Palin, in her Wednesday night vice presidential acceptance speech, had the throngs of delegates chanting "Zero! Nada! Zero!" in response to her demand to know Obama's achievements. "Two memoirs and not a single major bill" was the way she summed up his record... Democrats insist that she distorted the picture... But the ethics, health care, nuclear proliferation and veterans initiatives for which he takes credit were more routine than headline fare.
-- David Broder,Washington Post, Sept. 5
Oh Really? Less than 5 minutes with my pal Google searching for Obama most important legislation and I have something that shows this "zero" talk is all a LIE and if the so-called "dean of political journalists" ever learns to use the mighty Google, he will know it too.
Forget about the Lugar-Obama Non-proliferation legislation signed into law by Bush. No headline there. It's only after people use nukes that folks care. Fine, then what about this one:
DIGNITY FOR WOUNDED WARRIORS ACT OF 2007.....
Republicans love to talk about the amazing sacrifices of America's men and women in uniform... as long as no one let's the press cover the funerals. There is no question the Republicans have mastered the Dark Art of Forgetting, Ars Oblivionalis. How many times has this administration ordered flags at half-staff for a service member killed in combat? Never. Not once. Zero.
Plenty of governors have had to carry out that terrible task. Gov. Bill Richardson and Gov. John Corzine are notable for having done this routinely. How many times has Sarah Palin? Never. Not once. Zero. Not even for men who hailed from her hometown of Wasilla.
Republicans can get the faithful to cheer deliriously for sanctimonious platitudes about sacrifice, but none of the people who claim to "support the troops" even noticed McCain's backdrop was Walter Reed (ahem)Middle School(ahem), instead of WRAMC. 30 feet tall and completely wrong? That's the sort of cockup you're supposed to catch in rehearsals! What is the response of the McCain campaign to that insulting faux pas? Nothing. Nada. Zero.
But the icing on the cake of their hypocrisy and deceit is the claim by Sarah Palin that "it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform..."
The nation was shocked to learn of the serious problems at Walter Reed Army Medical Center including decaying, cockroach-infested facilities and an overwhelmed patient-care bureaucracy. The series of articles in the Washington Post by Dana Priest and Anne Hull made headlines around the country. I know Broder can't find the Internet with both hands in a well-lit room, but now I wonder if he even reads his own paper.
Unfortunately, this sad state of affairs was not news to people who actually care about the care wounded soldiers receive. That is why almost a year before this became a headline story around the country Barack Obama sponsored a law to address the very concerns raised in these stories.
The Dignity for Wounded Warriors Act of 2007 was not an empty exercise. It was a detailed and pragmatic solution to a very real and complex set of problems.
This was not some quixotic exercise in positioning. That is being ahead of the curve. That is visionary leadership. That is the kind of change we need in Washington. Proposing legislation is one thing. Generating support for it is another. On that front Obama achieved quite a bit as well. That is why the bill has 34 co-sponsors. Joe Biden is a co-sponsor along with dozens of his Democratic colleagues. However, the party that likes to pretend it cares deeply about our troops? Not so much. There are only 3 Republicans co-sponsors on that list, and John McCain is not one of them. As Jack Cafferty notes, that is one reason why "Barack Obama is ahead on the battlefield. More members of the US military are donating to Obama than to the military man, John McCain."
So next time someone asks you how much credibility does John McCain, Rudy Giuliani, Sarah Palin, David Broder, or the corporate media have when they claim that Obama is a lightweight with no experience, you can point to this and tell them: "Zero. Zip. Nada."