Maybe they should have a one-on-one bowling competition - Joe "Dead Intern" Scarborough vs. Barack "Next President" Obama.  Talk about Must See TV......

Come on!!!! It's not as if Scarborough was making some kind of serious insightful statement. The entire segment was just them joking around. MMFA is reaching for controversy with this one. Conservative misinformation?????? I don't think so.

Agree completely Chris, these talk shows aren't allowed any humor whatsoever anymore?  

Lighten up..... 

Tommy, hope you saw my response on the other thread. I didn't mean you at all in my response, sorry!

Snoop, Not sure which thread you are referring too? 

the NAFTA thread.

Nah......it's all cool, I got what you were saying.  :)

Cool. BTW, I tend to agree, I only wish this was banter that spanned both parties. Joe has a record of only skewering Dems which is what really pisses off us on the left. It would be nice if we could get "equal banter" time (at least proof that there are dem supporters out there who can joke too! ;))

Maybe we need a Fair joke doctrine? ;)

I hear ya, but Joe's ideological persuasion makes him feel better when he is sticking to liberals and Democrats, so he is decidedly one-sided, no argument from me on that.

I just don't feel that protective of any politician or get too offended by the ribbing they get from anyone, they are big boys and girls and can take it, I hope. 

Oh it humorous to say someone isnt a REAL man? I really dont get this nasty denigration and contempt of someone as being humorous. It has an agenda and its WRONG.

Try selling your contempt to most and watch them laugh at it as being either incredibly paranoid, or just downright "henny-penny sky is falling" nonsense.

We all get that you WANT us to just TAKE the jabs and ignore the agenda. THAT has worked so well for the rightwing in the past. Its transparent, its crude and frankly its ignorant. What it ISNT is funny. Anyone that would laugh when someone else is being told they are not a man is a jerk. Hey tommy you are you on your period or something? Isnt that hilarious?

Solon, You are talking to the wrong person, I don't get offended that easily, sorry.....my sensibilities are not so easily jarred as yours, I guess.  Does everyone tread that lightly around you?  Whew...

Then you DID think it was hilarious? See that is the thing was if funny? I dont care if it offended you anymore than you care how offended Obama has a right to be. YOU said it was funny well mine is essentially the same joke so wasnt it FUNNY?

That I am on my period?  If that is the best you can do to make your point, then it's hilarious......I can barely type from doubling over in hysterics.

Man you are obtuse. Why would it have to be better or worse to make my point it was what it HAD to be to make my point ESSENTIALLY THE SAME JOKE. If a pundit said something like that about Bush or McCain the rightwing would cry and scream so loud it would knock the Earth out of its orbit and you KNOW IT.

I don't speak for, nor do I care, about the "rightwing".  So your bringing them up as some defense of your opinion is ridiculous.

No it isnt since you are carrying their water RIGHT NOW. This IS a conservative agenda, it HAS been pushed on each Dem candidate. You refusing to see that is partisan blindness they said this about Kerry and he is about 6ft 5 and a WAR HERO.

I am carrying rightwing water now?  You are hysterical.  Perhaps you have been mixing some of your own water with Johnny Walker or something, which would partially explain your posts today.

I dont drink, never have. I am not emotional that is your wingnut defense mechanism kicking in, you dont have a point you TRY to make it about me. You cant read my mind so you dont have any idea how I am feeling and it isnt my fault you are too dumb to see the obvious point.

You SHOULD have a drink or a joint or somethin'. 

You know a change....would do you good (that's from a song).

And after all, isn't 5 straight minutes of joking about a candidate's ability to bowl what we watch a "news" channel for?

All these shows on these 24/7 newschannels have their functions, this is basically a morning drive-type radio show on TV, they skewer and poke fun and mock politicians and public people all the time.  I imagine one tunes in for that very reason, otherwise they will go to NPR or C-Span.

Personally I watch hoping that I might see another Segway crash or our "fearless leader" choke on a pretzel. Now those are manly activities. Thank goodness managing the economy or prosecuting an illegal war is not so complicated.

Bowling that 37 was shrewd campaigning on Obama's part, in my opinion.  Look at all the mileage he gets out of it.  Really, does anybody give a damn how good a bowler you are?  It was the perfect sport to choose to capture some airtime.

What would get you as much mileage?  Golf? No.  Pool? No.  Poker? Heck no!  See all those have risk.  Bowling was perfect. 

I just wish they would have had a lobbing contest while they were at it.  But some of those bowling alleys got no sense of humor...

Every four years, the pundits portray the Democratic nominee as feminine, and it's supposed to be funny.

 But some of us don't find it funny anymore.

 

I take it then you don't find any poltical skewering of any candidate funny, unless of course it's directed at one you don't particulary care for?  Or am I wrong about that?

Oh it just makes me want to scream.

No it isnt joking around. These campaigns are about the narratives and the rightwing has been trying to feminize the left for a couple of decades. This is exactly the kind of rightwing meme attempting to CREATE conventional wisdom that we OUGHT to be exposing for its dishonesty and nastiness.

Oh please, if your candidates are so fragile and weak they can't take this "narritive", then you are just making Scarborough's point for him.  

Tommy

I'm halfie on this

Part of me understands that this is the nature of the show, its a boys club atmosphere where the line gets pushed for ratings, the old IMUS slot

The other part of me also recognizes a trend.  Maybe if conservatives mixed it up a little more as to what they consider funny, I don't know, but the feminization of liberals is getting old

Hating gays and toting guns don't make you a man, but what the F is up with a score of 37, Obamas my guy but damn

The point for me is how would the candidate handle the ribbing or the teasing him or herself with stuff like this.  I think Obama would probably laugh at it, or shrug it off, or realize it's the nature of the business and wouldn't give it much thought.

People who want to see something in this will find some nefarious underbelly of hideous liberal bashing at work here, the rest of us understand the mindless, harmless drivel of much of cable talk these days, and roll our eyes.

To a degree its the Richard Gere thing

After you hear it enough times you believe it to be true

But I agree, Scarborough is doing a eunuched Imus

BRZEZINSKI: Yeah, well, 15 million Big Macs later, I don't think that name applies, honey.

LOL

Having seen what the men who bowl look like I for one am truly glad that Joe can bowl and Obama can't. Seriously, Joe seem to be having a little too much fun with a joke that had grown old by the 3rd or 4th time he told it and sorry but bowling doesn't meet my manly test.  

Now basketball.......

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/multimedia/photo_gallery/0712/price.obama/content.7.html

 

Pearl,

Why does everyone want a 6 pack when they can have a whole case? ;)

Why does everyone want a 6 pack when they can have a whole case? ;)

LOL

With a case you get the Beer Belly Blues.

Beer belly blues... what color are my new shoes...
'cause my feet & belt buckle are things I rarely see.
My problem is not my glands,
it comes poured from aluminum cans,
and Pabst Blue Ribbon's been awfully good to me.

Beer belly blues... what color are my new shoes...
'cause my pants & my zipper are things I rarely see.
My Momma says I'm big-boned...
I can't fit in her mobile home...
and Old Milwaukee's been awfully good to me.

Pearl,

you just found your "outside" voice!

No Tommy. We get that you LIKE the rightwing getting away with this nasty and dishonest false framing. We KNOW your agenda is for the right to keep control. We think its a good thing to expose it. I notice that Bush never got skewered as being a coward for his terror of going to Vietnam or his hiding under the bed for 9/11. I notice this kind of narrative is exclusively for Dems. I think the press ought to start asking if McCain is a child molester. I mean if he is so fragile that he cant take that kind of false frame he doesnt deserve to be President. Its dishonest. It is a longtime rightwing tactic and its not worthy of public discourse.

GE makes the bombs

ABC tells the lies

NBC....ABC too though

So go ask McCain if he is a child molester?  Or start your own campaign to get that out there in the people's minds, go on, stop telling someone else to do it, put your money where your mouth is.  

Your comparisons never quite hold up in intelligent conversation, do they? But keep trying. 

That is because I am trying to have an intelligent conversation with someone who REFUSES to understand the SIMPLIST COMPARISON. ME saying it wouldnt be anything like this. A PUNDIT WOULD HAVE TO SAY IT TO BE LIKE THIS. And then pundits would have to repeat this same kind of innuendo and outright smear as a joke over a period of years about EXCLUSIVELY CONSERVATIVE CANDIDATES over a period of years. How much simpler do I have to make each point for you. Am I going to have to keep holding your hand and walking you through each point or are you being intentionally obtuse?

So your idea of an intelligent conversation is to float the idea that McCain is a child molester as some valid comparison to skewering Obama about his bowling prowess?   Or are you going to haul out the notion that I molest small furry animals again, another of your classics.

Sorry, if that is your idea of anything remotely beyond idiotic, find someone else to engage "intelligently". 

I guess I will have to if I want any intelligence OR honesty at all. This isnt about bowling and YOU KNOW IT. Its about saying basically Obama is not a man. I guess I should have known better than to expect comprehension from a half-wit. Those two insults are on a par. Your pseudo-outrage notwithstanding.

Lose an argument gracefully for a change, you embarass yourself far less, just a suggestion.

Tommy just because YOU are too stupid to see you are getting taken apart doesnt mean it isnt the base reality here. I am right, you are desperate and if anyone is embarassing themselves its YOU with your trademark stubborness and inability to cede a point.

No, Tommy is not stupid, but he must be a masochist to put up with your redundant unimaginative insults.

And how about this from 1965:

When I'm watchin' my TV
And that man comes on to tell me
How white my shirts can be
But he can't be a man 'cause he doesn't smoke
The same cigarettes as me

Oooh..must be a right winger, right? 

 

 

 

 

No Tommy isnt stupid. Stubborn yes. But he is definitly bright. You have no point. Just because the same tactic was used in an old ad campaign that doesnt mean it can be used again in a political context? Why would that be exactly? They have been using the divide and conquer tactic for millenia in military tactics AND in politics. Here is an old football analogy. You run the play until they stop it.

Just because the same tactic was used in an old ad campaign

 

As far as I know, those of us in the US know those lines from somewhere else, not an "old ad campaign".  You don't get it, do you? 

No I dont recognize it. I assume its song lyrics about an ad campaign using the same tactic I am talking about. The significance of this would be WHAT? OK so its the Stones. Never was a big fan.

Men have been dissing other men about not being "real men" for many years, most often over silly things such as drinking the right drink, driving the right car, or prowess in various sports. 

MMFA has started yet another thread about this, this time with Chris Matthews as the "offender".   One of the links MMFA cites in this post is about a NYT article about how great BHO is at pick-up basketball.

Fuss about this stuff if you want.  I am outtahere.

 

 

 

 

Ah yeah, but I notice the MEDIA doesnt do it to Republicans and do it regularly to Democrats. As I said it is an agenda, to portray the left as feminized. It is pretty easy to see. It really isnt relevant that the tactic has been used before or in other contexts.

It is part of the lyrics from the Rolling Stones hit, I can't get no Satisfaction

If you used either intellegence or honesty in one of your posts, it would be a first.  It was a joke, yes, it was funny, and that was it.  Nothing more, nothing less.

You hiveminders are USED to believing what you are TOLD to believe and you have been instructed that as loyal morons of the Limborg that anything venal a wingnut says that cannot be defended any other way is funny. That seems to be your definition of funny. That however doesnt mean it actually IS funny.

If you ever understood a single thing ever said by anyone not on Screechmonkey radio, THAT would be a first. You are stupid POV. That really isnt anyone elses fault. You got spanked in a thread the other day because you were WRONG. Get over it. It is going to happen again and again. Let me help you out of a sense of pity. Here is the thing. You cant make decent arguments because you are cemented into this Manichean black white thinking and you dont know WHY you believe what you believe. The hivequeen said it, you believe it, that settles it. So when you are SHOWN to be wrong by the facts you spin in hysterical circles embarassing yourself. The Limborg CANT be wrong or there is no order in your universe. So you dispute FACTS that no one anywhere is disputing to defend the lies you have been told and are regurgitating. When confronted with an actual logical argument you freeze up. Since higher brain function is completely beyond you the only tactic you have is to reach into your grab bag for another hivemind talking point no matter how irrelevant and embarass yourself further. You need help. Nothing you can do about being so stupid. THAT is just your burden to bear. Perhaps you may learn that everything a Screechmonkey tells you on the radio isnt necessarily true. Maybe you can train yourself to understand simple concepts. Most likely you are doomed to go through life, brainwashed, ignorant, and pathetic. Good luck with that.

Wrong POINT OF VIEW. There is a secret cabal of powerful men in the media who met every Monday and try to figure out ways to make Democrats look like pansies. It just so happens that they were able to communicate to Joe Scarborough right after their morning meeting that he needed do just this to Obama under the guise of joking conversation. Obvioulsy they don't want anyone to "really" know their secret and Joe Scarborough, being a willing participant, pulled it off beautifully. Only a select few who are not under the spell of Rush Limbaugh are able to see what is really going on. The rest of us are simpletons, who when we hear what is obvioulsy to us a joke, cannot distinguish that it is really secret liberal bashing by the corporate right wing media who wants to feminize all Democrats so Republicans can rule the world!!!!!

Finally somebody explains it CONSICELY, instead of takin' a whole page (mostly insults) like Solon, and puttin' us to sleep in the process. 

Thanks.

"You know, Willie, the thing is, Americans want their president, if it's a man, to be a real man. They -- 1984, I remember Ronald Reagan goes to South Boston. He holds up that beer mug --"

I know their joking, but did everyone see Bush's first pitch at the National's new park? To copy from a commenter on another blog "did you see where the ball wound up? As in everything else he does, President (expletive)'s emphasis was on force, not accuracy."

No - but when he threw out the first pitch in the 2001 world series at Yankee Stadium - he threw a strike.

Whatta man! Now if he would only "man up" to his failings.

When politicians attempt this kind of thing for a photo-op & fail miserably, they are going to get some good natured ribbing.

I mean a 37? Geez I bet I did better than that when I was a 8 yrs old! I haven't bowled in years but I know I'd at least break 150 or better.

Pretending to be a bowler or a hunter or whatever to appeal to certain voters is always a risk if you don't have a clue what your doing.

It's not like it requires stamina and fitness! I bowl like twice a year. Start out first round with a 90, by 5 beers I'm at 130. You should see me after 10+, it's like Barry of Beerfest!

Still say he's a helluvaman just because he was willing to finish a line that was gonna make him look like a BAD BOWLER.  He coulda looked at his watch after the first coupla frames and said "Hey, we gotta get goin'."  But he didn't. He finished it.

And he got a lot of minutes in the media devoted to it.  And nobody cares if you bowl a 37.  In fact they like it, and like you better.

So it was brilliant.

This is the real stuff.  True corporate filth. 

This is rock-ribbed, Republican filth.

With an  unmistakable undercurrent of corporate greed.

MSNBC at its best. LOL

I can't bowl a 150 either. But I could kick Morning Joe's @$$, does that cancel out my "prissy" bowling score?

I can't bowl a 150 either. But I could kick Morning Joe's @$$...

You'd have to stand in line to do that.  :-)

Does Obama being a bad bowler make him more prissy than GW the cowboy being afraid of horses? 

Obama would have crushed it if he had a few beers before he played!

I think the horses are afraid of shrub also, so its a mutual thing.

That was funny, Eweston. Weren't these great eejits calling Shrub the Bow legged cowboy? He's a Connecticut country club cowboy. Is that manly? Hey, maybe Obama should clear some brush with his bare hands  ;-0)

Out west of the Pecos, where I come from, we call him "shrub afraid of his horses."

Hmmm, I thought it would be more like "he who squats to crap and pulls needles out afterwards".

His nick is "shrub on aircraft carrier with cod piece". 

You have to have a pretty large codpiece for it to fit an aircraft carrier.

And W ain't carryin' no aircraft, ifyaknowwhatImean... 

Its a weird thing that his image at "home" is clearing shrubbery. I think his handlers had a hard time finding something folksy for him to be seen doing a "manly" thing on his ranch (an ex pig farm I believe). Yet no one asks why he doesn't photo op other ranch type chores, and where are all the farm animals? Cowering in the barn would be my guess.

Yet no one asks why he doesn't photo op other ranch type chores

Because shoveling crap is his day job, and when he goes to the "ranch" it's to get away from all that. 

wasn't NIXON the Big American BOWLER?

yeah, THERE's a criteria for electability...

damn...

Americans... if we're to believe they're *not* dumb

...then we're supposed to politely ignore that they're simply led by the nose... ?

~~~

Spread Love...

BlueBerry Pick'n

can be found @

ThisCanadian com

~~~

"We, two, form a Multitude" ~ Ovid.

~~~

"Silent Freedom is Freedom Silenced"

Naw, I think curling is THE manly sport.

hillary would have at least got an 80.  [joke]

In pants suit or skirt?

The best line was from Willie saying it looked like a children's birthday party.  Also, Mika is such a fool in these 3 way conversations.  She blurts out and exclaims and it was even weirder to see her comments transcribed.  She should have worked on Mystery Science Theater 3000 as one of the commentators in the audience.  She could have kept the name 'Mika' too.  

"[G]ood natured ribbing"?  Sorry, jeter2, I have to disagree.  Maybe if Maverick of the Living Dead was the bowler-- Scarborough and his fellow corporate media infotainwhores would've spun the lame showing with smarmy affection-- Maverick's Got Game!  Attaboy!  For he's a jolly good fellow!

From the ginned-up derision about Gore's "earth tones" (and the abominable Dowd sneering that he was practically "lactating") through Kerry's windsurfing and asking for an uncool kind of cheese (Swiss) on his cheese steak, there is a settled practice in the US corporate media of emasculating (male) Democratic candidates. 

Whether Scarborough consciously and deliberately joins the chorus, or just drifts into it by absorbing the infotainment elite meme, it's hardly an isolated or anomalous reaction.  The rule is to  "humorously" or "facetiously" demean any promising (male) Democratic candidate, by reinforcing the message that the candidate is a big pussy who runs/throws like a girl.  (Not to mention closet queen Tweety Matthews, who adds his own idiosyncratic psychosexual spin in defining Manly Men-- he's probably more interested in how Obama's bowling shoes smell.)

The purpose of this superficially "good natured" derision is to diminish and undermine the candidate's appeal and attractiveness using a "death of a thousand cuts" approach.  It's unfortunate that this transparent subliminal seduction is rationalized or blown off as insignificant.  And it's probably effective beyond the 25% or so of the Amerikan population who are more or less wingnuts, mired in primitive, lizard-brain proto-thought.  

BTW, I'm not an Obama supporter, although to me it's obvious that his intellect and character is of a far higher caliber than the competition. 

 

 

 

 

 

I'd like to see Joe go 1X1 with Barak at his "game" basketball.  Joe would look worse than a 30.

At least he didn't bring the Pomeranian.

Brzezinski has the best comment in this exchange:

To Scarborough:   "Oh, come on!"

What a god damned bunch of nitwits.

"You know, Willie, the thing is, Americans want their president, if it's a man, to be a real man. They -- 1984, I remember Ronald Reagan goes to South Boston. He holds up that beer mug -- ... -- in that South Boston pub, and everybody's like, "He's a real man," and I guess Barack Obama's trying to do the same thing, too."

Now I know drinking beer and bowling are linked spiritually but is the fact Reagan can close his hand around a beer mug's handle make him a man? I am baffled by the statement. Sounds like he (Reagan) drank a lot though -- well that would explain trinkle down economics or why he was not woke up when two F-14 Tomcats blew Libyan jets out of the sky, he was passed out or hung over -- better than old, tired, and senile. But do we want that guy on "THE BUTTON" probably not. Who knew Reagan and Bush had so much in common -- the liquor I mean. Well, I guess Cheney too since he shot his friend in the face during a "canned hunt". Now that is manly.

And what of Obama's reputed basketball skills? Isn't B-ball a tad higher than bowling on the manly sports ladder?

In fairness, this is less tasteless than Keith Olbermann saying that McCain should contribute to the economy by wearing more depends.

link

In fairness it IS less tasteless than saying McCain should wear more depends.

"You know, Willie, the thing is, Americans want their president, if it's a man, to be a real man. They -- 1984, I remember Ronald Reagan goes to South Boston. He holds up that beer mug -- ... -- in that South Boston pub, and everybody's like, "He's a real man," and I guess Barack Obama's trying to do the same thing, too."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Perhaps Joe has been hanging out with Chris Matthews and has learned to gush over former presidents in an embarassing manner .

I saw a clip of Obama trying to bowl. He got down in the gutter real quick!

Ridiculous.  The whole thing.  Though Axelrod's comment about HRC made me laugh. 

This fell into the category of "all in good humor". I often gasp at things JS says, but he was really just clowning around during this segment.  His intention did not seem sexist or critical in the least. 

Gee, Joe, bowling ain't exactly a sport African-Americans are known to excel in.  Once the Jim Crow laws got the boot, after decades of being kept out of bowling alleys except as "pin boys" -- where you never saw them, I might add -- blacks figured out that it was a redneck sport in any case, so why bother?  (One might say the same thing about golf, which would not account for Tiger Woods, but golf caddies caught on quick that if you mastered the game you could hobnob with the rich and famous.  That was surely one lesson imparted to Tiger by his hip dad.)  Bowling is beer and onions; golf, scotch and sirloin, surf and turf.

That Barack would be an inept bowler shouldn't come as much of a surprise.  Growing up and bowling from time to time, I never saw an African-American at the lanes.  Yeah, yeah, when I took bowling in college just to get the required "P.E." out of the way, the alleys didn't much like "tha nigras" coming around.  But I doubt people of color would have bowled in any case.  They've got more class.  As for Joe the Scar's fey comment equating good bowling with manliness, I betcha Gov. Schwartzenegger bowls gutterballs every time, too.  It's just too hoi polloi.  Come to think of it, Scarman's a bit of girly boy himself.

 

Pardon the interruption

But it wasn't "Hee!" it was "Wee!" 

As in "Wee! That was fun!"

That is all.

 

 

 

 

Did these guys graduate from junior high?

This whole exchange reminds me of Matthews' pronouncements about how Americans want a President with some swagger, somebody who we can enjoy a beer with. We all know how well that worked out. For those who are tempted to write this off as just the fluff side of the news cycle (and it is), I'd point out that a huge portion of the electorate really do vote based on this sort of thing and Scarborough is pushing the Obama-is-too-fem-to-be-Prez meme to that demographic. I'd trade a "real man" president (if Bush or Reagan are what Scarborough means by that) for one with rational and humane policies.  

Since Scarborough was joking around in a manner that is at Obama's expense he is spreading "conservative misinformation?" Is the bowling score of a potential president actually subject to serious debate, the ramifications of which could affect Obama's viability? This article really is pretty childish...as if Obama is some deity who can be cast in no light other than the most flattering...

I'd like to bowl against Scarborough. I wonder when the last time he went bowling? I recently started bowling again. The first week, after a long hiatus from bowling, I got a 100, after two weeks I'm up to 180-190. Bowling is difficult to do if it has been awhile since you last did it.

It sounds to me as if they all have penis envy.