CNN's Spitzer Calls Tea Party 'Vapid, Puerile;' Parker Applauds Obama as 'Very Lincolnesque'

By Matthew Balan | January 7, 2011 | 1:34 PM EST

On Thursday's Parker-Spitzer, CNN's Eliot Spitzer lashed out at President Obama from the left, going so far as to accuse him of forfeiting his campaign promises, simultaneously attacking the Tea Party movement in the process: "He...let the Tea Party- one of the most vapid, puerile groups out there, without meaningful ideas- take over those voices for transformation, and now, he is embracing their agenda."

Spitzer led the 8 pm Eastern hour with his critique of Obama naming William Daley to be his next White House chief of staff: "You know, I don't think anybody is going to view Bill Daley as the enemy. I think everybody agrees that Bill Daley is an honorable guy...The problem I have with this is that Bill Daley, ideologically, is simply not what this president ran on....This is no longer change you can believe in....This is somebody who has been a senior executive at Morgan Chase- no longer the concerns of the middle class, no longer carrying the banner that got him elected."

On the other hand, Kathleen Parker, his pseudo-conservative co-host, waxed ecstatic about the Daley nomination, and made it clear that she is still a "big fan" of the President:

PARKER: I think what is most appealing to me about this pick...is that Obama did not go for his ideological twin. He actually picked someone who might challenge him. This is very Lincoln-esque- I would think that you'd be- find that appealing- that he's going to surround himself with people who don't necessarily agree with everything he thinks and who are not going to reinforce every thought he has, but challenge him.

The former Democratic governor of New York didn't buy this and continued expressing his extreme disappointment in Obama:

Eliot Spitzer, CNN Host | NewsBusters.org SPITZER: The problem is nobody knows anymore what Barack Obama thinks, and I think what Barack Obama has done is make himself an empty vessel once again. Because he was so passive over the last two years, failing to articulate a rationale for what should have been transformation, he ceded the entire political landscape and let the Tea Party- one of the most vapid, puerile groups out there, without meaningful ideas- take over those voices for transformation, and now, he is embracing their agenda, rather than standing up and saying, this is what I believe in. And I think that is why people are gasping, saying- wait a minute: Bill Daley is a wonderful guy. Nobody will speak ill of him as a person (Parker laughs), but ideology matters. Politics is about ideology, and either this president knows how to stand up and fight for it, or he doesn't, and if he doesn't, then why will people care about whether it's him or George Bush. And frankly, people are beginning not to care, and that's a problem.

One wonders what kind of far-left fantasy land Spitzer is living in if he thinks the President is "embracing" the agenda of the Tea Party movement.

Parker replied to her co-host's rant with a crack: "The terrible irony of all of this is that you are making a case that many Republicans made from the very beginning, that Barack Obama did not know what he really stood for."

Spitzer's blast at the chief executive is a drastic change of tone for him, as just over two weeks ago, he was defending the Democrat's record on education by making the false claim that "President Obama has done everything to push the agenda for choice in schools."

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