Originally Posted by SteveZ

And the Randi Rhodes, Bill Maher and the after-midnight crowd are any better or different than Limbaugh? They are all entertainers, paid by revenue from advertising sponsors and at the mercy of ratings.

They do mirror segments of the populace, and they do bring out strong feelings - pro and con.

Now let's take one of the more flamboyant positions, that being an Obama failure. It's safe to say that we all want him to be a successful president, but that success is measured by different criteria, depending on one's political leanings.

As a progressive neanderthal, my criteria for a successful Obama presidency would be:

1. End of the Iraq War, with an Iraqi government in place that actually believes in human rights for Sunni, Shi'ite, Kurd, Christian, Jew, Druid and whomever/whatever else lives in that geography. Anything less is failure.

2. End of the Afghani War - with the same points as above.

3. Elimination of al-Qa'ida and its subordinate and satellite entities from this planet, in that they no longer present a threat to the Western world. Anything less is failure.

4. Reduction in government spending, especially in social programs geared to increase the dependency of targeted groups toward government aid for long-term existence. If that means some of the Obama administration's pet programs don't become law, that's a success.

That's just a few of what I consider a successful Obama presidency. So, "failure" is a subjective term.

Let's remember that "all Americans" didn't vote for Mr. Obama. Many voted for him not because of his position on issues, but because they just either wanted somebody who didn't seem like a continuum of the previous administration, or because he is of like ethnic background, or because he was the media darling.

He does have a political honeymoon ahead, still owes many political debts, and has the luxury (as all new administrations do) of saying that things are worse than he thought, so the "rules change" is the first of the "changes" to occur.

Limbaugh, Hannity, Levin, Rhodes, Maher, and all the others - even as entertaining commentators - provide a lot of good, and have done so - pro and con - very well. We would all be much less informed, and probably less interested in many issues had it not been for these left-and-right-leaning commentators. They make us think! They force us to investigate! They have the luxury of devoting a lot of time into watching and listening, and give us information we would not have received from the broadcast media - also dependent on dog food commercial revenue for their survival.

So, if the administration can't take criticism from these commentators, and if public criticism is to be silenced as "fairness," the term describing that policy is Faschism.