Michelle Goldberg (No relation) cuts to the heart of Mark Halperin’s offense (Note: It’s funnier if you try to read it aloud with as much drama as possible):
Here’s why Mark Halperin is a disgrace. It’s not because he used a mild obscenity to describe our president on Morning Joe, disrespectful as that was. Rather, it was the circumstances of the slur. Right now, the Republican Party is threatening to blow up the world economy unless Democrats agree to savage cuts in spending while refusing any of the revenue increases that all serious economists say are necessary to actually address the national debt. Obama, whose greatest fault in office has been a misplaced faith in the GOP’s capacity for reasonableness, went on television and chided the party for this stance. Apparently, this struck Halperin as unreasonable. His response embodies all that’s rotten and shallow about D.C.’s pundit class, which fetishizes bipartisanship even as it only demands it of one political party.
I just knew Republicans were somehow to blame for a liberal journalist on a liberal TV show on a liberal television network calling the liberal president of the United States a “d*ck.” I just couldn’t figure out why until Michelle explained it to me.
And I love — love — this part: Obama, whose greatest fault in office has been a misplaced faith in the GOP’s capacity for reasonableness…
And she thinks the DC pundit class lives in a bubble.
Tremble and obey, kulaks!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWho is this Michelle Goldberg person and how can I get in touch with her?
I have this bridge in Brooklyn I KNOW she'll want to buy!
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"It’s funnier if you try to read it aloud with as much drama as possible."
It's plenty funny if you just read it silently. I wonder why she didn't blame global warming, too.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIn a stable full of unhinged, crazed lefties at The Daily Beast, Goldberg is arguably the prized Filly.
An especially prescient example of her "excellence" in this regard, is a story she wrote back in May titled, "The Narcissists Defending Dominique Strauss-Kahn".
I'm always amused when the Party of the ACLU so violently disregards the presumption of innocence.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBut Scott, rape is such an awful crime that even innocence is no defense.
/feminazi
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAren't you lucky, Jonah, that you are 'no relation,' for I would not want to be related to her, either.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"His response embodies all that’s rotten and shallow about D.C.’s pundit class, which fetishizes bipartisanship even as it only demands it of one political party"
It's all I can do to keep my head from exploding after reading that...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseLiberal TV show? Joe Scarborough was a Republican congressman. Willie's a conservative. Mika is on record as saying that small town America is more American than big city America. Did young Goldberg dash this off without thinking? What a surprise that would be.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMika is "on the record" stating a vapid cliche? That settles it!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHave you ever actually watched the show? Republican is not synonymous with Conservative. No serious conservative could tolerate that fever swamp of a network.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abusetbenoit, almost...
The GOOD news is, Mika did say that about "small town America is more American than big city America."
The BAD news is, the small towns she was referring to were Ann Arbor, Georgetown, Martha's Vineyard, and Berkeley.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAnd Chapel Hill (NC).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAt this point I'd like to point out that George W. Bush, despite his status as former president, despite all his connections, and despite the formidable array of assets at his command, did absolutely nothing to dissuade Mark Halperin from launching this horrific assault on President Obama.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOh Henry! You deluded child you! Don't you KNOW how this thing works in the evil Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy?
Halperin calls Obama a "dick":
Another word for that is "weiner"
Anthony Weiner is pilloried by the evil Republicans for simply using the technological gifts that God and Al Gore gave him.
But DUBYA? He is probably spending this weekend at a Fourth of July Cook-Out? And you know what they cook at those, don't you?
Yes...WEINERS!!!
"Dissuade" Halperin? Heck, George W. Effingbush (who of course is a cowboy "hot dog" right? Right!) CAUSED him to say it! By...well, Texas-hypnosis. Or secret right-wing ninja stealth tactics. Or something. Anything.
Bush Lied, Halperin Dicked!!!
The evidence is indisputable, I tellya! Just ask anyone you know who's a "sensible, reputable economist!"
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI used Miss Emily Litella's voice while I read this piece. Sadly for Michelle, the Radner character's prose blunders all made more sense.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou inspired me.
I re-read, using the cackle of my favorite FORMER congress"person", Patricia Ireland.
I wish Ireland was still relevant, as she'd have faulted Halperin for sexism, too.
Patty-cakes would have added:
"He just cannot bring himself to 'stoop' to unsocialize his mind to use female anatomy to describe a man. What's wrong with the 'C' word, huh, Mark? Chicken sh*t!"
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe really funny part is, her style and talking points are nigh on indistinguishable from that of local commenters like 'Hughman' and 'Who Cares.'
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAs I read that (silently, to myself) I tried to imagine it being spoken by Helen Lovejoy, gossipy wife of First Church of Springfield minister Timothy Lovejoy and of "oh, won't someone please think of the children" fame, and it was just about perfect.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt's about time the GOP's capacity for "reasonableness" is diminished. Tom DeLay's House was too reasonable, Compassionate Conservative George Bush was so reasonable he abandoned his free market principles. And John McCain didn't become The Maverick by being unreasonable.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseFunny how "every serious economist" is always a Keynsian acolyte who advocates statist policies, even as we watch such policies "explode the world economy", or at least the ones in Crete, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, and the U.S.
Has she blamed George Bush for the Greece debt debacle, yet? Did he not pay for his Gyro, or something?
People like Michelle Goldberg, while accidentally infinitely more amusing than comedians named Whoopie (any relation THERE?), actually do every single college graduate a thorough disservice.
She proves all too thoroughly that there's not necessarily any inherent value in one's bachelor's degree. Her pretzel logic counsels HR departments everywhere to consider the inherent worth of ALL such certificates on a case-by-case basis.
On the flip-side, however, she's a walking billboard for educational reforms that target students for vocational schools and other less traditional educational tracks at an early age.
Something tells me that, if the adults in her life paid closer attention to her intellectual aptitude, she'd have been targeted for pigeon cleanup, or trash-poke duties in the gullies along the highways.
"... D.C.’s pundit class, which fetishizes bipartisanship ..."
It seems to be HER fetish:
"Right now, the Republican Party is threatening to blow up the world economy unless Democrats agree to savage cuts in spending while refusing any of the revenue increases that all serious economists say are necessary to actually address the national debt."
That's not ranting and raving for conciliatory negotiations? Or, is it that she "only demands it of one political party"?
Lost, of course, in the entertainment that is Ms. Goldberg, is the laser-sharp precision of Halperin's chosen anatomical description for Obama.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse