To borrow one of James Taranto’s leitmotifs, the Democratic Party has had many powerful orators over the years:
- Andrew Jackson is often attributed as saying, “One man with courage makes a majority.”
- Franklin D. Roosevelt comforted the nation when he said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
- Harry Truman famously said, “The buck stops here.”
- John F. Kennedy reminded Americans, “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”
- President Barack Obama in 2010: “We’re down there. It’s hot. We were sweating. Bugs everywhere. We’re down there pushing, pushing, pushing on the car. Every once in a while we’d look up and see the Republicans standing there. They’re just standing there fanning themselves — sipping on a Slurpee.”
Mark Knoller of the effectively state-run CBS, which has never met a Republican it liked seemingly since the days of Bill Paley writes, “To hear President Obama tell it, Slurpees are the beverage of choice of obstructionist Republicans:”
In each of 20 political speeches over the last two months, Mr. Obama has included a riff in which he portrays GOP leaders as sipping Slurpees while hard-working Democrats struggle to pull the economy out of a ditch.
“We’re down there. It’s hot. We were sweating. Bugs everywhere. We’re down there pushing, pushing, pushing on the car. Every once in a while we’d look up and see the Republicans standing there. They’re just standing there fanning themselves — sipping on a Slurpee.” *
The line never fails to get a laugh, as it did Thursday afternoon at a Democratic rally at Bowie State University in Maryland. His audience laughs and Mr. Obama does too. He clearly gets a kick out of the image of GOP leaders sipping a slushy, ice-cold Slurpee while Democrats like himself nearly kill themselves to pull the economy out of the ditch of the GOP’s making.
Huh. I’ll bet Slurpees* are pretty popular with the fellas at Fannie and Freddie, too:
[youtube 1RZVw3no2A4]
Elsewhere in news of the Alinskyite Demonizer in Chief, Rich Lowry notes:
Amazing that the President of the United States attacked Karl Rove by name twice yesterday. That’s like President Bush attacking Bob Shrum or Joe Trippi in a stump speech, something he never did. Bush had a sense of the dignity of his office that the current occupant apparently doesn’t.
And Joe Biden, whom James Lileks, during his interview for tomorrow’s PJM Political, brilliantly dubbed an even more bumbling version of the elite, snarky but feckless Roger Sterling character on Mad Men refudiates the English language as we know it, by announcing the White House’s strategery post-November: “If We Lose, We’re Going To Play Hell:”
[youtube BwYvrlhv-xg]
Add that to Obama’s speech yesterday, shortly before the brave lad who told the clothes they have no emperor was attacked by the reactionary true believers in the crowd:
[youtube NoNlhJAPmaM]
Is it just me, or despite the spin by Mark Knoller above, do both of those clips of Biden and Obama, really have that taint that a losing campaign has? Biden sounds like he’s just going through the motions, Obama sounds even angrier with the world than he usually does — I wonder what sort of numbers are being generated by their internal polling on the House and Senate elections next month?
* Besides, we all know what’s actually the favorite drink of Ruling Class Republican insiders everywhere.
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