RKMBs Forums .::Important::. Politics and Current Events Barack Hussein Obama in '08?

it's an honest mistake [to think Obama is a Muslim] when you factor in that little cosplay incident of his from a while back.

Obama to Reporter: Sorry I Called You "Sweetie"
May 15, 2008 11:16 AM
FROM GUEST-BLOGGER RICK KLEIN, OF ABC'S THE NOTE
Really? He calls people "sweetie"? And this is a "habit"?
A little flare-up out of Sen. Barack Obama's Michigan visit: A (female) reporter for ABC's Detroit affiliate, WXYZ-TV, shouted a question in Obama's direction yesterday, inquiring about Obama's plans to help American autoworkers. Obama didn't feel like answering at the time -- not unusual, since Obama likes to answer questions at structured "avails," or media availabilities, if fielding questions at all, while on the trail.
Obama's response: "Hold on one second, sweetie, we're going to do -- we'll do a press avail."
First, the easy stuff: Obama never did do that "avail," and never did answer reporter Peggy Agar's question, which (if it matters) was substantive and relevant to Obama's visit that day.
Then, the harder stuff: Obama actually called a reporter "sweetie."
I don't know about you, but I don't believe I've ever used that term. My mother calls me "sweetie" from time to time. She's my mom. It's not a slur, but in a professional setting? I'm fairly certain that Obama would flunk basic corporate training if he used a term like that to refer to a female colleague.
Obama (or one of his aides) realized the mistake, and the candidate himself called Agar and left a voicemail that started by apologizing for not answering her question.
"I broke my word, I apologize for that, and I will make up for it," Obama said.
Then the meat: "Second apology is for using the word 'sweetie.' That's a bad habit of mine. I do it sometimes with all kinds of people. I mean no disrespect and so I am duly chastened on that front. Feel free to call me back. I expect that my press team will be happy to try to make it up to you whenever we are in Detroit next."
This would seem like the kind of "bad habit" Obama may want to break at some point, like smoking.
The New York Times' Jim Rutenberg points out that Obama has used the word "sweetie" at least once before on the trail, referring to a female factory worker in Allentown, Pa., last month.
While we're breaking the bad habits, how about media access? Sen. John McCain just gave a speech where he promised to give weekly press conferences as president -- and he gives just-about daily (and sometimes far more than that) casual and formal access to the press as a candidate. Anyone think the different styles WON'T catch up with Obama at some point in the general election? Even after this, the most he can say is that he expects his press team to "try to make it up to you" next time he's in town?
Listen to the voicemail, and see the exchange with the reporter, HERE (click on the video player to the right).
Don't miss Agar's response, toward the end of her TV spot: "This 'sweetie' never did get an answer to that question."
-- Rick Klein

I thought those evil evil corporate scumbags weren't to be trusted.

I'm sure you did.

ABC

He's just so presidential isn't he!

Barack Obama accused President Bush of "a false political attack" Thursday after Bush warned in Israel against appeasing terrorists — early salvos in a general election campaign that's already blazing even as the Democratic front-runner tries to sew up his party's nomination.

The White House denied Bush had targeted Obama, who said the Republican commander in chief's intent was obvious.

In short order, the controversy spilled across the presidential campaign.

John McCain, the Republican nominee in waiting, said Obama was showing "naivete and inexperience and lack of judgment" in his willingness to meet with U.S. foes.

Hillary Rodham Clinton then called Bush's original comments "offensive and outrageous, especially in light of his failures in foreign policy."

As the workday began stateside, Bush gave a speech to Israel's Knesset in which he spoke of the president of Iran, who has called for the destruction of the U.S. ally. Then, the president said: "Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along."

"We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: 'Lord, if I could only have talked to Hitler, all this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history," Bush added.

With the president abroad and those seeking to succeed him campaigning at home, the transcontinental tiff signaled the early direction of the general election. Bush seemed to assume the traditional lame-duck presidential role in trying to help the Republican nominee-in-waiting, and Obama tried to maneuver for advantage — and to show strength — while on the cusp of clinching the Democratic nomination.

McCain played his political role as well in tandem with Obama, notable for two White House hopefuls who are campaigning for a bipartisan governing approach free of the often divisive discourse in Washington.

By tradition, partisan politics comes to a halt when a U.S. president is on foreign soil, and Bush's remarks led Obama to quickly cry foul. The first-term Illinois senator responded to the comments as if they were criticism of his position that as president he would be willing to personally meet with Iran's leaders and those of other regimes the United States has deemed rogue.

"It is sad that President Bush would use a speech to the Knesset on the 60th anniversary of Israel's independence to launch a false political attack," Obama said in a statement his aides distributed. "George Bush knows that I have never supported engagement with terrorists, and the president's extraordinary politicization of foreign policy and the politics of fear do nothing to secure the American people or our stalwart ally Israel.

In turn, White House press secretary Dana Perino denied that the Knesset remark was aimed at Obama. In fact, the language is fairly typical for Bush speeches, and Gordon Johndroe, a national security spokesman for the president, said Bush was referring to "a wide range of people who have talked to or suggested we talk to Hamas, Hezbollah or their state sponsors" over a long period of time.

One such person most recently was former President Carter, who held talks with Hamas leaders, leading to criticism from Bush officials as well as Obama and McCain.

Even as the White House said Bush meant no dig at the Democrat, Perino couldn't resist the opportunity to get in a small one.

"I understand when you're running for office you sometimes think the world revolves around you. That is not always true. And it is not true in this case," she said.

Meanwhile, in Columbus, Ohio, McCain said he took the White House at its word, but then he weighed into the spat himself, saying: "This does bring up an issue that we will be discussing with the American people, and that is, why does Barack Obama, Senator Obama, want to sit down with a state sponsor of terrorism?"

Asked if Obama was an appeaser, McCain said Obama must explain why he wants to talk with leaders like Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and added that Obama's position was a serious error. "It shows naivete and inexperience and lack of judgment to say that he wants to sit down across the table from an individual who leads a country that says Israel is a stinking corpse, that is dedicated to the extinction of the state of Israel. My question is, what does he want to talk about?"

Clinton, campaigning in South Dakota in advance of a June 3 Democratic primary, said Bush's statement had "no place in any presidential address. ...

"I have differences with Senator Obama on certain foreign policy matters, but I think we are united in our opposition to the Bush policies and to the continuation of those policies by Senator McCain." Clinton has criticized Obama in the past for his pledge to meet with prominent adversaries of the United States without precondition.

Although his political interest is keen, Bush has mostly tried to refrain from injecting himself into the presidential race.

He largely remained silent during the Republican primaries but appeared with McCain at the White House after the Arizona senator clinched the nomination and, since then, has talked up McCain frequently. As for the Democratic race, the president typically avoids naming names, but he has publicly disagreed with the positions of the Democratic front-runners, including Obama's expressed willingness to meet leaders of U.S. adversaries.

The debate over whether a president should directly negotiate with such leaders has been one of the most prominent issue differences in the race for the Democratic nomination. Obama has said he would be willing to meet with heads of state in places like Iran, Cuba and North Korea. Democratic rival Hillary Rodham Clinton has argued that those meetings could be used for propaganda and her first response would be outreach through diplomatic channels.

By criticizing Bush, Obama sent a signal that he's ready to take on the sitting president and the incumbent party — and tried to counter the notion that Clinton would be the stronger Democratic general election candidate. Democrats also are working to link the unpopular Bush to McCain at every turn as the public craves change, and even if it wasn't directed at Obama, Bush's remark gave Democrats an opening to claim more of the same.

"It is time to turn the page on eight years of policies that have strengthened Iran and failed to secure America or our ally Israel," Obama said in his statement. "Instead of tough talk and no action, we need to do what (Presidents) Kennedy, Nixon and Reagan did and use all elements of American power — including tough, principled, and direct diplomacy — to pressure countries like Iran and Syria."

For their part, McCain and Republicans increasingly see Obama as their November rival and have been taking every opportunity to raise questions about his readiness to be a wartime commander in chief. The GOP also hopes to make national security — historically a Republican strength — a focus of the campaign when the political terrain favors Democrats.

Indicating what's to come, McCain said: "Peace through strength is the way we achieve peace in the world. That's the point. I will debate this issue with Senator Obama throughout this campaign."

...

Are you criticizing his refusal to answer a question, or him calling someone 'sweetie'? Cuz I'll agree with you if it's the former, but not if it's the latter.

he's talking about people in the arab world seeing him as more worldly than george bush because of his past travels and cultural heritage. that's different than endorsing terrorists.
but people trying to link him to terrorists by his name alone is as silly as wondy linking every brown skinned person to the mexican invasion.

Obama, facing likely defeat, will skip visiting Kentucky
By Ryan Alessi | Lexington Herald-Leader

LEXINGTON, Ky. — Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, facing a likely defeat in next Tuesday's primary election, won't travel to Kentucky before the voting, but said he hopes to have much more time to win over Kentucky voters before the November general election.

"When we're able to campaign in a place like Iowa for several months and I can visit and talk to people individually, I do very well. That's harder to do at this stage in the campaign," Obama said in a brief telephone interview Friday. "And once we get past the primary, we'll ble to focus more on those states where we need to make sure people know my track record."

In contrast, Obama's rival, Sen. Hillary Clinton, will make five stops in Kentucky over the weekend, including stops at two university campuses.

Obama said he'd hoped to spend a bit more time in Kentucky earlier this week, but was called back to Washington, D.C., for votes.

"We're having to campaign in a lot of different places," he said. "Obviously we think Kentucky is important. People in Kentucky are concerned about the same things people are concerned about all across the country — declining wages and incomes and everything from gas to health care."

But he conceded that he has a steep challenge to get his message and background to voters in states such as Kentucky — where he trails Sen. Hillary Clinton by 27 points, according to a poll published earlier this week — and West Virginia, where voters chose Clinton over Obama by 40 points on Tuesday.

"What it says is that I'm not very well known in that part of the country," Obama said. "Sen. Clinton, I think, is much better known, coming from a nearby state of Arkansas. So it's not surprising that she would have an advantage in some of those states in the middle."

But he said he and Clinton match up similarly against Republican nominee John McCain. Both trailed McCain by double digits in the poll, which was conducted for the Lexignton Herald-Leader and WKYT television. McCain leads Clinton by 12 points and Obama by 25 points.

"I think whoever the Democratic is we're going to have some work to do in a state like Kentucky," Obama said

Yeah, assassination of agents of change in this country have historically been really hysterical.

so it's okay to say bush should be executed for 'war crimes' but as soon as someone threatens to crucify your lord and savior you get your panties in a bunch?

Yep. receiving the usual sentence from the Hague for murdering thousands in an unprovoked war is the same thing as an assassination.

Sen. Barack Obama went one step further today in his pushback against presumptive GOP presidential nominee Sen. John McCain and President Bush on appeasement, suggesting that both Republicans have a problem with presidents past who have engaged in direct diplomacy.

"If George Bush and John McCain have a problem with direct diplomacy, led by the president of the United States, then they can explain why they have a problem with John F. Kennedy because that's what he did with [Soviet leader Nikita] Khrushchev, or Ronald Reagan, 'cause that's what he did with [Soviet leader Mikhail] Gorbachev, or Richard Nixon 'cause that's what they did with [Chinese leader Mao Tse-tung]," Obama said in Roseburg, Ore.

The Wall Street Journal:

• If nothing else, we now know what it takes to make a Democrat go nuts. One word: "appeasement."
  
  Notwithstanding that President Bush named no names in his speech to Israel's Knesset on Thursday, Barack Obama instantly called it a "false political attack." On him, of course.
  
  something has hit a nerve.
  
  Forget the complaint that Mr. Bush used a Hitler analogy. It's the here and now that has the Democrats upset. The fuse that set them off is any suggestion inside the context of a live presidential campaign that the Democrats are soft on national security.
  
  If Barack Obama has an Achilles' heel, this is it. He first exposed it last July in a Democratic debate when he replied, "I would," to a question of whether he'd meet as President with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "without precondition." Even Mrs. Clinton took a shot at that one, calling the Senator's comment "irresponsible and frankly naive."
  
  Speaker Pelosi's own April 2007 sojourn to Syria is remembered mainly for Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert feeling obliged to correct Ms. Pelosi's announcement that Mr. Olmert had told her he was ready to start peace talks with Syria. Untrue.
  
  Meanwhile, Speaker Pelosi announced in Damascus: "We came in friendship, hope, and determined that the road to Damascus is a road to peace." There must be a word for this somewhere. Just last month, former President Jimmy Carter met with leaders of Hamas to promote, among other things, "human rights."
  
  But Barack Obama is the party's presumptive standard-bearer for 2008. Thus, let's try to bring this dispute into sharper focus.
  
  Mr. Obama asserted again yesterday that he will not meet with terrorists. He is, however, willing to meet with Iran or Syria. Virtually no serious person disputes that Iran has shipped weaponry to terrorists in Iraq and that Syria has provided safe haven to these terrorists and let them cross from Syria into Iraq. In turn, these jihadists have killed U.S. soldiers. At a minimum, one might expect that ceasing this lethal activity would be a "precondition" before committing the office of the presidency to meet with either.
  
  Leaving no argument unturned, Democrats have reached back to Richard Nixon's trip to China and Ronald Reagan's negotiations with the Soviet Union as evidence that Republican Presidents "talk to the enemy." Put it this way: The day Iran brings forth a Chou Enlai and Syria a Mikhail Gorbachev, sure, give them a call.
  
  At bottom this dispute is about understanding the nature of the enemy in Iran, Syria and other sponsors and practitioners of Islamic terror. If the tempest over his indelicate words causes the Democratic presidential nominee to think twice about the political cost of trafficking with Tehran or Damascus, uttering "appeasement" will have been worth it.