:rolleyes: Speaking of strawmen . . . You know perfectly well only RWs actually call him that.
The notion that saying nothing suppresses speculation is silly. A brusque refusal to say “No” is almost certain to lead to speculation that the true answer may be different.
Do you not see a difference between the likely consequences of what was reported in the linked article vs. saying “We are looking into the matter and feel that premature comment might be unhelpful.” ?
Emanuel is often described as a “consumate political insider”. Can he plausibly claim not to understand how reporters react to various types of statements?
Huh? Strawman? You must have eaten a tainted brain there BG.
I ask again for you to point out the straws that this thread would suggest I’m grasping at. I’m sure it wasn’t the one I admitted to.
The straw you are grasping at, desperately and feebly, is the negligible possibility that Obama might actually have done something illegal or to his own discredit in connection with the Blago business.
Illegal … no. I doubt that very much.
To his own discredit? In your eyes… once again, no.
In others’ eyes… the blubbering answer he gave just a few minutes ago has already done that I’m sure.
But that’s Obama… I didn’t mean this to focus on him anyway.
No, I don’t think that’s the case. Most people seem to realize this is not Obama’s problem and his people didn’t do anything wrong. At this point I think you’re just hoping they’ll misunderstand the situation. Or perhaps you think everybody’s as eager for him to screw up as you are, which does not appear to be true.
:dubious: On whom, then?
What “blubbering answer” did Obama give in your alternate universe? You’re not talking about the statement he gave that he’d been asked by the feds to wait another week before he made public his list of innocuous contacts with the Illinois Governor’s office, do you?
If you have a specific accusation to make, then make it.
I think it’s become apparent that Obama had nothing to do with the Govenor selling the Senate seat. That one of his representatives may have spoken to the Govenor is not indicia that they were involved in bribery. Indeed, it seems clear from the tapes that they only thing the Obama camp may have been offering is gratitude. Nothing else.
Of course, as the great harbringer of change one can ask why Obama did absolutely nothing in Illinois and was either silent or beholden to the Daley clan but that’s a different discussion. It’s very clear, imo, that he had nothing to do with Blago’s effort to sell the seat.
See Post #1
Not buyin’ it.
Sadly, “specific accusations” have been a losing proposal so far, and “guilt by association” hasn’t gained much traction either.
We’re down to the backup arsenal now. Sure, Obama appears clean… but only through bent rules, the sycophancy of an adoring media, and sophisticated camera trickery!
Today’s fractured right, raised to understand that “integrity” only exists as a veneer to conceal one’s actual designs, can only view him with suspicion; their language permits nothing else.
Let us not paint with too wide a brush. I do not believe that the “Right,” fractured or otherwise, is totally lacking in integrity or an understanding of integrity. There are certainly people on the Right for whom integrity is a hollow word. (The most important thing is sincerity. Once you can fake that, you’ve got it made.) I’m sure that we could also find people on the Left, the middle, and outside political discourse who share that characteristic.
I suspect that it would be better to simply note that various individuals of various political (or non-political) beliefs seem to lack a basic understanding of integrity, (along with many other things), without turning this discussion into a political feud.
I think it’s fair to say that as far as the right wing media demagogues go (and a good percentage of their audience), the appearance of integrity by anyone on the left – especially by a Democratic POTUS – can never be accepted as genuine, but must be interpreted as a mask or a smokescreen for more nefarious motives. The possibility of a “liberal” POTUS having authentic integrity results in too much cognitive dissonance.
True. However, if the left could come up with similarly effective demagogues, the same situation would occur in reverse. (In fact, if you concentrate on blogs instead of AM radio, you can find exactly the same sort of silly beliefs among the Left toward the Right.)
I am just trying to head off any “Right vs Left” poo flinging in this thread. We have enough of that, (and enough posters of both political persuasions and similar tunnel vision), that I have to read too much of it, now, and it is really not pertinent to this discussion. What the … !!! has firmly established his or her credentials as an Obama hater, regardless of his or her political persuasion and I do not see any of the other posters from the Right jumping in with support for the silly accusations of the OP, so I see no reason to broaden the poo flinging to include posters who have made no similar statements.
I’m waiting for **What The …!!! **to start insinuating that Hillary must be involved in this mess as well. After all, where did she grow up? Illinois, that’s where! Need I say more?
:dubious: What did you think was the point of this thread?!