Broder “Labors” To Produce Another Obama Farce

I have a lot of issues with the latest attack on Obama by “The Dean Of Beltway Journalism,” but I just want to highlight a few in particular…

Obama's disappointing speech (in Denver Thursday) also reflected what I had thought was the one conspicuous failure of the convention program -- the missed opportunity to introduce the country to others in the younger generation of Democrats than just Obama and his dazzling wife, Michelle.

Gosh, apparently Broder was watching a different convention than I was, because I saw some terrific speeches from Illinois State Representative Jesse Jackson, Jr., Gov. Brian Schweitzer of Montana, and of course, Congressman Patrick Murphy (and I thought Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown did a nice job hosting a sort of “town hall” kind of forum with three pre-recorded questions that were answered by a panel of experts).

The convention hall was full of bright, attractive men and women serving as governors or mayors or in other posts. Obama knows many of them from his campaign travels, and he gave the keynote spot to one of them, Virginia's Mark Warner.

But the prime-time spots on the convention program went to Sen. Ted Kennedy, Sen. Hillary Clinton, former president Bill Clinton and Sen. Joe Biden, the vice presidential nominee. All are comfortably familiar figures to members of my generation, and all are part of a Washington that is hardly the favorite of most voters.

Putting aside the ridiculous “hardly the favorite of most voters” charge, I can’t think of a word to describe Broder’s utter failure to note the incredible outpouring of sympathy for Sen. Ted Kennedy given his illness. To imply that his appearance was “business as usual” is just about disgusting beyond words.

And before Broder took the opportunity to fluff the memory of The Sainted Ronnie R once more, he snuck in this drivel…

(Obama) is not the first Democrat who has promised a new day. Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, in different ways, tried to change Washington, and both wound up frustrated. The status quo forces -- the interest groups, many in Congress and parts of the media -- all are powerful.

Oh yes, Broder, I know how you and your utterly insulated Beltway fourth-estate pals imagine that you have an all-encompassing force and weight on our national dialogue, as noted here by Glenn Greenwald; in response to an online Q&A, you basically considered the lies that represented the case for the Iraq war to be no big deal, yet you never had any qualms about sneaking around inside Hillary Clinton’s underwear drawer (part of that mentality captured in your evergreen quote about Bill Clinton, noted here: "He came in here and he trashed the place. And it's not his place.").

And rather than waste any more of my time on Broder, I’ll just let Cenk get in the last word here.