"What to do?" Discussion Thread Edition

What to do, what to do? Teabagging to the left of us, pirates to the right of us. The RW noise machine is actively rooting for our President to fail, at every opportunity (see below). They are stirring up the Right's wingnuts with delusional fanatasies so extreme that even certain reliable RW crazies (like LGF) are rebelling. And the crazies respond by flaming LGF for daring to disagree with their delusional orthodoxy.

This would be funny if it were not so alarming. Other than continuing to expose, and mock, the extremity of the RW silliness in hopes of peeling off some of the less insane, how does one counteract the movement by Faux News, Limbaugh, the NRA, et al to mobilize their listeners against our duly and popularly elected president? When Faux/Limbaugh/NRA are their only trusted sources of information?

It doesn't matter that their numbers are relatively small and unreflective of American public generally (see below). Because "small numbers" = tens of millions, mostly armed, many paranoid, generally deluded.

First time ever I've solicited comments. So please comment and discuss. If this succeeds at generating a real discussion, I'll try it again tomorrow noon regarding concerns expressed by Cliff the other day.


Sully: Quote For The Day

"[M]uch of what passes for intellectual life on the right is a product for local consumption only, like those Argentine-made television sets that could exist only behind the old Peronist tariff walls. Unlike Hayek and Friedman, it has no impact at all on the thinking of those not already committed to the ideology from which it emerges. It's a sorry situation, and it has very ominous real world consequences: It means that conservatism as a body of ideas will not attract the best minds among the young and open, in the way that it was often able to do in previous generations," - David Frum.

Benen: THEY'RE GOING TO NEED MORE TEA BAGS....

When it comes to public opinion on volatile issues like the economy, poll numbers can turn pretty quickly. For now, however, the White House has to be pleased with the support it currently enjoys.

A new Gallup poll released this morning shows 71% of Americans "have a great deal or a fair amount of confidence in President Obama to do or recommend the right thing for the economy." Just over half (51%) say the same about Democratic leaders in Congress, while Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner have the confidence of 49% and 47% of the public, respectively.

Republican leaders in Congress are pretty far behind, with only 38% of the public having confidence in the minority party's economic policies.

Given the GOP's calls for a five-year spending freeze, the 38% figure is almost certainly too high, but with Republicans' numbers about half that of the president's, it seems the right's criticism isn't connecting outside of the party's base.

What's more, Gallup added, "Democrats have more faith in their leaders than Republicans do in theirs. Seventy-nine percent of Democrats say they have confidence in the Democratic leaders in Congress on the economy. Although this is lower than the confidence Democrats have in Obama, it is higher than the 57% confidence rating Republicans give the Republican leaders in Congress."

Benen: OBAMA VS. PIRATES....

At some point over the last few days, the hostage standoff with Somali pirates became a leadership test for President Obama. I'm not sure how or why, and I'm less sure this makes sense, but it apparently happened anyway.

Oddly enough, it seems conservatives wanted it this way. Some on the right blamed the White House for the pirates attacking the Maersk Alabama in the first place, while many more blamed the White House for not resolving the matter immediately. The situation, conservatives told us, made the president, and the country, appear "weak." As Michael Tomasky noted this morning, the "unhinged-o-sphere" had started calling this "Obama's Hostage Crisis."

Given this, if Obama is held responsible when bad things happen, I suppose he necessarily deserves at least some credit when good things happen. In this case, the president authorized the use of military force to rescue Capt. Richard Phillips, and the result was a successful operation.

It was one of the earliest tests of the new American president -- a small military operation off the coast of a Third World nation. But as President Bill Clinton found out in October 1993, even minor failures can have long-lasting consequences.

Clinton's efforts to land a small contingent of troops in Haiti were rebuffed, for the world to see, by a few hundred gun-toting Haitians. As the USS Harlan County retreated, so did the president's reputation.

For President Obama, last week's confrontation with Somali pirates posed similar political risks to a young commander in chief who had yet to prove himself to his generals or his public.

But the result -- a dramatic and successful rescue operation by U.S. Special Operations forces -- left Obama with an early victory that could help build confidence in his ability to direct military actions abroad.

It's easy to get a little carried away with this. There's plenty of credit to go around, but I'm inclined to give most of it to Richard Phillips, a genuine American hero; the U.S. servicemen and women who responded to the standoff; and the Navy SEAL snipers who can do very impressive things under very difficult circumstances.

But from a purely political perspective, as Daniel Politi put it, "[T]he truth is that it's hard to see how things could have gone better for the young president."

• Sudbay: GOP leaders were hoping (and convinced) ) Obama would fail

  The Republicans desperately want Obama to fail -- even if that means the nation suffers. What's most disturbing is just how vocal so many GOP blowhards, which includes everyone at FOX, are about it -- even in the midst of a crisis. The latest example was the pirate hostage situation. But once again, the President stayed cool, calm and collected. He acted like a president should. The results speak for themselves, just as the GOP's bizarre obsession with wanting Obama and the U.S. to fail, says so much about them.
  
  From Jed at DailyKos:
  
  These people are sick. And, it sure looks like they hate America these days.