Obama: "Don't Think We're Not Keeping Score, Brother"
Karl Rove says that is what the President told Rep. Peter De Fazio after the Oregon Democrat voted against the stimulus package.
Heavens to Lyndon Johnson, this made my day. I always assumed that Obama could be a tough m'fer when crossed (he won, didn't he?) but I wasn't sure.
Now, unless Peter D says it never happened, I'm going to believe the President said it and celebrate.
I wouldn't bother scorekeeping with Republicans. I expect the likes of Boehner and Cantor to do their worst, which, in the end, will secure our majority. No, I'd focus on the Democrats who think they can piss on a Democratic President's leg in the belief that he'll just think it's raining. They need to support the Obama program or start paying a price (you know, the way LBJ only built dams in the home states of friendly senators).
And then there are the foreign leaders like the Europeans who ridicule Obama's efforts to save the world's economy and, of course, Netanyahu who clearly believes Obama is a pushover.
Put these guys on the score card too. Barack Obama is the most powerful person in the world and the most popular. Nobody should feel free to treat him like chopped liver (that was for you, Bibi).
Keep score. Take names. Do everything LBJ did, except involve us in another dumb war.
Couldn't agree more, MJ. That sounds more like something Rahm would say, though. Publicly I think Obama would take a more conciliatory stand, but I would like to see some fire from him occasionally.
April 2, 2009 4:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
MJ: Check out Livni's comments. See http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ioi_0jtO9RjMwPNRoXNCndRPRq3gD97A7QUG0
And some ridiculed humble me for saying that the Palestinians had no peace partner. Now the out-going FM of the GOI agrees.
April 2, 2009 4:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Stop the presses! Mythbuster and Tzipi Livni agree.
April 2, 2009 6:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Lieberman was a little too blunt for Livni eh! Gave away too much of the game publicly? Just maybe there's some major buyers remorse going on:
Ynetnews: "...It is still unclear how long Avigdor Lieberman will remain in the post of foreign minister..." hmmm...
and then this comes out today:
JTA.org: " Lieberman grilled in laundering case"
April 2, 2009 10:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
WTF does MB's comment have to do with article and thread. Does MJ care? Is MB's shatbombing accepted as behavior allwable for all or for one. Is MB actually MJ?
April 3, 2009 10:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
Was I replying to you -- No!
Was I replying to MJ -- No!
So mind your own F business.
April 3, 2009 10:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't know about 'you know, the way LBJ only built dams in the home states of friendly senators'. Trying to use earmarks as leverage is swimming against the tide. I think Obama should use soft power here. Obama and other Democrats can ostracize Democrats who vote against what has to be done. Pelosi can prevent committee assignments. Fund raising can be hampered. There all sort of ways to use softpower here effectively. Caro's books on LBJ which are great books are not much of a recommendation for how LBJ wielded power.
April 2, 2009 5:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
BEFORE the day of the ten thousand legislative earmarks. Why do you think that legislative earmarks were developed? Other wise the lumps sums appropriated for each agency as handed out become executive earmarks. Track budget requested by President and passed by Congress. Sometimes they align; sometimes not.
April 2, 2009 8:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
What you say?!
"Caro's books on LBJ which are great books are not much of a recommendation for how LBJ wielded power."
How can a recommendation be retrospective by over 40 years? What's the point of this, Mr. Zed? You got me intrigued, then the whole thing kinda evanesced or something. :)
April 3, 2009 1:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
Before the Karl Rove version gets too much traction, perhaps the original story that clearly illustrates the humorous context of the whole exchange should be read in full:
http://www.oregonlive.com/newsflash/index.ssf?/base/news-30/1238517843114870.xml&storylist=orlocal
April 2, 2009 5:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
Just like MJR to transform an innocuous exchange into a blunt instrument.
April 2, 2009 6:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh please.
It was Karl Rove who is the transformer guy here, not MJ.
Should MJ had done due diligence and checked the original source? Hell yes.
Frankly, this post reveals that your pique at MJ so clouds your vision that you fire willy-nilly at the wrong target.
BTW, why shouldn't mythbuster agree with Tzipi?
April 2, 2009 6:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Pique? Moi? Jamais. Please don't take me that seriously. (Cue to my detractors, I know already... you don't.)
As for Mr. Myth and Tzipi, just strange bedfellows is all. Perhaps peace is possible.
I do find it amusing, though, that MJ would, without checking, interpret Obama's apparent jest in accordance with his own wish that our new boss start keeping score, which of course would be at odds with everything Obama has professed to stand for. (Incidentally, it was the desire for a muscular Democrat, one who would keep score and take names, that led me to prefer ever so slightly Hillary, perhaps unwisely.)
April 2, 2009 7:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, being the topnotch journalist I am, a veritable Walter Lippmann of our time, it is incumbent on me to check quotes that appear in my posts.
April 2, 2009 8:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Pique isn't serious by definition...
MJ is guilty of trusting the psychopathic messenger and going from there. He also knows the game on the Hill up close and personal.
Many people who support Obama are uncertain about his "muscularity" and would adopt the Karl version of reality with relief.
Por moi, it was Obama's demonstration of his skill at going in for the kill that prompted me to declare, "I'm in". Aussie PM John Howard attacked Obama on the day after he announced his presidential run and as one Aussie commentator put it Obama's immediate riposte "drew blood" and was "deadly":
" Australia's conservative Prime Minister John Howard said Sunday that victory for Democratic Sen. Barack Obama and his party in next year's presidential election would be a boon for terrorists.
"If I were running al Qaeda in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008, and pray, as many times as possible, for a victory not only for Obama, but also for the Democrats," Howard said, speaking on "Sunday," a TV show on Australia's Nine Network.
March 2008 is when Obama has said he would bring U.S. troops home from Iraq, according to legislation he introduced in the Senate."
snip]
"Obama, campaigning in Iowa, told reporters Sunday he's flattered that one of Bush's allies "started attacking me the day after I announced (his presidential run) -- I take that as a compliment."
The Democratic presidential hopeful said if the Australian prime minister was "ginned up to fight the good fight in Iraq," he needs to send another 20,000 Australians to the war.
"Otherwise, it's just a bunch of empty rhetoric," Obama said."
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/02/11/obama.comment/
April 2, 2009 9:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
He also knows the game on the Hill up close and personal.
Seems to me that chrismealy commenting below @ 8:23 PM is a more likely fit for that definition.
You tried to politely correct MJ with the link that he didn't get the context right, that Obama bascially was teasing DeFazio, joking. He's ignoring that and so are commenters.
Mealy had to point out that DeFazio isn't one of the blue dogs but is coming from the left
But others are still going with MJ and Rove's imaginary version.
This whole post is a silly mess of disinfo! And it's helping Rove push his imaginary narrative!
Geez it's like being back in Bush world, this thread, just another made up reality, tell a story and make it reality and just ignore any facts anyone brings up.
April 2, 2009 10:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
They ignore Lally at their peril.
Pique, according to Merrriam Webster online: a transient feeling of wounded vanity. Great definition. But since I am utterly selfless and without vanity, it couldn't possibly apply to me.
AA, reality is in the eye of the beholder.
Which, getting back to MJ, was kind of my main point. Obama ran as a centrist "post-partisan" uniter, yet there is a crowd (I believe MJ might be among them) who keep expecting him to govern more like George W. Bush (not policy-wise, obviously). Did they think he was lying? My not-quite-pique was not about the fact checking; it was more about selective perception of reality.
And as I mentioned, I'd be perfectly happy if Obama was keeping score. Jon (neocon, at least as far as Israel) Chait had a great piece in the (Israel Lobby propaganda rag) New Republic about how the dysfunctional Democratic party might be a bigger threat to Obama than the Republicans.
http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=07bd4a20-60a7-44a9-ab92-115eeb62bd92
April 2, 2009 10:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
It does help to know the players of course, but the game is the game is the game. Don't forget who MJ used to work for. ;~{)
I knew I should have posted a pithy quote from the article.....got lazy.
I'm actually quite enjoying the dynamics on the world stage. Obama is an adept shmoozer. He makes the other heads of state want to find ways to get along.
Can't wait for the bibi & the bozos show to come to town.
April 3, 2009 12:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
Obama is an adept shmoozer.
Excellent choice of words, agree with ya 100%! It was in fact a most pleasant surprise....I am sooo glad he dropped that Dukakis routine, just in time, too....
Can't wait for the bibi & the bozos show to come to town.
Hah! You are right...especially because, don't forget how much experience Bibi has on American TV, not a newbie in the schmooze American style department.
April 3, 2009 2:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
"......how much experience Bibi has on American TV..."
I expect he will already be lining up interviews and can count on obsequious softball questions from all and sundry.
One big fat ? is the amount of bad blood among the Clintonites who are in important positions in the administration (Dennis Ross excepted, of course). At the very least, I doubt that Hillary et al would be inclined to trust him.
April 3, 2009 3:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks 1ally.
April 4, 2009 11:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Heavens to Lyndon Johnson, this made my day."
And that line made my day! I couldn't agree more. Very, very glad to hear this, and seriously hope this account is true. Thanks for posting!
April 2, 2009 6:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Glad you liked my line!!! Thanks
April 2, 2009 8:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
An all-powerful president ruling over Congress, Europe and the Middle East: the role Mr. Rosenberg imagines for the POTUS is strangely similar to the infamous "unitary executive".
Note that Mr. DeFazio voted against the stimulus because it wasn't progressive enough, with large tax cuts instead of more funding for schools and railroads. So really, we should support Obama when he threatens elected officials not conservative enough?
April 2, 2009 6:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes. This. Very good!
April 3, 2009 3:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hear! Hear! No more all powerful Oz crap. De Fazio is a real lefty and not some corporate shill. The House is the people's house and we need to take the power back from the unitary executive whether he has a higher IQ than the last one or not.
What is this fawning over schoolyard bully talk? I thought people voted for change? Not really. Many voted for more of the same i.e. my bully can beat your bully.
So far the "score" is people zero and profit makers 10. I'll applaud when we get a national health care plan and pass the EFCA and close some of our 760 some military bases. I'm keeping score too. And De-fazio is a winner in my court.
April 3, 2009 9:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good. Clear message to the blue dog Democrats so determined to keep their options open, even to the point of joining the first rats off should the ship sink anew: We all burn together or you burn separately. Let them cry into their pillows, thinking about that. The hearth of liberty must sometimes be warmed by the kicked asses of fair-weather warriors.
Jefferson, I think, said that...
April 2, 2009 7:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
Peter De-fazio is actually a member of the Congressional Progessive Caucas not one of the Blue Dogs.
He voted against the bill on principle because he was one of the congresscritters that actually read the bill. He knew it would pass. Rep. Defazio IMHO is one of the 'Good' guys which worries me if Obama is truly after him... If Obama really wants to fling his weight around, maybe he should check his score sheet on some of our belligent Democrats that want to make the Middle East even more unstable and shove even more money to the war makers -- like Democratic congresswoman Shelley Berkley an influencial member of the House subcommitee on the Middle East and South Asia who's never supported a bill AIPAC doesn't like.
Anyways, here's Rep. Defazio's side of the story:
Defazio's Press Release: DeFazio Votes Against Excessive Spending Bill [2/13/09]
Defazio's Press Release: DeFazio Comments on President Obama's FY2010 Budget [2/26/09]
Also, another thing he's one of the very few sane Democrats we have when it comes to War and Peace issues, looking out for 'our' interests. He was the brave Congressman who authored the Defazio Amendment in '07 that was to prohibit a preemptive attack with Iran without Congressional Authorization!
Defazio's Press Release: DeFazio Offers Amendment to Prohibit Preemptive War with Iran without Congressional Authorization
[5/16/07]
Needless to say the amendment went down with some prominent progressives voting against the amendment. AIPAC was very active that day!
April 2, 2009 10:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
"belligerent"
April 2, 2009 10:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's the "tree" of liberty. Like a tree, liberty is born in the mud, and reaches for the stars.
April 2, 2009 7:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Evidently, the "tree of political convenience" must be refreshed from time to time with the bullshit of "progressives".
April 3, 2009 11:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hey dummies, De Fazio isn't a blue dog. He's one of the top pro-transit guys in the House. It's the weasels in the Senate who need to get in line. De Fazio was signaling that you can't take progressives for granted. He's one of the good guys.
April 2, 2009 8:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have been saying the same thing , by myself, for a while now.
Glad to know I am not alone anymore.
I might even be upset by the name calling , if I ever read replies!
April 2, 2009 9:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
That Barack is a baaad mutha-
(shut your mouth!)
But I'm talkin' bout Barack?!
Who's the cat that won't cop out
When there's danger all about?
(Barack!)
Right on
Don't know or care if this is true (I hope he does push people on things like the stimulus, health care, etc.). But anything Karl (bizzaro world) Rove says, take as the opposite (or even better, hit him where it hurts, ignore the loser).
April 2, 2009 9:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Folks, before commenting, please take a look at the link posted by Lally above and the comment by chrismealy.
April 2, 2009 10:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
You were saying above it is apparent jest. Considered in that light, it sounds *exactly* like No-drama Obama, and not necessarily like Rahm. So I figure you got this right, Guerilla.
April 3, 2009 1:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
Just a little aside --
Obama has met with the "Blue Dogs", the "New Democrat Coalition", the "Congressional Hispanic Caucus" and most recently with the "Congressional Black Caucus" but for some reason he just hasn't found the time to speak to the Congressional Progressive Caucus! No drama -- just the knife maybe?
Liberals Feeling Slighted
Progressive Caucus Still Waiting for Obama Meeting
By Tory Newmyer, Roll Call Staff [03/26/09
http://www.rollcall.com/issues/54_109/news/33543-1.html
President Obama has first meeting with Congressional Black Caucus [02/27/09]
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/nation/stories/DN-cbc_27nat.ART.State.Edition1.4a60d0b.html
Anti-war [Nb: Blended Caucus] Democrats remain silent about Obama’s policies
By Mike Soraghan [04/01/09]
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/anti-war-democrats-remain-silent-about-obamas-policies-2009-04-01.html
April 3, 2009 2:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
Okay, but does it upset you so much? He just got his budget passed, with money in it for health care. That Judd Gregg is spitting tacks over that one. Do you enjoy watching a man who already is obviously the best President since JFK and maybe since FDR?
April 3, 2009 11:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
I 'try' to watch as much as I can. Also, I think its too early days to start comparing him to JFK and FDR. But, when you compare him to Bush -- I can't argue that he appears a bloody genius.
I'm just watching at the moment.
April 3, 2009 12:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
I respect what you're saying and I honestly don't think it's very early, maybe early-ish. Did you see he opened himself to questions with students in Europe -- Presidents never do that.
As to Bush, you need to look to the 18th Century to find a President who you can even argue was as bad, IMHO.
April 3, 2009 6:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Curse you, MJ! Tricked me into reading a fricking Karl Rove article before I realized what was happening to me!
A pox upon thee! :)
April 3, 2009 1:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think that Pres. Obama sent out the precise message he wanted. He is making people think about things. What a change!!
He might have been messin' with DeFazio by making a jestful comment like that, but he was clearly not talking just to DeFazio. If I was a Blue Dog Democrat (funny they all bleed red around here, literally and figuratively) I would have to start thinking that there in fact might be a price for me thinking and acting like a Repub.
I know that the ones running our state government act like WV won't pay a price for going red. I am sure that once again WV will learn its lessons the hard way. Reality is still reality despite the last 8 years.
April 3, 2009 9:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm sure there are contexts in which parrotting Karl Rove is appropriate, maybe passing on his chili recipe or something. This isn't one of them. It's embarrassing that this needs to be pointed out.
April 3, 2009 10:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not only happy to know President Obama is keeping score, I'm even happier he's telling these guys to their face he is.
Remember when John Edwards was wondering aloud whether or not Obama was "tough enough" for the job of president? That question has been answered.
Historians often draw comparisions between Obama and John F. Kennedy. Kennedy was quoted saying, "Always forgive your enemies, but never forget their names."
Obama's opponents always remind everyone the President is a "Chicago politician." Apparently, that also means he ain't no wimp.
Karl Rove is one of the most repellent human beings sucking air. Can't he and Dick Morris hook up in some underground S&M bar or something?
April 3, 2009 11:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
I wouldn't mind a little more spending on mass transit, particularly rails. It should not only come first, but should far outweigh the highway/street budget, seeing as everyone has an SUV and should be able to negotiate worsening road conditions.
April 6, 2009 10:01 AM | Reply | Permalink