Why Rescheduling Obama’s Jobs Speech Was a Good Idea

Chris Cillizza at the Washington Post makes a very good point in his blog post today on why it was actually a good thing to reschedule the Presidents speech on jobs before the House and Senate next week. His first point is the best one.

From the Washington Post:

“If Obama had doubled down on the Sept. 7 date, the coverage leading up to the speech would have focused heavily — if not exclusively — on the process (why the White House had done it, etc.) of the speech rather than the policy of it. Process battles, while beloved by reporters, are rarely a good thing for politicians and policy-makers.”

Heck yes. The message of promoting the creation of jobs would have been drowned out by the rightwing press who would have beaten their drums loudly. It would have been much worse than the present gloating that they seem to be affecting over how the Republicans made the President of the United States move his speech.

And I have one more reason why I am glad that he moved his speech to Thursday. I want to watch the Republican debate. I want to see Rick Perry on the stage trying to look presidential, but coming off like a country bumpkin. He wouldn’t debate Bill White in 2010 simply because both he and his handlers knew that to do so would only serve to increase Bill White’s numbers.

So yeah, given the choice between seeing my president speak before Congress, and seeing Rick Perry implode on national TV, well, it really is a no-brainer.