Reporters like to think that they’re just “calling it like it is”—even when they load their questions with accusatory “spin” or prejudicial perspective.
Major Garret, News Chief White House Correspondent, asks President Obama during the question and answer period at a White House news conference regarding the nuclear arms deal with Iran: “Can you tell the country, sir, why you are content – with all the fanfare around this deal – to leave the conscience of this nation and the strength of this nation unaccounted for in relation to these four Americans?” Garret was referring to four Americans that are being held in Iran, apparently as political prisoners.
Obama responds: “The notion that I am content as I celebrate with Americans citizens languishing in Iranian jails – Major, that’s nonsense. You should know better.”
Why is the use of the word “content” by Garret a loaded word and offensive to President Obama? Because, by using it, Garret presumes he knows what is going on in Obama’s heart and soul. Contentment is a feeling statement that describes an internal state of being within a person. Objectively speaking, if you are supposedly the contented one, only you can tell me so. As a statement of feeling, contentment or discontentment (about an action or situation), can only be testified to by the person owning such feelings. As such, if others are to know how you feel, it must be claimed from the inside out. That is, no outsider looking in, is in a position to authoritatively declare to you whether or not you are content and therefore certainly has no right to declare to others whether or not you are feeling content about something—without, that is, you first owning and admitting as much. Thus, such a declaration from another person other than yourself would be presumptuous and crossing personal boundaries. And this is precisely what Major Garret did.
Therefore, Obama’s irritated reaction to Garret’s use of the word “content,” makes perfect sense. Obama had all the right in the world to be offended by Garret’s presumptuous declaration that Obama is supposedly content about the situation respecting the four Americans imprisoned in Iran. In the course of normal interaction with others, you or I would be just as offended if someone presumed to know and then declare to others what our internal state of being is, with respect to a given situation, especially if it makes us look crude, rude, insensitive, or unsympathetic to that situation. For example, imagine if someone was discussing the fact that a family member of yours had recently been diagnosed with cancer and I, standing nearby, chimed in the discussion by declaring to you and those around you, “Oh, well, I know it means little to you, since you don’t care that he has cancer anyway.” Who am I to tell you that you “don’t care”? Unless you have already told me and others that you actually do not care, I am in no position to presume so and certainly have no right to say as much.
It is quite evident that Garret carefully crafted his question so as to subtly accuse Obama of being insensitive and uncaring. The nature of this carefully crafted question is not unlike the question: “So, have you stopped beating your wife yet?” Obviously, to answer the question with a simple yes or no, buys into a presumption within the question itself—that the man has been, and may very well still be, beating his wife on a regular bases. Now, if the man vehemently objects to the question’s assumption (and with much irritation), saying: “Nonsense! I don’t beat my wife and never have!!” He may then be accused of being hyper defensive, and therefore having something to hide. He may then be depicted as a liar and/or a man who is in denial. And for those who don’t like the man and never trusted him to begin with, the man’s response simply confirms their worst suspicions. They then walk away, confident that the man continues to beat his wife. Hence, the man can’t win whatever he says or however he says it.
This is what happens in politics all the time. There is no real argument and grappling with the facts. Rather, there is character assassination and name calling. We hear little actual objective and respectful debate over principles and ideas and their reasoned application in given circumstances. Instead of hearing counter arguments that include actual facts and variables and concrete factors that affect decisions, we hear things like “This is stupid,” and “You lie,” and “You’re heartless” and “You’re being naïve.” These are not arguments. They are attacks on the person. It is posturing, grandstanding, and it is insulting both to the American democratic system and to the American people.
Perhaps, next time, a White House Reporter should ask Obama whether or not he has stopped beating his wife and why he is content to continue to do so. I’m sure many Republicans will be more than happy to confirm a rumor like that and spread it around with glee—anything to make him look bad.
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