Education of a President

[inna]

PETER BAKER cover story of Sunday’s N.Y. Times Magazine, “Education of a President,” includes interviews with President Obama and nearly two dozen White House officials, talking about lessons of the last two years and what comes next after the election. ...

--In the interview, the president predicts he’ll be able to work with Republicans after the election: “It may be that regardless of what happens after this election, they feel more responsible, either because they didn’t do as well as they anticipated, and so the strategy of just saying no to everything and sitting on the sidelines and throwing bombs didn’t work for them, or they did reasonably well, in which case the American people are going to be looking to them to offer serious proposals and work with me in a serious way.”

--He reflects on what he called the “tactical lessons” of his first two years: He let himself look too much like “the same old tax-and-spend Democrat,” realized too late that “there’s no such thing as shovel-ready projects” and perhaps should have “let the Republicans insist on the tax cuts” in the stimulus. He said he and his team took “a perverse pride” in focusing on policy while ignoring the need to sell it to the country and that he realizes now that “you can’t be neglecting of marketing and P.R. and public opinion.”

--He says the next two years will focus less on passing ambitious legislation and more on implementing what he has already passed: “Even if I had the exact same Congress, even if we don’t lose a seat in the Senate and we don’t lose a seat in the House, I think the rhythms of the next two years would inevitably be different from the rhythms of the first two years. There’s going to be a lot of work in this administration just doing things right and making sure that new laws are stood up in the ways they’re intended.”

~snip~

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/magazine/17obama-t.html

[ThomWV]

1. blah, blah, blah ....

[Spazito]

2. LOL, Peter Baker is not exactly neutral....

one has only to look at his defense of the COC article to see that. A quick google of his articles makes it clear where Mr. Baker's 'sympathies' lie and it is neither middle nor left.

Link to COC defense:

Obama Ratchets Up Tone Against G.O.P.

snip

The chamber is hardly the only organization playing a role in the campaign that has international affiliations and gets money from foreign institutions. Among others are groups on the political left like the A.F.L.-C.I.O. and the Sierra Club. The law requires them to isolate foreign money from any domestic political activity.

snip

“Have these people no shame?” Mr. Rove said on “Fox News Sunday.” “Does the president of the United States have such little regard for the office that he holds that he goes out there and makes these kind of baseless charges against his political enemies? This is just beyond the pale. How dare the president do this?”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/11/us/politics/11obama.html?ref=peter_baker

Oh, and Mr. Baker couldn't even be bothered to get his facts straight in this article and had to add a correction 5 DAYS later:

Original contention in October 10 article linked above:

"His party is outmatched in advertising sponsored by groups in part because of a Supreme Court decision issued earlier this year which lifted restrictions on independent campaign expenditures by corporations and unions. Mr. Obama has suggested that the sponsors of campaign advertising have sinister motivations."

Correction, added to the October 10 article on October 15:

"An article on Monday about a campaign speech by President Obama in which he criticized political spending by special interest groups misstated the effect of a recent Supreme Court decision on such spending. The decision, in the Citizens United case, lifted restrictions on independent campaign expenditures by corporations and unions. It did not change existing campaign-finance disclosure requirements."

Edited for grammatical error.

[inna]

4. Are you suggesting that the President was misquoted in the interview?

It is Obama's own words that speak for themselves; it is an interview, not an opinion piece by Mr. Baker (whoever the heck he is; never heard of him before and frankly don't care).

[Spazito]

5. Assuming you read the article posted, I am surprised you did not notice...

the vast majority of the article was the opining of Mr. Baker and his interpretation of very carefully selected quotes.

Here is but one example:

"That presumes that what he did was the right thing, a matter of considerable debate. The left thinks he did too little; the right too much. But what is striking about Obama’s self-diagnosis is that by his own rendering, the figure of inspiration from 2008 neglected the inspiration after his election. He didn’t stay connected to the people who put him in office in the first place. Instead, he simultaneously disappointed those who considered him the embodiment of a new progressive movement and those who expected him to reach across the aisle to usher in a postpartisan age. On the campaign trail lately, Obama has been confronted by disillusionment — the woman who was “exhausted” defending him, the mother whose son campaigned for him but was now looking for work. Even Shepard Fairey, the artist who made the iconic multihued “Hope” poster, says he’s losing hope."

Not a quote to be found, all opining and that is only one example among many I could cut and paste from the article.

[inna]

7. Look, I don't care what this Baker person thinks.

(And no, I didn't read the entire article.)

It is Obama's own words and the message that he communicated that are important here.

Forget about Baker, he is irrelevant. (Unless you have reasons to believe that he distorted Obama's words.)

[Spazito]

8. I suggest you read it, it is quite enlightening, not for the author's use of...

selective, very selective quotes from the President but, rather, the very obvious bias of the author. Since when is the author of an article "irrelevant"? Baker's opining is VERY relevant to whether the article should be taken as credible or not. It is NOT, imo, because of the author's past and present bias.

Frankly, I find it astonishing one would post an OP on an article they haven't read in it's entirely, I hope that is not the norm.

[inna]

9. LOL, you're missing the point entirely. It is Obama's DIRECT QUOTES that are of any significance.

How do we know that he hasn't been misquoted by an allegedly biased/hostile interviewer (which is apparently the point that you are trying to make)?

Simple. The White House would've objected by now if that was the case.

Clearly, the Administration CHOSE to send this kind of message to the voters, and the timing is not accidental.

The message is loud and clear, and it's more than a little disturbing, actually, but... I guess they know what they are doing and going after a certain constituency (which wants more "bipartisanship"). :shrug: Whatever. I'm done discussing this with you BTW, you're entitled to your own beliefs, and I have zero interest in arguing with you.

[Spazito]

11. Seeing as you have stated you did not read the whole article before posting...

what message did you 'receive'? I can only gather from your perspective that if Karl Rove wrote an article with selective quotes from the President, the key would be the quotes and it is irrelevant that it was Karl Rove that wrote it. Interesting perspective if that is so.

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[stray cat]

6. And Bush in 2000-2008 is something worth returning to

:crazy: You also forgot to state he isn't an American

[Catshrink]

10. non-sequitir. again.

:crazy: