Sep 18, 2009 01:26 PM
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Wed Feb 10
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Prepare for a bipartisan orgy of political posturing and apocalyptically awful punditry this weekend, as Barack Obama hits the Sunday talk shows while a bunch of Teabaggers pray for Jesus to come home at the Values Voters Conference.
Obama plans an unprecedented (for a president) near-Full Ginsburg this weekend, with appearances on NBC's Meet the Press, ABC's This Week, CBS's Face the Nation, CNN's State of the Union, and some Spanish show on some Spanish channel. The only reason it's not an actual Full Ginsburg—defined as a one-day appearance of all five English-language Sunday political talk shows—is that he's deliberately snubbing Fox News Sunday, presumably due to security concerns.
But no worries—Fox will have plenty to cover without Obama, because while he's busy answering questions about precisely how racist every hardworking white American is and why he's so arrogant as to agree to answer questions from the very people who are asking him that very question, Michele Bachmann and a rogues gallery of other non-Kenyan Americans will be gathered at the Omni Hotel for the Values Voters Summit talking about why it's important to vote on such values as whiteness, American-ness, and not letting white teenagers get beaten up on schoolbuses by black kids, which Obama is for.
So there will be a lot of ping-ponging back and forth on cable between clips of Obama, probably saying reasonable-sounding things about putting childishness behind us and getting on with the business of reform, and clips of Carrie Prejean (who addressed the conference today), Stephen Baldwin, Bachmann, Tim Pawleny, Mitt Romney, and all the other bright lights of the Republican Party explaining why it's racist to call someone a racist for carrying a sign featuring the first African-American president dressed up like an African witch doctor. And each viewpoint will no doubt be presented with judicious equanimity, fairness, and balance, because they are always and forever equal in merit no matter what the holders of those views are actually saying, because that's what journalism is. Enjoy!
For kicks, Talking Points Memo published some of the breakout panels that the Values Voter Summit will feature:
"Speechless - Silencing The Christians"
"Thugocracy - Fighting the Vast Left Wing Conspiracy"
"Activism and Conservatism: Fit to a Tea (Party)"
"The Threat of Illegal Immigration"
"Obamacare: Rationing Your Life Away"
"The New Masculinity"
We can't figure out what the "new masculinity" thing is about—maybe this Republican guy? He seems manly. And Obama will hold his own breakout panel, too, after his orgy of self-veneration—a death one!
Interestingly, there are troubling signs that the GOP has come to recognize the political peril of handing over the party to former porn actresses/failed beauty contestants and other crazies. Sarah Palin, the belle of the wingnut ball, has inexplicably decided to skip the conference after previously having pledged to attend, as has Newt Gingrich. And crypto-secessionist Texas governor Rick Perry has asked that his name be removed from the ballot for the conference's GOP 2012 nomination straw poll. The good news is that Mitt Romney, who has thus far ducked many overt associations with the Teabaggers, will be there this weekend, up to his hips in it, and will hopefully be placed on the record as to Obama's noncitizenship, support for beating up white kids, and socialist tendencies for trying to impose a Massachusetts-style healthcare system on America.
Happy Friday.
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