TW: As the final selection neared, we became more excited about Chicago potentially getting the Olympics. Did not happen. For my edification I watched Fox News for its reaction. They naturally had a conservative talking head on to bash Obama. To Fox's credit their anchors tried to keep things somewhat rational but to Drudge et al.-"WORLD REJECTS OBAMA: CHICAGO OUT IN FIRST ROUND, THE EGO HAS LANDED" Kiss my ass. TW: update- like that someone has found the silver lining already...
From Mike Schearer at Time:
"It is possible that the defeat of Chicago at the International Olympic Committee, a stunning, first-round defeat, will be good for the president over the long haul. His loyalties to his hometown are unquestioned, but the prospect of Olympic building scandals, of friends and fundraisers benefiting form the Olympic spending, and the virtually inevitable over-budget controversies would not have served Obama well..."
6 comments:
Oh, Come on.
If Chicago had gotten the games, there'd have been PLENTY of talk about how Obama (and Michelle, who got to Copenhagen a few days earlier to lobby, had pulled it off).
He's the one who chose to throw his political weight into the process, and now he's taking a few harmless hits because it didn't work.
He'd have been *very* glad to take the applause if it had. Probably you'd have been one to give him at least a smidge of credit for it.
I will let noted left wing nut Joe Scarborough answer for me:
"Count me as one conservative who is disappointed that President Obama's hometown will not be hosting the 2012 Olympic Games.
Chicago is a beautiful city that would have made a perfect backdrop for the Olympics. The President was right to fly to Copenhagen to try to land the games, not for the sake of his city, but for the good of his country. The fact President Obama failed makes me respect him more for taking the chance, and the fact many right-wing figures opposed the President's mission shows just how narrow-minded partisanship makes us all. [...]
[W]hat we saw from some conservative corners regarding the President's failed Olympics bid was just plain stupid."
To be clear Chicago did not lose because of certain nattering nabobs of negativity on the right, they are merely an annoyance with whom we live.
Yeah, that's all fine. I don't fault the President, either. I'm glad Rio got the games, instead, but for reasons completely independent of US politics.
But the point is this: When are you willing to say, "That's politics--Obama took a chance and lost and I don't fault the other side for crowing about it because this is what pundits do and the guys on MY side would have done the same. In fact, the guys on MY side DID do the same for 8 years."
Instead, from you, it's a lot of tsk-tsking and "oh, those crazy whack jobs" in situations (such as this one) where it's really just politics as usual.
And let me save you the typing trouble: this isn't an equivalency argument. I'm not making the claim, "Side A does it, so when Side B does it, it must be right."
Instead, what I'm suggesting is that it's ridiculous for you to bitch about pundits on the right for doing stuff that pundits on the left have done and will continue to do when you don't bitch about those lefty pundits.
As far as the Olympics specifically, some on the right turned the Olympics into a political issue where they ended up cheering against the U.S. representative. Do you really believe Obama wanted to put his limited political capital to use with the Olympics in pursuit of his own gain? Only if you think he is stupid.
It was always at best 50/50 that Chicago would win over Rio. But he was in a damned if he did or did not situation. Had he not gone, he would have been criticized by the same nabobs. And no I would not have been crowing about Obama if Chicago had won that is your speculation.
Re pundits in general, there is no equivalency risk because there is no equivalent situation for you to point to whereby I or other mainstream Dems pulled the same stuff. Beck/Limbaugh et al are not pundits they are entertainers. The NRO crowd cheering wildly against the U.S. massively hypocritical.
And you are making an equivalency argument. Re-read your second paragraph. I critized Bush for most of his presidency on substance such as Iraq, Afghanistan (not invading just abandoning the after party), the tax cuts for wealthy, torture, etc. etc.
If you or other Republicans want to debate health care, stimulus, AfPak etc. (with actual facts and proposed solutions), fine. But cheering against an American city and seeking to de-legitimize Obama as POTUS are not equivalent and I will not let you (or anyone) try to claim otherwise.
Oh. Right. There are no "entertainers" on the Left, in positions of punditry, who cheered against the US because of their Bushitler hate.
I wonder how General "Betrayus" would evaluate your claim.
And you're not above it yourself. "It" being being the attitude that your own punditry is darkly colored by your partisanship.
Do you know what my evidence is?
1) You obviously do not read the pages of the Right yourself. You only take what you think you know about them from what places like The Economist quote.
Which is why you are able to think of such serious journalism as National Review as "nabobs of negativity"
AND it's why you can keep asserting that there are no ideas for Health care reform on the Right.
2) You are welcome to refute this because you know your own content far better than I do, but I am hard-pressed to think of an example of your applauding anything on the Right. Any Republican. Any Right writer.
Even National Review gives Obama himself a very specific compliment and "well done" where he deserves it.
You're thinking, "I can't give props where they're not deserved."
This is part of the point: Neither side is wrong ALL of the time.
If you are a writer and thinker who either never knows about what the other guy gets right or doesn't think it's worth pointing out, then I'm not sure you're really as interested in the conversation as you are about seeing the "progress" you've already decided is the right way to go.
Continuing on to your other Olympic post now. . .
I have made about 2K blog posts, folks can form their opinions accordingly regarding my biases, breadth of sources, competence in assessing viewpoints and synthesizing the data. You are certainly entitled to yours.
Your use of the National Review as your apparent primary source of news speaks for itself.
"conservative" sources that I consult include but are not limited to:
Greg Mankiw's blog (Harvard economist)
James Pethokoukis financial commentator (Reuters)
Bruce Bartlett fmr. Reagan/Bush I economist, current blogger at Capital Gains
New Majority.com- David Frum's site
Gahlran's Information Dissemnation blog (focues on Navy)
Mike Yon- independent blogger who embeds with our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan
Outside the Beltway blog
George Will- columnist at WaPo and Newsweek
David Brooks columnist at NYT
Mark McKinnon Republican strategist
Mike Murphy Republican strategist
Kathleen Parker columnist at WaPo
Peggy Noonan columnist at WSJ and fmr. Reagan speechwriter (when she is not getting too grandiose)
Joe Scarborough- fmr. Repub congressman and current MSNBC commentator
Robert Novak- the late columnist (actually posted a complementary piece on him when he retired several months before his death)
Pat Buchanan makes good points when he is taking his meds otherwise he can leave the reservation
Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt were great Republican POTUS, neither of whom imo would found anywhere near the present day Republican Party (then again neither would Eisenhower).
Most MSM financial magazines and bloggers are economically conservative if more libertarian on social issues, they all grew up worshipping Friedman
Economist is of course libertarian in orientation and conservative relative to Europe if not the U.S., their bloggers swing from both sides of the plate.
The above are obviously "moderate" Republicans. As I have said before I consider myself a Rockefeller Republican (economically moderate, socially liberal and non-ideological on national security). The moderate wing of the Democratic party embodies these principles far better than any remaining significant Republican blocs within the modern Republican party (social liberals are more or less automatically booted, and if one is not for tax cuts under all conditions it is tough too).
Recall as well one generally does not find on the blog endless or even infrequent references to:
Daily Kos/The Nation/Olbermann/Move On.org(the source of Gen. Betrayus) etc.
That is not to say the above are not serious journalists or smart I just prefer to live closer to the middle. Weekly Standard/National Review et al. likely have relevant material on occasion. It is lost to me amidst a cacaphony of crap (Kos et al have the same problem).
As far as policy, Cato Institute position papers do not constitute policy alternatives. Policy alternatives require exposure to the heat of public opinion and review where interest groups/lobbyists can sink their collective fangs into the alternatives just like the ones Obama et al. are proposing. (i.e. saying Medicare will never be cut is a nice political ploy but not a serious policy position).
So will you find me pimping NRO ideas probably never. Will you find me integrating ideas that incorporate "conservative" concepts such as fiscal responsibility, tough but rational national security measures, libertarian drug policies; yes.
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