Bang the Drum

Woof. Did you ever hear more crap flying around the airwaves from the pundits than you did tonight?

What’s that saying? Better to be silent and thought to be a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt?

Obviously none of them follow that advice. They should start.

What Obama said:

JG: Do you think that Israel is a drag on America’s reputation overseas?

BO: No, no, no. But what I think is that this constant wound, that this constant sore, does infect all of our foreign policy. The lack of a resolution to this problem provides an excuse for anti-American militant jihadists to engage in inexcusable actions, and so we have a national-security interest in solving this, and I also believe that Israel has a security interest in solving this because I believe that the status quo is unsustainable. I am absolutely convinced of that, and some of the tensions that might arise between me and some of the more hawkish elements in the Jewish community in the United States might stem from the fact that I’m not going to blindly adhere to whatever the most hawkish position is just because that’s the safest ground politically.

I want to solve the problem, and so my job in being a friend to Israel is partly to hold up a mirror and tell the truth and say if Israel is building settlements without any regard to the effects that this has on the peace process, then we’re going to be stuck in the same status quo that we’ve been stuck in for decades now, and that won’t lift that existential dread that David Grossman described in your article.

The notion that a vibrant, successful society with incredible economic growth and incredible cultural vitality is still plagued by this notion that this could all end at any moment — you know, I don’t know what that feels like, but I can use my imagination to understand it. I would not want to raise my children in those circumstances. I want to make sure that the people of Israel, when they kiss their kids and put them on that bus, feel at least no more existential dread than any parent does whenever their kids leave their sight. So that then becomes the question: is settlement policy conducive to relieving that over the long term, or is it just making the situation worse? That’s the question that has to be asked.

How House Republican Leader (architect of the anti-mothers vote last week, BTW) John Boehner lied:

“It is truly disappointing that Senator Obama called Israel a ‘constant wound,’ ‘constant sore,’ and that it ‘infect[s] all of our foreign policy.’ These sorts of words and characterizations are the words of a politician with a deep misunderstanding of the Middle East and an innate distrust of Israel”

Boehner was spurred along by the Republican Jewish Coalition:

“Once again, Senator Obama demonstrates his questionable grasp of America’s foreign policy. Senator Obama manages to excuse the inexcusable actions of anti-American militant jihadists by putting the blame for their actions on America’s foreign policy. America stands with Israel because it is one of our strongest allies and the only democracy in the Middle East. Senator Obama naively believes that solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will solve the global scourge of radical Islamic extremism. Yet Senator Obama never says how he will reign in Hamas’ daily onslaught on Israel or Iran’s scurrilous condemnations of Israel. Is it any wonder Hamas has endorsed him for president?”

And so, the Nixonizing now moves to a new arena. John McCain and his surrogate Republican in Democrat’s clothing calling himself independent Joe Lieberman, have already begun the memeorizing of the “Hamas endorsement”. But Boehner and the GOP Jewish Coalition have now just lied. Flat-out lied.

This isn’t even twisting. It’s a lie. Read it for yourself. In context.

I really hope all the voters think in this election. This is not an election that can be punditized. As Obama said, politics doesn’t do nuance well, but voters can.
Technorati Tags: lies, Republicans, Boehner, Nixon, Israel, Palestine

This is what Georgia bar owner and seller Mike Norman says about it:

Norman said he sees nothing wrong with depicting Obama as Curious George. “Look at him . . . the hairline, the ears, he looks just like Curious George,” Norman said. He said he did not design the shirts himself but bought them through a Web site.

It’s worth mentioning this as well: Norman’s bar is in a very conservative area of Georgia. I use the term ‘conservative’ guardedly, since I know lots of conservatives who are not Republicans or bigots.

Evidently Norman gives equal play to women, too. On his restaurant sign, he’s posted these fine examples of political discourse:

“I wish Hillary had married OJ,” “No habla espanol — and never will” and the standard “I.N.S. Agents eat free.”

In an effort to justify his musings, he says “he says out loud what everyone in this town whispers.”

That much is certainly true. Given that, I’d say the t-shirt graphic was hardly accidental.

Technorati Tags: racism, bigot, georgia, marietta, tshirt,

In 1950, Richard Nixon ruined Helen Gahagan Douglas, a passionate progressive California Congresswoman who was running for the Senate. Douglas, originally an up-and-coming Hollywood star, turned to politics after spending time in Central California with the migrant farm workers flowing in from Oklahoma and elsewhere. She was well-respected in the Congress, on track to become head of the Foreign Relations Committee, and popular among Democrats in California.

Her reasons for running for the Senate seat aren’t completely clear, but they centered around young Richard Nixon (then 37), who first tried running for Congress as a Democrat before switching to the Republican party in time to vie for the open Senate seat. The primary was a difficult process, due in part to the fact that her opponent (Manchester Boddy) was a newspaper publisher with no political experience whatsoever. It was bitter, and ugly, and the Republicans were able to groom their candidate during the primary to pick up the ball where her opponent left off, effectively finishing her for the general election.

She lost the election in a year where more Democrats than ever voted. The reason she lost? Voters thought she was a communist.

Not that Nixon ever came out and said that. Not quite, anyway. In over 300 pages of interviews done in 1976, campaign aides, union supporters, and friends talk about the quiet, but effective smear of Helen Gahagan Douglas.

Here’s one excerpt that describes how the primary worked to Nixon’s benefit:

When Nixon went to attack Douglas on legitimate issues, it was always framed inside of the more subtle and frightening message that she was really a Commie in a pretty pink dress. (See Pink Sheet (PDF)) That tactic has now been employed by Clinton supporters and has proven extremely effective against Obama in states like West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Texas. Only this time it’s not the “commie” label that’s been applied; it’s the “Muslim” label, with the subtle subtext that voters need to fear Barack Obama because of his middle name and color of his skin.

From Good Morning America (I can’t get the video to embed, so click here to see it on video)

GMA’s KATE SNOW: Janis said she can’t support Obama.
JANIS: He’s Muslim and you know, and that that has a lot to do with it. I just, you know, I just rather have Hillary.
GMA’s KATE SNOW: Just for the record he constantly says he’s a Christian -
JANIS: I know he does. He says he is.
GMA’s KATE SNOW: You don’t believe him?
JANIS: No.

Hillary Clinton has had more than one opportunity to set this record straight, and hasn’t. There’s only one reason for her not to, and that’s to weaken Obama enough to slide herself across as the ‘electable’ one. By playing the subliminal ‘pink paper’ in interviews (”Not that I know of….”), by continuing to hammer on the Reverend Wright issue in town halls and by using surrogates, Hillary Clinton has laid the strategy bare for the Republicans.

This time it won’t be pink sheets. It’ll be flag pins, pledges, and interviewers like the one on Good Morning America who set the stage.

The racists in this country will be racists no matter what. We won’t change them. But at the same time, they shouldn’t be allowed to frame a candidate this way, and particularly not with the complicity of mainstream media outlets like ABC and Good Morning America. (Not to mention print publications like the LA Times, who ‘forgot’ to qualify an interview statement about Obama’s alleged “Muslim affiliations” by reminding the reader that he is in fact, NOT, a Muslim).

Democrats everywhere need to read about how an honorable woman was smeared and ruined by insinuation with no fact, with much assistance from the press and ‘word of mouth’, and then decide whether they want that again this time. I sure don’t. I’d like to see Hillary Clinton exposed and barred from politics forever for what she’s done.

Technorati Tags: clinton, helen gahagan douglas, nixon, campaign tactics, smear tactics, idiocy, racism, bigots

I liked this one when I first saw it. I just didn’t think that it was the one I liked the best. I do think it will be a very effective commercial in the general campaign.

I just really liked this post over on the Obama blog and wanted to share. It reminded me about what should really matter to all Democrats, no matter which candidate they support.

Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your county - JFK

We’re doing it.
Obama ‘08