Over the past few weeks, the media has been overtly gushing over Sen. Barack Obama while continuing to slam Sen. Clinton on every little thing. Every single comment made by Clinton, her husband, or any surrogate, either live or in print, is overly analyzed and presented to the viewers in a context completely different than the original one. It seems that even the most positive comments made by the Clinton campaign get spun by the media to mean that the Clinton campaign is playing dirty and out-right lying.
The media can make a story out of nothing, but if they're going to twist one candidate's positions and words, they might as well be fair to others. And while there is no doubt that there are somethings that the Clinton campaign could have gone without saying, there are just the same number that the Obama campaign could have went without saying. Yet the media absolutely refuses to play fair. They refuse to look at and tell the viewers the obvious misstatements made by the Obama campaign. Indeed, over the last few weeks the Obama campaign has elevated its attacks on Sen. Clinton, while the Clinton campaign has reduced its attacks on him. If you remember, the media was all over Clinton's attacks on Obama, and they portrayed Clinton in an extremely negative light. Here are some of those attacks and why the are simply factually incorrect.
1. Barack Obama sent out this mailer to people attacking Clinton on healthcare, looking eerily similar to the Harry and Louise ads that Republicans used to defeat universal healthcare in '94.
In this mailer, Obama suggests that if you can't afford healthcare, Clinton's universal healthcare proposal would force people to buy it anyway. This is simply not true. If an individual can not afford healthcare, that person will receive subsidies that will allow that person to afford it. Kevin Thorpe, an independent health-policy expert, says that under Hillary's plan, every person will be able to easily afford healthcare. In fact, Hillary's plan arguably cuts costs even more than Obama's because her plan contains more generous subsidies. Again, it's only fair to point out that Obama's plan is not universal, 15 million people would be left out. Voluntarily leaving 15 million out actually increases costs rather dramatically because everyone else would have to (unfairly) subsidize emergency care for the uninsured, who could afford to be insured, but refuse to be.
2. Barack Obama continually says that Hillary embraces "the Bush-Cheney policy of not talking to leaders we do not like". This is a complete and utter mischaracterization of Hillary's position.
Sen. Clinton has always said that she supports, "very vigorous diplomacy". Obama, when making this comment, is referring to a debate where the question was asked about meeting with various dictators "without preconditions". Sen. Obama definitively answered yes. Sen. Clinton said that she would be willing to meet with any and all world leaders, but not without preconditions. Sen. Clinton said that she would want pre-conditions because "it is not that you promise a meeting at that high a level before you know what the intentions are...I don't want to make a situation even worse." On contrary, the Bush-Cheney policy is simply not meeting in any way, shape, or form with "leaders we do not like". Clinton is willing to and wants to meet with those people, but she also wants the proper groundwork to be laid first.
3. Sen. Obama's flip-flop on gun-control.
Okay, so maybe this isn't an attack against Clinton, but it is an obvious flip-flip on the part of Obama on a key issue---guns. Everyone knows that if Clinton made contradictory statements like this, the media would beat her up on it non-stop. But the media seems to magically miss it when Obama flip-flops.
When Obama appeared before an Idaho audience on February 2, he told the crowd that he has always supported gun rights and that he doesn't believe in "taking away folks' guns". But previously, when campaigning for office in liberal Illinois, compared to conservative Idaho, Obama said that he, "supported banning the manufacture, sale, and possession of handguns".
4. Sen. Obama constantly misrepresents Hillary's position on Iran saying she agrees with George Bush and goes along with him.
Sen. Clinton spoke out against saber rattling with Iran long before Obama and others did. Back in February 2007, Clinton made a floor speech in the Senate declaring that Bush must get Congressional authorization before taking any action against Iran. In October, Clinton also co-sponsored a bill with Sen. Jim Webb that prohibits the use of force against Iran without Congressional consent. Did Obama co-sponsor that bill? Nope. And the bill that called for "fierce diplomacy" against Iran, which Obama now characterizes as essentially a vote for war, was missed by Obama because he was too busy campaigning. To make Obama's argument against that bill even weaker, Sen. Dick Durbin, a long time anti-war, Bush critic, and Obama supporter also voted for that resolution. I don't hear Obama calling out his good old friend for that vote, although he has no problem criticizing Hillary for the same one.
5. During his speech last night, instead of giving an inspirational, up-lifting address to his supporters, Obama began laundry-listing false attacks on Sen. Clinton. Among his claims was that he has never taken money from lobbyists. Again, not true.
Until Obama began running for President and it became the popular thing to do, Obama willingly took money from federal lobbyists, as well as state lobbyists when he was in the Illinois state senate. Obama also has several lobbyists in high positions in his campaign.
"For that is how most of my colleagues, Republican and Democrat, enter the Senate…their words distorted, and their motives questioned."
The above is a quote from Sen. Obama in his book The Audacity of Hope. It would do Sen. Obama and the nation a great deal of good if he (and all politicians) lived by those words. Unfortunately, Sen. Obama has, as of late, distorted Sen. Clinton's words and unfairly questioned her motives. Obama has indeed been audacious, but far from hopeful.
