Sep
6
My takeaway from the past weekend
September 6, 2009 | 4 Comments
- A 9/11 truther was given a position in the Obama administration – a position that in and of itself demonstrates the silly heights of executive overreach.
- Aside from associating with 9/11 truthers, the appointee held all manner of quixotic views, has engaged in racial demagoguery, and would no doubt still be in a position of power were not the 9/11 stuff brought to light. Moreover his replacement will be an individual who is undoubtedly just as extreme in their ideology, just without all the kooky 9/11 stuff. Maybe.
- Practically no-one in the mass media even reported on the controversy until after the individual in question resigned. Instead of reflecting on how the incident further highlights the complete media sycophancy towards President Obama, and how this is all contributing to the death of the old guard media establishment, members of the press have decided to attack . . . the internet.
- In the wake of the resignation, the White House spin machine doubled down and offered no apology whatsoever for the appointment.
- The left-wing blogs are now working overtime to demonize the right, including some nasty rumor-mongering as regards Glenn Beck.
So remind me again how Barack Obama was going to unify the country?
Oh I guess it’s our fault that we just don’t take all this stuff lying down. Our bad.
As always, Andy McCarthy puts this all into perspective.
The point, of course, is that Obama vetted Jones just fine. President Obama is not Mr. Magoo — haplessly gravitating to Truther Van and Ayers and Dohrn and Klonsky and Davis and Wright and the Chicago New Party and ACORN, etc. Jones is a kindred spirit. Obama knows exactly who he is. Jones was given a non-confirmation job precisely because that circumvented the vetting process. This isn’t one of those things that just happen. This is Barack “Transparency” Obama gaming the system.
As former Reagan staffer Jeffrey Lord explains at the Spectator, the Secret Service carefully scrutinizes the background of everyone who works at the White House. With his background, Van Jones couldn’t possibly have gotten into the White House, much less had physical access to the president, unless the top echelon of the administration (I’d wager, the very top) overrode any objections.
The issue here isn’t process. It’s that Obama picked Van Jones because Obama adheres to Jones’s Alinskyite views and tactics, and is entirely comfortable with what most of the public would see as the horrifying specter of Jones managing how billions of public dollars are spent.
Comments
4 Comments so far
Is this — still be in a position of power — even true? Seriously, I don’t really think this guy had any “power.” Influence, maybe, but even that seems to be pushing things just a bit. That isn’t a rationalization, spin, or attempt to excuse the Administration for a shitty vetting job, but merely an observation about how blown out of proportion this story has become. Yes, it’s news. Yes, it needs to be covered by the media better than it has been. Yes, the Administration needs to pay a political price for its mistake. All that said, I think were done now, aren’t we? I mean this is the first or last guy administrations hire who turn out to be something other than promised, is it?\
I suppose the question of a “but for” nature. For example, “but for Van Jones would the Administration’s climate change and/or overall environmental policy views be any different?” Answer, likely not. Ergo, one can question just how really important this guy was. Conclusion, not very if nothing would have been or will be different in his absence.
you don’t see the story of a black militant communist who had control of 60 billion dollars for setting up so called “green” projects when his background that i have seenmakes no case in to why he even was even giving this position. woulnd’t someone with a construction experience or maybe a scientist or maybe just someone with a history of leading anything other than being another community organizer be a better pick? i guess my last point is moot since we did somehow elect a community organizer to be the prez…
but what if bush or a republican would have appointed a known KKK member who supported different white power movements was given a position in for a job which he had no experience for? what would have been the fall out? For one he would have never even gotten the job as the media would have dug up every little thing about him.
Yeah, I’m gonna have to go with dostadawg here. Van Jones may not have been the key player in the Obama administration, but you don’t get to just sweep this sort of thing under the rug. It’s not so much the specific case of Van Jones that we must focus on, but the way this administration is doling out these appointments. I would think you of all people would be just as uncomfortable with the czars as anyone else.
Oh, I am as my own post indicates. That said, I think that its still a bit overblown, especially this guy. I’ll grant the vetting problem, but in the end, its not like this guy was anything more than one other nameless bureaucrat sitting in some cubicle in the OEOB. Attempts to make him more important than he was just fall short, in my opinion.