Obama breaks bread with conservative writers

[GroundedSailor]

Link 1

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January 13, 2009, 10:28 pm
Obama Dines With Conservative Columnists
By Helene Cooper
President-elect Barack Obama arrived at a dinner party on Tuesday night in Chevy Chase, Md. (Photo: Charles Dharapak/Associated Press)

WASHINGTON ? President-elect Barack Obama spent Tuesday evening at a dinner party with several prominent conservative columnists, including William Kristol and David Brooks of The New York Times, according to an Obama transition pool report.

Mr. Obama, who has been staying at the Hay-Adams Hotel in advance of his inauguration next week, arrived at 9 Grafton Street, an upscale address in Chevy Chase, Md., at 6:34 p.m. The Montgomery County property tax records list this address as the home of the conservative Washington Post columnist George Will, the host of the dinner party. Also attending the party was Charles Krauthammer The Washington Post. Together, some of the columnists at the dinner party have been some of Mr. Obama?s severest critics.

Obama transition officials refused to comment on the dinner, saying that it was off the record.

Since arriving in Washington more than a week ago, Mr. Obama has made trips to his transition headquarters, Capitol Hill and the White House, and a surprise jaunt to Washington?s venerable late-night eatery, Ben?s Chili Bowl, which the president-elect visited on Saturday afternoon (far earlier than the usual late-night visit for Washington?s U Street revelers).

Tuesday?s dinner party with conservative columnists in Chevy Chase adds another dimension to the fevered speculation about the president-elect?s movements. In filing his pool report, Kenneth Bazinet of The Daily News of New York wrote, ?This is for real, folks. The bloggers are going to love this.?

Mr. Obama left the dinner party at 9:10 p.m. to return to the Hay-Adams.

Before the election wasn't there a lot of noise about Obama being a dangerous socialist / communist etc? Looks like he is going to a centrist if anything. How often do you see a President reaching out to his most vociferous critics? Obama's even having a dinner to honor John McCain prior to the inauguration.

Or is it a case of 'keep your friends close and your enemies closer'? Either way I hope he does a good jobs and increases bipartisanship.

 

[m1ldslide1]

Queue nutjobs calling BHO a waffler in 3...2...1...

 

[Moonbeam]

The opposition and fear of Obama is pathological. That means it can be cured. Those critics of his he chooses to meet with are, aside from being quite sick, intelligent people. They also are sophisticated and capable of introspection. Their anger is mostly self generated. When you befriend people and do it genuinely, you can often destroy prejudice and bigotry. When you acknowledge the existence of others they reciprocate. We are all the same.

 

[ayabe]

Whatever he's still a Marxist pussy whose trying to put us all in debtors prison, surrender to AQ, and make "gay" the national religion of the US.

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
The opposition and fear of Obama is pathological. That means it can be cured. Those critics of his he chooses to meet with are, aside from being quite sick, intelligent people. They also are sophisticated and capable of introspection. Their anger is mostly self generated. When you befriend people and do it genuinely, you can often destroy prejudice and bigotry. When you acknowledge the existence of others they reciprocate. We are all the same.

Substitute Bush for Obama and you've described yourself as well.

 

[Stoneburner]

All of these "conservatives" implicitly supported him ...

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
The opposition and fear of Obama is pathological. That means it can be cured. Those critics of his he chooses to meet with are, aside from being quite sick, intelligent people. They also are sophisticated and capable of introspection. Their anger is mostly self generated. When you befriend people and do it genuinely, you can often destroy prejudice and bigotry. When you acknowledge the existence of others they reciprocate. We are all the same.

Substitute Bush for Obama and you've described yourself as well.

Bush vindicated everyone who didn't like him from the start and made most of his supporters join the vindicated.

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: sandorski

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
The opposition and fear of Obama is pathological. That means it can be cured. Those critics of his he chooses to meet with are, aside from being quite sick, intelligent people. They also are sophisticated and capable of introspection. Their anger is mostly self generated. When you befriend people and do it genuinely, you can often destroy prejudice and bigotry. When you acknowledge the existence of others they reciprocate. We are all the same.

Substitute Bush for Obama and you've described yourself as well.

Bush vindicated everyone who didn't like him from the start and made most of his supporters join the vindicated.

You may want to look up vindicate.

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: sandorski

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
The opposition and fear of Obama is pathological. That means it can be cured. Those critics of his he chooses to meet with are, aside from being quite sick, intelligent people. They also are sophisticated and capable of introspection. Their anger is mostly self generated. When you befriend people and do it genuinely, you can often destroy prejudice and bigotry. When you acknowledge the existence of others they reciprocate. We are all the same.

Substitute Bush for Obama and you've described yourself as well.

Bush vindicated everyone who didn't like him from the start and made most of his supporters join the vindicated.

You may want to look up vindicate.

Bush [proved correct] everyone who didn't like him from the start and made most of his supporters join [the proved correct who didn't like him from the start]. (Hence his fight for the lowest approval rating in history)

You might want to work on your reading comprehension.

 

[Fear No Evil]

Lets see how Obama actually GOVERNS before we call him a uniter.

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: Fear No Evil
Lets see how Obama actually GOVERNS before we call him a uniter.

Strange, because you haven't waited to see how he actually GOVERNS before going after him?

 

[theeedude]

Keep your friends close, and your enemies even closer.

 

[Moonbeam]

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
The opposition and fear of Obama is pathological. That means it can be cured. Those critics of his he chooses to meet with are, aside from being quite sick, intelligent people. They also are sophisticated and capable of introspection. Their anger is mostly self generated. When you befriend people and do it genuinely, you can often destroy prejudice and bigotry. When you acknowledge the existence of others they reciprocate. We are all the same.

Substitute Bush for Obama and you've described yourself as well.

How else do you think I would know. I used to have to defend Bush from the left all the time. They kept calling him stupid, but I don't agree. I also defended his lack of linguistic skills as likely rather irrelevant.

 

[Skitzer]

Originally posted by: ayabe
Whatever he's still a Marxist pussy whose trying to put us all in debtors prison, surrender to AQ, and make "gay" the national religion of the US.

QFT

on/sarcasm/off

 

[Mursilis]

How is this dinner all that unique? It's just a political gesture. I can easily have dinner with people who completely disagree with me, and still govern the way I always wanted to govern, were I him. I'll grant that the dinner was a nice gesture, but in the end, it's quite probably an empty one.

 

[theeedude]

I sure hope it's an empty gesture. Conservatives have done enough damage to this country over the last 8 years and then some.

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: eskimospy

Originally posted by: Fear No Evil
Lets see how Obama actually GOVERNS before we call him a uniter.

Strange, because you haven't waited to see how he actually GOVERNS before going after him?

Did you give Bush a chance? No, wait, he stole the election, I forgot. He hasn't been your President since he illegally took power.

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: eskimospy

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: sandorski

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
The opposition and fear of Obama is pathological. That means it can be cured. Those critics of his he chooses to meet with are, aside from being quite sick, intelligent people. They also are sophisticated and capable of introspection. Their anger is mostly self generated. When you befriend people and do it genuinely, you can often destroy prejudice and bigotry. When you acknowledge the existence of others they reciprocate. We are all the same.

Substitute Bush for Obama and you've described yourself as well.

Bush vindicated everyone who didn't like him from the start and made most of his supporters join the vindicated.

You may want to look up vindicate.

Bush [proved correct] everyone who didn't like him from the start and made most of his supporters join [the proved correct who didn't like him from the start]. (Hence his fight for the lowest approval rating in history)

You might want to work on your reading comprehension.

In the context of the posts, I beleive vilify is the correct verb.

 

[bamacre]

You should change the title of the thread.

They aren't conservatives, they are neo-conservatives.

And anyone who thinks this is great is a dolt.

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: eskimospy

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: sandorski

Originally posted by: dphantom

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
The opposition and fear of Obama is pathological. That means it can be cured. Those critics of his he chooses to meet with are, aside from being quite sick, intelligent people. They also are sophisticated and capable of introspection. Their anger is mostly self generated. When you befriend people and do it genuinely, you can often destroy prejudice and bigotry. When you acknowledge the existence of others they reciprocate. We are all the same.

Substitute Bush for Obama and you've described yourself as well.

Bush vindicated everyone who didn't like him from the start and made most of his supporters join the vindicated.

You may want to look up vindicate.

Bush [proved correct] everyone who didn't like him from the start and made most of his supporters join [the proved correct who didn't like him from the start]. (Hence his fight for the lowest approval rating in history)

You might want to work on your reading comprehension.

In the context of the posts, I beleive vilify is the correct verb.

No.

 

[JSt0rm]

Originally posted by: ayabe
Whatever he's still a Marxist pussy whose trying to put us all in debtors prison, surrender to AQ, and make "gay" the national religion of the US.

lol. Thats the name of his new book

 

[Fern]

I heard Rush Limbaugh was there too?

Anyway, it was just a clever ploy to get them all asembled together somewhere thereby making it much easier to plant 'bugs' in their homes.

But "meeting" is (potentially) a nice gesture; however we don't even know what was said (was the Fairness Doctrine discussed?). GWB met with Putin (a harsh critic), did that make him a "uniter"?

Fern

 

[GroundedSailor]

Originally posted by: Fern
I heard Rush Limbaugh was there too?

Anyway, it was just a clever ploy to get them all asembled together somewhere thereby making it much easier to plant 'bugs' in their homes.

But "meeting" is (potentially) a nice gesture; however we don't even know what was said (was the Fairness Doctrine discussed?). GWB met with Putin (a harsh critic), did that make him a "uniter"?

Fern

Would have been nice to be fly on the wall at that meeting!!

Rush was at the White House for the 'buddies award' ceremony.

 

[GroundedSailor]

Originally posted by: Fern
GWB met with Putin (a harsh critic), did that make him a "uniter"?

Fern

No, that just made him a soul searcher :laugh:

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: Fern
I heard Rush Limbaugh was there too?

Anyway, it was just a clever ploy to get them all asembled together somewhere thereby making it much easier to plant 'bugs' in their homes.

But "meeting" is (potentially) a nice gesture; however we don't even know what was said (was the Fairness Doctrine discussed?). GWB met with Putin (a harsh critic), did that make him a "uniter"?

Fern

I'm sure the Fairness Doctrine was not discussed. Why would it be? Everyone in the room would have opposed it and it has never stood any chance of being passed. The Fairness Doctrine only exists in the paranoid dreams of the ultra right. (and the weird fantasies of the authoritarian left)

GWB met with Putin because Putin is the head of another country that we have major dealings with. It's not like a president can avoid meeting with the President of Russia. Most presidents can probably live for 4 years without meeting Bill Kristol though.