18 months ago Republicans (or as they claim, the Clinton campaign) launched the first salvo or Obama's "muslim unbringing" in an article on InsightMag.com
On the January 19 editions of their radio programs, conservative talk show hosts Melanie Morgan, Lee Rodgers and Rush Limbaugh, as well as Fox News' John Gibson on the same day's edition of The Big Story, forwarded the accusation, originally published on the website InsightMag.com, that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) was responsible for spreading information about Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) -- specifically, that Obama "spent at least four years in a so-called Madrassa or Muslim seminary, in Indonesia." The article, bearing the headline "Hillary's team has questions about Obama's Muslim background," asserted that "researchers connected to Senator Clinton" disclosed the "details of Mr. Obama's Muslim past." Despite acknowledging near the end of his show that it "[d]oesn't seem" that "Hillary's fingerprints [are] on the story," Gibson said earlier in that program that "[t]he New York senator has reportedly outed Obama's madrassa past." MediaMatters.org--Jan 19, 2007
To be fair to Clinton-
None of the four radio or television hosts cited any evidence that Clinton was responsible for promoting the madrassa story, beyond the InsightMag.com article, which cited no one by name. Medimatters.org-Jan 19, 2007
I bring this up because for all the fawning we do on the strategic genius of the campaign, and believe me it is. For all the amazement we have regarding his internet financial campaign and bringing Presidential elections into the 21st century, it has been 18 months since this story broke and the still havent been able to fix it. No matter how many times he is on the record, he still cant put this rumor, not a smear, to bed. A smear implies that there is something terrible or wrong about being Muslim. Then last week we heard about the Muslim women who were not allowed by unpaid Obama volunteers to sit behind Obama (read: on camera)
Two Muslim women at Barack Obama’s rally in Detroit on Monday were barred from sitting behind the podium by campaign volunteers seeking to prevent the women’s headscarves from appearing in photographs or on television with the candidate. Politico.com--Jun 18, 2008
OK I can live with that. They were volunteers, at worst, maybe they were just doing what they were told by some guy 6 levels below Obama on the food chain. I thought is was just a dumb move by 2 volunteers. Then this involving Congressman Keith Ellison (MN-5th, D)
Mr. Ellison, a first-term congressman, remains arguably the senator’s most important Muslim supporter. He has attended Obama rallies in Minnesota and appears on the campaign’s Web site. But Mr. Ellison said he was also forced to cancel plans to campaign for Mr. Obama in North Carolina after an emissary for the senator told him the state was "too conservative." Mr. Ellison said he blamed Mr. Obama’s aides — not the candidate himself — for his campaign’s standoffishness.
Huh? Now I start to wonder. Why is this still an issue? How can a campaign, any campaign, just manage to let any rumor, no matter how big, small, true or false fester like moldy bread in the bread box for A YEAR AND A HALF. Why didnt they put Keith Ellison, one of Obama's earliest supporters out front of this issue back in January 2007? Why are they playing into the hands of the Republicans (once they drop the cash and oil from those same hands) with this seemingly aloof view for the Muslim community. Do they not see that while he may condemn the fearmongering tactics of those who subscribe to the 1% Doctrine, the past week his campaign volunteers and workers are contributing to the very same tactical strategy. Did they just think that it would go away? For all of the speeches Obama has given and will give, no matter how great they are or how many people his spoken word inspire, why hasnt he just said something like this
"Myself, I am not a Muslim. There is nothing wrong with people who practice Islam. I understand how Muslims have been depicted in the media during the last 8 years and I'm here to see that it is stopped. You cannot classify and entire group of people based on the actions of a few bad apples." Or like the infamous Seinfeld Episode "The Outing" where the now famous line is uttered, "not that there is anything wrong with that".
OR
maybe they thought 3 straight months of Obama Trinity BAPTIST Church coverage, invloving his angry CHRISTIAN Pastor, not Imam, Wright would be enough to quell all the muslim rumors. 10% of the American public, 30 million, believe this still. Something tells my not only children are getting left behind, so are those tasked with choosing the next POTUS. But the Obama campaign is not helping themselves at all with these 2 gaffes in the space of less than a week