Fox News host: ‘Bayonets’ zinger means Obama has ‘gone native’

[one_voice]

Fox News host Megyn Kelly on Tueday said that President Barack Obama may have “gone native” when he mocked Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney by pointing out that the U.S. military no longer used as many “horses and bayonets.”

During the third 2012 presidential debate, Romney had criticized Obama because “our Navy is smaller now than any time since 1917. The Navy said they needed 313 ships to carry out their mission, we’re now down to 285.”

In response, Obama promised that military spending would not be cut, adding, “I think Gov. Romney maybe hasn’t spent enough time looking at how our military works. You mentioned the Navy, for example. And that we have fewer ships that we had in 1916. Well, governor, we also have fewer horses and bayonets because the nature of our military has changed

During a segment on Fox News the following day, conservative strategist Michael Reagan told Kelly that the “horses and bayonets” line may have been too harsh for undecided voters.

“It showed Barack Obama, who he is: very condescending,” the son of the former president explained. “You begin to see why he’s accomplishing nothing in Washington, D.C., where my father was accomplishing everything in Washington, D.C. because when he spoke to you, he spoke with you. He did not speak down to you.”

*snip*

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/10/23/fox-news-host-bayonets-zinger-means-obama-has-gone-native/

[TrogL]

1. "uppity" dog whistle

[madaboutharry]

2. +1

[losangeleslibker]

4. Stupid

All those Fox News girls are. Gretchen Carlson wouldn't get a job anywhere else

[cali]

3. nope, not a dog whistle. blatant out and out racism.

[TwilightGardener]

5. "Gone native"--what in fuckall do bayonets have to do with

"native" anything? She should have to apologize on air, and then she should be fired.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

6. Oh come on!!! Reagan was FAMOUS for his condescending line, "There you go again."

[Vogon_Glory]

7. A Texas History Buff Responds: Can Faux Noise Commentators Really Be That Dumb?

I'm one of those people who got what President Obama said the instant he said it the first time he said it. So would anyone who either saw any of the old Sergeant Tyree movies, visited former US Army cavalry posts, or even seen troopers from today's Fort Hood dressed as 19th century cavalry troopers. So would the actors who played in those old westerns, guys like John Wayne and Ronald Reagan.

I admit I'm a graying, pudgy, out-of-shape lifetime civilian. But even I know that today's US Navy is far more capable than its 1916 counterpart. Today's capital ships and probably their lesser consorts could probably send even top-of-the-line 1916-vintage US Navy warships like the USS Texas to the bottom in minute.

My only quibble with President Obama's zinger is that he should have said "horses and sabers." Then maybe the majority of the Faux Noise viewer base might have gotten it.

Or judging from Megyn Kelly's and Paulie Ryan's reactions, maybe not.

[JHB]

23. Nahh. Anyone dumbass ignorant enough to not reject the "1916" bit as absurd...

...isn't going to be helped along by "sabers".

Hell, in 1916 there was still a distinction between "gunboats" and "steel gunboats" (although that may have been an artifact of an earlier classification system, as they were grouped together from 1917 on).

Let's also not forget that at the time there were a number of potential adversaries that had navies with as much or more capability. I believe the number that meets that criteria these days is "zero".

[demwing]

8. STOP A SECOND, think about what that means

"Going Native" isn't about race, it's about aligning yourself with those who face conquest, and against those who force conquest.

Kelly is saying that Obama is taking a populist stance against the MIC. Obama is a rich man, the President of the US, the CIC of the largest and best equipped army the world has ever known, and he should be on the side of those who profit from war...at least in the world we now refer to (thank you JS) as Bullshit Mountain.

Obama does not side with the MIC - he sides with the people.

Obama has gone native.

Thank fucking god for that!

[Quantess]

9. "Going native"?

Does that mean Obama is now an African witch doctor with a bone through his nose, dancing around a campfire with a spear?

What did Megan Kelley mean by that?

[Fawke Em]

10. Gone native?

Hmm.... The American Revolutionary War soldier. Notice the bayonet.



That's native to the United States, that.

[LTR]

11. Conservative strategist?

More like unemployed pundit.

[1StrongBlackMan]

12. Come to think of it ...

President Obama's remark would have been drop to the floor and laughingly funny, had he said:

“I think Gov. Romney maybe hasn’t spent enough time looking at how our military works. You mentioned the Navy, for example. And that we have fewer ships that we had in 1916. Well, governor, we also have fewer horses and bayonets AND ALMOST COMPLETELY ELIMINATED SPEARS FROM OUR ARSENAL ... I'M SURE THERE'S ONE OR TWO IN A MUSEUM SOMEWHERE ... because the nature of our military has changed "

That would have made the fox statement even more obviously funny.

[spanone]

13. 'going native'

The term 'going native' is employed to refer to the trepidation felt by the European colonizers in Africa that they may become desecrated by being assimilated into the culture and customs of the indigenous peoples. In today's liberal and anti-racist society, ‘going native' is understandably considered a derogatory and offensive term. The image of Africa as a savage, primitive territory is after all a predominantly Western construction and is due in large part to the tendencies of Europeans to judge other cultures unreasonably according to their own distinctly

Western standards of what constitutes civilisation. This prejudiced position not only completely ignores the accepted notion of cultural and historical specificity, but also the fact that foreign cultures often live according to their own traditional, sometimes tribal, belief systems. Viewed from this perspective, the idiocy and sheer injustice of labelling another culture's rites (of which we are largely ignorant) acceptable or not becomes apparent.

http://www.qub.ac.uk/imperial/key-concepts/Going-native.htm

[repiblikensouse]

14. As far as I can tell, the only people Obama talks down to are those who deserve it.

Liars, cheats, thieves, assholes - you know, your average Republicons.

[Bake]

16. And it's clear that the President has no use for Rmoney.

I'd say intense personal dislike (or stronger).

Bake

[HopeHoops]

15. It would be interesting to see an accounting of the number of horses and bayonets in 1916 v. now.

[yellowcanine]

17. I don't see "gone native" as racial but I also think it make any sense applied to Obama.

Because he zinged Romney on his ignorant remark comparing the 1916 and 2012 navies it means he has "gone native"? I don't get that. I suspect Ms. Megyn doesn't even know what the term means.

[jmowreader]

18. Michael, I am not sure what you think your father accomplished...

but I am here to tell you what he DID accomplish:

Tripling of the National Debt
Tripling of the Federal Deficit
163 administration officials investigated, indicted or convicted
Sale of heavy weapons (HAWK Missiles, for one) to a declared enemy of the United States
Routing of the proceeds from those sales to the Contras in violation of a law he signed himself
11 tax increases
10.8 percent unemployment
An entire industry (Savings and Loan banks) collapsed because he killed one tax deduction

Your dad was a criminal, Mike. Get used to it.

[cherish44]

19. One of these days someone on Fox is going to just outright call him a ni##er on the air

And probably will get away with it.

[susanna]

20. lol. n/t

[Marr]

21. Does she not know what "gone native" means?

It makes no sense whatsoever in this context.

[muriel_volestrangler]

22. It makes some sense, if you assume a mindset of "the President should use simplistic comparisons...

...because 'ordinary people' use them".

Michael Reagan starts it off with "my father was accomplishing everything in Washington, D.C. because when he spoke to you, he spoke with you. He did not speak down to you". Now, that ignores that Obama was not speaking down to 'you', or 'us'; he was speaking down to Romney, who had just said something dumb. If a member of the public had said the "less ships than 1917" comment, it would indeed have been unwise of Obama to use the "bayonets and horses" comment, because you may not require the public to be quite as clear on why ships numbers aren't a good metric; but this is a contest, and Obama is there to show Romney as unsuitable for the job. But Reagan, being partisan, has introduced the idea that Romney represented 'us' in this debate, and therefore we should feel as insulted as Romney felt.

Kelly has then run with this. She's going with the idea (very common in Republicans, especially Tea Party types, but found in some Democrats too) that the President is there to be a 'normal person' who fights against the 'elite' Washington 'insiders' - and it's that 'elite' who would do something as cruel as put down an idiotic comment. So, by showing up Romney, he has 'gone native' in Washington - she is saying he's now another one of the 'insiders'.

[eShirl]

24. She's alluding to the "spear-chucker" racial slur.