In Fox News Interview with Bret Baier, Obama was Frustrated, Lecturing and Highly Allergic to "interruptions"

In the highly anticipated Fox News interview with Bret Baier, an on-the-defensive Barack Obama oftentimes got frustrated, lecturing, and, in perhaps the most annoying aspect of his performance, highly allergic to "interruptions," which he accused Baier of making several times. This Fox News interview was a major one because it was right in the middle of the week of the run-up to the crucial, final vote on Obamacare that could come down as soon as Saturday. Given the high importance of the interview and the fact that Fox News put Obama in touch with many independents who could have their minds changed on Obamacare, you'd think the president would've presented himself in a better light to actually persuade the undecideds, yes? If that's what you thought, you'd be 100% wrong as the interview was characterized from start to end with nothing but Obama's idiosyncratic behavior when he's asked tough questions he doesn't like: hypersensitivity, evasion and a very unattractive tendency to make unwarranted accusations.

To be clear, this unflattering series of outbursts from Obama was totally uncalled for and not a little surprising because he was not being interviewed by one of Fox News' ultra-popular opinion commentators like Hannity, O'Reilly or Beck! Bret Baier is the very reserved, non-partisan and non-ideological host of Special Report, a nightly Beltway show that covers the bare bones of politics in Washington without any opinion or slant...except in the final quarter hour when both left-wing and right-wing analysts are brought on a panel to discuss the day's top stories. In short, Baier's a straightforward newsman, so the fact that Obama was so rude to him-to say the least-was indefensible as you'll shortly see for yourself in the videos.

In example, let's start off with the first question Baier asked-a question of such topical nature because it dealt with the week's biggest story by far, the process of getting the votes for passage of Obamacare. The question was simple and direct enough: It asked whether Obama supported the widely criticized and unconstitutional Democrat tactic of using the Slaughter rule-which would avoid an up-or-down vote in the House on health care "reform"-especially when he was on record up until just earlier this month saying he wanted an up-or-down vote. However, Obama never plays fair, so instead of giving a simple answer, what does the shameful president do?

He avoids the question and plans to dictate the course of the interview by giving Baier a monologue, instead, and insisting on talking about points he thinks are helpful to his cause...spin in other words. This kind of evasive BS has worked a 100% for Obama when he's on the Obama-mania media-CBS, NBC, ABC, you name it-but it doesn't ever fly on Fox News, which is why its audience is by far the largest of all the cable newsers. Further, shame on Obama for setting such a bad example as president because if you hold the highest office in the land, the least you can do is answer a simple question straightforwardly! Isn't that right, Mr. Obama?

To Baier's credit, he did what all those Obama-worshipping members of the liberal media relentlessly don't do, but should do as their profession of so-called "journalism" only demands: He came back to the original question after a couple of minutes of Obama's BS evasion and held his feet to the proverbial fire. Since Obama is not used to this kind of behavior from the media, but should be since the media's purpose is to be a watchdog and a check against power, which includes especially the president, the interview went south from there.

From that point onwards, on many continually relevant questions, everything from unethical, special deals in the legislation to consistency in Obama's words regarding the ability to govern after passing legislation with a paltry margin of 50-plus-one votes in the Senate, everything was a nasty, contentious fight. Obama on quite a few occasions told Baier to stop "interrupting" him-completely unreasonable, since the press' job is to...hold on here, everyone...actually question and follow-up even with presidents, especially if those presidents evade like Obama did continually-going so far as to wag his pointer finger in Baier's face! That's an action normally reserved only for naughty children, not noble journalists like Baier who rightly did his duty by holding Obama accountable and resisting his numerous attempts to turn the interview into a one-sided monologue! At one point, Obama even called the interview "frustrating," when he finally got it through his head that Fox News doesn't do softball "interviews" like all his worshippers in the mainstream, liberal media do!

The end result of this interview on Obama's part was utter, abject failure, and it's hard to see it any other way-unless you really hate Fox News and ideologically support everything Obama does like a zombie, of course. The reason is because the whole purpose of the interview was to go on Fox News-a network which has a large number of all-important independent viewers whose minds can be changed-and sell to them arguments why they ought to support Obamacare. Obama failed entirely to do this; he didn't even come close because of his arrogance, elitism and sheer defensiveness! Post-interview analyses pretty much concurred.

As a watcher of the interview, I giddily tuned in to see if Obama could answer straight (he wouldn't) and if Baier would challenge him (he did). The impression I was indelibly left with was that I essentially had my time wasted. I expected straightforward answers to really simple questions that even Kindergartners should have no problem with...but all I got was evasion and an insistence on Obama's propaganda/talking points to dictate the course of the interview. As a result, I don't know if Obama supports the Slaughter rule, or if certain, unethical special deals will remain in the legislation. One of the only things I learned, however, was that Obama is fine with shifting the blame to the previous Congress for the problem of setting aside $200 million for the so-called "doctor's fix." Yet, that still fails to answer, though, why he deceptively calls his legislation "deficit neutral," when it clearly isn't due to the "doctor's fix" among other things.

To send Marc questions, praise, or criticism, e-mail Marc at marc_schenker@telus.net

More Reading: Generation Zero Docu on Hannity Says Baby Boomers Caused Financial Meltdown, Rachel Maddow Calls Tea Party Attendees Racists in White Hoods, Glenn Beck: I used to be a Social Liberal Before I discovered AA and Sobered Up

Sources:

Bret Baier, Wikipedia

Special Report, Fox News.com

Slaughter House Rules, WSJ

Pew Survey: Fox News Audience Much More Balanced, Thehotjoints.com