Here’s how things could have been in the Obama Presidency. Instead, division and dissension:
Mr. Obama’s near-complete absence from more than 25 percent of the states, from which he is politically estranged, is no surprise, in that it reflects routine cost-benefit calculations of the modern presidency. But in a country splintered by partisanship and race, it may also have consequences.
So says even the liberal Donna Brazile:
“Every president should make an attempt to bridge the divide,” said Donna Brazile, an African-American Democratic strategist. “It’s a tall order. I wouldn’t give him high marks.”
If only Air Force One had landed in Rugby, ND, St. George, Utah, or Sandpoint, Idaho, to name towns in three key states that Obama has inexplicably ignored, our grim dystopian present would have been avoided.
HelloRochester
Donna and Brazile are two words that should not occur in polite political conversation amongst liberals.
Llelldorin
If anyone’s curious, the states mentioned in the article represent about 10.8% of the total population of the 50 states + DC. What a divider—he’s only visited states in which 89% of the actual people live.
Hill Dweller
Another DC hack trying to rationalize Republican insanity.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
And how they would have howled at the cost of AF1 visiting all of those states unnecessarily.
Napoleon
Fuck Harwood. Anyone in the press who would write a mindless POS like that should be forced to work in the press in Somolia.
maya
A simple, open- car motorcade thru Dallas would have been a nice gesture.
Mike in NC
If I were Al Gore, who would I hate more: Donna Brazile or Joe Lieberman?
NonyNony
Speaking as someone who lives in a state the President routinely visits (Ohio) in an area of the state he comes to often (Columbus) let me just say – no. This is stupid.
What a presidential visit does for everyone except the people who are going to actually get to see him speak/meet him is make their life more annoying. Sometimes just a little more annoying, sometimes a lot more annoying. Traffic patterns get altered. Streets get shut down. If the presidential motorcade is taking some portion of your route home off to the airport good luck making it home in time to pick your kid up from daycare.
When W would fly into town and disrupt life it made me hate him a little bit more than normal. When Obama flies into town and disrupts life it makes me dislike him a little bit. And this is an entirely normal reaction for people to have. You aren’t going to win people over by making them late to pick up their kids from daycare.
You know what helps? Getting people jobs.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Has anybody looked at where Dubya had visited by this point in his presidency? Oh yeah, too much work for lazy shits like Harwood.
And Donna Brazile needs to go far, far away. She’s a poster child for what’s wrong with the Democratic Party. Ugh, now I sound like a firebagger. Thankfully, she’s no longer a mover and shaker, instead just another hack on the teevee.
Tone in DC
I cannot even get upset at the Times anymore, though they’ve been publishing this drivel since 2007. This shit Harwood is flinging is too damn weak to get me off my ass.
Obama is the most reach-across-the-aisle president that centrists and non dain bramaged wingers could hope for. Harwood might as well have written that BHO is short, ill-tempered and in the NRA’s pocket.
Hmmm. Sounds like I just described John McCain.
Cacti
Efforts to bridge the gap with the red staters would suggest that there were reasonable, good faith differences in the first place.
Right wingers don’t have philosophical disagreements with the President, so much as they are angry at him for existing. There isn’t really a middle ground to be found between “You were born in Kenya!” and “No I wasn’t”.
dedc79
I can only imagine what these same critics would be saying if Obama had gone to North Dakota and seven people showed up to see him speak with five of them only there to call him a baby killer.
Strawmanmunny
I like that it’s pointed out that Donna Brazile is not just a Democratic strategist but a AFRICAN AMERICAN Democratic strategist. Wink, Wink. See, even his own people are upset wit him.
smh.
The media in this country really is pitiful.
aimai
@maya: I was about to say that.
? Martin
CNN BREAKING NEWS: JIMMIE HOFFA STILL MISSING
The Onion wept.
NickT
Brazile’s Nuts.
Hunter Gathers
I personally blame Obama for not visiting my little corner of eastern Illinois. I’m sure all of the Confederate flags I see everywhere would just go away if he only listened to all of the white people who live here that want him dead. Obama broke his promise!
PeakVT
I’d like to think that whoever wrote that (not clicking through, no sir-ee) will die of shame in the next day or two. But, sadly, I know better.
Tom Levenson
combine this with the other “why doesn’t the Prez play nice” piece on his relations with foreign leaders, and it’s pretty clear what shiny object has gained the NYT senior editorial staff’s attn. today.
srv
I wish I got Fox just so I could see Donna comment on the TV. She and Krauthammer could hug.
But look, he’s not even trying anymore. What’s the point? Just let them secede and we can all get on with the 21st century. Just how much effort do want your children to waste dragging the south?
Just because part of the experiment failed doesn’t mean we have to throw the whole thing out.
mistermix
@Strawmanmunny: Harwood had to segment the country to show that Obama betrayed his own race. He hasn’t even visited the predominantly African-American Mississippi Delta! Can you imagine?
bill d
Damn right! Because every republican governor should have an opportunity to insult the president in person.
Odie Hugh Manatee
The last thing the President needs to do is listen to a paid CNN hack whose best political moment was helping Al Gore lose. When CNN is tired of her I’m sure she will find a home at Faux.
dmsilev
@? Martin: Actually, as usual, The Onion is ahead of the curve.
Cacti
When Obama visited my personal wingnuttia of Arizona, our wrinkled alcoholic governor was there on the tarmac to point her bony finger in his face as soon as he exited the plane.
The basic level of disrespect shown to this POTUS is without any recent historical precedent. I wonder what’s different about him? /sarcasm
max
If only Air Force One had landed in Rugby, ND, St. George, Utah, or Sandpoint, Idaho, to name towns in three key states that Obama has inexplicably ignored, our grim dystopian present would have been avoided.
Whenever someone does this, they never ever criticize Obama for his policies (some of which I do not care for). Never any details, nothing specific, no ‘he did this when he should have done that’. Always some vague bullshit about not doing enough of some touchy-feely shit, usually followed by a generic criticism of failing to enact a right-wing policy.
So anyways, who’s paying her?
max
[‘And what do they want?’]
aimai
This is pretty funny:
Obama made them hate him! He “allowed” that “negative sentiment” to “deepen and harden!” Will nothing make the President cure our ills?
I would be very interested to see a real breakdown of these imaginarily necessary state visits. As I recall Obama was asked specifically not to come to certain states, even during the midterms, because the local dems were terrified that he would drag them down during that election. Elections are the only time we, in MA, see Obama because his time is precious. It should be obvious that swing states or states in crisis are going to get the majority of any President’s time, but Obama and Clinton both had to deal with massive, personalized, pushback against their presence in certain states. I think getting around to 75 percent of the states is pretty damned good.
? Martin
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage:
Typical liberal. Completely overlooking that time when Bush passed up an opportunity to go to Louisiana to instead head over to California to pick up a guitar with his name on it. Just to show how much he cared about the blue-staters.
dmsilev
@Tom Levenson:
I’m sure we can expect a “Obama is a wimp” column from Maureen Dowd soon to “balance” things out.
MomSense
I hate our media–they are the problem right now. The Republicans would never get away with their BS if it weren’t for our craptastic media.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I gather Chris Christie was on Morning Schmoe banging the “Obama didn’t reach out” drum the other day. I’m sure Mika and whatever other designated liberals are there to balance out the Gingrichite Squint on the Liberal Equivalent of Fox all rushed to point out that Boehner and McConnell refused to take Obama’s calls on election night.
Cacti
@srv:
There’s no moral dilemma of leaving the slaves to their plight this time around, and the government could repatriate anyone who wanted to remain a US citizen.
Bokonon
Um … the man has been busy, people. Remember that mess he inherited? And the problems that Congress has been throwing his way (like … trying to force a default on the national debt?)
Besides, the Republicans viciously attack Obama any time he travels outside D.C. (claiming he is lazy, distracted, wasting taxpayer money, boondoggling …). That’s part of the whole Benghazi craziness – the GOP is going after the President for leaving town the day afterwards, when he should have been at his desk freaking out and dropping bombs on people or something.
piratedan
IF ONLY HE HAD USED THE BULLY PULPIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ben Cisco
If you’re in the FerengiMedia™, the next best thing to having a white dude crap all over POTUS is having a Negress do it (if “Stephen” from Django Unchained isn’t available).
gbear
How come the NYT doesn’t have that article open for comments? The only reason I clicked on the link was to check out the ‘reader’s picks’ comments, which tend to be pretty smart.
Suffern ACE
@Tom Levenson: The president should visit foreign leaders. And he should visit all the states. What has gotten on the NYT editorial nerves is that he doesn’t travel enough?
peorgietirbiter
@bill d: QED.
Berial
@NonyNony: THIS! So much.
W came down here once. His route from the airport to the school he visited almost exactly bisected my (and THOUSANDS of others) route to work. There was almost NO WAY to get from one side of the route to others because the damn security team wouldn’t let any cars even cross the route. INCLUDING HIGHWAYS! WTH man?
balconesfault
Brazile makes her money these days being a part of wonky gabfests … as such, it is obligatory that she shows her “independence” by being critical of Obama now and then.
Only Republicans are allowed to stay on the air while being critical of their party leadership (in fact, for a Republican to get much air, it’s almost obligatory that they 100% support anything that Boehner/McConnell/Cantor etc say – if they dissent much they’re quickly left off the MTP rolodex.)
Yatsuno
@Ben Cisco: Donna is and has forever been a Clintonite. She was denied her rightful position in a Hillary administration by THAT ONE and she is still quite bitter about this.
Ted & Hellen
@HelloRochester:
Two things:
RACIST!
Balloon Juice is not a liberal blog. Get real.
Tone in DC
@Bokonon:
The g00pers attacked Obama when he appointed a winger SecDef. They attack him when he gets up in the fucking morning.
Ted & Hellen
Also too: This post appears to be Mistermix’s apology to the Bots for having the gall to question the character of the sacred FBI in the thread below.
Well done!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Even old Bob Dole remembered to croak out the “Obama campaigns too much”, which means travels too much. Or something. He should be in a room listending to Boehner slur lies about this one time at Pebble Beach with Clint…
Cacti
@Ted & Hellen:
So, you never answered the other day.
Would you like the President better if he was more like Jerry Sandusky?
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Idaho and ND “key states”? That’s news.
Forum Transmitted Disease
The perception is that Obama is the President of the Cool Kids Club, they aren’t invited, and the butthurt is eating them alive.
The media in this country manages to be both hilarious and sad at the same time, rather like a homeless clown who straps himself into a large bundle of balloons and flies away into the skies to freedom, only to shortly afterwards be sucked into the engine of a jumbo jet.
catclub
@? Martin: Also, how many aircraft carriers has Obama landed on to visit? Huh? Huh?
Tone in DC
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
I only skimmed the Harwood “article”, so I missed that part. That is pretty damn ridiculous.
Suffern ACE
Maybe the president needs to take a high profile bus tour this summer to visit all the states he hasn’t been to. That certainly revived Palin’s fortunes.
Ben Cisco
@Yatsuno: “Every brother ain’t a brother cause a color
Just as well could be undercover..”
Teresa
Last I recall Obama was a grown man. Why so many politicians and their “strategists”, usually the really awful ones, continue to speak as if Obama is a wayward child that just won’t behave is beyond me. They drive me bug shit crazy.
maya
@? Martin: “Typical liberal. Completely overlooking that time when Bush passed up an opportunity to go to Louisiana to instead head over to California to pick up a guitar with his name on it. Just to show how much he cared about the blue-staters.”
Now hold on just a brush clearin’ minute there. He also paid a visit to Californ-I-A to walk arm in arm with the most ultra- liberal of Democratic senatoress’, Diane Feinstein, shortly before, or after, (does it matter?) her hubby Dicky Bloom got one of those big fat Iraq War contracts. Not bad for a former Marin County RE developer…. and his mate..
Oh yeah. There was some earthquakey thing going on at the time.
Keith
So basically, he should spend his waking moments playing golf with John Boehner, calling John McCain, drinking beers with Mitch McConnell, not taking vacations, and now flying to various BFEs (presumably flying coach) across Red America.
Llelldorin
These state-by-state counts are a wonderful way to vastly overcount rural conservatives. It’s hardly shocking that Republicans love them so much.
Greater Boston has a larger population than the overwhelming majority of the states listed. California has a greater population than all those states combined. My home county (Alameda) has a bigger population than four of those states!
But counting people wouldn’t be fair, somehow to all those people in Wyoming and the Dakotas. After all, they’re just better (in some let’s not mention it out loud sort of way) than the more that three times as many people who live in the Bay Area. Just as well they get six senators, instead of the two we have to share with the rest of California.
balconesfault
ND, SD, AR, ID, SC, UT
Six states with an average population of 2.8 million … or enough to barely make it into the top 20 Metropolitan Statistical Areas in America.
Hey – has he visited Northern Colorado yet, either?
StringOnAStick
Yeah, it makes the best possible sense to have the guy in charge of the country spend so much time visiting various low population states that he’s tired and burned out all the time. That how all the best presidentin’ decisions get made.
dedc79
@Llelldorin: And it’s not just that they are low population states, it’s that the states are primarily rural and the populations are very diffuse. Hell, how much time to Republicans even spend in most of those places either during primaries or when they’re in the white house?
Sublime33
Donna Brazille reinforces the argument that the media is anything but liberal. By putting her on the Sunday morning talk shows, the networks could give the facade of being balanced when in fact they were putting their thumb on the scale. She may be a good writer and may be great at committee work but she is AWFUL on television and probably worse on radio if she was ever invited. And the network brass knows this. If they really wanted to get balanced viewpoint from African Americans who can actually debate, think fast on their feet and articulate well, they would invite Van Jones and TaNehisi Coates and tell Donna to come back after she gets a voice coach. I am sorry, but having spent a number of years in Cracker Country, her voice just reinforces unfavorable stereotypes.
Shakezula
Gosh, it couldn’t be that the SS has said no fucking way to visits to certain areas.
StringOnAStick
@balconesfault: He visited here in Golden, CO during the campaign. Not exactly northern Colorado, but this is a small town (35,000) on the edge of our biggest city. His first comment on a perfect fall day was basically “this place is so beautiful; how do you people get any work done?”.
Certainly campaign mode is campaign mode, but I neither expect nor want him to have to waste time traveling here just to visit and keep Brazile happy. Screw her and the DLC horse she rode in on.
Violet
Has anyone done a comparison of how many states modern presidents have visited during their time in office? Maybe starting with Nixon or Carter? Offhand I’d guess that Obama is about average in number of states visited. Of course that wouldn’t be good enough because blackity black Kenyan Muslim Soshulist. Etc.
@max:
Yeah, exactly. Follow the money.
Hill Dweller
The Republican party is intellectually and morally bankrupt. They have no solutions for the problems facing this country, and are willing to tearing it down in an attempt to acquire and/or retain power.
The Beltway refuses to acknowledge that fact. Consequently, we repeatedly get nonsense like this in an attempt to absolve Republicans of any responsibility for their actions.
Yatsuno
@Hill Dweller: Sally Quinn. Cocktail weenies. These are the only true concerns of the Village.
gar5358
How does one become a pundit? IMO they seem to be wrong much of the time….also clueless when it comes the way most people live.
Sublime33
@Sublime33: And before any throws the race card at me, I feel exactly the same with white women speaking with a Valley Girl up speak tic. It just does not sound professional, and anyone on the Sunday morning shows is supposed to sound professional.
dmsilev
@Violet:
It’d be interesting to see, but fundamentally I don’t think the number matters much. After all, a Presidential visit doesn’t necessarily mean that said President knows any more about a given state than before that visit. You don’t need a huge amount of prep time to, for instance, blow into town to headline a fundraiser for a local Congressional candidate. Or to show up to show concern after some disaster.
Besides, all of the states have these things called “Senators” and “Representatives” who are supposed to communicate local problems to the President. Of course, there you run into the problem that the states in question tend to elect insane folks to those positions. I wonder whether that counts as a ‘local problem’ which should be communicated to the President?
Violet
@Suffern ACE:
Speaking of Palin, she’s back on Fox. Check out her hooker heels and boobs galore.
Higgs Boson's Mate
OT: The government says that its collection of metadata does no harm to individual rights. Fair enough. Why then has it placed Google under a gag order forbidding it to release the number of national security data requests that it receives from the government?
LINK
Villago Delenda Est
John Harwood needs to be beaten like a red-headed step child.
Repeatedly.
THEN fucked sideways with a rusty chain saw.
balconesfault
@StringOnAStick:
You’re being modest. It’s also Coorsville!
But it’s not a part of the Northern Colorado Secession Movement.
ruemara
@Violet: That is so very sad and whorish. I guess we can attribute her campaign stylin’ to good GOP stylists.
Yatsuno
@Villago Delenda Est:
That’s not very nice. What did the chainsaw do to deserve such shoddy treatment?
piratedan
@Violet: this week on Wasilla Shore……
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Villago Delenda Est:
Didn’t know who he was (No watch teebee news) so I looked him up. Seems like another case of a three hundred dollar haircut on a two bit head.
dmsilev
@Violet: Did she shoot those snakes for the shoes herself? From a helicopter?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@piratedan: I was thinking Real Housewives of WatSuMeth Valley, or whatever it is.
Amir Khalid
@Violet:
I don’t remember her being so prominent in the upper chest area before. I could almost swear she’s had some cosmetic enhancement in that region.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@dmsilev:
She bagged the snakes as a result of short throw while she was dynamiting fish.
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: In the immortal words of a man of accidental genius, “shut up, that’s why.”
PurpleGirl
@NonyNony: I and some friends were eating out one day when the President was making multiple stops in Manhattan. Luckily we were in the restaurant for most of his travel in the neighborhood. They were just reopening the streets when we were leaving the restaurant and we were able to walk to the bus stop.
Living in NYC, this also happens at other times, for United Nations meetings and such, and it is a royal PITA when bus schedules are disrupted.
Yatsuno
@Amir Khalid: I wouldn’t doubt she’s had some enhancements done on other areas as well. Her looks are fading fast and she has to know this.
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Amir Khalid: I was wondering why she’d dropped out of sight for a while. Good link, Violet, although not for the reasons the publisher thinks it is. She’s had a rather extensive amount of “work”, and not just on the mammary glands. Good, high-dollar work, too. Hard to notice, save for the babyfeeders.
Marmot
@srv: “Just let them secede and we can all get on with the 21st century. Just how much effort do want your children to waste dragging the south?”
Who is “them”? Some imagined homogenous group that populates an entire region?
Whatever pissant state you’re from, I’m sure you like it, but think things could be better. That’s how I feel too. Stop trying to fuck over us red-state Dems, you fuck.
aimai
@Keith: Does Mitch McConnell even drink beer? He looks, like Calvin Coolidge, like he was weaned on a pickle.
maya
@piratedan: First episode; Sarah and Bob Craft set out to retrieve Bob’s Super Bowl ring from the evil Putin, who lives just across the Bering Brook. They travel barefoot with K-bars and combat bras..
Villago Delenda Est
@Teresa:
The man is blah. That’s how you speak to him. Like he’s a wayward child.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@aimai:
Leave McConnell aloooooone. He is walking proof of the advanced state of American medical technology. What other nation could combine an asshole and a wattle and come up with a Senate Minority Leader?
piratedan
@maya: Episode 2, after meeting with Vlad “The nuclear situation” Putin and striking out, Sarah has to win a Moscow Biathalon (pole dancing/skeet shooting) event in order to have enough cash to make it home.
LAC
@Hill Dweller: And trying to rationalize her relevancy. Al Gore, Donna? Please, SHTFUP…
Villago Delenda Est
@Hill Dweller:
We need a new term. “Bankrupt” doesn’t go far enough as the adjective here. They’re reaching into territory that makes the Marianas Trench look like someone’s back yard.
Comrade Jake
That has got to be one of the more vapid pieces I’ve read at the NYT, and that’s saying something.
shortstop
Is this a waving hanky designed to get the Clintons’ attention, like Carville’s antics of late? Please, Hill, don’t take these people’s calls. Please.
Patricia Kayden
Funny because a Vice President Palin surely wouldn’t visit anywhere except the “real America”. (wink wink nudge nudge).
Why should Obama visit every nook and cranny anyways? What makes anyone think Idahoans or North Dakotans long to see him?
maya
@Villago Delenda Est: How about: The Republican Party now meets Wall Street standards as an Intellectual and Moral Bundled Derivative.
NCSteve
I, for one, am very disappointed that he didn’t spend more time seeking the approval of heavily armed people who hate him with psychotic intensity in states with three electoral votes.
gene108
The million dollar unanswered question of this Presidency is going to be how a person with very high approval ratings and personal charisma, when entering office in 2009, somehow couldn’t put out a message that kept people in tune with his agenda.
Maybe there were too many disparate groups in the 2008 Obama coalition, like the Wall Street types and the DFH, to try and keep together. I don’t know.
But there was a groundswell of support for President Obama that never held together long, after he was elected.
Alex S.
I agree with this sentiment. A campaign is something else, but why NOT go to Idaho at least once?
shortstop
@NCSteve: That made me laugh.
Mike E
@Sublime33: You sound articulate, clean.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Wow. Watching three Villagers on EventheLiberalMSNBC trying desperately to pretend the IRS scandal is a scandal.
Yatsuno
@gene108: Little to no support in Congress, not even from members of his own party. To wit: closing Gitmo. Not to mention the massive teeth pulling and compromise that was ACA.
Villago Delenda Est
@gene108:
Well, for one thing, an unhealthy chunk of the electorate just totally lost their shit when this near sheriff guy was put into office, and then there was the absolutely valid concern about his place of birth making him ineligible for the Presidency (Hawaii is an “exotic place” in the eyes of, for example, esteemed Villager Cokie Roberts).
So there’s that.
Villago Delenda Est
@Alex S.:
Because there’s nothing there.
S. cerevisiae
And yet the wingnuts constantly bitch about the lavish lifestyle of the Obamas, why you think he was preznit or sumthin’. They need to just stay home and eat mac and cheese with cut up hot dog’s.
Villago Delenda Est
@gene108:
Seriously, when the media has every reason not to give this guy a platform, and then paints the picture you describe, you’ve got your answer.
Bob In Portland
Tell them if they want the President to visit they need to stage a big tornado or a flood.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
people crave stability; very few people want to talk about restructuring their health insurance when their personal balance sheet is going to hell, just to use one example
(Oh god. EvenTheLiberalMSNBC just announced tomorrow’s line up for the Alex Wagner show: Andrew Ross Goldman Sachs Sorkin, Joe Bill Clinton Klein, Howard PUMA Bloomberg Fix The Debt Wolfson and Howard there’s a new sheriff in town Fineman. I hope Ed Rendell is on call in case one of those worthies gets a sniffle. Are their regular bookers on vacation, or is this part of a conscious attempt to chase a CNN audience, like CNN spent ten years chasing Fox? )
priscianusjr
Donna Brazile, the political genius of our time.
priscianusjr
@gene108: But there was a groundswell of support for President Obama that never held together long, after he was elected.
Yeah, I’m sure if the election were held today, Romney would win hands down. NOT.
True, Obama’s approval has declined a bit over the past month, probably due to the massive convergence of non-scandals and pseudo-scandals. The CNN poll is an outlier.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/17/barack-obama-cnn-poll_n_3456322.html
Jim, Foolish Literalist
There’s that, also that tricky business of the actual composition of the House and Senate. Obama hadn’t been inaugurated yet when Evan Bayh announced the official formation of a Blue Dog caucus in the Senate, to reassure Wall St that he wouldn’t let Obama go too far. It got shot down pretty quick, but the story was that in less than twenty-four hours he had at least twelve of 57 of his colleagues on board. Bart Stupak threw a redundant abortion wrench in to HCR because the Catholic bishops offered him a fancy medal he could wear to his Knights of Columbus meetings. Dennis Moore of Kansan and Ike Skelton (I think he was still around in those first two years?) among other didn’t give a fuck about Wall St or DFHs.
Violet
@ruemara: Yeah, it is. She’s really catering to that low rent white male demographic.
@piratedan: Heh. Made me laugh. Snowbilly Snooki, for sure.
El Tiburon
What a stupid and idiotic statment to make. The nerve. How dare she expect and want better from her President? She obviously deserves spite and ridicule for these otherwise benign and “who gives a fuck” statements.
Oh, the urge to troll-post some more Greenwald/Snowden is burning deep inside isn’t it Mistermix?
JWR
Funny. This morning on CBS Morning News, they didn’t introduce Frank Luntz as a “White” Republican Pollster. (I know. What’s he doing on CBS News?) At least they got the “Democratic” part right.
Violet
@Amir Khalid: @Forum Transmitted Disease: She’s definitely had work done. Disagree that it’s good quality, though. If you actually see her face in a non-blurry photo it’s very obvious. Kind of like her daughter Bristol’s plastic surgery–the girl doesn’t look anything like she used to. Sarah’s work is similar. May be high dollar, but it’s noticeable. And not just in her chesticular region.
srv
@Marmot:
We need to look forward. If courtesy bombs are good for Libya and Syria, then they’re good for you too.
shortstop
@ruemara: And something tells me she kept plaintively insisting to those stylists, “This needs some sequins or some metallic animal prints or somethin’.”
Paul in KY
Even the ‘liberal’ Donna Brazile.
Zounds!!!!
shortstop
@Yatsuno: The problem is that the “enhancements” she’s choosing are starting to make her look like a middle-aged man in drag. She’s got really good raw materials for sure; another woman who had what she’s got could age beautifully and elegantly. Too bad she keeps ruining the solid foundation with seriously bad taste — in clothing, makeup and surgery.
Chyron HR
True Progressive “logic”: “Well, on the one hand, the idea that Obama is a bad President because he doesn’t go to Wyoming is plainly stupid as hell, but on the other hand, FUCK OBAMA.”
Paul in KY
@Mike in NC: Lieberman.
FlipYrWhig
@El Tiburon: wait. Aren’t you one of the ones who thinks Obama tries too hard to make nice with people who hate him? That’s what Brazile is saying he should do. And you’re siding with Brazile? Or is this some kind of meta-meta thing?
beltane
@Violet: She’s definitely getting that late-era Michael Jackson look, except with ridiculously oversized fake boobs.
Keith G
Okay, I’ll bite.
I would like to see Obama travel more to the hinterlands. The Democratic Party cannot rest its future on the notion that the GOP will self destruct. We Need to continually build wider and deeper party connections in fly over country.
I am talking about actions that have a medium to long term payout. Every time the President stops to speak at a university or community college, he gets a twofer. First, he gets unfiltered media attention to deliver a message. Second the local Democratic Party can get thousands of contacts. Third, local volunteers and organizers get a chance to be rewarded by maybe a few minutes a presidential attention.
Our overall goals will only be made more achievable if we increase our energy in the local communities. President Obama’s effort here could have amazing payoffs.
shortstop
@El Tiburon: Oh noes! Does Obama bow to Republicans at every turn or does he not show sufficient fealty to Republicans!? It’s soooooo confusing to be you! All I know is Obama FUCKING SUCKS today!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Really? You’ll play the sanctimonious contrarian? Hoocoodanode?
Violet
@shortstop: Her wig choices really amplify the “middle-aged man in drag” look. It often looks like she’s wearing some kind of animal on her head. Not a good look. And yeah, she’s messed with the underlying structure to the point where she just looks creepy. If you look back at the photos from the 2008 campaign, she looks so young and fresh-faced. Now she looks old and worn out. She’s aged a ton in just a few years.
Cappadonna
1. Why would Obama visit places with little more than, as the great Wanda Sykes said “Rocks, Coyote and a guy named Ned”.
2. Do we care what this crow think? Seriously, Donna Brazile is another DLC leftover from the 90’s who still awaits for the Clintonian ‘Return of the King” and see Obama as an arrogant young usurper to the Democratic Party ‘throne’.
3. The idea that Obama needs to twist and turn even more to suck up to right wing nut jobs and hillbillies is a major issue in this country, just as much as the idea that Obama has to kowtow to hippie burnouts and Net Roots lunatics.
Paul in KY
@Sublime33: They like her because she is ‘awful’. She’s Alan Colmes, only she doesn’t know it.
Keith G
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: See, you’re not that foolish after all.
Shanna
@Violet: Meth will do that to you.
piratedan
@Keith G: I actually don’t have a problem with this and if we continue to have politics as usual (i.e. a Republican Congress that will enact no laws in the interests of the American people) why not go out and start planting seeds for the next generation. The Republicans have no long game but they have all the money, what Dems need and has proven to work against big money is ground game. Ground game needs nurturing and seedlings and some attention to thrive.
Eric U.
@Marmot: I like the south and the red western states are really nice. Nothing wrong with those states that a few FEMA camps couldn’t take care of.
In fact, I thought the idea of a batch of dems moving to Wyoming and taking over the politics was something I could help with personally.
Hoodie
@ruemara: That’s insulting to whores. No self-respecting streetwalker would be caught dead in that get up.
Haydnseek
@Alex S.: Why? There aren’t very many people there. The people that are there hate his muslim, socialist, niclang guts. Idaho is where Los Angeles PD cops retire, because they never want to see another black person as long as they live. Hope this helps!
Paul in KY
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: She went ahead and made shoes out of em though. That’s real Murcan do-it-yourselfidness there.
matt
@aimai: Who knew presidential visits were the Omega-3 of politics? This is a fascinating theory.
Paul in KY
@aimai: I think technically he does. He has a big Irish contituentency there in E. Louisville (going all the way back to his days as Judge Executive). He’d have to go drink a beer in a bar sometime when campaigning.
Bet he doesn’t really like to drink & only does for the rubes.
shortstop
@Eric U.:
I’ll come with you. It’s a wonderful place and I hate to leave it every time I go. It needs some major infusions of blue blood — I’m not talking about wealth and aristocracy — in hiking boots and skis.
Keith G. will have to continue reforming Texas on his own.
Paul in KY
@piratedan: Pole Dancing before the skeet shooting, right? That would be an interesting competition…
jamick6000
@Cacti:
Actually, as a bi-partisan centrist, I contend he was conceived in Kenya, but born here.
There are elements of truth in both sides’ narratives, they just need leadership to come together. God bless the USA.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Paul in KY:
Skeet shooting while pole dancing. Hey, I think I just invented the next smash hit reality show.
Kay
Sherrod Brown tried this during his first term. He came from the House, and he took his “I serve red and blue counties” slogan public. He appeared, he listened, he held events in this conservative county.
It didn’t do a bit of good. They threw wads of cash at him to beat him in 2012, and he lost ground in vote totals here between 2006 and 2012.
The CEO of our local for-profit hospital was lobbying Brown for increased funding for subsidies for rural health care (which Brown delivered) WHILE trashing Brown and Obama on “government run” health care in the local.paper.
When I told Brown this, he laughed. He already knew.
I don’t know why political.reporters have to pretend that only ONE SIDE is “playing politics” but it must be a rule.
It’s silly. All of these rock-ribbed principled conservatives play politics, too.
Ash Can
What? What the fuckety-fuck is the matter with these people?
“Hey, guys, I’ve got a swell idea! Let’s send the president out to visit places where only a few dozen people live, and they’re all dying for a chance to take potshots at him! AND those places have concealed carry, open carry, militias galore, and weekly assault-rifle love-ins! Wouldn’t that just be the greatest?”
Yeah, no.
SatanicPanic
@gene108: What do you mean? His popularity has held pretty steady his entire presidency.
Mark B
Actually, Obama has spend a decent amount of time in Texas, mostly on fund-raising trips, and it’s always interesting to see the idiots have a rage attack every time he has the temerity to go to ‘hostile territory’. In truth, Obama wins most of the urban areas in Texas, but the backwards rural areas are pretty dead-set against him. I think in about two generations, Texas will become a blue state and the racist idiots will be somewhat marginalized.
Paul in KY
@Violet: Looks like she had a ‘Juiceoplasty’ to make her head bigger (which makes your body look smaller, then).
Haydnseek
@gene108: Really? It held together long enough to kick Romney’s ass so hard that by the time he stops rolling, his mom jeans might actually be in style.
Brother Machine Gun of Desirable Mindfulness (fka AWS)
I will just note (not having read *all* the comments) that there is no real comparison of how other presidents have traveled. Did GWB hit all 50 states? WJC? GHWB? RWR?
Show your work dammit.
Paul in KY
@jamick6000: I have decided to split the difference and now contend he was probably born 83 miles off the West coast of the Azores.
Paul in KY
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: Annie Oakley would have owned that sport. She was born too soon, sniff…
Mark B
@Brother Machine Gun of Desirable Mindfulness (fka AWS): Sorry, their sense of history only goes back to 2008. And a lot of the history that they think they know after that is pretty fanciful.
shortstop
@Paul in KY: Ima look that up. No, I’m not. I’m not going to let that into my beautiful mind.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Brother Machine Gun of Desirable Mindfulness (fka AWS):
Nixon was the first president to travel to all 50 states. Dunno who’s done it subsequently.
gVOR08
Where’d you come up with Rugby? I grew up there. Air Force One could not land at Rugby International. (A few Canadians land there. Or used to, I imagine the rules are a lot tighter these days.)
agrippa
That is all very well. But, Harwell plays down the intransigence of the GOP.
MikeJ
@gVOR08:
The 747 commonly used couldn’t land at Rugby. Any plane the pres gets on is AF One.
raven
@MikeJ: Chopper too?
Higgs Boson's Mate
@raven:
Whichever chopper he’s using becomes Marine One.
Haydnseek
@agrippa: Of course he does. Those cocktail weenies won’t eat themselves, and the idea that a quick visit consisting of a few grip and grabs, a couple of visits to the main street coffee shops in a few towns, and then a speech at the VFW hall will forestall a gen-u-wine dystopia is so incredibly stupid that only Peggy Noonan could believe it, because Harwood knows it’s bullshit.
grandpa john
@priscianusjr: Also if I remember correctly,CNN didnot publish the crosstabs of the poll, which according to Nate makes it pretty much useless, if you don’t have a demographic breakdown on who was actually polled
West of the Rockies
@Violet: Followed the link you provided. Good heavens, but that woman is trying much too hard to stay relevant. I know that focusing on her appearance is probably a bit sexist, but isn’t that sort of the point of her outfit? And what look is she actually going for there anyway? The heels look like she snatched them from the costume department of Vivid Video.
shortstop
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: Looks like Clinton and GHW Bush did it while in office — Bush pere during only one term. Dubya hit 49 while in office.
But Nixon did it while campaigning for office in 1960, not when he was president. If we’re counting states visited while campaigning for a first term, Obama hit 50 states a few months into his presidency, according to this article.
Alex S.
@Haydnseek:
There are people, he’s the president…it’s not an idea that should be disregarded in general.
MikeJ
@shortstop:
And as a result missed being in battleground states at key times.
ETA: That article says Obama hit 50 lifetime visits to states, not that he visited as president.
shortstop
@MikeJ: He was in Alaska the day before the election, wasn’t he? D’OH!
Higgs Boson's Mate
@shortstop:
Thanks for the link. Although I have very mixed feelings about Clinton he was the best retail politician I’ve ever seen.
Brother Machine Gun of Desirable Mindfulness (fka AWS)
@shortstop: Wait, so the entire premise of the article hinges on “near”?! color me surprised.
jamick6000
@Paul in KY: agreed. we need the two sides to call a truce on this “Where Was He Born” issue and tone down the acrimony so they can sit down across the table from each other and deal with the deficit and entitlements.
shortstop
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: I think it’s kind of weird that no one apparently noticed Poppy Bush hitting every state within four years. Well, he was not really a stand-out fellow. I was fully sentient during his presidency and remember only the really in-your-face stuff.
Haydnseek
@Alex S.: Fair enough. This idea shouldn’t be disregarded in general. Only in this specific case, for the reasons that I stated. Hell, if he decided to go to MilitiaCountry(tm), the secret service would be clamoring for help from seal team six. And they would probably get it.
Botsplainer, fka Todd
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
Shit, I’d pony up for that on pay per view.
shortstop
@MikeJ:
Which is why I didn’t include him in the list of (apparently only two) presidents who did it while they were president.
cckids
@Villago Delenda Est: Not to mention, the first quarter of 2009 was when the absolute sh*tstorm apocalypse that was our economy then truly came to light in all its glory. Having to get some type of stimulus through Congress, with all the R’s determined to let the world crash & burn, takes a toll on the “charisma” and good feelings.
I think too many of us forget the real terror that things were headed for Great Depression territory & fast. Not that it hasn’t been bad, Christ knows, but it could have been worse & longer, if the Repubs had had their way.
Violet
@West of the Rockies: The English have a phrase for it: Mutton dressed as lamb. That kind of sums it up.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Botsplainer, fka Todd:
Girls, guns, and G-strings. It can’t miss.
Matt McIrvin
@MikeJ: Any Air Force aircraft he gets on becomes Air Force One, I believe. But that’s the usual affiliation of any plane that the sitting President gets on. Marine One is so called when it’s a Marine aircraft, typically a helicopter.
“Navy One” was used for the Navy plane George W. Bush rode to his “Mission Accomplished” event, and “Commercial One” was used for a regular airline flight that Richard Nixon rode at one point during his presidency.
shortstop
@Matt McIrvin:
And I’d just like to point out that he did not, as was suggested, use his paper towel to wipe out the sink as a courtesy to the next passenger.
Kay
@Cappadonna:
The problem for me with her theory is, Clinton HIMSELF was unable to put it in practice.
The main complaint about Clinton was, he built no Party architecture on the ground. He left nothing “grassroots” behind.
It sort of amazes me that she still promotes this theory when SHE failed at it.
Obviously she believes it passionately, but I’m not clear why she believes it.
West of the Rockies
@Violet: Sorta like if we saw Obama wandering around a mall wearing basketball shoes sans socks, plaid board shorts, and a “Who farted” shirt (complete with the burn holes — who remembers that lovely fashion choice from 1985 or so?)?
A man (and a woman) has got to know his/her limitations….
Haydnseek
@Matt McIrvin: and Capital One is the no-limit credit card that Wall St. gave Eric Holder once it became apparent that he wasn’t going to prosecute anybody, no matter how egregious their felonies, because they’re “too big to jail.”
gene108
@priscianusjr:
Point isn’t that he wouldn’t win in 2012 or 2016, if he could run again.
The point is he had a really broad base of support. Wall Street went all in for Obama in 2008. Liberals went all in for Obama in 2008. Moderates disgusted with Republicans went all in with Obama in 2008.
To stitch these groups together is what is needed to be a transformative President, which President Obama wanted to be.
Somehow he lost Wall Street quickly enough and they’ve poured hundreds of millions into defeating Democrats and President Obama. Some liberals have a sad that Obama isn’t more liberal.
To me it’s one of the great questions of this century, can a President be transformative, given the extremely different interests of different groups and what seems an unwillingness to compromise with others?
You are either for granting amnesty of some sort to illegal immigrants or you want to deport everyone.
You are either pissed of more punitive measures weren’t applied to Wall Street or you feel government is interfering too much with Wall Street.
The polarization is most visible, with the “Kenyan lion, lyin’ Kenyan” signs, but it’s there all across the political and social spectrum right now.
A transformative President would get those different interests to line up to some sort of understanding most could agree upon and work together to move the country in the agreed upon direction.
FDR did it with the New Deal. Reagan did it with “government is the problem”. Teddy Roosevelt did it with Trust Busting.
I just don’t see that sort of once in a generation transformation happening anytime soon.
EDIT: Obama had the promise to be that sort of President, but somehow it hasn’t materialized.
Why?
I don’t know, but it’s something I think will eventually need to be discussed.
Matt McIrvin
…ah, I was wrong, the commercial flight was called “Executive One.” (Nixon was apparently riding it as a symbolic fuel-saving gesture, a practically pointless one since his 707 flew there empty to bring him back.)
shortstop
@Matt McIrvin: Yep. And that eventually got out, and he was roundly mocked for his self-congratulatory posing, and instead of his team admitting to themselves that it’d been a stupid stunt, they swore revenge against the liberal media that had reported it. Classic Nixon move.
Matt McIrvin
Anyway, I guarantee that if Obama went out of his way to visit more states, it would be spun as a profligate waste of taxpayer money.
ThresherK
St. George, UT has a prominent place as civil servants’ retirement community, IIRC. Lots of California’s tax dollars go to (largely white) retirees.
But this is just another example of internalizing the crap we had to put up with: Democrats shouldn’t vacation where Democrats are (Clinton in Martha’s Vineyard stories, anyone) but when we have a manlyman Republican president, a vacation is just a vacation from his hard work*, so quitcherbitchin, press corpse.
*This was evident during Reagan and Bush II’s four terms. Yes, “hard-working and need a break” was used.
NickT
@Violet:
Clearly Sarah Palin takes the approach that when life doesn’t give you melons, make melonade.
rikyrah
WHY should the President go to places that elect people like Darryl Issa and all the rest of the crazies.
It’s HIS fault that these racist muthafuckas don’t like him?
G-T-F-O-H
he shouldn’t waste one fucking moment on them.
Haydnseek
@gene108: You don’t know why that hasn’t materialized? Wow. Jus wow. Where the fuck have you been? The right hates Obama not for what he does, but for who they would like their constituents to think he is. They run away from their own legislation should he offer to co-operate. (Healthcare mandate, cap and trade, the list is endless.) If Obama has fries with his burger, the next day every teabagger in congress wants to outlaw potatoes. They hate his guts. They’re crazy. But’s it’s Obamas fault, because he hasn’t pulled a fucking thorn out of the paws of all these hate-filled assholes and won their love and loyalty. There can never be an “agreed upon direction” to move the country because the right wants to move the country back to 1860. If you want to agree to that, fine, but don’t fault Obama for not going along. He’s gone along with enough right wing bullshit already, but if he doesn’t eat the whole shit sandwich, he’s not transformative. No, this can’t be discussed, because why do you hate America and favor Sharia law and Freedom? Get a grip or get a clue. Off topic, but where’s Randinho? The Brazil-Mexico match is starting, so I’m done with this. Looking forward to the post game thread…….
StringOnAStick
@gene108: Wall Street supported Obama in 2008 because they were quite aware of the problem of unfunded wars running up the tab on the national credit card. Also, not everyone on Wall Street was down with the whole CDO/CDS shit pile; a good number of them feared for the stability of the entire system simply because the whole derivatives thing had gotten so out of hand. Things is, it still is.
Where Obama lost Wall Streeters was after the derivatives mess hit the fan, and Obama actually blamed them publically, and then didn’t suck up to them as the true MOTU that they all think they are. Having a huge ego appears to be a prereq for working there at any significant level of power.
Paul in KY
@gene108: Only a Republican would feel that regulation would be ‘interfering too much with Wall Street’.
wvng
I was glad when he made it out of OK with no incidents. And WV after the mine disaster, and MO after the tornado.
Paul in KY
@NickT: I think it is a very Republican approach: When life doesn’t give you melons, buy them.
ricky
So explain this to a rube like myself:
If dissent is festering in the six states Obama “forgot”
(according to the headline of this pointless NYT article),
How come John Harwood forgot to interview a single person from a single one of those six states?
amk
@FlipYrWhig: You’re using logic with a firebagger. Not.Gonna.Work. No known cure yet for #ODS.
ruemara
@FlipYrWhig: No. It’s just Barack Obama, bad; anyone who criticizes him at all, good. SS/DD
Paul in KY
@ricky: Why try to get info that might conflict with your chosen narrative?
Also, he’d have to actually speak with people from those benighted states. Can’t have that when you are on the Village Gravy Train ™.
Haydnseek
@ricky: Easy. Those six states aren’t in the beltway, so they aren’t real. They only magically come into existence when assholes like Harwood need a flyover Louisville Slugger with which to beat Obama for not forestalling his delusional “dystopia.”
ricky
@gene108:
So you want to discuss why Obama hasn’t been a “transformative” President?
Perhaps it is because none of the three you mention, the two Roosevelts and Reagan, were themselves.
What exactly did Teddy’s “trust busting” transform?
The New Deal certainly staved off the kind of revolutionary upheaval several years of economic disaster which preceded FDR might have otherwise fomented, and Reagan was personally popular throughout his years in office.
FDR was certainly responsible for the most lasting governmental changes, but whether you can credit that to
his policies or the incredible prosperity brought about by the US emergence from World War Two as an unscathed military and economic giant might be considered.
JWL
If I were POTUS/King, I’d have shut down NASA’s shop in Texas & ‘Bama and moved it to New England and Northern California.
Along with each and every other federal program that keeps their states clicking along.
Villago Delenda Est
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
Unless it’s an Army chopper. Then it’s Army One.
nineone
@Violet: Oh my, how embarrassing. I saw Merkel wearing the exact same outfit.
Nothing screams Executrix like fake boobs and FM pumps. What, was she all out of CS red lippy?
gene108
@Haydnseek:
I didn’t mention the right in my previous post as part of the disparate groups that needed to be stitched together. They hated Obama for palin’ around with terrorists, being born in Kenya, and his terrorist fist jab with Michelle, among other things.
You aren’t going to win those folks over.
There are/were a lot of people, who voted for Bush in 2000 and/or 2004 and are/were willing to never vote for a Republican again. I’m not sure, if they are still willing to forsake Republicans now and go all in for Democrats.
There are business interests that were behind Obama, but have either become hostile to indifferent.
Liberals wish he’d be more liberal, but figure he’s the best option.
Somehow the great liberal transformation, after 30 years of trickle-down economics, hasn’t materialized. People who were disaffected by Republicans under Bush, Jr. aren’t all in for Democrats.
@StringOnAStick:
The thing with Wall Street is they really don’t understand how distorted their relationship to the rest of America and the economy became.
They really felt like the didn’t do anything really, really wrong or the companies that did – Lehman Brothers, Bear Sterns, etc. – paid the price, while the well run companies like JPMC and Goldman Sachs get demonized for proper management. They just don’t get that everyone in the MBS/CDO/derivatives dance all have some explaining to do about why the economy nearly went belly up.
I know folks, who are basically like “fuck Paulson, he made JPMC and Goldman take TARP funds, when they didn’t need it, so other companies wouldn’t look bad and now the public is pissed off at JPMC and Goldman for taking TARP funds”, even though JPMC and Goldman had their hands out at the Fed window for cheap cash, so everything isn’t as rosy as Jamie Dimon wants folks to believe.
That’s sort of what I mean by the 2008 coalition being difficult to balance, with regards to competing interests. The lefty-lefty-left-liberals wanted all the Goldman Sachs executives in jail, along with the AIG executives, etc., while Wall Street felt it didn’t do anything wrong and they won’t make the same mistakes again, so government shouldn’t be involved.
There’s really no middle ground between the left and the Wall Street types, where Wall Street has a mea culpa about wrecking the economy and the left decide Goldman Sachs executives shouldn’t all be jailed.
Look at the blow up over the public option and healthcare reform, on the left, because Obama cut a deal with Pharma to get them on board and eventually tried to do something similar to get insurance providers on board, though it didn’t work as well as with Pharma.
@ricky:
If FDR wasn’t a transformative President, than there’s damn near nothing any President can do to transform this nation into something it wasn’t before taking office.
The country is then some sort of inert entity that just moves along and me, you and the every POTUS that was and will ever be just hangs on for the ride.
We’re living in Reagan’s vision of “government is the problem”, especially as evidenced by the slashing of state budgets and services, where Republicans control state and local governments.
Trust busting was a big deal back when Teddy Roosevelt was President. The Robber Barons were happy with McKinley maintaining the status quo, but Roosevelt set us down the path to reduce the power of that generation of oligarchs and make it possible for other Progressive reforms to go through.
lojasmo
@Matt McIrvin:
I believe his final flight transitioned from AF1 to commercial one as Ford was sworn in.
mikefromArlington
Everybody knows all he needs to do is spend some human capital
AxelFoley
@FlipYrWhig:
Thank you. No matter what Obama did, assholes like Tiburon and T&H would have said he should have done the opposite. We all know these fucks don’t argue in good faith.
AxelFoley
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Heh, he’s another one, ain’t he?