CSotD: Of binders, Teleprompters and an Obama pick-six
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Adam Zyglis made good use of the binder concept.
And a few others came close, but the binder meme seems to me a pretty good example of what's wrong with this whole group-participation form of presidential campaign: A lot of piling on over something of very little significance; a lot of straining over gnats and swallowing of camels.
It's pretty obvious I'm in Obama's corner, though I hope it comes through that I don't see him as a miracle worker or the Ultimate Answer, if only because I've quoted Wanda Sykes more than once in noting that he went to Harvard, not Hogwarts.
But, though I may get burned at the stake for saying it, pummeling Romney over the binders remark is no more useful or insightful than pummeling Obama over using a Teleprompter.
It's so pointless that it smacks of desperation, which is silly, since the entire "binders of women" story was very quickly revealed to be a lie.
You don't have to reach for obscure weapons with Romney. Just examine the ones he is handing you.
Meanwhile, contesting the phrase itself is counterproductive and foolish. Just as accusing Obama of using a Teleprompter suggests that you have no idea how many presidents have routinely used Teleprompters, going gaga over the phrase "women in binders" makes you seem like the kind of pointy-headed intellectual that non-hipsters despise.
So you make your fellow hipsters giggle, but you're still all sitting over there at the table in the corner getting sneered at.
And, besides, it leads to extraordinarily lame cartoons about Bill Clinton wanting to see the binder. Really? You guys got paid for those cartoons? No wonder the art form is dying.
But it's not like the sins are all one-sided. There are plenty of conservatives who use lame talking points to create lame cartoons, and one in particular backfired on them this week: There was a proliferation among the right-wing cartoonists of variations on "hiding behind Hilary's skirts" over the Benghazi incident.
Boy, didn't Obama pick off that wounded duck and take it in for a touchdown!
First, the interception:
Secretary Clinton has done an extraordinary job. But she works for me. I'm the president. And I'm always responsible.
Then the runback:
The day after the attack, Governor, I stood in the Rose Garden, and I
told the American people and the world that we are going to find out
exactly what happened, that this was an act of terror. And I also said
that we're going to hunt down those who committed this crime. And then a
few days later, I was there greeting the caskets coming into Andrews
Air Force Base and grieving with the families.
And
the suggestion that anybody in my team, whether the secretary of state,
our U.N. ambassador, anybody on my team would play politics or mislead
when we've lost four of our own, Governor, is offensive. That's not what
we do. That's not what I do as president. That's not what I do as
commander in chief.
That's known in football as a "pick-six," or a "14-point reversal," since it not only adds (with the extra point) seven points to his total but wipes out the potential seven points that — but for his heroics/their screwup — would have been scored against him.
I don't expect the "binders" meme to lead to anything like that, anymore than the Teleprompter meme has on the other side.
It is, however, a lame distraction and I wish it would go away.
But here's something I wish were not going away.
This "Ink Pen" was the first CSOTD, in its "let's see if this web site works" debut, February 13, 2010.
Which is why I have a little extra affection for the strip, which, in turn, makes me particularly sorry to learn from Alan Gardner that cartoonist Phil Dunlap is closing it down. Dunlap will continue to do a weekly version of the strip and reruns will be available at GoComics.
Sentimental attachment aside, I'm really going to miss the daily dose of wit this strip provided.
But, as noted here just two days ago, producing a syndicated strip is a burden and it has to pay off, in money or by scratching some obsessive itch, and hopefully both.
Ink Pen was a particularly fine strip. I wish it had done both or at least one.
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