Here's the definition of overdoing the Obama hype. On Wednesday, CBS's Early Show treated the story of Barack Obama and Joe Biden being driven over to Arlington for a hamburger as two all-beef patties and special sauce of history. Co-host Maggie Rodriguez actually said: "Coming up next, call it the ultimate power lunch. An unprecedented presidential burger run when we return."
"Unprecedented presidential burger run?" First of all, did CBS do a quarter-pound of research on presidential burger runs before making that claim? Secondly, if a burger run is the stuff of history, what trivial events in Obama's day won't they exaggerate?
Later in the first half hour, Rodriguez and co-host Harry Smith actually sat down to eat versions of the Obama-Biden vittles from Ray's Hell Burger sent to them from Arlington so they could ooze over the story some more:
HARRY SMITH: So the big headline out of the White House yesterday was the President and the Vice President went to lunch at Ray's Hell Burger.
MAGGIE RODRIGUEZ: Nice --
SMITH: It's a little joint -- a little tiny joint in Arlington, Virginia. What were you going to say?
RODRIGUEZ: No, just nice.
SMITH: Yeah, nice, right. Well, this is what -- we actually have copies, these are real -- real 'Hell burgers,' here all the way from Arlington. And the President had his with cheese and tomato, right?
RODRIGUEZ: And peppers-
SMITH: And bacon. No, I think the Vice President had the peppers.
RODRIGUEZ: Oh.
SMITH: There you go. Anyway, the basic burger there, amazing -- I think they were watching us with Bobby Flay yesterday and said 'we're going to follow suit.'
RODRIGUEZ: 'We've got to have that.'
SMITH: Exactly right.
RODRIGUEZ: And we know Michelle Obama went to Five Guys not too long ago. So, they like their burgers.
SMITH: Inside this is supposed to be even better. Someone at the White House told me that last night.
RODRIGUEZ: Another burger? We're going to eat, we'll be right back.
Why isn't it hard to imagine that the folks at CBS would want their burger to have exactly the same condiments as the Unprecedented Leader prefers?
(Image of Ray's Hell Burger from This Is Gonna Be Good blog.)