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| Knives come out for Obama's 'preening' social secretary |
| 2009-12-05 |
| She came to town as a certified member of Chicago's great and good: a highly successful professional, an A-list socialiser and a prolific fundraiser for both president-to-be Obama, and for his adopted city's bid to win the 2016 Olympics. One way and another, Desiree Rogers seemed perfect for her new position in Washington -- until a couple of Virginia parvenus crashed a state dinner. Unlike small children, White House social secretaries before her have generally been neither seen nor heard. Obscurity is a sign of success; their greatest moments are when glittering events unfold with the elegance and unobtrusive precision of a Swiss watch. Even close followers of the American presidency might be pressed to name a single holder of the job in the past couple of decades. Ms Rogers right now is not being heard -- she declined to testify at yesterday's Congressional hearing into how Michaele and Tareq Salahi managed, uninvited, to attend last week's gala in honour of India's Prime Minister. But far too much has been seen of her of late, above all in unflattering headlines blaming her for the embarrassment. The question now is, will Barack Obama jettison his social secretary just as he dispensed three weeks ago with the services of the White House counsel Gregory Craig? Mr Craig had become the face of the administration's failure to close Guantanamo Bay; Ms Rogers' claimed failings, in comparison, may seem rather less significant. Still, it can only be said that the 50-year-old holder of a masters from Harvard Business School had been riding for a fall. The first African-American social secretary, she delighted in making news even before the Obamas took up residence in the White House on 20 January. As Robin Givhan, the fashion critic of The Washington Post, tartly wrote after Crashergate broke, Ms Rogers "arrived in Washington this year to great fanfare, no small amount of it of her own making". "I don't want to take a job where I'd be picking flowers," she told an interviewer in those heady days. Admiring articles described her as "the most important event planner on the planet", and unusually she was given the rank of "special assistant to the president" to go with the formal title of social secretary. She featured in Vogue magazine a month before the First Lady Michelle, her official boss, and by April was the subject of a spread in WSJ, The Wall Street Journal's glitzy style magazine. Unfortunately, her critics say, somewhere along the way, Ms Rogers seems to have stopped paying attention to the nitty gritty of her job -- like making sure a person from her office was at the White House entrance on occasions like a state dinner, to make sure people who said they were invited actually had been. Instead, it is said, the Bush administration appointee who had that task was demoted by Ms Rogers, and finally left the White House in June. That fact too was inevitably seized upon, as proof that the new social secretary was just another Chicago operator. According to The New York Times At one level, the simultaneous assault by two sharp-tongued writers in the goldfish bowl of the capital should not be taken over-seriously. Washington delights in cutting pushy outsiders down to size. Social secretaries are meant to be demure. The present one summons many epithets to mind, but "demure" is rarely among them. But the episode is also a warning, another small sign of how the mood is starting to sour on the "brand Obama" that Ms Rogers came to Washington so intent on promoting. Among the complaints is that Mr Obama has brought with him his own mafia, an incarnation of the infamous Chicago machine -- but a machine that can't even run a state dinner properly. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #15 Common amongst Collectivists. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning-Kruger_effect |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2009-12-05 22:07 |
| #14 Because Shipman can't spell 'Bilderberger'? |
| Posted by: Pappy 2009-12-05 20:23 |
| #13 Why the Federal Reserve, Shipman? Surely they get nothing until the government makes us buy a stamp for every email... |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2009-12-05 20:17 |
| #12 The Martian Sekret Service is covering this shit up, they run Snopes.com for the benefit of the Federal Reserve. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2009-12-05 15:48 |
| #11 Y'know - I get scads of these 'forwarded-FYI' emails. They get discarded. It'd be kinda nice to not also have to see that junk on the Burg. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2009-12-05 15:14 |
| #10 I'm sorry, Redneck Jim. Snopes.com says it's a hoax. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2009-12-05 14:08 |
| #9 In the same "Obama's a fool" vein, this E-mail from a trusted source VERY QUIETLY OBAMA'S CITIZENSHIP CASE REACHES SUPREME COURT AP- WASHINGTON D.C. - In a move certain to fuel the debate over Obama's qualifications for the presidency, the group "Americans for Freedom of Information" has Released copies of President Obama's college transcripts from Occidental College .. Released today, the transcript indicates that Obama, under the name Barry Soetoro, received financial aid as a foreign student from Indonesia as an undergraduate at the school. The transcript was released by Occidental College in compliance with a court order. The transcript shows that Obama (Soetoro) applied for financial aid and was awarded a fellowship for foreign students from the Fulbright Foundation Scholarship program. To qualify, for the scholarship, a student must claim foreign citizenship. This document would seem to provide the smoking gun that many of Obama's detractors have been seeking. Along with the evidence that he was first born in Kenya and there is no record of him ever applying for US citizenship, this is looking pretty grim. The news has created a firestorm at the White House as the release casts increasing doubt about Obama's legitimacy and qualification to serve as president. When reached for comment in London , where he has been in meetings with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Obama smiled but refused comment on the issue. Under growing pressure from several groups, Justice Antonin Scalia announced that the Supreme Court agreed on Tuesday to hear arguments concerning Obama's legal eligibility to serve as President in a case brought by Leo Donofrio of New Jersey . This lawsuit claims Obama's dual citizenship disqualified him from serving as president. Donofrio's case is just one of 18 suits brought by citizens demanding proof of Obama's citizenship or qualification to serve as president. Gary Kreep of the United States Justice Foundation has released the results of their investigation of Obama's campaign spending. This study estimates that Obama has spent upwards of $950,000 in campaign funds in the past year with eleven law firms in 12 states for legal resources to block disclosure of any of his personal records. Mr. Kreep indicated that the investigation is still ongoing but that the final report will be provided to the U.S. attorney general. LET OTHER FOLKS KNOW THE NEWS, THE MEDIA WON'T ! So, either he lied to get aid he wasn't entitled to, or he lied about being a US citizen, either way, He's a proven Liar. |
| Posted by: Redneck Jim 2009-12-05 13:40 |
| #8 The Devil is in the details, President Papoon (not insane). |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2009-12-05 12:12 |
| #7 She may possibly have some embarrassing Tiger Woods type e-mails? |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2009-12-05 08:49 |
| #6 C'mon, Spook! He's a democrat! |
| Posted by: Bobby 2009-12-05 08:46 |
| #5 Obama continues to surround himself with utterly incompetent, self-important, well educated idiots. Just like him - they believe they are smarter than they actually are, and are far too arrogant (or stupid) to realize it. Of all the men to elect as our first black president, why this ideologue, this preening narcissistic fool, this teleprompter-dependent double-talking empty suit, a buffoon, a boob? |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2009-12-05 08:37 |
| #4 And OBumble invoked Executive Privilege over his Social Secretary. What kind of national security secret is a guest list? |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2009-12-05 06:22 |
| #3 "'Rrrr, rrrr, rrrr!' said the bus." |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2009-12-05 05:28 |
| #2 Remember, it's not crashers, it's "undocumented party guests". |
| Posted by: DMFD 2009-12-05 03:07 |
| #1 FTA: "According to The New York Times dowager columnist Maureen Dowd, she was...." Ouch! That's gotta hurt. |
| Posted by: tipover 2009-12-05 01:17 |