We Need A Better Pundit Class

I will be posting the video of President Obama's press conference from this evening shortly but I wanted to just take a minute out to ask a question of Howard Fineman who helped cover the event on MSNBC.

What the fuck?!

Here is what Howard Fineman had to say after the press conference.

Fineman: Not a lot of news. He didn't declare more specifically, forcefully what he wanted to see in the bill... that was absent. He needs to be more excited, about the future. He seemed tired. Same list of non-talking points. Missed an opportunity. Needed excitement.

Could have to do w/ the fact that he's in the middle of negotiations. Didn't want to show his cards? Then put it in human terms. Not like Ronald Reagan telling stories of people.

Now I watched the presser live, but I waited until a transcript came up just to be sure. Lets just see if President Obama avoided putting health care reform in human terms.

This is about the woman in Colorado who paid $700 a month to her insurance company only to find out that they wouldn’t pay a dime for her cancer treatment, who had to use up her retirement funds to save her own life.


This is about the middle-class college graduate from Maryland whose health insurance expired when he changed jobs and woke up from the emergency surgery that he required with $10,000 worth of debt.

This is about every family, every business, and every taxpayer who continues to shoulder the burden of a problem that Washington has failed to solve for decades.

This debate is not a game for these Americans, and they can’t afford to wait any longer for reform. They’re counting on us to get this done. They’re looking to us for leadership. And we can’t let them down.

snip

QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. You’ve been pushing Congress to pass health care reform by August. Why the rush? Are you worried that, if you don’t, there’s a delay until the fall, the whole effort will collapse?

OBAMA: A couple of points. Number one, I’m rushed because I get letters every day from families that are being clobbered by health care costs. And they ask me, “Can you help?”

So I’ve got a middle-aged couple that will write me and they say, “Our daughter just found out she’s got leukemia and, if I don’t do something soon, we just either are going to go bankrupt or we’re not going to be able to provide our daughter with the care that she needs.”

And in a country like ours, that’s not right. So that’s part of my rush.

Either Howard Fineman was high, or he didn't really watch the presser for him to make such an inaccurate statement about what President Obama did and didn't say.

Now I think I have figured it out as far as why the pundits weren't all jazzed up after the press conference as opposed to regular folks. Its probably because they expect President Obama to "preach" every time like he did last week to the NAACP. Well that is just ignorant. The man adapts his tone and mannerisms to his audience, but the message is still the same. And his message was on point and powerful tonight whether he had an amen corner going or not. I guess that is what happens some times when you set the bar so high, but its also why I think they should have snap polls after President Obama's press conferences much like they did after the Presidential debates last year. That keeps the pundit class in check and helps to gauge what public reaction really was to the speech rather than have a bunch of Villagers tell us what they THINK people thought about his performance.

Oh and expect the asshole Villagers to focus more on President Obama's accurate statement about the stupid arrest of Harvard professor Skip Gates than on his push for health care reform.

Again video to come later.

Update: Ok I have the video now but a couple of points about the EPIC FAIL that is MSNBC tonight. First every single pundit they had on decided that President Obama looked "tired" or wasn't "energetic" enough. Based on what, who the fuck knows or cares. But just remember that these were the same jack asses who thought he was losing the election last year because he wasn't listening to their advice.

Then we have Chris Matthews totally fucking up the common facts of the Skip Gates arrest so as to make it seem like its all a mystery. In both the police report and Professor Gates' account he showed the officer his ID proving he was in his house. But of course Tweety doesn't let facts get in the way of him complaing about President Obama calling what the stupid assed cop did, stupid.

And finally we have the coup de grace from Big Ed, whereby he proceeds to say he was "upset" because President Obama didn't talk about a public option.

Oh really?

QUESTION: Thank you. To follow up on Jake’s question earlier, sir, so many Americans are concerned that this plan, particularly the government insurance, the public option, would lead to reduced benefits or reduced coverage.

Two questions. One, can you guarantee that this legislation will lock in and say the government will never deny any services, that that’s going to be decided by the doctor and the patient, and the government will not deny any coverage? And, secondarily, can you, as a symbolic gesture, say that you and the Congress will abide by the same benefits in that public option?

OBAMA: Well, number one, not only in the public option, but the insurance regulation that we want to put in place will largely match up with what members of Congress are getting through the federal employee plan.

That’s a good example of what we’re trying to build for the American people. The same thing that Congress enjoys, which is they go, there’s a marketplace of different plans that they can access, depending on what’s best for their families.

Now, one of the plans that we talked about is a public option. And part of the reason we want to have a public option is just to help keep the insurance companies honest. If the insurance companies are providing good care -- and, as it is, they’re going to be more regulated so that they can’t deny you care because of a pre-existing condition or because you changed jobs or because they’ve decided you’re too sick and not a good risk -- you know, with regulation, there’s already going to be some improvement in the insurance industry. But having a public plan out there that also shows that maybe if you take some of the profit motive out, maybe if you are reducing some of the administrative costs, that you can get an even better deal, that’s going to incentivize the private sector to do even better. And that’s a good thing. That’s a good thing.

Now, you know, there had been reports just over the last couple of days of insurance companies making record profits. Right now, at the time when everybody’s getting hammered, they’re making record profits and premiums are going up.

What’s the constraint on that? How can -- how can you ensure that those costs aren’t being passed onto employers or passed onto employees, the American people, ordinary middle-class families, in a way that over time is going to make them broke? Well, part of the way is to make sure that there’s some competition out there.

Just to make matters worse Big Ed decided to play a clip to try to make his point about President Obama not mentioning the public option and its actually just the tail end of the answer I just block quoted. Way to go Ed, I already have a hard enough time watching your shitty show. Now I have no choice but to turn away since you're going to be flat out making shit up.

I really would like a sample of whatever in the hell they were smoking at MSNBC tonight though.

Without further adeiu here is the video.

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