Comparisons

At this point it seems like there is nothing that the President can do that won't have conservative honks coming out of the wood works to complain about. It doesn't matter what the issue is. For these people no topic is too trivial.

The most recent example of this is the belief that President Obama compared himself to Teddy Roosevelt. Regardless of how accurate this claim is I fail to see how this is at all relevant to the troubles facing the country. Are we to assume that the President can no longer make informed decisions on domestic and foreign policy issues because he may have compared himself to another President?

He is after all one of only 43 people in the history of this country to hold the position so it would seem comparisons to his predecessors would be likely. Perhaps history will prove Obama right or the commenter's wrong. Regardless, what I can't find from these same conservative honks is their articles complaining about Newt Gingrich comparing himself to Ronald Reagan and Margret Thatcher, or Dan Quayle comparing himself to JFK, or George W. Bush comparing himself to Ronald Reagan, Harry Truman, and Abraham Lincoln. Also absent from their writing is the reference from the patron saint of the Republican party Ronald Reagan comparing himself to JFK.

It seems like many of these examples should elicit a similar response, but this complaint, of course, is not about the absurdity of the ego of men in power but the vitriol towards a President. This is the beauty of the bully pulpit; no admission of historical facts required.