The usual disclaimers first: Yes, Donald Trump is a zillionare blowhard with a bizarre waffle-pattern combover — perhaps if only to make a mockery of the classic Spy magazine prediction from 1990 that he’d eventually be shilling a book called Trump: The Art of Fine Grooming. Yes, the odds of him winning the GOP nomination are rather slim — and heaven help us all if he actually does. Yes, he has the potential to do Perot-level damage to a GOP candidate if he runs as third party candidate.
Yes, the Birther stuff is a bit nutty, and a distraction from the serious issues of the day. Yes, Trump could be some sort of one-man false-flag operation, as the Hot Air readers suggest.
But.
In the middle of “Donald Trump Scores an Important Victory… Over the Media,” Seth Forman of the American Thinker has a good summary of the where Trump’s crusading Birtherism stands:
One of the functions of the media is to protect the public from fraudulent statements made by public figures. The unwillingness of the media to fulfill this role in the case of Obama has led to significant, and probably needless, public tension. Obama’s resistance to releasing the long version of his birth certificate, has served not only to raise legitimate speculation about the circumstances surrounding his birth, but to give fodder to anti-Obama extremists.
Gail Collins, the New York Times’s most reliably uninteresting liberal attack dog, questioned Trump’s sanity just for raising the birth certificate issue. But would she say the same about famed black Vanderbilt University Law Professor and Obama supporter Carol Swain? Swain has said “I think that by not releasing it [the full birth certificate], it makes people much more passionately opposed to the president. Moreover, for a president who was elected on the basis of his personal background, it is troubling that Obama himself would want to withhold such basic information.”
The media’s curiosity about the background of those running for national office seemed to know no bounds when it came to George W. Bush’s service in the Texas Air National Guard or the sexual behavior of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s daughter. But during and since the 2008 campaign a virtual wall of silence has been constructed around Obama.
Check out new Pajamas Xpress blogger Barry Rubin’s flashback of how, as then-Newsweek editor Jon Meacham would later admit, the MSM made Obama seem like he walked on water in 2008. And then add that to Spencer Ackerman’s now-infamous concurrent threat in mid-2008 to pick any one of Obama’s conservative critics at random, “Fred Barnes, Karl Rove, who cares — and call them racists.”
Which brings to something Charles Krauthammer wrote in 2004, which we’ll quote after the page jump.
To get a sense of how the hermetically-sealed media environment of 2008 still resonates today, recall Charles Krauthammer’s “pressure-cooker theory” from August of 2004:
It is not often that a losing presidential candidate (Al Gore) compares the man who defeated him to both Hitler and Stalin. It is not often that a senior party leader (Edward Kennedy) accuses a sitting president of starting a war (“cooked up in Texas”) to gain political advantage for his reelection.
The loathing goes far beyond the politicians. Liberals as a body have gone quite around the twist. I count one all-star rock tour, three movies, four current theatrical productions and five bestsellers (a full one-third of the New York Times list) variously devoted to ridiculing, denigrating, attacking and devaluing this president, this presidency and all who might, God knows why, support it.
How to explain? With apologies to Dr. Freud, I propose the Pressure Cooker Theory of Hydraulic Release.
The hostility, resentment, envy and disdain, all superheated in Florida, were not permitted their natural discharge. Came Sept. 11 and a lid was forced down. How can you seek revenge for a stolen election by a nitwit usurper when all of a sudden we are at war and the people, bless them, are rallying around the flag and hailing the commander in chief? With Bush riding high in the polls, with flags flying from pickup trucks (many of the flags, according to Howard Dean, Confederate), the president was untouchable.
The Democrats fell unnaturally silent. For two long, agonizing years, they had to stifle and suppress. It was the most serious case of repression since Freud’s Anna O. went limp. The forced deference nearly killed them. And then, providentially, they were saved. The clouds parted and bad news rained down like manna: WMDs, Abu Ghraib, Richard Clarke, Paul O’Neill, Joe Wilson and, most important, continued fighting in Iraq.
With the president stripped of his halo, his ratings went down. The spell was broken. He was finally, once again, human and vulnerable. With immense relief, the critics let loose.
Obama’s magic spell began to unravel amongst voters over a long period leading up to November of last year, but it’s taking someone has reckless as Trump to point out that he’s still golden with the legacy media. (QED.)
It’s likely that Trump will personally uncover nothing of significance about Obama. But at the moment, he’s certainly reminding the American people how determined the Palace Guard media are at protecting the man they helped elect to office.
By the way, Krauthammer’s article from 2004 was written in the thick of a heated presidential election — one that’s impacting Canada right now in a curious way. How? Well, let’s just say that dubious pasts aren’t just for liberal American presidents any more.
Related: “When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber.”
Also Related: “Amazing!”
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