SubscribeShocker: The Press Asks Obama Questions
From Dana Milbank at the Washington Post:
Ask Tough Questions? Yes, They Can!
By Dana Milbank
Tuesday, March 4, 2008; A02SAN ANTONIO It took many months and the mockery of “Saturday Night Live” to make it happen, but the lumbering beast that is the press corps finally roused itself from its slumber Monday and greeted Barack Obama with a menacing growl.
The day before primaries in Ohio and Texas that could effectively seal the Democratic presidential nomination for him, a smiling Obama strode out to a news conference at a veterans facility here. But the grin was quickly replaced by the surprised look of a man bitten by his own dog.
Reporters from the Associated Press and Reuters went after him for his false denial that a campaign aide had held a secret meeting with Canadian officials over Obama’s trade policy. A trio of Chicago reporters pummeled him with questions about the corruption trial this week of a friend and supporter. The New York Post piled on with a question about him losing the Jewish vote.
Obama responded with the classic phrases of a politician in trouble. “That was the information that I had at the time. . . . Those charges are completely unrelated to me. . . . I have said that that was a mistake. . . . The fact pattern remains unchanged.”
When those failed, Obama tried another approach. “We’re running late,” the candidate said, and then he disappeared behind a curtain.
Before he beat his hasty retreat, however, Obama found time to assign blame for the tough questions suddenly coming his way. “The Clinton campaign has been true to its word in employing a ‘kitchen sink’ strategy,” he protested. “There are, what, three or four things a day?”
Spoken like a man who had just been hit on the head with a heavy piece of porcelain…
“I don’t have any preliminary statement,” Obama said as he began his news conference, encouraging reporters to “just dive in.” That was a mistake.
Tom Raum of the Associated Press led off with a question about whether an Obama aide had told Canadians not to take seriously the candidate’s public rhetoric critical of the NAFTA trade agreement. “Let me, let me, let me, let me just be absolutely clear what happened,” Obama answered, explaining that the meeting was a “courtesy” and involved no “winks and nods.”
Then an agitator — columnist Carol Marin with the Chicago Sun-Times — broke in. Marin, a visitor to the Obama entourage who accused the regulars of being too “quiet,” accused the candidate of concealing details about fundraisers Rezko had for him and a real estate transaction between the two.
“I don’t think it’s fair to suggest somehow that we’ve been trying to hide the ball on this,” Obama answered. But this only provoked a noisy back-and-forth between Marin, Sun-Times colleague Lynn Sweet and Michael Flannery from Chicago’s CBS affiliate. “How many fundraisers? . . . Who was there? . . . Disclosure of the closing documents?”
Obama, while repeating his formulation that it was “a boneheaded move” to do business with Rezko, tried to shut down the requests for more information. “These requests, I think, could just go on forever,” he said. “At some point, what we need to try to do is respond to what’s pertinent.”
Reporters, however, had a different idea of what was pertinent, and the questions about Rezko, NAFTA and other unpleasant subjects continued to come. An aide called out “last question,” and Obama made his move for the exit — only for reporters to shout after him in protest. “C’mon, guys,” he pleaded. “I just answered, like, eight questions.”
The questioning, however, has only just begun.
The Saturday Night Live sketch had very little to do with any of this. And Mrs. Clinton’s “phone call” ad even less.
It is far more likely that the press is just now being fed the questions to ask. And, more importantly, they have decided it might better serve their agenda to actually ask them.
For it is is a preposterous myth that our watchdog media do much if any investigating on their own.
At best they follow up on the press releases, tips and opposition research from other interested parties.
But, of course, they only do that when they feel it will help their own agenda — or rather, the Democrat Party’s.
If the media is now at the eleventh hour deciding to question Obama, it is probably because polling numbers are starting to show he might not be as viable a candidate for their side as Mrs. Clinton after all.
After all, this is a candidate who cannot admit his middle name.
The questioning, however, has only just begun.
It is to laugh.
11 Responses to “Shocker: The Press Asks Obama Questions”
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March 4th, 2008 at 11:40 am
To give the Chicago press the credit it deserves, reporters from both the Sun-Times and the other Chicago paper have been trying to get a one-on-one interview with Obama for months. They have been reduced to submitting Q & A forms to the campaign, so that there can be no follow up questions to the Obama campaign responses. The Obama campaign is rapidly becoming known as not allowing the national media to pose any tough questions, shutting them down and instead chosing to do interviews with little known “local” reporters who are not going to delve into the Rezko trial instead doing interviews based on the philosophy that all politics are “local”.
The Obama campaign has put it out that they have been quite willing to permit “interviews” but the Chicago Sun-Times reports point out that submitting Q & A forms are not “interviews” and that face time with the Messiah himself has been non-existant.
Opening statements in the Rezko trial are scheduled for Thursday. And I don’t think Patrick Fitzgerald is going to have a problem with exposing any political corruption in Chicago. If he softballs this case, he will forever be thought a political hack (which I think he probably is) and not the tough on corruption/crime prosecutor who plays to win that he wants us all to think he is.
The Obamania wave has been going on for months. But all honeymoons end eventually. And with Obama being thought the presumptive candidate for the Dhimmicrat Party, now the tough times begin. There is a lot to the “historic Georgian mansion” buy that Obama and Mrs. Finally Proud bought in Chicago, including her inside track on the mansion coming up for sale. Also, someone is going to ask why Mrs. Rezko, who claimed an annual salary of $32,000 could cough up $125,000 as a down payment on a land-locked lot next to the Obama castle. Nevermind that Rezko’s Iraqi billionaire managed to pony up a cool $3.5 million loan to Rezko within days of the purchase by both Obama and Mrs. Rezko.
Other liberals are beginning to ask questions and even though they are in the tank for Hillary, those questions still need to be asked.
March 4th, 2008 at 11:54 am
From Media Research Center:
“A Nexis search through February 2008 finds Time magazine has never mentioned Tony Rezko, despite several soaring cover stories on Obama. U.S News & World Report noted it once, briefly (September 24, 2007). Newsweek disposed of the smelly land deal in one paragraph – paragraph 20 – in a January 31, 2008 story that actually touted Obama as a reformer.”
http://www.mediaresearch.org/r.....080303.asp
March 4th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
GNB, look at the Google Trends chart of hits for Rezko and Obama:
http://tinyurl.com/yu6r9e
The bottom section shows media stories. Google doesn’t show enough to measure.
Very telling.
March 4th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
SG
Thanks SG. All that activity in the first quarter of 2008 and the media still doesn’t want to “inform the public”. I wish the graph were more detailed so I can see what a difference a day makes in Google searches. I mean after Hillary’s Rezko memo.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
“Obama strode out to a news conference at a veterans facility here” A Democrat politician at a veterans facility? You’ve got to be kidding me, what’s he doing giving them more of the “We cannot Win” message from the Democrat controlled Congress?
Standing in front of a US flag. What’s next– Are we going to be told it’s an important part of his beliefs? But it is just wrong to salute it. My guess is that somewhere there is a picture of his respect.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:40 pm
““C’mon, guys,” he pleaded. “I just answered, like, eight questions.””
Wow, the SATs and LSATs must have been brutal to him.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:43 pm
This article reminds me of two other stories - one from the early days of OIF, a reporter calls his home office (in LA I believe) and says (from under the desk he is hiding under) We are being bombed. The person on the other end says - The ticker from the NYTs doesn’t mention it, so it isn’t happening. Five minutes latter, the ticker from the NYTs comes through that indeed that particular area is being bombed - and the guy in the LA office calls back the reporter in Iraq and says - Give me the details, the NYTs says it’s true! Says a lot about who/how our msm determines -what’s fit to print -
Second is I just saw Manufacturing Dissent - a couple of Canadian film people got kind of hot under the collar when they found out Michael Moore had met with Roger Smith (Roger & Me) twice and left them on the cutting room floor while implying that he never got the interview. Sooo they followed the Land Whale around while he was promoting Farenheit 9/11 - simply asking for an interview - Alas, a lot like He Who Cannot Be Named - it just never came through. Bet ole Mikey is an Obama Boy!
March 4th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
One has to wonder if the press will look into this:
http://strata-sphere.com/blog/.....hives/5140
Obama possibly linked to bribery of former Iraq (Saddam Hussein) regime?
March 4th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
crosspatch;….”Obama possibly linked to bribery of former Iraq (Saddam Hussein) regime?….”
But Bush went to war in Iraq for oil, right? The un-answered question to statements such as that begs the question itself. Since we kicked the crap out of everybody who got in the way in less than four months, and since they were totally dependent on the US, and since the oil could have been ours for the taking, how then did Halliburton and “big oil” profit? And why are we paying $100/bbl. for crude? Maybe the left has Bush confused with Hugo Chavez, and the US confused with Venezuela.
March 4th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
“So, I have a message. Pusillanimity, thy name is liberal politician. Liberal politician, you are weak. You are entropy in action. Your ranks are filled with feminized capons and masculinized clucking hens, leaving you only to ponder which sorry set makes for better men. And if you knew what masculinity was, what femininity was - if you even believed that such qualities were a reflection of the divine and not merely social constructs - you would have a prayer of reclaiming your manhood and resurrecting virtue in yourself at this, the eleventh hour. Alas, though, lost in a sea of confusion and androgyny you’ve become a pathetic creature, possessing neither Christian fortitude or pagan ferocity. Yet, you indulge the delusion that you’re fit to perpetuate civilization? You fancy yourself capable to run a nation? The only thing you can run is your mouth.”
March 5th, 2008 at 3:15 am
I just saw Obliviama’s kinda-victory speech after Hillary took the Texas Primary (but not the caucus delegates if I am not mistaken). He spouts the usual nonsense, chants “Si se pueda” a couple times, then manages to say a few things that actually catch my attention.
The first thing he said hammers home his determination to get out of Iraq as soon as possible, so as to “use that money repairing our roads, our schools,” blah blah blah. As he blathered on, I thought “Wait a minute, this guy offers hope? Hope for whom? How hopeful is it to abandon an entire nation of 50 million plus people to chaos and war so we, the richest nation the world has ever known, can spend that money on — who else — ourselves? Now, last time I checked, it was selfish, not generous, to refuse to help those in need in order to help your buddies, and unless I’m mistaken, the people of Iraq are in far greater need of that aid than anyone in the U.S.
The other thing he said that actually sounded like a coherent thought was describing himself as someone who “isn’t afraid to speak truth to petty dictators.” Apparently, this is somehow supposed to justify his eagerness to rub elbows with President Tom, Kim Jong Il, Raul Castro, Michael Moore, and other assorted riff-raff. Then I tried with all my might to imagine a Republican who wasn’t “afraid to speak truth to petty dictators.” Oh wait! Yeah, that’s it! That one guy, a few years back, who told that Saddam Hussein guy something along the lines of LEAVE THE COUNTRY OR WE’RE GOING TO INVADE IRAQ.
Now that is speaking “truth” to a “petty dictator.”
Oh, but wait, Obliviama disagreed with that Bush guy on what to do about that Saddam character. What truth was he speaking to which power then?
And what’s Obliviama going to say to Ahmadinejad? “Could you please stop hanging every homosexual you find, you’re making me look bad, man! I mean, I invited you to the White House, the least you could do is commute the Sodomy Sentence bro.”
The key thing about Obliviama is, according to the MSM, his ability to speak and inspire. I’m not really all that inspired, to be honest. Actually, that’s not quite true. Every time he speaks, I am more and more inspired to vote aganst him. When he speaks, he doesn’t always say anything, but when he does actually say something, what he says is so impossibly stupid, I actually get a little offended. I mean, am I supposed to believe that leaving Iraq to its own devices is somehow a generous, hopeful act? Or that voting against the removal of a bloody tyrant is somehow an act of courage or some glowing example of good judgement? Or that a career social agitator — crap, I mean “community organizer” — with a solidly socialist — dang, I did it again, I meant “liberal,” really! — voting record, somehow has the magical ability to “bring together” conservatives whom he so obviously loathes?
So I guess I’m a little confused. Or maybe I just think too much. That must be it. Maybe if I stopped thinking so much, Obliviama wouldn’t seem so bad.
Hope of the world, my ass. More like Hope of the Democratic Dependency.