Rude Awakening at the White House

President Barack Obama has many challenges to deal with every day, which is typical of any Chief Executive regardless of party.  In an election year, those challenges multiply if you're running for another term, and all the nitpickers are watching your every move.

If it isn't running against Republican Mitt Romney, it's an economic crisis in Europe that threatens to damage the recovery here (and some of you are wondering:  What recovery?).  If it isn't awaiting a Supreme Court decision on health care reform, it's criticism about the lack of response to the violence in Syria and the elections in Egypt.

With all that going on, the last thing the President needed was to be interrupted during a speech by a member of the media.  During a White House event announcing the news that Obama had signed an executive order allowing children of undocumented workers the same rights as American citizens (without actually being American citizens), a reporter named Neil Munro of the conservative blog Daily Caller started shouting questions at the President before he was finished talking.

The media was aghast.  How dare Munro treat the President like this?  How rude and unprofessional.  Even conservatives agreed that Munro went too far.

Tucker Carlson, Munro's boss, tried to drag Sam Donaldson into this by saying that the former ABC White House correspondent used the same tactics during Ronald Reagan's presidency.  Donaldson replied that the difference was, he shouted his questions after the president spoke.  Not before.

We don't live in Donaldson's world any more.  Rudeness and unprofessional behavior have become standard operating procedure in Washington during this era of political hyper-partisanship, with neither Republicans nor Democrats giving an inch while the country burns.  Conservatives and progressives regularly bash each other on their own cable news channels.  The rest of us either cut in line or yak away on our smartphones, regardless of who else is in the room.

Why should we be surprised by Munro's attention-grab?  He's no different than protesters who shout slogans during political speeches, or Tea Partiers who ambush town hall meetings.  Except that Munro wasn't led away in handcuffs.  Freedom of the press, you know.  He has a right to ask his questions so long as he's patient enough to wait for the President to finish speaking.

President Obama has been dissed so often by the GOP that he should be used to guys like Munro by now.  Remember the State of the Union address a couple of years ago, when South Carolina congressman Joe Wilson shouted "you lie" while the President was talking?  It raised Wilson's profile with conservatives, at least for awhile.  Munro and Carlson are probably hoping that this little dustup can raise the recognition bar for their online publication.

Most of us want to see a return to civility not just in our politics, but in our daily lives as well.  It's conservatives who seem to want it more, and they're hoping it starts the moment Romney's elected.