Mark Halperin Says Something True, Then Apologizes For It (And An Alternative Negotiation Strategy For The GOP)
UPDATE: For his statement, Halperin has been suspended.
“Mark Halperin’s comments this morning were completely inappropriate and unacceptable. We apologize to the President, The White House and all of our viewers,” in a statement by MSNBC spokesperson Jeremy Gaines. “We strive for a high level of discourse and comments like these have no place on our air. Therefore, Mark will be suspended indefinitely from his role as an analyst.”
A “high level of discourse” from the network which employs Chris Matthews and Ed Schultz? Please.
ORIGINAL: Could his language have been a little better? Sure. But this morning, MSNBC political analyst Mark Halperin issued forth an accurate characterization of the demeanor and substance of the President’s press conference yesterday.
Halperin said Obama was a “dick.”
And then he apologized.
Maybe calling the president a dick is a little strong. Unless the president in question is Richard Nixon, in which case it’s innocuous.
But Halperin’s “absolute” apology was unnecessary and craven.
He could have said “let’s call him a jerk rather than a dick” and left it at that.
To apologize in the manner he did was to repudiate the assessment of Obama’s behavior inherent in the initial statement, and that assessment was spot on.
After all, what did Obama say yesterday? Well, he went after corporate jet owners six times as though tax breaks for the corporate jet industry make a difference in the budget deficit. Those breaks make for a $300 million “tax expenditure” annually, which is less than one tenth of one percent of the deficit. And that’s worth a full-court press demonization?
Only a dick would say something so ridiculous.
Obama also equated Congressional objections to his flouting of the War Powers Act, which happens to be the law of the land, to making Qaddafi a “cause celebre.” That level of demogoguery and deceit is the exclusive province of dicks.
Let’s see, what else. Oh, then there was this business of telling Congress that they should work through the 4th of July on the debt limit negotiations.
“They’re in one week, they’re out one week. And then they’re saying, Obama has got to step in. You need to be here. I’ve been here. I’ve been doing Afghanistan and bin Laden and the Greek crisis. You stay here. Let’s get it done.”
How many fundraisers has this guy done? 30? And how many rounds of golf? He sent Joe Biden to negotiate on the debt limit, for Pete’s sake.
For disingenuity, Obama’s a dick.
Y’know what I’m starting to think? I’m starting to think that maybe the Republicans ought to give Obama exactly what he wants. He wants to soak the rich and suspend tax breaks? Fine. Have a vote in the House on everything Obama wants, with all of the new taxes expiring on Dec. 31, 2012. And then have every House Republican vote “present” on the bill. The Democrats will have to pass the thing. And let Harry Reid ram those new taxes through the Senate. In return, gouge them for draconian budget cuts; $500-750 billion worth.
And when federal revenues don’t move an inch in a year, because economic activity grinds to a halt as investors and other folks capable of creating jobs sit on the sidelines rather than pay Obama’s taxes, Boehner and Cantor and McConnell and all the GOP presidential candidates can say “I told you so, dick.”
One of the big problems the Republicans have in negotiating with Obama is that these guys actually care about the country. They’re trying to implement good policies and they’re trying to stand on principle. It would have been nice if these guys had such a backbone when Bush was president and they were a majority prior to the 2006 elections; they might never have lost their majority in the first place.
But while caring about the country is admirable, it puts you at a disadvantage when the other guy is only trying to win the next news cycle. Obama doesn’t care about America, he doesn’t even like America. He proved that when he went on his Apology Tour, and ever since then we’ve seen him go after one group of “villains” after another – doctors, bankers, Wall Street, the coal industry, now people who ride on corporate jets. All Obama cares about is getting re-elected so he can continue to “fundamentally transform” the country. And why would you want to “fundamentally transform” something you love?
So when Obama’s goal is to demonize you in an effort to get elected, and when his acolytes at media shops like MSNBC, where Halperin doesn’t feel comfortable in calling a dick a dick without groveling, equate disagreement with Obama’s policies to “divisiveness,” trying to stand for the future of the country is a loser’s game. You’re right, of course, but you’re not going to get any benefit from being right.
Maybe the thing to do is get out of the way and let this guy turn the economy into Zimbabwe in time for the 2012 elections. The damage on those tax hikes he wants can easily be undone in January of 2013 when there are lots more Republicans in the House and Senate and when Obama is off building his presidential library at Cabrini Green or wherever.
Of course, there’s another angle to this. Namely, if the House GOP members sat on the sidelines on a tax vote, would the Democrats actually be able to carry a vote for tax hikes? I’m not so sure. I’m especially not so sure a tax hike would pass in the Senate. And if Obama’s dickish rhetoric on taxes were to actually fail in a Senate vote as a result of Democrat opposition, well…if that’s not the end of his presidency I’d hate to see what is.
It stinks when patriotism is a political liability. But when you’ve got a dick for a president, maybe the thing to do is to let his dickishness ruin him.
Yeah, Mark, saved your skin, buddy. The apology was totally necessary and you should not have said it. I will now still download your book to my ipad. Thanks for having the balls to admit your mistake, you are not a dick for doing so.
Obama is a DICK! He is also a LIAR! No apologies needed.
OMG that was a very funny and very well written article. I just sent it to my brother’s obama-lovin blog buddies. Hope they see the same humor as I did.
Obama even lied about his own children. He stated that they did their homework a day in advance. I asked my granddaughter in case I forgot but homework is not assigned days in advance, it is assigned one day to be returned the next. Also Obama wants congress to work this weekend while he plays golf and is out campaigning.
Seriously……. Your kid or kids, dont and can not afford to EVEN go to the same school, so how do you know that the teaching level is the same…. Come on now… .. Just tell the Real reason you dont feel that Barack Obama should not be in the White House…. Hey everybody we are in trbl and it’s NOT because of Barack,,, It’s because we (All American keep fueling our own, in the closet racisim)…. Unfortunatly (me to)…. …. All the other countries are standing around us in a circle watching us fight back and forth w/each other Waiting for the moment to pounce…. We are giving them the amunition ya’ll for real…. No I dont always agree w/Barack… for example I feel he should stand his ground and Stop being so dam nice…. But i think the Dems that we have in office right now are Weak …. and the Rep… are being a***s…. because they say no ….no matter what just because it’s the Pres…. in the Meantime We are being set up for the kill, by other countries… “THEY HATE US YA’ll … We need to stand together like family… we dont have to always get alone, sisters and brothers dont always get alone or agree with each other, however a real family dont let someone off the streets (other countries) mess with your sister or brother….
MH made an appropriate comment about obummer-he is still a *&%^, no matter how many apologies msnbc (from whom we can expect an explosion every time the prez is criticized) or MH makes. In fact, MH could have called his royal a**&$%^ an **&$%^ and he still would have been correct No apology for the truth is necessary!! It seems that the STUPIDITY of the prez and his advisors is starting to become a regular occasion every time he opens his mouth to speak.
[...] Earlier today I threw out another possibility – namely that the Republicans might consider giving Obama exactly what he wants for about 18 months so he can choke on what happens when you raise taxes in the middle of a depression. Bad for the country, sure. But only in the short term – if you can get a few hundred billion in spending cuts out of the deal and Obama’s stupid policies in application means the economy goes even further in the toilet between now and Election Day, then not only does he get annihilated but a good many Democrat senators and Congressmen get blown away as well. [...]
Really??? WOW! You Americans are stupid.
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Stupid enough to have gone to the moon, cured polio, defeated the Germans and the Japanese in WWII, and to create the best place in the world to live. If this weren’t so, why would so many people want to come here? I don;t know what country you are from, but here, we teach our kids manners and how to show a little respect. Obviously, they don’t in your country.
I think the whole idea behind the attack on corporate jets is that they symbolize the breaks that the wealthy get which ordinary folks don’t. The point here is that Obama is trying to get a little tax increase on people who can well afford it and who don’t usually pay their fair share of taxes. Does anyone actually think that if the wealthy are forced to pay a small tax increase, that they will “sit on the sidelines”? People who have made millions of dollars thanks to the good ‘ole USA shouldn’t bitch about paying a tiny increase. After all, how many houses, cars, jets, etc. does a person need? Most of the very wealthy individuals and corporations shelter most of their taxes and don’t pay anything close to what they should. I know the rules say they can, but who wrote the rules? Could it have been the wealthy, in collusion with their Republican lackeys in Congress? We can’t sustain Medicare, Social Security, etc. without some kind of tax increases and I certainly think the Rush Limbaughs of the world can afford to kick in a little more.
Disqus generic email templateFirst, taxing corporate jet owners won’t even get you one tenth of one percent of the deficit. In fact, you could take 100 percent of all the income the “rich” bring in and it wouldn’t wipe out half the deficit.
Second, taxing corporate jets merely hurts American jet manufacturers like Hawker Beechcraft, a company which is already struggling. That hurts middle-class people.
Grow a brain, then come back to lecture us about “bitching” millionaires.
I think that you are missing the point. The Democrats want to trick the Republicans into accepting a tax hike so that they can throw that at them for the 2012 election. They will continue to use lies, class envy, and any other means of deceit to try to get this done. They only want to spend more and are not serious about fixing anything that will create more jobs. They are more successful at creating a business environment that will chase more jobs out of the country. They have deliberately killed or restricted jobs in energy because of their naive background in the real world.