What does it take to agree with perhaps the single most ludicrous statement ever made by a U.S. president?

(Note: Blow quoted the Obama statement, but, as a reader points out, and which I didn’t realize, Blow left out the last sentence, which was the worst part of it. So my main assertion in this entry is incorrect. However, in not quoting that last sentence, Blow was doing something perhaps worse than agreeing with Obama’s egregious statement; he was covering it up.)

Here again is Obama’s already immortal line from last week:

The same thing that swept Scott Brown into office swept me into office. People are angry and they are frustrated. Not just because of what’s happened in the last year or two years but what’s happened over the last eight years.

Obama’s been ridiculed by everyone for saying that the voters of the most liberal state in the country elected a Republican to the U.S. Senate and destroyed the agenda of the Democratic Party because they shared the Democrats’ anger at a former Republican president.

Except for one columnist, Charles Blow of the New York Times, whose photo, I must say, positively radiates narcissistic self-satisfaction:

Blow agrees with Obama.

Now please understand, this does not mean that Blow is a partisan fool. Quite the opposite. In order to see the truth of Obama’s statement, a person must possess the ability to see beneath this world of false appearances to the real world. Only the elect possess that ability, and there are very, very few of them. Which is why Blow is so pleased with himself.

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Paul K. writes:

You wrote, “What does it take to agree with perhaps the single most ludicrous statement ever made by a U.S. president?”

It takes simply leaving off the last sentence of the statement. This is what Obama said according to Charles Blow’s column:

In an interview with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News this week, Obama acknowledged as much: “The same thing that swept Scott Brown into office swept me into office. People are angry, and they’re frustrated.”

It’s smart to acknowledge this, but can he get out in front of it?

That, as far as it goes, is correct. What swept Obama into office was anger and frustration with the Bush administration, and what swept Scott Brown into office was anger and frustration with the Obama administration.

BTW, I notice that Blow imitates the Maureen Dowd’s annoying habit of peppering his prose with meaningless word plays: “They feted the fearful to a steady stream of dread and circuses” and “his agenda will suffer now that the emperor has no cloture.” This attempt at wit relies on the set-up of our president as emperor and an involved citizenry as a mob, which is stupid and insulting. However, it allows him to insert a quote from “Gladiator,” which may be his Gibbon.

LA replies:

Good catch. I saw the famous Obama quote, but didn’t realize that he had left out the last part of it. My mistake.

So, does this make Blow less bad, since he wasn’t aggreeing with the worst part of O.’s statement, or does it make him worse, since he was concealing it?

Mike writes:

To be fair, at least Blow was smart enough not to include “Not just because of what’s happened in the last year or two years but what’s happened over the last eight years.” Actually, I see his commentary as more of an attempt to spin Obama’s remark than to agree with it. I’ll give Blow credit for basically saying that the American people are a bunch of idiots who voted for W, turned against him and voted for Obama, and have now turned against Obama—when everyone else is saying that Americans were a bunch of idiots when they voted for W.,then wised up and voted for Obama, but have now turned back into a bunch of idiots.

January 26

Paul K. writes:

I would say “more bad,” in that Blow is misrepresenting Obama’s point, and then adding “It’s smart to acknowledge this.” It would only be smart to acknowledge the anger if Obama didn’t go on to suggest that it wasn’t directed at him.

Over all, though, the Blowviator is so confused that I can’t be bothered to figure out what he’s trying to say. Like many liberals, he thinks Obama is the opposite of Bush, when in fact he has maintained most of his predecessor’s bad policies while adding new bad ones of his own.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at January 25, 2010 12:38 AM | Send