Obama: Opponents trying to weaken my support in Jewish community

[oberliner]

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama said Monday that there is a "constant virulent campaign" being waged against him as he strives to win the party's nomination, aimed particularly at weakening support for him from within the Jewish community.

Obama told Haaretz and writers from several Jewish-American newspapers that the campaign against him - calling him Muslim and accusing him of not pledging allegiance to the United States - is especially visible in the Jewish community.

The presidential hopeful said he would ordinarily ignore such comments, but he fears that they have been "getting some traction" and are being tuned into by public ears.

Thus he said, he has asked the Jewish newspapers and Haaretz to use their "megaphone" so people can hear "from the horse's mouth" that all such accusations against him are unfounded.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/948960.html

[rodeodance]

1. is this for real??

[Tellurian]

54. Wow, that didn't take long...someone keep a list of his complaints..

what does he think he is...a hotel guest?

[1corona4u]

2. What a fricken cry baby....

sheesh....

[SammyWinstonJack]

39. No kidding!

[Bluebear]

3. Obama certainly seems to think a lot of folks are out to "get" him

[Tellurian]

55. If it worked once... why not try it again?

does Obama realize, he's in a campaign?

[Bluebear]

4. Wait, he is requesting a foreign newspaper (Haaretz) use their "megaphone" re: an American election?

[rodeodance]

9. I was so taken back when I read this that at first I thought it wasn ONION piece .

[oberliner]

10. It appears to have been part of a conference call with a variety of Jewish publications

Some based on the US, some in Israel. All read to varying degrees by members of the American Jewish community.

More info from the Washington Post:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/thefix/2008/01/obama_rebuts_muslim_falsehood.html?nav=rss_blog

[niceypoo]

5. More of the Victim Card from Mr Hope

The dude really needs to grow a spine...

When was the last time Obama talked about policy? Everything he says anymore is a reaction to some percieved persecution.

[sunonmars]

8. god why doesnt he run home to Michelle and tell on the big boys picking on him

[NastyRiffraff]

6. Headline is misleading

"Opponents" sound like Clinton and Edwards, and there was no indication in the article that one or both were behind this.

And yes, calling him a Muslim and not pledging allegiance is reprehensible, but from what I can see, it's the newspapers that did that without the help or support of Edwards or Clinton.

[robbedvoter]

13. Correction: Mommy! Clenis is doing it again!

[oberliner]

17. The opponents in question are not Clinton and Edwards

But I do think it is a problem that these lies about his background are being put out there.

[jasmine621]

7. He is inferring that HC campaign is behind the circulating e-mails

without any facts and any proof. Once his sentiments circulate, it becomes gospel as the MSM will repeat his allegations over and over until most people will believe that is Clinton "dirty" tricks. Hillary needs to get out in front and speak to the voters stratigt up about this ugly rumor.

[rodeodance]

18. he is planting the seeds against Sen. Clinton--very ROVIAN OF HIM

[robbedvoter]

11. Playing victim and gaining sympathy for it = official campaign strategy:

http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/01/obama_and_clinton_to_clintons.php
Advisers believe that the more the Clintons poke at Obama, the more sympathetic he becomes, and the more she plays into his contention that she's a divisive, polarizing figure; Obama's polling shows and his campaign's strategists sense that it reminds Democrats in the interior of the country of the Clinton of yore: cold, unlikable, sarcastic -- and coastal. In states like Arizona, Kansas and Idaho and Missouri, Clinton will scare off independents and will lose support among younger women, in particular.

[Cronus Protagonist]

12. I love The Onion n/t

[oberliner]

15. This article is not satire

I think those ridiculous claims about Obama's background are being put out there quite aggressively. By whom, I have no idea.

[Cronus Protagonist]

26. I still love The Onion even although it's not as good as this n/t

[shayes51]

14. Is he paranoid?

[Tulkas]

19. Muslim E-Mails.... come on.. no not paranoid, this would weaken support among jewish voters

[Scurrilous]

16. Obama targeted in smear campaign (01.13.08)

In chain e-mail being circulated across US and Israel, Democratic presidential candidate portrayed as radical Muslim trying to help al-Qaeda take over US

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3493689,00.html

<snip>

"Illinois Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has been targeted in a recent smear campaign which claims that he is a fundamentalist Muslim working for al-Qaeda in an effort to topple the US government.

An inflammatory mass e-mail that is circulating in the United States and Israel lays out the anonymous author's version of Obama's background.

One of the target audiences in the campaign is clearly the American Jewish community because the e-mail has also been sent out in Hebrew.

The writer attempts to portray Obama as an al-Qaeda stooge rhetorically asking: "So who is Barack Obama?"



Jewish groups condemn attacks on Obama (01.16.08)

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3494849,00.html


Leaders of US Jewish organizations issue joint letter slamming email distributed recently in English and Hebrew depicting Democratic presidential candidate as Muslim pretending to be a Christian and working for al-Qaeda

<snip>

"Leaders of the Jewish organizations in the United States issued a joint letter Tuesday night condemning the email being distributed both in Hebrew and in English attacking Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

In the email, Obama is depicted as a Muslim pretending to be a Christian and seeking to take over the White House and handing it over to the control of al-Qaeda.

In an open letter to the Jewish community, the leaders said that they would not endorse or oppose any candidate for president, but felt compelled to speak out against "certain rhetoric and tactics in the current campaign that we find particularly abhorrent".

"Of particular concern, over the past several weeks, many in our community have received hateful emails that use falsehood and innuendo to mischaracterize Senator Barack Obama's religious beliefs and who he is as a person."

[robbedvoter]

24. Does he remember there's a GOP out there, or he thinks it'll be primaries forever?

Sheesh!

[Beacool]

20. Oh, here we go again!!!!

They're ALL against me, I tell you!!! It's a conspiracy!!!!

Hey buddy, it's an ELECTION, we are not choosing the next prom king.......

[Kucinich4America]

21. There was a troll thread on this board last night attempting to do exactly that

playing up alleged tensions between Blacks and Jews. And some other low post count Hillbot chimed in with some whiny ass crap about Obama "supporting Palestinians".

As neither a Hillary or Obama supporter, all I could do was order the Kosher Pizza Delivery and watch the circus.

It eventually was locked, but you can read it for your own amusement here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x4242305

[rodeodance]

29. Obama took his campaign into his own hands and summoned representatives of the Jewish community for

On Monday, Obama took his campaign into his own hands and summoned representatives of the Jewish community for a long conversation, to remind them of his many Jewish supporters - particularly from his home state of Illinois - and of his abhorrence for any display of anti-Semitism.

He also reminded the representatives - Jewish-American correspondents and this Haaretz correspondent - of his speech on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, in which he called on African-Americans to shake off the anti-Semitic sentiment prevailing within their community.

He also took the chance to distance himself - again - from the radical anti-Semitic black activist Louis Farrakhan, who was lauded by the head of Obama's church last year as being a man who "truly epitomized greatness" and awarded the Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. Trumpeter Award.

In Obama's words, the decision of his church leader, Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., to bestow that honor on Farrakhan was a "mistake of judgement."

[BeyondGeography]

22. Look at all the haters feigning ignorance about what Obama deals with all the time

or maybe they just ARE ignorant:

Obama fighting false e-mail rumors in South Carolina

Some voters say they are not sure of candidate's faith

PATRICK, S.C. - Barack Obama has proclaimed his Christianity on national television. His campaign has sent out mailers that show him praying and declare him a "Committed Christian" to refute false e-mail chain letters that claim Obama is a Muslim.

"You get one of those e-mails, don't believe it," Obama told more than 1,800 people at North Charleston High School on Thursday. "I've been a member of the same church for 20 years, and I praise an awesome God."

But in interviews in several rural South Carolina communities this week, a number of voters said they believed that Obama is, or was at one time, a Muslim, and some said it could influence their votes.

"He's acknowledged he was raised up Muslim, he says now he's changed," said Glenn McLain, 72, who owns a car lot and body shop in Patrick, a tiny town northeast of Columbia, S.C. "With ties like that, I don't think it would be good for our country."

McLain said he heard Obama had grown up Muslim on television, but he could not be more specific about when or on what program. McLain, who said he would probably vote for John Edwards, said he would not consider voting for Obama mainly because he is inexperienced, but also partly because of his religious beliefs.

Jackie Blanton, 78, a retired schoolteacher who lives in Gaffney, said she had heard Obama would not take his oath of office as a new senator in the traditional way.

"He did not want to use the Holy Bible, he wanted to use the Koran, and I resent that," she said.

Like McLain, Blanton, a longtime Edwards supporter, said her objection to Obama mostly had to do with his lack of experience, but she said she was also disturbed by the rumor she had heard.

A widely circulated chain e-mail falsely accuses Obama of secretly being a "radical Muslim," claiming that he attended a Wahhabist school while growing up in Indonesia, and that he took his oath of office on the Koran.

"The Muslims have said they plan on destroying the US from the inside out - what better way to start than at the highest level, with the President of the United States, one of their own!!!!" the e-mail says.

Obama is a member of the United Church of Christ. His Kenyan paternal grandfather and Indonesian stepfather were Muslim, but he attended secular and Catholic schools and was never a practicing Muslim.

But getting that message across has been difficult for his campaign in South Carolina, even after he said he was a Christian in a nationally televised debate in Las Vegas last week, in response to a question about the e-mails.

Mike Putnam, 60, a retired entrepreneur from Shelby, said he remained uncertain about Obama's religion.

"The only thing I can stand here and tell you tonight is I have heard he's a Muslim, and I heard him say on TV the other night he was a Christian," he said. "How do I know? I haven't done a background check on him for his religion."

Not all voters who received the e-mails assumed they were factual. Donna Caskey, a 61-year-old retired schoolteacher from Lancaster who is leaning toward voting for Edwards, said that when she received one from a friend, she turned to the Internet to figure out whether it was true.

"I did a lot of research, and that is such bunk," she said. She said sent her research to the friend who sent her the e-mail in hopes of helping to stop the spread of lies. "We do have a lot of people in our state, bless their darling hearts, they're gullible."

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/01/26/obama_fighting_false_e_mail_rumors_in_south_carolina/

[Proud2BAmurkin]

23. wow calling Jewish voters gullible?

[rodeodance]

25. Recall that Obama has issued recent statements in support of Israel of late--one

was to the UN to condemm the rockets. That was the day the gaza people broke down the wall and went into egypt--a humanitarian crisis.

[tandot]

27. How long will it take the media to blame the Clintons for that?

I can just hear Tweety claiming that "Bill is trying to take away Jewish voters from Obama..."

:eyes:

[jannyk]

28. WTF is he going to do if he has to take on Reublicans? They'll

eat him alive!!!

[SammyWinstonJack]

40. Yep!

[Bjorn Against]

30. This is not a good message for Obama to be putting out.

While I find the attacks on Obama for supposedly being Muslim despicable and bigoted, he really should not try to bring the Jewish community into this. To suggest that calling him a Muslim hurts him especially badly among Jews is to suggest that Jews are bigoted against Muslims, and that is most certainly not the message he should be putting out. Many Jews are not in the slightest bit anti-Islam, and most of the people in the US who are bigoted against Muslims are not Jewish.

I condemn every person who tries to falsely attack Obama as being a Muslim, every last one of them is a bigot. Period. But for Obama to try to bring the Jewish community into this is at the very least poor judgment, and that is putting it nicely. This has nothing to do with the Jewish community and it is wrong to drag them into this.

[rodeodance]

31. Umm.. look at this--

......Still, after domesticating a big fish like the Kennedy family, Obama is working hard to give the same treatment to smaller fish.

One of his biggest Jewish supporters, Lee Rosenberg, was sent on Obama's behalf to the former Israeli ambassador Danny Ayalon to find out why the latter wrote an article slamming the presidential hopeful - an article which raised hell in the Israeli diplomatic circles.

Rosenberg is a member of AIPAC's board of governors, and his support of Obama is the candidate's ultimate ammunition against whoever tries to question his pro-Israel sentiments.

While Ayalon said he had been misquoted, he nonetheless maintains that Obama's inexperience in foreign affairs is a problem. Rosenberg urged him to become more familiar with the candidate and his history, and said he's happy to send him information. Ayalon said he was under the impression that there were no hard feelings

[Bjorn Against]

35. What does that have to do with what I wrote?

[robbedvoter]

50. Absolutely nothing. You did make an excellent point. It's offensive.

[rodeodance]

42. maybe nothing. don't know what I was thinking at the time. sorry.

..I condemn every person who tries to falsely attack Obama as being a Muslim, every last one of them is a bigot. Period. But for Obama to try to bring the Jewish community into this is at the very least poor judgment, and that is putting it nicely. This has nothing to do with the Jewish community and it is wrong to drag them into this.

[zalinda]

32. Damn what a cry baby

He complains that there is a campaign against him, and yet he has had the most positive press coverage of any of the candidates. He's acting like this Presidency should be belongs to him.

Compare that to Edwards, who is virtually ignored by the press, with a blurb about him here and there. Yes, Edwards did mention it to the press, but did not say that there was a group behind it. And, what mention has there been from the Edwards camp about the robo calls in SC against him. Nothing. No, he's an adult and knows that campaigns can be rough. I guess Obama didn't get the message.

zalinda

[in_cog_ni_to]

33. I really wish people would quit picking on Barack.

:eyes: Poor thing.

How long has this email been floating around? If people don't know it's a lie by now, they're living with their heads buried in the sand.

[OzarkDem]

34. If true, its shameful

That would be a real disappointment if the Jewish community was trying to exploit the "Muslim" meme. I support Edwards, but this kind of thing is really bad.

[Kucinich4America]

36. Apparently, mere "support" of Israel is not enough for AIPAC

They only want candidates who are willing to do for the Likud what Monica did for Bill.

[OzarkDem]

37. They are reprehensible

a nasty, destructive group of religious extremists who want me to pay for their war.

[Bjorn Against]

38. The Jewish community is not exploiting anything.

There may be individuals within the community that exploit it(just as there are individuals in many other communities exploiting it) but the Jewish community as a whole is most certainly not exploiting anything. This is why I think it was extremely dumb for Obama to make such a statement, because it makes implications about an entire community and it can cause a great deal of harm.

[Kucinich4America]

43. I don't see anything there that suggests Obama is accusing the Jewish community as a whole.

Rather he is asking mainstream Jewish and Israeli media to debunk the false information TO the wider Jewish community. In the case of Israel, Haaretz might be the only shot he has at fair media, as the other major paper, The Jerusalem Post is a complete tool of the Likudist propaganda machine.

[Bjorn Against]

46. I never claimed Obama was accusing the Jewish community as a whole of anything.

But his words imply something about the Jewish community that is not positive. The post I responded to suggested that the Jewish community was exploiting this, and that is exactly the kind of response I was worried we would see when Obama made that comment. I don't think Obama meant his words to make negative implications about an entire community, I think he meant them to benefit his campaign and help discredit some of the lies that have been spread about him. Make no mistake, I realize that the attacks against Obama for supposedly being a Muslim are lies, and the people spreading those lies are bigots. My problem is that Obama is drawing the Jewish community into something they were not responsible for, and doing this could end up provoking even more bigotry. I don't think that is what Obama intended, but he needs to think about what his words imply about the community before he speaks.

[rodeodance]

44. Yes, but obama will do anything to win

[kurth]

41. The whining WILL continue until 100% UNITY is achieved

If you're not an Obama worshipper, then you're retarded, evil and/or racist.

[BenDavid]

45. I'm a Jew and I'm liberal and yo ass has not convinced me

that you are worthy, Mr. Obama.....

[Metric System]

47. How long until this gets turned into the Clinton camp trying to pit the Jewish and

African-American communities against one another for political gain? Just as they tried to pit blacks against whites, and Latinos against blacks. :eyes:

Edit: Looking at the comments section of WaPo it's clear the Obamaniacs are already blaming the Clinton camp. Example:

"Its always been a part the Clinton underground campaign to paint Obama as a black muslim(remember Bob Kerry's remarks)like louis Farraghan. The Clinton smear team played it effectively in Nevada with some the more less educated Latino's."

I think we're all being played- by the Obama camp.

[robbedvoter]

52. Yup. Like there aren't GOP-ers ready to pounce, their arsenal ready

Conason once listed in an article the GOP arsenal. He was attacked as a hill shill (he wrote recently that the candidate who inspired him wasn't running - and has no candidate in this)
Obama & supporters would be well advised to look at Conason's article and remember that there are different levels of opponents out there.
It's very disturbing that every RW dirty trick out there kills 2 birds with a stone because this refusal to look past the primary.

[krabigirl]

48. lol zzzzzzzzzz

[ErnestoG]

49. There's a surprise.

I'm waiting any day for a doctored photo to surface, showing Obama in an SS uniform and inspecting Belsen in 1940.

[calico1]

51. Obama better toughen

up and grow some thick skin because if he ends up being the nominee, cry baby tactics aren't going to do it for him.

[eridani]

53. AIPAC does NOT = "the Jewish community" n/t