CNN was off the wall prior to President Obama’s farewell address as OutFront host Erin Burnett lauded “an emotional night” for the President’s most ardent supporters while an former Obama administration official compared him to Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars: A New Hope when he was struck down by Darth Vader.
Directing her comments to CNN presidential historian Douglas Brinkley, Burnett gushed over “the significance of where we are” upon seeing “passionate supporters...who love him” on hand in Chicago.
“You know, we saw someone with a My Brother's Keeper jacket on the back. You know, this is an emotional night for them. But this is very significant. These addresses are usually given from the Oval Office, almost always, in fact and never from an adopted hometown as Chicago is for him,” Burnett added.
Brinkley noted how most Presidents delivered their farewell addresses from the Oval Office (with a few other rare exceptions) before morphing into a fan boy:
George Herbert Walker Bush gave a speech at West Point that some consider his farewell address. Nothing like this. This is a rock ‘n’ roll concert, a political rally. The energy level is high and the amount of love in this city for the President that coming back here to this presidential center is just sky-high.
If that level of fawning wasn’t enough, guest and former Obama economic adviser Austin Goolsbee employed a line that Time magazine used when writing about President-elect Trump as their 2016 Person of the Year with Obama being a famous Jedi master from the movie saga.
“With a lot of executive orders I kind of think President Trump is going to experience his Obi-Wan Kenobi moment. You know, remember in the Star Wars movie, when Darth Vader comes out to fight the lightsaber battle and he just stands there and he says if you strike me down now, I shall become more powerful than you ever imagined,” Goolsbee explained.
Goolsbee further laid out his analogy by predicting that: “[W]hen things go wrong...people are going to say what did you do, Donald Trump? It was going well when you took over.”
Here are the relevant portions of the transcript from CNN’s Erin Burnett OutFront on January 10:
CNN’s Erin Burnett OutFront
January 10, 2017
7:07 p.m. Eastern
ERIN BURNETT: And, Doug, the significance of where we are. You know, just today, spending a few hours before this — before this event, you saw the people coming to hear him speak. These are his passionate supporters, people who love him. You know, we saw someone with a My Brother's Keeper jacket on the back. You know, this is an emotional night for them. But this is very significant. These addresses are usually given from the Oval Office, almost always, in fact and never from an adopted hometown as Chicago is for him.
DOUGLAS BRINKLEY: Always from the Oval Office or a State of the Union address that might count as a farewell. George Herbert Walker Bush gave a speech at West Point that some consider his farewell address. Nothing like this. This is a rock ‘n’ roll concert, a political rally. The energy level is high and the amount of love in this city for the President that coming back here to this presidential center is just sky-high.
(....)
7:43 p.m. Eastern
AUSTIN GOOLSBEE: With a lot of executive orders I kind of think President Trump is going to experience his Obi-Wan Kenobi moment. You know, remember in the Star Wars movie, when Darth Vader comes out to fight the lightsaber battle and he just stands there and he says if you strike me down now, I shall become more powerful than you ever imagined. And I think the more he gets rid of, then when things go wrong — remember, when Obama comes into office, the economy is not doing well, epically bad and as we have turned that around to be something more solid and we didn't have a depression, any stumble in the economy, people are going to say what did you do, Donald Trump? It was going well when you took over.
