Our Clever President

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President Barack Obama's first presidential news conference was performed feebly by the once-ferocious White House press corps and shrewdly -- if deceptively -- by the president. In the six years I did communications on former President Ronald Reagan's White House staff, I don't recall a single news conference in which there were no follow-up questions, no challenges to anything the president had said recently, no assertions of fact that the president was challenged to deal with. In fact, I don't remember former President Bill Clinton, either, ever getting a full 45-minute prime-time news conference pass. [snip]

One has to listen closely to spot the straw men that are carefully laced into his answers. While he repeatedly said he was willing to negotiate with Republicans on the stimulus bill, he pointed out that some of them wanted to do nothing. Well, perhaps there may be a few who want to do nothing. But Republican leaders in both the House and the Senate are proposing their own very large stimulus packages that, using President Obama's economists' own methods, would create more jobs faster than Obama's version would. In fact, according to the study, it would create 6.2 million jobs, compared with the president's plan's 3-4 million. [snip]

Our president has let it be known that he is an admirer of Abraham Lincoln's -- as well he should be, as are we all. He should take the time to read Old Abe's speeches and public letters. Honest Abe was exactly that. He would make his cases with meticulous and honest presentations of facts. He would describe his opponents' arguments honestly and fairly and then knock them down by genuine reason harnessed to a profound sense of morality. Lincoln wasn't fast and clever; he was slow and honest, and he carved out a place in the pantheon for the ages. He also noted that

"you can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time."

He thus left his newest admirer at least two lessons for a successful presidency.

[I don't know anymore. I think the election taught them that, with the help of the MSM, they can get away with anything. Consider; despite their behavior last year many folks are still watching TV for their news. Recommended > ]

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