White House Continues Putting Country Above Party By Reacting "Furiously" To Silly Speech Schedule

Yes, if I were president in a 9.1% unemployment (17% real unemployment) country about to slip into a second recession, I'd be primarily focused on a speech's scheduling, too.

The White House was well aware the president’s speech would conflict with a planned Republican debate sponsored by POLITICO and NBC to be held at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif. The debate would be broadcast live by MSNBC, CNBC, Telemundo and live-streamed by POLITICO.

Yet the White House did not see this as an obstacle. “With all due respect, the POLITICO-MSNBC debate was one that was going on a cable station,” the White House source said. “It was not sacrosanct. We knew they would push it back and then there would be a GOP debate totally trashing the president. So it wasn’t all an upside for us."

Not sacrosanct, like, say, the President's preferred "We must act now" speech that he's been putting off for two months.

Allah points out:

[T]his entire moronic episode could have been avoided had O simply asked to address Congress later. But he was apparently intent to have it on the night of the debate — note the boldface part in the blockquote — which means Carney did indeed lie shamelessly to the press yesterday when he said the timing was a coincidence. Here he is this afternoon lying again, insisting that no one cares when the speech is scheduled — except for every Democrat in America, apparently — and that the White House is A-OK with it happening on Thursday. Except, of course, that they’re very much not.

The "furious" is quoted from Politico's headline, not from any source. They are greatly annoyed, however. One source grouses the House "will do anything to muck us up," and I that "muck" is probably a soft rhyme for the verb actually used.

And more whining:

The White House is viewing it as very consequential, however. “It is a big deal,” the source said. “It shows the House Republicans will do no outreach, nothing.”

And who does the White House believe was really behind treating the president so shabbily?

“At first, I didn’t think it was Boehner, but his caucus,” the source said. “But maybe not. Maybe it is him.”

The article details how they're only concerned with optics -- they want the grand stage -- and tv viewership, which means this is, in case you were unsure, almost exclusively a campaign event. They are surprised the Republicans aren't eager to join Organizing for America.

How blatant a campaign move is it? They've already leaked their Blame Republicans strategy to the press.

in the forthcoming issue — ‘Can He Step Up His Game? Obama’s next move: if he can’t fix the economy, make sure the Republicans get the blame’

Obama is not looking for solutions; he is looking for campaign attacks. He wants a laundry-list of vague, soundbite-friendly non-initiatives (nonitiatives?) which he knows the Republicans will reject (he's counting on them to reject them) so he can claim all economic troubles are due to Republicans not wanting to throw more money at high-speed rail and high-speed internet.

posted by Ace at 06:56 PM

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