Hendrick Hertzberg

"Postscript: Sargent Shriver" appears on The New Yorker's Web site today.  In it, senior editor Hendrik Hertzberg writes:

In 1972, when George McGovern’s original running mate, Senator Thomas Eagleton, had to withdraw, Shriver defied the family pecking order by taking Eagleton’s place on the ticket. The Democrats had their problems that year, but Shriver wasn’t one of them. He was a magnificent candidate.

It's doubtful that the late Speaker of the House, Tip O'Neill (D-MA), who knew a thing or two about campaigning, would have agreed.

Leave it to Chris Matthews, a former speechwriter to Jimmy Carter, to actually commemorate the 30th anniversary of the former president's infamous "malaise" speech. On Wednesday's "Hardball," Matthews invited on his former bosses from the Carter White House, former speechwriter and now New Yorker senior editor Hendrick Hertzberg and former aide Gerald Rafshoon to mark the event and claim that Carter was vindicated by history as Matthews proudly asserted Carter was "Dead on," about "putting on a sweater, lowering the thermostat," to solve the energy crisis. And Hertzberg did Matthews one better by proclaiming Carter a "prophet."

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Rick it seems to me Carter was dead on, on the need for energy sufficiency and dealing with the energy conservation. Putting on a sweater, lowering the thermostat. All of those things made sense. He was right about the problem of nuclear proliferation. Of arms getting to countries like Iran. He's way ahead of his time on that. And also his concern for human rights. Right? So he was right, but?

We've seen the Obamacized media call President Obama Lincoln, we've heard him called FDR and Kennedy, we've been informed that he gives newsers a thrill up their leg. The media has even ridiculously called Barack Obama a "light worker." He is The One, their Obammessiah. Well, we can now add another undue adulation to the media's obsession of finding great figures to compare Obama to: Mahatma Gandhi. At least according to the New Yorker's Hendrick Hertzberg he is, anyway.

In a piece from February 23, headlined "Partisanship, by the bye," Hertzberg likened Obama's work on the so-called stimulus bill to a "Gandhian" effort because it is going so swimmingly for The One.