Barrack Obama - 100 years of *fill in the blank*
Obama and his campaign (along with Hillary!) have been making much of John McCain using the term 100 years in regard to Iraq. The claim being that McCain is ok with war lasting 100 years. But in a case of perhaps hell is seeing a cold front, some in the media are saying that isn't fair. This brings us to Obama being asked about it on the Today Show recently.
I'll start with the following clip (thanks to HotAir).
Now of course this has been edited and it needs to be noted that Obama actually was referring to seeing what McCain had to say on youtube, not to his own remarks on the matter. Some may think that saves Obama from the charge of dishonesty. I say, not so fast.
Let's consider the exchange.
Meredith reads what Frank Rich has to say:
REALLY, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton should be ashamed of themselves for libeling John McCain. As a growing chorus reiterates, their refrains that Mr. McCain is “willing to send our troops into another 100 years of war in Iraq” (as Mr. Obama said) or “willing to keep this war going for 100 years” (per Mrs. Clinton) are flat-out wrong.
Fred R. Conrad/The New York TimesWhat Mr. McCain actually said in a New Hampshire town-hall meeting was that he could imagine a 100-year-long American role in Iraq like our long-term presence in South Korea and Japan, where “Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed.” (source)
[...]
She then asks Obama, "are you willing to admit that you distorted his statements?" which then has Obama saying that's just not accurate we can pull it up on video. As I noted, if one checks the full Today Show interview, Obama is saying this about McCain's statements not his own, though the above video appears to show otherwise. That doesn't help him though. Let's bullet point the problems.
- He dodges the actual question.
- He strongly implies that video will show McCain does favor a 100 year war.
- He then ignores what he implied about the video of McCain's comments.
- Finally, he shifts to talking about McCain wanting 100 or more years of occupation, rather than what the question was actually about.
Rather slick that, but still dishonest in my book.
Perhaps some true believers will hold on to the fact that Obama didn't deny he ever said that about McCain, though it be only by shifty evasion and deception by which he manages to avoid that in this interview.
Unfortunately for Obama his entire campaign isn't so glib and comfortable with deceptive language as he is.
on MSNBC, Obama senior strategist David Axelrod said Obama "is not saying that Sen. McCain said we'd be at war for 100 years." (source)
Now watch that video again.
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Filed under: Iraq -- NewsPolitics
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