Given That Prez is Running Against Pol Pot-Like Challenger, Daily Beast's Tomasky Urges Obama to "Grow a Pair"

The next time folks start complaining about the rotten tone of American political reporting, don't forget this link, which is filled with sadness of a very particular sort. It's the sort of sadness I feel whenever I see hapless partisans descend into terror at disappointment over their own candidate, whether its's someone running for president or best in show at a Star Trek convention costume contest.

Here's Michael Tomasky of The Daily Beast, recently seen counseling presidential adviser David Axelrod to "nonperson" Newark Mayor Cory Booker (who "is not entitled to his own views" on Bain Capital), telling Barack Obama to "Grow a Pair." Obama's main offense - besides his various policy choices that have not helped the country's economy or standing in the world - is that he did a Father's Day event rather than likening his GOP rival Mitt Romney to murderous thugs.

What's needed here isn't soul-searching. It's gut-punching, as in, get out there and do some. Of course, it helps if they act like they're on the same team, which they didn't during Bain week. But they ought to be able to do it on the questions of stewardship of the economy and Romney's dreams to lift every boat of the top 1 percent of the country. A candidate who's tossing out zingers and on the offensive and looking like he's having fun is a candidate who'll energize everyone in his party.

There's no doubt the race has tightened up some in the last two weeks. I say it hasn't tightened up because of the May jobs numbers or this Fed report or anything else like that. Those have obviously dinged Obama, but it's really tightened up because only one candidate is campaigning—only one is punching. I'm a father myself, so I've nothing against Father's Day. I just hope Sasha and Malia get him a spine.

Cuz make no mistake, Romney isn't just a guy who envisons a federal government that spends a lot more than the we do today. He's a guy who has signed on to a budget plan that would increase annual spending by a $1 trillion more than it is today. But a $1 trillion less than Obama would like to spend in 10 years. Romney, you see, is "a candidate to whom the word 'vague' applies roughly as 'mean' applied to Pol Pot."

More here.

Does anyone else expect a little more from a guy whose Daily Beast byline says he's also editor of Democracy: A Journal of Ideas? At the very least, I'd expect the dig at Romney to be wittier, more biting, or maybe even a little bit funny.

More fun with Tomasky, where he inveighs not just against the crime against humanity that is Mountain Dew: Code Red but the objectively bourgeois horror of large servings of meat: "Eight- and ten-ounce burgers are sick things."

Hey, it's Friday and as long as we're talking about Pol Pot, let's take a Holiday in Cambodia with the Dead Kennedys:

Comments

[ant1sthenes]

Well... he isn't saying he's like Pol Pot really. Just being a retardouche. I mean, if I say a chick is as hot as Hitler was evil, I'm not saying she's like Hitler, I'm saying she's hella hot, but in a way only a mentally deficient person would think was ok.

[KDN]

Mountain Dew Code Red is awesome in the proper situation (drunkenly housing a grande meal). Tomasky's an asshole.

[KDN]

Also, that link in the article is broked. It redirects to an admin page.

[R C Dean]

it's really tightened up because only one candidate is campaigning

Yeah, Obama is holed up in the White House, flyspecking legislative proposals. He needs to get out, give some campaign speeches, maybe raise a little cash.

[Pro Libertate]

This is what a cheerleading media gets us--open, easily exposed lies being bandied about like the Lord's gospel. If the media were worth a shit, they'd be openly mocking this administration by now.

[VG Zaytsev]

Yep.

Obama's a self parody in so many ways.

Railing against the one percenters at $45,000 a plate fundraisers, for instance. Then his security detail jacks up commute times for the little people.

[NoVAHockey]

"Then his security detail jacks up commute times for the little people."

you know what Bush never did? decide that rush hour was good time to take Laura out to dinner. or decide that rush hour was a good time to go anywhere that I can recall. twice i've been screwed and stuck -- not moving stuck -- for more than a hour because Obama had somewhere to be during rush hour.

[John]

Bush for all of his faults, actually had a sense of decorum and respect for the country. He also never took lavish vacations and stopped playing golf shortly after the war started.

[Joe M]

Yeah, like when he joked about not finding any WMDs.

[John]

They found them all over. The goal posts just moved.

[KDN]

Bush shut down the area around the Waldorf at rush hour every time he was in NYC. I'd have to cut out of work 15 minutes early to get to Penn Station on time for my regular train. Not nearly the same thing as Obama in DC (unless you're trying to catch a cab uptown), but it did happen.

[ChrisO]

Obama is careful to do this in places like NYC and L.A., where all those sophisticates will undoubtedly vote for him anyway.

[John]

And the funny thing is that it doesn't help their cause. If the media were truthful and hard on Obama, Obama would know better than the try the stupid tactics he is using. But these people live in a bubble and have no idea how out of touch they are.

[Pro Libertate]

What's particularly dumb is that the Internet makes information much more widely available, limiting their "gatekeeper" function tremendously.

It's truly an absurd age in which we live.

[John]

They would like to fix that little problem. They loath the internet.

[Pro Libertate]

They can loathe it all they like, but they're being stupid. The one thing they could have used to fend off the bloggers and other "new" media outfits was to be the trusted source of information. To use their resources and professional knowledge to report things as accurately and truthfully as possible. Instead, they decided to enter politics even more overtly. Which is going to be the ruin of most if not all of the traditional media institutions.

[Somalian Road Corporation]

I noticed the "legacy media needs a government bailout and subsidization" drum hasn't been getting beaten quite as often as of late, but I have absolutely no doubt that setting up Pravda West is still the goal of some.

[Pro Libertate]

Fuck that shit.

[John]

They stopped selling information and started selling opinion years ago. With the internet opinions are now free.

[ant1sthenes]

"Reality-based community" lol

[Fist of Etiquette]

"Eight- and ten-ounce burgers are sick things."

Maybe he meant sick as the kids use it these days. "That ride is sick, daddio!"

[John]

How sick and delusional do you have to be to think Romney is some small government radical? I don't understand why these people get so angry and desperate. At worst, Romney gets elected and puts off bankruptcy for a few years. Is it really that bad? What exactly is Romney going to do that is so bad in these people's view?

[fish]

What exactly is Romney going to do that is so bad in these people's view?

He won't be Black Kennedy....that's enough!

[Mo' $parky]

What exactly is Romney going to do that is so bad in these people's view?

Be a Republican president.

Why is that so hard to figure out?

[John]

Sadly that is the answer. I think it is just narcissism on their part. People measure themselves by their enemies. If Bush or Romney or whoever are just ordinary politicians, then this guy is just an ordinary hack journalist. If Romney is some great threat to the republic, then he is not a hack journalist. He is a crusader saving the country from evil.

[Joe R.]

That's what I was wondering. What is this policy of Romney's that will lift the boats of the 1% that Obama will crush like an empty beer can?

[fish]

Grow a pair....? You want fucking motivation.... tell Sugar Coated Barry O's that if he loses he has to go back to Chicago with his wife "Aunt Esther" to while away the days. No more deferential treatment from sychophants like Chris Matthews...no more steam room fun with Rahm. (Rahm still has his sights set on bigger things) He'll knit himself a long form birth certificate and carry people to the polls on his narrow shoulders to defer that punishment for another 4 years.

[The Hammer]

That's not the worst part. This is: "Democrats, as is their wont in these situations, wring their hands and start soul-searching. But what's needed isn't soul-searching. It's gut-punching?as in, get out there and do some."

Yeah, because democrats just spend too much time in self-reflection, questioning whether their policies actually work. They never just ram stuff down our throats and move on to the next "problem."

[Tulpa the White]

but it's really tightened up because only one candidate is campaigning?only one is punching.

Last night during the news and Seinfeld on Fox there was an Obama commercial during every fucking commercial break. They were pretty awful commercials too, basically saying that Mitt Romney sucks almost as bad as BO does.

They have more money in their war chest than they knew what to do with.

[John]

This is the campaign who thought Julia the never married single mother government leech was a good campaign mascot. These people think Anna Wintour, the world's most renown and nasty elitist, makes a good campaign spokesman in the middle of the worst economy in 70 years. At some point you have to conclude that the Obama people just are not very smart.

[carol]

Yeah, they really don't seem to understand that whole "optics" thingy. Or they believe they are above all that.

[Tulpa the White]

In Tomasky's defense, he didn't really "liken" Romney to Pol Pot. Maybe The Jacket needs to splurge on some SAT prep for dealing with analogies.

If I say that my neighbor is "smelly" like Hitler was "racist", I'm not likening my neighbor to Hitler.

[T]

But you did Godwin the whole discussion, so you have that going for you.

[The Hammer]

If you said your neighbor is as smelly as Hitler was racist in a published article, it would be glaringly obvious that you were trying to associate your neighbor with Hitler in peoples' minds.

[ChrisO]

Tomasky has apparently never heard of the campaign strategy of having lackeys and compliant members of the press do the dirty work, while the candidate appears to stay above the fray. Campaign 101--you never want the candidate to do the nasty business directly.

Obama's lackeys are doing plenty of feces-slinging at Romney, it's just that they haven't been doing it very well, and there doesn't appear to be a lot there, since Romney is a bit of a cipher.

In any event, a president's reelection campaign is always a referendum on the last four years, and not so much about the challenger. Obama's in big trouble.

[John]

I have been saying that for two years. The challenger is a bystander in a Presidential campaign. It is a referendum on the incumbent.

[R C Dean]

You're right, as long as the challenger clears the plausibility bar.

What the Obots have been trying to do is disqualify Romney entirely.

Not working. Its hard to disqualify somebody like Romney. He's just hard to get excited about, either way.

[John]

They could have done that had Paul or Gingrich won the nomination. They could have played the Goldwater "in your gut you know he is nuts" card. But you can't do that with someone like Romney. There are lots of reasons to dislike Romney. But being a crazy right winger unfit for office is not one of them. No one but the chorus is going to buy that. It doesn't even pass the laugh test.

[juris imprudent]

Even the choir doesn't really believe it - they just go along with it for the sake of harmony.

[BarryD]

The DK video is an example of why Nick Gillespie's posts are always the best ones.

I'm happy to have my own office today, even if it DOESN'T have any windows.

[Brandybuck]

Obama can't come out swinging because every punch at Romney is a punch at his own Mini-Me. What's he going to attack him on that is not also an attack on himself?

This election will decide between Obama and Obama-Lite.