Just today I was talking by phone with some folks about how polarized, negative and toxic our political scene is — coupled by a bad barrage of economic news which included the big Dow plunge today. And then a TMV reader send me THIS LINK with a commentator suggesting that since the stock market is down Barack Obama might think about resigning.
Did I miss something?
Were people from the same quarters suggesting George Bush resign during the government melt-down?
Were there suggestions throughout history that other Presidents who faced sharp economic downturns, big defeats resign?
Not every politician is like a Richard Nixon who left due to Watergate or a Sarah Palin who left her Governor’s job after a….whatever.
There is a chance to toss our politicians out of office and that’s on election day.
I myself have been critical of Barack Obama including in THIS COLUMN.
But I have also noted in another column how the conventional wisdom often shifts quickly. It’s hard to believe it can shift again dramatically in Obama’s favor but the CW does change quickly in unforeseen ways.
But resigning? Did I miss something when George Bush was President? Or has yet another political assumption been shattered in our increasingly strident, mega-partisan political culture: that a President is allowed to complete his term and it’s not suggested that when there are bumps in the road he quit.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.