While troops are dying in Afghanistan and jobs are rapidly disappearing in the US – 11,000 in one week – President Obama is having a war of the words with Fox News.

There is something drastically wrong with this picture, although he says “I’m not losing a lot of sleep over” it.

A failure to make a rapid decision on a troop surge in Afghanistan results in the direct loss of American lives, which we can lay at the door step of the White House.

A failure to create jobs while spending an inordinate amount of time on Health Care Reform, which Americans won’t be able to afford without jobs, can also be left at the door step of the White House.

Meanwhile Obama is escalating a war of the words with Fox News, on whether it is a legitimate news outlet, or more likely as he suggests, equivalent to ‘talk radio.’

An NBC reporter asked Obama about his advisers portraying Fox News as an illegitimate news organization and why they have targeted the network openly?

Obama tried to deflect the question, by saying “the American people are a lot more interested in what we’re doing to create jobs or how we’re handling the situation in Afghanistan.”

You got that right Mr. President, but what are you doing about it, while campaigning for a beleaguered NJ governor and elevating the controversy over Fox to a new level?

When the interviewer pressed for an answer, Obama said: “I think that what our advisers simply said is, is that we are going to take media as it comes.  And if media is operating, basically, as a talk radio format, then that’s one thing.  And if it’s operating as a news outlet than that’s another.  But it’s not something I’m losing a lot of sleep over.”

Michael Clemente, senior vice president of news for Fox News, issued a statement:  “Hundreds of journalists come to work each day at Fox News all deeply committed to their craft.  It’s disappointing that the White House would be so dismissive of their fine work and continue their vengeful war against a news organization.”

Obama has demonstrated in his short time in office that he intends to involve government in every aspect of the private sector.  We already have young children in schools across his nation singing his praise, he uses public funds to manipulate artists to create positive Obama posters, similar to totalitarian governments, even Broadway sings his praises in shows and of course he knows all about the auto industry, investment and financial firms.

If we listen to the White House rhetoric we will soon believe that we have an impotent citizenry, a public that can’t do anything for itself without government assistance  in this once free and open democracy.

And now, he and his advisers want to tell journalists what news is and what it isnt.

White House advisers have openly and directly criticized Fox News and its coverage of the administration, calling them an arm of the Republican Party.  If that is true what is the New York Times and the Washington Post, the mouth piece of the White House?

When Press Secretary Robert Gibbs was asked how Fox News was different from other news organizations, Gibbs cited the channel’s 5 PM and 9 PM shows, in an explicit reference to “Beck” and “Hannity” – even though those two shows represent opinion programming.

When called on this point Gibbs said, “That is our opinion.”

What it all comes down to is Obama’s image and sense of control over just about everything in the private sector.  It is a sad state of affairs when critical issues such as lives in Afghanistan and jobs in America must take a back stage to the president’s war of the words with Fox News.

“I tink