Comments on: Column: Making Sushi of Obama’s Speech

By: Barbara Carr

Barbara Carr — Sun, 09 May 2010 18:41:08 +0000

Thank you Dave Askins! First, I read the commencement speech only in the Chronicle (because I chose to go to the opera Saturday afternoon) and appreciated the way it was presented. Second, I find your current column discussing journalistic methods and the basic message of Obama’s speech very interesting.

By: Sam A

Sam A — Thu, 06 May 2010 18:18:03 +0000

Conservatives had no problem during the Bush years when the Republican Party was shoving bad policy down our throats and kicking moderates out of their own ranks. Those policies led to financial disaster, which led to the appropriate voter response.

As near as I can tell, the policies passed by this so-called Obama/Pelosi/Reed juggernaut (I can barely use the term in this contaxt without laughing) have only stabilized an economy that conservatives singlehandedly ruined.

If you are so concerned about a single party passing legislation over the objections of another, you should have spoken up during the Bush years. But who are you kidding? The real problem is you don’t like the shoe being on the other foot, so you are trying to demonize your opponent. Fox News has taught you well.

By: Tricia

Tricia — Thu, 06 May 2010 02:47:34 +0000

But that came right on the heals – shouldn’t it be heels? Although healing would be apt…

By: Mark Wynn

Mark Wynn — Wed, 05 May 2010 21:53:28 +0000

Pardon me, but I do not recall any conciliation in the steamroller approach of Obama/Pelosi/Reed majority. Why is it that those citizens who are concerned about the direction of this juggernaut are anti-government foes of democracy??

By: Sam A

Sam A — Wed, 05 May 2010 20:53:37 +0000

The untold story is the rise of the conservative media and the role it has played in the decline of civility. To make a profitable place for themselves, they had to discredit other media by labeling it “liberal”; promote itself as the only “objective” source of news; and then produce the most slanted and opinionated objective news in the history of journalism.

Mainstream media is culpable to the extent that it has been running scared from its conservative critics and allowing them to frame the conversation around objectivity rather than intellectual honesty.

We are all biased storytellers. The difference is what individuals and organizations do to curb that bias. The latest batch of media outlets nurtured by cable TV and the Internet seem to have almost no standards of fairness. To them, it’s a zero sum game. We win. You lose.

By: RPMcDonough

RPMcDonough — Wed, 05 May 2010 17:34:59 +0000

Should he have treated the addled tea bag people with more generous language? He is not the pleaser in chief, Peter, he is a rational human being.

By: Peter

Peter — Wed, 05 May 2010 13:51:13 +0000

A proper analysis also would have included a discussion of the president’s hypocrisy in criticizing coarseness despite his own use of the pejorative “tea-bagger” insult.

By: quotidian

quotidian — Wed, 05 May 2010 13:02:40 +0000

Obama’s speech notwithstanding, I have no idea what this piece is about; it is almost incomprehensible.

By: Daniel Rubenstein

Daniel Rubenstein — Wed, 05 May 2010 00:54:32 +0000

It’s interesting to consider what Obama “really” thinks, but I don’t find the NYT headlines to be off the mark. The media is one factor, and it amplifies conflict. But it doesn’t force politicians to play to it; they choose to do that. And I think that’s what Obama was trying to convey to the graduates — you are in control of yourselves, you have to take responsibility for how you act, what you say, how you think. Be mature. A good message for everyone.

By: Steve Bean

Steve Bean — Tue, 04 May 2010 02:24:38 +0000

Fun column, Dave, but I don’t know if I’d quite trust you to cut up my blowfish: Johnson was a Democrat.

I look forward to some other commenter carrying the sushi/hamburger metaphor into the realm of American political culture. (“Do you like sushi?” “No.” “Have you ever tried it?” …)