Chicago's Kass: Obama to 'Scoop the Poop'

With Republicans set to make stunning gains in Tuesday's midterm elections, one of Chicago's most prominent newspaper columnists takes President Barack Obama to task for being out of touch.

Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass, writing in Sunday's paper, related an anecdote about a $7,500-per-person fundraising dinner last week headlined by Obama.

Here's how Kass describes Obama's dinner at the Rhode Island event: "As true representatives of the struggling middle class, the wealthy liberal guests prepared for a sumptuous feast: Delicate lobster risotto, handsomely marbled and tender beef, and various cheeses and wines. The dessert was undisclosed, but surely there was fluffy chocolate souffle, or was it tiramisu?"

The real stunner, Kass notes, was when, without warning, Obama told the crowd he was leaving.

"I've got to get home because Michelle is on the road. So I've got to be home to tuck in the girls and walk the dog. And scoop the poop."

Asked Kass: “Is that what many Democrats in Congress are calling it, with Tuesday on their minds?”

Kass went on to slam Obama's administration for leaving “dangerous leavings across the land, and his loyal Democratic Congress has stepped in it. They're the ones who will pay at the polls for his excessive feeding of the federal government.”

Kass criticized Obama for losing supporters by “jamming what the people didn't want down their throats and telling them to like it” – the federal stimulus plan, an ownership stake in General Motors, healthcare reform.

Here's a key excerpt:

"It started with a near-trillion-dollar federal stimulus — including cash for a famous study on coked-up monkeys — and it got worse.

"Americans didn't want coked-up monkeys. And they didn't want the White House to own General Motors.

"They didn't want massive government programs like his revamping of health care. They told him they didn't like it at all those angry town hall meetings. But he didn't listen.

"And he didn't listen when moderate Democrats warned him. He didn't listen as many independents became radicalized as tea party protesters.

"So the White House tried to demonize the tea party. At first the Axelrodian response was to insist the tea party folks were crazy, because only lunatics would oppose an unprecedented and costly expansion of the federal leviathan, right?

"When that didn't work, the tea party folks were labeled as racists. Then as fearmongers. It all failed."

As Kass concludes, Obama is “scooping all right, desperately and unsuccessfully trying to clean up the mess.”