It's easy to think that the efforts by the Obama campaign to silence its critics are just overblown hysteria. But then, the evidence starts to accumulate. First came the threatening letters from the Obama lawyers to stations that ran an NRA ad. Then the aggressive mob tactics to silence a critic of Obama from speaking. Add to it, the inappropriate request by the Obama campaign of the Justice Department to investigate a group who questioned Obama's assertions about Ayers as being untrue.
Luckily for Obama, the LA Times came to his defense and said that the entire event was untrue. Except, it was true. As Patterico points out in this post, he pointed to a blog by a liberal blogger who described the event. Then after Patterico pointed it out to the LA Times, the article disappears. Luckily, the evidence is still preserved at his site.
The problem that I am having with this is the combination of heavy handed thuggery in conjunction with the complicit MSM. Was the LA Times so inept that they missed the evidence? If so, why did the evidence suddenly become "disappeared?"
Democrats may feel that they are just trying to avoid being Swiftboated by using these tactics. What they forget is that the essential elements of the Swiftboat vets are true, and if Kerry had responded in the same manner as Obama, it would have been an affront to open and honest discussions about a candidate.
GGuy at Electric City has posted a piece that mentions a new blog Unfair Doctrine, that is covering the suppression of free speech by the Obama campaign.
If you don't agree completely with "The One," be afraid. Be very afraid.
3 comments:
Yeah, sure hard to argue with this kind of logic, when it's premised on the assumption that the Swiftboat Vets for Truth were telling the truth.
Sigh. Do you ever think what kind of damage it does to our democratic institutions when you decide to name everyone on the other side of the aisle a demagogue or traitor or un-American?
Does that thought ever even enter your mind?
Pogie, you are one of the few exceptions to the rule. I do take what you say seriously because I don't think that you are a demagogue. But I haven't accused anyone of being a traitor or un-American.
The point of the post still remains. There is an organized and concerted effort to use all means both legal and non-legal to shut down dissent.
My beef with Kerry goes way back before 2004, and I haven't trusted anything he has said since his Congressional testimony. I wasn't there with the Swiftboats, but they raised an issue that even today, Kerry hasn't addressed.
But I do appreciate that you take a look every now and then. I need to do it more on your site as well.
Given the size and ferocity of the right wing noise machine in this country, and its ability to amplify any story, no matter how small, into a big deal, it's hard to take you seriously. Look at the so-called "voter fraud" stories, all the noise, with no underlying story, not even one fraudulent vote. You guys have the ability to make a thousand news stories out of one. Media bias, my ass.
And the point of the Swiftboat movement was not whether what they said was true or not, but rather their ability to frame the debate - the fact that the story entered and endured in MSM (while, for example, Todd Palin's Alaska Secessionist affiliations hardly get a notice) was the pivotal feature. Rove managed to take Kerry's strength, and through deft media manipulation, destroy it. (Though I always caution people that official vote counts may not reflect actual votes cast.)
Nothing similar is going on this year, though Lord knows they are trying.
Post a Comment