Hoopster in Chief Gives Day of Fun To DC Youngsters

Every day I scour the internet for news.  I look for valid issues to report on, particularly those already misreported by the other side.  I choose my subjects knowing that I have my own progressive slant to my views and that I am sometimes snarky to the other side.  When I write my articles, I often use "colorful language" and "teachable moments" to make my points.  I have fun pointing out ironic or grandiose behavior in politicians and celebrities.  I consider this one of the few privileges of being a writer who makes less than five bucks a day, and maintain that it is reasonable so long as I am telling the truth.

Each morning as I begin my quest for news I remind myself that I will be confronted with a news slant that opposes my own and skews reality and I ask God for the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change… But this is getting ridiculous.  Today we took a step beyond the fact that Fox news frames each and every story they cover with the red eye of a republican watch dog.

Today’s headline, "Hoopster in chief Puts Own Image on Basketball" is such a flat out falsehood that makes for a particularly distasteful combination of flagrant hypocrisy and dishonesty that even I was surprised.  Considering how hard right-wingers worked to get that NBC exec fired for the editing of the 911 tape in the Trayvon Martin case, you'd think this organization would go a week or two without lying outright, in their own headlines.

I try to tell myself not to expect too much from these people and I don't.  I tell myself each morning that I will be confronted with a news slant that opposes my own and skews reality and I ask God for the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change... But this is getting ridiculous. 

This is obviously a desperate attempt to perpetuate the blurring of our nation's understanding of our president and his Christianity.  By painting him as a narcissistic boob, one attempts to discount the apparent devotion this man has to tradition, to his religion, and of course, to the health, happiness and prosperity of this nation’s children.  One glance at the photo of this little girl, captioned "Future President Saddler" makes it clear that the President's contribution to society on Monday far exceeded the gift of some basketballs.

Both Fox and ABC falsely reported that the basketballs used by many, including Barack Obama, were printed by the president though Fox went to much greater lengths to discuss their belief that this was some kind of narcissistic propaganda effort.  Eventually ABC News writer, Jake Tapper tweeted that he had been incorrect about the origin of the basketballs and clarified that they were actually a gift from NBA and WNBA players visiting for the event.   As of this afternoon, both the Fox and ABC links are still active. 

These fabrications were offered as substitution for the real story that should have been about the White House Easter Egg Roll, a yearly event that occurred this Monday.  More than 30,000 people participated in this year’s 134^th edition of this event.  This year’s theme was based on Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move Campaign and it was called “Let's Go, Let's Play, Let's Move”  Festivities included games, stories, and the traditional egg roll on the South Lawn.

This isn’t the first time that the right wing media has used the distraction of this kind of media attention to negatively cover our President’s the White House Easter Egg Roll.    Last year Fox & Friends derided the event for being "energy efficient, for encouraging children to exercise, and also – ironically – falsely claimed that souvenir eggs were "stamped with pictures of the president.” 

It seems to me, that if you are going to be a group of big fat liars who make oodles of money lying about our fine president, you ought to have to come up with new lies.   You can’t just dust the same stuff off every year, like “Hey Bill, here’s the box of Easter lies!”  Seriously, get a grip.