book in 2000 (!) called The Case Against Hillary Clinton. Gotta love that Bill and Hill are now seen as the lovely, nostalgic “way we were.”
jl
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
OK, in defense of Noonen, her Bill Clinton is a boisterous white trash hypocrite and noxious fat smelly sweaty poseur.
But… did she say she disliked him? Did she actually call him creepy? Or just a sleazy bad-faith foul vulgar frat boy? There is, you know, a difference.
SiubhanDuinne
@catclub:
He actually directed that line at MoDo, not Nooners. I’m not sure whether either of them was at the WHCA thingie. I actually wish he had referenced the Noonan atrocity, but his remarks were probably already in close to final draft by the time her column hit print.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@jl:
Good point. The subtle nuances of Noonan’s work, like the subtle esters escaping a leaking container of box wine, are lost on me.
Violet
Ah, Nooners. Remember when she drove through some upper class white neighborhoods right before the 2012 election and saw a bunch of Romney yard signs and thought it meant he could win? Finger on the pulse, as always. Her description of Obama as creepy is just as accurate.
Suzanne
I am going crazy. I need my mom to move out. Oh my God.
I am completely at a loss and I need help. Arrrrrgh.
Violet
@Suzanne: Why’s your mom living with you?
Hill Dweller
Despite being bat shit crazy, Noonan will continue to be a columnist and guest on the Sunday talk shows. Just like every other Republican/conservative, it is impossible for her to lose credibility with the Village.
Violet
@Hill Dweller: Dead boy or live girl would do it.
Yutsano
@Violet: I wouldn’t even count on it then.
Suzanne
@Violet: Because she called me up two weeks ago and said she was going to kill herself. I had her involuntarily committed. She also said, “My house is being foreclosed on tomorrow.” So she was released because she doesnt have health insurance to my house but I can’t take care of her because I have two children and a job. And I am about to lose my fuckin’ mind.
hamletta
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: Dear Lord, she is awful.
I am a very devout Lutheran. We hear the same lessons from Scripture every Sunday.
Where does she get this shit?!
Violet
FYWP! It ate my comment and when I tried to edit it into a previous comment it called that one spam. So I’ve copied and pasted that one:
@Suzanne:
Oh, god, that sucks. Are there any services available for her since she’s without insurance? Is this new and unusual behavior for her or has she been unstable for awhile?
Suzanne
@Violet: She’s been depressed since I was a teenager, but this recent awfulness started about three years ago, when she got laid off.
Services are next to nil in this shithole of a Red State I live in. Someone who worked since she was 14 and never took a dime of unemployment is a “taker”, dont’cha know.
Violet
@Suzanne: I’m so sorry! What are you looking at doing about the situation? Are there any charities that you could get help from? Your mom must feel such a loss of pride and self-esteem if she’s always worked and is now in this situation. That sucks.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@hamletta:
I’m floored by the fact that shes been paid for so long to write that uninsightful, superficial, crap. I can’t believe that there’s no English speaking person who couldn’t do a better job.
Suzanne
@Violet: We are trying to get her some low-cost medical and psychiatric care, but it is hard to come by. She doesn’t qualify for AHCCCS (AZ’s Medicaid). We have found no charities willing to help, and she’s so ashamed that she wouldn’t accept help anyway.
Her siblings, who live on the East Coast, are coming out in a few weeks to help me get this situation taken care of, but this is causing some really awful tension in my family and my husband and I are miserable.
Hal
@Violet:
Oh Glob, I completely forgot about that.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Suzanne: @Suzanne:
The pressure on you and your family is the worst part. Sending you some good vibes.
Frankensteinbeck
@Hal:
I have always loved Marceline, but Flame Princess is totally IT. She is so awesome. Also, this topic is vastly more nuanced, important, and intellectual than Noonan’s entire body of work.
Violet
@Suzanne: I’m so sorry. Hang in there. Find some time for yourself and your husband–go for a walk together or take the kids to the park of something. Is there anything your mom can do to feel useful–is she up to that? Cook or watch the kids or something? Or is she so depressed she’s unable to function?
I know it’s so hard dealing with a loved one with depression. Take care of yourself first. No one else will, so make sure you do it. At least help is coming, even if not soon enough.
Suzanne
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: Thank you.
My house, which three weeks ago felt so big, now is constantly cacophonous, messy, smelly, and small. And I could deal more gracefully with all the really bad stuff if that was not the case.
What can I say, I’m visual/spatial.
Violet
@Suzanne: Can you hire a maid for the short term? Just having things clean and neat might help your outlook.
RaflW
@kc:
Indeed. Just needed saying again. (emphasis added)
Mnemosyne
@Suzanne:
I think Violet’s got the right idea for your short-term sanity — is there a maid service you can call to come in once a week or so to get you through the crisis? I’m assuming your mom is under 65 if she’s not eligible for Medicare, but I wonder if it’s worth trying to get her on SS disability.
Also, when it comes to psych care for your mom, the magic words you’re looking for are “sliding scale.” It looks like this hospital in Phoenix may offer it, but you would have to call and ask. It’s most common for medical schools and public hospitals to offer it, but I’m not sure what’s available. If she needs talk therapy, you can call ASU and see if any of the graduate students in psych or social work take outside clients (ie non-students) as part of their training.
RaflW
@Hill Dweller:
Thankfully, every single weekend, fewer people watch the Sunday bullshit festivals. It’s a long, slow wait, but the pickled country-clubbers are a dying relic, as are their TeeVee shows.
RaflW
@Hal:
What Nooners meant to write:
While everyone is looking at the polls and the storm, Romney is slipping into
the presidencymy satin bedsheets with me.David Koch
the drunk bitch has to get her talkin points right.
just two days ago Frank Luntz was secretly recorded whinning that the entire media is on obama side.
David Koch
This is why they hate him
http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/imagecache/gallery_img_full/image/image_file/_psa5741.jpg
https://imageshack.us/scaled/large/18/obamajerusalem.jpg
They will never-ever get this kind of response. They know it and it kills them.
John O
Peggy Noonan, like most of our Village Elders, really needs to hang up the ol’ fingers, because she is The Suck on several levels. I’d love to see Rachel Maddow bitch-slap her around.
Also on several levels.
PurpleGirl
@Redshirt: Not Italian… doesn’t end in a vowel.
A woman named Margaret Ellen (Peggy) Noonan is in all probability Irish.
askew
@John O:
Maddow would never do that. She is much more respectful to conservatives and Republicans that she has on her show than she is to Democrats.
John O
@askew:
Yes, but a man can dream, no?
AA+ Bonds
She’ll get plenty of shiny awards before she dies.
The court jesters take care of their own.
She put her time in; it doesn’t matter how. She found an audience and survived.
That’s all that hacks care about, because it justifies their own lives as hacks.
AA+ Bonds
No, it wouldn’t. Peggy Noonan isn’t comfortable with black people. She thought she despised the Carters and the Clintons, but she realizes now, in hindsight, she didn’t realize what she had when she had it: people who looked like her image in the mirror.
Arclite
Nooners is a fucking racist. It’s just that simple.
There is no way a rational, objective look at Bush and Obama can result in anything other than Obama being vastly more competent and intelligent than Bush. In Obama you have a man who can speak intelligently off the cuff about almost any topic put to him from the Middle East to economics to basketball. In Bush you have a man who could not speak in grammatically correct sentences. In Obama you have a man in complete control of his administration. In Bush you have a man who preferred playing golf, clearing brush, and letting his VP run the show unfettered by the rule of law.
The two men aren’t even the same league.
WereBear
I’ll tell you why Republicans are treated like royalty by the likes of our Press Corpse: Republicans are thought of as “true Patricians” because they have contempt for the little people.
With their extraordinary ass-kissing instincts, that’s enough for a diseased mind.
Patricia Kayden
@Elie: Because there are no coherent thoughts about his tenure to ponder! He was a mess. A horror. Best to be forgotten. It will be interesting to see if the Republicans put him on the rostrum at their convention in 2016 since they appear to love him so much. For now.
And Noonan is an idiot. Who pays attention to anything she has to say? The fact that someone like her hates President Obama is enough to let me know that he’s a great guy. Thank God her guts were wrong or we would have ROMNEYBOT and the GRANNY STARVER firmly in control.
Ramalama
@jl: Looks like you’ve got the chops to write your own political thriller. Or at least get one started and have other people chime in. Something somewhere makes me think that there’s a place to crowd source stories. Could be hilarious or a train wreck or something in between.
Patricia Kayden
@NotMax: Well, at least he didn’t ask the Negro to fetch him a drink. That’s progress.
Patricia Kayden
@jl: You win the thread. That was hilarious. Wouldn’t read it though.
Patricia Kayden
@David Koch: Oh noes! I thought the JEWS hated him because he’s so anti-Israel.
Patricia Kayden
@Arclite: Thank you!
Patrick
OMG – How much weirder and out of touch can the beltway pundits get? Noonan’s piece takes a price.
I guess it wasn’t creepy to Noonan when Bush gave an unwanted neck rub to Germany’s leader Merkel.
Good grief!
IowaOldLady
Noonan is just obviously silly. She’s has to adopt profound mannerisms when she speaks to try to make her puff of hot air sound meaningful.
Misamericanthrope
Every time I see Peggy Noonan, I just can’t shake that she looks like Gary Bauer in a wig and make-up.
El Cid
She’s so full of shit it’s not even funny as parody.
Put it this way: those people who would rathet hang out w/Bush Jr. instead of Obama?
That would be all I’d need to know to conclude that I’d rather not hang out with them.
Seriously — who on Earth, outside simply gathering material for purposes of mockery, would have more fun with Peggy Noonan and her friends versus Obama’s friends?
MomSense
I think the pundits liked Obama well enough when they thought he would just be the charming young man who gave the speech in Boston but figured he would become one with the Senate Borg and not cause too much trouble.
Once he organized an unprecedented number of people to defeat the Clintons (I think they freaked at the amount of money he raised in small donations because they didn’t know that grift was possible for them –hence getting in on the tea party action a few years later) and started talking structural inequality he became a threat. Long before Elizabeth Warren he was talking about how the cost of health care and college education and expenses had gone up but wages hadn’t and that people were using their home equity to try and keep up. He was talking about the consequences of their Saint Ronnie’s policies and about how the big – name Dems went along with Iraq. In a debate he called it the biggest foreign policy blunder and chastised Biden, Clinton, etc for supporting it.
Ksmiami
@Suzanne: is there a local senior center that could help you. They are often filled with good people and information.
gelfling545
@Frankensteinbeck: I think you have zeroed in on the main objection to Obama where Ms. Noonan & her ilk are concerned.
They know that compared to him they will always be lame and just can’t get over it..
Li
“I wonder if this is what French establishment pundits sounded like in early 1789”
I don’t know about that, but I know that by late 1793 they mostly sounded like wet spurting and the ragged sucking of air.
jshooper
This woman just wants a white President so bad, her pain can be felt in every sentence she writes.
Obama is just so “creepy” and unlikeable unlike Mitt Romney, George W Bush, Dick Cheney etc.
Why can we just go back to “the way we were”.
/clearly not racist….lmao
IowaOldLady
Suzanne, ksmiami is right about the senior center being a possible source for help. They sometimes have senior day care. Alternatively, my MIL goes three days a week to day care at the Jewish Community Center, despite being Catholic. A bus comes and gets her and brings her home again.
Grumpy Code Monkey
ONE. MORE. TIME.
Black. Blackity black black. Black black, black, black black black black. Black black black. Blackity, blackity black, black black black.
Black? Black!
Negro.
ThresherK
I think the pundits liked Obama well enough when they thought he would just be the charming young man who gave the speech in Boston but figured he would become one with the Senate Borg and not cause too much trouble.
Hey, in 2008 he proved the Fox News Fulcrum Law*. Well, right up until he started winning delegates on his way to getting the nomiation.
*The best way for a Democrat running for president to get praise on Fox News is to be in second place.
rikyrah
Pierce’s title about Noonan was hilarious.
Also, fuck that racist bitch.
rikyrah
@Grumpy Code Monkey:
You forgot..
BLACKILICIOUS….
BLACKERIFFIC….
BLACKTASTIC…..
jim filyaw
give her the f-king pulitzer! considering that stable of stiffs at the wapo editorial corral who have one, it doesn’t mean s–t anymore, anyway.
Deb T
What is the deal with this “Obama is unlikable” meme. I think a lot of us, maybe the majority, find him charming, warm, humorous, rational. Sure there are sides of him I don’t like – the compromising with Republicans for no good reason I can see side – but, as for likable, he just is.
RaflW
@Deb T:
It’s not likable to lecture your (presumed) betters. That time Obama went to a House GOP caucus event and just schooled them for like two hours? Totally, thoroughly unlikeable.
Boo hoo.
fuckwit
Argle blargle.