We haven’t had a post on Skeetergate yet, so here you go. (If you’ve been buried under a rock, it all stems from Obama’s claim that he shoots skeet at Camp David which triggered the usual wingnut freakout, followed by this picture and some pointing and laughing from Obama staffers.)
I can’t shake the feeling that this whole thing was a set up rather than an offhand remark, and even if it wasn’t, the White House held on to that picture just long enough to let a bunch of idiots show their asses.
arguingwithsignposts
Has anyone checked the kerning on that gun?
Also, -gate? Really, MM, must you perpetuate that bullshit tired suffix?
dr. bloor
They’ll be the last to realize it, of course, if they ever do at all. They’re already aflutter with photoshop, gun trained too low, etc., etc. bullshit.
Apropos of nothing, that man has enormous hands.
mistermix
@dr. bloor: Big hands I know you’re the one.
@arguingwithsignposts: It can’t even be used ironically any more?
JPL
Chuck Hagel wants to thank the President for releasing the picture now.
If the President wants to teach me how to skeet shoot, that would be fine with me. just sayin
The Other Bob
My anti-gun seven-year-old is very offended by Barack Obama shooting a gun.
In related news anti-gun control, former Navy Seal and sniper was killed at a shooting range yesterday. If only he was well-trained and had a weapon to defend himself.
arguingwithsignposts
@mistermix: I think its irony quotient has passed its sell-by date. Throw it under the bus!
YMMV, of course.
ETA: check out those forearm muscles!
dmsilev
@dr. bloor: Of course they are. It’s like an intricate ballet, with all of the steps carefully choreographed ahead of time. We’re about two or three days away from the first GOP representatives “asking questions” and by the end of the month Darrell Issa will start talking about convening hearings.
jayboat
Who woulda evah thunkit?
Surrounded by guns, military types, secret service etc etc…
not much of a gun culture near and surrounding the potus.
never.
wingnutz sure live in a weird world.
Pincher
Playing eleven dimensional chess again, this time with a gun!
Mutant Poodle
And the West Wing has the appropriate clip, where Bartlet, on a hot mic after a morning show cut-in, suggests, with regard to Rob Ritchie, his Rick Perry/George W. Bush – like Presidential opponent, that “…we might be talking about a .22 caliber mind in a .357 magnum world.”
Ritchie then spends the whole week complaining that the President called him stupid, and CJ, at the end, figures out it wasn’t an accident at all.
Jay C
My wife’s comment,s when I showed her this picture, were two: first, “who cares?” and second, “did he hit what he was aiming at?”
To mix metaphors a bit, I think that if the President’s target was wingnut/Republican tendencies to make fools of themselves – a combination of clay pigeon and sitting duck, then he’s definitely scored a bullseye!
Elizabelle
Glenn Kessler was early on the chase; ready to award 4 pinocchios.
I think the President played him.
Now, settling in to watch “Rebel without a Cause’ on Turner Classic Movies. Never seen it and in the mood for some James Dean.
RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist
The president tucks his t-shirt into his jeans. Must look away. So disappointed…
OmerosPeanut
Another wingnut freakout? Oh, skeet skeet!
jayboat
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist:
If you had a stomach like that you’ld be tuckin’ it in, too.
just sayin’…
Or something like that.Suffern Ace
Well, if not “-gate”, “-erloo” and “-ageddon” are available. Although “-calypse” would be taking things too over the top for what is really another example of the freakshow our political-media complex has become.
JGabriel
@dr. bloor:
This will divide the GOP! Half want to claim the picture is fake, the other half are outraged that a black man is brandishing a gun.
.
GregB
Bin Laden also posed with a gun!
MomSense
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist:
The real scandal here is the tucked-in shirt mom jeans look.
amk
eats shoots and leaves
The Ancient Randonneur
2nd Amendment absolutists being gunned down after the Newtown “shooting”, former Navy SEAL gunned down, now a picutre of the Kenyan Usurper shooting “skeet” … can the executive order authorizing the hunting of Real Americans be far behind?
(If if you think this idea is far fetched in the minds of wingnuts just go read comments on some the even not so nutty right wing sites. )
Maude
It looks to me like he’s wearing a Kevlar vest. That would pad his shoulder.
LosGatosCA
I do think the barrel is too low to be shooting skeet.
This picture is definitive proof that Dick Cheney never did shoot that guy in the face, it was the Kenyan Muslim Commie Fascist Usurper all along.
Omnes Omnibus
@JGabriel: Oddly, most will do both at the same time.
RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist
@jayboat:
I’m 3 years older than the President, 5’10” and 153 lbs. I’ve got nothing to hide in the midsection and I let my shirts hang. Otoh he’s a lot taller than me and on a long thin torso an un-tucked shirt can look weird. But that’s the former menswear fitter in me talking.
When this pic showed up on TPM I Facebooked it. No responses yet from my wingnutty relatives. Not holding my breath, either.
Anya
@MomSense: That’s not a mom jeans. This is mom Jeans.
dr. bloor
@JGabriel: Southern Beale had it right yesterday. She said they’ll claim he’s holding up a gas station.
GregB
@The Ancient Randonneur:
A wingnut former shoolmate has a link to a story about a veteran being arrested in New York on charges of possessing 30 round magazines.(Which were already illegal in NY)
His post with the link to that story:
This is how the end begins.
I am planning on calling him a drama queen in the comments.
RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist
@Anya:
Oh, that’s just awful. With a dress shirt and necktie no less. And to think this man came in second for Leader of the Free World.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
“just long enough”?!?
Meh.
The Flickr page says that photo is from last August 4th.
I don’t think the White House is scheming to find ways to show up the idiots that are opposing them on everything, and somehow stashing evidence away in case they need it, or something.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Dave
They’ve been telling us for years that Obama was coming for our guns. Now we know what he’s going to do with them!
dr. bloor
@GregB:
Before or after you call him a fucking moron?
the Conster
@dr. bloor:
You know what the corollary is of enormous hands is, right? That’s what’s at the root of all the insecure white male wingnuttery.
the Conster
@dr. bloor:
You know what the corollary of enormous hands is, right? That’s what’s at the root of all the insecure white male wingnuttery.
Anya
So, what you’re saying is Chris Hughes was in on the set up when he
asked the president if he had ever personally fired a gun? The president after all replied to a direct question saying: “Yes. In fact, up at Camp David we do skeet shooting all the time.”
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Shake harder.
Ash Can
Hey, we’re talking about people who, when the blackity-black furriner islamofascist illegitimate stole-the-office-because-there’s-no-way-this-country-could-have-a-black president criticizes Nazism, find nice things to say about Nazism (c.f. the National Review; sorry, no link). There’s literally no limit to their ODS.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@dr. bloor:
Obama was probably trap shooting rather than skeet shooting. In trap shooting the clay pigeons are launched at an angle close to the ground to simulate a bird taking wing.
That will not deter wingnut criticism. After all, these are people who believe that Cherry Hill was a government plot.
Anya
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist: He was such an awkward man. We dodged a bullet with that one in more ways than one.
Ken
“Skeetgate” maybe. Skeeters are mosquitoes where I grew up. Heaven knows what could trigger a scandal about mosquitoes, but I’m confident in our wingnuts.
amk
The ‘hero’ sniper who got shitcanned y’day is a serious gun nut alright.
MattF
Colored person with a gun. Eek.
dedc79
I kind of want to start a rumor that the skeet Obama was shooting was made out of pieces of his foreign birth certificate. You know, and see how quickly it takes off.
Barney
Meanwhile, the freak show on speed is going on at Free Republic, where the entire site is convinced that the President had Chris Kyle, Navy sniper and author of “American Sniper”, killed, because … well, just “because”.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2984764/posts
handsmile
is there any truth to the rumor that “skeet” means “white man” in Swahili?
MattF
@Barney: Has Vince Foster been mentioned?
Kip the Wonder Rat
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Of course the photo wasn’t taken for a possible future “gotcha” moment. But it’s not like staff didn’t knew that POTUS shot skeet and that there are a couple of POTUS photographers around him nearly all the time. I don’t think President Obama made the statement about shooting skeet just so that wackos would look (even more) stupid when they questioned the statement. OTOH, I’m sure staff, including those who review his speeches, knew about the various skeet shooting sessions and that photos probably existed.
MomSense
@Anya:
Eyeballs still on fire!
Ben Franklin
Again, I ask; Is that weapon semi-auto with a ported barrel? Pretty close to the definition of assault weapon, isn’t it?
This is not a good example of responsible gun ownership :)
Ben Franklin
Reagan got all gun-contrlolly when the Black Panthers brandished their weapons in public
dr. bloor
@Barney: Nuh-uh. Not getting out of the boat for that one.
sidhra
Maybe the clay targets are Wayne Lapierre’s feet?
Anya
@amk: The head count of the kill is so troubling. I just don’t get the point of mentioning the number of people he killed.
But his murder challenges the “a good guy with a gun can stop a bad guy with a gun” theory. Since he was at a gun range, it’s fair to assume that he was armed; yet that didn’t prevents him from being shot and killed.
dr. bloor
@the Conster:
The ability to drive the lane?
gene108
@Barney:
The comments section match up to the KHOU Houston Texas article about Kyle’s death, from yesterday.
Between the NRO standing up for Hitler and this round of conspiracy theories, Obama Derangement Syndrome (ODS) has taken a hard left away from reality.
Right-wingers need to realize they need to get their ODS under control.
MomSense
@Barney:
Too bad there is no mechanism for automatically providing anti paranoia meds to anyone who clicks submit comment on that site.
dr. bloor
@Anya:
It’s bizarre to be sure, but the head count is a defining feature of a sniper’s (military) identity. It’s the equivalent of the number of planes a pilot shoots down, and it’s going to appear in any standard obituary.
JGabriel
Clearly that photo of President Obama with a gun was cropped to leave out the voting booth behind him.
.
Villago Delenda Est
We’re dealing with a bunch of rabid dogs here. The Blackburn bint epitomizes the stupid that is inherent and integral to the wingtard mindset (stretching the word “mind” to the breaking point).
There’s only one way to approach this.
Schlemizel
Sorry for the double post but I just saw this on DVR & it is a great take on the skeet nonsense and TDS doing Dr. Seuss
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-january-31-2013/skeet-fighter
Honus
@Ben Franklin: Your are an idiot even on your own terms. That’s clearly a superposed double barrel skeet gun. Two rounds of 20 gauge ammunition. Pure special-purpose sporting arm. Complete antithesis of an assault weapon.
Kay
When will they admit Obama is a good politician? Even if you’re unalterably OPPOSED to all things Obama, for God’s sake, give him that.
There’s this assumption that they will “catch” him on some stupid technical error.
I remember during the 2008 campaign, where he told a story about a soldier in Afghanistan who didn’t have the equipment he needed. There was this insane rush to prove he was LYING. I mean, why the operating assumption that he’s that fucking stupid? Would he really say it if he couldn’t produce the soldier?
Five years out, and two elections later, the Right and the entire political media STILL believe he got where he is thru some fluke or some accident.
It’s insulting, on a “purely political professional level”, and you have to wonder where it comes from, and why it is so stubborn and resistant.
arguingwithsignposts
@Or something like that.Suffern Ace: Skeeterloo has a nice ring to it.
Villago Delenda Est
@Ben Franklin:
Not one of the wingtards seems to ever recall this chapter in the history of the sainted one.
TaMara (BHF)
The meme on FB yesterday was this was a staged photo…done after the Prez made his statement. You can’t win with wingnuts, because the key component there is NUT.
RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist
@Kay:
The default wingnut assumption about anything coming from this White House is it must be a lie. Evidence never makes them change their minds. It just kicks off another vigorous round of ‘find the fib’.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay:
He’s near. There’s no way in hell they will ever concede that. It’s like the election…they can’t believe that Rmoney lost to a near guy. How can that be? They’re all inferior…Andrew Sullivan pimped a book that PROVED that!
Higgs Boson's Mate
@JGabriel:
And the teleprompter.
Citizen_X
I like the comment (can’t take credit) that he’s got Straight Outta Compton playing in the headphones. I get called off/I grab a sawed-off/Squeeze the trigger, and bodies get hauled off. BANG!
Ben Franklin
@Honus:
20 gauge? Why the porting? {the idiot asks}
Honus
@Ben Franklin: Also, porting is quite common in skeet guns. You want to minimize recoil when shooting so many rounds. You are confusing this with the flash suppression common to assault and sniper weapons used to prevent detection of the shooter.
Cacti
I’ll bet the gun was born in Kenya.
Frankensteinbeck
@Cacti:
I’ll bet the gun is from Moscow, where he takes his orders from the Party Chairman!
Soonergrunt
@dr. bloor: “It’s bizarre to be sure, but the head count is a defining feature of a sniper’s (military) identity. It’s the equivalent of the number of planes a pilot shoots down, and it’s going to appear in any standard obituary.”
For a sniper, maybe. Not for the rest of us for the most part. You guys will never know how many (or even for certain if there were any at all) for me. Hell, there are guys I know for a fact have killed enemy personnel because I saw them do it, and they flat deny it, even so far as sworn statements and we’re talking Infantrymen.
And I don’t know anybody who actually brags about it. That’s just crude.
arguingwithsignposts
@Soonergrunt: My stepfather served in Vietnam and only once did he ever mention being in a combat situation where he may have killed enemy soldiers (it was combat, there were 5 of them, he wasn’t sure). My grandfather was in the battle of the bulge, and never talked about it, although I remember hearing a message left on his phone one year on the anniversary from another vet calling to wish him well.
Bragging does seem wrong.
Jay C
This latest outbreak of ODS over the skeet-shooting pic makes little sense even by the low standards of most right-wing media: when I went out for coffee this morning, I saw a full-page of the photo fronting the NY Daily News (which, myself, I wouldn’t use as fishwrap lest it taint the fish) with the blaring caption: SKEET FOR BRAINS! and a subhead something like: “Bam panders to gun-lovers with idiotic photo!” Now admittedly, the Daily News is a cheap tabloid, whose editorial stance is what Archie Bunker would have written if he hadn’t been a fictional character, but even given all that, what’s their issue? Or is merely dumping on Pres. Obama (on however thin grounds) the whole point of the exercise?
Todd
It shoulda been that he goes target shooting at the range. The pic could then be of him sagging and holding a stolen Glock gangsta style, aiming at posters of bibles, crosses and old white women.
Valdivia
on the great shirt-tucked debate going on–I must say that some shirts look idiotic not tucked in. Too mumu like. The rule should be that you should look in the mirror an determine what looks good on you. Just saying.
Obama looks fine here. :)
GregB
It seems the dick swinging bravado is much more of a recent media creation.
My grandfather, who lost a leg in WWI in France never talked about the war and my father said he’d get weepy when drunk and wouldn’t watch war on TV at all.
The recently departed Charles Durning said he never talked about the war because he didn’t want to cry.
Much of the chatter about war comes from armchair shitheels who see themselves as the next generation of Wolverines but instead of killing Russians they are killing fellow Americans.
Whom the Gods will destroy they first drive mad. The wingnuts are going mad before our eyes.
ruemara
@Jay C: Dumping on Obama serves to disrespect the n1gger in the white man’s house. Is that plain spoken enough? I swear, you shouldn’t even have to ask.
By the way, those are neither mom jeans, nor is a tucked in shirt some how a disappointment. He looks fine. Some guys are just plain old neat.
gene108
Also, too what the hell is it with wing-nuts that they believe in conspiracies that require Democratic Presidents to take out hits on other Americans?
They really do hate us that much.
dr. bloor
@Soonergrunt: I was referring specifically to snipers–ever see/hear a news story, interview or obituary about one that doesn’t refer to kills? It’s not about bragging, and I certainly don’t look at it that way–it’s a data point about the competence of a soldier who fulfills a very specific role.
No offense to you or the majority of military folks. It just is what it is.
emma
@GregB: whom the gods would destroy they first drive mad. I have been thinking of this for a while now. The sad part is that so much of the insanity comes from people that will never be touched by it. Limbaugh and Murdoch and the Koch brothers will never be affected.
Villago Delenda Est
@GregB:
Well, this is what you get when you’ve got an entire industry that is, from stem to stern, filled with people who have not experienced war up close and personal. They don’t know, because they have not been there…and by choice, I might add. Ever since the military went all volunteer back in the early 70’s, it’s become somewhat estranged from the rest of society. It’s easy to compartamentalize it away, and furthermore, the elite media thinks it’s expert about so many things when in fact it’s only expert at career building and giving blowjobs to suits who can advance your career.
Villago Delenda Est
@gene108:
It’s projection.
For the umpteenth million time.
It’s what they’d do if they had the power. You see that with these assholes all the time.
gene108
@Kay:
President Clinton is a heckuva a politician, but they caught him on a technical error.
I guess they hope history repeats itself, but without the $50 million budget Ken Starr had and the Hastert Congress doing away with the Special Prosecutor, it does make it harder to “catch” Obama.
RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist
Further conspiracy: If Obama shoots and writes lefty, why does he wear his watch on the left wrist? Huh? Got an answer for that?
Davis X. Machina
Oh, look, an actual picture of a troll.
(Obama may spend the whole second term trolling… This guy’s soooooo good. I hope the appropriate staffers got the weekend off, or whatever.)
gene108
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist:
That’s deep man.
Maybe this Obama 2.0 is an al-Qaeda sleeper agent taken to Washington DC by Seal Team Six to convert us all to Islam, impose Sharia law on America and allow al-Qaeda to prevail over us, since Obama 1.0 failed to carry out his orders in turning us all Muslim.
EDIT: Is it a coincidence that al-Qaeda sleeper-agent Obama 2.0 is really coming for our guns, when Obama 1.0 kept away from the issue? I think not.
Johnnybuck
@Kay: Clinton outsmarted them too, played the game better than they did. He slipped up once, and they impeached him for it. They cast a wide net, they’re willing to be patient, and bide their time.
When they see a Democrat in the White House, they see Jimmy Carter. Weak, ineffectual, illegitimate. And a good many of them weren’t even born when he was elected (or Reagan either for that matter) but the mythology is strong with these people.
We get pictures of a commander in the situation room monitoring the raid that killed Bin-Laden, they get a picture of a jackass in a flight suit.
i’d be pissed off too.
Kay
@gene108:
That wasn’t a technical error. He didn’t “misspeak”. Everything Obama says there’s this rush to prove he was lying.
I remember during the fake-tied-to-Obama-scandal about appointing the Senator in Illinois. Obama’s statement on that was unequivocal. He left himself ZERO wiggle room. I was confident he didn’t have fingerprints on that, when I read his words. Political media were not.
Can we agree that this is a person who chooses words carefully? They won’t even give him that.
Jay C
@Johnnybuck:
You’re quite right: but one minor correction:
The myth is, indeed, strong…
Baud
Obama needs to start dressing up like the sheriff in Blazing Saddles all the time.
wasabi gasp
@Anya: Those jeans are actually filled with mom parts.
http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m3vmz46rDB1r0hleoo1_500.png
Soonergrunt
@dr. bloor: I didn’t take it any way at all, and I know that you didn’t mean to be offensive–which you weren’t. I know there’s this fascination with snipers and their scores. It’s part of the mystique. But even they don’t walk around introducing themselves “hi, Jon Smith, 17 confirmed and 3 probable. Damn glad to meet you!”
jayboat
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist:
Well, I was just sayin… 8-]
I would definitely give him big points for the casual look, and if truth be told, he’s probably dying to loosen up at least a tiny bit.
Job says no, no. Tighten up, button up , tuck it in.
boss bitch
It wasn’t an off hand remark. He was asked by TNR if he’s ever shot a gun.
MomSense
@Kay:
“When will they admit Obama is a good politician?
Even if you’re unalterably OPPOSED to all things Obama, for God’s sake, give him that.”
Never. I read the comments on facebook of many of the kids I grew up with and it is clear to me that they have created an entirely fictional Barack Obama to hate. They see an empty suit, moronic, never worked a day in his life, beneficiary of handouts and white guilt. I have read all of these descriptions and sooo much worse. These opinions are completely immune to the facts of his biography. I have come to the conclusion that it is all about race and some bizarre team fan like devotion to the Republican party. If I post an article written by someone perceived to be on the other team they will just discount it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
If the people you grew up with are anything like (some of) those I did, the racial tribalism came first. A lot of my parents’ generation were what the media called “Reagan Democrats” , but were more accurately “Nixon Democrats”. When LBJ said Civil Rights lost the South for a generation, he was underestimating in terms of geography and time. ETA: just to clarify, this was Chicago, not Dallas or Atlanta
Kay
@MomSense:
I think it is, too. I think the reason that every activist Republican I met in the run-up to the 2012 election thought Obama was “toast” is because they thought the first election was a fluke.
They’ll never admit it, but that’s what I think. They assumed “we” would return to normal, and replace the black guy with a white guy. That’s why they’re running around screaming that they don’t know their country, or, “where did all these VOTERS come from?”
They thought the whole country WAS THEM. I can’t even imagine that, because I always, to some extent, feel like an “outlier”. I always assume I’m a little outside the mainstream. They apparently NEVER do.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@MomSense: This.
And it’s not surprising as it’s what their “news” sources have told them about him for the past 6 years or more. It’s not surprising at all.
Too many of these people are beyond reaching, unfortunately. That means that the path to progress is to route around them by expanding the base of voters who turn out.
Cheers,
Scott.
redshirt
I hope Obama has a Trolling Team at this point. Maybe like 3-5 people who’s job is simply to monitor Wingnut space and propose ideas to troll them. Some are taken up, most are not. But they’re working on it!
Baud
@Kay:
I often see this sentiment on liberal blogs – that conservative views represent “America”. It saddens me.
gogol's wife
@arguingwithsignposts:
Wasn’t that Barbie’s little sister?
Kay
@Baud:
James Carville used to say “if you’re counting on new voters, you’re losing”. Words to that effect. That was the conventional wisdom. I think two cycles put paid to that, first John Kerry’s and then Obama’s. Kerry did a huge new voter push, and then gave the list to Obama, so it was actually cumulative, in Ohio, anyway, didn’t “work” right off, but paid off over time and was predicated on ignoring James Carville :)
I watched Carville on CNN the night of Kerry’s loss, and I was just disgusted, like “oh, fuck you” pissed off. There was something triumphant about his smug “they were counting on new voters! the naive dreamers!” general attitude. Yeah, we were, and eventually we got it figured out, no thanks to you, asshole.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kay: with the exception of Karl Rove, is there a more over-rated political operative than James Carville? HE and his hideous wife successfully marketed themselves to the round tables and dinner table of the Beltway, but his actual record is not so impressive. I fell for it myself, and I remember actually being glad when I heard he was going to take on Kenneth Starr in the impeachment nonsense. Then that consisted of going on TV and yelling “Cigarette law-yuh” over and over again.
West of the Rockies
I foolishly keep hoping that something akin to cosmic justice will assert itself, that there will be some observable repercussions for fools who expose their idiocy in public. Wingnuts spew horseshit and nothing happens though. Snookie continues to stomp around in tiny denim skirts and Ugz. Chris Brown continues to make millions of dollars, his reputation only enhanced for bullying behavior. Well, who knows, maybe the Flying Spaghetti Monster will see fit to making the 49er’s lose today. I don’t know if there is a more insufferable sports fan than the Niner fans of northern California.
Bill Arnold
@dedc79:
Are we sure that President Obama hasn’t had a custom batch of clay pigeons made with Republican elephant logos on them?
Frankensteinbeck
@Kay:
If you’re counting on a shrinking voter base, you’re losing.
West of the Rockies
@MomSense: You got that right, MomSense. I remember reading a comment in a blog the day after Obama was sworn in in ’08. The comment read: “Worst. President. Ever.” These people are sputtering with rage, convinced they are just the most wonderful, honest, hard-working folks in the the greatest country in the world (if only it weren’t for all the darn people who aren’t like us who have taken away our freedoms — I just want my country back!)
James E. Powell
@Kay:
When will they admit Obama is a good politician?
Right after they admit that George W Bush was a disaster.
gene108
@Johnnybuck:
They think that about all Democratic politicians – appeasers, weak, effeminate, etc.
The issue Republicans have is that ever since Nixon, every Republican Administration has been dogged by scandals.
The only way they can “save face” is to make it seem Democratic Presidents are just as corrupt as their own guys in office.
That’s one reason Fox News, et. al. keep the “scandal-meter” cranked to 11 all the time. That’s why they went after President Clinton with a vengeance, because they wanted to taint the Democratic brand, just like their brand was tainted with Watergate and Iran-Contra.
@Kay:
Yeah, Clinton didn’t misspeak, but I still think all the investigations into his Administration were horseshit. They didn’t involve anything he actually did as President.
Also, see my explanation above about the right-wing freak out regarding any of Obama’s utterances.
They need to make it seem that Democrats are just as corrupt as their Presidents, or else they’ll lose whatever veneer of credibility they have as “serious people”.
As long as the country and the MSM have a “both sides do it” narrative, there’s no reason to hold Republicans to account for their corruption and unless the right-wing outrage meter is constantly trying to churn up scandals, it’d be pretty damn obvious that President Obama’s administration has been among the least corrupt in history and miles better than any Administration since President Carter.
Kay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I’m glad they’re sticking with Karl Rove, because that’s what you do, right? You go back to the last winning campaign, and try to replicate that. I saw the Rove effort in Ohio in ’04. They brought out religious conservatives on gay marriage. That’s what put Bush over the top. They aren’t going to be able to replicate that.
Bill Arnold
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist:
Some Moslems insist that the watch should go on the right wrist preferably. (A brief search indicates that this is not the consensus at least in the English language world.)
Bill Arnold
@gene108: @Bill Arnold:
Gene108 also covered this, more elegantly.
grandpa john
@Elizabelle: I remember seeing it when it first came out but I image at my age then (1955 , the year I graduated HS )it was more for Natalie Wood that it was for James Dean
Jim, Foolish Literalist
also, Marsha Blackburn, the idiot who tried so hard to make a controversy out of this nonsense, said that this matters to the current debate in Congress. I would humbly suggest that if trap, skeet and target shooting matter to this debate, Bushmasters don’t.
Mr Stagger Lee
@emma: Because they subscribed to the dictum penned by H.L. Mencken
Oh BTW it seems that Chris Wallace kicked Wayne LaPierre’s ass on Fox News this morning. I think Mr Wallace better watch his back.
J R in W Va
@Honus:
Looks like a 12 to me, that’s what most folks use for trap and skeet. I prefer a 20 myself, you can shoot one all day without getting bruised.
Maybe thats just how the burning powder happened to come out around the back of the shot load.
Elie
@redshirt:
And given the collective wingnut IQ of 10, trolling is probably pretty easy to do and hilarious to boot!
In response to Kay and others upstring about why oh why they keep “thinking” and acting on the assumption that not only O, but his whole team are stupid, rubes, I don’t think its just that he is a black Democrat. I believe that they cannot allow themselves to be convinced of Obama’s intelligence, legitimacy or macho good looks. To do that just makes their whole reality — everything that the rightwingers have owned and lived — a complete LIE. They can’t do that. His moderateness, reasonableness just rubs salt in the wound — forcing them to ever higher need to reaffirm their operating beliefs. Its not Obama — its about THEM.
911 loosed a particular kind of demon in these people’s heads. That period of time where unbounded hate of the other was permitted and in fact encouraged by the media and the Bush administration, got them carried away that they represented a new American reality — that only the rightwinged white people were righteous Americans and were indeed charged with complete responsibility to hold up certain values agains all brown and black comers. Even after the focus on that started to die down, so many of them changed how they thought about themselves, their lives and priorities, that they can’t easily undo it. To have a President who is brown and has the middle name of “Hussein” is just not tolerable. We have almost a whole generation of kids raised under that world view, and before that, another generation that was taught to hate government..
That said, we are making progress. We are.
PS — I just love looking at O. He is so handsome and virile. Its just killing them looking at him with that big gun in his hands…. hahahahaha
Field Guide
I honestly do wonder why there appears to be an screw in choke tube in the top barrel but not in the bottom.
Maybe he was actually shooting trap instead of skeet?
Elie
@Bill Arnold:
Just to touch base with reality here, I am left handed when I write and wear my watch on my left hand.
Though I am primarily left handed, its not absolute, and I do some things right handed. That damned biology and genetics — just too complex!
gogol's wife
@Elie:
I got to see him up close once and I almost fainted. He’s even more handsome in person.
Yes, I’m an Obot.
grandpa john
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist:
wondered when someone was going to catch the greatest conspiracy, he’s a left wing ideologue because he shoots left handed, of course he also writes left handed but that is part of the conspiracy, these uses of the left hand are secret signals to let the other conspirators know that he is one of them.
I am also left handed so I guess that makes me part of the conspiracy,however I shoot right handed. That is to confuse the opposition as to whether or not I really am part of the conspiracy.
Being a wingjut trying to figure out all these conspiracies really gives the old brain a real work out. especially if you are working with a sub 80 IQ to start with.
andy
@TaMara (BHF): The Exif data on the picture says it was taken back in august, though.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@grandpa john: I’m left handed and shoot right handed as well. It’s so that I can point a gun at someone while finding Pandora.
kindness
Skeet guns have side venting? What is that puff of smoke off the side?
Elie
@gogol’s wife:
I can dig it. I saw him at a medium distance when he and Michelle were walking in the inaugural parade — Their bodies just seemed so relaxed in space — not uptight — relaxed and comfortable..
Yum!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@andy: oh yeah? Did anyone check the kerning on all those green deciduous trees? With apologies to the three or four people who probably made that joke in this thread alone.
Will it be K-LO or Jennifer Rubin who goes all Blow Up on that picture to prove Obama has goosebumps on his arm from being out in a short-sleeve shirt in January?
Field Guide
@kindness: Yes, porting is common on many different types of modern shotguns.
jonas
@the Conster:
Why do you think they’re so obsessed with guns in the first place? It’s all about compensation. Doesn’t that Bushmaster assault rifle advertise itself as giving you your “man license?” or something? Because they can’t come right out and say “extra firepower for the man with a small dick who thinks the world is out to get him.”
But you know that’s what they’re saying.
nancydarling
@Elie: I am something of a connoisseur of hands and President Obama’s are very beautiful. I wish his mom was alive to see what he has achieved. I feel very close to her because we are the same age, both born in Kansas, etc. She was much more fearless in her life choices than I have been though
And I shoot left-handed because I can’t wink my left eye. I think that is a genetic trait.
catclub
@Kay: “Can we agree that this is a person who chooses words carefully?”
Very, very, carefully. No argument here.
MomSense
@West of the Rockies:
I asked some people at a tea party rally when they wanted to go back to and they all said some version of the second half of the 1950s. And I said “but taxes were up around 90% at that time” and I got these blank looks.
They really wanted to go back before the Voting Rights and Civil Rights Acts. It didn’t have anything to do with Taxes
which was the supposed basis for the Taxed Enough Already (TEA Party). I got those same blank looks when I told them that taxes had never been lower and that President Obama passed massive tax cuts with the Recovery Act.
MomSense
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
Before the 24 cable news channels and the expansion of media, most Americans watched one of the three versions of the nightly news. We all got the same 27 minutes of information.
Now people just self select and I think most of us probably choose news that affirms our perspectives/biases/ideology. We had a meeting to talk about preventing gun violence and it was interesting to hear the people who read the pro gun sources try and talk with the people who read other things. It was fascinating. We decided that one of the first steps had to be sharing of information.
MomSense
@Kay:
A fluke or worse. People I knew were complaining about Acorn and the new Black Panthers and all sorts of crazy conspiracies that would explain it. George Soros was turned into some sort of incomparably powerful, nefarious warlock. The number of conspiracies he was funding and directing were infinite!
MomSense
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I’m in Maine. Same here.
West of the Rockies
@MomSense: Well, now, you can’t have facts getting in the way of a good narrative! Those TP’ers are probably just doing what their grifter media pundits want, repeating the tale of how the scary black man wants to take away all of our hard-earned pennies and give them to undeserving ne’er-do-well’s in the name of socialism. Oh, and God bless ‘murica!
Mnemosyne
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist:
I’m left-handed and wear my watch on my left wrist (when I remember to wear one). I wonder if it has something to do with vision strength, because I also bat right-handed in softball and that apparently is because my left eye is stronger than my right eye.
My brother is right-handed but golfs left-handed.
Elie
@nancydarling:
Amen…I hope that somewhere in the timeless universe, that she knows… and his father too, for that matter —
Elie
@Mnemosyne:
Back in High School I could bat(softball) right and left — but lost it and went all right handed on that. I paint and draw with both hands and knit and crochet right handed.As a nurse I started IVs and drew blood with my right hand — mostly — but could do left for IVs.
When learning anything new, I don’t know in advance which way I am going to go — I just have to try and see which way feels right..(or left :-) )
Bobby Thomson
@RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist: That’s one of the worst photoshops I’ve ever seen.
Slag
@Kay:
I’m convinced this is also why so many Republicans are so in love with the “free” market. They have no needs outside it because it’s a reflection of them.
Random J. Nerd
@GregB:
My father-in-law fought in WW-II. I knew he saw action (in a mortar squad) including the liberation of Auschwitz (he had photo’s that he took, and he asked me to make copies of them, that he could submit to an archive project of the brigade)
He regularly attended reunions, etc. Other than that, he never spoke of any details. It wasn’t until I was going thru his study after his death, that I found the box that included his Purple Heart and Bronze Star. Neither of his daughters knew about their existence, never mind what he did to earn them.
Ellyn
It’s very amusing, though.
mrmike
@Field Guide:
It’s almost certainly trap, based on the firing angle relative to the ground. Of course, now you’ll have the “He doesn’t know skeet from trap, Hur, Hur” meme following close behind, so you can’t win either way.