"If Barack Obama's past had been subjected to one tenth the media scrutiny during the full year of his candidacy, to which Sarah Palin has been subjected during the last 11 days, Obama .. would be junior senator from Illinois."
BARACK OBAMA: ...on this Ayers thing, which you've been hyping, Bill.O'REILLY: Not that much.
BARACK OBAMA: This guy did something despicable forty years ago.
O'REILLY: Despicable last week. He said he didn't do enough bombing. That's last week.
BARACK OBAMA: Here's a guy that does something despicable when I'm eight years old. Alright? I come to Chicago. He's working with Mayor Richard Daley, not known to be a radical. So, he and I know each other as a consequence of work he's doing on education. That is not an endorsement of his views ... This guy is not part of my campaign, he's not some adviser of mine.
Interviewer: One of the criticisms that arises in connection with your candidacy is you simply haven't been in the Senate very long, the State Senate. You have a limited track record in terms of time, what is your argument based on the one term that you've served so far? What makes you prepared for the Congress?
Obama: Well, I'm in my second term, but it's true that certainly both Senator Trotter and Congressman Rush have been in elected office longer than I have. I can't deny that. I would argue, though, that my experience previous to elected office equips me for the job. I have a background as an attorney, I've represented affordable housing organizations to build affordable housing, something that's a major issue in the district.
I've chaired major philanthropic efforts in the city like the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, that gave fifty million dollars to prompt school reform efforts throughout the city.
Ayers and Obama also served together on the board of the Woods Fund of Chicago. Among those who received funds from the pair were the Arab-American Action Network, founded by a member of the PLO, and ACORN, a group infamous for vote fraud even to this very day.
Reverend Meeks, Father Pfleger, Reverend Jeremiah Wright and Trinity United Church all received funds from Ayers and Obama.
In return, the mega-churches are alleged to have delivered thousands of votes to Obama.Capitalism played its role historically and is exhausted as a force for progress: built on exploitation, theft, conquest, war, and racism, capitalism and imperialism must be defeated and a world revolution... must win.
In some ways life underground was [in some] ways... extraordinary because we felt that our lives had a serious purpose that we were conscious of and earnest about every day: to end a war and overthrow a system—imperialism—that made war after war inevitable, and to upend centuries of racial oppression and white supremacy creating a society based on equality, justice, and love.
On occasion, Americans find it necessary to rationalize this rough-and-ready process. What a splendid system, we say to ourselves, that takes little-known men, tests them in high office and permits them to grow into statesmen. This rationale may even be right, but then let it also be fair.
Why shouldn’t a little-known woman have the same opportunity to grow? We may even be gradually elevating our standards for choosing Vice Presidential candidates. But that should be done fairly, also. Meanwhile, the indispensable credential for a Woman Who is the same as for a Man Who - one who helps the ticket.
Obama interview:How does it feel to break a glass ceiling?
How does it feel to “win”?
How does your family feel about your “winning” breaking a glass ceiling?
Who will be your VP?
Should you choose Hillary Clinton as VP?
Will you accept public finance?
What issues is your campaign about?
Will you visit Iraq?
Will you debate McCain at a town hall?
What did you think of your competitor’s [Clinton] speech?
Palin interview:
Do you have enough qualifications for the job you’re seeking? Specifically have you visited foreign countries and met foreign leaders?
Aren’t you conceited to be seeking this high level job?
Questions about foreign policy
-territorial integrity of Georgia
-allowing Georgia and Ukraine to be members of NATO
-NATO treaty
-Iranian nuclear threat
-what to do if Israel attacks Iran
-Al Qaeda motivations
-the Bush Doctrine
-attacking terrorists harbored by Pakistan
Is America fighting a holy war? [misquoted Palin]
The truth is that Sarah Palin has been the object of the most vicious and concerted smear campaign in modern American history. But that fact doesn't cause the media (or Howard Kurtz) to get mad.
It's not too hard to diagnose why, as Kurtz correctly says, "the media are getting mad." They're getting mad because their candidate is losing...
They've spent years building him up and covering for his mistakes and shortcomings, and he is such a stiff that he can't coast across the finish line. I'd be mad too, I guess, but I think I'd have the decency not to take it out on Sarah Palin.
Thus, Obama’s average male employee earned $54,397... Obama’s 30 female employees [earn] $45,152, on average.
McCain’s... male staffers [average] $53,936... His... female employees averaged $55,878.
GIBSON: Have you ever met a foreign head of state?
PALIN: There in the state of Alaska, our international trade activities bring in many leaders of other countries.
GIBSON: And all governors deal with trade delegations.
PALIN: Right.
GIBSON: Who act at the behest of their governments.
PALIN: Right, right.
GIBSON: I’m talking about somebody who’s a head of state, who can negotiate for that country. Ever met one?PALIN: I have not and I think if you go back in history and if you ask that question of many vice presidents, they may have the same answer that I just gave you. But, Charlie, again, we’ve got to remember what the desire is in this nation at this time. It is for no more politics as usual and somebody’s big, fat resume maybe that shows decades and decades in that Washington establishment, where, yes, they’ve had opportunities to meet heads of state … these last couple of weeks … it has been overwhelming to me that confirmation of the message that Americans are getting sick and tired of that self-dealing and kind of that closed door, good old boy network that has been the Washington elite.
In this case, an Internet site reported that the child Sarah Palin claimed was her own was actually her teen-aged daughter's, and the elder Palin was lying to cover up her daughter's pregnancy. Journalists started digging into the report to find out whether it was true, which led to the McCain campaign issuing a statement: The child is, indeed, the elder Palin's.
...it was okay for the drive-by media to savage a 17-year-old because...well...why was that okay again? And then, several paragraphs later, you mention that the very same drive-by media ignored reports--for eight months!--that a Presidential candidate had impregnated a staffer while having an affair with her. I would think, Mitch, that your analysis of this complex situation would have touched on the stunningly different approaches taken by the drive-by media in these two cases. Why did they immediately and brutally and relentlessly tear into the life and behavior of a 17-year-old who had only a marginal connection to the presidential campaign, yet totally ignore for eight months---eight months!---the lies and deceit and *relevant* story involving John Edwards? ... Why did the NY Times run three --- THREE!! --- cover stories on Tuesday about Bristol Palin, but has said next to nothing about Barack Obama and Bill Ayers, or Barack Obama and Tony Rezko, or Barack Obama and how he’ll make the oceans fall and the sick heal?
Her daughter's pregnancy *is* relevant in the context of her mother's opposition to sex education and her vetoing of funding for a shelter for pregnant teens. And, Republicans can't complain about families being drug into the national debate when they've been virtually pimping their Iraq-bound son. Either family is all in, or all out.
...The Times screwed up by failing to report the Edwards story. They admit it. And now, faced with another story of how a candidate in the Presidential election handles a family-values issue, should the Times have backed off of that story? ...Bob also wants to know why mainstream journalists have given Obama a free ride on his links to Ayers and Rezko.
[The ad was] foul, poisonous and emanated from the upper reaches of the Republican Party. (What a surprise.) [It was] designed to exploit the hostility, anxiety and resentment of the many white Americans who are still freakishly hung up on the idea of black men rising above their station and becoming sexually involved with white women.
This sensitive operation, possibly involving secret Rovian search engines, outstripped the vast resources and capabilities of the New York Times and Bob Herbert.A February 24, 2005, Washington Post article reads: There's nothing exotic or complicated about how phenoms are made in Washington, and, more to the point, how they are broken... "Andy Warhol said we all get our 15 minutes of fame," says Barack Obama. "I've already had an hour and a half. I mean, I'm so overexposed, I'm making Paris Hilton look like a recluse."
Meanwhile, print advertising revenue continued to shrink... Revenue dropped 6 percent to $741.9 million, missing the average Wall Street estimate for $754 million. Ad revenue slipped down 11 percent, hurt mostly by fewer classified ads.
John McCain was unavailable for comment; presumably because he was too busy giggling.
It would be terrific to have an article from Senator McCain. However, we feel McCain's perspective in this piece is not as open as Senator Obama's. Nor has McCain earned the right to an automatic slot on our op-ed page through his service to the community the way the Obama has.Remember, McCain never served as a community organizer. He did not serve his local citizenry as a state senator. And he never built grass-roots support organizations.
Barack Obama is a candidate who espouses inclusion, tolerance, and humility.
Furthermore, the presumptive Democratic nominee has been consistently right on the major issues; which is not the case for Senator McCain. We'd like McCain to take responsibility for his actions including terrorizing innocent civilians.
In conclusion, I'm not going to be able to accept this piece as currently written. I’d be pleased, though, to look at another draft once Senator McCain has addressed these issues.
