It began as the non-troversy of the holiday shortened week: the accusation that Barack Obama had plagiarized part of a stump speech from Mass. Governor Deval Patrick
He hadn't. And even if he had lifted or borrowed or co-opted a couple of lines, does anybody really think the post-modern politician expresses a single word that isn't team scripted and focus group tested before it's uttered in the public square?
The plagiarism jab left barely a scratch on Obama. But sometimes even the slightest wounds can fail to heal.
As I was making the rounds with the cable newsers this past Tuesday before the primary, I witnessed first-hand a theme develop. Almost to a person the newers I spoke with dismissed the plagiarism rap, but wondered aloud about Obama's rhetoric. The word rhetoric being flipped from asset to pejorative. Was there, they wondered, more to Obama than his rhetoric? How far, they asked, would his rhetoric take him? When would his rhetoric be replaced by specifics?
The Obama/rhetoric question is not new.
And some of the hectoring over Obama-mania is coming from the usual suspects. But the Chris Matthews/Kirk Watson interview was fuel on the fire, and in the days since the chorus of "give us more" seems to have increased rather than diminished.
Certainly some of this hectoring can be attributed to the media news cycle looking for a new drum to beat, if not some old fashioned player hating for the new Democratic front runner. But for those who think the questions of rhetoric are limited to MSM hacks with sharp knives, it is not. The BBC World Service ran a piece on Obama openly wondering if his rhetoric is becoming a liability. I can't say as the BBC would be particularly partisan in this instance.
Ultimately, if there is this sense that Obama is all sizzle and no steak, it is certainly not the fault of the man himself. At this late stage of the primaries, the media has had every opportunity to give the guy a good shaking out. If the newsers feel Obama isn't forthright with specifics, it's their responsibility to ask the questions they'd like answered. There is little doubt Obama could answer them. He may be relatively new to the national political scene, but he is hardly a neophyte. More importantly, we all benefit when the candidates have their mettle fairly tested in the media glare.
The larger question going forward is: do specifics really matter? To quote Mike Tyson: the best fight plan in the world only lasts until you take the first punch in the face. Similarly, the best political ideas only last until you get them before a divided and ineffectual Congress.
Perhaps, more than specifics, we need a leader who can inspire people to pressure their reps to bend to the will of the new. What is rhetoric if not a call to action?
Perhaps that's a question someone would care to ask of Barack Obama.
No one would expect women to stand behind Obama if he implied that women should be home, barefoot and pregnant.
She had a HEAVY LEAD in the black vote, until the gaffe of S. Carolina.
There are a number of privileged women who seemed to be appalled at the thought of losing a bit of their privilege. Equality for all, unless someone gets in your way?
Hillary, the candidate 'for women'? Really? Again, unless you're a woman who gets in her way and then comes the 'defense committee' and then 'watch out b*itches!':
http://youtube.com/watch?v=breSVtVYSmo
She's not losing because she's a woman... that's why she was winning in the first place and beat MOST of her male competitors. She's losing because she's run a lousy campaign and it's indicative of what she'll do in the White House, as well.
I WILL VOTE FOR THE DEM PICK.
Beware the provocateurs, both covert rethug and deranged dem.
Hillary: What a terror! And a damned liar.
Why did Watergate topple Nixon? Why did Monica Lewinsky almost but not quite topple Bill Clinton? Why does nothing that GW Bush does: torture people, start wars on false pretenses, run the country into trillions of dollars of debt, much to cronies like Blackwater, which is as unconstitutional a concept as anyone has come up with yet, wiretapping galore, all this stuff, yet not a murmur of impeachment nor any noticable concern from the press?
When you look at all this, it is obvious there are forces "pulling the strings".
These same forces are dancing Obama thru tulips today. Why? One obvious reason is to stop Hillary. However, there is probably more to it than that, unless these forces fear Hillary, because they are afraid what she could do knowing what they are and how they operate. So, maybe it is just to stop Hillary.
Yes, it is not the millions of Obama supporters who are pulling the voting lever as the reason for his victories, it is the force. May the force be with you!
Kerry had a 15-point lead and lost. They are so afraid of Hillary, they want to get her out now. They know they can define Obama because he is so new and has a 100% liberal rating. Hillary is a centrist compared to McCain and Obama. Outside the extreme left and right she is the natural candidate for the country.
Pubs are taking the chance that Obama will not be able to close the deal with a majority of the Electoral College.
Seems you can talk bad about a white woman but dont say a word about a black man.
His wife is out and out racist and it shows.
The face of the presidency will, from Day One, send a substantive message to ourselves as a nation, and to the rest of the world. No one needs to be ashamed of including this reality into their considerations of who to vote for.
We could argue which message is most urgent now (color or gender), but I'm not overly concerned if, say, a woman votes for Hillary strictly because she is a woman -- if there's no more important issue to that voter. My concern is when women start accusing other women who support Obama "traitors" -- something I've seen happen a fair amount here on the boards. Of course, I'd feel the same way if I heard blacks saying similar things. But let's not go calling people racists just because race is part of their decision-making process.
I gave donations to obama at the beginnig of the year. But changed my mind after he failed to answer Hillary's charge why he took off his speech opposing the Iraq war from his website when he was running for the senate in 2004 and then voted to fund the war in 2005, 2006 and 2007. He doesn't answer questions and the media is giving him a pass while scruinizing everyone else and beating them up with tough questions
He brags about opposing the war from the beginning but when his opinion counted, he voted for everything Bush asked for!!.. and if you say that to him he doesn't answer and gives his usual line: " the notion that somehow bla bla bla is not true ".. how many times in this campaign did you hear Obama say this sentence: " The notion that somehow bla bla bla ... is simply not true " .. I bet you if someone goes back and check all his speeches and debates, the number of how many times he said it will be in the hundreds .. This sentence is what 911 is to Rudy. He would be speechless without it .. or without his left index..
Just what is that exactly? Is it like consultant, writer, self-employed, etc?
"Similarly, the best political ideas only last until you get them before a divided and ineffectual Congress."
Spot on...if the Democratic Party does not rid itself of Harry Reid, it doesn't matter who the president is. Their agenda will be DOA. How is it that Reid gets a free ride. He is the Don Knotts of the US Senate.
.
Barak and Michelle Obama have been given passes by the media on ALL of their mis-steps/mis-speaks.
I wonder how much of it is a fear of being called racist for criticizing a respected person of color?... AND, I wonder if Obama isn't cynical to realized that he has/can continue to get away with it?...
If he didn't realize it before, he certainly must have gotten the message when the media ignored his two Senate resolution vote NO-SHOWs (in Sept.) on Iraq and Iran, EVEN AFTER HE WAS OUTED DURING A DEBATE BY MIKE GRAVEL (otherwise NONE of us probably would have known about it.)
Support Obama if you like (I don't, but then I don't like Hillary either), but just don't think he's mister pure...I suspect there may be some unexpected (and unpleasant) surprises lurking behind the smoke and mirrors he's so deft with... Forewarned...
Article on how Obama obtained his first political office by betraying his friend and political mentor, Alice Palmer:
www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-070403 obama-ballot, 0,1843097.story?,page=1
Article on Obama's true position on the war:
www.huliq.com/47109/meet-press-hillary-examines-sen-obama-iraq
Article on Obama and Rezko:
www.huffingtonpost.com/taylor-marsh/obamas- faustian-bargain-_b_82863.html.html
Website for Obama's church where is mentor and spiritual advisor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, was pastor:
www.tucc.org/about.htm
Obama's church presenting racist and Jew hater Louis Farrakhan with a lifetime achievement award:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXS_YrYp07Q
Obama complimenting Rumsfeld and other Bush appiontees:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxPA37n0oOU
Article on Obama's church and their arguably racist theology:
www.newmediajournal.us/staff/rush/2007/ print/02202007.htm
Article on Obama's relationship with indicted slumlord:
www.suntimes.com/news/brown/757286, CST-NWS-brown24.article
Obama lies about race card issue:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXXjWy-OztQ&feature =related
Obama lies about state lobbyist as his campaign chair:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYVrMA9PkKo
Obama lies about his Pakistan policy:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kkGGqufu2c
Discussion of Obama's connection to indicted slumlord:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pqhbihfwgx8
Discussion of Obama's connection to Rev. Wright
www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FUnBi1i90E
Article on Obama's fundraising:
www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ chi-galesburg_obama_webfeb01,1,6024020.story
There is a lot more than just this, for example, Obama's interference with Kenya's political problems in order to help his friend, Odinga; Michelle Obama's college thesis on race which has been purposely sealed until one day after the general election, etc., etc. We are in for a really bumpy ride.
Take your closing claim, that Michelle Obama's college thesis has been sealed until after the election. That would come as news to Politico, which has published it.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0208/8642.html
The claim that Michelle wrote that she considered herself black first and a Princeton student second took a fragment of one sentence in a way that completely changed the meaning of her words. The comment was not that she considered herself black first, but rather that OTHERS seemed to consider her black first. Here's the sentence: "Regardless of the circumstances under which I interact with whites at Princeton, it often seems as if, to them, I will always be black first and a student second."
Your post carries this same type of deception. You imply, by lots of links, that there's all sorts of nefarious stuff. In general you link to partial, one-sided information. You link to YouTube excerpts from Sean Hannity (a real objective source!) and anti-Obama-ites like Taylor Marsh. The few objective sources you list don't have dirt, but you try to give people the impression that they do by adding them to your list of opposition hit material.
Nice propaganda job. But it won't work.
The thing I will always remember about Sen. Biden's plagiarism was that he (or his witers) did not even have the sense to Americanize the expressions. Americans don't say things like "I was the first in my family to go to university..."