Robert Gibbs was right to criticize the 'professional left'

[ProSense]

Robert Gibbs was right to criticize the 'professional left'

I'm with Gibbs.

At times I've found White House press secretary Robert Gibbs to be unnecessarily irascible, and maybe his lashing out at the constant grumbling of the "professional left" wasn't the best tactic. You want the base worked up -- but for you, not about you.

Nonetheless, his basic point was spot on: The complainers from the left are, in some combination, myopic, forgetful and deranged.

<...>

Health-care reform, in this glass-half-empty world, is a disappointment because it lacks a public option. The president's failure to close Guantanamo or end the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy is a betrayal. If only President Obama was willing to bang heads, name names, stand tough, he would have been able to get -- fill in the blank -- a bigger stimulus, tougher financial reform, new legislation to help unions organize.

Excuse me, but can these people not count to 60? Have they somehow failed to notice that Mitch McConnell and John Boehner have not exactly been playing nice? That while the left laments Obama's minor deviations from party orthodoxy, the right has been portraying him, with some success, as an out-of-control socialist?

Apparently not. Responding to Gibbs, Jane Hamsher, of the blog Firedoglake, derided Obama's record of "corporatist capitulation" and noted, "Spiro Agnew -- sorry, Robert Gibbs -- says ‘the professional left is not representative of the progressives who organized, campaigned, raised money and ultimately voted for Obama.' Well, the Obama in the White House is not representative of the Obama who organized, campaigned, raised money and ran for office, so I guess it's a wash."

Spiro Agnew? Gibbs is going to have to work on his alliterative skills to come up with anything as memorable as nattering nabobs of negativism. Carping cavilers of cyberspace?

more

[rug]

1. Ironic.

[FrenchieCat]

3. That comment coming from someone like you is actually

not ironic,
more like predictable.

[rug]

5. Speaking of predictable

[FrenchieCat]

8. Yep. I'm a Democrat, and I will continue to defend the Democratic President

from those naysayer who can't say anything positive ever.

You are damn right, I'm as predictable as you,
difference I'd rather be me than you anyday!

[frylock]

14. you're a loyalist..

good for you.

[zulchzulu]

2. Professional Left? Perhaps better named as Civics-challenged Complaining Sock Puppets...

The screeds from the usual civics-challenged circle jerking purists is evident when you watch them complain about issues that need a reality check. The cynics that offer nothing more than ignorance toward how government works and how legislation is indeed incremental offer great fodder to their political enemies.

When I watch Keith Olbermann imply that Michael Moore is "professional left" while trying to imply his self-importance and Faux-Morrow schtick on this Gibbs comment, I am disgusted that I have to watch such childish chicanery.

Many of these people have promoted the notion that Obama is somehow a King that can bequeath legislation that all will fall on the ground effortlessly make Obama wishes policy and predictably whine with great narcissistic glory by spinning that Obama can't "seal the deal" if the Republican unanimously vote against him as well as Blue Dogs and the other uncourageous sycophants.

It's as though they haven't a fucking clue on how legislation is passed in this country. They are like children screaming in the back seat that they want whatever they see on a billboard and they want it now.

Circular firing squad blowholes from the so-called Angry Left need to just do what they actually usually do when the heavy lifting needs to happen.

Nothing.

See you in the streets doing grassroots work. Or see you whining on some blog in the safety of your own sophmoric torpor.

[firedupdem]

7. +1

:applause:

[Bobbie Jo]

12. +2

:applause:

[Kind of Blue]

13. +3. If a Dem really thinks the president is

like Bush - well, then it had to be said.

[SunsetDreams]

4. K&R

I like these passages:

"Indeed, for all the derision from the left about the Bush administration not being "reality-based," many lefty bloggers and talking heads have failed to be reality-based in assessing the Obama administration."

"Excuse me, but can these people not count to 60? Have they somehow failed to notice that Mitch McConnell and John Boehner have not exactly been playing nice"

It's not only that though, the conservative dems make it impossible to have Pure Leftist legislation.

[awoke_in_2003]

16. You know, we could never do anything...

to stop the repubs when they controlled the senate, yet they never had 60 votes. Now that we control the senate, we cannot do anything because of the repubs. Bring back the original filibuster rules, stand on principles and grow a spine, and make the repubs make an ass out of themselves by reading phone books on the senate floor. Democratic politicians have ZERO principles anymore.

[Chef Eric]

6. O.K., you win. I'll go pee in a cup, as required for my drug test.

Just give me your address, and I'll mail it to you.

[Dinger]

9. Just Curious . . .

Are you related to Gibbs?

[ProSense]

10. Hmmmm?

What do you think?

[Jennicut]

11. I think both sides in this little melodrama of the week are getting a bit

ridiculous. I mean, the primaries happened tonight. There was a passage of the bill to help states desperately needing funding. Some old guy from Alaska died today and made me hate planes even more then I already do. And we are talking about if Robert Gibbs thinks the professional left is too snitty for its own good (it is) and if Gibbs and or the WH messed up on this one (he/they did). Sheesh. I deal with a 5 and 6 year olds that have better arguments. Now we are reduced to arguing about if Gibbs thinks all liberals are drug addicts (does pot count?) and just what is the Professional Left anyway? Wake me when we talk about something important.

[Kind of Blue]

15. Jennicut, I think your Alice byline is at the heart

of the issue :rofl:

[Jennicut]

17. Yeah, it was my little dediction to DU. Though like Wonderland, I do find DU

to be a fascinatingly sometimes fun place.