Long Hot Summer Blues

[RoyGBiv]

I remember the fist time I read a detailed history of the Cuban Missile Crisis thinking how very, very fortunate humanity was that the man in the White House was Kennedy and not Nixon. None of us would likely be sitting here today. The main reason Kennedy was able to salvage anything out of that situation was not necessarily because he was smarter or had the correct political ideology. It was because he remained, relatively speaking, calm, and his advisors remained calm, at least in front of the world where it matters.

Everybody is concerned that Barack Obama is not emotional enough. MSNBC has seemingly devoted weeks of programming to try to get the president to be outraged about the oil spill in the Gulf. Liberal commentators are suggesting that the key for managing the crisis is that the president should show his feelings -- weep like Representative Melancon, rail like James Carville, mist up like a CNN reporter covering virtually any natural disaster.

...

Emotional? We should be thankful the President of the United States is not curled up in a ball on the floor of the Oval Office weeping. That he can still get dressed in the morning, that he is still willing to show up for work, is a sign of great fortitude.

It's easy to carp. It's easy to give advice. It's not easy to sit where the buck stops. It's not an easy time to live at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. And perhaps the hysteria engines in the U.S. media ought to think about that when they are barking nonsensical emotional advice at the White House in a set up that is very reminiscent of the tactics the U.S. used to get Manuel Noriega out of his hideaway in Panama. (For those of you who don't remember, that involved large, loud speakers...)

Frankly, what the president is doing, staying cool and trying to handle items one at a time is precisely what we need right now. My sense is that as bad as things are in the world, they are only going to get worse this summer. Markets will teeter. Wars will spark. The weather will not cooperate. It's going to be a long hot one... and that is precisely why we ought to be delighted we have a cool customer in the White House.
http://rothkopf.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/06/04/long_hot_summer_blues

And your poetic thought for the day ...

If
by
Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream---and not make dreams your master;
If you can think---and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings---nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!

[Raine1967]

1. Oh -Thank you for this.

You provided me some calmness for the day. You helped put things into perspective which I really needed a dose of today. :hug:

[elleng]

2. WONDERFUL! Thanks so much, for IF!

I noted that last night, on NewsHour, David Brooks said

'We were happy to have elected someone who is cool in a crisis, and now we complain that he's cool in a crisis.'

[quiet.american]

3. One wonders why the media doesn't understand they look like absolute FOOLS on this.

Instead of relentlessly reporting on how the administration has deployed massive resources in managing the disaster -- they've created a summer-long story about how nothing is of more importance to the situation than them being able to get footage of Obama punching BP CEO Hayward in the face, or perhaps Obama chasing down Hayward with an AK-47. Okay, that's an exaggeration -- but no doubt if Obama were to have started his response to the disaster by pounding a podium in a spittle-flecked rage, the story then would have been "OIL LEAK DISASTER RATTLES OBAMA" or "OUT-OF-CONTROL OBAMA LASHES OUT" -- with the meme gradually stoked over the summer to find the autumn ushering in a Gallup poll that would find a "majority" of Americans considering the president to be "an angry black man."

The "media" in this country. What a sad joke.

(Great post, btw, RoyGBiv).

[RoyGBiv]

5. Nail. Head.

This is another of those things we're not supposed to say in polite company, but I can't avoid the conclusion that they're really confused why they *haven't* seen the "angry black man." I mean, he's black. Shouldn't it be in his DNA to go out there and make someone his daddy?

Yeah, everyone in the media would remind me Maher was joking. Just a little joke. Just a little bit of the act.

Jokes like reveal an awful lot about how we think as a culture.

[Cha]

4. This is an awesome article by David Rothkopf

to illustrate what so many of us have been saying since President Obama took over the bushcheney coup(and during the campaigns).

My son's friend who watches the financial markets told him to watch out for this summer..don't be spending money unnecessarily..time to batten down the hatches.

We are fortunate we have President Obama in the White House during these times of extreme crises. The corporatemediawhores will always be here and a president shouldn't be jumping to their tune..world leaders are taking this all in as well.

The US "media" got us into the torture-loving bush's Iraq, too.

Thank you so much for reminding us of this well conceived poem by Rudyard Kipling, Biv..it could have been written with President Obama in mind as well as all the other calm leaders throughout history.

And, it's a good reminder for us.

[Number23]

6. That laundry list of calamities in the Foreign Policy article would make anyone nervous

But this one makes me extra more special nervous:

"Mexican political bigshots are disappearing off the streets. America is on the opposite side of the immigration issue from the President. It's hot out. The worst hurricane season in years is being predicted... Larry King was flirting with Lady Gaga."

Just the THOUGHT of that makes me shudder in my shoes. I honestly can't tell who's creepier... Larry or Lady.

Really great post, Roy. I've always thought you'd have to be crazier than a bedbug to want to be President of this country. And seeing what Obama has been dealing with just in the last SEVEN DAYS makes me think that even more.

[RoyGBiv]

7. Just think ...

What if they hooked up and had KIDS.

The genetic soup that would result from that pairing might cause me to rethink my thoughts on the existence of an Antichrist.

I'm bad. I'll go self-punish now. :)

[babylonsister]

8. What a great post; thank you so much!

:hug:

[Peacetrain]

9. Thank you for the wonderful post.. I put the first few lines of that in my comments section..

So true.. so true

[mr1956]

10. Thank you for the perfect post (EOM)

[Cha]

12. Perfect~

[JohnnyLib2]

11. Thank you for posting. I sometimes wonder if

being old enough to have vivid memories of that crisis (via little black and white tv's) shaped my perceptions of the presidency.