“Fat, lazy, and stupid is no way to live your life, son.” How well we remember Dean Wormer admonishing Kent “Flounder” Dorfman in Animal House. However, today, we have another “floundering” character who needs a similar scolding, something like, “Pompous, arrogant, and clueless is no way to serve as White House Press Secretary, Mr. Gibbs."
How else can one describe the current White House Press Secretary, Robert Gibbs? While some recent secretaries surely excelled on the dullard scale, case in point Scott McClelland, who the Washington Press Corp enjoyed using to mop the press room floors, Gibbs has a remarkable quality of vacillating between sucking up to the press assembled or hectoring them for having even the slightest gumption to dare seek further clarification of what in his mind must be divine edicts, pronouncements from the great enlightened President for whom he serves.
Certainly our expectations for White House Secretaries must be set rather low. Their job is to present what the White House staff wants the public to hear in as non-specific terms possible and to keep reporters from probing too deeply wanting to control the message so as to present the President and his mission in the most favorable terms possible. Some have done so with a remarkable flare. Mike McCurry, who served from 1995-1998 during some of the most difficult times of the Clinton administration was sharp witted and possessed a friendly demeanor that was most effective while exerting enough control not to let press briefings turn into inquisitions on the Monica Lewinsky affair. While the press was certainly predisposed to loathe President George W. Bush both Ari Fleischer and Tony Snow conducted a very upbeat and professional press room despite each gentleman having very different personal styles. While not as polished or possessing any special flare, Dee Dee Myers for Bill Clinton and Dana Perino for George W. Bush represented their Presidents professionally and handled some of the toughest members of the press without getting rattled.
Enter a new administration with Barack Obama setting the expectation of grand transparency, open communications, and sunshine everywhere. From day one who would not have felt being snookered by the appearance of Robert Gibbs?
Early on, he seemed like the second coming of Scott McClelland, dull, quivering, and easily rattled by tough questions. How many times did the camera catch the fumbling, bumbling boob with the deer in headlights dull gaze muttering, “uh, uhm, uhhhhh, ah……” too rattled to articulate even a brief phrase with any thought content.
While this typically dull response remains a possibility on any given day during the White House briefing, Gibbs has added some new elements to his cold oatmeal personality adding political commentary scolding critics who’d dare question the supposed brilliance of the Obama vision or worse attempts at humor – almost always dull wisecracks aimed at the administration’s critics.
While Sarah Palin’s antics are certainly fair game for late night comedians as she surely gives them endless material for some nasty putdown humor, one does not expect a Press Secretary to have a planned little antic designed to mock a political adversary. Sarah Palin’s little goofy stunt of writing some talking points on her hand to guide her through a Q&A session sure gathered a firestorm of putdowns, negative comments, and ridicule from her opponents. While we condemn some of the most vicious and personal attacks directed at Palin and this episode is a relatively minor issue, we might not like some of the putdowns directed at Palin, but did she not truly bring it all on herself?
Fair enough – such is the realm of political commentators and late night comics. However, for the White House Press Secretary to scribble something on his hand waiting for the right moment in the daily press briefing to take a stab at Palin is as inappropriate as it is unprofessional clearly revealing what a total doofus the man is. His little note had “milk, bread, eggs, something crossed out, and hope & change.” HAR-HAR-HAR a much more advanced comic than Robert Gibbs would have bombed with that one.
Upon his presentation, there was a mixture of sneering laughter as surely this assembly of journalists are no fans of Palin but others were more sneers of contempt as if to say, “Here we go again…oh this is supposed to be … well it’s not really … he doesn’t know how to be funny.”
Let’s put it straight and let it all flow from this. It is no place for the White House Press Secretary to ridicule a political adversary under any circumstance. A press secretary can certainly refute the claims of a political foe. It is his job to correct misinformation with correct information. The White House Press Room is a place for professional conduct where the White House agents act above the political fray. In past administrations some reporters might have asked for a response to some insulting comment an adversary or public figure might have made directed at the President. The professional press secretary would just say, “No comment.” or find some other way to stay focused on the issues at hand.
Later Gibbs attempted to defend his behavior suggesting that even the White House Press Room needs a little humor to lighten things up. Fair enough, figures like Mike McCurry, Ari Fleischer, and Tony Snow knew how to do that quite effectively and the humor was often self-mocking. Robert Gibbs display was far from those standards.
The real casualty of Gibbs terrible performance is that he becomes increasingly difficult for anyone to take seriously and thus all information being made public through him regarding the administration is not taken seriously either.
We see a person who is truly a total lackey for the administration incapable of adding any kind of personal insight or integrity who further fails to understand the importance of his position or to take his job seriously.
For those who feel the Obama administration is a joke, one need go no further than listening to the daily press briefings for exhibit A as proof.
It’s not for us to call for Robert Gibbs dismissal. If this is how the President wants his administration to be presented, that’s his business. We’ve chosen to dismiss taking this character seriously long ago and hope others will do the same.
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