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Obama's Disdain Not Limited to
the Media Part Two of Three By Dave Andrusko Let's see if three developments this morning help us understand where we stand with pro-abortion President Barack Obama--and where he stands with the American people.
I read this story over a bowl of cereal this morning, written by the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz. The article was a love fest for MSMBC's Chuck Todd, who, like Kurtz, seems almost omnipresent. Todd is, among other things, NBC's chief White House correspondent and the network's political director. "Despite his newfound prominence, Todd, like his colleagues, has limited access to the man he is covering," Kurtz writes. 'Obama himself is the one who doesn't like dealing with the press,' he says, exonerating the White House staff. 'You can't even do shouted questions.' Todd, who first met Obama in 2002, when the then-Illinois state senator came to a meeting at Hotline, has a theory about Obama's frequent criticism of the 24-7 media culture. "Once Obama was elected to the Senate in 2004, 'he didn't need to woo the press anymore. The press was there at the drop of a hat. To him, almost all the experience with the press is invasive. . . . He's developed this disdain for us.'" What else did we learn today? Rasmussen added two important pieces. First, Obama's "Presidential Approval Index" is now a whopping negative 18%. While only 25% of the nation's voters approve strongly of his job performance, 43% strongly disagree--a difference of 18 percentage points. Perhaps not unrelated, Rasmussen also tells us this morning that "Sixty-three percent (63%) of voters nationwide favor repeal of the health care law" (only 32% oppose repeal)-- " the highest level of support for repeal yet measured. " Moreover, Rasmussen reports, 33% of voters now believe the health care plan "will be good for the country, down six points from a week ago and the lowest level of confidence in the plan to date. Fifty-five percent (55%) say it will be bad for the nation." (Emphasis added.) Rasmussen appropriately cautions that since this is the first time the repeal figure has topped 60%, we need to see if this "marks a brief bounce or indicates a trend of growing opposition." My guess is the number will only grow. To return to Todd's comment, it should be noted that because of his constant presence on the tube and on the Web, and his voracious use of Twitter, the Obama administration pays Todd more heed. But this growing sense that Obama is arrogant and beyond criticism is not, I would argue, confined to reporters whom Obama often treats with a disdain bordering on outright contempt. People realize that it's bad enough that Obama is all speed and precious little altitude. Making it worse is that the public is growing aware that he really does feel entitled to what he wants--including a health care bill rife with abortion-promoting components--and to win it any way he wishes. |
