Jan Crawford is Back
[Guest post by DRJ]
Jan Crawford, formerly known as Jan Crawford Greenburg when she worked at ABC News, is now working at CBS and blogging at Crossroads. Crawford explains the title of her blog, her absence from the internet in recent months, and her name change in her first post.
Crawford was a panel member on Bob Schieffer’s Face the Nation yesterday (transcript here) where she talked frankly about President Obama’s approach to terrorism:
BOB SCHIEFFER: Jan, some people, critics of the President are saying that perhaps the response to this was one of the low points of this administration.
JAN CRAWFORD: Well, I mean when you’re talking about the Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano coming out and insisting that the system worked and Press Secretary Robert
Gibbs saying on this program last week, pretty much the same language that the system has worked. That’s a problem. I mean obviously the American people can look out there and go, well, you know, it didn’t.But it’s not just those sound bites. I mean those are sound bites. The reason that’s an issue for Obama is that it goes to the bigger question of the competency of his government and the trust that people have in that government. You look at polls. Polls show that the trust in government is an all time low. Domestically, obviously, stimulus plan hasn’t worked. Unemployment is high. And so now we have a situation where a terrorist can get on an airplane, seemingly could have been caught if some officials had just done a basic Google search of the database. And the Homeland Security secretary is insisting the system worked.
BOB ORR (overlapping): Bob, can I just–
JAN CRAWFORD: That doesn’t you know work. We’re in a–what people are going to want to know is, you know does Obama have a plan? What is his plan to fight this long-term war against a determined Jihadist enemy? What’s the plan and do Americans have the trust that Obama is confident to fight that long-term war?
Crawford also made two bold predictions, one about politics and the other about sports:
JAN CRAWFORD: Justice John Paul Stevens will retire from the Supreme Court at ninety, giving Obama his second nomination. Solicitor General Elena Kagan will be the nominee replace to him.
And I’m not saying in the order of importance, but the University of Alabama will win the national championship on Thursday.”
Welcome back, Ms. Crawford. You’ve been missed.
— DRJ
Kagan would be a force on the Court bench. She’s lightyears smarter than Sotomayor appears to be. And that’s a bad thing. Sotomayor won’t be able to avoid problematic rulings that can be revisted and overturned. Kagan will think long term, and avoid that.
In my opinion, there’s a huge difference between an O’Connor and a Brandeis.
oh, and Hook ‘Em, Ms. Crawford. Alabama will know they were in a fight.
Dustin (b54cdc) — 1/4/2010 @ 10:57 pmAnd I see from reading the comments on her first post that some of her lunatic, bitter, delusional ignorant are back too.
JVW (8704f2) — 1/4/2010 @ 11:09 pmAnd I see from reading the comments on her first post that some of her lunatic, bitter, ignorant commenters are back too.
JVW (8704f2) — 1/4/2010 @ 11:09 pm[sorry for the double post; screwed up the first one]
JVW (8704f2) — 1/4/2010 @ 11:10 pmthat’s why i decided, early on that the “smart latina” was a great choice by Ear Leader…. i also doubt he will pick this “Kagan” woman, who ever she is.
from experience, weak stupid people in positions of power select other weak stupid people to surround them, so as to not be outshone. the current administration has done nothing to disprove my theory.
as for Ms. Crawford, she should have been a PRC resident: non-compete contracts are unenforceable here. i guess we should be grateful she isn’t covering employment law, eh?
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 1/4/2010 @ 11:13 pmred, she’s currently the solicitor general (which classically was a preparation for a Court nomination. She’s a long time professor.
Not only a Harvard dean and Law grad, but a Chicago professor. She kept JAG out of Harvard job fairs.
She’s been careful about her political views (not that they aren’t obvious) in her public statements, like a politician.
I read a 1st Amendment Law Article by her a while back and thought she was intelligent. Certainly intelligent enough to handle writing a ruling. Sotomayor was a shocking selection, and I’m still baffled as to how she was the best choice in Obama’s world. Perhaps you have a point.
Dustin (b54cdc) — 1/4/2010 @ 11:23 pmSotomayor was a shocking selection, and I’m still baffled as to how she was the best choice in Obama’s world.
Not to be too cynical, but Sotomayor was selected because Obama decided to take a pass on immigration reform in 2009 (and possibly in 2010) so he needed her as a consolation prize for Latino groups.
JVW (8704f2) — 1/4/2010 @ 11:26 pmWelcome back Jan, better days are comming!
james conrad (633fbc) — 1/4/2010 @ 11:27 pmone can never be too cynical: one can only garner more experience.
hence one of my personal aphorisms: “i’m not cynical, i’m experienced.”
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 1/4/2010 @ 11:33 pmBob Schieffer also had biting words for the Obama Administration’s lack of candor in saying the system worked:
When government officials insult us with spin they’re doing it on our dime, which is supposed to be used to operate the government, not to hold news conferences to tell us what a fine job people on the public payroll are doing. As we learned during Katrina, self-serving spin at the first sign of crisis does not help the situation. It makes it worse. Because it makes it harder to believe anything the government says. Real security is built on trust in government. That requires truth, which should be the beginning of government presentations, not the fallback position.
Brother Bradley J. Fikes, C.O.R. (9eb641) — 1/5/2010 @ 7:12 amJan is one smart and insightful lady. I always am interested in hearing what she has to say. Thanks for the update.
I saw Jan at a Supreme Court discussion at the Printer’s Row Book Fair a couple years back. Unfortunately, she had to share the stage and mic with Geoffrey Stone who tried his usual level best to be condescending and overbearing, but she more than held her own.
elissa (6bc677) — 1/5/2010 @ 7:20 amJan Crawford is back? Let me know when Broderick Crawford is back.
Official Internet Data Office (eb2f3c) — 1/5/2010 @ 9:13 am10-4!
MikeHu (255b30) — 1/5/2010 @ 9:48 amI’ve always liked Ms Crawford, and look forward to reading her work again.
Also, she should call me. 😉
Scott Jacobs (d027b8) — 1/5/2010 @ 10:08 amMr. Jacobs, it seems like you are looking for a relationship. Any guy could tell you the secret: don’t say much, don’t show too much interest, and wear a fake wedding band. All these things make you endlessly fascinating to many single women. I don’t know why.
Eric Blair (ddbceb) — 1/5/2010 @ 10:10 amdid anyone read the story in the times about the obama family’s return to dc from vacation? Two things stood out to me. A reporter asked the obamas if they wanted to go back and all of them, president included, yelled “no!” and everyone thought it was great fun. The other thing was michelle obama allegedly saying before the trip that she wanted “no news to break” during the vacation. And i’m thinking, a year in, and your wife is apparently getting a little sick of your job, so are your kids, and maybe you are, too, barack? That’s just wonderful. You know how about how smart, arrogant people can get: sometimes, when they get a job they think they’re perfect for, all of a sudden they realize there’s a lot more work involved than they thought they would need to do (being so great and all) , amazing triumphs arent being achieved, and they get in a snit and the job gets even harder because of it. But that’s what you get when you elect a leftist intellectual to the presidency: no emotional maturity.
chaos (7c068a) — 1/5/2010 @ 10:12 amran outta space on stupid phone. The big point is, if obama is getting a little sick (or more than a little) of being president, thats horrible for the country. Even if hes a lefty douchebag, you still want the sitting president (or michelle… You have to wonder just how whipped barack is) to not start thinking of the job the way a 16 year old teen queen would about working in fast food. Theres jobs at hollisters for those kinds of people.
chaos (7c068a) — 1/5/2010 @ 10:16 amone can only garner more experience.
Experience. One of those things that you acquire just after you really, really needed it.
political agnostic (99027e) — 1/5/2010 @ 10:30 amIf Laura Ingraham’s experience at CBS News still takes hold, Jan will be looked at only sideways by the likes of Kutie Katie when the “ON AIR” sign is off.
L.N. Smithee (0931d2) — 1/5/2010 @ 2:08 pmBOB SCHIEFFER, some people, critics of the same ol’, same ol’ are saying that perhaps you should hang it up.
GeneralMalaise (68a574) — 1/5/2010 @ 6:56 pmShe used the j-word, jihadist. She must be brave, and smart.
Conservative?
Patricia (b05e7f) — 1/5/2010 @ 7:27 pm