The Sparkling Stranger

Admittedly, the general harping by Conservatives about media favoritism toward President elect Obama can appear tedious. But just when you thought the peak of Obama favoritism had been reached, new high water marks get discovered. The Weekly Standard has some amusing observations in an article on just this topic. One is that Keith Olberman does not vote in order to preserve his objectivity Olbermann Declines to Vote to Preserve Perception of Objectivity. Another is Time Magazine's editor-at-large, Nancy Gibbs, telling her readers in this week's feature story on the election that:

"Some princes are born in palaces. Some are born in mangers. But a few are born in the imagination, out of scraps of history and hope.....people were waiting for him, waiting for someone to finish what a King began"

Which King is that? One assumes she is using a play on words, although she leaves that unsaid so who knows? The King presumably is Martin Luther, not the one born in the manger. Yet the hyperbole is still absurd. She sees no irony in her "born in the imagination" imagery. And this is in a news story, not an opinion piece.

But even in the world of opinion, where all is allowed, Time still manages to set new fantastical standards. Novelist Pico Iyer writes this week's guest essay in Time My Close Encounter With Obama in Hawaii. From his comments it is clear he has become so used to projecting fantasies onto paper, he cannot distinguish reality from his novels. In a great bit of "look back" projection, Iyer recounts accidentally meeting Obama in Hawaii outside at an "avocado burger" place (you just cannot make this stuff up). He looked like a "skinny teenager" but the most remarkable thing about Obama was:

"this sparkling stranger was so much like the kind of people we meet in Paris, in Hong Kong, in the Middle East: difficult to place but connected to everywhere....like the air of his home island...he spoke for the global melting pot of today"

Seriously, doesn't this make you laugh out loud? Having been to the aforementioned three places (he can't trick me with his globetrotting conceit!) on many occasions, I never had trouble "connecting" these people to where they actually live, rather than "everywhere". Nor do I recall some ubiquitous fascination with global melting pots, but I am sure we traveled in different circles. But Iyer is not satisfied just making the point about the futuristic Obama's transcendent humanism; he needs to also contrast this with Alaska's backward looking yesterday's "go-it-alone" spirit. He happened to be in Alaska the "week Sarah Palin was introduced to the world" (who is this guy, Zelig ?). Despite Alaska's "great possibility" it is tied to the "last frontier" vision of yesterday, not to the hopeful tomorrow of the "kids" outside the avocado burger "North Shore shack" in Hawaii.

If Time has a "Meet The Beatles" frame of reference about Obama, its crosstown rival, Newsweek, leans more toward "Sympathy for the Devil". Somehow they never did get around to sharing that perspective with us prior to the election. I wonder why? In an interview with NPR's version of Larry King, Charlie Rose, Newsweek's Jon Meacham and Evan Thomas reveal their insights into Obama's personality A conversation with Jon Meacham & Evan Thomas. Meacham is the editor-in-chief of Newsweek and Thomas is its most senior writer. What is remarkable about the interview is it shows that the media has had its doubts about Obama all along. Yet somehow this has never lead to any serious investigative reporting that may have shown Obama as a human being with a history, rather than some magical phantom.

Evan Thomas almost causes Meacham to have a heart seizure when he refers to Obama's "creepy cult of personality". Rose also nearly fell out of his shoes when Thomas said this and he repeated it back to Thomas in disbelief. Thomas reiterated his comment and then upped the ante by also saying he was "deeply manipulative". Thomas also casually asserts Obama's attachment to the teachings of leftist Saul Alinsky (Obama's Alinsky Jujitsu) as if it were common knowledge. Now you may agree with the objectives and tactics of Alinsky but my guess is the majority of Americans do not.

So here we have Evan Thomas, on the day after the election, telling Charlie Rose that Obama is a follower of socialist/Marxist Alinsky, is a creator of a creepy cult of personality and is a deeply manipulative individual. Before Thomas could go any further, perhaps even persuading us we just elected Satan as president, Meacham had to disagree with the "creepy cult" concept and somehow turned Thomas's observations into "Obama is really more like Reagan". I had thought Ronald Reagan Was An Amiable Dunce but I suppose that was another day and another time.

Either we get the comically absurd hero worship of Time magazine, or the equally absurd cynical avoidance of inconvenient truths by Newsweek. Obama faces a difficult enough task as president. Wait till he actually has to start making some decisions. I think he will discover the media's exaggerations can go both ways.