"The most open and accessible inauguration in our nation's history"

 

"He enjoys the back and forth, and he is not, you know, tough, mean, insulting, snarling none of that stuff, and we weren't either," Larry Kudlow told CNBC’s Melissa Francis re sweet nothings whispered in each others' ears when "Obama attend[ed a conservative dinner party" at George Will's place the other night. Above, Ringley Bros. Barnum & Bailey Circus elephants kowtow to trainer. (Tony Cenicola/The New York Times photo)

"Like George W. Bush, [Palin] reinforces every European cliché about the otherness (cowboyness, hickiness, wackiness) of Americans, sniffs British author Timothy Garton Ash, according to a James Rosen Fox News report headlined "Palin Fascination, Scorn Shows No Sign of Receding." A sucker for punishment, we googled author Ash and found this predictably reflexively Bush-bashing, give-Obama-yet-another-pass pronouncement from the author's latest Guardian column:

At a moment when the United States is suspended between an outgoing president who won't do anything to stop the slaughter and an incoming president who feels he can't yet, Europe has a chance to show what it can do …

Look at the mess we're in. Europe faces two acute crises that threaten both our interests and our values. The Gaza war is a negation of every principle for which Europe claims to stand. It directly affects our vital interests, not least because the latest round of Palestinian suffering (compounded by the Palestinians' own divided and irresponsible leadership) will further inflame the anger of Muslims living in Europe. The Russian-Ukrainian gas dispute has already resulted in elderly citizens of some eastern European member states shivering in unheated apartments. If protecting our people from dying of cold is not a vital interest I don't know what is. And this conflict, too, mocks European ideals of conflict resolution by peaceful negotiation under the rule of law.

At least he's got it right about "the mess we're in," but how about Ash's facile dismissal of the current POTUS Bush's Gaza-war policy as a stubbornly willful "won't" vs. PEOTUS Obama's presumably well-intentioned but impotent "feels he can't yet"?  We were reminded of two things that came in over the transom in the last period of time. First, this obscenely condescending and disingenuous — come to think of it, downright lying — email from Barack Obama himself that we received this morning thanks to our having put ourselves on his mailing list way back in the heat of the primary campaign:

Sissy -- On January 20th, our journey to bring change will officially begin.

We're organizing the most open and accessible inauguration in our nation's history. And we're doing it without contributions from Washington lobbyists or big corporations.

Just like we did on the campaign, we're relying entirely on supporters like you -- ordinary people giving whatever they can afford to make this an event for all Americans.

We guess it depends upon what your definition of "relying entirely on … ordinary people giving whatever they can afford" is. For the record, "donors are being limited to $50,000, and according to the nation's moribund "newspaper of record" itself, big-time spenders like Anti-City-Upon-a-Hillist George Soros and other well-heeled supporters from Hollywood, K Street and — we're shocked, shocked! — the usual suspects in the "big corporation community" have given the lion's share of the $24 million now resting comfortably in Obama's bank account to facilitate the imminent Greatest Show on Earth:

President-elect Barack Obama has raised more than $24 million for his inauguration so far, much of it with single checks of $25,000 or $50,000 from executives from Silicon Valley, Wall Street and Hollywood as well as from former supporters of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.

There's a sucker born every minute, but Obama, sir, we just don't happen to be one of them. You gratuitously and without accountability called us a racist way back in December of 2006, and now you're taking us for a fool. Harrumph!

Now for the second item that relates to the spirit of that original "an outgoing president who won't do anything to stop the slaughter" phraseology cited above, and this is a keeper, big time, from Assistant Village Idiot [via Maggie's Farm], in the provocatively titled two-part post "Did Steven Pinker Lie?":

I am just barely into Pinker’s The Stuff of Thought. Before I can read farther, there is an annoyance I will get off my chest. I am aware that Pinker is politically liberal, somewhere near the “progressive” default setting for academics. Conservatives are also wearily adjusted to liberals gratuitously injecting their political sermons off-handedly into other matters. Somehow, they just can’t stop themselves.

As we wrote in his comments:

Just as you know "elite" audiences and their allies will snicker and cheer in appreciation when performing artists mouth the required Bush bashing in their banter. Its their way of signaling to each other that they are members of the tribe.

The importance of being noticed is where it's at.

Update: Our friend Carol Ward leaves an insightful analysis in the comments at Assistant Village Idiot:

My interpretation was that his emotions overcame his logic because to accept the logic would mean outright ostracism within his tribe. Pinker probably would have recognized the danger of tribal ostracism. In the wild, an ostracized individual is left to die. In the wilds of Cambridge, there would be no tenure, no praise, no admiration … in other words, left to die.

At that point, to me Pinker was an intellectual, but not a courageous intellectual. In fact, he seems to have spent a lot of time trying to prove his bona fides to his tribe. Perhaps he is overcompensating.

As we wrote in the comments to our own blogpost He complained about "respect creep" last year, "gratuitous, reflexive dissing of President Bush [is] a signal of species recognition."

Comments

[goomp]

Kate Smith sang "God Bless America." Now that the ignorant liberals are in control it will have to be "God Help America."

[pam]

My head is going to explode before the rotund girl takes the stage and belts out her tune...

[kimsch]

Open and accessible my foot. If I were to go, I wouldn't be able to go to the "front" area because I can't stand for long periods and would need my Rollator (wheeled walker chair type thing) and they aren't allowed in front of the port a potties at the inauguration. Besides, it would be too cold. I wouldn't go to any inauguration in January even in DC...

[Laura Lee Donoho]

The photo is a hoot Sissy! Obama is the ringmaster now that he's got Bill Kristol enlisted as well as George Will re the dinner they attended last night. Smart man that Obama. Just ask them and they will come...the easy ones that is. I note that Peggy Noonan was also in attendance.

As for the inauguration I have discovered I may have a dilemma if I am not very careful.

I am employed as an art teacher for our city's school district. The administrator who is responsible for the art, music, p.e. teachers and the principals is a really great lady who also happens to be African American.

She has only been in this position for two years and has been a real advocate for the art teachers who have been told by previous administrators that we are the lowest of the low. This lady has done a lot for us and is really a good person.

This morning I read in our local paper that she and her family are attending the inauguration and that she is very proud of Obama and especially Michelle Obama. She has never spoken of her political views to us so this has come as a surprise to me but I suppose it shouldn't have.

Now I know I had better be very careful about blogging at school even during breaks and being sure that none of my co-workers know about my blog. I never speak of it to anyone. I just want to keep my opinions free but I also would like to keep my job.

Anyway, I read tonight that President Bush has declared Washington D. C. an emergency so they can use funding to pay for all the extra policing that it will take for this inauguration. I also read that 15,000 hotel rooms are yet to be filled in the D.C. area. It's also going to be very cold. It will be very interesting to see from the comfort of my own home what comes from this historic moment. Four years of this. I already miss President Bush.

[Gayle Miller]

Sissy - I've been blogging about the "over the top" inauguration kerfuffle - this morning en route to work we spotted porto potties ON Pennsylvania Avenue.

Just the message we want to send to the rest of the country - and the rest of the world!

[Sissy Willis]

Egad, Laura Lee. It looks like you've become what former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky calls a "doublethinker" under the Fear Society Lite jackboot of political correctness.

Gayle: Stay inside and lock the doors. :-)

[Laura Lee Donoho]

Natan Sharansky. What a heroic man. Named for a heroic prophet. "Thou art the man."

Sharansky speaks the truth. I will be very careful but I will continue to speak the truth. I can't be a doublethinker. That's too confusing.

[Teresa]

One must wonder where all this money is going... you would think $24 mil would be enough to cover EVERYTHING. But apparently not...

http://tinyurl.com/9yz6hl

The link above is to a news article detailing the fact that President Bush has already declared an emergency in DC because the $15 mil on hand for the inauguration is not enough to foot the bill...

Okay, $24 + $15 = $39 mil if my math is good... that's not enough for a few hours for ONE DAY????

Yeah, where is all the money going?