Pull My Finger
This whole tempest in a teapot about Obama telling an untrue story about his grandfather is pretty stupid. Nevertheless, it gives Clinton supporters something to latch on to distract them from the fact that their candidate lost the election. Jeralyn at TalkLeft has a “theory” about this whole hubbub :
Barack Obama escaped hot water over his mistaking Auschwitz for Buchenwald. Fair enough. But I have a new theory now — one that’s more a curious observation than a criticism, or perhaps a little of both.He makes a lot of mistakes about his family history. It’s like he’s retelling stories he’s heard from third parties, including campaign staff who looked the stuff up. Maybe, aside from his grandparents with whom he lived for several years, he didn’t know their side of the family that well — including the great uncle who was one of the first at Buchenwald. In other words, he’s telling stories he’s learned on the campaign trail rather than ones he grew up hearing.
It probably wasn’t his father who mistakenly told him the Kennedy family paid for his travel to the U.S. to study in Hawaii. It probably wasn’t his mother who told him the 1965 March in Selma, AL allowed her to marry his father (he was born in 1961). More likely, I think, campaign researchers and aides came up with it.
That must be it. The most obvious answer has to be that Obama’s campaign staff came up with some lies for him to tell about his family.
Here’s my “theory” : Barack Obama’s family told him stories that turned out to be untrue because grown-ups always exaggerate stories they tell little kids. We all probably believe some stories of questionable truth that our parents and grandparents told us (insert religion joke here), but unlike Barack Obama, you and I don’t have the Clinton campaign and the entire Republican establishment trying to figure out whether or not Uncle Ernie is a liar.
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I’ll remind you that there is no “winner” until the votes at the convention are tallied. If you’re gonna parse everything that Clinton does and says, you’ll have to deal with it yourself.
As for Obama’s slip-up, it’s relevant to Clinton’s supporters because he makes a point of slicing-and-dicing all of her slip-ups.
Obama himself has offered around 6 different explanations of Rev. Wright (ranging from “I wasn’t there” to “he only said it sometimes” to “I disagree but still like him” to “now that he’s a liability, he’s gone”). Similarly, there’s the flag pin issue. That’s been “it’s just a symbol so I don’t wear it” to “I never said that” to “sometimes I wear it.” Again, he’s always reacting to the political environment around him.
That’s not a criticism. It’s doing what you gotta do. But for whatever reason, various people’s revulsion of Clinton is often justified by the same behavior in her. It’s sort of hypocritical.–you probably don’t see it that way, being such a strong Obama supporter and equally strong critic of Clinton, but that doesn’t change the reality.
Comment by Brad Gutting — May 29, 2008 @ 8:03 am
I can’t take anyone seriously who would use the term “the flag pin issue”. The fact that Hillary supporters would actually take something that superficial into consideration when deciding who should be the next president makes me realize that their judgment is as pathetic as Hillary’s in October 2002.
Comment by greg — May 29, 2008 @ 9:22 am
There is a pretty signifigant difference between thinking your great uncle helped liberate one Nazi camp rather than another on one hand, and claiming you were under fire at a peaceful and routine meet and greet at an airport that was extensively filmed and covered by the press, on the other.
Comment by Michael Harrington — May 29, 2008 @ 10:40 pm
Bush and Cheney wear flag pins. Does this mean they’re more patriotic than Obama?
Comment by Doobie — May 30, 2008 @ 11:46 pm
Re: Family exaggerating when telling stories to kids.
When I was little, my dad used to tell us exciting war stories about his experiences on Mindinao during WWII. I think I was in my early teens before he told us the truth: he was 4F and was stateside the entire time. Ha, ha, ha. The thing is, if he hadn’t come clean, I’d probably believe to this day that he had served in the Phillipines.
Comment by PGE — May 31, 2008 @ 11:10 am