Obama's New Girlfriend: (her name is Sandy)

I am growing so, so, so weary of pundits saying that Sandy was a blessing for Obama because it gave him a chance to “look presidential.”  He wasn’t looking presidential.  He was the President.

It wasn’t about “looking” anything.  In times of crisis, you look to your president, your leader.  There was Katrina, there was Bush.

To listen to pundits, it’s as if New Yorkers and New Jerseyians called down wrath upon themselves so that Fox/CNN could blame them for Republican shortcomings.

 Most leaders (reality check) are going to have to deal with problems; if the issue becomes how they “look,” then we’re really in trouble.  Say Romney wins—will he call the national weather service not to find out what hurricanes are coming but how he will “look”?

-zr

And another thing!, he stormed uselessly and thunderously.  This whole "look presidential" and "photo-ops" crap mostly comes from the tv media itself.  So you're a journalist, so you've been subjected to a "photo-op"--whatcha gonna do about it?  Call it a photo-op, or act like a journalist and talk about what actually happened?  What Jane Doe or John Doe sitting in his/ her living room in Oklahoma really ponders the issue of "looks presidential"?  Journalists have been sucked in and are trying to report on themselves before they report on the story at hand. 

First, there has to be a crisis.  Then, there has to be a leader.  Then, there has to be a leader seen dealing with it.  You don't leap out of the gate with: "here's a chance to look presidential!!!"  TV journalists are so infected and indissociable from their own medium than they can't sift anything for reporting or analytical purposes.

Where was the journalist who said: "er, this storm is causing damage.  The president said "blah."  He is taking "blah" measures."  Oh no, it was all about journalists getting to speculate on whether or not whatever candidate "looked" presidential.  How messed up is this, completely.  Say a journalist's mother gets breast cancer.  Does a journalist's mother stand by eagerly and say: "yes, yes, she's looking like a warrior.  She looks like she's ready to fight it.  For those who counted her out, here she is saying, defiantly, that she's in this race until the finish."  The media offering me nil in the way of moral compass, as usual I'm going to have to make up my own, on which I'll report later, I guess.