Further, I thought the essence of Swiftboating was that it attacked the target’s perceived strength. Kerry’s Vietnam service was a central part of his campaign, and Obama isn’t running as “the candidate who supports same-sex marriage.”
NO, the people who sat around describing it, without replaying it, torpedoed him.
I remember it being described as a complete psycopathic breakdown, a deranged rant, and much much more.
This probably isn’t that damaging, except that it reinforces the narrative that Obama is liberal and an unknown quantity. How much damage it will do will depend on how much fear there is that Obama is too liberal for the country.
As an analogy - if some idiot hung a swastika at McCain’s headquarters, it probably wouldn’t be a big deal. No one associates McCain with anything represented by a Swastika, so he’d issue a routine denunciation, and that would be that. But if say Pat Buchanan was somehow the frontrunner and a staffer hung a swastika in his offices, there would be hell to pay because the episode would play to people’s fears about the candidate.
The big question is whether or not the Che Guevera thing resonates with people’s fears about Obama. I have no idea.
What could happen is that Obama might have to come out and say something strongly anti-communist and/or anti Che Guevera, like telling people he thought the man was a murderous thug (which he was). That could alienate the whack-job wing of his base and cost him a little bit. On the other hand, it might actually help him with independents and blue-collar Democrats if he said something like that.
So probably not a big deal, but something that may have to be addressed by Obama. It could do some damage to him in Florida among the ex-pat Cuban community, though.
I agree that it’s no big deal for Obama. But I do wonder at times what it will take for leftists to look at Guevara with a critical eye.
The man clearly isn’t someone who should be plastered on T-shirts, his “iconic” image be damned.
The few leftists (there aren’t very many in the US) that you see going around with the Che shirts are doing it as a fashion statement and the truth is that most of them don’t actually know anything about the guy.
Nobody with any intelligence thinks that Obama is secretly a radical, Marxist terrorist and the leap from mainstream American liberalism (which is right of center everywhere else in the world) to revolutionary, South American Marxism can only be made by those who are being intentionally disingenuous.
There is no statistically significant Che Guevera faction in his base, I assure you and there is nothing in Obama’s background which makes a connection to that kind of radicalism the least bit credible. He would not lose any votes by disavowing any affection for Che. It wouldn’t be a risk, any more than McCain or Huckabee disavowing the Klan would cost them any votes.
I wonder if anyone in the McCain or Hucabee campaigns have any Confederate flags in their offices. Hmmm…I bet we could find a crazy volunteer somewhere and then pretend that it feeds into “fears” about the candidate.
You never heard of “black Irish”? 
Coming in third in Iowa had nothing to do with it?
History-challenged college students =/= “leftists”
I consider my own college political beliefs and actions to be slightly embarrassing today. My current political beliefs are much more nuanced and (usually) not so disturbingly earnest and humor-impaired. I would think that is at least a common (if not universal) experience.
I have never seen an adult Democrat/liberal/progressive over the age of about 23 wearing an image of Che Guevera on their clothing/backpack/scarf (after app. 1973, anyway).
I showed up to my first day of law school with a Che shirt, shorts, flip flops and really long hair…less than ten years ago. That was after having served six years in the US Army which included a tour in Iraq. The image of Che does not necessarily mean support for his ideology but simply his defiance of the status quo. He gave up a comfortable life to fight what he believed was injustice. Agree with him or not many admire his courage and willingness to suffer for his ideals.
Turns out the office isn’t even an official headquarters for his campaign. It’s an office set up by outside volunteers. Cite .
Another thing to consider is that the bulk of the American public doesn’t have the slightest idea who Che is.
Not to mention his willingness to make others suffer for his ideals.
If you mean the sell out troops employed by a tin horn dictator propped up by the US determined to expropriate the wealth of a small island nation for the benefit of a few fatcats and mafiosi, then yeah I admire his willingness to make them suffer. But I digress…
Maybe this is just the preliminary step, and later they’ll drop the first A as well.
Does that make McCain space ghost?
The people he shot - what about their suffering? What about their ideals? And mind you - these weren’t battlefield deaths, but for the most part what amounted to executions without trial.
Anyway, I agree that an ignorance of history is behind this - but I wonder why so many are ignorant of this? Surely it isn’t because movies like The Motorcycle Diaries never mention it, eh?
How old was the woman opening the office, anyway.
How many Torries were executed between 1776 and 1788, won’t somebody think of them? Maybe you don’t because it wasn’t shown in the movie The Patriot…
One mans freedom fighter is another mans terrorist, try to remember that Moto when you claim others are ignorant of history. You don’t have a monopoly on truth. Hell IMHO you wouldn’t recognize truth if it fucked you in the ass.
That might be true.
Che wasn’t fighting for freedom, though, was he?
He thought he was. Just like you do.