Leave it to the Rude Pundit to rudely mention the obvious, what he calls The Lewinsky Nuke, that even liberal bloggers are too polite to mention.
Let us say, and why not, that surrogates for the Obama campaign, aided and abetted by the RNC and the media, decided to go after Hillary Clinton in relation to the Monica Lewinsky scandal (and, to be clear, no matter what you think about impeachment, the President of the United States getting blown by a White House intern qualifies as a scandal). Let us say, and, indeed, why not, that in order to gain some ground lost by the interminable focus on Jeremiah Wright, Obama's surrogates decided it was time for a little refresher course in the shit people put up with in their personal lives.
It would be so fuckin' easy to take down Hillary Clinton, and the RNC knows it and can't wait for the chance to do it. Obama hasn't, and probably won't. Here's the one-two-three of how, if the Obama campaign truly wanted to go negative, the Clinton campaign would be over. Follow the bouncing ball of a logical progression to the nuke:
I have defended Wright up until this point even after the Moyers interview, which I thought was rather harmless and thought it showed the pastor in a positive light. I defended him against criticisms, giving him the benefit of the doubt that he didn't mean to infer that Obama said things for purposes shielding his true thoughts, or for political expediency. But now with consecutive appearances before the NAACP and NPC, he has actively and quite unnecessarily inserted himself deeply into the Democratic campaign, and he has proven me wrong by affirming that indeed he did mean to imply Obama is something of a pandering, disingenuous politician. Whether intentional or no, whether passively or aggressively, the pastor is actively engaged in the process of throwing Obama under the bus.
I continue to argue that it is unfair to hold Obama accountable for his pastor's comments, or for the media or the other two candidates to try to conflate the two men into a single entity. But I am no longer cutting Wright any slack. At all. Perhaps Barack won't or can't denounce him (and I admire him for not doing so), but that doesn't prevent his supporters from doing so.
In a mirror corollary to Obama's position, I am, if not entirely in agreement with, then mostly sympathetic to Wright's socio-political preachings (save for AIDS conspiracy theories and the like). And the man certainly has a right to speak his mind in and about America.
My denunciation is of the man himself, for allowing his enormous ego to damage Obama's campaign. It is hard for me to believe the Reverend is completely unaware of the harm he might inflict. And if that is the case, then one must wonder if he is not intentionally attempting to undermine Obama's chances due to some interpersonal dynamic between the two not yet understood. But whatever the reason, it is unforgivable. With friends like that, who need enemies?
(I hate to end with a cliche, but there it is.)
Update: If an old friend is deliberately trying to run your campaign bus off the road and into a ditch, then the moral imperative is to throw that old friend under that bus and back up over him a few times, for the benefit of not only yourself, but for all the passengers on board, for the good of the country and the world. After having given Wright every benefit of the doubt, only to be rewarded with intentional personal betrayal, Barack did the right thing today.
We continually have candidates and their surrogates saying things like this:
No, I don't think he/she lacks integrity, but he/she says one thing and does another.
No, I don't think my opponent is a liar, but he/she keeps saying things he/she knows are untrue.
No, I don't think he/she is a [elitist, racist, etc.], but his/her comments are.
Must we really allow these politicians to continue to play these stupid games? Can't we get them to take a stand and go on the record as to what they really think of their opponents instead of engaging in all this childish innuendo?
And the same goes for journalists and pundits. If you keep raising the issues of flag lapel pins, fiery pastors and ex-Weather Undergrounders, even after the candidate has addressed those issues multiple times, and then continue to dog the issue even after having examined his personal history, read his writings and listened to his speeches, then maybe you should arrive at a conclusion about whether you think he is an America hating terrorist sympathizer, show the evidence upon which that conclusion is based, and say so outright - or just shut up, move on, and address those things that are factual, real and important to the American people.
We've heard a lot lately about Hillary's "kitchen sink" strategy. We've been bombarded with images of her or her campaign surrogates tossing sinks at Obama. Some, to reinforce the magnitude of the situation, may describe the sink as still filled with pots, pans, dishes, etc. The problem is, the metaphor entirely incorrect and is being grossly misused.
The phrase actually has to do with including everything except the kitchen sink. This is based on the idea that since the sink is built-in to the plumbing and cabinetry, it is extremely difficult to include, and so is specifically and logically excluded. An example of proper usage would be: "When she left, she took everything but the kitchen sink."
Do you think the members of the MSM will ever understand that they are actually the real elitists and are the ones that are truly out of touch with the lives or ordinary Amercians and the mood in this country? Don't you suppose they read Frank Rich?
Thus did another overhyped 2008 story line go embarrassingly bust, like such predecessors as the death of the John McCain campaign and the organizational and financial invincibility of the Clinton political machine against a rookie senator from Illinois. Not the least of the reasons that the Beltway has gotten so much wrong this year is that it believes that 2008 is still 1988. It sees the country in its own image — static — instead of as a dynamic society whose culture and demographics are changing by the day.
In this one-size-fits-all analysis, Mr. Obama must be the new Dukakis, sure to be rejected by white guys easily manipulated by Lee Atwater-style campaigns exploiting race and class. But some voters who lived through 1988 have changed, and quite a few others are dead. In 2008, they are supplanted in part by an energized African-American electorate and the young voters of all economic strata who fueled the Obama movement that many pundits didn’t take seriously before Iowa. And that some still don’t. Cokie Roberts of ABC predicted in February that young voters probably won’t show up in November because “they never have before” and “they’ll be tired.”
However out of touch Mr. Obama is with “ordinary Americans,” many Americans, ordinary and not, have concluded that the talking heads blathering about blue-collar men, religion, guns and those incomprehensible “YouTube young people” are even more condescending and out of touch. When a Washington doyenne like Mary Matalin, freighted with jewelry, starts railing about elitists on “Meet the Press,” as she did last Sunday, it’s pure farce. It’s typical of the syndrome that the man who plays a raging populist on CNN, Lou Dobbs, dismissed Mr. Obama last week by saying “we don’t need another Ivy League-educated knucklehead.” Mr. Dobbs must know whereof he speaks, since he’s Harvard ’67.
