At the Atlantic, Conor Friedersdorf takes issue with the Breitbart.com vetting of Obama’s younger years, and argues that it’s just one example of the conservative media’s self-defeating behavior:
Perhaps “The Vetting” drives traffic to Breitbart.com. When it comes to giving insight into Obama’s actions, or the course his second term would be likely to take, or advancing conservative insights, it’s utterly pointless — it misleads more often than it clarifies, and whereas actually digging into Obama’s behavior during his first term, or his donors, or the gulf between his promises and actions might produce newsworthy scoops, Breitbart.com is spending its time digging up old play posters with Obama’s name on them and proving he once dressed patriotically. …
On Twitter yesterday, conservative journalist John Tabin took issue with my argument that these pathologies, common to many (though not all) conservative media outlets, are one obstacle to a conservatism that focuses on and achieves the passage of reform legislation on taxes, spending, and entitlements. So I’ll close by posing a question to him. Breitbart.com is read largely by movement conservatives. Does it help or hurt the conservative cause when they focus on the issues raised in “The Vetting” series?
It’s true that digging into Obama’s past for insight into his second term is probably useless, and these issues shouldn’t be used as a serious conservative arguments against Obama’s reelection. But that’s not really the point of Breitbart’s vetting, which is aimed at holding the media accountable for what it missed in 2008 – as the Breitbart website explains, “to show that the media had failed in its most basic duty.” Whether it’s been successful is a matter of personal opinion, but the issue of the media’s double standard of scrutiny are certainly worth addressing.
So Obama wearing patriotic garb, and a copy of an old law school exam he gave may not be major bombshells. But is the story about Romney’s dog riding on the roof of his car decades ago really a groundbreaking revelation? Why have reporters dug up Romney’s prep school frenemies from half a century ago, while the mainstream reporting on Obama’s college and post-college years has largely been fawning and positive? Even David Maraniss’s book, which is expected to be the most exhaustive examination of Obama’s post-college years, sounds like it will also be a flattering portrayal. From Josh Wilwol’s review (h/t Mike Allen):
“Maraniss’s Obama is sympathetic, and in contrast to his exotic background, he emerges as a normal, well-adjusted guy. At Occidental, ‘Barry”s Mick Jagger impression was legendary, and as a teen at Honolulu’s Punahou School, he was known for snagging joints from his buddies’ hands and shouting ‘Intercepted!’ before taking an extra hit. Halfway through the book, Maraniss describes a day when a high-school teacher asked Obama what people should most fear. ‘Words,’ uttered the boy who would be known for his stirring speeches. ‘Words … can be weapons of destruction.’”
There’s no reason the conservative media can’t cover media bias issues, while also discussing policy — in fact, it already does that. Friedersdorf’s overarching implication, that the conservative media as a whole is obsessed with digging up Obama’s past and ignores more substantive debates, is just inaccurate. The Breitbart focus on media bias isn’t a threat to policy-driven conservatism, because it’s not necessary to choose one over the other. There are plenty of other conservative publications that cover fiscal policy, and that doesn’t mean important cultural issues have to be ignored.
Excellent post Ms. Goodman, character and policy are both important to most conservatives._However, the dismal state of the economy will most likely be this adminitrations Achiles heel.
It's a well known behavior principle that the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. What does that tell us about Obama's likely actions in a second term?
Agreed. And it isn't that we aren't being told about Barry's young adulthood as much as we are only being told the version that his people want us to know.
If that was the case Obama should have never gotten a first term, his friend and associates are some of the most despicable people ever – Van Jones, Wrong Reverend Wright, Father Fleger, Bernadine Dorn, William Ayers just to name a few of his friend.
I don't quite follow the argument that the mainstream's press silly coverage of Romney's past is somehow a defense of Breitbart.com's silly coverage of Obama's past. n nHow is that a defense? If something is worthless it's worthless no member which "tribe" – the lefr or right – does it. n nSecond, we of course look at a candidate's past to guess how they would act in the future. Private acts and public policy. It's a difficult endeavor, a type of pyschobiography that can lead one to dead ends. What in Nixon's past predicted Watergate? The man was a devoted and hardworking son who sacrificed mightily to make a name for himself. Nothing in his youth presaged his failure as president. Even Garry Will's "Nixon Agonistes" had to look at his early political career – not his youth – to find the seeds of his acts. n nIt seems to me the goal here is to embarass, to ridicule, to bring down people. And whether it's the Post doing so to Romney or the Times to McCain, Breitbart's actions make little sense.
Something may be "worthless" in some intellectual sense and still have a political effect. What you are calling for here is unilateral disarmament on the part of the Right, and that as much as anything is what defeated McCain. n n"They said if we laid down our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease. nBut when we disarmed they sold us and delivered us bound to the foe. nAnd the Gods of the Copybook Headings said stick to the Devil you know." n
Sorry, I'm not interested in the tribalism of the "right" or the "left". Tribal politics is self-defeating as it puts tribal solidarity over everything else. Principles, standards, the truth all are secondary to the interest of the tribe. As the heroic civil rights advocate Roy Wilkins said about joining the black separatist movement, "Include me out." n nIf action "A" is wrong, it's wrong on its face. It doesn't become acceptable if "my side" does it.
Nixon was destroyed not by his dishonesty but his pathological paranoia. And you can see that in his childhood and young adulthood. n nTake Bill Clinton — the word "Bimbo Eruptions" comes to mind, and you can see everything in his young adulthood that he would become as President. It wasn't that he was the first POTUS to sleep with everyone except his wife, power is the ultimate sex appeal and the type of person who seeks high office often tends to seek lots of companionship as well. JFK was (amongst other things) sharing a girl-toy with at least one Mafia Don, the difference was that Bill never had any intention of keeping it under cover. n nIt has only been 14 years or so, but when I heard about the cigar, my immediate thoughts were that 'he's gone" — that there was no way that Clinton could survive. About half the country initially thought that the issue was that Monica had been *smoking* the cigar, something not considered "ladylike" not to mention this was at the height of the movement to ban indoor smoking — only later learning what had really been done with it. n nNo, instead the Clintons changed the country, and that you could see in their youth. And as to Nixon, excepting both his "Chequers the Dog" speech and his work on the HUAC in the 1950s, one could look at his being "a devoted and hardworking son who sacrificed mightily to make a name for himself" and predict a good chunk of what did happen. n nRemember they broke into the Watergate Building and tapped the Dem's phones out of fears that the Dem's were going to pull some dirty tricks on them. To prevent a re-occurance of what had happened 12 years earlier with the vote fraud, at a time when the 101 Airborne were bunking in the basement of the White House out of fears they might be needed to defend the building.
“…holding the media accountable for what it missed in 2008..” Missed? Or suppressed? nTo answer the basic issue raised here, Obama’s pre-politics attitudes and associations are more pertinent than ever as predictors of his possible actions and attitudes after (God forbid!) his re-election. It is quite logical to infer that his actions after his 1st term election would be tempered by the need to be re-elected in 2012. After the next election, he will have no need for such restraint: He can freely act according to his ideological preferences, which may best be reflected in his pre-politician attitudes and associations. n
I'll explain it to you, Steve. it's called "hypocrisy." here's an example: n nthe MSM announces breathlessly that–horrors–Mitt Romney once put a dog crate on top of his car and drove to Canada. egads! (one NYT writer recently admitted that she deliberately works that fact into each of her columns, just to keep it top of mind.) n nthis goes on for awhile, with liberals outraged as usual and all sorts of stories and "Daily Show" skits and so on, and then the story that Obama ATE a dog comes out. suddenly, after a big fat yawn, the MSM explains that because this happened a long time ago it's therefore not germane. n nhere's another example: Obama's pastor, the man who converted him, preached to him for 20 years, baptized his children, and functioned as a grandfatherly mentor to him, also happens to be a flaming anti-American anti-Semite. that fact interests almost nobody. in fact, if you brought it up in '08, people tried to say you were a racist. n nOTOH, Chuck Hagee, the far-right minister, endorsed John McCain. that's all: he endorsed him. they didn't hang out, they didn't vacation together, they didn't baptize each other's kids…Hagee just supported McCain. the MSM went vicious: dissecting everything Hagee's ever said, trying to prove that he's a right-wing gay-bashing hater and by association so is McCain. n nas long as you bring up tribal politics and solidarity, let's look at the 95% of blacks who will vote for Obama no matter what he does, and you tell me if that can be explained by anything BUT tribal solidarity.
Obama ate a hot dog once? What the farc!!? This is a big deal because…he skipped the Grey Poupon? Bizarre. I saw this Walt Disney movie once, the Shaggy Dog and this guy, Fred Macmurray turns into this big lovable mutt of a sheep dog and runs around and has trouble driving or getting a drink and getting laid because he's just a dog, you know? Well, what if Romney is like that but *in reverse*–he's a happy go lucky dog with hair flopping in front of his eyes and a big wet nose and then, shazoom, he turns into a Presidential candidate, shaking his invisible tail and begging everyone he runs into please-be-my-friend please-be-my-friend. Explains a lot more than stoner O's days hanging out at the 7-11. Who cares? It's like everybody always hating on O for hanging with a southern fried homey barbecue king rotisserie maestro playing the guys commercials over and over and over again: "God damn America…God damn! This is where America's chickens come home to ….roast!" Sheet. Sounds tasty!! But nooooo. I dont' understand conservatives at all. n nWhat?
LOL, that's actually pretty funny. n nBtw, only Gulden's mustard on hot dogs please!
Well, there's French's. You know it's got to be good because it's so yellow. Vincent Van Gogh used it in all his paintings squirting it on the canvas right out of the nozzle. It's so pure, he'd shout, so true. And because he was poor he'd have something to eat if the paintings didn't sell. But his brother was horrified. What are you doing, he said, that's crazy! I can't hear you, talk into the other ear said Vincent. n nWhat?
Yes, you're citing legitimate examples of unfair treatment of guys on your side. But then make a mistake, in my view, by supporting unfair treatment of the other side. Because, you argue, it's fighting fire with fire. n nWith the risk of sounding sanctimonious, either unfair treatment is wrong or it isn't. It can't be right or wrong depending on who is disseminating it. This is the mess we've gotten into: both sides point to the other in defense of their attacks. I'd like to call a cease fire (yeah, good luck with that). n nRe "tribal" politics: that's a figure of speech that has nothing to do with race in the context I was using it. It's about defending your "tribe" or political party/ideology/group regardless of whether it's right to do. Tribe above all else: principle, truth, fairness, civility. That's secondary to defeating the other tribe.
I voted for Obama in 2008 but the Reverend Wright story still bothers me. Is it really unfair to point out that the President's attitude towards race, American exceptionalism, Israel and Jews may be a direct consequence of his long association with Wright (and Bill Ayers, for that matter)? And that the reason for resurrecting this is precisely because he is running again for President? I have no reason at all to worry about Obama's youthful potsmoking, or Romney's alleged teenaged bullying. But, were I a dog, I would indeed worry about that Fido-on-the-roof thing. Romney's Mormonism should be about as relevant as a candidate's gayness or past divorces, i.e., important only as a purely partisan diversion. It is ludicrous for a Democratic party that tolerated a former Klan Kleagle and a Ted Kennedy to even bring up far more trivial issues from Romney's distant past. It is indicative of how little they really have. n nI may be reconsidering my 2012 Presidential vote. I am sick of this crap.
One needs to understand the Congregational Church (aka "United Church of Christ", UCC) which is the faith of Reverend Wright, and which evolved from the Massachusetts Puritan Church — until 1855, every Massachusetts town had to hire a minister, pay him out of the property tax, and his salary, allotment of firewood and continued employment were debated and voted on at the annual Town Meeting. n nTo this day, every Congregational church has an annual meeting of "church members" who vote on things like the annual church budget, the minister's contract and the rest. When I was a teenager, my vote (and hence attendance) at an annual meeting was once needed to fire a minister, amongst other things he was having a rather public affair with the choir director, both were married but not to each other, and it was the responsibility of the congregation to do something about it. n nContrast this to the Catholic (and Mormon) faiths — the edict comes out of Rome, down the chain of command to the Parish Priest who says things which parishioners may or may not agree with, but which they have no ability to change. In the Protestant faith, particularly the UCC, the minister serves at the pleasure of the parishioners, not just that they can leave that church if they are not happy with what the Minister is saying, but that they don't have to renew his contract. They can fire him. n nJohnathan Edwards was a famous minister in Northampton (MA) but he went too far and when his theology was felt responsible for the young people committing suicide, he was fired. If Rev Wright's church wasn't happy with him, they could have fired him as well. n nIf the Obama's were members of that church, and I believe they were, they had the right to go to the annual meeting and to vote to either renew Wright's contract or not. Even if they didn't go, they could have and hence essentially voted to permit Wright to continue on with his rants. n nThis is a level of responsibility far beyond just sitting there and listening to him, they had the opportunity to remove him (and the related opportunity to counsel him to tone stuff down or they would).
"But, were I a dog, I would indeed worry about that Fido-on-the-roof thing." n nI have owned enough dogs to know that this "scandal" is ridiculous. He was trained to jump into the container—and loved the experience. The dog enjoyed traveling with the Romney family—and lived to be about fifteen years old.
Arf.
really, the dog loved being stuck in a dog-can on the top of a moving car? really? dogs do love sticking their heads out the car window and letting the wind blow into their faces and whip around their ears…freedom! with their hind legs firmly planted on the seat. but not-loving-the-experience of container-containment-on-a-hot-tin-roof may explain why the dog pooped uncontrollably. or put another way, this would ever ever occur to you as a way to take your own dog on a vacation? would this occur to anybody not born on Planet Romney?
The fact remains that some dogs sit in crates whether on the top, back, pickup box of a vehicle. Not every dog gets to hang their heads out the window as you suggest either.
"Why have reporters dug up Romney’s prep school frenemies from half a century ago, while the mainstream reporting on Obama’s college and post-college years has largely been fawning and positive?" n nWhy indeed?!? n nMs. Goodman makes a good point — and if folk like Rush Limbaugh are right about the fact that none of Obama's college classmates can ever remember seeing him, then we have a major scandal of epic proportions. But just look at high school. n nThe hair cutting/assault incident demonstrates two of the biggest concerns folk have about Romney — that he is a bully, and that he will say whatever is necessary to get ahead. (I am more concerned about the fact Romney doesn't remember the incident than anything else.) nPothead Obama and abandoning the friend who rolled the car over are equally insightful into Obama's character. n nThe word "candidate" comes from the same Latin word as "candid" — these are folk who are supposed to be candid about who they *are* as well as what they propose to do if elected, and it is the media's job to find out for us who they really are. n nSo we go back to Ms. Goodman's point — and why aren't we hearing the stories about Obama? We know he likely was the beneficiary of Affirmative Retribution (Michelle openly admits that she was), if Limbough is right that none of his classmates remember him being in classes with them, some very interesting possibilities start arising….
All good points, Ms. Goodman, but any post that gives that intellectual thug, CF, publicity is a mistake from the get go. He should simply be ignored, no matter how valid a sounding board his post makes.
I appreciate the post and the various comments but I'm persuaded on the issue by a political and legal solon we must all respect, at least for the office he holds. Relative to tactics he recommended, “If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.”
I much prefer a different line from that same movie — Sean Connery saying "if Capone puts one of your guys in the hospital, you put a few of his in the morgue." n nIn other words, we aren't looking for trouble, and we are going to play by the rules. But if you go over to the dark side, we can be darker…
"The child is father of the man…" Wordsworth, Hopkins, Blood Sweat and Tears.. n"Words..!!" Profound utterance of a child n"Intercepted!" Meaningless playfulness of a high-spirited young man nIs it any wonder that Breitbart goes after the LSM's worship of their idol!
The Statist Media's sycophancy toward Obama in 2008 (and since then) is the very kind of thing that fuels conspiracy theories. Even rational people can start to wonder, after a certain point, "What are they trying to hide? Why won't they insist on Obama revealing his college/law school records? Why does the media keep certain videos of Obama sealed and stored away (such as the one of him at the send-off party for the radical, pro-Palestinian professor)?" If Breitbart's piece does nothing more than give air and light to the kinds of biography that every candidate gets– the typical vetting process– then it is well worth it. If it actually shames the Statist Media (or alternatively alerts the general public) to re-examine their standards, then it is priceless.
I reject the critics' AND the author's contention that Obama's past is a poor guide to helping us understand what he might do in a second term. The fact that he will be completely unburdened by the need to seek re-election means that he will have no reason to pretend to be anyone other than who he really is — a wannabe Marxist tyrant. So, his past, largely ignored or marginalized in 2008, is essential to understanding his true beliefs and aims. n nFurthermore, those critics of the re-vetting of Obama might actually try connecting the dots and ask themselves why is it that Obama has shared so little about his plans for a second term as chief executive of the country. Hello? Earth to Media Elite… n nI wonder why we have this continued base-level lack of back curiosity and inquisitiveness among professionals whose job is to ask direct, pointed and sometimes impolite questions. And asking the president what his second term plans would entail is hardly impolite, but you wouldn't know that from observing media behavior. n nWhat an utter failure the American media has become. It's almost as if they're trying to emulate their own pathetic heroes.I reject the critics' AND the author's contention that Obama's past is a poor guide to helping us understand what he might do in a second term. The fact that he will be completely unburdened by the need to seek re-election means that he will have no reason to pretend to be anyone other than who he really is — a wannabe Marxist tyrant. So, his past, largely ignored or marginalized in 2008, is essential to understanding his true beliefs and aims.