RNC Big Lie Obama is a Typical Politician: How to Spot It, How to Fight It

[McCamy Taylor]

Before I start, I want to remind you of one thing that many people may have forgotten but I have a memory like an elephant (even though I am a yellow dog Democrat. Last winter, we learned that the McCain campaign's strategy against Barack Obama would be to portray him in the GE as a typical corrupt, Daley style politician.

Now, I want you to think about the news coverage this week in light of this fact and ask yourself how much of what you saw was staged by the RNC. 10%? 20%? Read on.

I. Kathleen Parker Says Obama Lacks “Foxhole” Qualifications

Remember how I said yesterday that the next two months are all about Obama proving that he has the presidential qualities of love, courage and wisdom because this is the time when the RNC will try to prove to the American people that he lacks these same attributes?

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/McCamy%20Tayl...

And that his stand on particular issues of interest to the Democratic base is much less important than his success at defining himself as someone whom America can trust to lead the nation. Someone with leadership potential.

Check out this bit of oppo from Kathleen Parker which the Fort Worth Star Telegram calls Obama lacking presidential traits but which some other sites have called Who would you want McCain or Obama in your foxhole?

http://www.star-telegram.com/245/story/738411.html

I have wondered from time to time if Kathleen Parker is paid by the right wing to make women look bad. Misogynists like to stereotype women as irrational---creatures driven by emotion, bereft of logic. Basically, she says that McCain is a good guy, because he gave up the chance to leave the Hanoi Hilton early in order to show solidarity with his fellow POWs. Obama is not a good guy, because he eventually distanced himself from Rev. Wright. Therefore, we should elect McCain----because if he is ever in a POW camp with us, he promises not to go home early?

Like I said, don’t look for logic here. This is strictly an emotional wallow. However, when we reach the part of the election where the candidates are being defined as good guys or not so good guys, you will find a lot of tugging at heart strings and a lot less matters of substance.

For instance, if this were a matter of debate, in which logic and constituency was an issue, poor Ms. Parker would score a big red F. Look at what she wrote this spring.

http://www.townhall.com/Columnists/KathleenParker/2008/...

The question still remains: Why did Obama, future author of racial harmony, stay with a preacher whose black nationalist leanings were no secret?

There is just no pleasing some people. Not if you are the presumptive Democratic nominee.

II. RNC Calls Obama a Politician. Will Announce that Earth is Round Sometime Next Month.

Recalling how outraged the progressive wing of the Democratic Party became when Rev. Wright called the political candidate, Barack Obama a “politician”, the RNC is about to unveil a series of four ads in key battleground states in which they will do just what Democrats here at DU are currently doing (shame on them ).

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0708/RNC_plans_a...

Sources familiar with the media buys say the Republican National Committee has reserved advertising slots in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, large buys that could mark the first serious wave of televised attacks on Barack Obama.
Further details of the advertising plans were unavailable and an RNC spokesman said he was unaware of ad plans and of the substance of any planned attacks. John McCain and the Republican Party have stepped up efforts in recent days to portray Obama as a "typical" politician, and have accused him of changing his position on a range of key issues.

Can we talk? Who runs for president of the United States? Politicians. Can we stop pretending that being a politician is a dirty, shameful thing? Thomas Jefferson was a politician. He held his tongue during the John Adams administration, when speaking out against the government could have landed even the Vice President in jail, and then he ran for president and won. He had to endure political smears—he was an atheist, he was sleeping with his sister-in-law who was also a slave. We are all lucky that he was willing to do what politicians had to do, otherwise the Federalists might have had their way, and we might be singing God Save the Queen now.

That election was a lot like this one. There was a Constitution busting president who had used a phantom menace---the threat of France—to deprive Americans of their civil liberties. And there is another, more recent election that was a lot like this one. In 1976, Jimmy Carter had to appeal to the nation's independents after he sewed up the nomination. In the wake of Watergate, he ran on the A Leader for a Change platform. He was a 100% character candidate, and he managed to beat a fairly popular incumbent Republican, despite having many strikes against him---no national experience, training as an engineer rather than a lawyer, a heavy Southern accent at a time when the rest of the country thought “South” meant George Wallace.

Character can win if the country is fed up with what it has and the people want a change of direction. Obama is a “character” candidate. The Republicans will concentrate all of their efforts trashing that character. They will portray him as 1) inexperienced, 2) out of touch with average Americans (too liberal) 3) unpatriotic 4) corrupt (typical “politician”). The whisper campaign that he is a Muslim will continue, too.

III. If Innuendo Does Not Work, Just Make Shit Up

This article about McCain and Obama is less irrational than Parker’s, but only because nationally syndicated Parker is forced to stick with something close to the truth or every liberal blogger in the country will descend upon her like a pack of rabid weasels . Those whose names are less well known can make arguments that seem more elegant, because they can build them with lies. No one is going to fact check people like----what is his name?---Victor Davis Hanson at National Review on line .

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NDA4ZTYzMGIyMWQzYT...

McCain couldn’t even hold the changeable Obama to his primary pledge to use public campaign funds, and thereby cut down his opponent’s significant edge in private cash contributions. The cash-rich Obama has now sworn off public financing.

Note that the article is called Imagining the Election That is what the author instructs his readers to do. Imagine the election as they want it to be. I.e. make shit up. Is your candidate a crook who has been caught twice with his hand in the cookie jar (and once with it down the blouse of a blonde lobbyist named Vicki)? Does he have memory problems? Did he lie about the stage of his melanoma? Is his nickname "Flipper" because of his stance on issues like abortion, the war, energy, taxes? Does he prefer fist fights to negotiation? No problem. Just rewrite history.

About that quote above, in the world where real people live, McCain had to agree to accept public financing in order to qualify for a loan to keep his campaign afloat and now he is in deep shit with the FEC, while Obama said that he would consider public financing.

Since Hanson is factually impaired, ignore the stack of “waffles” in his fable and look instead at the storyline. He paints McCain as the tortoise and Obama as the hare. McCain is a seasoned warhorse and Obama is a “frisky” stallion ( “Lock up your women. A Black man’s in town!”). McCain is George Foreman, which makes Obama…. a Black Mulsim????.

“Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!” indeed. (Title of my first journal of this series)

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/McCamy%20Tayl...

The Hanson piece above is extremely silly---and infuriating. It will be used as a template for other character attacks on Sen. Obama so study it.

IV. Friendly Fire: Howard Fineman Calls Obama a “Traditional Politician” on Countdown and Rachel Maddow Does Not Smack Him Down For It

Here is a simple rule. When you produce anything for YouTube or write anything that is meant for a lot of lay people (not political insiders) to read about Sen. Obama, make sure that it can not be construed as calling him 1. a liar, 2. a coward 3. dumb 4. inexperienced 5. mean spirited 6. greedy or 7. a “typical politician”. If you do, you are doing McCain’s work for him.

An examples of a “friendly fire” attack on Obama’s character this last week---
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25515018 /

Howard Fineman and Rachel Maddow on Countdown yesterday.

FINEMAN: And I‘m at something called the Aspen Institute Ideas Conference. There are a lot of very interesting, important, powerful people here in politics. A fair number of Obama fans, some of whom I‘ve been talking to today and they are concerned about it. One of them is somebody you probably know, Arianna Huffington, and her point, as others have made here, is it‘s not so much left or right, although it might be that, too, as it is whether Obama is risking damaging his brand and that brand is about authenticity in being a different kind of politician.
So, when he decided not to do the public financing, when he decided to support the FISA bill, when he decided to take a more positive attitude towards NAFTA, it wasn‘t any one of those things necessarily, it‘s the idea that suddenly he was becoming a traditional politician, a traditional maneuverer. And a traditional maneuverer is precisely what he‘s been running against so far in this campaign.
MADDOW: It‘s also true that that means the left-wing critique or progressive critique of Obama just jives directly (ph) with the McCain critique of Obama which could be dangerous when it‘s coming from both sides. Roger Simon on Politico.com wrote today that there is a difference between running as a candidate for president and running as the leader of a movement.

Note that Fineman listed two of the “waffle” points from Hanson’s hit piece above and added a third of his own, about FISA. Basically, Fineman just said the same thing that Hanson and Parker said in their columns. Obama is a typical politician. This is the strategy that the John McCain campaign said it was going to use against Barack Obama all the way back in January. Paint the Illinois Senator as a Daley style dirty tricks politician.

Fineman just succeeded in calling Obama a liar, a coward (since he suggests that Obama is scared to run as a liberal) and a typical “politician.” Obama got slimed on Countdown . Friendly fire is the worst kind of all.

When I see an atrocity like this, my RNC oppo radar goes wild. Could it be that Obama did not really make a sudden move to the center this week? Maybe what really happened is the McCain camp----together with the RNC----is unveiling that “Obama is a typical Daley style politician” attack strategy that they have been promising since January. And that is why Cal Thomas wrote about how Obama and Clinton hated each other before they loved each other and Parker wrote about how Obama dumped Rev. Wright for calling him a politician and that is why Hanson cooked up a stack of “waffles” and that is why Howard Fineman called Obama “a traditional politician" , and that is why the RNC has four ads coming out which will portray him as “a politician”.

What exactly did Obama do to merit the label of “traditional politician” this week? He declined to criticize John McCain for using his POW experience as a campaign issue. I can not fault him for that. Plenty of people----especially nice people---would cut John McCain slack on that one. And one of Barack Obama’s character traits that endears him to his supporters is his compassion.

What else? He said he supports allowing some church groups to administer government social programs as long as they follow the law regarding hiring and discrimination. That policy, too, is consistent with Obama’s own history of partnering with church groups in Chicago as a community organizer. The Church with which he was associated for almost twenty years had a dedicated social outreach program. And, as I show in my last journal, African-Americans and Latinos are much more positive about faith based social programs than other groups in the U.S. Again, I see consistency.

On FISA, I am going to write a lot more frankly than anyone else has. The administration is playing a dangerous game. Recall how McCain’s adviser said that he welcomes another terrorist attack on U.S. soil. Bush-Cheney can not afford to allow such an attack to occur---unless they can blame it on the Democrats. Congress has stalled on FISA and telecom immunity for almost a year. However, certain provisions of the law are about to run out

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/barack-obama/my-position-...

The ability to monitor and track individuals who want to attack the United States is a vital counter-terrorism tool, and I'm persuaded that it is necessary to keep the American people safe -- particularly since certain electronic surveillance orders will begin to expire later this summer. Given the choice between voting for an improved yet imperfect bill, and losing important surveillance tools, I've chosen to support the current compromise.

This is what Obama has written at The Huffington Post . Now, imagine that you are the unholy alliance of Cheney, Addington, Rove, Wolfowitz. You desperately want McCain to win. You want to keep the Dems from getting 60 seats in the Senate, too. However, America’s fear of terrorism is down to 35%. Another terrorist attack could raise that number and increase McCain's chances, but if that happens on the Republicans watch everyone will blame W. On the other hand, if, because of Democratic stubbornness, one single change in terrorist surveillance has happened recently, then you can blame the attack that occurs in late September or early October on the Democrats . And specifically on Senate Democrats like Barack Obama. You can use the deaths of more innocent American civilians as an excuse to launch a new war against Iran. Suddenly, America will be scared of change. It will want something tried and true.

Between now and November, Congressional Democrats can not give the appearance that they have removed even a single tool in the so called “War on Terrorism”, because that is all the excuse the administration needs to launch the October Surprise that it could not use in 2006, because of the Iraq NIE---the report that revealed that the War in Iraq had made us all more vulnerable to terrorism rather than safer from it.

As much as I hate the idea of the telecoms getting immunity, I hate the thought of more innocent Americans dying even more. I believe that Obama is making the wise and the compassionate choice here---and once he elected president, he can fix this mess, the way that Thomas Jefferson fixed John Adam’s mess.

V. Fight the Smears!

You know the Big Lie they are trying to sell America, Obama is a typical politician with all the little lies that it implies, he is a liar, he is a back stabber, he is greedy, he is ambitious, he is all talk, he can not be counted on in a fight. Had he and the Clintons not made up, we would be hearing a lot more about the events of the primary campaign, too (this was why I said that certain memos would only be defused by unity).

This is how Gore is a liar started. This is how Kerry is a waffler started. This is how Edwards is a phony and Hillary is a bitch started. I have plenty of journals that show how this kind of oppo works, who the usual media whores are, how they do their dirty business.

Call them to account. Start email campaigns against the worst offenders. Be especially brutal against those who make racial slurs. (These guys will not be able to help themselves). Paint glowing character portraits of Obama. Do not be distracted by divide and conquer bullshit issues that are tossed our way. Do not be distracted when they dredge up former political opponents to talk about "dirty tricks" (this tactic is inevitable for this kind of Big Lie, especially now that Obama and Clinton are best buddies). The Daley political machine's problems are irrelevant to this campaign (that tactic is also inevitable, so resolve now that you will not be swayed.)

McCain means endless wars for oil and twelve more years of Republican rule (two terms for his VP).

Obama means that we have a future.

[NattPang]

1. Very important information.

Thank you.

[crankychatter]

2. whew - glad you're on OUR side.... kicked and recommended NT

thank you

[ErinBerin84]

3. I remember being really distracted by

Howard Fineman's blindingly hot pink shirt in that Countdown episode, anyone remember?

[Captain Hilts]

4. Well, he is acting like a politician.

In a lot of ways, he's Bill Clinton all over again.

[Political Heretic]

9. Fine then. I'd take the 90s over the last eight years in a heartbeat!

[Captain Hilts]

10. Me too! The 90s were pretty good. nt

[opihimoimoi]

5. Yup, them Pubs will be going all out...using everything they can find...incl kitchen sink and all

things smelly...

KnR

[defendandprotect]

6. The way to fight this is to NOT watch it ---

Your brain is rerunning their program, their tunes ---

Take back possession of your brain --

[McCamy Taylor]

7. No, that is called "burying your head in the sand" and it does not work.

All those people who thought that "Gore is a liar" would not affect an election were proved wrong.

This time, we should take the oppo seriously. I know that the Obama campaign is. They are very serious folks. If they have Bill Clinton giving them advice, they will be in even better shape.

[defendandprotect]

14. Look . . . your actions now were right for 20 or more years ago . . .

I was doing then what you're doing now ---

Corporate-press is fascist and in control -- it will take major change to put corporations

back in the box ---

Again -- GORE WON THE ELECTION IN 2000 ---

It was a major STEAL, pulled off by theft of votes, fascist rallies to stop the mandated

vote counting, and finally a knock out Supreme Court decision which put W in the Oval Office.

If McCain wins this time around it will be another steal.


Meanwhile, these steals didn't begin in 2000 ---

They began back in the mid-1960's when the computer counters began to come in.

Two journalists became suspicious and began to investigate ---

http://www.constitution.org/vote/votescam__.htm


So try to understand that while we have had tremendous fascist propaganda going back at least

to Nixon . . . you have also had a long history of GOP steals. They didn't kill Kennedy

and move a huge coup on US government only to see it take back by voters!!!

[sandnsea]

8. Out-Standing!!

I am jumping up and down on my chair

[guruoo]

11. I wouldn't worry about Fineman....

because 99% of the American couch potatos that actually heard what he
said won't have a freekin clue as to what he was talking about.

[McCamy Taylor]

12. Here is one of the atrocities at DU, right now. Over abortion. It's a BIG LIE

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

Read the source article. Obama said he objects to doctors who do late abortions (meaning after the fetus is viable) for "mental distress". For those who do not know much about the private practice of medicine, you can get a doctor to sign a piece of paper saying that your little darling needs a late term abortion if you have the influence and the money, even if she only needs it because she is embarrassed by the stigma of out of wedlock motherhood. I have a relative who was born with severe birth defects including near blindness, because the doctors were persuaded to do this kind of therapeutic abortion for another relative.

In the article, champions of abortion rights go on record as stating that they have no problem with Obama's comments. It is Right to Life which raises a stink. That makes this a right wing attack piece. The right wing is one that accuses him of changing his stance on the issue of abortion--and instead of praising him, they get angry.

And then, someone at DU posts the article and whole bunch of people at DU get angry, too. Some people even accuse him of being the same at McSame and Bush and wonder why we even bother vote. Shades of 2000 when they said that Gore was the same as Bush and that we should all vote for Nader.

I offer this thread as proof that the Freeper activity which was so rampant here during the primary has not died, it has just changed its tune. And also that the Big Lie "Obama is a typical politician" needs to be eradicated from DU.

Anyone want to help?

[McCamy Taylor]

13. Another "Obama is a typical politcian" RNC Big Lie here at DU

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

Here is the Times article:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/ger...

Left-wing commentators have raised the usual cry of betrayal. Arianna Huffington, that rare creature, a young conservative who moved sharply left in middle age, dubbed Mr Obama's move not realpolitik, but “realstupidpolitik”.

Conservatives, meanwhile, led by John McCain's Republican campaign, say that the presumptive Democratic nominee's pivot shows that, for all his talk of offering a new kind of politics, he is really just another cynical politician who will say anything to get elected.

Recall that The Times is owned by Rupert Murdoch.

[McCamy Taylor]

15. Weee! Thread no. 3! Let's pick the scab off the Hillary-Barack wound, so

that we can complain about how unkind things were said about Clinton by Obama supporters. As you read this bit of recent history from the Guardian UK, remember that the Guardian was one of the biggest Hillary bashers around not so long ago.

Here is their recent piece in which the Guardian chastises the left for all the unkind things it said about Clinton, forgetting all the unkind things which they said about Clinton (maybe I will remind them in a separate thread).

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/01/hil...

This, too, is just more RNC oppo (you didn't know that they have friends across the Atlantic, did you).

[McCamy Taylor]

17. Crap the Guardian UK Wrote the Destroy HIllary Before they Wrote "Destroying HIllary"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

[jgraz]

16. Ridiculous post. Fox will NEVER admit the earth is round.

[jtt]

18. defense is defeat.

Bush is close to being regarded as the Worst President in History, and McCain offers nothing but a less intelligent continuation of his policy.

Why are the Republicans choosing all the topics for discussion around here, and possibly modifying the stances of our candidates?

WHY are we having this conversation??

[skepticscott]

19. None of this answers the question

of why Obama and his representatives are lying about his support for the House FISA bill. This is the crucial constitutional issue that started the current firestorm here on DU, and Obama's response to the criticism, while rhetorically slick and completely palatable to those who want to support him blindly and uncritically, still doesn't pass the sniff test. Obama is a constitutional lawyer and knows perfectly well what the truth is in this matter, so why is he peddling this baloney?

[DeanDem10]

20. Once again, thank you.

But I agree with the poster who commented that we have to remember: Gore won the election in 2000. The "machine error" which registered -16,000 plus votes in Volusia County alone for Gore tells the story. There were many more "issues" (i.e., steals of votes) besides this one--such as the tens of thousands of voters wrongfully purged from the voting roles. We cannot ever slide into either acceptance or acquiescence on this subject. And we must carry the message forward until our grandchildren and their children tell the story. We can't let revisionism, convenience, or fatigue hide the truth of what happened.

[Puzzler]

25. I agree too, but ...

... I think that if Obama wins by a considerably larger margin than Gore did, the election will be much harder for the GOP to steal (without the fraud becoming so obscenely obvious to all but a handful of freepers).

[kentuck]

21. It is important whether or not...

we do it from a defensive or offensive stance. Simply responding to attacks usually do not work. You have to mount your own offensive.

[Joe Chi Minh]

22. And Hillary wasn't....?

[cstanleytech]

23. I could use some advice, how do you counter people who claim Obama is to "radical"

but they wont post examples to show how he is more "radical" than McCain?
I am running into this on another forum and could use some tips if you have any to share.

[Joe Chi Minh]

24. In a wicked world, it is our duty to be radical: radically opposed to evil.

Christ was the supreme radical, and was outlawed and crucified for it.

Radicalism just means wanting to get to the root of problems, and not fiddle around at the margins. It signifies the opposite of the cosmetic make-overs favoured by the politicians, which won't make waves and upset the country's powerful vested interests: the arch-worldlings who run the show. Radical surgery is often needed when dealing with cancers, or heart diseases; a few aspirins would not be helpful at.all. And, indeed, cancer is the perfect metaphor for those richest individuals and the corporations, for whom, as Chomsky pointed out, the people (and implicitly, their wishes,) are an irrelevance.

Of course, radicalism doesn't have to be good. Thatcher and modern Republicans are examples of a particularly destructive characteristic of the far right - a deranged radicalism, anything but conservative. Unfortunately, today, we have the worst of both worlds in the UK, the social and moral radicalism of the atheist left/neo right with its fundamental, materialist misunderstanding of what constitutes human freedom, together with the economic anarchy of the far right. (The "Middle", according to the MSM).

Our complaints about the DLC enablers is precisely that, far from being radical, they are wusses, who are prepared to pander to the Republicans, and let them walk all over them, and hence, the people of the country.

We've just been watching a programme on BBC2, in the UK, about the struggle Aneurin Bevan, the Socialist Health Minister, faced from the Tories (particularly Churchill and the doctors, themselves). Of course, though Churchill performed a tremendous service to the nation and the world during WWII and the years immediately preceding it, apparently he had once described Mussolini as the greatest leader ever. He seemed to recognise the deep-dyed viciousness of the Nazis, but initially and and perhaps primarily, it seems that he recognised and was motivated by their threat to what remained of the Empire and to the nation, itself, where, in the latter case, lesser men, the appeasers, chose not to.

On one occasion, Bevan let rip, roaring in Parliament that he hated the Tories, whom he considered to be lower than vermin. What a stink the Tories and their tame press made about that. It hit home so hard, they evidently never forgot it. Well, they did happen to forget that he actually said "LOWER than vermin", so he was always ever so slightly misquoted. Can't imagine why.

It has apparently been said that the National Health Service was the greatest political achievement of the twentieth century. I'll settle for "of all time".