The “pitbull with lipstick” goes on the attack
By Ted Belman
Gov Palin spoke to a crowd of 16,000 in California and immediately went on the attack to the delight of the audience. She reminded them that California was Reagan country.
DOUGLASS K. DANIEL, Associated Press didn’t like it one bit. I have made bold the editorializing.
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By claiming that Democrat Barack Obama is “palling around with terrorists” and doesn’t see the U.S. like other Americans, vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin targeted key goals for a faltering campaign.
And though she may have scored a political hit each time, her attack was unsubstantiated and carried a racially tinged subtext that John McCain himself may come to regret.
First, Palin’s attack shows that her energetic debate with rival Joe Biden may be just the beginning, not the end, of a sharpened role in the battle to win the presidency.
“Our opponent … is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect, imperfect enough, that he’s palling around with terrorists who would target their own country,” Palin told a group of donors in Englewood, Colo. A deliberate attempt to smear Obama, McCain’s ticket-mate echoed the line at three separate events Saturday.
“This is not a man who sees America like you and I see America,” she said. “We see America as a force of good in this world. We see an America of exceptionalism.”
Obama isn’t above attacking McCain’s character with loaded words, releasing an ad on Sunday that calls the Arizona Republican “erratic” — a hard-to miss suggestion that McCain’s age, 71, might be an issue.
“Our financial system in turmoil,” an announcer says in Obama’s new ad. “And John McCain? Erratic in a crisis. Out of touch on the economy.”
A harsh and plainly partisan judgment, certainly, but not on the level of suggesting that a fellow senator is un-American and even a friend of terrorists.
In her character attack, Palin questions Obama’s association with William Ayers, a member of the Vietnam-era Weather Underground. Her reference was exaggerated at best if not outright false. No evidence shows they were “pals” or even close when they worked on community boards years ago and Ayers hosted a political event for Obama early in his career.
Obama, who was a child when the Weathermen were planting bombs, has denounced Ayers’ radical views and actions.
With her criticism, Palin is taking on the running mate’s traditional role of attacker, said Rich Galen, a Republican strategist.
“There appears to be a new-found sense of confidence in Sarah Palin as a candidate, given her performance the other night,” Galen said. “I think that they are comfortable enough with her now that she’s got the standing with the electorate to take off after Obama.”
Second, Palin’s incendiary charge draws media and voter attention away from the worsening economy. It also comes after McCain supported a pork-laden Wall Street bailout plan in spite of conservative anger and his own misgivings.
“It’s a giant changing of the subject,” said Jenny Backus, a Democratic strategist. “The problem is the messenger. If you want to start throwing fire bombs, you don’t send out the fluffy bunny to do it. I think people don’t take Sarah Palin seriously.”
The larger purpose behind Palin’s broadside is to reintroduce the question of Obama’s associations. Millions of voters, many of them open to being swayed to one side or the other, are starting to pay attention to an election a month away.
For the McCain campaign, that makes Obama’s ties to Ayers as well as convicted felon Antoin “Tony” Rezko and the controversial minister Jeremiah Wright ripe for renewed criticism. And Palin brings a fresh voice to the argument.
Effective character attacks have come earlier in campaigns. In June 1988, Republican George H.W. Bush criticized Democrat Michael Dukakis over the furlough granted to Willie Horton, a convicted murderer who then raped a woman and stabbed her companion. Related TV ads followed in September and October.
The Vietnam-era Swift Boat veterans who attacked Democrat John Kerry’s war record started in the spring of 2004 and gained traction in late summer.
“The four weeks that are left are an eternity. There’s plenty of time in the campaign,” said Republican strategist Joe Gaylord. “I think it is a legitimate strategy to talk about Obama and to talk about his background and who he pals around with.”
Palin’s words avoid repulsing voters with overt racism. But is there another subtext for creating the false image of a black presidential nominee “palling around” with terrorists while assuring a predominantly white audience that he doesn’t see their America?
In a post-Sept. 11 America, terrorists are envisioned as dark-skinned radical Muslims, not the homegrown anarchists of Ayers’ day 40 years ago. With Obama a relative unknown when he began his campaign, the Internet hummed with false e-mails about ties to radical Islam of a foreign-born candidate.
Whether intended or not by the McCain campaign, portraying Obama as “not like us” is another potential appeal to racism. It suggests that the Hawaiian-born Christian is, at heart, un-American.
The fact is that when racism creeps into the discussion, it serves a purpose for McCain. As the fallout from Wright’s sermons showed earlier this year, forcing Obama to abandon issues to talk about race leads to unresolved arguments about America’s promise to treat all people equally.
John McCain occasionally says he looks back on decisions with regret. He has apologized for opposing a holiday to honor Martin Luther King Jr. He has apologized for refusing to call for the removal of a Confederate flag from South Carolina’s Capitol.
When the 2008 campaign is over will McCain say he regrets appeals such as Palin’s? ___
Palin was right on the money. Obama is not one of us. Not because of his colour but because of his far left politics.
The fact that she lablelled him un-American is hugh. Look for this theme to be played over and over again.
The far left San Francisco Chronical reported it this way.
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With just a month to go until the election, Palin gleefully signaled the start of an aggressive new attack aimed at painting Obama as too radical to lead the country.
“There is a time when it’s necessary to take the gloves off, and that time is right now,” she said, adding that her campaign adviser encouraged the move saying, “the heels are on, the gloves are off.”
“Evidently, there’s been a lot of interest in what I like to read lately,” Palin said in a laughing reference to a recent interview with CBS anchor Katie Couric where she was unable to name publications she regularly reads. “Well, I was reading today a copy of the New York Times,” she said to loud boos, “and I was really interested to read about Barack Obama’s friends from Chicago.”
The story in question, published Saturday, explored the “crossed paths” of Obama and Ayers, and what it characterized as sporadic links the two shared as residents of Hyde Park and as members of a nonprofit organization concentrating on Chicago schools.
“One of his earliest supporters is a man who, according to the New York Times, was a domestic terrorist … part of a group which launched a campaign to bomb” the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol, Palin told the Carson crowd. “These are the same guys who think that patriotism is paying higher taxes.”
Supporters of the GOP ticket, including actor Jon Voight, echoed Palin’s comments - or went even further in their attacks at the rally. The actor told a pre-rally press conference that “no one’s vetting Obama at all … this fellow has a lot of very strange associations … such as his affiliation with William Ayers, the unrepentant terrorist.”
Voight told reporters that Ayers and Obama “worked together at the Chicago Annenberg Challenge … four years together, radicalizing the Chicago school system. That’s what their agenda was.”
McCain campaign spokesman Rick Gorka said Voight “does not speak for the campaign,” but Democrats assailed the allegations made at the rally as outright lies.
“That’s called throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks,” said California Democratic Party spokesman Brian Brokaw as he watched the rally from the stands. “They’re behind in all the battleground states.”
Sanchez, the Obama spokesman, said the Annenberg public-private partnership was founded with the help of a Republican governor to improve Chicago schools, and that Obama and Ayers were never associates in that work.
Palin, in her address, repeatedly - and to the crowd’s delight - jabbed at the media. In a reference to her interview with Couric, she said that she had been “flippant” in some answers, but didn’t think the questions were very relevant. “Oh, come on, let’s start talking to the American people about the issues that you guys want to know about,” she said to cheers.
Peppering her speech with folksy sayings and references, she had the crowd chanting and cheering her on as she told the Carson audience that “our opponents take this state and all of you for granted. … But I’ve got some news … for millions of Californians, this is still Reagan country.”
Palin’s speech was interrupted several times by protesters who shouted slogans and were escorted out of the arena as the crowd drowned out their shouts with “U-S-A!”
But the GOP vice presidential candidate also hit hard on issues, like taxes and offshore oil drilling, even leading the audience in a chant of “Drill, baby, drill!”
And just how old was Mr. Obama when Mr. Ayers was desecrating the American flag in 2001? Perhaps serving with him on the Woods Fund?
Comment by lincolnsixecho — October 5, 2008 @ 4:18 pm
Palin’s response to the AP attack
Comment by Ted Belman — October 5, 2008 @ 4:46 pm
we love sarah palin!!!!
jewsforsarahpalin.blogspot.com
Comment by bugsy — October 5, 2008 @ 5:39 pm
What’s racially tinged about it? William Ayers is white.
Comment by Bill Levinson — October 5, 2008 @ 5:52 pm
In the first sentence of the article, “a faltering campaign” is also editorializing IMO.
Comment by profmom9 — October 5, 2008 @ 6:35 pm
[...] Israpundit [...]
Pingback by Scroll For Updates: Imagine That: The AP Sees Racism In Palin Calling Obama Out On His Ties To Ayers | Right Voices — October 5, 2008 @ 11:05 pm
Amen! ME TOO! l u l u com / sunstar4foxtmf In my expose research I just simply connected the dots by following the money of all the democratic institutions and organizations that fund democrats. The website OPENSECRETS is an excellent source for information as well as either NOMOREDNC OR, DNCNOMORE which is also an excellent resource for information.
FOX ROCKS and I can honestly say that after NINE ELEVEN, Fox News is the only news station that gave a darn about America, Israel, Christian Justice, Republican Justice, and going after the bad guys. I am paying attention and have been paying attention ever since I started laughing with the Rush Limbaugh show during the 1990s when that adulterous pervert imposter called Bill Clinton seized the White House and surrendered America to America’s enemies. It used to be that Republicans were evil and democrats were good, but now it’s the exact opposite, where democrats have become ultimately evil, whereas, Republicans at least used some of their wealth to follow Biblical standards, such as: Defending Israel, defending the Ten Commandments, defending MARRIAGE BETWEEN MEN AND WOMEN, fighting against child molesters and gay adoptions; fighting to keep Christmas alive; fighting to keep the cross on churches; fighting against Islamic terrorism and HATE; fighting for a better world freed from communism, socialism,but even though I disagree with many of their capitalist policies, I still support them for their courage, their bravery, their heroism - in giving our soldiers their pride back. God bless Fox News; God bless FAITHFUL Christian Republicans; God bless Israel; God bless Ted Belman; God bless the Israeli government under new leadership; God bless Sarah Palin and John McCain! We need to pray for our leaders and also pray for the social justice of radical financial reform that allows all nations to become free and equal: FREE COLLEGE EDUCATION; FREE HOUSING; FREE HEALTHCARE; FREE ENERGY - and that would be a welcomed CHANGE - something COMMUNISTIC DEMOCRATS COULDN’T POSSIBLY CONCEIVE OF as their kind of PROPOSED CHANGES are just another SLAVE FACTORY FULL OF SLAVE JOBS FOR CHEAP FOREIGN LABOR, HIGHER TAXES, the destruction of religion, and standing everywhere, but nowhere! No,we don’t want COMMUNISTIC DEMOCRACY - WE WANT A REPUBLIC OF FREEDOM WITH THE RIGHT KINDS OF CHANGES!
Comment by Michael Sunstar — October 5, 2008 @ 11:25 pm
I reasoned that if all the companies that fund democrats bulldozed America for greedy gain and profit so they can bury dog shit in their backyards and cook wieners, then what do they care whether Alaska is drilled for more oil? You’d think they’d all be happy to support bulldozing even more of God’s Creation for oil - then again, their only color is GREEN money. That is their god. You’d think they’d celebrate cutting down more trees to print paper money. No worries, democrats are now at work building the mark of the beast so that their GREEN god can change colors like a chamelion.
Comment by Michael Sunstar — October 5, 2008 @ 11:32 pm
Yes DRILL Sargeant!
Comment by Michael Sunstar — October 5, 2008 @ 11:45 pm
FOX ROCKS and I can honestly say that after NINE ELEVEN, Fox News is the only news station that gave a darn about America, Israel, Christian Justice, Republican Justice, and going after the bad guys. I am paying attention and have been paying attention ever since I started laughing with the Rush Limbaugh show during the 1990s when that adulterous pervert imposter called Bill Clinton seized the White House and surrendered America to America’s enemies. It used to be that Republicans were evil and democrats were good, but now it’s the exact opposite, where democrats have become ultimately evil, whereas, Republicans at least used some of their wealth to follow Biblical standards, such as: Defending Israel, defending the Ten Commandments, defending MARRIAGE BETWEEN MEN AND WOMEN, fighting against child molesters and gay adoptions; fighting to keep Christmas alive; fighting to keep the cross on churches; fighting against Islamic terrorism and HATE, fighting for a better world freed from communism, socialism, but even though I disagree with many of their capitalist policies,
Comment by Michael Sunstar — October 5, 2008 @ 11:46 pm
I do support Sarah Palin! What an awesome woman! It’s just really great to watch all the wicked stepsisters make sport of Cinderella! It’s fun to watch the wicked witch of the east buried under Hillary’s fallen housing plan; it’s fun to watch the wicked witches of the West laugh at Sarah as they did at Dorothy; it’s just fun watching the witches of THE VIEW try to look all educated and smart, all the while Americans are laughing at just how dumb and unenlightened they really are, hoping that Halloween costume time is over, only to be laughing as they wear scary Halloween attire every time they show their ugly faces in public, and if they try to make Elizabeth Hasselbeck look stupid, her stupidity is actually smarter than their claim to intelligence; now the BRAVE, SMART, SOPHISTICATED, BEAUTIFUL, TALENTED women can be separated from the fat, ugly, disgruntled dykes who have nothing better to do than be man-hating, man-eating black holes whose white wigged vaginas suck your whole universe into nothing but anti-matter. But with Sarah Palin, you are getting a very smart and beautiful woman with a great attitude that should shut every feminist mouth throughout the world! And chauvinistic pig men too! An applause to Sarah Palin’s husband for having an equal relationship with his wife. Between FIREPROOF starring Kirk Cameron to Sarah Palin’s example of an equal relationship, instead of men allowing the Medusa’s of society to turn them to mush their rock hard stones can remain solid without cracking!
Comment by Michael Sunstar — October 5, 2008 @ 11:56 pm
Thank you, Ted. It’s pretty plain to see, that AP has simply become the media outlet of the extreme Left, which Obama represents. ABC, NBC, CBS and CNN are parroting this stuff, along with Google News. Fox and the blogosphere seem to be the only places left, that haven’t been bought out by the Arab-Leftist coalition and people with their agenda.
At the same time that mud is being slung at McCain for being a “mudslinger”, the hype about the economy continues. Every rise in the market is ignored, and every drop is played up as part of a “meltdown”. In reality, the market has been dropping for around a year now — part of a normal correction after the speculation and leveraging of the Clinton years. They are doing this in order to prepare the public for Obama’s own mud barage, trying to pin the S & L scandal on McCain. I’ve never before seen the press so obviously working hand-in-glove with the Democrats in a Presidential election.
I think it’s obvious what the McCain camp needs to do: Make “Weather Underground” a household word, and dust off the records of the S&L scandal (and the involvement of Democrats in it). This is a dirty campaign, against filthy characters. Get vaccinated and put on rubber gloves before throwing punches.
Comment by BlandOatmeal — October 6, 2008 @ 7:12 am
An interesting tidbit from a bygone (but soon to be revived by Obama) era:
It’s Obvious why Obama is playing this card: He was only a student when the Democrat-controlled Congress was loosening rerulations on the S&L industry. It’s up to McCain supporters, to get hold of the Congressional Record from those days, and find out the depth of Democrat involvement in the crisis.
Of course, Obama’s attacks will be (1) personally against McCain, to put him on the defensive and put the smear of inuendo on him, and (2) to repeatedly identify McCain with the Republicans involved (Especially the Bush boy). McCain will then be between the rock and a hard place; because every time he accuses the Dems for THEIR part in the crisis, he’s siding with the Republicans — making him “one of them”. It’s a sly, dirty tactic replete with smoke and mirrors: Be ready for it.
Comment by BlandOatmeal — October 6, 2008 @ 7:31 am
Increasing attacks on Obama’s substance and character to strip away his centrist self image, so Americans see the real leftwing Obama is critical to McCain, if he is to turn increasing support for Obama to support for him.
Obama says such personal attacks are distracting from the real issues.
Republicans need to show that who Obama really is, is every bit as much a key issue in this campaign as is the economy.
McCain should also hammer away that if leftist and Islamic terrorist appeasing Obama gets in, just what damage both he and a leftist Islamic terrorist appeasing controlled Democratic Congress will do to America.
McCain had better start in ernest using one liners, symbolism, pictures and the like to reveal Obama as he really is, which means of communication is quickly grasped and understood by the American people.
If Obama’s image cannot be quickly tarnished, dented and stripped away, Americans will have Obama as their President elect on November 4, 2008.
Comment by Bill Narvey — October 6, 2008 @ 1:11 pm
Ha ha
There is nothing whatsoever racially tinged about discussing hussein Obama’s association with Ayers. But the race card is the only strategy the Obama campaign has, that being to intimidate people into silence about Obama’s background. This is the same strategy used during the primaries, where just about every statement made by the Clintons was met with accusations of “racism”. His position on Iraq couldn’t even be criticized without being accused of having racial overtones. If you recall Bill Clinton was accused of racism for saying hussein’s stance on Iraq was a fairy tale.
Comment by Laura — October 6, 2008 @ 4:08 pm
Sunstar, you are completely psychotic. I would bet that every woman you were with, assuming you have been with any, have turned into lesbians.
Comment by Laura — October 6, 2008 @ 4:15 pm
Latest pitbull attack.
Comment by Shy Guy — October 7, 2008 @ 10:27 am
It really is too late in the game to attempt to besmirch the reputation of Obama with personal attacks. For the sad fact is its the economy(stupid) that will dictate who will be the next president. Obama is now 8 points ahead in the telephone polls but that does not tell half the story.Many young people are not polled because they own cell, not land phones-and its only land phones that are being randomly called. Young people are overwhelmingly pro- Obama. I suspect that even Abe Lincoln should he be reincarnated and run as a Republican would be defeated today.
I was able to convince Yamit, ShyGuy, and Narvey to switch allegiances to Obama once they realized that the present financial crises was Hashen ordained.The timing of the event was such as to ensure McCain’s defeat.It could not be just a coincidence.
No one, but no one has any interest in Obama’s Pastor or any events that ocurred during the Viet-Nam era. The present financial emergency is too serious and effecting too many people that it totally overrides all this personal trivia.
I am sure most Israelis realize that a Bush 3 presidency would be a total disaster for Israel.
It is high time to make it unanimous and come aboard the Obama band wagon.
Comment by h peskin — October 7, 2008 @ 5:30 pm
Peskin, what have you been smoking?
Do you really believe that you have convinced me to switch allegiances to Obama? Saying I think the odds are with Obama to win is not the same thing as saying I believe in him. I don’t.
If you were operating on all cylinders of objectivity and reality, you wouldn’t make such a silly self aggrandizing suggestion that you have convinced me to accept your pro-Obama views.
So Peskin, just how many cylinders do you have to operate on and just how many of those cylinders are actually functioning?
Comment by Bill Narvey — October 7, 2008 @ 5:53 pm
Bill Narvey: Methinks thou protesteth too much. You are too intelligent and too politically astute to back an obvious second rate and losing politician like McCain.
You have already been branded as a pinko by the powers that be at Israpundit, and so I can understand your need to cloak your views with a right- wing veneer. But we can all read between the lines. We all know where you really stand.
Besides as a fellow Canadian you must maintain some separation from the Yankee riff raff.
Comment by h peskin — October 7, 2008 @ 6:45 pm
Pesky-
Tell me if I’m wrong. You come to this blog feeling like a big fish in a small pond. You must be deluded! But please continue to embarrass yourself. How about playing pied piper to the cell phone youth, you know, that demographic who have the least voter turnout of all age groups? Maybe you can come up with a plan for them to text their votes.
Comment by elvis — October 7, 2008 @ 7:33 pm
Elvis: Let first congratulate you on most of your previous posts. The vast majority of them are enlightened, liberal, and fair minded. You are in my estimation tending toward a leftist world view. I realize of course, that in order to satisfy the many, too many in my opinion, red-neck, know nothing,mad dog, extreme right wingers you feel compelled to counter my arguments. I understand your predicament but I also know in your heart you are one of us. So long, old pal.
Comment by h peskin — October 7, 2008 @ 9:18 pm
Pesky-
Please don’t confuse that just because I don’t like Mac it means that I’m a liberal. I don’t like him precisely because he is too accommodating to the left. Second of all, I am social and fiscal conservative, and I attend orthodox services. Nevertheless, Obama is so far to the left that the contrast between him and Mac is stark enough for me to vote against the much greater of two evils. But thanks for being a funny guy just the same.
Comment by elvis — October 7, 2008 @ 10:37 pm
I see Peskin wasn’t qualified enough to get that pole dancing job.
But at least he’s snagged a position as a chearleader, with a big letter “O” on his pink tanktop.
Pump those pompoms, Hyman!
Comment by Shy Guy — October 7, 2008 @ 11:33 pm
In 2009 with a new president, a really new president, finally we will say HALLELUJAH,HALLELUJAH.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh7ZaNQw7Jg
Comment by h peskin — October 8, 2008 @ 3:55 am
HALLELUJAH?
…
more onmoron moral relativism -Comment by elvis — October 8, 2008 @ 8:37 am
Peskin,
I am a pinko? I hide my true views with a right wing veneer?
Very colorful and very pointless Peskin, but I am interested to know where you think so characterizing me will get you?
In your closing, you stated that, “as a fellow Canadian you must maintain some separation from the Yankee riff raff”. What precisely do you mean by riff raff and why as a Canadian do you say that I must maintain some separation from them?
Comment by Bill Narvey — October 8, 2008 @ 8:44 am
Elvis baby: After last nite’s debate, the new poll numbers, the worsening and ever widening economic crises, for McCain( Bush 3) its game over-its closing time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrPEM2qc-j8
Comment by h peskin — October 8, 2008 @ 2:49 pm
Narvey:
On an absolute scale your views would be regarded as quite conservative. However by Israpundit standards, where every second post calls for for more wars and violence, your stance represent a liberal (or call it pinko) position.
With regard to the use of the words American Riff raff, always keep in mind that as a Canadian your level of civility, culture and way of life is on a much higher plane than your American cousins.
No where is it written in the Canadian constitution, that it is the G-d given right of each citizen to possess a weapon of the calibre of an AK47 or higher.
Canada does not feel that it is necessary to circle the globe with military bases. Nor do we engage in wars every few years. Our culture is not full of violence, decadence,
Our crime rate is a mere fraction of that of the U.S.
We don’t have a history of slavery,or the wholesale slaughter of our native population.
We never dropped a single nuclear bomb, nor did we use poison gas (agent orange) in any of our military engagements,
Bill, please remember all of that and stand in solidarity with myself in having pride in being a Canadian
and if you think I am being perhaps a bit too colourful in my language, You wrote,
In you I see a slack jawed toothless big mouth whose cranial hard drive needs some defragmentation and his mouth could use something to stem the tide of verbal diarhea.
So H. Peskin, you had your say, I had mine and just where does that leave things between us?
You are quite out of synch with reality. Give your head a shake. If you can come down to earth, maybe you can manage to avoid confusing me with some other Bill Narvey you invented whose words you have also invented, but which words are definitely are not mine.
Comment by Bill Narvey — May 29, 2008 @ 9:37 pm
Comment by h peskin — October 9, 2008 @ 9:25 pm