November 27, 2010

"That Fat Lip Might Give Obama Some Street Cred."

An NPR headline for a Scott Simon piece:
I wonder if having a larger scar wouldn't actually fortify President Obama's profile, as he contends with Kim Jong Il, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Vladimir Putin. Imagine a president with a gnarly, vivid scar telling the rulers of China, "Nice country ya' got here. I'd hate to see something happen to it if you didn't stop foolin' around with the value of your currency. Know what I mean?"
Uh... I think the reason he got 12 stitches was because they were very tiny stitches so there won't be a visible scar. But here's NPR trying to rise above its wimpy reputation.

49 comments:

TWM said...

I don't know, it's usually the guy who checks the other guy who ends up with street cred.

Triangle Man said...

Dollars to donuts it was a plastic surgeon doing very tiny stitches ( as Althouse pointed out). The trick is lining up the vermillion border.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Wasn't this exactly what was refudiated from cowboy Bush?

Ron said...

Kim Kardasian has more huevoes than that NPR dude....

Harry said...

Who is more qualified to discourse on the attributes of tough guys than the Low-T Scott Simon?

I'm recalling the exchange from The Magnificent Seven:

Sotero: There's one - look at the scars on his face!
Hilario: The man for us is the one who GAVE him that face.

The lip scar did something for Bogart and Stacy Keach, as a broken nose did something for Brando and Liam Neeson.

Synova said...

I got a hole the width of my front tooth all the way through my bottom lip and all I got was a bandaid.

And yes, a scar.

It probably did need a stitch though, truthfully. It's hard not to laugh or smile long enough so that the perforation doesn't get pulled open again every time you do.

Opus One Media said...

Oh brother. It is late Saturday night and before someone went to bed they had to ne snarky and take a "whimpy" cheap shot at NPR.

I suppose whimpy is the new definition of accurate.

.....NPR whimpy?.......

chickelit said...

Stitches helped LBJ didn't they?

FloridaSteve said...

As a former recreational hockey player of 15 years all I can say is big whoop.. If you need a scar to give you "cred" and you need NPR to promote it for you then... aww forget it. the wimp factor is so high that I have no words.

Irene said...

The President would have street cred with Kim Jong Il, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Vladimir Putin were his "gnarly, vivid scar" the result of a gnarly, vivid activities, like hunting bears, dressing moose, pummeling fishing in the Arctic, rock climbing, or . . .

Oh.

Palladian said...

The manly Scott Simon.

Anonymous said...

So we're supposed to believe that it takes 12 stitches to give Obama a set of balls? What a girly man! Hillary and Sarah don't need stitches to signify their brass pair.

Irene said...

Also: if Scott Simon wanted someone with a "gnarly, vivid" image who could stand up to dictators, then perhaps he should have considered shilling for someone who had survived a Vietnamese prison camp.

Unknown said...

Doing something that doesn't denigrate his country or his people (whomever they may be) is what will give him some street cred.

Funny thing about the Commies. They used the useful idiots, but they never trusted them. When they would go over to the other side, they were pensioned off to a dacha far removed from anything important. This on the assumption that, if you sold out your own, you'd sell out anybody.

Harry said...

I'm recalling the exchange from The Magnificent Seven:

Sotero: There's one - look at the scars on his face!
Hilario: The man for us is the one who GAVE him that face.


There's a similar piece in The Comancheros, where Nehemiah Persoff tries to explain to Ina Balin why the Duke would be a more suitable lover than good-looking Stuart Whitman.

"The scars above the eyes, the nose that has been broken. All signs he has imposed, or tried to impose, his will on others".

PS Excellent point, Irene.

Kev said...

(the other kev)

Scott, don't stop there, man. If 12 stitches ain't enough, let's give Obama a face tattoo like Tyson's. Yank out those pearly whites and give him a solid gold grill, maybe with the Presidential seal inscribed on an incisor. Have him flash a couple of gang signs during his next press conference. And a nickname - I'm thinking Notorious B-Dawg.

(Palladian, thanks for linking the pic of Simon, by the way. He looks like the kind of who crosses the street when someone's grandmother is heading his way.)

Girdermen said...

If physical scars impresses Mr. Simon, perhaps he should have paid more attention two years ago to Sen. John McCain - a man who suffered torture (not Guantanamo Bay torture, but real torture) over five years as a POW, four of which were after he turned down an early release because of who his father was. A fat lip caused by an errant elbow while playing a game causes no one any anxiety other than President Obama himself, due to his vanity. Sen. McCain bears the scars of a serious man having done serious things in the service of his country. President Obama is a superficial man whose physical countenance has been mildly altered by frivolity.

Anonymous said...

Scott Simon knows what's poppin' on the streets.

Perhaps NPR is building a "narrative." For many of them, It's all narratives, don't you know, subjective and best explained by academic experts that often tend to agree with NPR.

Psychology and Sociology and Political Science are in fact sciences I gather, and perhaps the best maps to describe the world around us, people's inner and outer states, how society ought to guide itself, and coincidentally, the best tools educate those who need to be educated and included (those long suffering and noble African Americans).

Come, come all of you and sit at the tribal radio fire and share in what's good for all of us. Sit in the warm bath of well enunciated words and issues of the day.

Just don't get in the way...

jamboree said...

I hit above my eyebrow on a shower soap dish when I didn't have health insurance and ran to a plastic surgeon for emergency stitches - $300. Never regretted it.

I hear emergency room docs are very good at stitches since they get so much practice - but I couldn't afford it. ;-) so a plastic surgeon it was. Happily, I already had one in mind.

It's small and lightening bolt shaped so it's kinda cool and all Harry Potter, but it's nearly invisible.

David said...

They could sew his lips shut.

Just for a week.

Penny said...

This is an NPR "opinion piece" from a guy named Simon who says...blah blah blah.

Not unlike our own Althouse salon where Ann gets to say...blah blah blah.

That being said and understood, at least by our little circle of commenters, this line was priceless! FUNNY! Well it would be, if not deadly serious...anyway, I digress...The line...

"Nice country ya' got here. I'd hate to see something happen to it if you didn't stop foolin' around with the value of your currency. Know what I mean?"

Sooooooo, "Simon Says" that is what Obama should have sung to the G20 choral group, which sang that very same song to Obama...en mass! first! and louder!

Why, Simon...that would make our President FAR more the "Swiss Miss" than even you make him out to be.

Yodel eh he "O"

LordSomber said...

Street cred? Where? Sesame Street?

AllenS said...

Street Cred is earned when you bust someone else in the mouth. What we have here, is a victim.

tim maguire said...

It's not the scar but the source of the scar that gives one cred. Knife fight, yes; extreme sport injury, maybe; accident in a friendly and mostly non-contact sport played in the backyard, no.

As a regular NPR listener, I feel I am uniquely qualified to call for zero funding. If the affluent white liberals who make up its target audience want their own radio station, they can easily afford one. Conservatives, the poor and minorities shouldn't be taxed to finance their ego strokes.

Mick said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Mick said...

Street Cred? He throws like a girl.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5JiE_Wkde0


He can't throw a football either. (did you see him on that "Play 60" opening last year w/ Brees, throwing and catching like a girl?)

What American male can't throw a baseball or a football? Certainly he is not a "creature of our own",
an indigenous citizen (born from within), a natural born Citizen (born in the US of 2 US Citizen parents). He is ineligible for the office.

AllenS said...

BREAKING NEWS!

Oslo, Norway

The Norwegian Nobel Committee has just awarded Barack Obama the 2010 Nobel Purple Heart Prize.


You the man, Barack! Peace prize last year, and now this. Other countries fear you!

AllenS said...

Wait a minute. Does a Peace prize take away from the Street Cred tough guy image?

WV: begat

Anonymous said...

Walking around with a scar on your face just means you got your ass kicked.

Of course, the victims who habituate the halls of NPR wouldn't recognize this.

ddh said...

Even with 12 tiny stitches sewn by a plastic surgeon, Obama's scar will intimidate NPR commentators. They will liken Obama to the Comanche warchief in The Searchers or a Miami coke king, as played by Al Pacino.

Man, he's tough.

AllenS said...

If this country needs to send an emissary over to North Korea to kick little Jongie's ass, we'll send Michelle Obama.

Paco Wové said...

I can't help but to think that if Rush Limbaugh said this, it'd be racist!

Humperdink said...

Count me as skeptical as to the source of the Obama's injuries. We have not seen the first lady or Hillary lately - both of whom could kick his butt...er.....lip.

AllenS said...

Paco,

I think that Rush is going to have a lot of fun with this. Probably more fun than we've been having. Get ready for a really cool song.

kjbe said...

I heard that yesterday morning and took it as Scott Simon just trying to be funny, through a bad, tough guy impression, and kind of missing the mark. Ot wasn't NPR trying to rise above it's wimpy rep, it was NPR trying to be funny. On a news show it just ususlly doesn't work.

Anonymous said...

Imagine a president with a gnarly, vivid scar telling the rulers of China, "Nice country ya' got here. I'd hate to see something happen to it if you didn't stop foolin' around with the value of your currency. Know what I mean?"

My tax dollars go to this idiocy?

Ugh.

Anonymous said...

I'd hate to see something happen to it

I guess it is good the stupid warmongering cowboy isn't in the White House anymore, huh?

Unknown said...

If Hillary Clinton gave Obama one of her balls they'd both have one.

Anonymous said...

By the way, it is nice to see that even NPR admits Obama has no credibility, "street" or otherwise...

Anonymous said...

with a gnarly, vivid scar telling the rulers of China

Um, the rulers of China sanction the Kidnapping, indefinite jailing, murder, rape, and torture of their own citizens.

They're going to be real scared of a Obama's fat lip he got because he's a fairy on the basketball court.

Omaha1 said...

He's going to have to ditch the mom jeans & the bike helmet> if he wants to look tough.

Charles said...

Don't know about street cred, but at least he's bangin under the hoop, didn't think he had it in him....

roesch-voltaire said...

Snarky over getting stitches, snarky over choking on pretzels; this political insight is what makes blogging such fun.

The Crack Emcee said...

"That Fat Lip Might Give Obama Some Street Cred."

Or it could just remind people of Fatlip.

Opus One Media said...

Paco Wové said...
I can't help but to think that if Rush Limbaugh said this, it'd be racist!"

but sir, he is a racist now. do you think he will become more racist?

Charlie said...

I wonder if Bill Clinton told him to "put some ice on that"?

rhhardin said...

He should take up German fencing if he wants a decent scar.

Trooper York said...

The toughest guy I know is about five feet tall and 110 pounds.

There is a big differance between looking tough and being tough.

The Crack Emcee said...

Trooper,

The toughest guy I know is about five feet tall and 110 pounds.

Same here. Knocks out guys three times his size.

He gets a little too protective of me at times, but that's because some asshole always wants to get in my face, and tell me what I can and cannot say.

They never see the lights go out,...

AST said...

Have you ever seen Scott Simon? He looks like a lonely puppy. I always thought he'd weep openly if someone used harsh language toward him.