Sonny Bunch raises an eyebrow:
Let me see if I understand Andrew correctly: President Obama engages in an unprecedented attack on the judiciary, botches the facts of the case at hand (or willfully distorts them for partisan political purposes), and has yet to correct himself…and Justice Alito is at fault for politicizing the judiciary? Seriously? Did that just happen?
A reader is less restrained:
I can’t help but think if Sarah Palin had mischaracterized a ruling you agreed with and if a Supreme Court justice you liked had done what Alito did, you’d be raking Palin across the coals for lying about the Supreme Court’s decision, for ignoring the separation of powers and you’d be lauding the counter-Alito.
Really Andrew, you’ve gone so far over to the other side, it’s now comical. Your sense of balance and fair play, your objectivity have been eroding for years. Now they’ve fallen completely apart. I still visit your site just to stay current on the cocoon you live in.
I guess I am part of the great unwashed, those ignorant ya-hoo’s who just don’t appreciate all the fine work our president and congressional majorities are doing for us. Damn me all to hell, I read everything you say and I still don’t get it. I must be crazy. Of course I should trust fully a process where senators are openly bribed and where we are assured endlessly that a program that exempts unions and congress, that doesn’t go into effect until Obama has run for office a second time, that “will save us money” (our government’s track record in that regard is surely comforting) and that will cap our costs but provide everything we had before (sure, doctors and hospitals work more for less money: who wouldn’t, given the opportunity?). And when the president pumps his numbers of ‘jobs saved’, clearly misstates a Supreme Court opinion and other mistakes already documented by the NYT, among others, I should just sit still and realize that I am a nihilist, vicious dumbass. Please.
Many conservatives were furious with Bush for his profligate spending. He had no choice on the bank bail out, nor did Obama (although Obama obscured his mere continuation of Bush’s policy, taking undue credit for his own role). But the continued spending is ridiculous. New programs are ridiculous and his fake freeze fools only those who were buying his BS in the first place.
Another reader makes the same point with somewhat less malice:
Judge Alito's reaction was an honest response to a lie told about him, to him. It was no more a departure from protocol than Speaker Pelosi's jack-in-the-box glee every time Obama proposed a vast new expenditure. Had Obama spoken honestly about a technical interpretation of a legal point, Alito should have been a statue. But that was not the case: Obama made up a fantasy–one which could easily cause a reasonable and learned judicial mind to have a reaction of revulsion. Had Alito sat stone-faced, the after-action report would have been that he "got told" and had to take it like a wayward toddler.
You betray your hero-worship of Obama when, in times when he is behaving in a ridiculous and ineffective manner, you run pictures of him from the campaign when he was standing around looking thoughtful, or speaking to his favorite kind of audience: tearful worshippers. Now you betray yourself further when you seek to make him immune to opposition.
The Dish 