Never mind the fact that President Obama's approval ratings have been about average compared to other two term presidents, Peggy Noonan would like the viewers of This Week to believe that Americans have "stopped listening" to President Obama "earlier than most presidents."
July 28, 2013

Never mind that around this same time in his presidency, George W. Bush's approval ratings were taking a nose dive, or the fact that President Obama's approval ratings have been about average compared to other two-term presidents and that's in spite of the fact that we've got 24/7 hate talk radio and Faux "News" berating him at every hour of the day -- Peggy Noonan would like the viewers of This Week to believe that Americans have "stopped listening" to President Obama "earlier than most presidents."

STEPHANOPOULOS: You are seeing (ph) more populist Democrats, I agree with that, but Peggy Noonan, you know, the president going back to the country one more time, it's unclear that these speeches are doing much to move public opinion, much less Washington.

PEGGY NOONAN, WALL STREET JOURNAL: Yes, I think that's true. But when the White House calls it a pivot, somebody counted it up and said it's probably the tenth pivot to the economy the president has done since he came in.

I noticed that in one of the speeches, it went over an hour. There was a heck of a lot jammed in. That tells me something. It said we're not sure exactly what to say, so we're going to say everything, but a speech about everything is a speech about nothing. Beyond that, I think every president in the intense media environment we have now, certainly every two-term president, gets to a point where the American people stop listening, stop leaning forward hungrily for information. I think this president got there earlier than most presidents. And I think he's in that time now.

I'm sure no one will be surprised she's just repeating the latest right-wing talking point of the week. We heard the same line of fire from that hateful Sean Hannity this week where he mocked President Obama's speech on the economy for the entire hour of his show. This has been the drumbeat day in and day out at Fox and the rest of the media hasn't been much better.

It's hard to have any meaningful discussion on policy and what it means for average Americans, as Katrina vanden Heuvel was actually trying to do during her time on the show, if the pundits would rather ignore any substance in the speeches and ask whether anyone cares about what was said, or if Americans are "tuning out" the President instead.

Despite Noonan's assertions here, he had plenty to say during that speech about Republican obstruction and the need to invest in our infrastructure and get Americans back to work. The right-wing would prefer that Americans hear none of it.

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