It's not that I mind a moment where the audience is reminded that the President has very personal reasons for championing the Affordable Care Act. It's true that his memories of watching her worry about how she would pay for cancer treatment were at the forefront when he fought through and got it passed.
I do, however, mind when some airheaded pundit uses what is intended to be a thoughtful moment as an opportunity to pretend he knows anything about voters and politics. Who the hell is Mallory Factor, anyway? I follow politics pretty closely and had never heard of the guy.
So I looked up his bio and realized he's a Wall Street hack, which would be why I hadn't heard of him, since I couldn't give a damn what Wall Street thinks of just about anything.
At any rate, he managed to turn a small sentimental moment at the end of Meet the Press into an opportunity to toss out one of the stupidest "analytical comments" I've heard yet.
From the transcript:
DAVID GREGORY:
Another moment this morning happening that I wanted to share is a moment from-- you know, whenever the president goes overseas, there's a lot of press conferences. We love that. And there's another opportunity to take questions. This was actually a town hall that the president had. And he took a question. And he was asked about his regrets. Here's what he said.
(BEGIN TAPE)
PRESIDENT OBAMA:
I regret not having spent more time with my mother. Because she died early. She got cancer and right around when she was my age - she was just a year older than I am now. She died. It happened very fast in about six months.
(END TAPE)
DAVID GREGORY:
What a tender moment, and a great life lesson in that, right?
[...]
MALLORY FACTOR:
David, that's classic Obama. And that's classically why he won the last time. All the polls on the issues had him down. But people really respond to him. And he does a magnificent job. And I believe he's sincere about that, too. This is the reason he's president of the United States and that Romney lost.
What bullshit. Romney sucked on the issues, especially after his disdain for the moochers and his love for the makers was broadcast in his own voice. Women, Latinos, African-Americans, Asians and every other voting bloc that isn't old white men supported Obama over Romney, and not just because he was sincere about regretting his mother's early demise.
Did he forget the fact that most polls tilted their bias toward Republicans, too?
If this is political analysis, I'll take the Sunday comics instead.
