HOW DO YOU DO CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM OF ELECTED LEADERS?

How do we constructively evaluate and criticize elected leaders when we do not agree with or support a proposed policy? What is the proper way to communicate what we want from our elected leaders?

In another thread, Rush Limbaugh is being mostly damned and trashed (and misquoted) for saying that he will support President Obama in good policies and will hope President Obama fails in getting through any harmful agenda should he propose such an agenda. Limbaugh is being condemned for being hateful re President Obama and being misquoted that he wants President Obama to fail.

In the opening chapter of Bill Sammon's book Misunderestimated, Sammons describes in some detail a crowd demonstrating frightening and aggressive unmitigated hate directed at President Bush during a visit to Portland. Early on some in the leftish media had coined the phrase 'selected - not elected' and condemned numerous points of President Bush's stated agenda and/or ridiculed the president for being ignorant, stupid, etc. This was all before 9/11. President Bush supporters saw this is unhelpful and hateful.

So how can it be said/done better?

Hoping that we can keep this objective and civil, discuss.

By Leonard Pitts Jr

Syndicated columnist

Rush Limbaugh stirs the pot.
"I hope he fails."

" Rush Limbaugh

It is, of course, a calculated outrage.

Meaning, it was spewed by a clown in the media circus to kick a familiar sequence into motion: angry denunciation by bloggers, pundits and supporters of President Obama (the "he" whose failure is hoped), followed by Rush Limbaugh refusing to retract a word, a courageous truth teller who will not be moved. And, trailing behind, like the folks with brooms trail the elephants in the circus parade, Limbaugh's devotees, complaining that their hero has been misquoted, misunderstood, or otherwise mistreated. "What Rush meant was ... yadda yadda yadda."

A calculated outrage.

And knowing this, knowing how frequently and adroitly media are manipulated by self-promoting media clowns who defame conservatism by calling themselves conservative, one is tempted to let the statement pass, to make its way unimpeded to the dustbin like so many other manufactured controversies. But occasionally, it's necessary to intercept one of them and hold it up to the light.

This is one of those times. Not because what Limbaugh said on his radio program a few days before the inauguration was an outrage " outrage is the point, remember? " but rather, because of what the thing he said says about him and his fellow clowns.

"I hope he fails."

Do you ever say that about your president if you are an American who loves your country? Would you say it about George W. Bush, who was disastrous, about Bill Clinton, who was slimy, about Jimmy Carter, who was inept, about Richard Nixon, who was crooked? You may think he's going to fail, yes. You may warn he's going to fail, yes.

But do you ever "hope" he fails? Knowing his failure is the country's failure? Isn't that, well ... disloyal?

The irony is that Limbaugh and the other clowns would have you believe they are bedrock defenders of this country, that they love it more than the rest of us, more than anything.

That's a lie. Limbaugh just told us so, emphatically.

It's not the country they love. It's the attention. The ideology, their perversion of conservatism, is but a means toward that end.

Yes, an observer might point out that it's counterproductive to give them attention while decrying their love of attention. But, as already noted, occasionally the clowns spew something that cannot, and ought not, be ignored.

Ideological division is nothing new to politics. But has ideology ever taken quite the seat of prominence it now enjoys? Have people ever been quite so prone to regard their ideological identity as more important than their national identity? The last 30 years are rare in that regard, if not unique.

"I hope he fails?!"

So that, what? The defamation of conservatism Limbaugh represents will stand vindicated? The Republicans will pick up a few seats in the midterm election? Limbaugh's "side" " his word " will score points?

Is this only a game, then? No lives at stake, no future on the line, no planet in the balance? Just a game?

I hope he bricks this free throw.

I hope he fumbles that pass.

I hope he fails.

And to hell with the country.

The country doesn't matter. The "side" does. And Limbaugh's side seems angry in power and angry out. It's as if anger is all they really have.

Barack Obama was elected in large part on a promise to carry the nation past anger, past the notion that either party has a monopoly on wisdom, past the belief that ideology is identity. He was elected because people want a sense of mission that makes them feel like Americans again.

If he is successful, Limbaugh and the other clowns will face tough sledding in a radically different world. Small wonder he is so eager to strangle this presidency in its infancy. And need it even be said?

I hope he fails.

This is an interesting question... I think you err in making Rush Limbaugh your example (most of us think he is particularly nasty). There has to be better examples of Conservatives engaging in "constructive" criticism.

The reason this is an interesting question is that the difference between "constructive criticism" and "partisan nastiness" is purely subjective... the fact that you and I apparently feel so different about Mr. Limbaugh is a perfect illustration of this.

Now, put the same words Rush is saying here in the mouth of a David Gergen or a Wolf Blitzer or a Bill Moyers and tell me that what he is saying is hateful:

This is an interesting question... I think you err in making Rush Limbaugh your example (most of us think he is particularly nasty).

Once we become fully socialized to the extent many European countries are socialized, we will be something very different from what we are now.

Foxfyre, My main point is that apparently the difference between "constructive criticism" and "partisan hatred" is purely subjective.

I thought the unfair and dishonest way that Rush's words were being addressed in another thread was an injustice. While I often disagree with Rush's point of view, in my opinion Rush here gave a brutally honest and excellent object lesson in what constructive criticism of an elected leader should be; i.e. "I will support and praise him/her as much as I can based on what s/he does, and I will oppose him/her and hope s/he does not succeed in doing what I consider to be wrong, destructive, or dangerous."

Rush, in Rush speak, was saying on the website that he did not want to Obama a chance to carry out the agenda he had spelled out throughout the interminably long campaign. He hoped that agenda would fail because Rush felt it would be disastrous for the country if it succeeds.

How else should he have said it to get his point across do you think?

Rush, in Rush speak, was saying on the website that he did not want to Obama a chance to carry out the agenda he had spelled out throughout the interminably long campaign. He hoped that agenda would fail because Rush felt it would be disastrous for the country if it succeeds.

How else should he have said it to get his point across do you think?