President Obama speaking at University of Michigan Spring Commencement, May 1st:
We’ve got politicians calling each other all sorts of unflattering names. . .
[One] way to keep our democracy healthy is to maintain a basic level of civility in our public debate. These arguments we’re having over government and health care and war and taxes -- these are serious arguments. They should arouse people’s passions, and it’s important for everybody to join in the debate, with all the vigor that the maintenance of a free people requires.
But we can’t expect to solve our problems if all we do is tear each other down. You can disagree with a certain policy without demonizing the person who espouses it. You can question somebody’s views and their judgment without questioning their motives or their patriotism.
President Obama interviewed by Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter on November 30th, as revealed in Alter's new book:
Obama offered that Republican opposition to the stimulus "helped create the tea-baggers and empowered that whole wing of the Republican Party where it now controls the agenda for the Republicans."
(via
Washington Post Right Now blog,
ABC News' Jake Tapper)
3 comments:
Notice he changed the person in his comments from first person plural to second-person plural: "We can't expect to solve..." and then "You can disagree...without demonizing..."
In other words, YOU can (and should) speak temperately about those who oppose what you believe to be right and good; HE cannot, and will not, and he knows it.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/horseraceblog/2010/05/obama_the_polarizer.html
May 11, 2010
Obama the Polarizer
In January, 2007 Barack Obama declared his candidacy for the presidency with these words:
It's not the magnitude of our problems that concerns me the most. It's the smallness of our politics. America's faced big problems before. But today, our leaders in Washington seem incapable of working together in a practical, common sense way. Politics has become so bitter and partisan, so gummed up by money and influence, that we can't tackle the big problems that demand solutions. And that's what we have to change first. We have to change our politics, and come together around our common interests and concerns as Americans.
Today, Gallup reports:
(Obama's) first-year ratings were the most polarized for a president in Gallup history, with an average 65-point gap between Republicans and Democrats. Obama's approval ratings have become slightly more polarized thus far in his second year in office, with an average 69-point gap between Democrats (83%) and Republicans (14%) since late January.
This is a big deal. The first quote is the principal reason Barack Obama ran for President. At a minimum, it was his first public argument for why he thought the country should elect him, as opposed to the dozen or so other candidates who would enter the race. It remained a critically important idea throughout his candidacy. Remember, the Obama campaign was an "audacious" act of line-jumping within the Democratic Party. His justification was that the country couldn't afford to keep playing the same old political games. The hook of his candidacy was: America, do you really want to do Bush-Clinton-Bush-Clinton?
(( more at the link ))
> You can disagree with a certain policy without demonizing the person who espouses it. You can question somebody’s views and their judgment without questioning their motives or their patriotism.
I think it's safe to say that the legions of pictures of antiBush protesters put the lie to this claim of innocence?
Is it fair to line up an array of pictures from, say, the inaugural to show how that behavior is anything but that followed by the Left?
Can you say "lying two-bit hypocritical sonsabitches"?
I knew ya could.
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