Cokie Roberts Attack Ad

Last week when Cokie Roberts attacked Barack Obama on ABC's This Week for vacationing in the "foreign" and "exotic" land of Hawaii, suggesting that he instead visit lovely Myrtle Beach, most of us just assumed she was shilling for John McCain. But, it turns out, she actually wasn't shilling for the Arizona Senator. She was shilling for something entirely different. Just watch.

I think all of us owe Cokie an apology. We thought ill of her when she tried to paint Obama as the elitist and exotic candidate, instead of McCain with his privileged upbringing, eight houses, and forty million dollar plus net worth. Little did we know how wrong we were.

So, allow me be the first. Cokie, I'm sorry.

And you'll be happy to know, I just booked a late summer getaway at lovely Myrtle Beach, South Carolina! With it's pristine beaches, golf courses, fine restaurants, and exciting nightlife, I think you'll all agree, Myrtle Beach truly is "America's Beach Playground".

Disclosure: This blog post brought to you by The Myrtle Beach Tourism Board.

Follow Matthew Filipowicz on Twitter: www.twitter.com/headzupmatt

Comments

[ihavenobias]

Great to see you on HuffPo Matt!

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

Thank you, my friend. Good to see you over here, too.

[Jonny38103]

I think people completely miss the point. Cokie was talking about image, not substance. The Repubs are trying to play Obama up as an elitist and her point was that by going to a place, state, island that most Americans have never been able to afford to go, he may be playing into the Republicans' hands. That's all. Geez, chill out.

[loper2008]

Very funny.

We expect journalists and pundits to do better this year and we are going to call them out on it if they don't.

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

Thanks, loper.

[NovaBoy]

Well, wait a second. Let's take a breath. I'm no white knight for Cokie (btw, wtf?!?) Roberts, but she is giving commentary here and not presenting a professionally journalistic piece. Maybe "journalists" shouldn't be doing Sunday morning punditry, but that's a different issue. She's supposed to be stating her opinion, specifically on whether Obama is responding forcefully enough to the frame that he is 'different' and 'elitist'. She's talking about how it doesn't look good, in her opinion, for Obama to vacation in Hawaii--rather than someplace more accessible to the average voter--when one of the (false) narratives of the campaign thus far is that he is 'exotic'. She has a point. She made it clumsily, but she has a point. Is that point biased? Of course. She could have said that the idea that Obama should vacation somewhere more 'ordinary' is nuts because he's from Hawaii and his grandmother, and his daughters' great-grandmother, lives in Hawaii. She took a different tack, but that doesn't make her a schill (shill, or whatever).

I come from rural, western South Carolina (thankfully I was smart enough to get the hell out there) and let me tell you that for people who don't have hundreds of dollars to spend on arline tickets, and who only get one week of vacation a year, even Myrtle Beach is somewhat exotic.

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

I'm from the Midwest. Any ocean anywhere is exotic.

[PaulinaSmedes]

Who is Cokie Roberts???

[Helzapoppin]

I don't live far from Myrtle Beach (aka "the Redneck Riviera"). And I'd much rather go to Hawaii.

[tjfxh]

Karl Rove picked up on Mark Penn's low-ball attack strategy of making Obama out as too "different" to win the nomination from Hillary Clinton. To her credit, Hillary rejected it, but Rove saw it's merits and said so. Shortly thereafter, it became a GOP talking points and Cokie is now flogging it for them.

[Decipherer]

She (Hillary Clinton) deserves no credit for rejecting that Penn/Rove slime, she was just a little more clever in how she and her husband used it.

It hasn't worked so far, that is, through the primary season, and with any luck the American people will wake up and see it for what it is -- a pack of fabricated racist lies and nonsense.

Of course, both Hillary and Bill Clinton have been diminished by having wallowed in that filth.

As for Cokie Roberts, she's got a lot of nerve to repeat that garbage, unless either she has an agenda or is more stupid than I thought. Since Obama actually spent some years when he was a child in Hawai'i, why the hell shouldn't he vacation in (drum roll, please) our 50th state (look it up).

[Marlyn]

It was a twofer

[anon004]

What is it with all these jounalists jumping on the "Obama is an elitist" bandwagon? They must know his mother was on welfare at one point in her life, and that Obama worked as a telemarketer selling NY Times subscriptions to get through college. His "wealth" (such as it is) is from the books he wrote. Are they jealous because he made more money with his books than they did with theirs? Or are they just jealous because he's so cool, and they're geeks? There has to be some deep-seated emotional issue with these people, because it sure isn't based on jounalisitic objectivity or rational analysis. And what's this deal with Hawaii being "foreign" or "exotic"? Last time I checked, it has been a US State for almost fifty years. How the hell can a US state be foreign? It's an oxymoron. Now, instead of fear-mongering foreign-born Arabs (which is idiotic enough), we're supposed to fear and distrust HAWAIIANS? Just when you thought the public discourse couldn't get any stupider . . .

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

They know all these things, anon004. But, it doesn't fit the "narrative" they've chosen, so it doesn't matter if it's true or not.

[Agent420]

This is politics. In politics, the truth has a different flavor and it sucks.

[Doofus]

You mean 'shilling', not 'schilling' (which was an Austrian coin once upon a time).

To 'shill' is to advocate, etc.: 'to act as a spokesperson or promoter'.

If you're a native of Hawaii, surely you ought to vacation there every
chance you get. Even if you're not, for that matter.

[wndrwrthg]

Do not forget that Schilling is also a distributer of spices.

[seriously29]

I guess you believe her because you want to or need to. That is your choice. I guess if his from the media's point of view.

Of course had he went to Texas instead of the big H, I guess the media could ride him on not going to visit his grandmother.

The media has its own interest. I remember that when I read what they write.

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

Ha! My spell check let that through! Thank you, sir.

[fpie]

As I understand it, a shill is a partner in a confidence scheam who's role is to pretend to be a disinterested party who thinks the con-man's offer is reasonable.

[tc399]

If I had been born in Hawaii and my family lived here it would be the most natural thing in the world for me to return for vacations.

I went home to San Antonio until my parents died, and now I live in Hawaii. We don't have sewers or city water. We catch rainwater and filter it. We don't use a garbage disposal....the rinds go outside to become mulch. MANY of us grow our own vegetables. And we are everyman and woman. All colors, all religions, many different languages. We are Hawaii, the Land of Aloha.

There is nothing 'elitist' about us. We are like settlers on the frontier....connected by friendship, sometimes by faith, but with the knowledge that we are alone out here, 2,500 miles from the mainland. We saw what the government did for New Orleans. We know no one will come to help us. We understand the facts of life. And we are THE Obama state. We accept anyone....any color, any religion, any sexual preference. We are THE free world.

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

Right on, tc399!

[seriously29]

Also, Obama's grandmother is ill and can't travel.

[Luigi53102]

A big thumbs up!

[jmundstuk]

You guys just don't get it. Real Americans, no matter how poor they (we?) are, think that we all can be rich. Real Americans want to own 8 houses too, and will fight to the death with anyone who says they shouldn't or can't. Real Americans celebrate the rich, the grosser the better, vote for the rich, want to be Bush's constituency of "the haves and the have mores." People who argue about working class people or about distribution of wealth or about a nuanced foreign policy for that matter are socialists, communists, "internationalists," and way back were called cosmopolitan, though not here. They are not "immigrants" and do not support Immigrants overrunning our country. The next logical step is to define a true American in more specific terms; like "stock," time in country, religion, etc. If we keep going like this for another presidential term or two, such definitions won't seem as far out as it does now. Cokie Roberts, who is a Real American whose family ranked in the power structure, understands and speaks the language very well. Myrtle Beach is a place of aspiration for real Americans, and our president should be reinforcing that particular value by going there.

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

Improving your lot in life and being rich & sucessful is the American dream. Nobody here is against that. Just don't say the man going to Hawaii to visit his grandmother is an "elitist", but the man with the 8 houses, married to a beer heiress, and 40 million plus in networth is a "common man".

[Agent420]

20 years ago the spread between the top guy in the company and the low guy was probably 10 to 1. Now it is over 100 to 1. Here is a question for you. Which person can a company do better with out? The CEO or the Janitor?

[MajorKong]

Your logic jinks around worse than an A-4 with a SAM locked onto it.

What makes Myrtle Beach a "place of aspiration for real Americans" and Hawaii some exotic destination for "elitists". For that matter, what makes a "real American"? Is there some "Congressional Committee on Real Americans" that publishes the guidelines?

I've been to Hawaii several times, nice place, but it hardly seemed "elite" to me.

[NovaBoy]

Umm, seems like some of you guys have your sarcasm detectors turned off.

[HeevenSteven]

Define "Real American".

[GeorgeKaplan]

The fate of politicians in an election have turned on smaller issues then this. Ed Muskie with a tear on his cheek (might have been show) or Mike Ducakus with a helmet. John Kerry windsurfing did not help Kerry much. Sounds silly, but I do think - know - that silly meaningless events can change the fate of anyone seeking office. It's part of the circus atmosphere that surrounds elections and especially Presidential elections. This overreaction to such a small comment by Mrs Roberts is part of the circus.

Does this matter to me? No.

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

I agree with you on elections being turned on small issues.
I think the Cokie thing is the left finally standing up, and saying that we're not going to let these little assumptions go unchecked. Especially when they're false.

[GeorgeKaplan]

I think what Cokie said is part of the nature of how elections are covered. It's not about issues it's about the " horse race." It all about the perception not about the reality. Everybody in the "news biz" has become a campaign manager. Cokie's comments are like those of some insider in the campaign who is worried about how his vacation will be perceived. I know this sounds crazy, but I do think insiders weigh this sort of thing. Remember that silly trip to "UNITY New Hampshire?"

Back on planet earth we are just talking about a guy and his family who wants to go home for a vacation. Everybody want to go home and home is Honolulu -- not some foreign land but the good ole United States of America. Obama's life will never be the same after he wins the Presidency he should have some time to take stock of that fact and have some private time with his family.

[Tommygun264]

It's sad to see a once intelligent, unbiased journalist go downhill like this.

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

I'm not fit to comment whether or not she was ever unbiased, but I agree that it's sad.

[Luigi53102]

That's what I thought about her in 1998 and 1999. Working for NPR was not then, nor is it now, a guarantee of objectivity or journalistic excellence.

[realpolitic]

"We thought ill of her when she tried to paint Obama as the elitist and exotic candidate, instead of McCain with his privileged upbringing, eight houses, and forty million dollar plus net worth." Only in America with the constant drum beats from the right wing, can a candidate from a single parent home who went to schools on scholarships be painting as elitist while running against a Republican with $40 million and numerous homes. The press has to stop buying into the conservative narrative. They do so out of laziness and naivity.

[Matthew Filipowicz - Huffpost Blogger]

I'm with you, realpolitic.
It's one of the many false narratives of this campaign.

[JBS]

I dunno why y'all want to blame this on the Carolinas.

Cokie Roberts (nee Boggs) hails from New Orleans, Louisiana where BOTH of her parents were Congress critters.

Her daddy was House Majority Leader Hale Boggs, and after he disappeared [Cessna 310 with Representative Nick Begich of Alaska, disappeared during a flight from Anchorage to Juneau], her mama, Lindy Boggs, was the first woman elected to Congress from Louisiana.

I betcha she ain't even ever been to Myrtle Beach.