The Media Research Center’s Obama Derangement Syndrome has continued unabated. For instance, Mark Finkelstein grumbled in a June 15 post:
Monday’s CNN This Morning seized on Lindsey Graham’s description of JD Vance as the “architect” of the Iran deal — framing it as a potential political risk for the VP if the deal falters. A poisoned chalice?
[…]Later, Cornish aired a clip of Barack Obama casting doubt on the Trump administration’s efforts. Obama, in that pompous cadence that makes Scott Pelley sound positively self-deprecating, suggested any new agreement would likely be no better than his 2015 JCPOA, which he “had worked for a long stretch of time” before Trump withdrew it in 2018.
[…]So Obama decided to trumpet his own supposed success while publicly undermining President Trump during sensitive ongoing talks. The mullahs are surely digging Barack’s rap.
CNN media analyst Sara Fischer, instead of calling Obama out for his vainglorious, ill-timed intervention, offered a sympathetic gloss: Obama was on a “media tour” for his foundation and library: “I think he wants to remind the American people that what they did in 2015 was, in some ways, a more permanent solution than to what we have now.”
No mention of the JCPOA’s documented flaws — sunset clauses, inadequate verification, billions in sanctions relief that flowed to Iranian proxies, or the regime’s continued march toward nuclear breakout. No pushback on the unusual step of a former president publicly second-guessing a successor’s diplomacy in real time. Just a friendly reminder of Obama’s superior wisdom.
Perhaps Barack should lay off the attacks on Trump and focus on ways to make the Obamalisk look less like a Klingon prison. Grow ivy on the walls, maybe?
As Finkelstein hinted at, the MRC’s Obama derangement extended to coverage of the opening of Obama’s presidential library. Geoffrey Dickens groused in a June 17 compilation post:
On Thursday, June 18, the Barack Obama Presidential Center will have its official dedication ceremony. Coverage of the live event will – no doubt – give the Elitist Media (who openly rooted for Obama’s election and championed him through his two terms) a brand new opportunity to throw bouquets his way again.
From ABC’s Terry Moran practically urging then-Senator Barack Obama in 2006 to run for President: “You can see it in the [Iowa] crowds. The thrill, the hope. How they surge toward him…Is he the one?” to MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell issuing him a fond farewell in 2016: “President Obama is the most noble man who has ever lived in the White House,” the following are just some of the most ridiculous “Obamagasms”[.]
Alex Christy served up a similarly derangement-filled preview:
With the Obama Presidential Library opening on Thursday, the cast of characters that make up MS NOW has been provided an excuse to return to fangirling over their favorite president. On Wednesday’s On the Line, it was host Alicia Menendez’s turn as she claimed the library would not just be a tribute to Obama, but to the whole country. Menendez’s gushing review also fit in nicely with how the media historically reports on Democratic presidential libraries.
Menendez began the segment by claiming, “Tomorrow is the grand opening of the Obama presidential center here in Chicago, not just a tribute to the nation’s first black president, but the country he represented and the city that first gave him a shot as a young political upstart.”
As it hard as it may be for media people to understand, the Obamas are not as universally beloved among Americans as they are among journalists. Nevertheless, Menendez then hyped the facility itself, “And this is no typical presidential library. The sprawling campus is meant to function as a community hub. There is a basketball court, a recording studio, a teaching kitchen, and fruit and vegetable garden, a beehive that functions as part of a sustainable ecosystem, a children’s playground, and, of course, the presidential reading room, part of a new Chicago Public Library branch with roughly 3,500 book titles handpicked by the Obamas.”
Of course, Christy is paid to hate everything Obama, so he and his MRC coworkers wouldn’t look fondly upon the library.
Intern Siena Do continued the pre-opening derangement:
With the Obama Presidential Center set to open to the public on Friday in Chicago, the liberal media is once again falling on their faces to grovel to Barack and Michelle Obama. ABC’s Good Morning America broadcasted a pre-taped interview with the former President and First Lady on Wednesday, praising the couple ahead of the ugliest museum in history’s dedication and opening.
“I was speechless, which is hard for me to be,” Michelle said to interviewer Robin Roberts in a rare moment of honesty. If there’s one thing we know about Michelle, it’s that she loves to run her mouth on her podcast, where she constantly degrades her husband, or on her endless media promotions.
In the world of politics, both Obamas have appeared on the campaign trail for Democratic candidates such as Kamala Harris, Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger, and New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill, making it hard to believe Barack’s claim they “prefer a quieter life.”
Do failed to explain how, exactly, Obama’s library is the “ugliest museum in history.” Instead, she ranted even more against Obama:
No mention about how his “Affordable Care Act,” which Barack suggested was his “greatest accomplishment,” hasn’t proven to be affordable at all. Or the failed Libyan intervention, or drone strikes that killed innocent American citizens. Despite those massive mistakes, the media still touts Barack Obama as one of the greatest presidents, but if they had been interviewing Trump, they would have attacked him for tiny things like his mean posts and comments before even getting to anything he did with the military.
Given that social media is a key way for Trump to communicate to his followers, it’s unclear how, exactly, Do thinks what Trump says in those missives is “tiny.”
Do concluded: “But unfortunately for the rest of us, the Obamas, despite what they and the liberal media say, will keep digging their claws into the American body politic for many years to come.” Written like a right-wing true believer — and, yes, an MRC intern.