With President Obama’s choice of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace David Souter on the Supreme Court sure to elicit the predictable fawning praise from the majority of the mainstream media, an important question needs to be asked: Is the mainstream media lauding and giving a pass to the president because they agree with him, or because they fear him? There is mounting evidence that it may be a bit of both.
Earlier this month, The Hollywood Reporter referred to the fear. While discussing the fact that the networks were “seething” behind the scenes at the prime-time Obama press conferences that cost them millions, the magazine said no network official wanted to be quoted by name, “fearing repercussions from the administration.”
“If the president wants to make it tough for your network, he can,” said one such executive. Another said, “Nobody wants to take on the White House, so we’ll have to tiptoe through this.”
Gee, if memory serves, network executives did not exhibit such a fear of retribution when George W. Bush occupied the White House.
But, maybe the network executives are right to fear this new president and what he can do to them or the bottom line of their companies. The evidence is there for all to see.
While our sacred Constitution grants him no such authority, Obama has had no trouble firing the head of General Motors, rewarding union “activists” with control of Chrysler, unilaterally forcing health care executives to forego $2 trillion (with a “T) in future revenue, implicitly telling Citigroup and Bank of America that they must fire their CEO’s, and blackmail, extort, or threaten the state of California that unless it restores wage cuts to a union, he will rescind billions in already granted stimulus money.
Four months into his presidency and Obama has removed all doubt that he is the most “activist” president of our lifetimes. He is an activist president who demonstrates his leftist leanings with almost every action and non-action.
One such non-action being his decision not to reject or correct America-bashing strongmen Hugo Chavez or Daniel Ortega at last month’s Summit of the Americas. Why? Because in a number of ways, Obama - like many in the mainstream media - empathizes with the socialist anti-capitalistic philosophy espoused by Chavez and Ortega.
While the mainstream media gushes over their chosen leader, it would behoove those not under the Obama spell to coldly and quickly look at the facts. Obama has skillfully and repeatedly said words he thinks the nation wants to hear. But behind the curtain, he is pushing every button and pulling every lever that will accelerate his brand of socialism down the tracks.
To my Venezuelan-born wife, Obama’s words, deeds and threats elicit memories of the leader of her former and failing country. Presidential “activism” by Chavez has brought Venezuela to ruin, while exponentially increasing the suffering of her people.
What is most amazing in all of this is that Obama’s aides make little effort to hide his agenda. When asked about the White House further engineering the makeup of U.S. companies, press spokesman Robert Gibbs said, “In terms of management changes, obviously in both the case of financial institutions and in the case of auto companies, the government has…weighed in on changes at the CEO level and at the board of directors level…we’ll have to wait and see what these individual tests bring.”
Big media has announced its love and fear of this “activist” president. Maybe it’s time for the rest of us to pay much more attention to what’s going on in this White House.
Author MacKinnon’s wife, a Venezuelan American, noted that what is going on here during the past 4-months, at an accelerated pace, is exactly what has happened in Venezuela under dictator, Hugo Chavez, during the past 12-years. HMMM… and is this not what we just heard from Russia’s newspaper Pravda?? And like what went on in the Weimar Republic (Germany)… while nobody was paying attention?
- Media Fear of the President and His Administration?
- No Checks and Balances from the Media?
- America likened to: Venezuela, Soviet Union, and Germany and being warned by China about Economy?
- Unbridled Spending?
- One: bailout: nationalization of companies: and launch of programs that America can’t pay for and the American public doesn’t want, after another…?
- Individual Rights curtailed daily?
What will you tell your children and grandchildren that you were doing while this was going on??
By Douglas MacKinnon is a former White House and Pentagon official and author of the novel, “The Apocalypse Directive.” – WashingtonExaminer.com
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