During Watergate, the question What did the President know and when did he know it? was first asked by then Senator Howard Baker, given to him, coincidentally, by Fred Thompson. The phrase has been used repeatedly in the decades since then whenever a scandal is brewing. Nevermore has it been appropriate than over the last six years.
President Obama has seen several scandals during his tenure: Fast and Furious, the IRS scandal, the Secret Service embarrassments, the NSA scandal, the IRS scandal, Obamacare, the VA mess, the AP scandal, the James Rosen affair, Benghazi and other incidents too many to recount here. The problem with virtually all of these scandals is that the President has claimed in several of them that the first he heard about them was from the media.
Seriously?
Really?
Mr. Obama possesses perhaps the greatest intelligence apparatus in the history of mankind. He has hundreds if not thousands of people working for him who are accountable to him. Ultimately, as he himself has quoted former President Truman, the buck stops with him. How, then, can it be that he's so woefully uninformed?
First and foremost, the MSM is enabling him by not calling him out on this. It's one thing not to ask the president questions at news conferences, but it's quite another to refuse investigations to see whether the president or his keepers are telling the truth. The Fourth Estate has basically taken to cheerleading over reporting, encouraging the administration in times of distress just as a cheerleader would try to buck up a player who had made a boneheaded play instead of reaming him for his mistake.
The next reason Mr. Obama's been given a pass is his race. The MSM, which is comprised largely of white liberals, is scared to death of being labeled racist, so it bends over backwards not to take him to task for matters that any white candidate would face. Ed Asner said as much when he answered why Hollywood failed to criticize its champion. That the MSM would be equally reticent isn't surprising.
The third reason is party affiliation. The MSM accepts whatever pablum he offers and excuse. It doesn't question him and shows no signs of indignation or outrage. Accordingly, he trots out the same lame excuse everytime something happens and there's no follow-up because the MSM is afraid of being labeled racist.
In short, there's no way the President of the United States is this uninformed. The MSM is allowing him to play that card for the reasons enumerated above. It's worked for him during his first term and will apparently be allowed in his second term.
The trouble with this craven favoritism is that eventually, a female president will be elected. If she's a conservative, there's less of a chance of this hands-off approach. But if as expected Cankles wins the presidency, will the MSM mete out the same treatment using gender as its motivation? Will it fear being viewed as sexist by holding her to the same standards it held white male presidents? Or will it soft-pedal any investigations holding her to a lesser standard?
The problem is that the MSM is supposed to be the people's watchdog for government malfeasance. Instead, it's turned into an informational remora that eats the scraps that it's left instead of digging for its own information. That is a disservice to the people.
Meanwhile, the President has cleverly latched onto this and continues to coopt the MSM, feeding it what he wants and reaping the benefits. Ironically, by treating the President this way, the MSM is engaging in a form of discrimination, because it's not treating him the same as if he were white.
There are no winners with this methodology.
(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles
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