Axelrod: ‘Patronizing and Disrespectful’ Obama Chewed Out Maureen Dowd

[DonViejo]

This is a rather lengthy article, kind of a mini book review of Axelrod's book, released today. It takes Lloyd Grove forever to get to the President's opinion of Maureen Dowd and then, the meat and the potatoes of the article's headline is one paragraph long. However, it's the two paragraphs after the Dowd paragraph that I find very interesting. I've got it in bold, below -- Don

Lloyd Grove

When David Axelrod published his memoir he hoped it would be seen as a respectable political memoir. Naturally, everyone just wants the bitchiest dish.

-snip-

Perhaps Axelrod’s juiciest yarn—at least for some the self-absorbed, self-dramatizing pundits who traffic in the journalism biz—concerns a visit Maureen Dowd paid to the candidate on the 2008 Obama campaign plane.

“When we brought her to the front of the plane,” Axelrod writes, “Obama proceeded to blister her for a previous column she had written. No one got under Barack’s skin more than Maureen…He was patronizing and disrespectful…After that awkward encounter, she seemed to take particular delight in psychoanalyzing Barack and belittling him in print, which only deepened his contempt… ‘Why are you friends with her?’ he would demand after Maureen sent one of her acid darts his way.”

“Axe” also makes short work of Clinton strategist and pollster Penn, currently Microsoft’s chief strategy officer, whom he describes as “bloodless and calculating” during their brief stint toiling together, and tangling with each other, on Hillary’s successful 2000 Senate race.

Penn “saw his mission as quashing any liberal impulses of the candidate or the campaign, and he justified himself with fuzzy polling numbers and smug self-assurance that made every conversation grating,” he writes. “I felt he spent as much time manipulating his clients as providing constructive counsel.”

###

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/02/10/axelrod-patronizing-and-disrespectful-obama-chewed-out-maureen-dowd.html

[blm]

1. Lloyd Grove is a longtime Bushie/GOP propagandist.

Just in case folks were wondering.

[DonViejo]

2. Thanks. I meant to include that in my comment but, obviously, forgot it....

His article is loaded with quotes from Axelrod, suggesting Grove spoke with him. It looks like the quotes are straight from the book however.

[blm]

14. He'll take book quotes and then run them thru his political spin machine.

Same as it ever was.

[Autumn]

3. Will Axelrod come out and call Grove a liar?

I can see why Obama doesn't like Maureen Dowd.

[Orrex]

4. My main reason for wanting to become President is so that I can chew out Maureen Dowd

That overpraised, no-talent GOP-enabling hack should be called out at every opportunity.

[stevenleser]

8. Well, he wasn't even President or the nominee then, I dont think. So all you need to do is declare

and you can have at her.

IIRC, I had a terse back and forth with her in email at around this same time Obama is talking about, probably about the same things he was upset about. She seems to love picking on petty things like appearance when it comes to Democrats but I never see the same thing from her about Republicans.

[Orrex]

10. Exactly right. She's big on questioning male Democrats' "manliness."

As well as their status as "real Americans."

She once described Al Gore as "lactating" in his excitement over some issue or other, and she fabricated a tale about John Kerry addressing a group of racing fans by saying "who amongst us doesn't love NASCAR?" to play upon his out-of-touch-ness. I don't recall a similar fabrication about Romney, for instance.

She's simply not as witty as she thinks she is, and her journalism is subpar at best. The sooner she gets out of the game, the better.

[stevenleser]

12. The sad thing is, her attempts to suck up to right wingers hasnt worked.

You can see on FR what they think about her. They hate her. Each time her name is brought up, they actually have a rule to post a pic of Catherine Zeta-Jones because Michael Douglas dumped Dowd for Jones (what do you expect from Freepers, they are also a petty and juvenile lot. Maybe the real reason they hate Dowd is her level of maturity reminds them too much of themselves). You can see similar contempt for Dowd on other right wing sites.

So her attempt to pander to the right wing base has failed and of course she has alienated most folks on the left. I'm not sure who remains to be a fan.

[Dwayne Hicks]

5. Isn't she

The idiot who couldn't even handle a pot brownie?

[DonViejo]

6. Yep. The one and the same. eom

[msanthrope]

15. Why yes---

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/04/opinion/dowd-dont-harsh-our-mellow-dude.html?_r=0

[Octafish]

7. Money.

Penn “saw his mission as quashing any liberal impulses of the candidate or the campaign, and he justified himself with fuzzy polling numbers and smug self-assurance that made every conversation grating,” he writes. “I felt he spent as much time manipulating his clients as providing constructive counsel.”

[alcibiades_mystery]

9. Oh, the days when Mark Penn was the darling of the Clintonites

Don't get the way-back machine set to 2008, cuz you will see a lot of DUers making damn fools out of themselves in that regard.

Well, some of them didn't make it past the summer of that year, actually, preferring to be racist schmucks elsewhere. Tra la.

[Paladin]

11. Ah, shit. MoDo will get some mileage out of this.

She's probably dredging up old movie plot references for use in the columns, right now. Thanks for nothing, Axelrod.

[Vogon_Glory]

13. My Heart Bleeds For MauDo--NOT

I have very little sympathy for Maureen Dowd. While I could possibly cut her some slack for criticizing former President Clinton, I remember all too well that she spent the 2000 campaign season attacking Vice President Gore. It is my belief that Mau Do's columns did more to dishearten and discourage Democratic and progressive voters than any amount of Republican boilerplate.

And when it was over, Buckaroo Bush was installed in the White House and Mau Do was left sitting pretty at the Eashington Post.

Candidate Barrack Obama gave Mau Do a hard time?

GOOD! She had it coming.

[hifiguy]

16. If there is any pinhead columnist to whom the phrase

"patronizing and disrespectful" applies, it is the pathetic MoDo. How the FUCK did she ever get a job writing for the Times? Brooks at least wraps his bullshit in pseudo-academic platitudes.

[hatrack]

17. They're both way too impressed with themselves, though Brooks is the more pedantic of the two

"Bobos In Paradise" -