Letters to the Editor
-
The Real Obama Campaign Machine
Nothing Obama says is accidental IMHO. His main skills are verbal.
Many of these posters criticize Sen. Clinton for negative ads and campaigning critical of Sen. Obama, claiming or implying that Obama does NOT use negative politics. I'm not a huge fan of Clinton, but that is simply not accurate; to correct the record for those who might not have seen these, here are just a few examples I can think of, of the Obama campaign at work (I hope it is not too far off target for this blog). I'm sure others can recall many more:
1) An Obama DM campaign in CA criticizing universal health care and attacking Sen. Clinton that was pure Karl Rove, what wasn't distorted was an outright lie (Salon had it earlier via Politico.com). It literally looked like a Republican mailer attacking health care.
2) The Obama press release labeling Sen. Clinton (D-Punjab), i.e. the Senator from India for relations she has with Indian IT companies. His team (not Obama) later apologized. Sort of.
3) how Obama criticized both Sens. Edwards and Clinton for not controlling their 527 supporters, implying the candidates were engaged in unethical conduct by not doing so, sniffed that 527's were unworthy of Obama's morally-superior campaign, then turned around and claimed he had no responsibility for the racist pro-Obama radio ads in Nevada (Spanish-language "Clinton Abandoned Our People" (which he never condemned until the votes were counted, wink, wink, nod, nod) ;
4) The African-American Campaign Manager for team Obama who bitterly responded on CNN to his candidate's New Hampshire loss with "Clinton didn't cry for Katrina." Gee, I wonder what that means, "Clinton didn't cry for Katrina"? Any code words in there? Anybody think that is negative?
5) The phantom Exelon bill (this one is comical) where Obama, struggling to find anything he has accomplished in his political career said he got a bill passed to regulate the nuclear waste industry. The bill did NOT pass, plus he effectively watered it down so much it would NOT have required reporting. So, Obama LIED. (plus note the 145 Exelon managers that in sum are the number one contributor to his campaign);
6) (One of my personal favorites) Obama's "Hopefund" PAC that has bought, er, contributed to 46 so-called Super Delegates so far (But I thought Obama was adamantly opposed to PACs, and attacked Edwards and Clinton for working with them, and doesn't accept their contributions? Oh, this is different because Obama set up the PAC himself and MAKES contributions to get other politicians' support. That is different, right?) (from today's NYT);
7) "Camp Obama" youth indoctrination and their "Moonie theme" (from both NPR and NYT) where youth are taught to campaign for Obama by ignoring issues and talking about how they "Came to Obama" (truly creepy stuff); and, finally,
8) How Obama is reneging on his "pledge" with Sen. McCain to run on government funding. (Again, in every debate he hit Clinton and later Edwards for how corrupt their campaign funding was -- without any specifics, of course.) But, hey, what's a little campaign promise between politicians, anyway? Obama doesn't have to actually prove he's different than other politicians, and he doesn't have to actually act differently than other politicians, because we just know he is in our hearts. With a mellifluous baritone, a winning smile who needs actual behavior to judge a potential Pres?