Robert Gibbs Touts Global Approval Poll on Twitter

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs has been easing into “the Twitter” slowly, with 5 tweets over the course of 2 days. With over 18,000 followers, every utterance is sure to generate Twitter heat, as this morning’s surely will. Gibbs notes that the recent snow in DC may have buried the lede that global opinion of US leadership went way up from 2008 to 2009.

Cue right-wingers returning to not caring what the world thinks of us.

Gibbs’ tweet:

Lost during the snow days in DC – Perceptions of US leadership improved significantly from 08 to 09 http://bit.ly/cGMnzU

During the 8 years of the Bush administration, the notion of world approval was the subject of mockery by our own elected officials. Suddenly, though, conservatives turned into diplomatic protocol experts (with selective memories) when there was red meat to be served. Depending on how long before his next tweet, I predict Gibbs will be lambasted for caring what the world thinks.

So far, Gibbs has also used his Twitter feed to highlight the killing of terrorists by drone strikes, which former Bush administration official Marc Thiessen thinks is a bad thing, and to point out inconsistencies in Republican reactions to John Brennan’s recent remarks on terrorist recidivism.

Tweeting and re-tweeting links can be tricky for public figures, as it can often be seen as an endorsement of every syllable in the accompanying article, but Gibbs has thus far chosen his carefully and deliberately.

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.

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