So went that wonderful FedEx commercial where two guys in a mail room thought they were DOOMED! They really weren't. But we are.
OBAMA: Uh, you know, I -- I -- I have more than enough to do, uh, without having to worry about the financial system.
You'll find that quote at the end of these dazzlingly tongue-tied remarks our eloquent President made in a non-telepromptered phone call to a New York Times reporter who had just interviewed him on Air Force One. The Obama champagne was flat.
OBAMA: See, uhhh, I -- I -- eh -- Just one thing that, uhh, I was thinking about as I was, uhh, -- as I was -- getting off the, uhhh, copter 'cause, I -- uhhh -- you know, it was hard for me to believe you were entirely serious about that socialist question.
ZELENY: Mmm-hmm!
OBAMA: Uhhhh, I -- I -- I did think it might be useful to point out that, uh, it wasn't under me that we started, uh, buying a whole bunch of (pause) shares of banks. Wasn't on my watch. And it wasn't on my watch that we passed, uhhh, a massive new entitlement, uhh, the prescription drug plan without a source of funding. Uh, and so I think that, uh, it's important just to note, uhh, when you start, uhh, hearing folks, uhh, throw these words around, thaaat (pause) .. Um, uh, we've actually been operating, uh, in a way that, uh, is entirely consistent with free market principles, uh, and that, uhhh, uh, some of the same folks who are throwing, uh, the word "socialist" around can't say the same.
I DIDN'T STEAL THE CANDY, MAHHHMMMY, GEORGE DID.
ZELENY: Right. So whose watch are we talking about here, sir?
OBAMA: Well... Uh, heh, heh, heh. I -- I -- I -- I just think it's c-clear that by the time we had, uhhhhh. By the time we, eh, uh, got here, uhhh, ummm, there already had been, uh, an enormous infusion of taxpayer money into the financial system, aaand, eh, eh, eh, y-y-yuh-y-y-yuh.... The thing I constantly try to emphasize to people is that, if coming in the market was doing fine, nobody would be happier than me, uh, to stay out of it.
ZELENY: Right.
OBAMA: Uh, you know, I -- I -- I have more than enough to do, uh, without having to worry about the financial system. Uh, and the fact that, uh, we've had to take these extraordinary measures, uh, and intervene, uh, is, uhh, not an indication of my ideological preferences --
ZELENY: Mmm-hmm!
OBAMA: -- but an indication of the degree to which, uhhh (pause) lax regulation, uh, and extravagant risk taking, uh, has precipitated a crisis.
Thus Spake Bamathustra. In His Own Write. Don't you just love having a President who's soooooo smart!??
Doomed, I tell you. We're DOOMED!
But many of you know that already. The rest are in denial.
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Comments
Tell me one of the conservative, free marketteer policies that worked? Now he has to clean up. So, he can hem and haw all he wants if that is the issue you have with him.
Smart, yes. It takes time and thought to clean up the mess that was created by the so smart and brilliant set of wall street, corporate America and the Republican party. Instant answers create the bubbles we are living under. Instead of increasing incomes and creating a viable economy, the Republicans fueled the false economic growth on the bubble of real estate values. Your policies ate all and any value/wealth Americans had.
Now sit back and take the cure.
B.O.'s pronouncements are Law.
B.O.'s speaks down to who? B.O..
No truth? Pay consequence. Boo.
O, we skate on thin ice that cracks.
B.O.'s plastic baby bottle is a Kool.
Smoker. B.B.Q. loyalist. O, AIPAC.
Emulates:`B.O. chews war's scroll.
B.O.'s Truth bottle leak. Punctures.
There is no true truth's rose water.
Doom. Truths? Pay a consequence.
B.O. hems and heehaws. O, Caesar.
B.O.'s a.n.t. being honest. O no no.
B.O. holds filth-hot CEO's fry PAN.
We citizens get burned? Oh, Doom.
O. Mmm-hmm! All the B.O. babble.
We wish to be the "inferior" O, huh?
Who are these immaculate disciples?
O. Foul excrement? Smart? Educated?
Who's so smart 'um will not fall, Laud?
Extravagant. Tricks. Treats? Standards?
O, the big spending giving away of public$.
It seems too fake. B.O. ain't natural, True$.
B.O.'s below a standard of truths.` Virtue$.
B.O.'s sour balsam salad vinegar, a buy Oy!
Catering to soiled-filth pal's corp ruin, Rot!
Besides, it's so clear to see Ya may be blind$
Great read. No hold Caesar salad in a hand$
Olive oil is virgin and innocent. O, grease it$
Politico $ Bribes. Greased palm $ O dough$
Truth? B.O. consequences. Ya get a deletes$
@ OS Ya are hospitable. Boo O Mmm-hmm!
I never am sure either.
Soon it will be summer.
Hot. Blazes. Doze sleep.
Lay in a rope hammock.
Sleep in a spiders webs.
O, B.O.'s pigeons preen.
huh. Where's rainbows?
soom Ya will dial 9-1-1'?
Comes drought and war.
River of rose water Yup!
Turn off the TV, prey, O!
Ay, sway in the rhythms!
Yes. The sunflower wilts.
eat ice cream. enjoy this.
e.i.e.i.o. Ya' all broken.
a would be psycho heel.
dropping on blue birds.
Ya real. Ya tough birds.
vile inner gizzard crows.
be nice. sneer. O. accent.
O, you love the plutocrat.
O, float around and gawk.
O, bored womanizer boy?
huh. I am newbie. be kind.
OBAMA: Uh, you know, I -- I -- I have more than enough to do, uh, without having to worry about the financial system.
That's the point. That's what begins the piece. The tangled tongue was just thrown in for the hell of it.
He says he has more to do than having to worry about the financial system. Anyone bothered by that?
I am. I guess you're all not.
I'll put up a New Post.
It's just a few old thoughts.
March 11, 2009 11:45 AM
So you think the republicans got us in this mess?
Eduacte yourself...
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=310173877357981
I am perplexed at some of these comments. Even O'Rourke . He has proven to be an intellectual idiot. What he lacks in principle he makes up for in misplaced wit. I completely get your point and I agree. Obama is running our government like he ran his own household. Hoping the next "deal" will somehow worrk and increase his standing. I hope he wakes up soon and realizes that when the poor start to really hurt, the glitter will have worn off and he is going to have to produce real results. He will squander our nations wealth and really really smart people like P.J. will blame some unrelated political detail that destined us for this mess when we should have seen it all along..blah...blah...blah.
Pray for a conservative leader with a personality that can win an election.
Stick with it. Rated
Great comment about the teleprompters. It's job creation SociObama style. (pronounced Socio-bama & yes I made that up) Why doesn't this bother any of those newly patriotic socialists? You would think they would want a leader who lived his ideas and spoke from his heart, not one who read them from a script or had ideas and responses fed to him.
I will celebrate the day when an honest and influential democrat comes out of the political closet and says we made a horrible mistake. Hope it's not too late.
To compare a world leader's scripted and unscripted statements is both legitimate and informative, particularly in the case of a leader whose qualifications for the job are so suspect.
Why should Obama worry about economic matters with Tim Geithner and his impressive staff (of none) at that particular helm?
Even when scripted, Obama can sound juvenile. His doublespeak statement today before signing (in camera) the Big Pig was a classic example of putting pragmatics and political payback ahead of the principles that he himself espoused during the course of the campaign. And the claim that he was merely cleaning up "last year's business" is so patently false as to be ludicrous.
If Obama were as smart as he thinks he is, surely he could have chosen a more effective Press Secretary, who shares Obama's verbal insecurities in spades.
But Obama is a saint compared to the leader who really calls the shots. John, I wish you'd do a riff on Ms. Pelosi and her insatiable appetite at the public trough.
If you are making fun of him for his speech patterns i dont much care what point you are making.
I just dont get this post at all.
1. The economic meltdown started and flourished under your lovely President Bush's watch.
2. There was massive socialism of the stupidest kind occuring under Bush: Drug company welfare program and the TARP program.
3. The current gov't intervention/ spcialism is forced upon this administration not by choice, but by the fact that CAPITALISM HAS FALLEN AND IT CAN'T GET UP. It's very expensive to save capitalism from itself.
Bare in mind that I have just read a post criticizing Republicans and their hatred of art that was just as over the top, rude, and silly, so I guess everyone wins here in the bad-manners-to-make-a-point dept.
Still. Republicans just don't have the funny. I wonder why that is?
As for Barack's manner of speaking, how about Mission's manner of spelling?
But "bare in mind" makes my day. It describes perfectly much of the socialist claptrap that passes for comment around here.
Thanks for joining in. A few general comments.
We are all mostly writers here. And we've been taught, or should have learned at least, that you put the point of your piece, the hook, the grabber, the issue, at the beginning.
So at the beginning, in bold, yet, after claiming with a comic reference about being doomed, is Obama's comment that (in caps now) I HAVE MORE THAN ENOUGH TO DO WITHOUT WORRYING ABOUT THE FINANCIAL SYSTEM.
That basically began the piece and ended it. Book ends, as it were.
That's the point of the piece.
It would have been nice if the Obama apologists addressed it, or at least told us how they felt about that comment from their leader. To it, I say in astonishment, What the fuck??????????
Instead, as Gordon points out, the reflexive, knee-jerk, liberal response is a reference to Bush. Yeah, my house may be burning but the guy who used to own it never got rid of the termites.
Uh, okay, but what're your thoughts on the actual burning house?
My belief is that the Obamacultists are in deep denial that he said it. My belief is that any sensible, rational person who's watching the economy tank would get the shimmies and shakies if their leader said that.
I'd just love for one of them to simply tell us what happened to their sense of confidence about the country's financial situation when they learned his manchild said that.
I'm wondering whether when their savings accounts, their IRA's, their parent's 401K's, their friends' modest investments would brush off that dismissive, uncaring remark.
I take some of the blame for the liberal knee-jerking here. I included as an add-on an observation about Obama's stuttering and mumbling ad-libs only because he has been praised ad-nauseam as a Churchillian orator, a modern Demosthenes, a speaker non pareil, forgetting that those moments happened when he was reading someone else's words off a teleprompter. On his own, he can hardly put two sentences together, which happened often on the campaign trail.
Nevertheless, I overloaded my post with TWO ideas, more than some could handle, I guess, because the second one mightily distracted them from the first one, the main one.
One thing a writer should learn is not to distract the reader and I didn't pay attention to that lesson.
Christ.
You da man.
Given that y'all feel that TWO IDEAS are far too much for our little minds to handle...I often wonder why right leaning folks choose to post on Salon...a very left leaning site.
Are you expecting to change minds and hearts here? Do you think that insults will do it? I would never go to a right leaning site and start poking at folks there with a stick. I never understood the appeal.
Maybe you think you are a lone voice of sanity in the wilderness? That yours is a high calling, this need to put down what most people here think? I'm not being sarcastic here. I really don't understand the appeal. Surely GordonO must be frustrated with what he sees as our obvious idiocy. I would think that the need to constantly point if out would be an exercise in frustration. Unappealing. Better things to do, and all that.
I would also just point out that maybe it's not stupidity that keeps people harping on the second point in your post, rather than focusing on the first one, which you feel was more important...
Maybe that one sentence, to most people here, isn't actually the smoking gun you see it as...that maybe people here don't actually think that Obama doesn't care, but that he is focused on many things, and not just that one? So ....not that big a deal?
We have a long history of presidents saying ridiculous things whilst meaning something else....maybe the focus on the sarcasm , etc, was because your first point wasn't seen as a BIG DAMN THING.
GW Bush and the GOP trashing of the economy does tend to make any Obama-is-goofy/ Obama and the economy piece look kind of puny.
That's just the nature of things in a 2 party system.
Philos,
You are hilarious. You truly don't know squat diddly about politics. You're a whackjob radio rerun; a walking e-mail hoax. Fringe candyhead. You couldn't take me on if your collection of Sasquatch spoor samples depended on it.
Sorry, John, just had to do that.
Also, if unchallenged, some specious arguments can in time give their creators a strengthening impression that their ideas have some validity. For example, somewhere along the line, a regular contributor to OS became egregiously confused about the nature of liberalism and conservatism in United States politics. This lack of coherent analysis infects his comments (I don't read his posts) and fellow liberals tend to overlook the silliness because of their general agreement with his political proclivities. Conservative commentators are not as forgiving.
As I'm sure you know, John, in the theatre split focus is death. It took me a long time to learn that in constructing a play, one cannot count on the ability of an audience to pay attention to more than one thing at a time. Thanks again for this fine post.
No one has expressed a feeling or idea about Obama's comment.
Except that it's not that big a thing.
Okay. That's something at least.
You bring up a good point. Why post here, indeed.
Well, it's no fun preaching to the choir. And it's important to remind all the smug, self-satisfied, progressive cultists that others disagree with them, usually without drinking Koolaid.
It's also fun keeping track of the continuing effects of Bush Derangement Syndrome, you know, making a criticism of Obama on an issue and getting a "Yeah, but what about Bush," response instead of talking directly to the issue.
For instance, here. Obama made what I consider to be a very disturbing comment for the leader of a tanking economy. But except for your opinion that most here don't think of it as a BIG DAMN THING, we still don't know what they feel. I don't even know what YOU think of it.
You guys on the left can exchange your ideas in the bread lines.
Maybe the reason Obama doesn't want to worry about the financial system is because he and his advisors (both of them at last count) aren't very skilled at dealing with it. According to today's poll among bipartisan economists, Obama et al. are bumbling on the economy. The stock market would seem to agree.
"Well, I just think it’s clear by the time we got here, there already had been an enormous infusion of taxpayer money into the financial system. And the thing I constantly try to emphasize to people if that coming in, the market was doing fine, nobody would be happier than me to stay out of it. I have more than enough to do without having to worry the financial system. The fact that we’ve had to take these extraordinary measures and intervene is not an indication of my ideological preference, but an indication of the degree to which lax regulation and extravagant risk taking has precipitated a crisis."
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/08/us/politics/08obama-text.html?_r=1&pagewanted=6
Understanding the context is the key to reading comprehension. No wonder you are a republican.
You blame deregulation.
Listen up and learn. It is a government regulation that mark-to-market accounting is in place. FDR suspended it but it came back.
That means that your assets are valued according to the market. So, if you're a business holding an asset that's worth one million dollars and for some reason the asset falls due to market "gyrations" as Obama calls it, you put in your books that your one million dollar asset is now worth 800,000 -- even though the asset is still functioning and producing dividends.
Of course, if the market rises, you put in your books that your million dollar asset is worth one million two.
But right now, asset values for many reasons, good and bad, have been dropping and the companies, banks, etc., who hold those mortgage bonds in the billions and trillions of dollars have to ...
ACCORDING TO A FUCKING GOVERNMENT REGULATION
...mark those losses to the market in the debit side of their books.
People look at the companies and say, wow, they're doing badly, they're folding, they're in trouble, let's sell their stock, and the spiral downward starts, continues and collapses.
Did you happen to notice that? Of course you did. It happened
BECAUSE OF A GOVERNMENT REGULATION.
Now, let's take ANOTHER GOVERNMENT REGULATION, which states that no company can have liabilities that are larger than their assets.
Soooooooo, because of THIS REGULATION, these companies have to sell off their GOOD assets to get the cash to cover the REGULATION that says they can't have assets less than their liabilities.
What happens when a company sells off good assets? They become weaker, they present as companies that're failing and the downward spiral is hastened.
ALL BECAUSE OF GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS,
NOT DEREGULATION.
Don't take my word for it. As Casey Stengel said, "You could look it up."
No wonder I'm a Republican, you say. You don't know what the hell I am, so keep my specific party affiliation to yourself, please, and learn something about what the hell is going on before you Chicken Little around about deregulation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMnSp4qEXNM&NR=1
March 12, 2009 11:53 AM
Did you even read the link? Here is another one for you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMnSp4qEXNM&NR=1
These are Democrats own words. Enjoy.
he says not how he says it. But it should be noted that without the prompter, he has to "think" about answers because he is always being the politician. He is the president now but still acts like he is on the campaign trail. In my book he is simply a liar. Always thinking about the best sounding answer. Not he he really thinks, but what he wants you to think that he thinks.
Lets take a Bush example. He admits that we used torture techniques. He says it frankly and bluntly and it the truth, like it or not. Of course this brings up visions of Spanish Inquisitions. When in fact no one really knows what really happened. How it was or how it wasn't. So what does Obama do. He says how evil it is. How he is such a compassionate guy and how wrong it is. Then the day after he is elected he votes to continue the spying on the American public and he is continuing rendition so that technically he is not torturing people. Just having others do to for him.
This is nothing but deceptive political double talk. Is it possible that once he became president he realized that these things may be morally wrong but necessary? Would he just say that to the people as simply as a Texas bumpkin? No he has to chose his words ever so carefully. Which to me is just lying. He is still spying and still torturing no matter how eloquent the words.
And you logic is even flawed. You blame Bush as usual. You refer this funding of Pharma and TARP as socialistic practices and then use it as evidence that capitalism is a failure. You had it right, socialism and artificial support of anyone or anything by the gov is a failure.
To the other poster - capitalism is not expensive to fix. Greed and irresponsibility is expensive to fix. I am still waiting in vain, like John, for anyone on any thread on this forum to admit there own over spending and personal responsibility for their own "economy" being broken. But instead all I ever hear is one gov admin. broke it and I want the other one to fix it. Fix it yourself. Quit blaming and quit expecting.
First, distractions on the plane? Please. Pleeeeeze. Air Force One is quieter than a Church on Good Friday. And if distractions are all it takes to screw up his thinking, what happens when a crisis hits.
Bush was no "speaker." I'll grant you that. But neither was Ike, Truman, LBJ or Jimmy Carter, to name a few.
But Bush was NOT the dumb, bumpkin progressives like to label him as. It's easy, it's fun and it makes them feel superior.
It's hard to do, but pick a Bush press conference. Find one. I challenge you to show me where he mumbled and jumbled and uhhed and ohmmmm like the Messiah ... and not the first time,either. This was how he handled impromptu questions througout the campaign.
Whatever his policies, the man is an empty suit. A baby in a man's job.
John Boni: "It's hard to do, but pick a Bush press conference. Find one. I challenge you to show me where he mumbled and jumbled..."
2001
"The person who runs FEMA is someone who must have the trust of the president. Because the person who runs FEMA is the first voice, often times, of someone whose life has been turned upside down hears from." -George W. Bush, Austin, Texas, Jan. 4, 2001
"I mean, these good folks are revolutionizing how businesses conduct their business. And, like them, I am very optimistic about our position in the world and about its influence on the United States. We're concerned about the short-term economic news, but long-term I'm optimistic. And so, I hope investors, you know-secondly, I hope investors hold investments for periods of time - that I've always found the best investments are those that you salt away based on economics." -George W. Bush, Austin, Texas, Jan. 4, 2001
If he's - the inference is that somehow he thinks slavery is a - is a noble institution I would - I would strongly reject that assumption - that John Ashcroft is a open-minded, inclusive person."-George W. Bush, Jan. 14, 2001
"The California crunch really is the result of not enough power-generating plants and then not enough power to power the power of generating plants." -George W. Bush, Jan. 14, 2001
"Redefining the role of the United States from enablers to keep the peace to enablers to keep the peace from peacekeepers is going to be an assignment." -George W. Bush, Jan. 14, 2001
"I'm hopeful. I know there is a lot of ambition in Washington, obviously. But I hope the ambitious realize that they are more likely to succeed with success as opposed to failure." -George W. Bush, Jan. 18, 2001
"I am mindful not only of preserving executive powers for myself, but for predecessors as well." -George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Jan. 29, 2001
"I appreciate that question because I, in the state of Texas, had heard a lot of discussion about a faith-based initiative eroding the important bridge between church and state." -George W. Bush, speaking to reporters, Washington, D.C., Jan. 29, 2001
...actually, that's just January of 2001. A partial excerpting, at that.
For the rest, go to
http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/blbushisms.htm
I'll take the occasional "umm" and "uhh" over these manglings any day, John Boni.
Additionally, you are a corn ball.
Having said that, I would respectfully submit that what Obama's miscue shows is that he is really, really worried about the Great Power Politics Game he has stepped into which he is not very well prepared for, either by training, or temperment.
We have not had a President who came into office with a deep understanding of the homicidal Great Game since H.W. was president, although Clinton learned, but W, in the end, to look into Putin's eyes and see anything but the Heart of Darkness... and even there with H.W., .... limits. Vladimir Putin is a very difficult person to deal with, a stone cold radiation poisoner that is a lot diffferent than a faculty back stabber or even a Chicago pol,and I think Obama probably got tripped up by what I call the Men in Black briefing:
"Mr. President, this is the current Russian plan for world domination. This is the Chinese plan for world domination, this is the French... In each case, they will kill 170 million Americans to get what they want, under the right circumstances."
And Obama especially, because of his background was like
"Oh my God. How can this be."
And the intelligence people just say,
"Don't worry sir, the Russians are always planning on taking over the world, and we are still here. They just hate everybody and are paranoid because of Napoleon, Hitler, the Mongols, Swedes, Poles, Arabs, Turks... You'll learn, or we are all dead."
That will shake up anyone into a miscue too.
John has been very kind to me in his writing, as have you all as someone who wants to share their thoughts, so you all keep up the good work that you do.