in describing his comments as "unartful," Gibbs continues to own them....

[mike_c]

Criticizing himself as "unartful" isn't a retraction by any means-- it's simply an acknowledgment that he should have sugar coated his contempt for liberals a bit more than he did, and that he shouldn't have expressed himself so plainly. Gibbs, a master of doublespeak, spoke his unvarnished truth for once, and now wishes he had buried it beneath a few layers of "artful" deniability.

There is no doubt that the WH has little more than contempt for the left unless they need our votes, which they somehow manage to simultaneously characterize as insignificant and a major cause of unreasoned grief. But in any event, Gibb's backpedaling isn't a retraction of the WH message to the left, it's an expression of regret for having spoken so straightforwardly.

[LoZoccolo]

1. Why should he? Anyone equating Obama and Bush* doesn't support Obama anyways.

No loss for the administration.

[Hello_Kitty]

5. Then why do they talk about them so much?

If they disparaged the teabaggers half as much as they do the left I'd be shocked.

[NYC Liberal]

6. You're not listening if you think they don't go after

the right-wingers.

[LoZoccolo]

8. Because they obviously like the teabaggers more with their birther accusations and red-baiting.

Don't you know?

[asdjrocky]

7. Then they won't miss my vote.

And people here should stop trying to scare or shame it out of me.

[LoZoccolo]

9. This is hilarious.

"I wasn't going to vote for Obama because he's just like Bush*...now I'm really not going to vote for him!"

How many times can you use that?

[asdjrocky]

10. Sure seems to get your goat.

So I guess it was good for at least one more time.

[LoZoccolo]

13. Say it all you want. n/t

[MineralMan]

20. No, they probably won't miss it.

That's really part of the point, isn't it? I doubt they could count on it anyhow.

[DirkGently]

15. He went past that, using the same strawman people here have

He went after "the professional left." That encompasses a lot more heft and intelligence than someone casually calling Obama a Bush clone. Gitmo. DADT. Targeted assassination. State Secrets. Co-opting BP's interpretation of the Gulf disaster. These are not people on "drugs." And by the way, wow, way to pick up rightwing cliches for attacking liberals, by the way, Mr. Gibbs.

It's a bad approach on his part, and eerily similar to the attempts at conflation we've seen here, with people arguing that that any criticism of the administration, no matter how solid or how constructive, is the equivalent of calling President Obama a Bush clone, and therefore a "rules violation" requiring that the critiques be driven from the site. It's a pretty bald fallacy, and while I can see people on an Internet discussion board trying it, it's surprising to see a political professional miscalculate so badly.

If this comment was not just a slip caused by a bad day of reading op-ed pieces, it's a politically suicidal stance, because if it's losing "the left," the Obama White House is losing, period. The right will not be appeased, because they simply want to be back in charge,the population in general does not respect peevish, schoolboy insults coming from our leaders or their representatives, and the left may receive the message that its opinions and principles are unwelcome.

Leaving ... who, exactly? Mr. Gibbs would do well to understand that while it may be that "the left has nowhere else to go," neither does he and the administration have anywhere else from which to draw support.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

35. Wait a second, is that Gibbs in your avatar?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

2. It's the "professional" centrist method of "artful" CYA.

[EFerrari]

4. It's Dennis envy. n/t

[jaxx]

11. LOL now that's funny, I don't care who you are.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

3. "I'm sorry if I offended any brain-dead commies..."

[Javaman]

12. The non-apology apology. nt

[gkhouston]

14. Unartful? More like unsmartful. Clumsy kabuki. n/t

[Radical Activist]

16. Gibbs didn't retract his point at all.

1) Obama has accomplished much and needs to accomplish more.
2) Professional pundits who can't see the difference between Obama and Bush are ridiculous.

He hasn't backed down from either statement and he's right.

[RaleighNCDUer]

18. Bullshit.

The professional pundits are NOT saying he's just like Bush - only that he must stop continuing Bush policies to avoid any such comparison.

And Gibbs and Rahm et al damn well know it.

If he doesn't want comparisons with Bush, he must put a halt to Bush policies. Is that so hard to grasp?

[MineralMan]

22. You're right. The professional pundits are not saying he's

just like Bush. They know better than that. It takes a special sort of blinders to say such a thing. The only place I've seen that said, and only briefly, is here and on FDL and Huffpo. Not from professionals. Just from amateurs.

[Radical Activist]

26. One of the few liberals syndicated in my daily paper.

Bush wasn't enough. Rall calls Obama Hitler III.





Personally, I appreciate the intelligent criticism like the ACLU report that criticized Obama for not doing more but also recognized that significant progress has been made since Bush left office. Few pundits share that level of honesty and perspective.

[MineralMan]

30. That pundit, then, and others like him are who Gibbs was

talking about, then. Fuck 'em. We have work to do. Bickering about Obama isn't getting it done.

[Hydra]

34. That was awesome

:thumbsup:

[Radical Activist]

25. On no, I've never seen anyone type "same as the old boss"

about Obama. It hasn't become overused to the point of being cliched at all. Nooooo. :eyes:

[BzaDem]

17. Good. Gibbs shouldn't backpedal. His only mistake was attempting to backpedal at all.

Sometimes, truth needs to be said, even if it is inconvenient.

[mike_c]

19. then there is simply no room in your party for leftists like me...

...and you won't object to my voting for another candidate in 2012. As you say, the truth needs to be said. Democrats can't crap on us over and over but still expect our support at the ballot box.

[MineralMan]

21. I doubt they expected your support in the first place.

I'm not even sure they could find any of it. I've certainly not seen any of it around here. I certainly don't care who you vote for. That's a decision you must make for yourself and cast in private at your polling place. Good luck to you. Now, I have campaigning to do, since our primary is today. Tomorrow, the campaigning for November begins.

[mike_c]

24. best of luck to you....

That's a realistic and productive approach, IMO-- recognition that we seek different political outcomes and will likely end up-- honorably-- on different sides of the electoral divide. It's the folks who rant "You must want Palin/McCain!" nonsense that I can't abide, or even have productive discussions with any longer.

Good luck in your primary! I'm in California, so ours was a couple of months ago. Damn, November is coming fast!

[MineralMan]

29. Well, I'm hoping for good luck.

Our House Member, Betty McCollum (who supports single payer) is a shoo-in. Most of my energy is going into the MN Governor's race and in CD6, where we have a fighting chance to defeat Michele Bachmann. Since it's a Congressional election year, all this talk about President Obama is pretty much a waste of time. It's time to try to get a better Congress for him to work with.

My goals and yours are about the same. It's just that I realize how difficult those goals are to reach, and know that it's going to be very difficult. The only way we're going to get any of those goals is to move Congress in a leftward direction. As far as I'm concerned, that's the only priority in 2010. I don't bother with unattainable schedules or getting angry that what cannot be done isn't being done. My eye is on the same goals you have, and maybe even a little further to the left. I'm working on them the only way I know how. It's 2010. There's an election this year, and that's the change we can help make.

President Obama comes up for reelection two more years down the road. I think we'll all like him a lot better if we can get him a better Congress to work with.

[BzaDem]

23. That's fine. You'll be back in 2016, whether you acknowledge it now or not.

One can only inflict so much pain on themselves before their survival instinct focuses the mind and forces them to see reason.

[damntexdem]

27. As he should.

But he should be worried about whether or not he remains artful enough to keep his job.

[spoony]

28. Gibbs is a fuck.

But he only says what his boss tells him to, so....

[blindpig]

31. Like the drunk said...

"I didn't mean to say it but I meant what I said.'

[Jester Messiah]

32. Contempt for liberals? Too broad a brush.

He was expressing contempt for the Never-Enough brigade, those who can't get it into their heads that half a loaf is better than none. Those who don't realize that nothing is ever accomplished except through compromise. In my view, contempt is an appropriate reaction to such folk, who in the end do their causes more harm than good by refusing to accept incremental progress.

[Binka]

39. Such Folks & "Their Causes"

Really? FFS are you ten? BARF. In my view you deserve IGNORE. :puke:

[Jester Messiah]

41. Well... bye.

[eridani]

40. The people who really deserve contempt are the ones who give everything away

--before compromising even starts.

[Jester Messiah]

42. Fair point. [nt]

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

33. As he should.

Gibbs was 100$ correct.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

36. Freudian typo is Freudian. -nt

[Gormy Cuss]

37. Nah, it was just his two cents.

[TheKentuckian]

38. Sure, inartifully just means I didn't day it right not that he didn't say what he wanted

Plus, who are all of these "professional liberals" that say Obama is Bush? None that I heard not Malloy, Schultz, Maddow, Olberman, not even Greenwald.

Nobody but a few boggers says that in any global way. Don't even pretend there is no policy continuity, though.
Obama sucks horribly on civil liberties, isn't exactly adversarial to voodoo economics, is bull in South America, is very receptive to "stakeholders", and rocks the war machine.