John King Calls 'Point, Set, Match Obama' for President's 'Ask Osama bin Laden' Retort
As NewsBusters has been reporting, America's supposedly impartial media have been gushing and fawning over President Obama's press conference retort to Republican accusations of his appeasement, "Ask Osama bin Laden."
Doing his part Thursday was CNN's John King who proudly declared on the program bearing his name, "Point, set, match Obama" (video follows with transcript and commentary):
JOHN KING: A fun little quiz before we go tonight. What's an 11- letter word for weak? Mitt Romney knows.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MITT ROMNEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Internationally, President Obama has adopted an appeasement strategy. Appeasement betrays a lack of faith in America, in American strength and in America's future.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Rick Santorum's got it, too.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICK SANTORUM (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This president, for every thug and hooligan, for every radical Islamist, he has had nothing but appeasement. We saw that during the lead up to World War II. Appeasement.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: And don't count out Michele Bachmann.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MICHELE BACHMANN (R-MN), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: President Obama must immediately end his doctrine of appeasement and weakness toward Iran and pursue decisive common sense strategies, ignored or rejected currently by this administration.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Appeasement. It's a page from the age-old Republican presidential playbook. Whatever it takes, do whatever it takes, make the Democrat look timid and weak.
Well, here's tonight's "Truth." It won't work this time. To borrow a sports cliche, the best defense is a good offense.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Ask Osama bin Laden and the 22 out of 30 top al Qaeda leaders who have been taken off the field whether I engage in appeasement.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Point, set, match, Obama.
Sure, there are things in the president's foreign policy record that are plenty fair game for criticism. You could build a long list of them. But bin Laden is dead, Anwar Awlaki, too. Not to mention Muammar Gadhafi.
And the sanctions he placed against Iran tonight are as tough or tougher than any put in place by the George W. Bush administration.
So Republicans would be best to look elsewhere for an Obama vulnerability. After all, "ask Osama bin Laden" is a pretty bulletproof comeback, or a slam dunk, as the Bush Iraq war team might say.
President Obama, as a matter of fact, gets his highest marks on terrorism and foreign affairs. It's his low approval rating on the economy that is his glaring weakness.
Truth is the appeasement line isn't really meant for all of us anyway. It's a serving of red meat for foreign policy conservatives who hope one of those Republicans wins so they can get all the jobs back at the State Department and the Pentagon.
But truth be told, this is a less red meat and a more eat your peas time for conservatives, now watching a Democratic president find and kill the terrorists who eluded them, all the while expanding the use of drone strikes and other covert tools in a terrorism fight.
Well, kudos to the troops and the intelligence professionals. That's what most of those conservatives say when you raise those points. But just as any president -- any president -- gets the blame for a bad economy, the commander in chief, including this commander in chief, gets credit for important international achievements. And the sooner conservatives accept that, the less they will have to hear this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: Ask Osama bin Laden and the 22 out of 30 top al Qaeda leaders who have been taken off the field whether I engage in appeasement.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
King was so impressed with this retort he felt it deserved an encore. That's almost akin to MSNBC's Chris Matthews talking about a presidential candidate giving him a thrill up his leg.
Let me clue in all the Obama-loving media who thought this was such a marvelous response by the President: the assassination of bin Laden has nothing to do with the President's policies toward Iran, Israel, and the Palestinians. This is what Bachmann, Romney, and Santorum were talking about Wednesday.
As Bloomberg reported:
Republican presidential candidates slammed President Barack Obama's policies toward Israel today, accusing him of undermining security in the Middle East.
Addressing a Republican Jewish group in Washington, the candidates accused Obama of failing to halt Iran's suspected efforts to develop a nuclear weapon, emboldening terrorist groups and taking a more sympathetic approach toward Palestinians than Israelis.
Seems pretty clear, right?
Yet America's press are collectively doing a victory lap for an albeit clever retort by the President that in reality had nothing to do with what the candidates were actually criticizing him for.
More importantly, since when is it the job of news anchors to defend the White House resident from attacks by his political opponents, especially in the middle of a reelection campaign?
Is this what Americans should expect in the next eleven months: so-called journalists parrying every statement by the Republican candidates and eventual nominee?
Sadly, the answer is yes, for the nation's press are willing to do whatever it takes to get Barack Obama reelected even if it means they have to break every rule of journalism to do it.
Fasten your seatbelts.
(H/T Steve Malzberg)
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Comments
So, Russia sending Cold War signals,
Submitted by bkeyser on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 10:31am.
Iran closer than ever to a nuclear weapon (and in possession of a secret spy plane WITH data), Israel rides under the bus, and secular Egypt and secular Libya being replaced with a conservative form of Islamisism is trumped by the culmination of the Bush doctrine toward Al Qaeda. Ok. That can be Obama's foreign policy slogan: "Yeah, Russia's antagonistic, the Jews are on their own and I lost North Africa, but where it matters most, Mission Accomplished."
As long as you're comfortable with that John... you hack.
Don't forget..
Submitted by NC Cop on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 10:35am.
North Korea sinking S. Korea warships with no fear of retaliation as well as shelling S. Korean territory and killing civilians, both acts of war.
Perhaps Obama could ask the dead sailors and civilians of S. Korea how well is foreign policy is working.
Oh Riiiight, Bin Laden
Submitted by Blonde on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 12:12pm.
That would be the same Bin Laden hit that ValJar & The Won tried to get out of fifteen ways from Sunday, right? The very same operation that The Won had to sleep on before being forced to give the go to? The takedown that The Won had to be hauled off the golf course for, in order that he appear in the photos (appearing bored, and pissed that he'd missed the 19th hole with his body dude), yes?
Handy Reference Guide to Obama's Gaffes and Goofs ~ Currently Numbering 200 (and Counting)
That picture
Submitted by jon_torlin on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 12:21pm.
Don't forget that one particular picture (appearing bored and pissed) was a faked one as if they were watching something when it was later revealed that it was posed.
-Jon
Yeah,
Submitted by bkeyser on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 12:21pm.
and now, presented with three options to retrieve or destroy the RQ-170, Obama punted over concern that any action would be perceived as an act of war. Can't have that during an election year -better to give away the technology. After all, this is Iran, not some pissant little country like Libya. For Obama, fear is the better part of valor.
What a debate would be . . .
Submitted by Gat New York on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 10:31am.
Imagine you are the GOP nominee and in a debate this is Obama's answer:
"Ask Osama bin Laden and the 22 out of 30 top al Qaeda leaders who have been taken off the field whether I engage in appeasement."
GOP Response:
That's it?! That's what you call your foreign policy accomplishments in 4 years is a bunch of dead terrorists by means of unmanned drones or by other country's actions?
Is that the answer you give for allowing for the spread of radical Islam throughout the Middle East - for the turning your back on allies and leaders who have supported us - for your isolation of Israel - for your disintegration of our alliance with Afghanistan and Pakistan - for the imminent swing toward Iran of Egypt and Iraq - for the empowerment of China as a major economic and geopolitical power - and for the disintegration of relations with Russia?
Your entire answer is a bunch of dead terrorists? That's all you got?
Bin Laden is dead only because of Bush policies
Submitted by ohio granny on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 10:37am.
The "Won" got? Bin Laden because of policies that President Bush put in place against all of the Democrats objections. And the so-called MSM thinks Obama has won the argument? Did King forget Obama was on the golf court when this operation was going down? And if reports were right he even tried to call the operation off? How is that for leadership? Oh wait that is called leading from behind.
These so-called journalists? should be charged with malpractice for all their lies and coverups for the "Won".
Fools and idiots. No wonder they keep losing viewers. Must be only the morally bankrupt and intellectually stunted that keep watching.
Mr. King just shows the depths that the LSM has sunk to.
Submitted by UpNorth on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 10:59am.
As Noel said, killing bin Laden and other AQ leaders is not a part and parcel of "Foreign Policy". It is a part of a policy set forth by President Bush, and continued by Obama.
Bowing to foreign leaders, insisting that Israel withdraw to pre-1967 borders, ignoring the aggression of North Korea, ignoring the aggression of Iran is foreign policy. That's where the Won is lacking, his ship of state, when it comes to foreign policy, among other policies, is rudderless.
Let us not forget Honduras
Submitted by Blonde on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 12:15pm.
Where The Won picked the illegal side in the coup attempt.
It was a small blip of idiocy to most Americans, but trust me, Latin America remembers.
Handy Reference Guide to Obama's Gaffes and Goofs ~ Currently Numbering 200 (and Counting)
What King and the MSM won't
Submitted by celator on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 11:04am.
What King and the MSM won't ever talk about is the foreign policy catastrophe Obama and Clinton have wrought from China to South America, to North Africa to Russia to Southeast Asia. They will not report that Obama had to be calf-roped by Panetta to pull the trigger on Bin Laden, though we now know that the Obama administration knew for nine months that Bin Laden was in that safe house. The Obama administration insists that it has droned-killed most of Al Qaeda's leadership and that there are only a handful of Al Qaeda leaders left--a bald faced lie.
Sure, there are things in the
Submitted by HypocriteHater on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 11:19am.
Sure, there are things in the president's foreign policy record that are plenty fair game for criticism. You could build a long list of them. But bin Laden is dead, Anwar Awlaki, too. Not to mention Muammar Gadhafi.
So John admits there's a long list of failures in O's foreign policy, but OBL is dead so end of discussion, period! I'm sure this will be of comfort to people once Iran is threatening us with nuclear obliteration.
Truth is the appeasement line isn't really meant for all of us anyway. It's a serving of red meat for foreign policy conservatives who hope one of those Republicans wins so they can get all the jobs back at the State Department and the Pentagon.
Of course, the democrats never serve red meat to their foreign policy liberals who have their eyes set on getting their State Dept and Pentagon jobs back....nah! This is such a blatantly bias statement, it's amazing he hasn't quite his job yet to work for O's re-election campaign.
How about asking
Submitted by Tugboat Phil on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 11:30am.
The dead soldiers of Ft Hood that were victims, according to Obama, of "workplace violence?"
Message to John King and all the leftist journalists...
Submitted by Conservator on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 12:40pm.
...and political pundits who are nothing but Obama cheerleaders as the transcript proves. The Appeasement the Republican candidates were referring to didn't apply to killing Al Qaeda terrorists like Osama bin Laden where the President has a good record - that would have been foolish. The Appeasement argument put forth by the GOP field refers to the overall foreign policy globally under Obama is a dismal record at best. Just ask Putin or China's Chu....
John King: "But just as any
Submitted by TE on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 1:38pm.
John King: "But just as any president -- any president -- gets the blame for a bad economy, the commander in chief, including this commander in chief, gets credit for important international achievements."
I'm confident that John King has never cast "blame [at Obama] for [the] economy." Like predictably giving Obama credit for things he had nothing to do with (e.g., the death of any al Qaeda member), I'm sure that John King has done nothing but defend Obama against Republicans correctly identifying Obama as the cause of the horrible economy.
We'd love to ask Osama, but
Submitted by eaglewingz08 on Fri, 12/09/2011 - 3:37pm.
We'd love to ask Osama, but there's no body. Just like the death of Voldemort in the Harry Potter's series, there is no real verifiable proof of either's death, just their disappearance. The US could have captured him and transferred him to Gitmo, but chose not to do so. The unmined intelligence info that was lost is astronomical. We are also learning that the photo of Obama in the war room during operations against OBL may have been photoshopped and that he could have still be out playing golf during the operation. Obama has a lot to answer for on foreign policy, and the Who Lost Egypt and the Middle East will be topic 1 at any foreign policy debate.
GirlyMan did not get Osama!
Submitted by billwhit1357 on Sat, 12/10/2011 - 6:10am.
Obama wished he was man enough to have gotten Osama, and smart enough, but it was Mr Bush's policies, already set into place, that found Osama and made it possible to take him out. Yes, Obama gave the go, but what would have happened if he hadn't and the public found out? Obama does what he does to advance his political career, he could care less about America or We, the People, that has been obvious. And he dispises the Constitution. Obama is a coward and fake, given a privilaged life, never having to prove himself. He never lived the life of a poor black, he had a fairly privilaged life, also a free education, as a foreign student. Only Obama, in his childish fantasy mind, thinks he is a real man and leader. What a pathetic person!