If You're Losing Frank Rich...

A second consecutive Obama-basher from Frank Rich.  And unlike last week, this one does not even pivot to Palin-bashing in order to reassure Times readers about the real evils in the world.

IT turns out there is something harder to find than a fix for BP’s leak: Barack Obama’s boiling point.

The frantic and fruitless nationwide search for the president’s temper is now our sole dependable comic relief from the tragedy in the gulf.

Rich then explains that our professorial Prez has too much faith in experts and meetings.  Who could have guessed?

We still want to believe that Obama is on our side, willing to fight those bad corporate actors who cut corners and gambled recklessly while regulators slept, Congress raked in contributions, and we got stuck with the wreckage and the bills. But his leadership style keeps sowing confusion about his loyalties, puncturing holes in the powerful tale he could tell.

His most conspicuous flaw is his unshakeable confidence in the collective management brilliance of the best and the brightest he selected for his White House team — “his abiding faith in the judgment of experts,” as Joshua Green of The Atlantic has put it. At his gulf-centric press conference 10 days ago, the president said he had “probably had more meetings on this issue than just about any issue since we did our Afghan review.” This was meant to be reassuring but it was not. The plugging of an uncontrollable oil leak, like the pacification of an intractable Afghanistan, may be beyond the reach of marathon brainstorming by brainiacs, even if the energy secretary is a Nobel laureate. Obama has yet to find a sensible middle course between blind faith in his own Ivy League kind and his predecessor’s go-with-the-gut bravado.

One of Obama's few job-related skills is his ability to run a meeting in which a wide variety of viewpoints are aired and a consensus is forged.  Unfortunately, one might worry that his typical experience is in forging a consensus related to relatively abstract ideas.  Bringing a Harvard Law Review meeting together on some legal question (e.g., capital punishment) is ultimately a matter of exposing the participants to a range of facts and opinions in order to change minds.  If views are fairly aired, people's minds are changed, and people who once disagreed leave in agreement then the meeting is a success. 

However, problems like the Gulf oil well are impervious to Obama's well-formed opinions and judgments, and physical reality takes over.  The consensus answer to capping a leaking well is irrelevant - what counts is the right answer.  Good meeting management skills will still be helpful, but there are important differences. 

Back to Rich:

By now, he also should have learned that the best and the brightest can get it wrong — and do. His economic advisers predicted that without the stimulus the unemployment rate might reach 9 percent — a projection that was quickly exceeded even with the stimulus and that has haunted the administration ever since. Other White House geniuses persuaded the president to make his fateful claim in early April that “oil rigs today generally don’t cause spills” — a particularly specious (indeed false) plank in the argument for his spectacularly ill-timed expansion of offshore oil drilling. The Times reported last week that at the administration meetings leading to this new drilling policy the subject of the vast dysfunction at the Minerals Management Service, the agency charged with regulating the drilling, never even came up.

Ouch.  Where were the meeting management skills then?  And a bit more:

Obama’s excessive trust in his own heady team is all too often matched by his inherent deference to the smartest guys in the boardroom in the private sector.

Obama trusted BP and he trusted Goldman Sachs, but, per Rich, Obama needs to save his Presidency by becoming a new Teddy Roosevelt, bashing Big Business at every opportunity.  Yeah, that will restore business confidence and create jobs.

Comments

[Clarice]

You cannot begin to understand how much angst this NYT criticism causes the "intellectual" set.They are used to reading only viewpoints which confirm their beliefs about the lightbringer.

Last night I had dinner with a prominent professor at Berkeley and he was apoplectic to realize that his views on everything were not universally held.

Among his "brilliant" observations was the fact that Palin attended 5 different colleges he never heard of. He never heard that Bush's grades and SAT's were better than Gore's and that Gore flunked out of divinity school. (How do you do that anyway? Confuse predestination with transubstantiation?)

The capper, I think was that after he fulminated on Bush's violations of civil liberties he couldn't name a single substantive change in the Patriot Act or the procedures he instituted to deal with terrorism, having to concede that Gitmo was not likely to be closed or KSM tried in a civilian court in downtown NYC.

I think for so many years the nutters wrote up crap in the NYT, the smart set read and parroted this crap to eachother and ne'er a dissenting voice was heard in this circles.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

However, problems like the Gulf oil well are impervious to Obama's well-formed opinions and judgments, and physical reality takes over.

Don't you hate it when that happens?

Next, climate science: who you gonna believe? The statistical models, or your lying thermometers?

[Clarice]

**inTHESE circles***

[Clarice]

Ah, yes, climate..the professor also was ballistic when I said I had little faith in the prevailing climate views.

(I also didn't believe in the swine flu pandemic and never got that shot..)

[narciso]

How did you happen to meet this modern day Solon, Clarice

[Thomas Collins]

Perhaps Rich would prefer thst Obama assemble a new set of advisors, say, Friedman, Brooksie, Dowd and Rich himself.

[ROA]

Why are so many people fixated on Obama’s temperament? I don’t care if he screams at people or talks in a slow stoner sounding voice. What I would like him to be able to do is to identify what qualities are required to manage the positions he appoints people to and select qualified people. The fact that “the system worked” Janet Napolitano was ever appointed to Head Homeland Security and is still there after such a bone headed statement demonstrates he definitely has not mastered that skill yet.

[Clarice]

narciso, we were guests at the same dinner party.

[Pops]

Some conservative should point out to the media that it is very strange that the politicians they agree with are always the 'smartest'. Now is that just coincidence?

[JorgXMcKie]

We need more people in govt who actually grew up on farms or in small farming communities and who actually worked on farms. There are very few experiences that will better teach you the disjunct between "well-formed opinions and judgments, and physical reality."

[Pops]

I never noticed Obama was smart. I just could never get past how clean he is, and so articulate for a black man. And I am still stunned how he has such light skinned and doesn't use that Negro accent.
I am just floored that he's President and not serving me my coffee.

[Captain Hate]

Gore flunked out of divinity school. (How do you do that anyway?

Not having an intellect capable of enduring any sort of rigorous exercise is a good starting point. Being emotionally unhinged was probably another factor.

[JorgXMcKie]

Oh And it is my experience that academics like the one Clarice dined with have bought deeply into the idea that not only humans but all of 'reality' can be forced into doing what they desire if only enough "smart people" agree on what humans should do and what reality should consist of.

Then, when neither of those happens, it is obviously due to opponents hampering their efforts or 'wreckers' who are just evil. Both of these need to be "re-educated" or eliminated, and then everything will turn out the way they prefer.

[I'm always amazed at how shallowly one needs to scratch many academics in order to discover the underlying fascist and/or totalitarian tendencies.]

[LouP]

If you want change for the sake of change, get an activist; if you want untested theories get a professor; if you want litigation get a lawyer; if you want inflated confidence and creased trousers, go to the Ivey League schools (and I'm reminded that the term "confidence man" has a basis worthy of remembering).

But if you want a fix, get a fixer - usually someone with engineering training, or a scientist who does not live in a lab or classroom, or a successful businessman who spends time out of the office and in the field. Military people often work well in this environment.

Liberals as a rule have never allowed themselves to be subjected to the fix environment, so they have no, nada, zip, nil understanding of it.

[centralcal]

Byron York reminds us in a flashback to 2008 that:

Obama Has Executive Experience

Disaster in the Gulf? No biggie - look how well I am managing my campaign!

[Thomas Collins]

Gore probably started having trouble in D-School when he noted on every assignment that the esoteric meaning of all Scripture is that the cosmos is one big Cap and Trade market, and Gore is the Messiah of that market.

[Thomas Collins]

I guess I never took seriously the notion that Frank Rich types really thought Obama was a cut above the average leader. I suspected that Frank Rich types simply viewed Obama as a good vehicle for advancing Oligarchic Progism. I am coming to realize that the effete elite really did think Obama was on some sort of higher plane of being, so that their disillusionment is now all the greater.

[Cecil Turner]

The frantic and fruitless nationwide search for the president’s competence is the one that primarily concerns me.

Whether rigs generally cause spills or not, the government's role is to oversee the operations and manage the risk . . . instead all involved were grossly negligent, and the only risk management the emoter-in-chief understands is political. (And that appears to be limited to class warfare and "fighting" for the little guy against the evil bankers, oilmen, and other fatcats . . . until a scheme can be implemented to soak them for political protection payments.)

[Jane says obamasucks]

Why are so many people fixated on Obama’s temperament?

I know. The media wants him to "get mad". First of all, my guess is he spends a good bit of time screeching at his family and aides. Secondly screeching doesn't solve anything. So does our liberal media think O's anger will hide his incompetence or something?

[Danube of Thought]

Rich would do well to recall that the phrase "The Best and the Brightest" gained currency as the title of David Halberstam's classic 1972 book. The eponymous subjects were the guys who brought us the Vietnam War.

[narciso]

The problem with Rich,Krugman, et al is that Obama hasn't yet done anything stupider, by our lights like impose 'cap and trade' or give up on Afghanistan, establish an embassy in Tehran, rest assured there's always time
for what bgates posits as parodies, but they
they think as laudable goals

[rrpjr]

These critiques of Obama mean little. It is just transitory peevishness. In the end, they will all come together around their prodigy.

[centralcal]

Sadly, I completely agree with you rrpjr.

[hit and run]

Obama needs to emote and take charge and stop listening to all these experts?

From what I was told during the campaign,he doesn't emote and doesn't rely on others for advice http://thevimh.blogspot.com/2008/05/stifiling-dissent-is-highest-form-of.html>when things go badly:

"It wasn't like 'Let's have a discussion.' It was 'One, two, three, four, here's what we're going to do,' "a staffer said. "When things don't go well, he doesn't yell and scream. He's very prescriptive. Everybody understands this isn't about having a discussion. He's got 99 percent of the voting shares. There's no point in taking a vote."

[LouP]

I think to really understand a liberal, you have to understand that their primal need, along with food, water and air, is the need for self-validation. (Liberals have very little, if any, real life experiences, so self-validation requires all liberals to think and act alike.)

Liberals have adopted the tactic of faux outrage at anything that doesn't go their way, and that involves a lot of screeching and yelling. Thus, they need - they really need - their supreme leader to validate their theories, and behavior - in this case, they need a dramatic show of outrage from The Won.

I think it's as simple as that.

[The dude]

Nobama is not very smart at all. Why does everyone keep repeating that Mantra? Hillary is supposed to be the smartest woman in the world. She is an idiot. Al gore is a genius but Bush is a morn??? Come on. Let the press keep repeating these themes while the US burns. I wonder if we will have anything to save after 2010 & 2012 elections.

[Pasadena Phil]

Since when are presidents expected to act like raving madmen during a crisis? What ever happened to "cooler heads prevail"? Is this a left-wing ghetto stereotype thing? Can we look forward to a "Feets don't fail me now!" encore?

[Steve C.]

These are the results you get for hiring a technocrat, a manager. Presidents and governors are first and foremost, leaders. A good leader might or might not be an effective executive. But a good leaders is one smart enough to know (per Dirty Harry) his limitations. He makes up for his shortcomings by hiring deputies who complement him.

Much like 9/11, Iraq and Katrina what we are seeing is a failure of imagination and judgment. And also, in a sense, some poetic justice. Democrats have been telling us for 75 years that the solution to human failings is to repose ever more power in remote centralized authority. Not only does this fly in the face of truths that were self evident 200 years ago, it flies in the face of how the modern world works. Smaller, better, faster, cheaper, flat and de-centralized are the principles of a modern economy. Creaking federal agencies with multiple chains of command and diffuse responsibility are not up to the demands of problem solving in the 21st century.

[MarkO]

I will look for TM to deliver a citation to substantiate this quote, which I believe to be without any truth:

"One of Obama's few job-related skills is his ability to run a meeting in which a wide variety of viewpoints are aired and a consensus is forged."

If one strips away the benefits of doubt ordained by his race, he is mediocre and would not make partner at a third tier law firm.

Who, here, apart from the obvious social advantaged, would hire him?

[narciso]

when has he ever managed anything except the CAC and the Joyce Foundation's accounts

[glasater]

Thanks to Ann for last evening's link to the Anchoress' wonderful article:
Obama Knew Spill Scope from Day 1
It's worth another look...

Loved this para:

We’ve just spent years listening to ungenerous, miserable people excoriate President Bush for calmly taking 7 minutes, after learning of the attacks of 9/11, to allow his Secret Service to do their thing and to–with a great deal of composure–take his leave from a classroom without managing to scare the children or give an impression of fear that would be put before the nation and the world.

[bgates]

Now:
The plugging of an uncontrollable oil leak, like the pacification of an intractable Afghanistan, may be beyond the reach of marathon brainstorming by brainiacs, even if the energy secretary is a Nobel laureate.

Then:
The administration's complete obliviousness to the possibilities for energy failures, food and water deprivation, and civil disorder in a major city under siege needs only the Donald Rumsfeld punch line of "Stuff happens" for a coup de grâce.....You could almost see Mr. Bush's political base starting to crumble at its very epicenter, Fox News, by Thursday night. Even there it was impossible to ignore that the administration was no more successful at securing New Orleans than it had been at pacifying Falluja.

[matt]

it is interesting to read these clowns as want they president to "go off" or get mad. I seem to remember concerns about the character of various candidates to act presidential. Stark anger was not one of those attributes. It was a sign that one could not control ones emotions, which would be very bad, say, on 9/11, etc., as glas mentions.

Now, we have, rather than an angry president, a disengaged one pretending to be angry.

Off to see more wondrous sights....

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vjnjagvet]

...he was apoplectic to realize that his views on everything were not universally held.

Professors' opinions are worth about the same as entertainers' or pundit/critics' opinions. Not much. Most of these folks' knowledge of the world is seen from a very narrow perspective caused by the prism of their narrow, specialized life's work.

Like His Travesty, they have no experience juggling many large, multi-dimensional problems simultaneously. They also share a contempt for those who have to deal with such problems as the main part of their jobs. Command and execution of plans and policies have little to do with their life's work. They don't respect these qualities, and probably are envious of those who exhibit them.

Ironically, if they were suddenly to become "The Man", they would likely have a collective nervous breakdown in short order.

[narciso]

Energy failures like the Cheney task force that they did the most to demagogue, the civil disorder was exaggerated as we now know, but it was in part the results of the big city machine, Yes thanks to Geraldo and Shep and can we forget Scarborough's tantrums
on the subject

[bgates]

One of Obama's few job-related skills is his ability to run a meeting in which a wide variety of viewpoints are aired and a consensus is forged.

I think I agree with that, if by "job-related skills" you don't mean "Presidential abilities" but "the kinds of things that were taught at the Mayor’s Office of Employment and Training Altgeld center". "Forged" is well-put, though.

[centralcal]

From a columnist weasel named Jose at the Palm Beach Post comes this:

Among the dozens of giant bouquets of white roses, the famous faces lit by the glow of hundreds of candles included those of: former Bush White House weasel Karl Rove; former presidential hopeful and Law & Order star Fred Thompson; former Kansas City Royals slugger George Brett; Fox News talker Sean Hannity; former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani; New England Patriots owner Bob Kraft; former Clinton White House weasel James Carville and his wife, GOP analyst Mary Matalin; and golfer Tom Watson, among others.

[centralcal]

Sorry, the above was about the wedding of Rush and Kathryn, yesterday.

[DrJ]

a scientist who does not live in a lab

Huh? A scientist who does not live in the lab is *good*? Do you suggest listening to the scientists who do pure theory and sit all day in front of the computer? Like much of the climate modeling community?

[MarkO]

Obama would get seriously pissed if we mentioned his goofy ears or his well-known girlfriend. He has the emotional make up to explode, but only if someone is making fun of him, like, say Fox.

You really need to understand that he will become animated once an issue is tied to his grand historical salient.

This is any easy theory to test. Start the next press conference with: "Why are you such a fucking liar?"

[narciso]

One of the proofs of a theory is that it can be replicatable under certain condition, that
is certainly not true with climate science, then again that wasn't the point of the exercise

[Gmax]

MarkO

Well if he says anything good about the Israelis, Helen Thomas may ask that and probably not quite that nicely and with a few ad homs thrown in for good measure.

The Heart papers never recovered from Patti's little adventure with Ayers buddies...

[Gmax]

Heart = Hearst

Sheesh

[Danube of Thought]

Take a look at the strange harridan Thomas jousting with Gibbs.

[LouP]

DrJ, I suggest you re-read the whole sentence or phrase: "...a scientist who does not live in a lab or classroom..." Meaning the few scientists who actually have pragmatic, in-the-field, and/or applied science positions. Scientists - scorned by the academic ones, BTW - even work outside academia.

[Jim Miller]

Clarice : For the record, Gore did get higher SAT scores than Bush did. (Though Bush's military scores suggest that his IQ is, if anything, a little higher than Kerry's.)

But bright people can behave stupidly. One of the most interesting revelations in the 2000 campaign was that Bush had handled his finances just the way most financial advisors would suggest, and that, in contrast, Gore had bungled his.

(From what I can tell, Barack and Michelle Obama have never handled their own money wisely, but I haven't seen a formal study.)

[Rick Ballard]

Both Obama and Biden (Dumb & Dumber) are still relying upon the crack crew of economic credentialed morons in formulating their happy talk about jobs. The Summers/Romer babble about 8.8% being the upper bound of unemployment took a couple of months to be proven ridiculously optimistic. The Obama/Biden babble didn't even make it to 48 hours. If Rich were in any sense competent he would have picked that fact up for this column.

[Clarice]

Thanks for the correction, Jim:

Here's Bush/Gore and Kerry compared.

http://www.insidepolitics.org/heard/heard32300.html

[Recovered Demoholic]

@LouP x2: "If you want change...." and "I think to really understand..."

Excellent!

@DrJ: "Huh? A scientist...."

Quibbling!

[MarkJ]

Peggy Lee had Obama's number over 40 years ago:

IS THAT ALL THERE IS?
Peggy Lee

SPOKEN:
I remember when I was a very little girl, our house caught on fire.
I'll never forget the look on my father's face as he gathered me up
in his arms and raced through the burning building out to the pavement.
I stood there shivering in my pajamas and watched the whole world go up in flames.
And when it was all over I said to myself, "Is that all there is to a fire"

SUNG:
Is that all there is, is that all there is
If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing
Let's break out the booze and have a ball
If that's all there is

SPOKEN:
And when I was 12 years old, my father took me to a circus, the greatest show on earth.
There were clowns and elephants and dancing bears.
And a beautiful lady in pink tights flew high above our heads.
And so I sat there watching the marvelous spectacle.
I had the feeling that something was missing.
I don't know what, but when it was over,
I said to myself, "is that all there is to a circus?

SUNG:
Is that all there is, is that all there is
If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing
Let's break out the booze and have a ball
If that's all there is

SPOKEN:
Then I fell in love, head over heels in love, with the most wonderful boy in the world.
We would take long walks by the river or just sit for hours gazing into each other's eyes.
We were so very much in love.
Then one day he went away and I thought I'd die, but I didn't,
and when I didn't I said to myself, "is that all there is to love?"

SUNG:
Is that all there is, is that all there is
If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing

SPOKEN:
I know what you must be saying to yourselves,
if that's the way she feels about it why doesn't she just end it all?
Oh, no, not me. I'm in no hurry for that final disappointment,
for I know just as well as I'm standing here talking to you,
when that final moment comes and I'm breathing my lst breath, I'll be saying to myself

SUNG:
Is that all there is, is that all there is
If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing
Let's break out the booze and have a ball
If that's all there is

[Gmax]

Some the smartest folks I have ever known, had as much common sense as a Concord Grape. My granny once said of a fairly bright and eccentric man, " he does not know enough to come in out of the rain". Al Gore seems to fit her measuring stick...

[Thomas Collins]

See LUN for a Kenneth Anderson post at Volokh (via Instapundit) on what it means to be a hegemon. Anderson asserts:

"The act that signals China’s hegemony, if it comes, will not be purely self-interested, because pure self-interest is not what hegemony is about – it will be the imposition of a rough but reasonably effective public order mostly beneficial to it – but just enough beneficial to others that they will follow. As they used to follow the United States."

The reason I fervently hope Palin takes over the POTUS post in January of 2013 is because I think she is the only GOPer capable not only of seeing the power politics picture that Anderson describes, but also the only one mentally tough enough to implement the "rough but reasonably effective public order" that China will impose if the US doesn't reverse its self-emasculation in the power politics game.

Folks such as Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney and Chris Christie probably know more about the nuts and bolts of policy than Palin. I think Palin, however, is the only one who has a visceral understanding of what Kenneth Anderson is articulating.

I post this thought on this thread because Frank Rich is the embodiment of the oligarchic elites who can't come to grips with the reality that the international system works in the way Anderson describes it in the LUN.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Do you suggest listening to the scientists who do pure theory and sit all day in front of the computer?

HEY!

[Thomas Collins]

See LUN (via Instapundit) for a spot on description about what is going on in the Middle East. Here is what Israel faces:

This is not a game theory scenerio. This is real. Already Erdogan is spending millions to prepare new ships to head to Israel. The man is spoiling for a fight. His verbiage makes absolutely no sense to Western circles; but, it is perfectly clear to his audience and their normative system. The pragmatic objective is to destroy Israel. This is not paranoia. He is not interested in a "fair" inquiry; in fact, he is loathe to anything of the sort. The man means war."

And this situation is unfolding with Obama as POTUS. Perhaps it is too much to hope for the miracle that Obama will shed his leftist, conciliatory internationalist mindset, but hope is all I have at the moment.

[Yet Another Lurker]

Like all things Frank Rich, this piece was a complete calculation. Rich doesn't lead -- ever -- he merely reflects the consensus of his Upper West Side constituency. Rich will never, ever be caught outside his little comfort zone (that's why he slavishly follows/reflects left-leaning blogs and John Stewart). So, clearly there's some unease around Zabar's. All his columns are just neighborhood gossip.

Look for him to do a piece on Israel in a week or two -- once he begins to sense the forming of the consensus.

[Janet]

Such dangerous times and we are stuck with a GQ model. As Jane pointed out, it wouldn't matter if he was doing coke or heroin...he couldn't be worse.

[Thomas Collins]

YAL, are you in the OL/YL line? In any event, welcome! The more Lurkers, the better!

[Danube of Thought]

I haven't sensed this kind of danger since the Cuban missile crisis. Once the US is seen as a passive bystander to events, the mischief-makers start coming out of the woodwork. By now all of the most dangerous people in the world are onto the fact that this guy is a eunuch in way over his head.

[Pofarmer]

but also the only one mentally tough enough to implement the "rough but reasonably effective public order" that China will impose if the US doesn't reverse its self-emasculation in the power politics game.

Get ready for the "quitter" chorus.

[Clarice]

My thoughts exactly, DoT..

[Old Lurker]

Mine too.

[Obama-Girl]

Frank Rich really doesn't get it.
Reverting to an "angry black man" offer Barack Obama no upside, except perhaps with his most diehard supporters.

Obama is done if he reverts to the white stereotype of an "angry black man" ... most especially if he does it in public.

[Ralph L]

Gore flunked out of divinity school. (How do you do that anyway?)
Vietnam PTSD, or more likely, pot.

[hit and run]

DoT:
Once the US is seen as a passive bystander to events, the mischief-makers start coming out of the woodwork. By now all of the most dangerous people in the world are onto the fact that this guy is a eunuch in way over his head.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/10/biden-to-suppor.html>The Unintentional Wisdom of Joe:

"Mark my words," the Democratic vice presidential nominee warned at the second of his two Seattle fundraisers Sunday. "It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking. We're about to elect a brilliant 47-year-old senator president of the United States of America. Remember I said it standing here if you don't remember anything else I said. Watch, we're gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy."

"I can give you at least four or five scenarios from where it might originate," Biden said to Emerald City supporters, mentioning the Middle East and Russia as possibilities. "And he's gonna need help. And the kind of help he's gonna need is, he's gonna need you - not financially to help him - we're gonna need you to use your influence, your influence within the community, to stand with him. Because it's not gonna be apparent initially, it's not gonna be apparent that we're right."

...

Because I promise you, you all are gonna be sitting here a year from now going, 'Oh my God, why are they there in the polls? Why is the polling so down? Why is this thing so tough?' We're gonna have to make some incredibly tough decisions in the first two years. So I'm asking you now, I'm asking you now, be prepared to stick with us. Remember the faith you had at this point because you're going to have to reinforce us."

"There are gonna be a lot of you who want to go, 'Whoa, wait a minute, yo, whoa, whoa, I don't know about that decision'," Biden continued.

...

"I probably shouldn't have said all this because it dawned on me that the press is here," he joked.

[Neo]

Say goodbye to yet another "stimulus" and the "Volcker Rule"...
Finance ministers of the world’s leading economies have been so spooked by the sovereign debt crisis that they have decided they can no longer wait until economies are growing strongly before they remove fiscal stimulus.

The meeting of the Group of 20 finance ministers and central bank governors in Busan, South Korea, at the weekend also dropped proposals for a global banking levy, giving countries leeway to do what they thought best for their domestic circumstances.

[daddy]

Withering Questions.

To me it is all bottled up in the MSM's complete bullshit description of Obama "asking Withering Questions."

I found that bit of untrue, nondescriptive blather, more sycophantic than his 'trouser creases', or Matthew's leg tingles, or the "seas rising" or "strides the world like a god", or the 'greatest political writer since Julius Caesar," etc.

It was all bottled up in this one phrase that sitting on his ass at some conference table Obama had the supreme superhuman ability "to ask Withering Questions." Not to act on the answers he got; not to make an intelligent decision; not to "do" anything whatever;---but man, he was the one guy on the planet who could cow Generals and Scientists and nations and opponents and the planet with his magic, commanding ability "to ask Withering Questions".

What a load of Horse#$@t. The Withering Question should be how come you dumb press a-holes could all jump on the "Withering Questions" bandwagon in the first place. You jackasses figure out how you dumbass intellectuals all got snowed into buying that imbecilic meme in the first place and you may finally learn something about reality and about yourselves. The biggest story of this generation is staring you bunch of MSM whores in the face, right from your own mirrors.

"Withering Questions" my ass.

As goes the Press's description of Obama asking "Withering Questions", so goes the Press's opinion of Obama.

[Clarice]

Bravo rant, daddy.

[Rick Ballard]

The finance ministers have totted up the sum necessary to fill total world wide fiscal hole and realized that there just ain't enough money available - even with Uncle Ben running the printing presses at Warp XII. Additional borrowing will shred budgets due increased interest rates or inflation will cause rates to rise. Either way - you're broke.

[LouP]

daddy, you stopped too soon...

I was under the impression that it was the Press's job to ask the Withering Questions. What happened? When did they abdicate their responsibility?

Seen any Withering Questions lately? Nor have I.

[Or a private detective.]

Maybe he should have been a journalist.
==============

[Clarice]

Rick, I saw this posted somewhere (maybe here) and I know you'll love it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUVYLUV_MHI&feature=related>The Euro Crisis

[PDinDetroit]

Gore flunked out of divinity school. (How do you do that anyway?)

He quoted his mentor, The Bishop from Caddyshack: "There is no god"

[Jim Miller]

Clarice - You're welcome, of course. And thanks much for finding that useful summary.

FWIW, I am reasonably certain that we have not seen either test scores or undergraduate grades for Obama because his aren't anything to brag about.

[Rick Ballard]

Thanks, Clarice. That was an excellent summary. A bit optimistic re China though.

[Jane says obamasucks]

I've got some of the most ominous skies I've ever seen outside my window right now. Round 2 has arrived. TC it's coming to you soon.

[Danube of Thought]

Hey daddy--work out, man!

[Danube of Thought]

Imagine having her in the first place:

"Nine Speakers, the agency that represents Helen Thomas, has dropped her as a client."

And Hit, you're in rare form.

I remember when the press (for a while) fell in love with R. Strange McNamara's "withering questions." One query they all thought was just brilliant was when, while aboard a carrier watching flight ops, he said "why do we need so many different kinds of planes?" Sure stumped 'em with that one.

[MarkO]

Gore flunked out of divinity school. (How do you do that anyway?)

Night putting. Night putting with the daughter of the dean.

[Porchlight]

These are the results you get for hiring a technocrat, a manager.

Obama isn't a manager. I don't even believe the theory that he's good at leading meetings. "Forging consensus" - anyone familiar with bureaucrats knows that's just coming up with the lowest common denominator non-solution, requiring the smallest amount of work, that everyone at the table will agree to.

[Clarice]

Rick, wish we had such talent here. No comparison with the dolts on SNL or Jon Stewart..
Hit's always well done, never rare.XOXOXOX

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vjnjagvet]

I haven't sensed this kind of danger since the Cuban missile crisis.

...which probably have ended much worse had the hardnosed Joseph P Kennedy not been alive and providing support to his tyro son. Even though he had a debilitating stroke in late 1961, he was still available for advice and counsel during the missile crisis.

His Travesty is stuck with Biden who is no Joe Kennedy.

[Janet]

Clarice that Euro Crisis video was posted by Glasater on the Sunday thread.

Very clever...

[Benson]

Mark O said:
This is any easy theory to test. Start the next press conference with: "Why are you such a fucking liar?"

OMG!!! that was so funny...only if.

This is what I say to myself and anyone else in ear shot every time this ego-manic speaks except I don't ask why I just call him a fucking liar. No body's gotten mad at me yet...I'm blessed with intelligent friends.

Don't hold your breath that any of the media is really going to abandon him. They made him their stuck with him and we won't forget it.

[Clarice]

Thanks. Janet. I thought I'd seen it here but couldn't remember.

[Extraneus]

I'd take any random first-line engineering manager over Obama in a situation requiring a real solution. The only problem Obama has ever managed was how to take out an opposing candidate. Unfortunately, that's not the same thing as solving an engineering problem, which has nothing to do with garnering votes as a minority candidate.

[narciso]

ABC has really descended into the mire, by the
nature of the folks they put up to defend the
indefensible, in the LUN

[Janet]

and Extraneus, I question if he even did that..."take out an opposing candidate". Someone or some group probably did that for him.

[narciso]

Surely Janet, some other person challenged the signatures, Axelrod used his press connections to force them to release the Ryan and Hull divorce records, and an associate of
his, Winner, sponsored much of the astroturf
against Sarah, since attacking McCain was rather superfluous at one point

[Janet]

Yeah narciso...so essentially Obama can officially do nothing except read teleprompters.

[LouP]

"...Obama can officially do nothing except read teleprompters..."

S-h-h-h! Don't tell Sir Paul that.

[DrJ]

LouP

DrJ, I suggest you re-read the whole sentence or phrase: "...a scientist who does not live in a lab or classroom..." Meaning the few scientists who actually have pragmatic, in-the-field, and/or applied science positions.

I did indeed read the whole sentence or phrase. I just think you are wrong. The preponderance of science, even the applied sort, is still done in the lab. And there is nothing special about field work either.

Charlie, no offense intended. Have you ever hung out with the theoretical chemists or biologists? Quite a different sort that straight CS, even those active in one of those fields.

[bgates]

These are the results you get for hiring a technocrat, a manager.

Obama isn't a manager.

And as for technical knowledge, I imagine Malia's asking the deep questions about his job because she's given up trying to have him help with her homework. "Yeah, dad, I know why they're called Arabic numerals. That doesn't tell me how the associative property works."

[Porchlight]

OT,

Does anyone else get the sense that the MSM just loves to say and type the word "flotilla"? Military terms make liberal reporters feel butch.

[Melinda Romanoff]

DrJ-

It all depends on each of our experiences. All the theoriticians I've ever encountered need a source of imagination, where they get it is their business. Inspiration is inspiration, be it an overheard comment at a gas station or collegial conversation over bad lab coffee.

Real life is a petri dish, who knows what grows after a day and some random contaminant.

But that's just me and my bright shiny eyes.

[narciso]

But Flotilla doesn't sound like a military term, if they used fleet that would be something again,

[Porchlight]

Well, I've been reading a lot of Patrick O'Brian in the last few years, so it's all of a piece. Flotilla means "small fleet" fwiw - I believe it is a real naval term but others here surely have more expertise than I do.

[narciso]

Well it is, but it has a certain connotation of rag tag underdog effort, hence they use it
against Israel's more professional military

[Melinda Romanoff]

Euro trades under 1.19 tonight.

At least crude will continue to drop like a rock...

[Rick Ballard]

Mel,

The Nikkei is down 4% at the moment as well. The G20 credentialed moron meeting doesn't seem to have inspired a great deal of anything but mistrust.

I'm leaning towards the -2% Q3 prognosis at the moment.

If our luck holds.

[DrJ]

MR,

I'm not going to disagree with you on inspiration. Here's the quote I was responding to:

But if you want a fix, get a fixer - usually someone with engineering training, or a scientist who does not live in a lab or classroom, or a successful businessman who spends time out of the office and in the field.

I know many people who have built companies from the lab work up. Lots of them. Tell me with a straight face that George Rathmann is not a fixer. I could name similar people for a dozen biotech firms, all of which are lab based. Those are just the people I know. There's lots more.

The original statement is simply misguided.