The President is Right – Kanye IS a Jackass…And So Is Terry Moran

This just in: according to Barack Obama, the sitting president, rapper Kanye West is a jackass for interrupting the acceptance speech of Taylor Swift for her Video Music Award from some channel that used to be relevant.

As a national media, the past few days have been dedicated to kvetching over West’s rude actions at MTV’s VMAs on Sunday, followed by the president calling him a jackass off the record.

Well, let’s settle a couple of things:

First, Kanye West is a jackass. And a douche-bag. And a class-A attention grabbing, self-promoting, self-loving media creation who happens to make decent hip-hop (I must confess, I still hum “Golddigger” from time to time). So there’s not much of a story there. And if you want further proof of the dude’s latent inability to shut his mouth, watch him make Mike Myers – someone who has made a living by saying outrageous things that push the boundaries of polite society – uncomfortable enough to go silent.

Second, does it really merit national attention that the president of our country thinks one of its private citizens is a jackass? I mean, really – is this so shocking? Chances are he’s got a list longer than Shaq’s left arm full of people who strike him as jackasses, and perhaps lists that utilize other, more colorful words to describe people who rub him the wrong way. But then again, don’t we all? Personally, I thought there was nothing wrong with the leader of our country expressing his displeasure at a childish act on national TV.

I don’t want this to turn into a race thing, but our president happens to be black, so we’ll deal with it. I say kudos to the world’s most powerful man, who happens to be black, taking to task someone who is considered by some black kids a role model. Obama needs to say things like this to help change the idea of what constitutes a good example. If even one kid – and honestly, white, black, yellow, red, green, plaid, it doesn’t matter – if one kid comes away moved by the president’s disapproval of Kanye West then the president has done a good job. I think it’s awesome that we even have a black president to begin with, and if he can help turn attitudes in a generation around, even better.

What is really the issue to me is the fact that the pugnacious little turd to the left, one Terry Moran from ABC News, took an off-the-record comment and Twittered it to the rest of the ever-loving free world. In essence, Moran created news, which is a violation of the journalistic code of ethics (such as they are…). Several levels worth exploring here:

1. The Twitter Factor – once upon a time, news stories had to be run through a review process before the saw the ink of print. Now, in the wake of Twitter, we have an unfiltered spout from which we can draw. And that’s the problem. Twitter only limits the number of characters you can use – not what you can say within that limit. Moran did an end-around on the traditional press and put a private conversation between the President and the Press Corps out for public consumption. Used to be, that’s a no-no. Now, other journalists as well as the American people, will have to deal with a President who is more guarded in his comments and approach to the public, and that’s just unfair. We shouldn’t have to have a President who’s even more scripted and controlled that we already have.

2. The Race Factor – again, I hate to bring up race, but did Moran Tweet this because he thought it was funny or because he thought it some grand insight into the black culture? I don’t know Terry Moran (pronounced More-ran, though it might be tempting to pronounce it More-ron, and possibly more accurate…) so I can’t say he’s racist, overtly or otherwise. But if the President were lily white, would he have violated the journalistic code? Would he have still Tweeted the comment? I don’t know.

3. The Change Factor – and that’s the problem. Obama campaigned on a platform of change when that message was badly in need of proclamation. People bought into it, and while it hasn’t been as smooth as all would have hoped, it hasn’t been so bad. But things are changing, and that means that we have to deal with situations and circumstances that a few years ago, a decade ago, would never have seen the light of day. Now, we’re so open and transparent and attention-hungry (as evidenced by things like this blog post) that we rarely stop to consider the ramifications of that openness. So we take liberties now we might not have taken before; the President called someone a jackass? Funny! Let’s put that on Twitter. And we do so because the rules are gone; the gloves are off; we’ve settled into a malaise in which we’re left to define right/wrong purely by sight, and the fact of the matter is we’re all in need of some corrected vision.

Kanye a jackass? Damn straight.

Should the President have said it? Why not? He’s entitled to his opinion, especially in a setting that has always been considered sacrosanct and protected.

Should Moran have Tweeted it? Hell no.

But hey – why wait around to report news when you can create it, right?