"The Wheels On The Bus Go Round and Round ..."

(Editor's Note: Peeling off a quick one here ... To follow-up, some complications with the Aunt in the hospital, and, likely, a procedure will be needed tomorrow, to correct the problem ... At least, hopefully, that will be the case - the other option is surgery)

Quick, someone update the Rodney Dangerfield line;

"Hey ... I went to a political campaign the other day ... And a bus caravan broke out ..."

So many bodies under buses lately.

Are we, have we, slipped down to being some backwater banana republic, where the candidate that promises to have the buses run on time (with or without bodies under them) will be the winner?

I think you only need one, or two, more to have a quorum.

And the big question, will this be a new metric for the Clinton Campaign, that they threw more (or less, if you want to base it on golf) people under the bus then Obama, therefore, that makes Hillary the rightful, fit, nominee, ready to throw more people under the bus on Day One!

Question - If you have already been thrown under a bus, can you still, is it possible, to throw someone else under the bus, while you are still under it?

Following the Jeremiah "I Ought To Be In Pictures" Wright World Tour, it was the MSM meme that he threw Barack Obama under the bus.

This wasn't promulgated by the MSM with a tremendous amount of sympathy for Obama, mere reporting "just the facts".

And it wasn't until Obama's press conference yesterday, that the MSM could shift into their latest meme, the morphing of Obama, from, as you may remember, he entered this campaign with the question mark of "Is he black enough" ... That soon morphed, with a healthy push from the McCain-hugging, 3AM Bashing from Hillary Clinton, to "Is he experienced enough" ... And now, with the Obama denunciation of Wright yesterday, we have "Is he angry enough" in play.

Rather than note, and discuss, how Obama has taken a substantial problem (that is both political and personal), and not once, but twice now, handled it, took it straight on, looked it dead in the eyes, and articulated, with great eloquence, and simple language, what his position is, what his thoughts are, what he wants to do with it, what he will do with it.

Obama gave Wright back, in his press conference yesterday, and to paraphrase Wright, "You think you're going to come in here and throw my campaign under a bus ... You got another coming!"

And, from what I saw last yesterday afternoon, and evening, that wasn't the meme coming from the pundits.

It was "why did he wait so long" and "why didn't he do it sooner" and, as Margaret "Marcie" Carlson noted how he handled it, it was a "disaster".

Yeah, they're right, Obama should have handled last week ... Or., maybe two months ago ... No, back when he first decided to run for president ... Still late, he should have done it when he was in college ... No, perhaps back when he was a toddler, or, even, still, in the womb ...

And let's not forget how the MSM (and certainly the RWFS) will pile on now, with additional memes, of why did he join this church, why did he stay with this church, why did he even go to church ... Wright's rage will be painted on Obama directly, subtly, through smears and innuendo, perhaps prompting Obama to come up to the plate a third time on all of this ...

This should put a stake in the heart of "guilt by association" for Obama, but, likely it won't.

And don't you think, for a moment, that Hillary Clinton and her campaign, aren't retro-fitting those kitchen sinks to accommodate holding Obama, Wright, and a bus, or two, in them.

I'm hoping, that maybe, now with Obama's press conference yesterday, the natural order of the news business can be restored, and the week's mega story - Hannah Montana's Pin-Up Girl Photos - can finally land on the front page, and dominate cable news - and, of course, Brian Williams, on the NBC Nightly News.


Big, Roomy Bus Links

Andrew Sullivan: Obama Divorces Wright

Richard Blair: Delicate Flowers

Greg Sargent: Obama On Wright: "I Might Not Know Him As Well As I Thought"

Steven Benen: When Obama gets pissed

Errol Louis: Is Jeremiah Wright a colossal disaster for Barack Obama or a press trick?

Rush Calls Operation Chaos Pause

Wright's Right ...

If you didn't have a chance to catch the full program (and not just the press previews, endlessly played yesterday by the cable news pundits), head on over to Bill Moyers Journal, where you will see, clearly, how the Reverand Wright controversyis such an over-hyped, partisan, prejudiced bag of you-know-what.

Much of what Moyers and Rev. Wright discussed could have easily been a handful of break-out sessions, had it taken place the day of Obama's Race Speech.

Here's two passages, the full context, of what has been so hideously displayed in the video loops aimed at bashing Obama.

1. The God Damn America Brouhaha

REVEREND JEREMIAH WRIGHT: Where governments lie, God does not lie. Where governments change, God does not change. And I'm through now. But let me leave you with one more thing. Governments fail. The government in this text comprised of Caesar, Cornelius, Pontius Pilate - the Roman government failed. The British government used to rule from East to West. The British government had a Union Jack. She colonized Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria, Jamaica, Barbados, Trinidad and Hong Kong. Her navies ruled the seven seas all the way down to the tip of Argentina in the Falklands, but the British government failed. The Russian government failed. The Japanese government failed. The German government failed. And the United States of America government, when it came to treating her citizens of Indian descent fairly, she failed. She put them on reservations. When it came to treating her citizens of Japanese descent fairly, she failed. She put them in internment prison camps. When it came to treating citizens of African descent fairly, America failed. She put them in chains. The government put them on slave quarters, put them on auction blocks, put them in cotton fields, put them in inferior schools, put them in substandard housing, put them in scientific experiments, put them in the lowest paying jobs, put them outside the equal protection of the law, kept them out of their racist bastions of higher education and locked them into position of hopelessness and helplessness. The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law, and then wants us to sing God bless America? No, no, no. Not God bless America; God damn America! That's in the Bible, for killing innocent people. God damn America for treating her citizen as less than human. God damn America as long as she keeps trying to act like she is God and she is supreme!

2. The Chickens Come Home To Roost Brouhaha

REVEREND WRIGHT: Yes, I did. I was trying to show how people- how the anger- and we felt anger. I felt anger. I felt hurt. I felt pain. In fact, September 11th, I was in Newark. September 11th, I was trapped in Newark 'cause when they shut down the air system I couldn't get back to Chicago. September 11th, I looked out the window and saw the second plane hit from my hotel window. Alright, I had members who lost loved ones both at the Pentagon and at the World Trade Center. So, I know the pain. And I had to preach to them Sunday. I had to preach. They came to church wanting to know where is God in this. And so, I had to show them using that Psalm 137, how the people who were carried away into slavery were very angry, very bitter, moved and in their anger from wanting revenge against the armies that had carried them away to slavery, to the babies. That Psalm ends up sayin' "Let's kill the baby-let's bash their heads against the stone." So, now you move from revolt and revulsion as to what has happened to you, to you want revenge. You move from anger with the military to taking it out on the innocents. You wanna kill babies. That's what's going on in Psalm 137. And that's exactly where we are. We want revenge. They wanted revenge. God doesn't wanna leave you there, however. God wants redemption. God wants wholeness. And that's the context, the biblical context I used to try to get people sitting again, in that sanctuary on that Sunday following 9/11, who wanted to know where is God in this? What is God saying? What is God saying? Because I want revenge.

REVEREND WRIGHT: The people of faith have moved from the hatred of armed enemies, these soldiers who captured the king, those soldiers who slaughtered his son and put his eyes out, the soldiers who sacked the city, burned the towns, burned the temples, burned the towers, and moved from the hatred for armed enemies to the hatred of unarmed innocents, the babies, the babies . "Blessed are they who dash your baby's brains against a rock." And that my beloved is a dangerous place to be. Yet, that is where the people of faith are in 551 BC and that is where far too many people of faith are in 2001 AD. We have moved from the hatred of armed enemies to the hatred of unarmed innocents. We want revenge. We want paybacks and we don't care who gets hurt in the process.

I heard Ambassador Peck on an interview yesterday. Did anybody else see him or hear him? He was on Fox news. This is a white man and he was upsetting the Fox news commentators to no end. He pointed out. You see him John? A white man he pointed out -an Ambassador! He pointed out that what Malcolm X said when he got silenced by Elijah Mohammad was in fact true. America's chickens are coming home to roost! We took this country by terror away from the Sioux, the Apache, the Arawak, the Comanche, the Arapaho, the Navajo. Terrorism! We took Africans from their country to build our way of ease and kept them enslaved and living in fear. Terrorism! We bombed Grenada and killed innocent civilians, babies, non-military personnel. We bombed the black civilian community of Panama with stealth bombers and killed unarmed teenagers and toddlers, pregnant mothers and hard-working fathers. We bombed Gadafi's home and killed his child. "Blessed are they who bash your children's head against a rock!" We bombed Iraq. We killed unarmed civilians trying to make a living. We bombed a plant in Sudan to payback for the attack on our embassy. Killed hundreds of hard-working people; mothers and fathers who left home to go that day, not knowing that they would never get back home. We bombed Hiroshima! We bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye! Kids playing in the playground, mothers picking up children after school, civilians - not soldiers - people just trying to make it day by day. We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and Black South Africans, and now we are indignant? Because the stuff we have done overseas has now been brought back into our own front yards! America's chickens are coming home to roost! Violence begets violence. Hatred begets hatred and terrorism begets terrorism. A White Ambassador said that y'all not a Black Militant. Not a Reverend who preaches about racism. An Ambassador whose eyes are wide open, and who's trying to get us to wake up and move away from this dangerous precipice upon which we are now poised--

Peck's Bad Boy

The Ambassador Peck Rev. Wright refers to?

From Counterpunch, Oct 11, 2001;

"Why it is that all of these people hate us. It's not because of freedom. It's not because Britney Spears has a belly button or because we export hamburgers. They hate us because of things they see us doing to their part of the world that they definitely do not like."

And this;

Edward Peck, former US Ambassador to Iraq and deputy director of President Reagan's terrorism task force.
PECK: You have to understand now. Just like the colonel here, I'm a veteran of the armed forces. I have had two tours of active duty in the Army. And I don't take a back seat to anybody in terms of patriotism. This is the greatest nation that ever was and may be the greatest nation that ever will be. But that's my view, and it is not universally shared. So we have come out with 21 pages of proof that Osama bin Laden was involved. I have read that material. That's allegations. That's not proof. It's an entirely different thing. Proof of what it means to us. So, yes, he's not a nice guy, Saddam Hussein. But I think that the costs to our nation and its interests of taking him out are probably vastly exceeding anything we would gain by doing it.

You can also check out this: Meet The (White) Man Who Inspired Wright's Controversial Sermon

Hmmm ... I didn't see, in that Obama-bashing, Rev. Wright video loop, any footage of Ambassador Peck and his criticism ...Then again, as we know from the revelations last week, the Bush Grindhouse didn't put anyone on television that they didn't approve of, so, it's very likely Peck didn't make Rumsfeld's, and Torie Clarke's list, as to going out and selling the war.

And I chuckle when I think of the Right Wing Freakshow, and their flying monkeys (they're already up-in-arms over it, here and here), salivating at the prospects of a McCain-Obama final, so they can claw and bash Obama with Rev. Wright ... This from the people with Hagee, Robertson, Falwell, etc in their closets ...

Why let facts and context get in the way, when it's just as easy to make things up and smear people ... Play the Fear Card and you hook'em everytime ...

Oh, what a tangled web we weave ...

Links

Bill Moyers Journal

Transcript of Moyers-Wright Interview

Watch The Video

Obama Minister Wants To Nuke Small Towns!

Give it another day, or two, and we'll probably see this headline somewhere, the odds-on bet, on Faux News...

Or, the Right Wing Freakshow will serve this up, with extra, extra spicing, over the radio airwaves ...

A whole lot of panties bunched up last night, and today, (go to Memeorandum for a peek) over remarks made by Barack Obama last week, at a fundraiser in San Francisco

Here's what he said;

So, it depends on where you are, but I think it’s fair to say that the places where we are going to have to do the most work are the places where people are most cynical about government. The people are mis-appre…they’re misunderstanding why the demographics in our, in this contest have broken out as they are. Because everybody just ascribes it to ‘white working-class don’t wanna work — don’t wanna vote for the black guy.’ That’s…there were intimations of that in an article in the Sunday New York Times today - kind of implies that it’s sort of a race thing.

Here’s how it is: in a lot of these communities in big industrial states like Ohio and Pennsylvania, people have been beaten down so long. They feel so betrayed by government that when they hear a pitch that is premised on not being cynical about government, then a part of them just doesn’t buy it. And when it’s delivered by — it’s true that when it’s delivered by a 46-year-old black man named Barack Obama, then that adds another layer of skepticism.

But — so the questions you’re most likely to get about me, ‘Well, what is this guy going to do for me? What is the concrete thing?’ What they wanna hear is so we’ll give you talking points about what we’re proposing — to close tax loopholes, uh you know uh roll back the tax cuts for the top 1%, Obama’s gonna give tax breaks to uh middle-class folks and we’re gonna provide healthcare for every American.

But the truth is, is that, our challenge is to get people persuaded that we can make progress when there’s not evidence of that in their daily lives. You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

Um, now these are in some communities, you know. I think what you’ll find is, is that people of every background — there are gonna be a mix of people, you can go in the toughest neighborhoods, you know working-class lunch-pail folks, you’ll find Obama enthusiasts. And you can go into places where you think I’d be very strong and people will just be skeptical. The important thing is that you show up and you’re doing what you’re doing.

In a phrase, forever immortalized by our Vice President ... So!

Wait a minute! ...

OMG! ... He used the word "bitter", to describe the feeling people may have, from being screwed over for too many years ...

OMG! ... He criticized Guns and Religion, inferring that they both may be a problem, that both may be a screen, a mask, to front for other problems ... They both get in the way of dealing with other, more important issues, issues that effect the daily lives of people - in small towns - and in big cities.

It's one thing for the MSM to jump on this ... They have an agenda ...Gotta serve the Corporate Party Line ... They have to keep truth out of the news, better just to offer campaign fluff and pap, like MSNBC the other day, with Tweety (and, disappointingly, David Shuster) jumping up-and-down on Obama's back over orange juice.

Orange Juice!

We just had Petraeus and Crocker in Congress, continuing to sell Bush's Iraq War (and the new one, against Iran) and there was bombshell breaking news, on how all the big cheeses in the Bush Grindhouse met regularly to map out the Torture Program, all this on top of the bleak economics of the country and these lint-heads get all lathered up over orange juice.

Help Me Mister Wizard!

Then, of course, both Duck-and-Dodge Hillary "Sniper-Fire-Survivor" Clinton and Stumblin' Bumblin John "If You Knew Sunni, Like I Know Sunni" McCain have to jump all over Obama for his remarks, calling him elitist and out-of-touch.

Please ...

What's getting lost in the din, something that doesn't exactly fit the storyline for the MSM and Cable News nitwits, is Obama, pretty much, goes helmet-less and deals with adversity straight on ... He jumps on it, and, to the best of his strong abilities, doesn't let others pen the story, or, at minimum, speak for him.

There was the "Minister Problem", so Obama goes out and hits one of the park with his Race Speech...

Now we have everyone making hay with his San Francisco comments, and he fires back, right away, with this;

Obama Responds to McCain and Clinton attacks in Terre Haute; Barack responds to criticism from Hillary Clinton and John McCain, at a town hall meeting in Indiana




Pay close attention to this story ...

There's going to more people, feverishly working with paint-and-paint-brushes, on it, than at a Benjamin Moore convention ...

And, eventually, their work will have the canvas looking like "Obama Minister Wants To Nuke Small Towns!"

It's up to you, the good people of Pennsylvania... You're next in line, so you can stand there and inhale the paint ...

Or, wake up and smell the coffee ...


Bonus Small-and-Big-Town Links

Catherine Crier: Punished for the Truth

Ezra Klein: Obama Turns All Thomas Frank On Us

Jill/Brilliant at Breakfast: Why is anyone having the vapors over this?

Jeff Fecke/Shakesville: Barack Obama Hates You

Anonymous Liberal: Going Too Far

Andrew Sullivan: The Red-Blue Divide

"Oh ... THAT Conspiracy ..."

Or: Being Hillary Clinton

The Hillary Clinton run for the Presidency is getting stranger by the minute.

She seems determined to live up to the Samantha Powers-bestowed moniker of "monster".

I half expect it to burst open, that screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, and director Spike Jonze have teamed up again, and have been making a movie "Being Hillary Clinton".

Yes, I know the thought of that, of being "in there", inside Hillary's head, is thoroughly, skin-crawling, creepy, and that may offer some (certainly not all) explanation.

But they could keep the element of, when ejected from Hillary Clinton, you still get dumped off in New Jersey (or perhaps, they can tailor it to Hillary, and you are rudely exited in Arkansas).

When we posted last evening (see "Classic Clinton - Or: Hillary, Unwittingly, Cuts An Army Commercial"), we did note and link to the Pittsburgh Tribune Review, for Hillary's kitchen-sink-trashing of Obama, but it wasn't until watching the replay of 'Countdown, with Keith Olbermann' that our mathematics skills kicked back in, allowing a recovery and the ability to add up two-plus-two.

There it came out that the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review is owned by, none other than, Richard Mellon Scaife.

MISTER RIGHT-WING CONSPIRACY













Josh Marshall, from TPM, hits it good;

"This alone has to amount to some sort cosmic encounter like something out of a Wagner opera. Remember, this is the guy who spent millions of dollars puffing up wingnut fantasies about Hillary's having Vince Foster whacked and lots of other curdled and ugly nonsense. Scaife was the nerve center of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy. Those of us who spent years defending the Clintons from all that malarkey learned this point on day one."

And this, from Wikipedia;

"Regardless of his role, the project not only accused Clinton of financial and sexual indiscretions (some later verified, others not), but also gave root to hyperbolic conspiracist notions that the Clintons collaborated with the CIA to run a drug smuggling operation out of the town of Mena, Arkansas and that Clinton had arranged for the murder of White House aide Vince Foster as part of a cover-up of the Whitewater scandal."

I believe we can safely speculate that Barack Obama will not book himself on Sean Hannity's show this evening, to go tit-for-tat with Hillary, or phone into Rush Limbaugh, to make his case - again - about Reverend Wright.

And we really have to watch this, to see if there was a Quid Pro Quo for Hillary's sitdown with Scaife, if there was a deal made.

If we see something in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review, or should start hearing whispers, random postings or comments on some of the Dittohead, Freak Show blogs, that Reverend Jeremiah Wright killed Vince Foster - and Obama knew about but didn't say anything - we'll know why Hillary did the interview.

At least presently, even the Rightwing Freak Show is stunned by this.

In a recent Garlic Survey Poll, on Hillary's Campaign slogans (H/T to Barry Crimmins), the winner was "Keep Hopelessness Alive!".

Boy, does she ever look to be living up to that.

Word is out that Hillary is, or, is about to, employ the Tonya Harding Option.

We go from kitchen sinks to lead pipes.

Is this the new Clinton strategy, she's going to run the Elements Chart on Obama?

Will Bunch, of Attytood offers a "Being Hillary Clinton" view of that;

"I'm afraid that's really hitting the nail right on the kneecap. Of course with the Tonya Harding option, none of the Democrats wins and -- as Tapper notes -- John McCain becomes Oksana Baiul. Does this also mean that Hillary turns up later in celebrity boxing matches?"

Hmmm ... Hillary Clinton versus Tonya Harding ... Hillary can utilize her dash-and-dodge skills she honed in Bosnia, I suppose, to avoid being hit

But, I would bet it will never happen.

To many people would line up to kneecap both of them.


Bonus Being Hillary Clinton Riffs

Timothy Noah: Hillary's Rev. Wright - His name is Richard Mellon Scaife

NYT: Clinton Seeks to Soften Impact of Misstatement

A.J. Daulerio: Seriously, Regardless of How Many Bosnian Bullets She Did/Didn’t Dodge, Clinton Will Lose

A Tiny Revolution: Post Leaves Something Out About Richard Mellon Scaife

Greg Sargent/TPM Election Central: Hillary Finance Committee Member Compares Wright And David Duke, Says Obama "Used Race Where It Suited Him"

Classic Clinton (Or: Hillary, Unwittingly, Cuts An Army Commercial)

Somebody get this girl a clock.

She needs to be working later in the morning.

She busied herself, invested tons of time and money into the 3AM, I'm-Ready-On-Day-(Or Night)-One, Commercial (and, oh, how the tables turned on that one), when she had a better one in the can all along.

Establishing Shot

Large, U.S. Military Plane landing in Bosnia

Medium Shot

Hillary and Chelsea Clinton emerging from Military Plane, surrounded by soldiers, their weapons drawn, bending low as rifle and gun fire fly overhead.

Hillary and Chelsea run, in a zigzag pattern, bullets ricocheting off the ground near her, just a few feet away.

Hillary and Chelsea, panting with fear, as well as out-of-breath, reach the safety of a military hanger and taking off their coats, we see both wearing bullet-proof vests.

Cut to Hillary today, standing in front of large screen, replaying her zigzagging run, wearing her trademark school-bus-yellow pant suit.

Hillary (speaking directly into camera)

I'm Hillary Clinton, and I do more before 9AM than most candidates do all day

Cut .. Print ... It's a wrap

It's also a crock!

It may be the grand movie, the blockbuster, playing in her mind (or, perhaps, the voices are whispering it to her), but it isn't what went down.

You would have thought, with all the PR geniuses in her campaign, that someone would have told her not to tell deer-hunting stories (since the campaign is in Pennsylvania, we'll go in-theme), when there's videotape that she's never splashed on deer piss and sat for days in a tree.

Instead of "Be All You Can Be", Hillary opted for "Spin All You Can Spin".

From Greg Sargent, over on TPM Election Central;

“I certainly do remember that trip to Bosnia, and as Togo said, there was a saying around the White House that if a place was too small, too poor, or too dangerous, the president couldn’t go, so send the First Lady. That’s where we went. I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base.”

And she got caught - big time

Here's the CBS video that, whether they did this intentionally, or it's just how it played out, it be pretty funny, almost in the spirit of a Leonard Pinth Garnell riff.

CBS Exposes Hillary Clinton Bosnia Trip



And here's another take from Jedreport;

Coming soon to a superdelegate near you: Hillary in Tuzla.

It's an unbelievable tale of heroism, written and directed by Mark J. Penn.

The Baltimore Sun calls it a "whopper."

"Four Pinocchios!" says the Washington Post.

"Requires enormous suspension of disbelief" raves the Huffington Post

Hillary in Tuzla: The Tale of Bosnian Sniper Fire (TRAILER)

Now, being caught like a deer-in-the-headlights (PA Theme, again), we got the classic, and totally unbelievable, "I misspoke" line, before Camp Clinton locked itself down.

And, of course, the Obama Campaign weighed in on this tall tale.

"Rival Democrat Barack Obama's campaign quickly scoffed at the attempt to dismiss the fib, noting that the mistaken wording was included in the text of Clinton's speech"

So, what's a losing candidate, behind in almost every conceivable manner, caught in an embarrassing position that puts a spotlight on her credibility, to do?

If you're Hillary Clinton, first you add on to the "misspeak" thing, that you were "sleep-deprived", inferring the lack of slumber caused you to "misspeak".

Then, if you've been slapped around, as she has deservedly been, you PUNCH BACK, whipping out and serving up a fresh platter of Reverend Wright!

"Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, in a wide-ranging interview today with Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reporters and editors, said she would have left her church if her pastor made the sort of inflammatory remarks Sen. Barack Obama's former pastor made.

"He would not have been my pastor," Clinton said. "You don't choose your family, but you choose what church you want to attend."

And it hasn't gone unnoticed.

From Steve Benen, over on The Carpetbagger Report;

"This may sound cynical, but my guess is that media interest in Clinton’s debunked Bosnia story had become too great a distraction. The controversy (and damaging videos) undermined Clinton on two fronts — credibility and national security experience — both of which are of critical significance.

So, how better to change the subject that to revive the Jeremiah Wright story with brand new criticism?

Actually, considering what her husband said last week, it's, more-or-less, Classic Clinton, a 1-2-punch, two kitchen sinks being hurled in the direction of Obama.

Has Hillary Clinton ever been to Darfur?

I can hardly wait for the narration of that trip.

I suppose she can use the sniper/gunfire theme again, but, perhaps, we'll get something like she rolled up her sleeves and lugged sacks of food off the plane.

Heck, if we go down the line of all her travel, she'll have to claim, after she "misspeaks" on all those, that she was in a coma.

We can only offer one prediction out of all this;

I suspect some lonely intern is tucked away in the Clinton Campaign, culling through videotape and matching it up against her speeches this very evening.

While another one hunts down more Reverend Wright video and quotes.


Bonus Hillary Threshold Links

Joe Gandelman/The Moderate Voice: Clinton Admits She “Misspoke” On Bosnia And Enters Credibility Danger Zone

Washington Post: Candidate Watch - Hillary's Balkan Adventures, Part II

NYT The Caucus: Clinton ‘Misspoke’ About Bosnia Trip, Campaign Says

Pam's House Blend: Why padding your 3 AM-ready resume is a really bad idea

Josh Marshall/TPM: That's Not Wright

Top Ten Cloves: Things Hillary Clinton and Howard Wolfson Think Barack Obama Can Do To Pass National Security Threshold

Obama-Wright, Part II ... Some Perspective

Well, Well, Well ...

We could go on a diatribe, on the extra distance one candidate has to go, that the other candidates do not, even though that candidate addressed the issue - repeatedly, publically, and in his own words.

The big breaking news last evening was that Barack Obama is going to give a major address to this morning on race.

From Marc Ambinder, over on The Atlantic;

"He is expected to recount, in detail, how he came to know Rev. Wright, how he came to admire Rev. Wright, the history and meaning of the Trinity church, and address the controversial remarks attributed to Wright.

He is also worried that Wright and church will get caricatured unfairly.

Since everyone is paying attention to Obama and race, the basic thought, according to advisers, is why not give a big speech about... Obama and race."

Thankfully, Ambinder refrained, but others didn't, of alluding to Mitt Romney's big moment, his big speech on "Mormonism" (See The Garlic's Romney Speech: Where's Leonard Pinth Garnell When You Really Need Him?)

Make-up Mitt delivered a snoozer, and only mentioned the word "Mormon" once.

Little worry about Obama on that front.

He's been in the big show for a while now, and, be it his 2004 Convention speech, or out on the stump, he's shown he can hit the fastball.

While the MSM, and Cable News, seems to take glee, in showing the montage of video clips of Reverend Wright (and the Freakshow is having a field day with them), they are often, in most cases, presented out-of-context.

It isn't discussed why Rev. Wright is angry, or hostile, only that he is, and he is Barack Obama's guy, therefore, Obama must endorse what Rev. Wright is saying.

And stating, for three-or-four days that he doesn't, isn't enough, hence today's big Obama speech.

We looked around the World Wide Web, the blogosphere and found some good posts, to counterbalance, better yet, to, hopefully, enlighten, the single-prisim people.


Some Perspective

From Melissa McEwan's "I Recommend Not Holding Your Breath, Either", over on Shakesville;

"We know Obama's minister's name because he told us. And until we all grow up and decide we're really going to have a country with a genuine separation between church and state, and no religious litmus tests, we are going to have candidates introducing us to their religious mentors, and various other ways of trying to out-god each other. This would certainly be as good a time as any to revisit the wisdom of that habit and engage in a little self-reflection on whether it's actually helping our country in any discernible way."

The Anonymous Liberal;

"I always figured that if Barack Obama's presidential campaign took off, media attention would eventually focus on the Reverend Jeremiah Wright and some of his more colorful sermons. I was expecting it to be more of a general election, swiftboat type issue than an issue in the primaries, though. I guess I never really figured a Democratic rival would pursue an electoral strategy based on stirring up white resentment. A failure of the imagination I guess.

Conservative double standards are rarely as soul-crushingly obvious as this one. Hinderaker has no problem with Republican politicians associating themselves with (and indeed aggressively seeking the endorsement of) people like Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, John Hagee, and James Dobson, men who have track records of saying crazy, hate-filled things that Rev. Wright can't possibly compete with. Moreover, if we're looking for segments of society into which "irrationality has penetrated deeply," we need look no further than the conservative evangelical community which forms the base of the Republican party and to which Republican politicians endlessly pander."

And Dennis Perrin knocks one out of the park, hitting it dead-on, in his "Land of Chains";

"Amid all the righteous noise made about Rev. Jeremiah Wright, it was David Gergen on Anderson Cooper's show who made the most pertinent observation. The veteran GOP operative with bipartisan ties informed the audience that black America is having a different conversation than white America, so one cannot apply the CNN, Fox, or MSNBC framework to African-American concerns.

That it took a power broker like Gergen to make this obvious, important point further reveals how fixed our "national dialogue" remains. This of course allows all manner of patriotspeak to flow unimpeded, for there's nothing that the Liberal Media loves more than to prove its nationalist bonafides. After all, who do you think keeps the American flag lapel pin industry in the, er, black?"

With kitchen sinks coming at him from all directions now, I hope the Superdelegates and DNC are paying attention.


Bonus Links

Transcript of Obama’s Interview on “NewsHour”

Andrew Sullivan: The Testing Of Obama

Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes/TMV: Barack is Not White, Barack is Not Black” The Possible Gift in Being Bi-Racial

Kos: The Clinton civil war

Sticks and Stones Will Break My Bones ...

Obama's Turn ... On My Faith and My Church

We start the week with the two-headed monsters of Hillary and Geraldine "I'm Not A Racist" Ferraro, all but calling Barack Obama a lawn jockey, and then (Geraldine) getting all pissy about it, while Hillary took the time to have a cup of coffee, before kicking her off the bus (no, not throwing her, nor running her over).

Then, today (or was it yesterday) a dizzying array of video is played all over television news, like a Los Angeles freeway car chase, of Obama's "Pastor", Reverend Jeremiah Wright, in his greatest hits of over-the-top, lung-screeching, America-bashing sermons (or speeches) and, bang, everyone starts throwing kitchen sinks, toasters, blenders, stoves, you name it, at Obama.

(Check out Memeorandum either now, or between 5:00PM and 6:00PM this evening).

And, I believe it may have been two, possible three-seconds after the videos began airing, the cacophony of dwarfs, finks, phonies and frauds began demanding that Obama disavow, reject, denounce, and hit with either a cluster or nuclear bomb, the Rev. Wright.

And for every second that Obama didn't show up on national television, holding the bloody head of Rev. Wright, the calls got louder and louder.

Good thing the Junior Senator from Illinois is one cool cucumber.

For, before the round, nationwide, of 5PM newscasts, before the big network anchor guns went on air, Obama pens this, on The Huffington Post;

On My Faith and My Church

Second paragraph;

"Let me say at the outset that I vehemently disagree and strongly condemn the statements that have been the subject of this controversy. I categorically denounce any statement that disparages our great country or serves to divide us from our allies. I also believe that words that degrade individuals have no place in our public dialogue, whether it's on the campaign stump or in the pulpit. In sum, I reject outright the statements by Rev. Wright that are at issue."

Obama goes on to explain his coming to Rev. Wright, rightly fills in more of the picture of Rev. Wright (sorry nitwits, he doesn't just live inside those videos) - a former U.S. Marine, the charitable and giving work of his church, etc.

Then Obama closes down with;

"Let me repeat what I've said earlier. All of the statements that have been the subject of controversy are ones that I vehemently condemn. They in no way reflect my attitudes and directly contradict my profound love for this country.

With Rev. Wright's retirement and the ascension of my new pastor, Rev. Otis Moss, III, Michelle and I look forward to continuing a relationship with a church that has done so much good. And while Rev. Wright's statements have pained and angered me, I believe that Americans will judge me not on the basis of what someone else said, but on the basis of who I am and what I believe in; on my values, judgment and experience to be President of the United States."

Asked ... Answered ... Delivered.

Well, at least for today.

No doubt, the RNC/GOP, Freakshow and Dittoheads will chase him all the way into November with this stuff, which Obama acknowledged, in an interview with Keith Olbermann at 8:00PM (did we mention about Obama being too cool?)



Two different things, Ferraro and Rev. Wright, but, unfortunately for most of the country, they'll be pulling out their little scorecards, and checking off one in the Obama column.

Tit-for-Tat.

And it wouldn't surprise me if Hillary and her crew are reloading the kitchen sink, with burned CD's of the Reverend Wright video highlights, to hand out along the campaign trail for the next six-weeks in Pennsylvania

Or maybe Ferraro, exercising her First Amendment rights, will do it.


A Dump Truck of Links

MSNBC: Controversial minister leaves Obama campaign; Presidential candidate condemns words but not ministry of former pastor

Marc Ambinder: Hagee, Wright, Parsley, Fallwell, Obama and McCain

Blue Texan/Firedoglake: BREAKING: Obama Found To Have A Pastor; Possibly NOT A Muslim

hilzoy/Obsidian Wings: Obama And Wright 1: In The Real World

David Kurtz: Is Wright a "Death Blow" to Obama?


Bonus Bonus

Ta-Nehisi Coates/Slate: Playing the Racist Card - Ferraro's comments about Obama were racist. Why can't we say that?

Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite/Newsweek: You're Wrong, Ms. Ferraro