Nobody Expects the Unexpectedly!

Certainly nobody at the Obama-friendly CNBC and Reuters, the respective (if no longer respectable) sources of the the above headline and lede  — screencapped in case it changes, as often happens at Bloomberg.com, who have been known to airbrush out the U-word from their frequent “unexpectedly” bad economic news, after being mercilessly mocked for their selective amnesia by the starboard half of the Blogosphere.

With wide swatches of the country losing their health insurance after being repeatedly told by the president and his Democrat boosters in his administration and media that they could keep it, who wouldn’t expect bad economic news — except the MSM, Democrat operatives with bylines, as the Insta-Professor likes to say.

Way back in 2011, the Say Anything blog noted:

This end of the blogosphere has enjoyed a delicious running joke for much of Barack Obama’s presidency…the strange appearance of the word “unexpectedly” in MSM coverage of the anemic economic recovery.  Of course, many of us knew that Dear Leader’s economic policies would either amount to nothing and/or inhibit economic growth even as they were being debated, so there was nothing unexpected about the result.  Still, the joke has only gotten funnier (sadder?) as time has worn on and it becomes clearer and clearer that the man-who-has-never-had-a-real-job-yet-occupies-the-White-House has no clue what he is doing when it comes to the economy. (For our purposes here, we ignore the not-so-outlandish notion that perhaps he knows exactly what he is doing, but that robust economic growth, if it is the result of typical laissez-faire American capitalism, is not his goal.)

Anyway, this joke – and the point it reveals – has finally made it somewhat mainstream via the good offices of Michael Barone, who makes it the central theme of this Washington Examiner column.

It’s gotten so grim at Bloomberg.com that in recent months they’ve been reduced to playing the race card, NBC-style to defend Mr. Obama.

And speaking of the president, his media, and the ’70s-style Carter-esque perma-malaise they colluded to return to the nation,  Mike Flynn of Big Government spots left-leaning National Journal arguing that Obama “blew it,” losing the entire year of 2013, with possibly more news of fresh disaster to fall to his party next November. As Flynn writes:

National Journal notes that part of Obama’s problem is the kind of campaign he ran to win reelection. This is true. His campaign was based almost solely on tearing down Romney, rather than a new mandate for a second term. Indeed, on most major issues, voters agreed with Romney. They felt Romney also was a stronger leader, had a better plan for the economy and future and a greater ability to get things done.

On the question of which candidate better understood and cared them and their issues, Obama won overwhelmingly. He was reelected on his personal attributes, not his policies. Empathy, however, is not an agenda.

Obama has three years left in his term. His approval ratings, though, have recently dropped into the 30s, a level similar to Bush’s at this point in his second term. Obama no longer has a full-scale campaign and a single opponent for contrast, so, without a major course-correction, its hard to see how he lifts his poll numbers.

The second term curse, where reelected Presidents become bystanders to domestic politics as others rise to the national stage, seems to have come earlier for Obama than past Presidents. Vulnerable Senate Democrats up for reelection next year are already trying to distance themselves from the problems with ObamaCare. That phenomenon will accelerate in the coming months.

Obama lost 2013. Or, in the words of the National Journal, he “blew it.”

For National Journal, like CNBC, like Reuters, like Bloomberg, I’m sure Mr. Obama’s failures occurred entirely unexpectedly.

Besides, other than the half of the country that they pay little attention to, who could have seen it all coming?

Update: At the PJ Tatler, Bryan Preston spots tomorrow’s fresh disasters today:

Under Obama, we already have some of the worst deficits in American history. Obama has racked up more debt by himself than all the previous presidents combined.

To recap: Thanks to Obamacare, millions of Americans are losing their healthcare and will have to pay more for worse coverage. Taxpayers will be on the hook for the subsidies that Obama keeps promising will lower premiums for many Americans. The resulting federal spending on these subsidies will not be deficit neutral. If Howard Dean is right, we will have a budget crisis to go along with the canceled insurance crisis and the embarrassing Healthcare.gov website debacle.

Will President Obama get around to issuing a half-hearted apology for that lie, too?

Only Valerie knows for sure…