The Republican debate was scheduled first. (And it's an important one, at the Reagan Library, with Rick Perry's first appearance in a debate.) Obama swiftly relocating his personal speech bubble into the media space bubble currently occupied by his GOP challengers. But following the Emily Mills rule of political bocce ball, the GOP media bubble must honor the Obama bubble and bounce out of the way (because the second-arriving bubble has the power to oust the first bubble, especially when the incoming bubble come in from the left).
But the President can't just barge into Congress whenever he wants. (Ever heard of the notion of separate co-equal branches of government?) He's got to ask, and he's got to ask John Boehner, and Boehner says no. But not because of the debate. Oh, no no no. Because the House isn't reconvening until the following day and because it's a lot of work setting up the security for a presidential visit.
I just have 2 more questions:
1. If all the other networks aired the Obama speech, do you think fewer people would watch the debate (assuming MSNBC and CNBC would stick to their plan and show the debate) or do you think more people would watch? That is, if Obama preempted the regular shows people like, they might flip over to the debate. How many of the people who want to watch the debate would pick an Obama speech instead?
2. Should Obama be criticized just for doing a Joint Session of Congress, quite aside from the debate? This proposal isn't going to amount to anything, is it? It's political grandstanding. There's something dreadful about locking all the members of Congress in place where they're supposed to sit silently — God forbid anyone yells "you lie!" or whatever — or cheer and laud the President. Frankly, I don't think it's presidential, because — in America — we have 3 branches of government, and the President's forays into the Capitol should be rare, dignified rituals of a nonpartisan nature.
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«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 261 of 261Seven,
I could not care less. And, neither will any of you a few outrage cycles from now.
But, your profuse typos (a bit earlier) were actually interesting.
Starting the sauce a little early?
Or commenting while making love?
Presumably there's some other explanation. I dunno.
So...you don't think it was childish and amateurish on the part of the administration? How many unforced errors can one administration have and still hope to be re-elected?
Dude -- My profuse typos were quoting a poser. I even put them in italics.
So, no, I haven't been starting the sauce a little early. Have you been sticking your brain in the vagina of a squirrel in heat?
I also hate the phrase making love. It hurts to type it.
I would like to know your thoughts on what Obama was thinking. I am intrigued.
7m,
"Will there be loaves...?"
Sorry, Titus has the exclusive franchise on that aspect.
ndspinelli,
"Carol Herman will explain the punt to all you non sports fan "
Why, so can I, or so can any commenter; But will they understand when she does explain to them?
Here's a 1000 folks who will probably not be watching Obama's "jobs" speech.
Man, does he have the reverse Midas touch or what?
Seven,
I really don't care. This issue is meaningless.
Although, I was intrigued by the cons who suggested it'd be wise to time things so that BHO spoke first and the R debate followed it.
They could have eviscerated his specific quotes.
But, as it stands many cons (at least on this thread) think that BHO is the loser because he gets the last word (as the POTUS, in front of a joint session).
Maybe.
Maybe not.
P.S.
Back in the day I half-cringed at the term "making love." But, now it feels right--and has for a decade, or so. Not sure why that is.
"Oh, you pathetic child."
I like that, accept it, wear it as an honor.
As I said, it wasn't over until one of the principals backed down. Now, one of them has. It's over, at least this round, maybe. (Never underestimate the corruption of the cat and his handlers occupying the White House.) Out of the mouths of babes and children.
@ Alex I'm beginning to think that garage = America's Politico.
I thought you were.
Looks like this guy got out of Solyndra right before the hammer dropped. This is from their website in the news section. It's dated August 19th.
Dr. Chris Gronet, Founder of Solyndra and former CEO and Chairman, has transitioned to the role of advisor and consultant. He will be pursuing new opportunities and challenges in clean-tech.
He got while the gettin' was good. Anyone think he'll be able to scare up another $500 million for another failed "green tech" startup?
We would like to thank Chris for his innovations and efforts that gave birth to Solyndra and for his visionary leadership during the first 5 years.
...which ended in our utter failure.
Honestly. For any GOP candidate on the same debate stage, Obama, who was at this plant just last year showing it off as proof that green jobs are the way to go, that we have the best universities, and the best workers, is basically exposing his jugular.
I've said it before and I'll say it yet again. Whoever the GOP candidate ends up being, they need to drop any semblance of playing the "elder statesman" during the debate and simply trot out this guy's record, his own words, and clobber the shit out him.
It wouldn't be hard, it just takes a big sack.
I agree that the issue is meaningless. I feel like this little vignette gives us a unique window into what's going in the White House right now. As I see things, it's got to be one of two things:
1. Team Obama expected to be able to preempt a scheduled Republican debate and then meekly allowed Boehner to basically tell him to fuck off. So, there was utterly no strategy.
2. Team Obama had no idea that there was a scheduled Republican debate.
Either way, not flattering to Team Obama.
Three years and he hasn't done jack shit for jobs for the average joe. What's one more day to hear his plan to raise unemployment?
Brian Williams: Let's talk about another topic that's part of the firmament here and everywhere. And that's the economy. The New York Times said this weekend, "President Obama has another new plan on the economy. Now would be a good time to find out about it." Do you have anything new on the economy? And while you've been away, we had a horrible GDP number last month.
Obama: Well, look, we--we anticipated that the recovery was slowing. The economy is still growing, but it's not growing as fast as it needs to. I've got things right now in--before Congress that we should move immediately. And I've said so before I went on vacation, and I'll keep on saying when I--now that I'm back.
DATE: AUGUST, 2010
"Either way, not flattering to Team Obama."
So, in the end the Rs will debate on Wed, as they struggle to raise their own appeal--relative to the other master-debaters--to the Luntz gang.
And, then, a day later, after the dust settles, BHO will chime in w/ the last word w/ all the pomp and so on associated w/ the real POTUS speaking down to all (w/ one exception, positioned as a backdrop) of congress.
And, this is a TOTAL WIN for the Rs?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
"Were you president of Student Government Club in high school? You sound like it."
No, no student or any other government experience, though some government and NGO consulting experience.
In high school I was an honors math and political philosophy student. I read Hegel in grammar school along with Schweitzer and Nietzsche. Niebuhr at university (along with Church Organ), Calvin at seminary and Tillich since, well, as long as I can remember.
So to you I sound like something I'm not nor ever have done. Which says something about your epistemological sensitivities, I suppose. And perhaps also my ability to confound.
Mon Dieu, why waste your time on these frivolities? Why waste your opportunity? For example thus: I, sir, if that brain were mine, I would have it amputated on the spot! Perhaps you can compose a better. At least one that fits the historical record? Meanwhile, catty aside, may we to the topic of the post?
PBJ -- You are speaking to the issue, which you say is not important to you.
The implications of your statements are that Obama:
1. asked to speak the same night as a scheduled Republican debate,
2. so that he could be turned down, and
3. end up speaking on the night of the opening game of NFL football, the most popular sport in the country, when the last two Super Bowl champions play.
Is that your theory?
And, this is a TOTAL WIN for the Rs?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
Since this meaningless event is still being analyzed, let's have some more fun with it.
You do realize, pbj, that this superior option of speaking the day after the Republicans' debate was available to Obama from the outset. So the only thing added by the rescheduling is to reinforce his image of ineptitude.
I read Hegel in grammar school along with Schweitzer and Nietzsche.
I read The Great Brain books. But I got down a girl's pants a lot sooner, probably, so it's a wash.
You do realize, pbj, that this superior option of speaking the day after the Republicans' debate was available to Obama from the outset.
The comeback will be that doesn't care, that this is a big win for Obama, and that he doesn't care.
Seven,
That's my theory.
But, I think your two theories are just as plausible.
The only thing I know w/ metaphysical certitude is that none of these theories mean anything in the long run.
Which poser were you emulating?
BJM:
That Solyndra story a bit light on facts. The $535M was offered as loans - but were they actually drawn? If so, were they secured by some assets, etc. Lots of facts that you would think some journalist would find and some editor would know that people needed to have in order to form a conclusion about the wisdom of those loans. But this is mainstream journalism...
I read Hegel in grammar school along with Schweitzer and Nietzsche.
This may well be the most astonishing sentence I've ever read on this blog.
Especially if you mean to say that Schweitzer and Nietzsche were your classmates.
Chip,
Yes, that did occur to me.
I was making fun of Matt for saying he hoped Obama would kick their ass, but Matt -- who likes to present himself here all highbrow and intellectual -- spelled their there.
Any other grammar mistakes are likely my own.
Long shot:
Obama knows that (1) he has no real plan but must deliver a speech and (2) most media coverage of the speech will not be as bad as the speech itself.
Best course: have the least amount of interested-but-independent voters watch the speech.
Options:
(A) Give the speech during the Republican debates. If Boehner trashes that option, then (B) give the speech during the football game. (He'd look like a dick if he scheduled the speech against football on his own, but that is the best option for having the least amount of viewers. Bonus: Obama can make small references to the Republicans' "partisan games" to bolster his non-jobs job speech.)
In Matt's defense, he may have read a lot of Gertrude Stein in 4th grade, and it left a lasting impression on him.
I also noticed his "there."
But, I only noticed it because I constantly make the same mistake. [Even *shudder* Althouse has made that mistake.]
@Joanna, That's a double bank shot, not a long shot. You should be on the WH staff.
But wouldn't he be well advised to squeeze his speech in just before the game to maximize ratings? And wouldn't he be best able to control the time of the speech by giving it from the WH instead of the Congress?
I only laid into him because of his pose. I make editing mistakes on here all the time. My big problem is missing words, because my brain is ahead of my hands and I don't take the time to proof.
We all make mistakes. I shouldn't have been so hard on poor Matt. He's not reading this, of course, as he fled right when Obama agreed to the day after for whatever reasons.
Ha! I left out a word in that very post. Not intentional!
"I've said it before and I'll say it yet again. Whoever the GOP candidate ends up being, they need to drop any semblance of playing the "elder statesman" during the debate and simply trot out this guy's record, his own words, and clobber the shit out him."
Roger that. Ram reality down dreamers' throats. That pushes the spiders out. Most loving thing that can happen to them. Also wins political contests.
"and Tillich since, well, as long as I can remember."
Paul Tillich - it's nice to hear his name again. One of the greats.
"I read The Great Brain books."
ooh - I loved the Great Brain books. Some of my favorites.
And: who cares what he says in his speech or when he says it?
None of it makes a bit of a difference politically unless some actual jobs are created.
Rhetoric, politics, framing, rhetoric, blah blah blah.
Not to be a complete materialist, but this is what matters in the next election: People don't have enough bloody money and there aren't enough bloody jobs.
Oh, and the Eurozone is fracturing.
Now I'm going to tell the kids to get off my lawn.
"Obama knows that (1) he has no real plan but must deliver a speech and (2) most media coverage of the speech will not be as bad as the speech itself."
Yes, if by real plan one means to help the general population. However, he does have a real plan, the one in effect since JAN09 and continuing, and that is to help his orbit, international financial and academic elites, transfer the wealth of the nation to themselves. This plan has succeeded more than he and they hoped. It has change everything by fundamentally transforming the nation into two classes separated by freedom in one and servility in the other and maintained by money in one and hand-outs to the other.
Yes, his media sycophants will embellish him to high heaven, just as they will subvert Republicans the evening prior.
When I grew up, we generally assumed, ad meliorum, that government reps were doing their best for the nation. Now, ad pejorem, it is common, and painful, to assume that government reps do their best for themselves, not the nation.
The meta-message of this incident is that careerism subordinates national security. That attitude, like a waterfall or drug use, destroys its base.
"Especially if you mean to say that Schweitzer and Nietzsche were your classmates."
Not were, are.
Notable that Obama & Palin, on the same day, each have kerfuffles about the logistics of a major speech. They are shadows of each other.
Just imagine the fury on the left if George W. Bush held a joint session of congress to make a speech on the Patriot Act.
Or a speech to push his budget priorities.
7M, you left out my favorite part of that quote (from Obama to Brian Williams, dated August 2010). It's the last line.
Obama: Well, look, we anticipated that the recovery was slowing. The economy is still growing, but it’s not growing as fast as it needs to. I’ve got things right now in - before Congress that we should move immediately, and I’ve said so before I went on vacation and I’ll keep on saying it when I - now that I’m back. We should be passing legislation that helps small businesses get credit, that eliminates capital gains taxes so that they have more incentive to invest right now. There are a whole host of measures that we could take, no single element of which is a magic bullet, but cumulatively could start continuing to build momentum for the recovery.
"Could start continuing"! Love that-- not as an unintentionally contradictory phrase-- but for revealing the equivocating mind behind the words, tripped up by reality but still trying to cover his ass.
There's a wonderfully Beckettian quality to the phrase: "could start continuing to build momentum for the recovery." (Waiting for Godot, after my vacation.) It's not just the uncanny repetition, the same situation & excuse echoed from one year to another. Under the sign of O, the building of momentum has never started, has been impeded by his policies from starting, hence cannot be continuing, and yet is (per O) continually aborning, imminent & ongoing, yet to come & well under way.
Imminent & to come, if only the evil midwives/ aborters in Congress would bring O's beautiful policy-idea-babies into the world.
That's the Catch-22 of the phrase. For at the present moment (and that moment same time last year), Obama has to say, impossibly, that the "building of momentum for the recovery" is something that "could start" (these are brilliant new ideas, yet to be implemented, if not for the evil GOP) and that it's "continuing" (O's been hard at work saving the economy, and his policies have been a success); yet he can't say that it would just be starting now (he hasn't been sitting on his ass all this time, while his party controlled Congress, & only now getting around to addressing the most urgent issue) nor that it's a continuation of what we've experienced so far (Obama has to distance himself from the bad state of the economy, blame the GOP & give us reason to vote for him next year).
O has to simultaneously give us hope (elect me for change) and persuade us to be grateful for all he's done (elect me to continue). He has to take credit, disavow responsibility, project leadership, deflect criticism, and assign blame. Not an easy task. But O's oratory is up to it.
"Start continuing": what a great motto for O's 2012 (re)election campaign! How emblematic of that campaign's predicament: hope & change, more of the same. And now that I see Beckett in Obama's rhetoric, "Yes We Can" takes on new meaning too.
Mottos for the Obama voter 2012:
"I can't go on. I'll go on."
"Go on failing. Go on. Only next time, try to fail better."
Prof. Althouse said, regarding the upcoming debate by Republican Presidential hopefuls:
"(And it's an important one, at the Reagan Library, with Rick Perry's first appearance in a debate.)"
Can any Presidential candidate debate--by either party--really be considered "important"? Hell, they're not even really debates, but staged opportunities for the candidates--frauds all, (again, of either party), to serve up canned talking points that are only glancingly (if at all) responsive to the questions posed to them or to the canned statements made by other candidates.
This is obviously a stupid and hamhanded political move by Obama...but so what? It's politics! Who cares? This tempest in a pisspot exemplifies the ills of Washington today...sound and fury signifying idiocy, trivial "controversies" over insignificant turf wars and mendacious verbal sparring between the Wall Street factota of either party.
Greenwald today contrasts the attention paid by the media to this latest of Washington's phony political battles to the utter lack of attention paid to the recent publication by Wikileaks of a diplomatic cable revealing an atrocity committed by American troops in Iraq in 2006.
And of course, we're all riveted to the news reports discussing the broad investigations and prosecutions of massive fraud and theft committed by the financial institutions over the last decade, contributing greatly to our ongoing complete financial collapse.
Oh, wait....
I'm watching the Packer game that night insteaf
obama changed the big speech night not because of Boehner, but because the big speech was going to tell everyone that his awesome jobs programs would feature a vision that he originally had with clean energy powerhouse Solyndra. Once they announced that they were going belly-up, he had to write a new speech.
That's my theory.
The issue isn't the schedule, the issue is that Obama and/or his staff made the schedule the issue with another example of administrative clumsiness. Unfortunately, they show similar clumsiness with things that really do matter.
I don't care. Obama is awesome.
When the word "infrastructure" is first used it will be accompanied by the modifier "crumbling". We should then ask ourselves why fixing this is going to cost extra. Isnt one of govt's roles to maintain the infrastructure to keep it "crumbling?". Where did that money go? Why?
Obama fail. Maximum fail.
Are you ready for some TOTUS?
A soaring rhetoric party?
We've got Saul and Bill and Karl
Let's get the revolution kick started.
Obamacare is here and tax hikes are in sight
All my marxist friends are here on Thursday night.
The money for maintenance to keep the infrastructure from crumbling is sitting safely in the Highway Trust Fund right next to the Social Security Trust Fund.
But Congress was so busy earmarking useless projects of their contributors choosing for the last 20 years that no one remembered to do the maintenance jobs.
Come on man. How much can a Congressman be expected to do in one day?
If his jobs plan is nothing more than more infrastructure and stimulus spending with a call for taxing millionaires and billionaires, wouldn't this be nothing more than a reopening of the debate on increasing the debt limit and expose the US to a further downgrade in our credit rating?
More cowbell is all we get from this guy so I anticipate that we will get a call for MORE COWBELL! We just did not spend enough the last time to tackle unemployment so this time we will really, really, really have to spend more.
Steve G
Freder, Bush's speech was immediately after his first election, and as such was an honest attempt to lay out his agenda to the nation who just elected him. He didn't use it as a cheap ploy to gain political advantage in his own upcoming reelection, by un-presidentially stepping on his opposition's debate.
Besides, people wanted and needed to hear what Bush had to say. Obama is just gonna talk again. I think every President should hold such a speech soon after his FIRST inaugural. Then shut up and get to work.
That speech was just a few months before 9/11, a decade ago. What a decade - what a horror a few dedicated fools with dreams of 72 virgins can cause to the entire world. In the end it accomplished nothing for their cause. In fact, it set it back and led to the death of most of their fellow club members. What does Allah have against virgins anyway?
You have this screw up, the stupid gift to Gordon Brown of CDs, the retarded Ipod to the queen, and endless more embarrassments. It takes a special talent to be so bad at this stuff - and that's the easy stuff.
I wonder if the left-o-sphere is happy that President Obama decided to pick another fight with Republicans?
When will they learn that picking pointless fights on a regular basis diminishes you more than the people you pick the fights with?
Why, so can I, or so can any commenter; But will they understand when she does explain to them?
Well, if you've got 27 minutes, I'm sure she can certainly put together a illuminating post on the subject of punting, filled with tenuous analogies to Cyrus Vance, Jr.
If MSNBC is the host, who in heck will be the moderator? I hope it's Rachel Maddow! Ed Schultz would be fun too.
Wouldn't miss this for the world.
Haven't read through the thread, so this may have been commented on already. I watched the crazy channel last night. Even Lawrence O'Donnell was scornful of the White House claim that it was a coincidence and also scornful of the amatuerishness of the ploy.
Even Lawrence O'Donnell was scornful of the White House claim that it was a coincidence and also scornful of the amatuerishness of the ploy.
Wow.
X, your MNF parody was great. Only thing missing was my favorite part: Faith Hill in thigh-high boots.
He should have told him that he can speak on the floor anytime he wishes, we just won't be there.
The emperor has no clothes.
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