I don't do a rec beg often, but given how much the right is pushing this right now, I'm gonna ask you to PLEASE RECOMMEND this diary.
A few hours ago over on FARK, someone posted a link to a "NewsBusters" story (it's sort of an attempt at a right-wing version of Media Matters, except with a lot of epic FAIL), about an interview with the father of the soldier Obama referenced Friday night during his own "bracelet" story.
The gist of the story is that the father (Brian Jopek) of the soldier, Sgt. Ryan Jopek of Wisconsin, claims that Ryan's mother, Tracy Jopek, is now opposed to Obama "exploiting" her son's death by telling the story, supposedly told Obama to stop using her sons' name on the campaign trail, and is presumably livid that he told the story again during the debate Friday night.
I was gonna blow this off, figuring that the less coverage the better, but if you check FARK and DIGG right now, you can see that the Freeper types are trying to push this story HARD--they've submitted it like a dozen times in the past few hours. They're gonna try to make this a new smear on Obama being "opportunistic", being "disrespectful to the soldiers' families" bla bla bla, so it seemed appropriate to give a heads-up.
Now, it's conceivable that this is the case, and that Obama was being a bit insensitive. HOWEVER, there's a lot of reason to believe that things aren't as this wingnut source claims.
First of all, the radio interview in question is with the father, not the mother--she's never quoted directly, so we can't be certain what her views actually are. He also claims that the mother is now refusing to do any further interviews on the topic whatsoever, which conveniently means that there's no way of confirming or denying what her true feeling are these days--or whether or not she ever informed Obama of her change of heart.
Secondly, the couple is now divorced, so the ex-husbands' claims about what his ex-wife's views on the subject are should be taken with a large grain of salt.
Third, the original story about the mother, Tracy, giving Obama the wristband on February 15, certainly makes it seem like she wanted him to tell her story to as many people as possible:
"I wanted him to know my son's name for one thing, for when he's commander in chief," Mrs. Jopek said during a telephone interview in which she frequently grew emotional. She said she was somewhat uncomfortable getting so publicly involved in the war debate, but felt the issue was too important for her to remain silent during this campaign.
She said she's a Democrat who will vote for Obama in Wisconsin's primary Tuesday. Like Obama, she said she was against the war from the start and had a hard time watching her son go to war.
"My son loved this country very much, I love this country, but I don't feel that staying in Iraq will vindicate my son's death," she said. "And it's not over for us until this war is over. I just don't want any more soldiers to die in vain for something that we can't solve."
Mrs. Jopek said she's a "political junkie" who was once watching a press conference on television and noticed likely GOP nominee John McCain wearing a similar bracelet.
In other words, the whole reason she gave him the bracelet was specifically for him to counter McCain's own "bracelet tale" that he'd been telling for months.
Fourth, I ran a quick search, and it appears that as late as May 10 (at least), she still had no problem with Obama telling her story at rallies/townhalls/etc:
Tracy Jopek, who lives in Merrill, has been an Obama backer since the Illinois senator announced his candidacy for president last year.
"I believe he will lead us in the right direction, he will tell us the truth and be upfront and honest with us," says Jopek.
She continues to choke up when Obama mentions her Ryan on the campaign trail, as the presumptive Democratic nominee frequently does.
"To know that he does know his name," Jopek says of the senator and her son. "It means a lot."
In other words, she had no problem with him telling the story at every rally and townhall meeting from February through May (or possibly even longer), throughout the most intensely followed primary in recent memory, with news coverage galore, but somehow decides between then and Friday that she "doesn't want to be in the spotlight" anymore?
I suppose it's possible that after 3-4 months of having her story told to thousands of people (or millions, including those who watched Obama events on TV/the web) it's conceivable that she grew weary of the attention, but this doesn't sound kosher to me. She said early on that she wasn't "comfortable" about the attention but that her tale was too important. So she's gonna do a 180 at the very moment that her story will have the most relevance in the entire campaign--at the very moment that anti-Iraq war Obama blasts warmonger McCain with it, in front of 80 million viewers? I don't buy it.
Sounds to me like the father just has a completely different POV than the mother and is presuming to speak for her.
NOTE: I'll be out for most of the rest of the day, so I won't be able to post any updates on this, but feel free to post any additional info/links/etc in the comments and I'll be happy to update it tonight (assuming that the diary is still being read by then, of course).