When OIP Derangement Syndrome Is in Fashion

Last week President Barack Obama held a news conference to address the US economy, foreign policy challenges, and other topics. And one day later, as shown above, Rep. Peter King (R-NY) went on a right-wing political site called NewsMaxTV to complain:

There’s no way any of us can excuse what the president did yesterday. When you have the world watching…a week, two weeks of anticipation of what the United States is gonna do. For him to walk out — I’m not trying to be trivial here — in a light suit, light tan suit…

Imagine what detail King would lead with if he were trying to be trivial!

Now not everyone can match up to Rep. King in looking like a recently awoken city boss, perhaps from the old Soviet Union. Nor does everyone else have the finely calibrated fashion sense to know when one can criticize someone else for dressing too casually while not wearing a tie.

But we can note that past Presidents, including Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and Bill Clinton wore tan business suits during official events without attracting such criticism.

Double standards like King’s are a symptom of OIP Derangement Syndrome. So is hyper-intense focus on trivial details in an attempt to deny the real reason for one’s visceral reactions to seeing Barack Obama at work as President.