Taranto Whacks Halperin Across the Head and Shoulders

It's Rabbit Season! It's Duck Season! is the headline of Taranto's latest putdown of national Journalist-Hysteric-In-Chief Mark Halperin, whose chest-heaving prose is often studded with frantic sports metaphors to get Alpha Males interested in his wild and wooly commentary. And Game Change is an example of his NFL one-week-it's-the-Jets and next-week-it's-the-Patriots windsock turnabouts:

It must be exciting being Mark Halperin. He lives in a world where everything completely changes from one week to the next. Think we're exaggerating? Check out his Time.com column from last week:

The coalition that got Barack Obama elected President just two years ago has been shattered. . . . A survey of the political landscape shows that many groups who were part of the 2008-09 Obama coalition have turned on him. . . . With unemployment high and promising to stay there, it is nearly impossible in the short term for Obama to shift opinion and be seen as a successful President. . . . Even if the President somehow sloughs off that Spock-like laconic demeanor and dispatches his fired-up-and-ready-to-go persona, he isn't going to be able to change many of the dynamics that have weakened him.
Pretty grim, huh? Things were so bad for Obama, Halperin opined back then that even "should Obama effectively confront these dynamics, he will still need some luck." As examples of "luck," Halperin offered the Oklahoma City bombing and the 9/11 attack, though he did offer the disclaimer: "No one wants the country to suffer another catastrophe." That's a relief.

OK, now check out this week's column:

By closing 2010 with the kind of bipartisan compromise that was supposed to be the hallmark of his Administration, Obama showed that he is capable of change, and that there is hope he can achieve his goals. . . . Over time, this new Obama--the one who, out of necessity, is going to make deals with Republicans to fix the economy and get things done, rather than keep his wagon hitched to the liberal wing of his party--has a chance to have not only a liberated and happy holiday season, but also a 2011 filled with the fruits of a successful midcourse correction that has not yet been a part of his presidential repertoire. That's change the President can believe in.

Does anyone know a good personal-injury lawyer? We'd like to explore the possibility of suing Halperin for giving us whiplash.

Time Inc. must have an odometer attached to its speedometer when Mark circles the track. Never know when a new course record is going to put onto the stopwatch.