The one face of Milbank and Dowd: In this morning’s Washington Post, Milbank plays the silly card with respect to Susan Rice.
But first, Maureen Dowd played the silly card with respect to President Barry. On Sunday, she started her column like this, pitiful headline included:
DOWD (9/8/13): Barry’s War WithinReturn of belittling nickname? Check.
The winner of the Nobel Peace Prize had been up late pleading for war.
The president looked exhausted as he met the press in St. Petersburg on Friday. The man elected because of his magical powers of persuasion had failed to persuade other world leaders at dinner the night before about a strike on Syria.
Silly pseudo-contradiction? Check. (Man of peace pleads for war!) Loaded account of the way he looked? Check.
Everyone knew what was coming next. Soon, the doctor was IN:
DOWD: It is uncomfortable to watch the president struggle to reconcile his two conflicting identities as he weighs what he calls the unappetizing choices on Syria, and as he is weighed down by the malignant choices on the Middle East made by his predecessor.In our view, it is beyond “uncomfortable” to watch the New York Times offer this pitiful dreck to the public. That said, Dowd has been playing these games for so long that the liberal world doesn’t seem willing or able to see it.
In his head, is Barry at war with the commander in chief?
One side of him is Barry, the smooth consensus builder and community organizer, the former constitutional professor and the drive-by senator who must stand by the argument he made when he ran for president excoriating W.’s and Dick Cheney’s highhandedness: checks and balances must be observed...
When it came time to act as commander in chief, he choked and reverted to Senator Barry...
In Dowd’s childish Two Faces of Barack, the smooth “Barry” may be at war with the commander in chief! Soon, she offered her childish take on Nancy Pelosi:
“Now the president who saw no benefit in wooing Democrats on the Hill is desperate for their love. Nancy Pelosi, the San Francisco peacenik, will have to win Barry the right to bomb.”
To Dowd, Pelosi is a “peacenik.” Dowd, a childish empty soul, is living in 1960.
This morning, Milbank follows. For him, as for Dowd, life-and-death issues get resolved to simple-minded pseudo-ironies. Headline included:
MILBANK (9/10/13): Susan Rice returns to CIA talking pointsRice is back on the CIA points! It’s just like last year!
This is the price of insularity.
About a year ago, the White House put Susan Rice, then the ambassador to the United Nations, on TV to read CIA talking points that turned out to be false about the attack in Benghazi, Libya.
The backlash poisoned her relationship with Republicans in Congress and dashed her chances of becoming secretary of state. President Obama instead named her national security adviser, which didn’t require Senate confirmation.
Now there is another crisis. Obama needs congressional support for a military strike on Syria, because a “no” vote could cripple his presidency and damage American credibility. So what do the big brains in the White House do? They put Susan Rice in front of TV cameras to read CIA talking points.
Milbank forgets to note a basic fact from last year’s batch of points: When Rice was “put on TV to read CIA talking points that turned out to be false about Benghazi,” she noted, again and again, that she was offering preliminary assessments—that the investigation was continuing, that the facts might change.
Beyond that, the points Rice read last year weren’t all that false if you review what she actually said. Milbank isn’t going to do that. The pundit clowns to forget.
In our main set of posts this week, we are reviewing the “adult abuse” readers get from the New York Times. For many people, it’s hard to grasp the depth of the inanity displayed by our press corps elites.
Is Nancy Pelosi a peacenik: In this morning’s New York Times, Jennifer Steinhauer profiles Pelosi.
Is Nancy Pelosi a silly peacenik? In the mind of the broken child Dowd, she is! For a more adult portrait, click here.
Finally! Bob realizes there is a crisis in Syria!
ReplyDeleteSo what does he choose to write about when he finally, at long last, gets around to writing about Syria?
The lowest of the low-hanging fruit, the fishiest of fishy barrels to shoot into -- Maureen Dowd.
Lordy, Somerby's obsession with this woman is approaching pathological.
Yeah, pointing out her pathology is pathological.
DeleteBut the way _you_ always show up to complain that Somerby picks on Dowd -- that's just a healthy obsessiveness.
I wish he'd get his own blog. That way he could eschew low hanging fruit and go straight to the top by lambasting the president and congressional democratic leadership...
DeleteOr Bill O'Reilly...
DeleteSorry Anon 403,
DeleteTDH shows no sign of any interest in Syria--only in defending Susan Rice's Benghazi spinning. Bob can't figure out why anyone would find Rice is not credible on issues that involve national security. It's a puzzler...
I said in real time that Rice, nor any high-ranking government official, should not have been making the rounds of TV interviews making statements about situations they still know very little about and armed only with preliminary "talking points" that could blow up in their faces.
DeleteI was told by Bob and his tribe that favored government officials don't have to say what they mean and mean what they say as long as they use enough fudge words and phrases.
"Milbank forgets to note a basic fact from last year’s batch of points: When Rice was “put on TV to read CIA talking points that turned out to be false about Benghazi,” she noted, again and again, that she was offering preliminary assessments—that the investigation was continuing, that the facts might change. "
ReplyDeleteBecause they can't admit that. Ever. If they did they would then have to admit that they talked about the talking points instead of what really happened in Benghazi. They don't know what happened in Benghazi.
They veered off track on those talking points because they think Jake Tapper is great, and that's where HE went so they all went clambering after him.
If Susan Rice had set this up as a diversion it couldn't have gone better. They GAVE her the diversion a "guilty" person would have loved.
I don't think she IS guilty of anything, I don't think she planned it as a diversion, but they made it one.
What a mess they made of the reporting on Benghazi. They will never, ever admit that.
Anon@405: you and Bob both forget the basic fact that Dana Milbank is the world's dumbest journalist. If there already wasn't the Peter Principle, it would be called the Milbank Principle.
DeleteDowd's column included another standard point (when she wrote "[Obama] is weighed down by the malignant choices on the Middle East made by his predecessor.") --
ReplyDeleteIt's Bush's fault
C'mon, David. Where were you when I (and other sentient beings) said it would take decades to get out from under the disaster of the Bush/ Cheney Presidency?
DeleteThat doesn't mean Obama isn't a shitty President, it just means the disaster that was the Bush Presidency was obvious to all but GOP sycophants.
Berto
Frankly, the selling of a strike on Syria has been downright cringe-producing.
ReplyDeleteGoodness gracious, I'm in their corner on this one, and they have made this matter look like some sort of save-face gesture and only that.
It's impossible NOT to try an analyze their psyches just to assuage your own confusion.
DAinCA,
DeleteStandard points aren't always wrong. The WPE jiggered intelligence to con the Congress into letting him fight the longest war in US history to rid the world of Saddam's non-existent WMDs. Now we're confronted with a Middle East dictator who has and uses actual WMDs. Are you surprised that neither the public nor the Congress has any stomach for military action?
CeceliaMc,
DeleteNo, no. It's quite easy not to indulge in this particular dumbness. Obama says that we have to act in the face of certain events. The use of chemical weapons is one of those. He may be right or he may be wrong. There may be military actions that would prevent further use of the weapons or there may be no worthwhile military options. Not acting may embolden Assad or he may act on his own counsel without taking us into account. These considerations should cause confusion over the what course to take.
Will Congressional refusal to act cause Obama in particular or the US collectively to lose face or affect Obama's domestic agenda or determine whether Obama is a "strong" President or a "weak" President? These are narratives of the commentariat, worth nothing and certainly not the grounds for more narratives about the psyches of others.
"Obama says that we have to act in the face of certain events. The use of chemical weapons is one of those. He may be right or he may be wrong."
DeleteBut without the support of the UN or NATO or the US Congress, that is to say without the support of the law at any level, then Obama is just making it up as he goes along. Sort of like ruling by decree...doesn't seem like a system of government that will benefit most readers of this blog.
Obama went to Congress, the UN, NATO, and the Arab League. He won't act unless he has Congressional authorization. How is this anything like "ruling by decree"?
DeleteDeadrat, in determining the best course of action it only makes sense that you would gauge the mettle of the man in charge. That you would determine whether his actions are consistent with his expressed motivation, and whether he has the resolve.
Deletedeadrat,
DeletePresident Obama has consistently maintained that he does not need authorization from any of the named organizations and that he cannot be constrained by them.
CeceliaMc,
DeleteWhat foolishness. Do you think you could even define "mettle" in some useful way? Do you expect Presidents to lead a phalanx of hoplites into battle?
In late October 1983, Ronald Reagan lead the US to a glorious victory in Grenada, What did you learn about his "mettle" and his "resolve" from that? Did that teach you anything about his response to the bombing of the Marine barracks in Lebanon two days earlier? He eventually cut and ran from that mission.
It's hard enough to determine what happened, who was responsible, and what an appropriate response is. You want to add "analyzing psyches" to that list?
Oh, spare me the tu quoque fallacy, deadrat.
DeleteThe president has determined what needs to be done and is in the process of selling it and defending it in the manner that a small town mayor defends a bond issue: condictory appeals to all sides, and a wide-eye for potential ass covering.
Trollmes, but at the same time, if everyone just refuses to enforce the law, what are we left with?
DeleteI can see both sides here. If we decide as a planet that we will not tolerate chemical weapons, yet refuse to do anything about it, what does that really mean?
Trollmes, but at the same time, if everyone just refuses to enforce the law, what are we left with?
DeleteI can see both sides here. If we decide as a planet that we will not tolerate chemical weapons, yet refuse to do anything about it, what does that really mean?
OMB
ReplyDeleteExcellent post BOB. Just two tiny questions about this statement.
"That said, Dowd has been playing these games for so long that the liberal world doesn’t seem willing or able to see it."
What IS the liberal world willing and able to see? And when they see it, what happens next?
EB
So
Could it possibly be that the "liberal world" considers Dowd far less relevant and worth discussing than BOB does?
DeleteIn other words, is it even possible that the "liberal world" and most of the sane world as well, has tuned her out a long, long time ago?
And wouldn't that be an outcome that give BOB cause to rejoice and be glad?
Anon@ 11:36
DeleteAs it was with the events which occurred on a dark and rainy night in Sanford, Florida,
"anything is possible. We just don't know."
Would that be an outcome for BOB rejoicing?
That would require me to know what he thinks
(which would make me DOWDian) or what he SEEMS to think (which would make me BOBilicious.) However, I am neither. I am MANDALbrotian, according to Sherrlock, which shatters to tiny, tiny fractals any illusion I have of being able to answer that question.
Thanks for the follow up questions. Meanwhile I continue my quest for what the Liberal World can and cannot see. As Emperor of the Planet of Doom in the Middle Universe (AKA King Zarkon), I have a morbid curiosity in things which can see, since there is a connection between Mt. Doom, on Middle Earth and the Eye of Sauron, which could see many things. I am wondering if the Liberal World is like Sauron in its visual abilities.
King Zarkon (KZ)