You Can Quote Me On That

This has been a good couple of weeks for really stupid quotes.

Let's start with President Obama and his summary on why he is meeting with experts on the oil spill in the Gulf:

"I don't sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar, we talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick."

We all know that rhetoric is the President's strong suit, so tough talk is all he can really provide during a crisis. We've discussed previously the increadible frustration he must feel in knowing that in yet another case, Big Government is not the solution to the problem. And just whose ass has been kicked? As Florida Senator George LeMieux pointed out, the President hasn't even met with the CEO of BP to discuss how this happened, why fix attempts haven't worked and what the company plans to do clean everything up.

Of course the only thing people are paying attention to is the use of the word "ass". "Not very Presidential" they say. Maybe that's the way he talks to his daughters while sneaking a smoke outside the White House. Or maybe he just wants people distracted from what is really not being done.

Let's move on to now-former White House reporter Helen Thomas and her incredibly enlightened statement on the legitimacy of Israel as a nation:

"They should get the hell out of Palestine. Remember, these people are occupied, and it's their land," and Israelis should "go home [to] Poland and Germany."

This is just the latest in a series of recent incidents that has to have Israeli officials and citizens to wonder if the US still has its back. Condamnation from the White House of new settlements in Gaza and the West Bank, the UN allowing Iran to develop weapons grade nuclear materials and sanctions for raiding the "missionary boats" trying to run the blockade on Gaza.

Is Helen Thomas an anti-Semite? Probably not. I believe that you can criticize the actions of Israel without being a bigot. But to side with terrorists looking to destroy a democracy in a region of the world that is short on the observance of human rights is certainly questionable.

And finally my favorite quote of the week--from Packers Head Coach Mike McCarthy:

"I like our training camp schedule."

I would hope that Coach would like the schedule--since he was the one that made it. It's not like the NFL Office released this schedule and the team had no control over it. This is just another example of how over the top we have become in our obsession with football. We're breaking down training camp schedules now?!? I'm surprised one of the reporters yesterday didn't ask Mike to "give us some insight into the decision to go only 'shells' during the second of the two-a-days on August 2nd." To quote Alan Iverson: "We talking about practice.....practice."