The President Said What, Now?
My nine-year-old daughter looked at the front page of the paper, and her eyes grew wide:
The president said “ass”?
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She swallowed the A-word, because it is, after all, the A-word. I nodded; he said that. She was silent for a while, digesting the information. Presidents, after all, are part of the great Pantheon of Authority, standing over the school principal, teachers, the pastor, police, and perhaps the mailman. To consider them using bad words reordered everything. Unless …
“He didn’t mean donkey,” she said, this being the only possible explanation. I shook my head. It will now be difficult to tell her not to use that word; it will now be a matter of time before my wife says, “Well, your daughter was sounding presidential today,” and it won’t be a reference to mankind’s universal aspirations. Unless you include the desire to kick BP’s tuckus, which seems fairly widespread.
Daughter asked for context, and was doubly nonplussed: he doesn’t know? True: if there’s one thing a child expects the president to know, it’s Everything. Adults may share the confusion. Adults may wonder if we will need a blue-ribbon panel to investigate just which fundaments require the application of the POTUS heel. (They will report back in six months and recommend federal oversight of the shoe industry.)
Barack Obama is probably the last guy you’d think would introduce “ass” into the mainstream political discourse. It’s like Spock announcing he wants to “knock boots” — a expression both crude and banal coming from someone renowned for dispassionate cool. But the idea that the president should confine himself to polite terminology is one of those antiquated chocks that prohibit true, honest expression, and if the post-Boomer culture has taught us any-effin-thing, it’s that authentic people use earthy language, authentically, and only the spats-and-monocle crowd insist on the verbal equivalent of the raised pinky and other useless vestiges of high-tea manners.
I agree. Obama is the scrawny,cowardly kid on the playground who shied from the fight until being “held back” by his bigger buddies then shouted “Let me go, I’ll kick his ass!”. So predictable from this wuss.
I’m the proverbial 98 pound weakling and I’m pretty sure I could whip him.
His wife Michelle though. She scares the crap outta me
Golly Moses! I wanna sound effing presidential too
Gee willikers and shucks already! The guy who until recently looked like a social x-ray is going to kick some a$$? Seriously? What, a ten year-olds? The guy who needs 3 hours for nine holes of golf? I dunno, he might want to leave that sort of thing to the missus, with her awesome arms and stuff. Good thing no one believes words mean anything from this guy…must have been a typo on the ‘prompter.
The guy who gives the finger to political opponents has said the a word? Shocking, just shocking. The MSM cheers on and Spike Lee congratulates him for “going off”. Time for another music party, like maybe on July 4, because nothing else should be going on that day. And there are more Presidents that need schooling by Sir Paul McCartney. Yup, July 4 at ‘Bama’s house to celebrate his awesomeness. July 4, BO Day. Cage fighting on the lawn. These are the best of times…
Churchill’s “V” was something of a vulgarism — up yours Adolf, was how people read the gesture. (He didn’t know the extra meaning, some allege.)
It depends which way round the V was displayed: if it was the inner part of the fingers as Churchill displayed them then it was for victory. He certainly didn’t display them knuckle side out wards to his audience.
Actually, early on, Churchill did show the V sign knuckles out until an adviser explained the meaning of that two-fingered gesture.
What is so pathetic about this is that Obama thinks that by acting tough he really is tough. Contrast Obama to, oh, LBJ, a man really known for his foul mouth and hair-trigger temper. Johnson could actually unclog a toilet just by yelling at it, and people knew it. But he always, ALWAYS, did it in private and never uttered a bad word in public. People got the message. Politicians were terrified of going toe-to-toe with Lyndon Johnson, a guy who backed up his tough talk with actions. Now please understand that I am no fan of Lyndon Johnson (never, ever, was), but you had to give him his due when it came to actually being a tough guy from Texas. He would have made short work of a spineless worm like Obama and people now are beginning to realize that.
Mr. President, the time for running a campaign and running for office is OVER! You are now stuck with the job of being a tough, solid, executive who isn’t afraid of being unpopular IF it means getting the job done. Results have a way of signifying success, and right now you are about as successful as Jimmy Carter was during the Iran hostage crisis. I can’t wait for November.
The old Congressional Barons from the South, on both sides of the Hill, were invariably Gentlemen in public, but if you were on the wrong side of them politically, you never turned your back, for they were experts on “slicing and dicing”.
I agree with your assessment of Mr. Obama but have to part with you on the subject of Lyndon Johnson’s manliness. Robert Caro wrote in his LBJ biography (still unfinished) that Lyndon was a physical coward. He rubbed a lot of guys the wrong way in college and some went looking for him. When confronted with an aggressor Lyndon would fall on his back and start waving his arms and kicking his feet in a rather spastic defensive posture. Potential assailants would walk away shaking their heads. LBJ pursued a decades long affair with Alice Glass, the wife of one of his principal political supporters. Lyndon wouldn’t end the affair but was always terrified that the husband would find out and destroy him in Texas politics. (This was always LBJ’s first priority. The effect on his wife and children apparantly did not figure prominently in his thinking.) Caro notes several times that LBJ’s primary talent was to identify older men who could help him politically, pose as a surrogate son and then “cultivate” them. (We would use the term “suck up” to them.)
Admittedly Caro is not a particularly friendly biographer but the picture he paints of Johnson is of a grasping, cowardly, mean, selfish, self-absorbed, adulterous, bully who quite literally would sell his soul and anyone else’s for a few votes.
As much as LBJ and Obama differ in personality, they are running into similar problems with the left side of their political base. As much as Johnson expanded government with the Great Society, and satisfied the left with passage of the Civil Rights Act, LBJ could never be far left enough for them, mainly due to Vietnam.
Johnson had the added problem of the Kennedy people believing the White House was stolen from them by JFK’s assassination and wanting to regain control through Bobby, which was the spark for the Kennedys’ alliance with the left that resulted in Teddy being the champion of liberalism for 40 years. Obama’s iconic status thanks to his election makes a similar challege from the left in 2012 unlikely, but it’s that group that’s been angry that Barack hasn’t implemented all the far left ideas they thought he would in 2008, and they’re also the ones wanting him to get really angry and take punitive action against BP (and all the other oil companies), so more than anything else, Obama’s “kick-ass” remark was directed at mollifying them, even when nothing short of the President of the United States nationalizing the assets of a British company will make them happy.
From Psalm 91, President B+ is a “…noisome pestilence”.
No matter what Obama says or does, it comes off contrived and confused. Him threatening he’s going to “kick a..” is embarrassing at best. I cannot get the image of him knock-knee’d in starched jeans throwing the first base ball of the season last spring.
You do realise of course ad e.g.Bill Maher and his ilk that vile is anagram for evil ?
You do realise of course ad Bill Maher and his ilk, that vile has as anagram evil?
He doesn’t see it that it’s his job to solve any problems. He just sees himself as the guy that won, and now he gets to use his authority to talk to the people to find out who he can blame for every problem. He will just use his bully pulpit to preach to us and to shake his finger at the scapegoats.
And he’s not actually going to kick anybody’s ass. Bullies just like to make threats, but they’ll cower at any real confrontation. But if he can put on a good show, sound tough and get away with little more, that’s what he’ll go for.
The opening trope of this article, referring to Mr. Spock, is based on a false impression – and I am surprised that otherwise intelligent and perceptive analysts fall for it. There has never been anything “Spock-like” about Obama’s non-scripted utterances, and there is nothing in his academic or work record that would lead one to think of him as an intellectual. So his use of profanity and other gutter epithets such as “get in their face…punch back twice as hard” does not surprise me in the least.
Obama is a thug, raised by Leftist thugs, who idolizes truly evil thugs such as Chavez, Putin and Ahmedinajad. I lost a great many friends over the last election, and wondered if I should regret it. Now that events have proved me right, I know that these friends were such poor judges of character that it doesn’t matter. If push came to shove, they would probably obey Obama’s order to imprison me.
Heh, heh, heh, heh,….he said “Ass.” Heh, heh, heh, heh.
It is Obama’s job to find some one to blame, other than himself.
You have to take that boot off their neck to kick some ass.
Your comment would make a great political cartoon!
I’m still confused. I thought Obama has been in control of this disaster since Day 1.
An effective leader would have had the crisis contained by now, not looking to kick the asses of his subordinates or BP.
yep, and he takes complete responsibility..so I guess it is his ass he’ll be kicking.
One of the fisher men at Grand Isle said that Obama comes down here and talks like John Wayne, leaves and acts like PeeWee Herman. sadly true.
Pretty brave for a guy with a pant load of armed body guards. Wonder if the Secret Service protects him from the Rue Paul impersonator sorry I mean Michelle? I know she can kick his ass, and does kick it if she is smart.
Metaphorically speaking, of course!
Not sure if my kids have heard about this yet.
But I really made them think when they relayed some of the latest anti-smoking messages they receive at elementary school and I asked them, “You know who’s a chain smoker?”
“Who?” they inquired.
“President Obama,” I told them.
Bwaa haa haa!
Considering how much time he spends either kissing it or threatening to kick it, I do find this perverse Presidential proclivity for posteriors perturbing. Of course, it does go a long way towards explaining his fondness for lots of things, from Michelle to Islamic tyrants, and fits in well with his attitude towards the American people (which could be summed up in two words, “Bend over!”)
The really sad part is all of Obama’s supporters probably think it’s great that our President is so childish and unprofessional.
Nether fish nor fowl, nor good red meat. Just tofu sushi past its expiration date.
“So when the president finally let some steam leak out from his exquisitely calibrated first-class temperament, he was being real. He was being authentic.
Even then, it seemed utterly false.”
That is because our President is authentically false.
The only time Obama gets emotional is when he isn’t getting his way.
He also gets pretty darned emotional when a reporter asks a question he doesn’t like (but maybe that too falls under “when he isn’t getting his way”).
Maybe it’s a bit past time to teach daughter that the president (any of them) is her employee and not some sort of demi-god.
Overlooking the obviously out of control narcissism evident in his choice of words, as if anything he says is made better by him saying it, Obama seems above all to be living in a kind of movie.
He is not John Wayne, though, but Mario Van Peebles or Woody Harrelson.. some B grade character who is morally suspect but somehow the audience is expected to love him.. the precedent is the nameless stranger in the spaghetti westerns, who reluctantly does the right thing while frightening everyone into respecting him… and they respect him because he did the right thing AND because he could kill them all in a moment of pique and they would be powerless to stop it..
This, then, is Obama. Clint Eastwood, Woody Harrelson, Mario Van Peebles, feel free to add to the list of examples for how a narcissist might see himself.
I’m hearing “Thug for Life” by Tupac Shakur in my head right now.. don’t ask me how it got there..
If the press weren’t as neutered as the President they could have some fun with this. “Mr. Gibbs, has the president kicked anyone’s ass today? And, as a follow-up, if he hasn’t then what is he waiting for? If he knows whose ass to kick then why doesn’t he? Is it possible that he doesn’t know whose ass needs kicking?”
I think it is possible that the Obama has never kicked anyone’s ass (except, figuratively, McCain’s). Can anyone in Obama’s mysterious past step forward and exclaim “yes, I once saw Mr. Obama open a serious can of whup-ass. Y’all better watch out.”
And, of course, there’s the embarrassing possibility that we’ll have no idea who just got their ass kicked by Obama by just looking at them. “Mr Gibbs, Obama claimed to have kicked Mr. Hayward’s ass. But he looks fine to me.”
Also, your cited examples of past Presidential cussing left out one important distinction. Those examples were either spur-of-the-moment exclamations or descriptions of something having already been done. Other than criticizing the crassness of them there really wasn’t much more to say. Obama’s cussing is a promise yet-to-be-fulfilled. So there’s no natural end to it. Every time he feigns outrage at something the obvious question is “You gonna kick their ass? Huh? Huh?”
Exactly so. I hope Jake Tapper is reading this…
Where ya been, Kurt? Everyone knows there can be no “Official Government Ass-kicking”, even by the President, without first having a minimum of a dozen congressional hearings. I think we’re at 3 right now, far below the necessary ass-kicking number.
Yawn. Carter played the look-tough-with-kinda-crude-language card back in 1980. Said he’d ‘whip Ted Kennedy’s ass’ if TK ran for the nomination against him. Caused a minor two-day kerfuffle in the press when he said it.
Let’s not forget Spike Lee is the person who said Obama ought to “get tough” or some suck advice.
How confident should we be in a POTUS taking advice from the likes of Spike Lee?
Who is next….Michael Moore?
I cannot help but wonder if the kick-ass phrase was on the teleprompter, part of speech planned to make him sound tough.
James Lileks’ daughter is 9 now? Man, time flies.
This is the most hilarious essay I’ve read since the last P.J. O’Rourke offering. Lileks is a really good writer, and hit all the right notes with me. Thanks for my morning cackle!
http://thoughtyoudneverask.blogspot.com/2010/06/presidential-bad-boys-teaching-moment.html
Kids say the darndest things!
“…only the spats-and-monocle crowd insist on the verbal equivalent of the raised pinky and other useless vestiges of high-tea manners.”
You’re wrong, of course, as evidenced by your mocking tone. Some people are better than others, and grace and respectful behavior are among the criteria.
Do you not understand that? Of course you don’t!
Alan, I agree with you, but I think you should re-read that paragraph. I think JL was being ironic.
WHAT? Some people are better than others? Quick, somebody tell Obama before he redistributes ALL our hard-earned taxpayer dollars to the usual deadbeats.
Captain Kick Ass is an empty suit commanding a rudderless ship.
I can’t help but wonder what Frank Marshall thought of Barry’s ass.
Thanks to all for helping me to start my day with a laugh!
Ah bland and stupid, what James Lileks excels at.
Those who can, do. Those who cannot, threaten to do.
The smallest guy in my platoon wiped the floor with a bullying bigmouth the last time I saw this. He never said a word. He didn’t need to.
President Obama is proof that it is possible to graduate from an Ivy League university and not learn many of life’s essential lessons.
Correction,
“…not learn ANY of life’s essential lessons.”
This is just plain weird isn’t it? I recall when he visited our town on a campaign stop in 2008 and made his now infamous, “get in their faces” speech. The ammo he expected his minions to use was his positions on taxes and guns, issues that he gets an F grade on from the National Tax Payers Union and the NRA respectively. What kind of leader sends his troops out with that kind of ammunition knowing full well it is a lie that will make them an embarrassment in any fair debate? The same kind that puts us all at risk by confronting a world full of danger with his laughable, “hold me back” braggadocio. Does anyone really buy anything coming out of this guys mouth any longer?
I can swear with the best of them…but I don’t do it at the office. I did one time and people were actually shocked. I’m not really sure if that’s good or bad.
Obama’s “ass kicking” line reminds of this anecdote about Nixon:
Nixon tried to be a Man Of The People with a group of construction workers. He asked one of the hard hats, “So, have you been doing any fornicating?”
I never thought I’d be nostalgic for the quality leadership of Jimmy Carter.
Hypocrite for behaving politely in public ?
No freaking way.
Inconsistency ? OK, sure.
Hypocrisy ? Give me a flipping break.
What kind of case-hardened, steel-belted-radial, industrial-strength doofus can’t appreciate the need for keeping some words & activities private & for observing at least minimal standards of politeness & courtesy in public ?
I am not responsible for what goes on inside my head. I am to be judged by my behavior.
Any disconnect between my thoughts & my actions is just inconsistency & not any kind of hypocrisy.
Besides, as long as I keep my thoughts to myself then (a) How do you know what I’m thinking? & (b) What’s it to you anyway, Bub ?
“It will now be difficult to tell her not to use that word;…”
Really. Do you have trouble teaching her not to smoke, since the president smokes?(I don’t see how you can sustain that)
Do you have trouble teaching her not to threaten people with physical harm, since the president does that? (think bankers and pitchforks)?
Do you have trouble teaching her how to be unkind to people who demonstrate religious faith and not call them names? (the president does that frequently)
Do you have trouble teaching her not to be irresponsible with other people’s money? (the president boasts about doing that)
Ok. I’ll take your statement at face value.
This this episode of vulgarity should present actually presents several opportunities in your teaching of your young daughter. Point out to her that his choice to be vulgar demonstrates the danger in a person thinking vulgarities in their mind (sooner or later they are going to come out of their mouth). Use the response to his vulgarity to teach her that even people who think they sound tough when they speak with vulgarities or profranities will usually either be ignored or disrespected by decent people. Use his vulgarity to teach her that being a smartmouth can never be a convincing substitute for genuine intelligence.
Dukakis in the a tank
Consider that in the process of looking for an A$$ to kick . . . Obamie-whamie should IMHO be kicking his OWN. Since there have been so many errors, mistakes, complications etc that he is no longer capable of responding in any productive way to the OIL leak. Also consider that obviously the OIL is coming from a HOLE in the ground. Thus through simple logic . . . Obamination clearly does not know HIS A$$ from a HOLE in the ground.
Good essay, but I disagree on one point: Bill Maher shouldn’t be mentioned with Lenny Bruce unless the intent is to demonstrate why Maher is an epic fail.
Well it could be worse. When my daughter was nine I got to explain stains on a blue dress. One hopes you will be spared THAT.
Once again I find myself fascinated by a different part of the episode. He said he was meeting with the locals and fisherman so he he would know who’s ass to kick. What is he going to learn from this group about who’s at fault? I think we all know the blame is with BP primarily and his regulators in the Interior Department secondarily. Are those the people he refered to with the college seminar comparison? I would think insticts would guide one to the source to find where to apply pressure. Instead of meeting with the problem source face to face he scolds from afar while standing aside the victims. He comes off as an ineffective coward.
It’s a sure sign of a small mind and a losing argument when reduced to profanity in an attempt to get one’s point across.
James’ link to the Beeb article about the British two-finger gesture included this mind-blowing bit:
How in the heck could that be “racism”? “French” is hardly a race. British and French populations are genetically almost identical; it would take DNA sequencing to distinguish between two people raised in the same country, one of whom was actually descended from the other. And even that might not be enough; there’s more variation within either population than between them, even without including their respective former colonies.
100 years ago, it was quite commonly accepted that the French, British, Germans, etc., were different races.
So, this high school kid gets upset and proceeds to tell the teacher, I will kick your —. Of course the teacher sends the kid to the principals office.
When the kid is questioned, he explains that the President of the United States said it, why can’t I. He threatens people with violence, I should be able to. And by the way, that teacher deserves an — kicking.
This just reinforces my two-years-ago assessment of Obama as a naive college sophomore. He was just trying to impress us that he is a tough guy, and, in the sophomore context, that means using improper language. He really has no idea as to what it means to be President of the United States, or how to conduct himself with propriety. For him it’s just the glamor and the perks.
Well, it’s sure no George W. Bush calling Adam Clymer a “major-league asshole” into a live mic during the 2000 campaign (as in, you know, eight years before Obama was elected), but I guess it’ll do. For the mathematically challenged anyway.
You would have a point if:
1) Bush had said it on a national news broadcast
2) Said it to show he was being “tough”
Neither 1 nor 2 are true. Where does that leave you?
Where does that leave you?
With about a hundred other examples of presidents saying “ass” in a way that could be heard by the public prior to Obama taking office.
I think it’s pretty clear that you internet tough-guy sup-R-geniuses either don’t know what the word “introduce” means, or have the collective memory of a gnat with OCD. There is this thing called “the Google”, you know, but I suppose even that wouldn’t be able to stop all of your hilarious rationalizing.
“With about a hundred other examples of presidents saying “ass” in a way that could be heard by the public prior to Obama taking office.”
Well, super internet genius guy, instruct us…provide some of these ’100 other examples’. It should be very easy to find examples of previous presidents going on TV and putting on the tough guy act, just as Obama recently did with his false bravado.
By all means, please deign to share with us mere proles your uber intellect and kick-ass interwebz research skillz.
Here, I’ll start you out: Carter (another famous Democrat pansy) threatening to “whip his ass” if Ted Kennedy ran against him.
Go.
We will leave it to you to prove that “gnat’s” are even capable of “collective memory” with the capacity to suffer from “OCD”. Google on, smart-ass, and be sure to let us know what you find. In the meantime, the “talks like John Wayne but acts like Pee Wee Herman” analogy is a fitting approximation for this inept, incompetent, and “hilariously irrational” Commander-in-Thief whose job approval is now polling negatively, according to the latest Gallup survey. That didn’t take long, did it?
My recollection of the event was that Bush didn’t know the mike was live when he made the comment.
Read a history book dumba$$es. The use of salty language during a major crisis or national disaster has occurred often. Here are some people I’d like you to read about; here are President’s Jackson, Grant, Teddy Roosevelt, Truman, LBJ, Nixon, George HW Bush, George W Bush, etc etc etc.
Me thinks thou dost protest too much. Time to move on to your next feigned outrage of the day. This one is getting more petty and transparent by the minute.
In a situation like this, I usually like to quote great men: Nietzche, Camus, or Socrates.
But for you, I think we’ll go with a quote from Sgt. Hulka:
“Lighten up, Francis”
and yet, other than this and the Carter incident, you can’t seem to name a single other time a president has deliberately used profanity in public.
See, it’s not good enough to say ‘read a book’ or ‘google it’–if you claim that there are many other examples of this you’ve got to provide at least one.
Perhaps, but in public, during a speech or an interview?
Yet another fail.
Everything about Obama is contrived…except his real agenda.
From his Spike Lee insults to his campaign promises, Obama has been an empty suit. Platitudes of “Hope and Change” and “Yes We Can!” that pass as profound?
Part red diaper baby, part hate-filled black “theology”, if the man wasn’t endangering our future and didn’t have a vast following of rubes, I’d laugh at his shallowness.
Unfortunately, at least 40% of America is right there with him.
I do not see why everyone is so shocked by this? THis presodent ALWAYS talks tough. He is always making lil threats and gestures like this. Ususlly to the american people. Our enemies on the other hand. If he actually said it to Americas enemies and then actually did something..then i would be shocked. he will posture and say stooooopid stuff like this to get people to focua on what he said over what he has actually done. As a leader he is worthless. Mothing more than a marxist college professor annoyed that he actually has to do something instead of having people revile in how ‘brilliant’ he is
The libtrolls don’t want to get it. Who the hell would believe that this nerd, who throws a baseball like a little girl, could actually “kick ass”, even if he wanted to? It’s laughably pathetic. The world is no longer afraid of America. That isn’t funny but it’s dangerous and sad.
With Michelle in the house and her to-and-fro swaying, humongous backside in his view, the word is always on the tip of Barack’s tongue.
Does this mean that Obama is going to kick some of his biggest campaign contributors in the a$$?
“Exquisitely calibrated first-class temperament” is code for “black”. You are a racist bigot.
The Principal Liar sleazits Persons Galore…
Why be so afraid of the “A” word, don’t anyone remember who our last president was? Ha….
#52 ENOUGH HATRED OUT THERE. What hatred do you refer to, EHOT you,self righteous cretin?Hatred of white people,as in Affirmative action(the sick policy which enabled this marxoid mediocrity to become president)? Hatred of reality? As in Obama’s bankrupting the nation with historically failed Keynesian bailouts?Hatred of the first amendment, as in Obamas thuggish behavior toward SCOTUS?Please be specific.The problem with the Ohole’s use of salty language,is lack of credibility. It’s hard going from PRESIDENT LICK-ASS (tongue worn out from licking oligarchs, and psychotic dictators like Calderon and Chavez),to president” kick ass” a failed thug who attempts to bully the people of Arizona , BP and Tea partiers, without looking like a hypocrite. This clown’s an abject failure,and all the salty language in the world won’t save him!
From now on when I hear the name “Obama” uttered, I’ll picture Barney Fife (thumbs in belt, smirk on face) saying “I’m here to kick some ass. Where’s my bullet?” ….. At least Barney was an impotent character you could love. Obama’s just impotent.
Hey at least(for now) he’s just swearing and you’re not having to teach your kids about oral sex, how a cigar can be involved, and what Monica had on her dress. Of course when you have to explain to your child that grandma has to die because BO want cough up the bucks for her surgery that will be a lot worse than him saying a**. All hail the juvenile in chief
I Like your use of tmesis in any – effin – thing there, the insertion of a word between syllables is a very effective intensifier. For the record tmesis is the only word in the English language to stasrt with the letters “tm”
Pajamas Media readers all knew that of course. But you can bet Obie didn’t. Wonder if his autocue reads these threads?
I do wish you would all stop using ass and reclaim the Anglo Saxon arse. It has a much richer sound to it.
This is just posturing on Obama’s part and I think we all realize it.
BP will simply declare bankruptcy and we will lose big time. Obama needs to learn a little diplomacy.
Withis attitude and inadequate I do not believe Obama has ever been faced with a situation that he actually had to make a big decision without being to blame someone else… I don’t hate Obama, but I am really afraid of his decisions. Okay, maybe I do dislike him..a lot..
Obama’s chickens have come home to roost..and they are covered in oil
Wow, you watch bill maher.
Are you tied to a chair and forced to do this against your will? You gotta be.
Obumble was responding to a week of charges that he didn’t appear emotional enough about the spill, trying to sound tough. Yeah, it came off as weak and manufactured.
However, in his shady back-room political shenanigans, Obama and his sidekick/enforcer Rahmbo Emanuel are true Chicago thugs.
Ah, our invertebrate President.
You know, when he says “kick some ass,” all I can think of is one of those tiny dogs yapping…
In ten years or less, it will be wholly acceptable for Democrats to call their opponents “douchebags”. The reverse, obviously, will not be allowed by the media.
I’m sure in the wake of the call-outs by Spike Lee, Bill Maher and others who are considered touchstones of liberal pop culture thinking, the White House polled and focus group tested the reaction of core supporters on the effect of sprinkling some saltier language into the president’s official statements, and the results came back that showed enthusiasm levels rising among the core supporters if Obama would ‘get mad’ at the people they don’t like.
The problem is the only reason Obama got elected was because the non-core voters were comfortable that he was pretty much a laid-back policy wonk, i.e. a ‘cool nerd’. And the left thought that simply through his charisma and uniqueness of being the first African-American president, that would be enough to intimidate others into doing what he wanted. That didn’t work, and the president’s personality is what it is, so that going on NBC and uttering the ‘kick ass’ line comes off as both fake and an empty threat, and unless the left can come up with a machine to turn Urkel into Stefan, nobody’s going to believe in in the future, either (and if they could build that machine, they would have built a copy of Karl Rove’s weather machine to break up the oil spill before it ever hit the beaches).
Congrats. World’s most pathetic thread.
P.S. ARSE!!!!!!!one1!
I dunno. I really don’t care about this. Although, if you really think about it, it’s the only time he has ever really showed any balls. It’s the first thing he’s marginally correct on. He’s already been giving us all the shaft anyway.
Mark Steyn sheds light on the heart & soul of the modern multiculturalist/generalist/transnationalist
Don’t bother me with no stinkin’ reality
“Obama’s postmodern detachment is feeble and parochial…(He has) grasped the essential lingo of the European transnationalist: Continental leaders strike attitudes rather than effect action — which is frankly beneath them…There are millions of people like Barack Obama, the eternal students of a vast lethargic transnational campus for whom global compassion and the multicultural pose are merely the modish gloss on a cult of radical grandiose narcissism. As someone once said, “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.” When you’ve spent that long waiting in line for yourself, it’s bound to be a disappointment.”
Bamabits has always been the object of derision, scorn and ridicule; always been on the meek, fearful end of the bully phenomenon. I don’t like bullies, but that’s where he spent his youth, and not on the giving end. Away from the protection of ritzy schools Obama was always a target in the bully free fire zone. Since then, YoBama’s taken to street language to show he’s not afraid. He’s Clint Eastwood playing “Dirty Harry.” In real life, though, Obama’s the punk. Whose luck is running out. Frankly, I think he’s shaking in his hobnail booties these days more than ever because America is finally discovering what a fake he is. ZeroBama is imitation Presidential timber. The tallest tree in a forest of hate-Americanism. With the backbone of a jellyfish caught in an oil slick. His claim to masculine fame was learning to knock knuckles instead of giving high fives, which went out a decade ago, but nobody ever told golfers or Obama. He bowles like a wisp because he is one.
Fortunately, for little o, he’s got a few things going for him; the ability to give speeches, good speechwriters, a strong belief in Alinsky, neo-com principles and a coterie of neo-com savages. Any gravitas he seems to have is in actuality flem or the equivalent caught in his throat. Given the opportunity he’s a con artist that chokes. He’s not much interested in the suburbs or oil disasters; one of which he’d never live in, and the other will end up being his political Waterloo. He’s more political hack than politician, and has resorted to the language of the street to show he’s tough. But a powder puff is always a powder puff no matter how much political power he wields.
His objective on becoming President was to get filthy rich, dole out billions of taxpayer money to cronies and destroy America in the process; financially, culturally and militarily. Unfortunately, this accomplished miscreant has accomplished all three. He’s now staring like a deer in head lights at an Iran about to announce a Russian provided missile defense shield suspiciously like the one he rug pulled from Poland and the Czeck Republic. Obama says missile defense is on back burner. If Israel and metropolitan New York are ever vaporized, Obama may regret. One thing’s for sure, though. The American people, at least 53% of them, will live (or die) regretting giving their vote to a certifiable madman. He deserves to have his ass kicked.
I would not be surprised to find Obama re-elected in 2012, unless he has a nervous breakdown before that.
The man truly is in over his head. Perhaps he thought being president was like being a community organizer…delegate, delegate, delegate and collect the awards.
He’s always in “speech/campaign” mode.
As said, I would not be surprised to find him re-elected.
Envirohypocrisy
America’s Left has always been noted for its hypocrisy but it has outdone itself with respect to the Gulf oil disaster.
Had this catastrophe occurred on George W. Bush’s watch, he would have been pilloried mercilessly by the likes of the Sierra Club, Greenpeace and other envirogreenies.
On the other hand, Obama’s inaction, his detachment, his failure, even his transparent tough guy language about kicking ass have been met with a hypocritical stoicism by most Lefties to the point that it’s scandalously disgusting.
James Carville, who lives in the Gulf area, and Bill Maher, who is a brainless twit, have voiced their dismay over Obama’s blatant display of incompetence and inexperience in this emergency but they are virtually alone among “progressives” in their sentiments.
As the public seethes over the situation, as the Gulf states suffer immeasurable hurt, as the ecosystem is on the verge of being permanently despoiled by oil and tarballs, as the economies and lifestyles of millions are imperilled, Obama acts like a national Gautama Buddha sitting in the White House with his legs figuratively crossed and his soul figuratively praying for his daughter to stop annoying him with her daily questioning on whether he plugged the hole yet. . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=1731)
How do the pinheaded wingnuts explain this?
http://www.google.com/search?q=site:lileks.com+lileks+ass&hl=en&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&rlz=1I7GFRC_en&start=10&sa=N
Now…for me…being a libertarian nerd…I LOVE that they’re using “Kick-Ass” in pointing out how immature Berry is being BECAUSE..the guy that wrote that comic, when he was at home watching his kids, is NOT a fan of Dems….this really does make it all the more rich*smile*…
Keep on Keeping on!
Get real. Grow up. Get a life. And maybe better prepare your daughter for the reality out there.
A$$? He said a$$? That is far worse than Cheney telling Sen. Leahy to “go f*#$ yourself” in the Senate chamber.
#79 BOOB: So nice of you to remind us of what a man does, as opposed to an inept, egotistical adolescent.Cheney swore out of genuine anger at a manifest traitor, and demtard thug, who when not drunk,is busy leaking military secrets that could imperil American lives;Obama needs to act tough and bully a hapless corporate scapegoats to simulate what he lacks: competence.The salty words are beside the point,like your post.
#70 TWISTED COLOR And what twisted YOU? Was it the crack? Was it exposure from living under a bridge with the other demented homeless? Or was it too much reading the NY Times without adult supervision?
What is wrong with the word A$$. This is not cursing. This is pretty much americal colloqual that is used in borad meetings, emails and even in press releases.