Defending a Man Who Needs No Defense

So last night, Iain and I are watching The Tonight Show, because one of about maybe 5 people on the planet who can get us to tune into that dreck is a guest: President Obama. And everything's going pretty well, when Obama comes out with this mess:

THE PRESIDENT: I bowled a 129. (Laughter and applause.)

Leno: No, that's very good. Yes. That's very good, Mr. President.

THE PRESIDENT: It's like—it was like Special Olympics, or something. (Laughter.)

At which point I said, "Wow. He's going to need to apologize for that one."

And so he did. Even before the show aired, Obama called the chairperson of the Special Olympics, Tim Shriver, from Air Force One and apologized to him.

"He expressed his disappointment and he apologized in a way that was very moving. He expressed that he did not intend to humiliate this population," Shriver said Friday on ABC's "Good Morning America." Obama, Shriver said, wants to have some Special Olympic athletes visit the White House to bowl or play basketball.

Still, Shriver said, "I think it's important to see that words hurt and words do matter. And these words that in some respect can be seem as humiliating or a put down to people with special needs do cause pain and they do result in stereotypes."

Obviously, it would have been better if Obama had never said something so wildly insensitive in the first place, and it's terrible to know he holds the sort of prejudices that allows that sort of "joke" to even pop into his head (no less out of his mouth), but he did—and he had the decency to apologize for it as soon as it was pointed out to him and/or he realized that he'd made a serious mistake.

That has not, however, stopped fauxgressives leaping to the defense of a man who himself clearly sees no need for defense of his own admittedly indefensible action. As Shaker SamanthaB notes in comments: "[T]he thing that has me furious this morning with the fauxgressives are the justifications for Obama's Special Olympics last night. One of the most common arguments was that this was such a non-issue compared to the AIG stuff. Sure, it's just a one liner, but, Jeebus, they speak to the EXACT same thing, this BS Social Darwinism, where people who can play the game right are inherently more worthwhile than others. It ALL connects, and for 'progressives' not to get this is rather astonishing. Anytime you're suggesting that one person is more worthwhile than other, it has repercussions far and wide."

That about sums it up. And I can't help but bitterly laugh at the knee-jerk impulse to defend a man who said something he already admitted was wrong—which may actually be stupider than the idiot conservatives and their knee-jerk impulse to defend a man who was congenitally incapable of admitting he was wrong.

Something for which, if I recall correctly, progressives used to mock them. And deservedly so.