WSJ: Obama Could Never Run Country of Fatties, He's Too in Shape

Posted by Brad , Sadly, No! at 2:59 PM on August 1, 2008.

So it's come to this: Americans may not vote for Obama because he eats well and he exercises. No, really:

Too Fit to Be President?

Facing an Overweight Electorate, Barack Obama Might Find Low Body Fat a Drawback

By AMY CHOZICK

August 1, 2008; Page W1

Speaking to donors at a San Diego fund-raiser last month, Barack Obama reassured the crowd that he wouldn't give in to Republican tactics to throw his candidacy off track.

"Listen, I'm skinny but I'm tough," Sen. Obama said.

But in a nation in which 66% of the voting-age population is overweight and 32% is obese, could Sen. Obama's skinniness be a liability? Despite his visits to waffle houses, ice-cream parlors and greasy-spoon diners around the country, his slim physique just might have some Americans wondering whether he is truly like them.

A few points:

This isn't the Journal's op-ed page. Rather, it appeared in their weekend section. This is allegedly a "news" feature.

Are you fucking kidding me. Obama is now being criticized for not being a colossal fat-ass. That's funny, because the right just loves to ridicule Al Gore and Michael Moore as colossal fat-asses. But Obama? He's not a colossal fat-ass so that sucks too!!! For past precedent of this sort of thing, I refer you to the 1872 Supreme Court decision of the Rubber v. Glue case.

No, seriously: are you fucking kidding me.

And yes, there is more:

According to Sen. Obama's Chicago physician David Scheiner, the senator works out regularly, jogs up to three miles a day when he can, and has "no excess body fat."

Dr. Scheiner didn't disclose his patient's exact weight, but medical observers estimate that the 6-foot-1.5-inch-tall senator appears to weigh at least 10 pounds less than the roughly 190 pounds that the average American man of his height weighs. The Obama campaign declined to comment for this article.

Though Sen. McCain cannot lift weights due to injuries he suffered as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, he "walked the Grand Canyon rim to rim in August 2006Åç and hikes whenever he can find the time, according to John D. Eckstein, an internist in Scottsdale, Ariz., who treats Sen. McCain. At roughly 165 pounds, his weight is slightly above average for a 5-foot-7-inch man his age, according to nutritionists.

So: McCain is in worse shape than Obama and it's not because he's OOOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLLD ... it's because he's tough! And he was a POW! And while Obama is lifting sissy-ass weights with his pals in Europe, McCain is hiking the Grand Canyon while eating apple pie!

Can we get any stupider? I mean that as a serious question.

But too much time in the gym can cause problems, as Sen. Obama learned last month after he made three stops to local Chicago gyms in one day, for a total of 188 minutes. The marathon workout session sparked a widely circulated Associated Press article titled "Obama Becomes a Gym Rat." In it, the reporter wrote, "Sometimes it's hard to tell if Barack Obama is running for president of the United States or Mr. Universe."

Republicans have recently picked up on the senator's fitness regimen. On Wednesday, the McCain campaign launched a new ad titled "Celeb" that compares Sen. Obama to Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. In a memo to reporters explaining the ad, McCain campaign manager Rick Davis wrote, "Only celebrities like Barack Obama go to the gym three times a day."

Plus, I hear he windsurfs.

In case you guys were wondering why I felt so down yesterday, it's because articles like this one keep popping up in our mainstream press corps. It's like the bastards have learned nothing from the past eight years and are happily going along with the GOP's identity-based smears yet again. Just shoot me.

Tagged as: obama, mainstream media sucks, the wall street journal

Brad is a regular blogger for Sadly No!.