If you’re the Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza, the answer to this ridiculous question is yes. In a June 17 article, Cillizza groaned, "Is it possible for a president — any president — to succeed in the modern world of politics?"
Rather than admit to the possibility that President Obama has been a lackluster president, Cillizza maintained, “...Pessimism about our nation’s future, partisanship and a splintered media makes it clear that any president elected or (reelected) has slim hopes-or at the most a very narrow window-for political success.”
Cillizza is implying that Obama is the victim of a series of events he has no control over all of which threaten his political future. A 2010 article by MRC’s Kyle Drennen pointed out that Newsweek pushed this same excuse to justify failed liberal presidencies in this past.
This argument is nothing new for the left. Going as far back as 1980, Time magazine’s James Reston whined that “watching President Carter try to juggle all the contradictory foreign and domestic problems of the nation during a presidential election and an economic recession, you have to wonder who can do it and who can govern America.”
Ex Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw offered a similar refrain on the March 29, 2011 edition of Today. He whined:
CO-HOST MATT LAUER: "You said that you haven't, in your memory, you can't recall a time where a president has faced a confluence of events, like the confluence of events taking place right now. Just explain that."
TOM BROKAW: But in my adult lifetime and as a reporter, here you have a president who has two wars underway, is engaged in really what is a third war....And then we have, here at home, a recession that we cannot completely get out of yet. And political paralysis in Washington over the budget. All of that has arrived at, at the Oval Office, at the same time."
Maybe Cillizza and Reston could at least concede the possibility that the problem lies with the man and not the office.
