Time to man the fuck up.

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When Obama was running for president there were people saying that he needed to stand up to his attackers. Others, like my friend, fellow blogger, and state Senate candidate Phillip Baruth, said that he knew what he was doing, he'd lived in the country and dealt with racism all his life, and that we should have confidence in him.I wasn't necessarily sold, but it seemed to be working for him so I didn't complain too much.

But after this Shirley Sherrod fiasco I have to ask, “Can't anyone here play this game?”

The basic outlines of the story are clear: Serial liar and right-wing scaremonger Andrew Breitbart published a heavily edited video of two minutes of a speech by Shirley Sherrod, an official at the US Department of Agriculture. Breitbart's claim was that Sherrod is a racist and that she is using her position with the USDA to screw white people. Within seconds the Obama administration leapt into action and fired her without even finding out the truth of the story.

Things have been changing so fast that when I walked out to the end of my driveway this morning the headline on the front page was that Thomas Vilsack was sticking to her firing, even though by now it was clear that the whole thing was built on a lie, but by the time I got back to the house and turned on the radio the same Secretary of Agriculture was considering reconsidering his decision. You can almost picture people running up and down the halls at the White House, bumping into each other, throwing files in the air, and tripping over their own ties.

By the end of the day the White House and Vilsack were apologizing to her, practically begging her to take her job back, and that might happen. Even Breitbart, that lying sack of shit, was pretending to feel sorry for her.

So why is the Obama administration rolling over for a lying, right-wing hit man like Breitbart? What is he really afraid of? There were a lot of people who didn't like it when Obama appointed Rahm Emmanuel his chief of staff, but I kind of liked it because he is a fighter. The problem is, there's no fighting. Just when is this administration going to decide that it's not going to play dead for every right-wing attack?

What's next? Is Obama going to invite Sherrod and Breitbart to the White House for another beer fucking summit?

It is time to fight.

5 thoughts on “Time to man the fuck up.”

  1. So why is the Obama administration rolling over for a lying, right-wing hit man like Breitbart? . . . The problem is, there’s no fighting. Just when is this administration going to decide that it’s not going to play dead for every right-wing attack?  What’s next? Is Obama going to invite Sherrod and Breitbart to the White House for another beer fucking summit?

    It is time to fight.

    There has been plenty of fighting. The problem is, the White House only seems to get in the ring throw a punches at the the liberals who have been correct on every single damn issue on which the White House has strategically chosen to cave.  

    Health care, Iraq, Guantanamo, restoring the rule-of-law in the Justice Dept., meaningful stimulus packages and economic recovery policies, I could go on all night. They are quick to take a punch at Howard Dean, or whistleblowers, or members of congress who put the interests of working people above Wall Street bankers. Those people, just like Ms. Sherrod, are insta-targets for the White House. Still, the White House bends over backwards to coddle Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson, while President’s allies in un-fucking this country are ignored or publicly castigated.

    But when it comes to right-wing media or the Tea-Baggers in congress enabled by it, the White House acts like one big testicle cozy for the lunatic fringe.

    How many times and how loudly do we need to keep saying this simple, obvious, undeniable truth (courtesy of Chicago’s finest):

    Long ago I began saving myself untold ergs of mental energy by simply presuming that if a Conservative is in front of a camera, behind a microphone or by-lining an editorial about anything to do with culture or politics, I assuming they are lying. Because to remain a Conservative these days you have to lie to yourself pretty much 24/7, and if you are a Conservative media thug you have to keep that lie-based consensual political hallucination going by broadcasting outright bullshit ’round the clock.

    Lying well or poorly. Lying smoothly or awkwardly. Lying out of stupidity or fear or racism or venality or just because they’re fucking nuts. Lying by omission. Lying by false equivalence. Lying by beating statistics until they bled.

    But lying.

    But for years now I have always, always, always presumed that somehow, some way the Conservative who is opining about the state of the nation is in some crucial way just fucking lying his ass off.

    Sadly, after all this time, it has proved to be a presumption that has rarely failed me.

    Which leaves us with the same question we always seem to return to after the White House gets head-faked and humiliated by the Right yet again: How the fuck is it that insignificant Liberals like me can figure this shit out with one frontal lobe tied behind our backs, while the Most Gifted Democratic Politician in a Generation keeps proving himself over and over and over again to be clueless, callow and jejune?

    Mr. President, if you would like to know what the people who put you in the fucking White House are thinking about Brietbartgate, it is just this simple: No matter how many times you finally figure out that you were wrong and we were right, how is it that your loyal Liberal supporters still get the back of Rahm Emanuel’s hand every time we ask for something like, say, Single Payer health care, while your entire Administration jumps like trained seals every time a Right wing scumbag like Breitbart snaps his fingers?

  2. Not all of us didn’t see this coming. He may talk nice but ‘spine’ has never been one of Obama’s traits(like most DC Dems). It’s always been my biggest problem with him. One doesn’t take a gun to a knife fight with crazy people. When they’re as crazy as the modern GOP, they need a .44 Magnum, but Obama brings a nail clipper to the fight.

  3. When I envisioned change w/ Obama, I envisioned FDR-like internet chat reaching out to the many Americans he had mobilized for his election.  Instead it seems to be politics as usual with all the ‘beholdin’ to the lobbyists and corporate donors who helped to fund his campaign.  And, in my realm, when science is continually trumped by politics, I am disgusted.

    Thanks Jack.

    I hear from insiders in DC that Rahm Emanuel is more interested in fighting with and beating down anyone he has perceived as a personal enemy of his power than in moving legislation or getting thins done.  I have heard tales of some real vindictive game-playing, and everyone is afraid to put that fact out in public.

  4. Nice use of the Fuck, Fucking, shit words.  Real pithy.

    Now we need puke, piss, and muthafucka, and we’ll all be true revolutionaries.

    Well done !

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