David Remnick

Newsweek Editor Promotes Obama View that Opponents Are 'Afraid of the Future,' and Oppose Greater 'Understanding'
By Tim Graham | April 8, 2010 | 11:07 AM EDT

Unsurprisingly, Newsweek editor Jon Meacham bowed deeply to New Yorker editor David Remnick and his new book on their agreed-upon hero, Barack Obama: "envy gives way to admiration" of Remnick’s skills, he wrote in his "Top of the Week" commentary in the magazine. Meacham hyped the notion that when asked about the "racial component of the opposition," Obama told Remnick "I tend to be fairly forgiving about the anxiety that people feel about change."

Neither Obama or the journalists who adore him seem to grasp that conservatives aren’t anxious about "change" – they’re anxious about crushing debt, and America’s lunge toward European-style socialism. Meacham found Obama’s words to Remnick admirable, where most conservatives would find them patronizing, about our slowness to recognize the greatness of the "evolution" unfolding:

NPR Reviewer Says Obama Book, Like Obama, Is 'Eloquent and Beautifully Packaged'
By Tim Graham | April 7, 2010 | 8:12 AM EDT

Does NPR love Barack Obama? Look at how they reviewed an Obama book Tuesday night on All Things Considered:

In many ways, David Remnick's new book, "The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama," is very much like its subject: even-handed, eloquent, beautifully packaged.

The reviewer was Susan Jane Gilman, author of a book called Undress Me In the Temple of Heaven. She liked the Remnick book, but felt that much of it was already familiar and too recent to feel like history. She ended with this:

Author Says Obama Is Not a 'Phony' When He Changes His Speech Patterns, He's a 'Translator'
By Tim Graham | April 6, 2010 | 5:30 PM EDT

Appearing on the Charlie Rose show on PBS Monday, New Yorker editor (and former Washington Post reporter) David Remnick tried to argue his way out of his new book’s reporting on the phoniness of Barack Obama. Remnick suggested Obama has been a "translator" between races and cultures.

Rose asked him to discuss Reverend Wright. By dumping him, the most significant message Remnick came away with was "He wanted to win," so dumping Wright was essential, and inescapable. But Remnick still tried to claim that "there’s a lot of positive qualities in Jeremiah Wright, and it’s foolish to look past them. He was a social activist. He was utterly committed to his community, a church community that grew."

The "translator" talk occurred as Remnick also tried to revise and extend his remarks on Meet the Press that Obama didn’t have the talents of Ronald Reagan:

NBC Nightly News: Mohammad Ali, Walt Whitman, Annie Oakley and Now...Barack Obama
By Brent Baker | April 6, 2010 | 2:47 AM EDT
NBC News is certainly enthralled with David Remnick’s new book, ‘The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama.’ After giving him a guest slot on Meet the Press and an interview on Monday’s Today show, NBC Nightly News on Monday showcased Remnick in an “In His Own Words” segment to expound on his admiration for Obama’s racial identity journey, starting with how Obama follows in the tradition of Annie Oakley:
There are a lot of American characters no matter what the field who make themselves, who create themselves out of what’s in the cultural air. It’s an American thing, whether it’s Mohammad Ali or Walt Whitman or Annie Oakley. And Barack Obama is somebody who grew up in Honolulu and had to learn how to be African-American in the absence of African-Americans. Racial identity is a drama that Obama had to undergo long after he had become comfortable with his own identity.
Remnick, a former Washington Post reporter who is now Editor of The New Yorker magazine, recalled that after Obama delivered “an electrifying speech” at the 2004 Democratic convention, “that makes him a national figure, maybe a world figure,” at the airport he’s “racially profiled.” When that upset his campaign manager, a delighted Remnick recounted how “Obama says, ‘dude,’ he really said it, ‘dude, don't worry about it. Don't sweat it. I’ve gone through this all my life.’”
Even Obama's Fans Notice He's a Phony In How He Writes, Talks, and Even Walks
By Tim Graham | April 5, 2010 | 7:30 AM EDT

How phony is Barack Obama? PBS Washington Week host Gwen Ifill reviewed New Yorker editor David Remnick's new Obama book The Bridge in the Washington Post Outlook section Sunday, and she kept finding Obama is a Slick Barry, a "shape shifter." Obama even admitted to rhetoric what should be obvious -- how he changes "dialects" depending on the audience he's talking to:   

Obama cops to this. "The fact that I conjugate my verbs and speak in a typical Midwestern newscaster's voice -- there's no doubt that this helps ease communication between myself and white audiences," he tells Remnick.

"And there's no doubt that when I'm with a black audience I slip into a slightly different dialect. But the point is, I don't feel the need to speak a certain way in front of a black audience. There's a level of self-consciousness about these issues the previous generation had to negotiate that I don't feel I have to."

AP: Bill Ayers A 'Former' Radical
By Mark Finkelstein | February 23, 2010 | 10:04 AM EST
At age 50, Bill Ayers called himself a "radical" and a "communist." As recently as 2001, Ayers had himself photographed for a magazine story trampling an American flag. But that's not good enough for the Associated Press. In an article today, AP describes Ayers as a "former radical."

AP's de-radicalization of Ayers appeared in an article about a forthcoming biography of Barack Obama, entitled The Bridge, by New Yorker editor David Remnick.  Here's the line [emphasis added]:
New Yorker’s Remnick: ‘Palin’s Career Would Be Eliminated’ If ‘Preposterousness Were Disqualifying’
By Brad Wilmouth | February 9, 2010 | 4:06 PM EST

On Tuesday’s Morning Joe on MSNBC, on the same show in which host Joe Scarborough had earlier complained about FNC’s Bill Sammon claiming that the media "hate" Sarah Palin, guest David Remnick of the New Yorker magazine -- formerly of the Washington Post--  declared that "Sarah Palin’s entire career would be eliminated" if Americans were influenced by seeing "preposterousness" on public display. Remnick’s comment came during a discussion of the Senate’s adherence to the filibuster rule that makes it easier for the minority party to block the passage of legislation. At about 8:09 a.m., Scarborough contended that he would prefer that filibuster participants be required to actually stand up and speak in televised debate so that Americans might see the "preposterousness" of the practice.

Remnick then took his shot at Palin to dismiss Scarborough’s theory that "preposterousness" could wake up the American public. Remnick: "We see a lot of preposterous things in American politics. That doesn’t seem to convince us otherwise. Sarah Palin’s entire career would be eliminated, would pass out of history if preposterousness were somehow disqualifying, but it’s not."

Below is a transcript of the relevant exchange from the Tuesday, February 9, Morning Joe on MSNBC: