Obama's Dinner Date with George Will and the Conservative Media Elite

As you may have heard, Barack Obama did some socializing in Maryland last night. His host: conservative columnist George Will, who brought out some of the biggest stars in the right-wing media establishment for dinner, wine, and restrained hostility collegial conversation. David Brooks was there, as were Charles Krauthammer, Larry Kudlow, Rich Lowry, and the always perspiring Bill Kristol.

Filing a pool report outside of Will's home, Kenneth R. Bazinet of the New York Daily News summed up the odd gathering nicely:

"This is for real, folks. The bloggers are going to love this one."

Indeed they are. And already the chirping has begun. Over at the Daily Kos, for example, the response was near immediate:

...We're really supposed to be outraged about this or something? Why wouldn't he talk to conservative writers? It's not as if he shied away from the other side during the campaign, even going on Bill O'Reilly to get yelled at by that old gasbag. Let him try to work his charm with that crowd. There's little downside.

 
Nah, there's no outrage or anger. What I feel is more like pity.

 
Adds a commenter:

Basically it's a room full of people whose work over the past year and a half or so was dedicated to defeating Obama. And now they have to sit down at a table with the living, breathing proof of their total defeat.

 
 
John Batchelor, writing for Tina Brown's The Daily Beast, has this to say:

Why did Obama want this to happen? No Republican president in memory has ever engineered a meeting before or after his inauguration with the most potent voices of the left....Not one of these men tonight would vote for Obama or his party ever, and together these men have persuaded tens of millions of Republicans to vote against the whole of Obama's ticket. And they will again in 2012.  
The only credible explanation for the dinner party heard 'round the world is that Mr. Obama believes his personality is more substantial than his politics. That he believes charm, soft words, candlelight, good wine, and stagey entrances will overpower ideas, ideology, and partisanship.

 
 

I really sort of like that. I like this image of Obama, sitting in his temporary residence at the Hay-Adams hotel, thinking to himself: If I can just get the right-wing punditocracy to have a candlelight dinner with me...soft violin music...soft words...a bottle of Chateau Lafite....

Obama, playing footsie under the table with a blushing Larry Kudlow....
 
 

Me? I think this talk of charm is overblown. Nothing is more tired than the endless carping about a politician's incredible charm, his remarkable social gifts, his wonderful ability to feel your pain and warm even the coldest of hearts. Enough already. I think it might be time for a redefining here.

One thing I like about Obama: He almost never appears to be trying too hard. It's, um, charming how he doesn't appear to be trying to charm you. (Dick Cheney isn't trying either, mind you, but then Dick Cheney isn't charming.) Barack Obama is charming. But you rarely see him flashing a blatantly phony smile and oozing superhuman empathy from a pair of teary eyes. He almost never makes you queasy. You don't really get the sense that he looks in the mirror and winks at himself every morning. Perhaps this is simply deft performance, and the guy is so good at over-extending that he makes it look effortless. Perhaps he's got me fooled. Or maybe he's just unusually authentic for a man in his position. (Let's hope he's unusually authentic for a man in his position.)

Wouldn't that be charming?
 

And if this does indeed turn out to be the case, then I think we can expect to see more friendly dinners with the members of the hostile loyal opposition in the years to come. Continued efforts at consensus building. An unusual commitment to genuine civility.

This, to me, is wise.
 

Closing thought:

If Obama was even slightly successful last night at charming the masters of conservative opinion, I doubt it had anything to do with what he said. Instead it was likely due to the fact that he simply sat there and listened to them.
 

-BL

Comments

[Fjlisti]

Just another indication of how self-confident he is about leading in a different direction. Obama has studied history well. We are not likely to see ambivalence on policy and priority. Many may disagree at various times with both his policy and priority. But, most will know where he stands and why.

Let's hope it impacts the world favorably.

[Beth Dewey]

Sean Hannity was whinning today because he wasn't invited to George Will's dinner party with Obama. Maybe now he finally "gets it" that he is a conservative talk host/entertainer and legitimate members of the conservative media don't want to be grouped with him. .He says he had a "mole" at the dinner party and will "tell all" later. I really have to wonder if he will really get a "tell all" from a someone with integrity who was at an "off the record" event. Hannity is a little man who wants to be a big man and is the center of his own universe. He allows himself to be a mouthpiece for people who want to spread rumors and if you listen to him on his show, which I have for the past 4 years, it is obvious his first activity with a new "story" is to think up negative spin and inuendo to rant about and stir people up who feed on negativitiy. Hannity has a long way to go if he wants to become a "credible" conservative reporter.

[joycehelene]

Somewhere along the line he will have to deal with them so it was better to take them head on all at once and get it over with. He does like to listen to other points of views, so he must have gotten an earful here, I hope he charmed the pants off of them.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

Not literally, I presume.

[AbstractImp]

I truly like John Batchelor's criticism, yet I am not so sure that he has the argument completely right.

You speak charm, soft words and candlelight, when you are not in the room to hear the ideas . . . being responded to by . . . ideology and partisanship.

Is talking capitulation? Where have I heard that before?

So your criticism sounds like whining, and too many lefty social democrats are "crying right out of the box", as if they expect the world to change overnight.

We are now about to witness the departure of the first attempt at fascist control of America, with the corporate government union with a surveilance state.

Obama is my hero for bringing the people out to defeat that monstrosity.

In the cause of liberty, he need never get anything else right in my remaining lifetime. I thank him for that.

And you should too.

[OWCH]

Brad, I have been reading Krauthammer's crap for 20+ years. He's a paraplegic.

The "playing footsie" phrase doesn't quite work here in this context. Choose another conservative.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

Seriously? Honest mistake if so. I've been reading Krauthammer for a long time as well, but I did not know about his condition. How awkward!

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

Correction made. He is now playing footsie with Larry Kudlow. Thanks for the heads-up.

[picard922]

It didn't help to ameliorate the bashing from Fox News when he met with Rupert Murdoch. It didn't soften criticism from Bill O. I hope the food and wine was good. That's about all I can see coming of a meet and greet with this audience.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

They had lambchops. Baby sheep.

[tweedledeedumb]

Yummy!

[eva belle]

Heck, remember how the Lord is my shepherd...i shall not want...He will prepare a feast for me, lay a table for me, infront of my foes. God is so good!

[justice11]

EVEN THIS CAN'T GO WITHOUT A SARCASTIC REMARK FROM GOOD OL GRETA, " DON'T FORGET THE REST OF THE PEOPLE", SHE SHOULD HAVE TOLD THAT TO BUSH ALL THESE YEARS! SHE'S THE HEAD OF THE HATE GROUP OVER AT GRETAWIRE! SHE LEADS, THEY FOLLOW ALONG! NO MATTER WHAT OBAMA DOES, PEOPLE LIKE THESE WILL ALWAYS FIND SOMETHING WRONG WITH IT! LET'EM STEW! WE'RE ALL READY TO UNITE! GRETA AND HER FAITHFUL BLOGGERS OVER THERE CAN SIT AND SULK AND STAY AT A STANDSTILL WHILE WE ALL MOVE ON!! THEIR ABOUT DIVIDING WE'RE ABOUT UNITING!!!

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

WHY ARE YOU TALKING IN ALL CAPS?

[propitiousmoment]

Why are you yelling?

[ErinBerin84]

Think of it this way....three out of the four conservatives have written negatives things about Sarah Palin. Yup, you're the loser again, Kristol.

Obama's supposedly meeting with "non-Republican" columnists (uh, does that mean, Democratic? Liberal?) this week as well, please post when you know who this group will include.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

"Non-Republican" columnists? I'll certainly be keeping an eye out. Interested to see who this group will include.

[Zenpilot]

Maybe Obama actually believes all that nonsense he was spouting during the campaign about inclusiveness and working together and one America.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

*laughs hysterically*

[customgreen]

The right wingnuts in the press Kristol and the rest are way to cynical. They will rip Obama no matter what. He is red meat to them and they can't wait to cut him down. It's what they do, just like the left wingnuts.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

Afraid you're right.

[vernonbc]

Great diary. If nothing else, these various columnists who put words on paper for a living must have enjoyed having a conversation with a president who can use big words in comprehensive sentences. I think it was a great move by Obama. If he can, by the dint of his engaging personality, get these writers to tone down their ideological rantings, it'll maybe get the country back on a more civil path.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

I heard Obama use the word "interlocutor" in his appearance on 'This Week' last Sunday, and it sort of stunned me. Nice to have a president in the Oval Office with a truly great intellect and a command of the language. Hugely important.

[JoePalooka]

I totally agree; however, Obama would have appeared in a better light if he had included powerhouses like Rush, Mike Savage and Joe DePlumma in his soiree at Will's.

[HeevenSteven]

They may be power-houses, but these columnists see themselves as the intellectuals, above all that man in the street stuff, that talk radio aims for. Singling them out would of course make them feel and even look privileged; that's a good way to drive a wedge.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

"Drive a wedge." That phrase will forever remind me of Karl Rove.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

Rush Limbaugh and Barack Obama at dinner together. What I wouldn't give to be a fly on the wall for that one.

[RobertHenryEller]

Bill Kristol and his buddies were charmed by Sarah Palin.

How charming would Obama have to be?

It's not about charm. Obama said he would talk to anyone, without preconditions. If he's willing to talk to Amadinejad, it's not much of a stretch to talk to Kristol, or even to listen to Kristol. (Hell, I can read Kristol without losing complete control of my gag reflex. I expect that a person qualified to be president can handle him too.)

I'll tell you what Obama's doing: He's doing his job. As it should be done.

The problem is ours: It's been so long since the person in the White House was doing his or her job, that we have forgotten what the job description is. It's time for all of us to re-educate ourselves about what a chief executive should do. That we're even talking about this in an indication of how far the bar has been lowered over the last eight years.

[Brad Listi - Huffpost Blogger]

Very good points, all. It was said to me by a friend that Obama actually *likes* this stuff. He likes meeting with people who disagree with him. Rather than diminish or threaten him, it strengthens him, sharpens him. And these, like you say, are very novel concepts after the past eight years or more.

[pollyannish]

Yes. you are quite correct sir!