As you all no doubt know, the right wing is all a-flutter over a video still that purports to show President Obama checking out the derrier of a young junior delegate from the G8.
John Gibson was taking calls about this all afternoon, all the while claiming that he was "forced" to talk about it, even though there was more important news out there. I just couldn't help myself...
John's radio call in show is a particularly easy one to get on. I listen occasionally on the Fox channel on Sirius radio. I don't know if it is syndicated on regular AM or FM.
Anyway, I told the screener that I thought it was more phony outrage from the right, and he put me right through.
John had repeatedly referred to this "picture", and I first corrected him that it was actually a video still.
I then explained to him that my 2 and a half year old daughter can recite her ABC's by herself, but that if I take a video of her doing so, and freeze it in just the right way as she's twisting her face to get out the next letter, she can appear to have Down's Syndrome. In other words, a video still CAN be very misleading.
He seemed to accept my premise, and referred to it as a "sreen grab", but then asked me whether I thought it was "presidential" or "inappropriate".
That's when I wound up for the big pitch.
"Well", I said, "I don't think it's any more inappropriate than your colleague Bill O'Reilly telling Andrea Mackris what he'd like to do to her with a loofah in the Bahamas."
Click.
Silence.
I quickly turned on my radio, and they had dumped the call. He spoke over the end of my comment so the only thing a listener heard was "oofah in the Bahamas".
I doubt I convinced a single winger to think differently about this, but it was a fun way to spend my lunch hour.