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Since 2008 – Progress Through Politics

McLiar–Not in Hillary’s Name!

Last night, John McCain tried to tie his smear campaign against Barack Obama to comments made by Hillary Clinton during the Democratic primary campaign this spring.

“I don’t care about an old washed up terrorist, but as Senator (Hillary) Clinton said in her debates with you, we need to know the full extent of the relationship with you.”

I’m not going to parse, here.  That is a bold-faced lie.

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Hillary never said that Senator Obama’s “relationship” with Bill Ayers needed to be investigated.  She only addressed this issue when she was asked about it and it was only brought up in one debate, their final debate of the primary season, held a week before the Pennsylvania primary.  This is what Hillary actually said:

CLINTON: Well, I think that is a fair general statement, but I also believe that Senator Obama served on a board with Mr. Ayers for a period of time, the Woods Foundation, which was a paid directorship position.

And, if I’m not mistaken, that relationship with Mr. Ayers on this board continued after 9/11 and after his reported comments, which were deeply hurtful to people in New York and, I would hope, to every American, because they were published on 9/11, and he said that he was just sorry they hadn’t done more.

And what they did was set bombs. And in some instances, people died. So it is — I think it is, again, an issue that people will be asking about.

And I have no doubt — I know Senator Obama’s a good man and I respect him greatly, but I think that this is an issue that certainly the Republicans will be raising.

And it goes to this larger set of concerns about how we are going to run against John McCain. You know, I wish the Republicans would apologize for the disaster of the Bush-Cheney years and not run anybody, just say that it’s time for the Democrats to go back into the White House.

Unfortunately, they don’t seem to be willing to do that. So we know that they’re going to be out there, full force.

And, you know, I’ve been in this arena for a long time. I have a lot of baggage, and everybody has rummaged through it for years.

And so, therefore, I have an opportunity to come to this campaign with a very strong conviction and feeling that I will be able to withstand whatever the Republicans send our way.

Senator McCain, if you want this campaign of lies and smears to be your legacy, so be it.  But do not invoke the name of Hillary Clinton to justify your scorched-earth campaign tactics.  What you are doing now is not “country first,” it is “country last.”  Your campaign strategy may endear you to the people who scream “kill him” at Sarah Palin events, but history will make the final judgment.  Senator, if that is of no concern to you, so be it.  But don’t twist the words of Hillary Clinton, a victim of these same kinds of campaign tactics, to justify your dirty tactics.


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/ 13 Comments

13 comments

  1. Peter Jukes

    McCain is trying to rewrite history – in fact apart from the dog whistles to the base, ALL he’s ever really tried to do since the appointment of Palin, is try to peel off supporters of Hillary.

    Good to be reminded of the truth of this moment. In retrospect Hillary was right to mention things the republicans would raise. And by being aired vigorously, often by trolls who were not really Hillary supporters, Obama was inoculated against many of these things in the media.

    I thought she was great last night BTW. Her support for Obama makes a crucial difference

  4. spacemanspiff

    Contrary to many other fellow Obamabots. I’m glad Hillary was tough on Obama. If you haven’t noticed, most of McCain’s attacks are recycled from Penn and Co. They don’t have the bite they would of had if they had never been brought up.

    The ABC debate was a hit job but I’d rather it happen during the primaries than in the last debate of the General Election. It was going to happen anyways. Let’s not pretend these “shady” associations were not going to be brought up by the media smear merchants. Hell, they even nibbled at the Whitey tape and we all know how that turned out.

    So why do some believe she pushed the Ayers bullshit? She was asked. She was always going to be asked. Hillary answered the best way she could while trying to score political points.

    Did she take the middle road (McCain has redefined low) on a couple of ocassions? Of course she did. It’s called politics. Did Barack take the middle road during the primaries? Hell yeah.

    Do you forget the time his campaign forwarded Keith-O’s rant on Hillary and the RFK comparison? They backtracked, but with or without Obama’s consent, the campaign forwarded the video. I’m pretty sure he was pissed when he knew about it because they backtracked in about 10 minutes. Before they knew how anybody would react to it. Somebody high up must of pulled the plug on that one. Which is why I think it was Barack.

    That was the lowest I saw their campaign go. I cringed.

    So yeah, would of I liked for Hillary to defend Obama? Of course!

    Would Obama have defended Hillary in the same situation? Hell no!

    But Hillary never tried to define Obama in a negative light. She did say she was going to vet him and she did. Hillary was thinking about the Democratic party. Sending Obama out after his 13 state sweep would of made it a much bumpier ride for him, and Democrats in general.

    Let’s not kid ourselves. He was not vetted.

    teh Hillaree roxors!

  5. Koan

    former Clinton supporters who are holding out has gone by fits and starts, like he can’t quite bring himself to do it right or, more likely, he’s just not competent at it.  I always thought Palin was a plausible VP pick because the McCain campaign was going to be sure to try and use her to swipe a cut of Clinton’s base, and on the stump she alternates kind of jarringly between making awkward, strained overtures to middle-class women on the one hand and riling up the frothy base of wingers on the other.  The clumsiness with which McCain keeps dropping her name doesn’t resonate well, I would think.

    Speaking of holdouts, Psychodrew, I appreciate your argument better now wrt arguing Roe and the Court as a reason for former Clintonites to vote for Obama.  I had thought that it was pretty much the strongest argument could think of, and though I don’t engage I like to lurk around PUMA sites to see how the dicussion’s going and what people say about those topics.  A diary on riverdaughter today last night, by a purported pro-choicer, commended McCain for saying last night that he thought Roe was wrongly decided and considered judges who support it unqualified, and hated on Obama for agreeing with Roe, warning that only one more justice could overturn it, and being pro-choice.

    The commenters had a pretty intense reaction to the suggestion that the Court is a compelling reason for progressive women to consider voting for Obama.  Like they were against it, really really against it. And I thought, well, Drew was totally right, this would be a bad argument to try to use any time soon.

    I’m gonna go back and rec that diary if I didn’t already.

  6. rfahey22

    He has Palin do most of his dirty work, then hides behind Clinton when he has to do the job himself.  Oh, and who can forget the fact that because Obama didn’t agree to do 5,000,000,000 town halls this fall, that somehow justifies all of the dirty smears that McCain has perpetrated.  He’s such a Republican, he even refuses to take personal responsibility for his own campaign.

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