The public’s love affair with President Barack Obama is ridiculous and quite possibly poisonous. “Obama is so f–ing cool,” a male comedian at a Laugh Factory performance recently gushed. I had a heterosexual professor who joked that he had feelings for Obama because of the supposedly tremendous job Obama has done so far.
Why is the public so infatuated with Obama? I have no clue. Let’s look at some of Obama’s less-than-lovable character foibles.
On The Jay Leno Show, Obama compared his poor bowling skills to athletes in the Special Olympics. Later, Obama called out a police officer for arresting a man that refused to identify himself when asked by authorities. More recently, Obama decided to again criticize when he called Kanye West a “jackass.”
These slips of the tongue, if done on former President George W. Bush’s watch, would have caused him endless troubles.
I was deeply disappointed with the soft response from the chairman of the Special Olympics, Tom Shriver. Shriver told ABC News, “He [Obama] was very sincere … said he was a fan of the movement … he said he was ready to have some of our athletes over to the White House to bowl or play basketball or help him improve his score.”
In the second case, Obama took a jab at a police officer — admittedly not knowing the whole story. Obama said the cop “acted stupidly.” The end result? The Harvard professor — who refused to identify himself during the altercation — Obama and the police officer all had a beer together at the White House. And everything was OK.
If only Oktoberfest could bring world leaders together like this, we’d be well on our way to world peace in no time.
The last strike is the one that puzzles me the most, even though it is ultimately far less important. I agree with the sentiment but detest the execution.
During pre-interview casual talk, the president called Kanye West a “jackass.” He asked reporters present to “cut the president some slack” and forget the remark. But guess what? Other people were listening to the interview in another room, the comment ended up on Twitter immediately and the story started to bloom.
One would think that the president would have to answer for being a poor role model. Is it OK for anyone to publicly call a celebrity a “jackass,” or is it only OK if you’re the president? The White House initially decided to refuse to comment.
The parallel I draw when looking at West being slammed was when Bush called a reporter for The New York Times a “major league asshole.” Bush received endless flack for this campaign trail mistake. Obama — already elected — did not. It blew over for Obama.
Oddly, the media has allowed these things to slide. And when the media slips, the outrage rarely follows. Public apathy reigns. This leads us back to where we began. If “Obama is so f–ing cool,” why evaluate him by tough standards if we don’t have to?
Marcus Bockman is a senior journalism major and a contributing writer for the Daily 49er.