Some Questions Obama Refuses to Answer
By Larry Johnson on May 11, 2008 at 8:56 PM in Annenberg Chicago Challenge, Bamboozling, Barack Obama, Current Affairs, Woods Fund
The puff piece (some might call it an act of journalistic fellatio) on Barack Obama in the Sunday New York Times is but another reminder that most of the mainstream media have gone AWOL when it comes to getting Barack Obama to tell the truth about his past. Like a flat stone thrown along the surface of a still lake, this piece skips lightly over a host of issues–Tony Rezko, Bill Ayers, Rashid Khalidi, and Jeremiah Wright–without a probing question or the hint of doubt.
What does Barack really believe? What are his core principles? No one knows. Nope, he’s a “big tent” guy. According to the Times:
“There are some people who say he’s not strong enough on this or that, that he’s wishy-washy, that he’s trying to have it both ways,” said Abner J. Mikva, a former congressman and mentor to Mr. Obama. “But he’s not looking for how to exclude the people who don’t agree with him. He’s looking for ways to make the tent as large as possible.”
Mr. Obama’s ability to replicate the eclectic coalition he built in Chicago and expand it to the national stage has allowed the one-term senator to match the Clintons at their signature game: collecting influential friends and supporters.
But the authors of this treacle, Jo Becker and Christopher Drew, remain blissfully ignorant of the key gaps in the Obama saga or unconcerned with reporting what is actually known. One thing we know for sure–Barack is lying about significant portions of his life.
We know, for example, that Barack has not been truthful about his first job after graduating from college. He exaggerated his work and his position at Business International Corporation. One of his co-workers published a fascinating blog on this last year.
The idea of a politician lying is probably as novel as a sunrise. But Obama has traded on the mythology that he is somehow above all of this dissembling. Not so.
What we do not know, and no journalist to my knowledge has pressed him on this, is why he chose to go Chicago in the summer of 1985? He had no family or personal ties to the city. The only possible tie is Franklin Marshall Davis–a black Communist, who had lived in Chicago until 1948. Obama describes Frank as a mentor while going to middle school and high school in Hawaii. But Barack has been tight lipped about this relationship. Why?
Then there is his tie to William Ayers. Bill Ayers, unrepentant American terrorist, moved to Chicago sometime in the summer of 1987. He took up a position as an Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois–Chicago. Barack Obama first met Bill Ayers between July 1987 and July 1988. This explains in part why Barack was tabbed by Bill Ayers in the summer of 1995 to become the Chairman of the Chicago School Reform Collaborative (The Annenberg Challenge), which Ayers cofounded. Barack continued in that position until 2003.
When Barack was asked by George Stephanopolous about his relationship he said:
that he lives in the same neighborhood as Ayers on Chicago’s South Side, did not exchange ideas with him on a regular basis and was only 8 when the Weather Underground was violently protesting the war.
He does more than “live in the same neighborhood.” He served as Chairman of a foundation set up by Ayers and he served as a board member with Ayers on the Woods Fund. Oh yeah, Ayers helped Barack organize and execute the campaign to depose Illinois state Senator, Alice Palmer.
There is no denying Barack has a knack for forging ties with folks who can help him along. On the one hand, he has maintained close ties with Rashid Khalidi (a Middle East scholar at the University of Chicago and an adviser to the Palestinian delegation to the 1990s peace talks) and Ali Abunimah (a Palestinian-American author and co-founder of the online publication Electronic Intifada). But he also made the leap to pander for the Jewish vote. According to the Times:
During the Senate campaign, Mr. Obama joined in a “Walk for Israel” rally along Lake Michigan on Israel Solidarity Day. The Crowns and other Jewish leaders raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for him. Several days before the primary in 2004, some of his Jewish supporters took offense that Mr. Obama had not taken the opportunity on a campaign questionnaire to denounce Yasir Arafat, the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, or to strongly support Israel’s building of a security fence.
But in a sign of how far Mr. Obama had come in his coalition-building, friends from the American Israel Political Action Committee, the national pro-Israel lobbying group, helped him rush out a response to smooth over the flap.
In an e-mail message, Mr. Obama blamed a staff member for the oversight, and expressed the hope that “none of this has raised any questions on your part regarding my fundamental commitment to Israel’s security.” Mr. Abunimah has written of running into the candidate around that time and has said that Mr. Obama told him: “I’m sorry I haven’t said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race. I’m hoping that when things calm down I can be more upfront.”
Please let us know when you are calm, Barack. We would like you to be upfront. Did you cultivate ties with the radical left, the Nation of Islam, and Jeremiah Wright because you share their values or are you just using them to advance your career? That is a question I would like answered. Too bad the media will not ask.
, the basis for the Best Motion Picture Nominee (Golden Globes) starring Brad Pitt.
, the novel by John Le Carre, a new motion picture starring Gary Oldman and Colin Firth.
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