***Distortions in the KO "Special Comment" Tonight: Say It Ain't So, KO!*****

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Forum Name General Discussion: Primaries
Topic subject Distortions in the KO "Special Comment" Tonight: Say It Ain't So, KO!
Topic URL http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x5053063#5053063
5053063, Distortions in the KO "Special Comment" Tonight: Say It Ain't So, KO!
Posted by McCamy Taylor on Wed Mar-12-08 11:22 PM

Go on. Hate me. Call me names. I just finished a four part journal about the "The Press v. Hillary Clinton" and today I finished collecting 60 pages of notes for "The Press v. Barack Obama". In the latter, a disturbing trend has become clear. For fourteen solid months, right wing sites like Drudge, Insight and others have spewed lies about Obama being Muslim and assorted other charges and every time they do it they say that Hillary made them do it. . Worse, some drunkard right wing liar like Bob Novak always announces before hand that Hillary is going to unleash dirt on Obama. As if the Clinton campaign would tell Novak and then spread dirt in Moonie rags and Drudge and make sure to put their name on it. And when it happens, the MSM prints and televises a solid weeks worth of stories (or sometimes two or three or four) asking "Is Obama really a Muslim?" As to the second question, that isn't a question at all. The MSM just nods its head and says "Of course, Hillary did it. We hate her. We know a bitch like her must have done it."

Imagine finding story cycles like this over and over again over the course of two days as you are researching the media smears against a major Democratic presidential candidate. And then imagine that you turn on the television and hear Keith Olbermann, the man who has been a media watchdog, correcting people like O'Reilly and Beck and Savage when they play fast and loose with the truth---imagine that you hear him repeating the same media distortions that a mainstream internet site like Media Matters has already debunked.

It might get you a little bit frazzled, too. It might make you wonder if KO needs to make up his mind which it will be---sports or politics.

When he hosted Lawrence O'Donnell a few days after the infamous Huffington Post article "John Edwards is a loser" I thought has he lost his mind? No, it turns out that KO does not keep up with left wing political news. Too bad. His Special Comment tonight revealed that.

Here were his three "charges" against the Clintons (and yes, I heard that great big string of qualifiers he attached to them. They don't count. A rose is a rose is a rose and a charge is a charge when you are making an impassioned, vitriol filled rant):

1. Hillary equivocated in her 60 Minutes answer to the question "Is Obama a Muslim?" This particular rumor was started by Drudge. Drudge took her comments after the second time she was asked the question (as in Defend your comment ) and made it a stand alone answer knowing that out of context it had a different implication. This allowed the press to enter yet another of their festivals of discussing Obama's possible Muslim associations and Hillary's definite (in their eyes) bitchiness.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200803030004

There is a link so you can watch Hillary on 60 Minutes

On March 3, the Drudge Report linked to online news portal Breitbart.tv video footage from the March 2 edition of CBS' 60 Minutes under the headline "Hillary: Obama Not Muslim 'As Far As I Know' ... ," falsely suggesting that Sen. Hillary Clinton characterized the issue of Sen. Barack Obama's religion as unresolved. In fact, she did the opposite. Correspondent Steve Kroft first asked Clinton, "You don't believe that Senator Obama is a Muslim?" to which Clinton replied, "Of course not. I mean, that's -- you know, there is no basis for that. You know, I take him on the basis of what he says. And, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that." Kroft then asked, "And you said you'd take Senator Obama at his word that he's not a Muslim," to which Clinton replied, "Right. Right." Only after Kroft went on to ask, "You don't believe that he's a Muslim or implying, right?," did Clinton respond, "No. No. Why would I? No, there is nothing to base that on, as far as I know" .

Following Clinton's response to Kroft's third query on the subject, Kroft said, "It's just scurrilous --" to which Clinton responded, "Look, I have been the target of so many ridiculous rumors. I have a great deal of sympathy for anybody who gets, you know, smeared with the kind of rumors that go on all the time."On March 3, the Drudge Report linked to online news portal Breitbart.tv video footage from the March 2 edition of CBS' 60 Minutes under the headline "Hillary: Obama Not Muslim 'As Far As I Know' ... ," falsely suggesting that Sen. Hillary Clinton characterized the issue of Sen. Barack Obama's religion as unresolved. In fact, she did the opposite. Correspondent Steve Kroft first asked Clinton, "You don't believe that Senator Obama is a Muslim?" to which Clinton replied, "Of course not. I mean, that's -- you know, there is no basis for that. You know, I take him on the basis of what he says. And, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that." Kroft then asked, "And you said you'd take Senator Obama at his word that he's not a Muslim," to which Clinton replied, "Right. Right." Only after Kroft went on to ask, "You don't believe that he's a Muslim or implying, right?," did Clinton respond, "No. No. Why would I? No, there is nothing to base that on, as far as I know" .

Following Clinton's response to Kroft's third query on the subject, Kroft said, "It's just scurrilous --" to which Clinton responded, "Look, I have been the target of so many ridiculous rumors. I have a great deal of sympathy for anybody who gets, you know, smeared with the kind of rumors that go on all the time."


Now, I realize that some people at DU are currently of the opinion that "as far as I know" is the new slang for "yes", but I find it hard to believe that KO is one of them. If he can honestly say that he watched the video and watched Hillary's body language, the defensive way that she says the words, the slight squaring of the jaw, eyes opening slightly and staring straight forwards, as if to say "It's my opinion and it's all I have but it should be good enough"--if he can say that she was trying to give a nudge, nudge, wink, wink "yes" then I suggest that he never play poker with Chris Matthews. Because he is no judge of people and he will lose his shirt.

2. The 3 am ad was racist. Give me a break.That ad exploited fear. It exploited the fact that Hillary looks like good old reliable mom or grandma and Obama looks young. It was ageism, maybe , but not racism. She could have done the same ad with an opponent who was a young Asian woman or a young White man. She could not have done the same ad against Colin Powell. KO ought to be ashamed of himself. Some one told him that ad was racist. He did not think that one up himself.

3. Bill Clinton and Jesse Jackson and South Carolina. The problem with that one is that Bill Clinton was yanked off the Hillary Clinton campaign trail right after South Carolina. So, she did do something about it. She put the Big Dog back in the porch.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/02/27/hillary-clinton-campaign-_n_88670.html

If KO paid more attention to politics he might have noticed that. He also might have noticed what Jackson himself advised doing about the matter.

http://www.essence.com/essence/lifestyle/voices/0,16109,1706948,00.html

Essence.com: Did you hear President Clinton’s comment yesterday in Columbia, South Carolina, after someone asked about it taking two Clintons to beat Obama, and he answered, “Jesse Jackson won South Carolina in ’84 and ‘88. Jackson ran a good campaign. And Obama ran a good campaign here.” Many people are taking that as President Clinton’s attempt to tie Obama to you or to inject race back into the discussion.

J.J: We are tied together. Barack is the result of all the struggles, from Selma to South Carolina. They are factors in his ascendancy, which is accurate. Again, I think it’s some more gotcha politics. I did win in ’84 and ’88, and because we ran in ’84, the Democrats regained the Senate in ’86. I just think that we’ve got to be very sensitive to what I call gotcha politics and not take the attention away from student loans? The reason I keep going back to that is, kids are going to college now graduating with these $60,000 debts. You know?


Jesse Jackson is the grownup here. How I wish that he could be our president. And maybe get a prime time TV show from MSNBC. He would not talk about the latest "gotcha" du jour, stupid photos of candidates in turbans that right wing sites just swear were given to them by candidates whom they routinely refer to as lesbian bitch-witches. He is the one who knows that if we do not stand together we will die together (Caesar Chavez). All this tit for tat is tearing the Democrats apart the way it did in 1972---which is why the right wing smear machine keeps following the Pat Buchanan 1972 CREEPy play book. And dirty trick number one is (people who pay attention to politics rather than sports know this one without looking)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/watergate/stories/buchananmemo.htm

The preparation of attacks on one Democrat by another


Luckily, while KO was rewriting history tonight, Hillary was making history, by issuing her first apology.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080313/ap_on_el_pr/clinton_s_apologies

WASHINGTON - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton did something Wednesday night that she almost never does. She apologized. And once she started, she didn't seem able to stop.

snip

Her biggest apology came in response to a question about comments by her husband, Bill Clinton, after the South Carolina primary, which Obama won handily. Bill Clinton said Jesse Jackson also won South Carolina when he ran for president in 1984 and 1988, a comment many viewed as belittling Obama's success.

"I want to put that in context. You know I am sorry if anyone was offended. It was certainly not meant in any way to be offensive," Hillary Clinton said. "We can be proud of both Jesse Jackson and Senator Obama."

"Anyone who has followed my husband's public life or my public life know very well where we have stood and what we have stood for and who we have stood with," she said, acknowledging that whoever wins the nomination will have to heal the wounds of a bruising, historic contest.

"Once one of us has the nomination there will be a great effort to unify the Democratic party and we will do so, because, remember I have a lot of supporters who have voted for me in very large numbers and I would expect them to support Senator Obama if he were the nominee," she said.

snips

Of Ferraro's comment, Hillary Clinton told her audience: "I certainly do repudiate it and I regret deeply that it was said. Obviously she doesn't speak for the campaign, she doesn't speak for any of my positions, and she has resigned from being a member of my very large finance committee."


I think maybe there is a reason that Obama and Hillary are running for president and some of their supporters (like KO) are not. Obama and Hillary are the grown ups.

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1. transcrpt hree

Its already on Keith's site on MSNBC

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3096434 /