Jake Tapper writes that while much of what Jerome Corsi writes in his book Obama Nation is not true, Barack Obama is overreaching when he says that it’s all a bunch of lies.
Much of what Corsi writes in his book is demonstrably false, irresponsible, and feverishly conjured. The book is indefensible, as are Corsi’s many bigoted remarks about Arabs, the Pope and others.
But the Obama campaign got a little greedy in their refutations.
First of all, on the front of the response, is a labeled stamped “Brought to you by Bush/Cheney Attack Machine.”
Corsi has actually called for the impeachment of President Bush. Corsi’s a 9/11 Truther who thinks the Bush administration is covering up what “really” happened at the World Trade Center. It’s not fair to blame this nasty screed on the President.
One item the Obama campaign labels a “LIE” is the claim that when Obama ran for state senator, “(i)nstead of stepping aside in deference to (then-state senator Alice) Palmer, Obama decided to fight her for the nomination.”
This is not a lie, this is true. Palmer had decided to run for Congress, and Obama was tapped to run to replace her. When Palmer lost in the primary, she wanted to stay as a state senator. Obama said no. He had every right to do so, but he decided to fight her for the nomination instead of stepping aside in deference to her.
Nonetheless, the Obama campaign calls it a lie and quotes a state representative who said Palmer “pulled her own plug”
Read more about what really happened HERE in the Chicago Tribune.
Speculating about how Obama ended up using the words of Gov. Deval Patrick in some of his speeches, Corsi speculates that Obama strategist David “Axelrod most likely liked how the speech worked with his client in Massachusetts and so decided to try it once again with Obama, perhaps thinking no one would notice.”
Corsi has no way of knowing that, but the Obama campaign’s response — “REALITY: PLAGIARISM ATTACK WAS A “BASELESS AND DESPERATE PLOY” – is over the top.
As backup, the Obama campaign points out that writing in The Nation, Ari Melber wrote that “The Clinton Campaign’s attack on Obama’s use of the line ‘just words’ was widely panned as a baseless and desperate ploy. Her coverup might go over even worse.”
But that’s one man’s opinion.
Certainly it’s not “baseless” to question why Obama was using Patrick’s words as his own without crediting him, as we wondered about HERE.
Whatever you think of the incident, it doesn’t belong alongside the more unhinged Corsi smears, however much the Obama campaign would like it to be considered a non-event.
In another refutation, Corsi’s assertion that Obama adviser Air Force General Merrill ‘Tony’ McPeak (Ret.) has “anti-Israel views” is characterized by the Obama campaign as “SMEARING MCPEAK AS AN ANTI-SEMITE.”
Obviously holding anti-Israel views and being an anti-Semite are not the same thing (though they often go hand in hand.) But more to the point, plenty of Israel supporters have thought McPeak’s views on Israel — in which he seemed to blame the stalled Mideast peace process on “pro-Israel” voters in New York and Miami – as highly inflammatory.
It’s true that Jerome Corsi is somewhat of a loon. However, you can’t automatically throw the book out as unreliable because of that. There is quite a lot of truth in Obama Nation. You need to read it with an open mind and try to sort out the wheat from the chaff.
Think about it this way. Even if three quarters of what’s in the book is wrong, there’s enough factual material in the book to give anyone thinking of voting for Barack Obama pause. Why? Because it shows that there’s nothing new and different about Obama. He’s just a typical corrupt Chicago machine politician hiding in a nice suit and a pleasant disposition, no more and no less.
2 Responses
Calling for the impeachment of Bush does not make the man a loon. Many of us accept that there are grounds for the impeachment of Bush for his dereliction in enforcing immigration law (this is just one example). His “truther” position on the World Trade Center is loony, but his main offense seems to be telling the truth about “the one.”
If so much of the book is demonstrably false, then demonstrate it. Simply calling the man a loon, and saying he’s a liar doesn’t cut it. Any one can deal ad hominem. It takes a brain to deal with the arguments he makes, and he did document his claims in the book. Run his footnotes, place them in context, then do battle. Anything else is simply the leftwing way of argument.
I’d bet a dollar to a donut, that the overwhelming majority of what Corsi has to say about Obama is true. He’s made his assertions, and provided the footnotes. The ball is in the opposition’s court to show he lied. So far, they haven’t given it any effort. They’ve just squealed like pigs.
Posted on August 19th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
Well, what I said was that even though Corsi is somewhat of a loon much of what he wrote in his book is correct. And, even if only a small portion of it is true it’s devastating to Obama. My post is not an attack on Corsi or an attempt to disprove anything that he wrote.
Posted on August 21st, 2008 at 3:52 pm
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