Peggy Noonan Needs a Pay Cut
Peggy Noonan: “But Mr. Obama was supposed to be competent.”
No, Mr. Obama claimed to be competent. Mr. Obama put on airs of competence. But Mr. Obama had never actually proven to be competent, except at exactly two things: Winning easy elections and convincing the Mainstream Media not to look too deeply into those airs. And you, Ms. Noonan, were among the convinced.
Others can, and do say, “I told you so.” But not with any glee, Ms. Noonan, because we’re all paying for your unforced error.
More 20/20 hindsight from Noonan:
I don’t see how the president’s position and popularity can survive the oil spill. This is his third political disaster in his first 18 months in office. And they were all, as they say, unforced errors, meaning they were shaped by the president’s political judgment and instincts.
The press is supposed to push and prod and pester and generally make life unlivable for presidential candidates. The reason is: Nothing the press can do is even close to the real pressures of the Oval Office — but it’s as close as we can get. Obama never went through the mandatory pushing and prodding and pestering, so the press failed in its prime duty to test this man before Election Day.
And now, the chorus arises — first Chris Matthews, now Noonan — that maybe this empty suit might not be filled with all the stuff the MSM poured into it.
Golly, ya think?
Then the Noonans and the Matthews and the rest wonder why Obama treats them with such disdain. He’s right to.
And now it’s our turn.
I guess the tingle up her leg is gone as well.
Iowahawk had her and her ilk pegged just right with his T. Coddington Vorhees III series. And as much as I enjoy her bewildered stare at what has befallen this country, I can’t help seething with rage at her willful ignorance coupled with classism during the last election cycle. Her version of a Republican needs to go the way of the dodo.
last night obama reminded me of the great nixon statement, “i take the responsibility, but not the blame.” i still don’t know what it means, but i doubt that summoning up visions of nixon is obama’s goal.
What it means is a paraphrase of Truman’s famous quote: The buck stops over there.
thanks ferny, it works for me
I am guessing that once the lib press turned on the light, they didn’t like what they saw after all. I guess the Dream Date with Mr. Obama is over and reality set in. Community Organizers do not a president make, especially when they only spent 5 minutes being a senator.
Ka-ching! Way to turn Noonan’s reference to Obama’s “unforced errors” around on her.
Your point is right on: As right and as eloquent as Peggy Noonan can sometimes be, she and most of the political press betrayed their profession and the American people in their willful lack of scrutiny of Barack Obama.
Peggy who? She lost her credibility at the ’08 GOP convention.
Spot on. My only question at this point is what they’re going to do in 2012. If the press turns on Obama as thoroughly as it appears they might, but he runs again (no guarantee if his numbers continue to plummet), how do they square the circle and support him in his re-election aspirations? Peggy. I believe this petard is yours.
Oh, the schadenfreude is running deep and true. It is, it is.
They bought into the idea that electing Obama would “make history.” It didn’t occur to them that after taking office he would still make history, and relieve Jimmy Crater of the label “Worst President Ever.”
For those that do support Obama, the line will be, “No matter how bad he’s been, that evil racist Republican godbotherer will be even worse!”
Because right now it would be terrible to have a vice president who has had experience dealing with the oil industry? And who’s spouse worked in the oil industry? Is that why you went for Dear Liar, Peggy?
rbj, let’s not gild the lily here. Palin’s experience dealing with the oil industry amounts mostly to how much money she could extract from them for state of Alaska. And, sure, her husband worked in the industry, but how much time did he spend 5,000 feet beneath the sea? Just exactly what experience do either of the Palins have in their resumes which would guide them in a Gulf oil spill? The fact that it’s oil?
For that matter, I don’t see how any of this is Obama’s fault. Absent any shocking new discoveries, his administration figured that BP was on top of the accident, which is the same thing BP was thinking.
A while back, our esteemed host likened the response to this spill, to that of Apollo 13. The similarity goes deeper. If you recall, the engineer in charge of systems at first refused to believe that a quadruple failure had even happened; “that’s impossible.” Same thing for this accident. In fact, the rig had just celebrated their seventh year of a “spotless” safety record. The blowout preventer (BOP) was a four-way unit in which at least one way should have worked. It didn’t. (the quadruple failure to which I referred above) BP thought they had the spill under control. They didn’t. BP executed multiple attempts to stem the spill. They all failed. The problem is that this accident was almost literally a one in a million event.
If we followed the logic of the Katrina & Deepwater Horizon hysterics, NASA
The “accident” was inevitable the only ingredient missing was whatever untypically event the geology might surprise them with. They literally spent all their safety margin and kept hoping for the best. The only component missing to complete the elements of a catastrophe was for any one of the several different occurrences that any of those faulty safety devices were meant to counteract to occur and bang. They were ignoring equipment condition and data from gauges and instruments that they knew should have alarmed them. As a man I used to work for put it, just because you’ve done it a hundred times doesn’t mean you won’t have a failure.
ARRGH, damn “tab” key!! Anyway…
If we followed the logic of the Katrina & Deepwater Horizon hysterics, NASA would have been shut down, the program leaders charged with criminal negligence, and the Nixon administration charged with, well, all the crap they’ve laid on Bush & Obama. 20/20 hindsight is a wonderful thing.
I have to ask, just what could the Obama administration have done 7 or 14 days into this accident what would have given us a significantly different result? Specifically? This administration made the rational choice to allow the “boots on the ground” folks (i.e. BP personnel on the scene) to call the shots, instead of micromanaging from D.C. But this is a bad thing, according to some observers…
Give her the benefit of the doubt; Repentance must
be hard for a true heart who worshiped a false god.
As far as I can tell, Obama has exactly one talent–getting influential people excited about him.
And in so doing, he has shown the country how shallow, obtuse and frivolous so many influential people are.