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Compendium of Hillary's Dirty Tricks
* Mayhill Fowler, faux-journalist posing as faux-"Obama supporter", desperate to grab a Macaca moment right before the PA primary. A Hillary plant?
*Former Clinton staffer Stephanopolis's tabloid debate, mostly dwelling on McCarthyesque questioning of Obama's patriotism and pushing rightwing talking points, days before the PA primary
*Geraldine Ferraro's 'dog-whistle- affirmative action attacks ahead of PA primary
*Tearing up the day before the New Hampshire primary
* Hillary supporter arranges Rev. Wright's appearance before National Press Club, one week before Indiana and NC primaries
* NOW's false attacks questioning Obama's abortion stance before Super Tuesday
* NAFTA-gate, conservative CA government meddling, which was fact-checked only after the Ohio and Texas primaries
It's worth noting that Clintonista deny all of these and use a strategy of plausible deniability or just muddying the waters (NAFTA, especially). Just like Bushies deny that Bush and Rove ever used dirty tricks against their opponents. Yeah, right. As if anyone believes that Clinton is unwilling to use such tactics or incapable of this sort of scheming and string pulling.
Curiously, there's been little investigative journalism into these little "surprises" that always popup right before primaries that manage to keep Hillary's campaign alive. Bloggers have looked into but Hillary has never paid a price for these ploys which later turn out to be false or misleading, or just ugly. A case in point is Hillary supporter and Obama-critic Barbara Reynolds who was the point person arranging Wright's ill-timed appearance at the NPC. (more at Kos)
So why does hillary get a pass, and the media take each very predictable pre-election "bombshell" at face value?
Comments (24)
I think both the Fowler item and the teary eyed item only serve to water down your list some.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if Fowler's actions were driven by her desire to help Clinton, but she doesn't seem important enough for the Clinton campaign to have taken an active interest in her. I could be wrong, but there's definitely no evidence to support the idea that she was acting on directions from above on that.
And, whether or not the tears were genuine, I'd hardly call them a dirty trick.
Finally, you should have included the recent voter-suppression kerfluffle from WVWV that has her campaign's fingerprints all over it.
May 1, 2008 12:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
The Obama campaign statement that it is "very disturbing" and showed the signs of classic voter suppression is beyond misleading and false. They know who WVWV are and they know it's not a Hillary group. William McNary is on their board. He is one of Obama's personal friends and long time supporters - someone Obama went to when considering his run for Senate and for president. William loves Obama and I know beyond the shadow of a doubt he would not serve on an organization board that was trying to favor Clinton over Obama.
Now, the folks speculating here - they can be excused for being suspicious, but Obama and his campaign know better. There is no excuse for them to make the statement they made. this is an independent GOTV group that he will need in the fall, but hey, why not slander them? This is a classic example of Obama's campaign alleging racism to tarnish Clinton and in this case, it's obvious they know that the allegation is false.
May 1, 2008 2:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
Except that it is very disturbing and does have the hallmarks of classic voter suppression.
How do you explain the lack of caller ID? How do you explain the use of the name Lamont Williams? How do you explain the failure to identify which group it came from? How do you explain the delay in them stepping up and admitting it was them? How do you explain the calls/packets coming right before the primary in state after state after state? How do you explain the misleading information after they'd already been called on it in several states?
One or two of these you could explain as human error, but all of them?
May 1, 2008 7:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ah Ben, you need to look at it in the context of that day. Keith Olbermann, on that day, called her on not just the emotional upheval, though he specifically said she was "not crying at all, but close enough", but also the fear mongering and obvious racial statements that even Josh Marshall titled "No Way". Check it out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BB4Vvgn_4k
May 1, 2008 2:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Your list is like a Seinfeld show...you know, a list about nothing.
May 1, 2008 12:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
These days it's hard to know where standard campaigning ends and dirty tricks begin. Certainly much of Clinton's behavior has been designed to server her ends rather than the Democratic party's.
She and her gang seem convinced (or want to convince us) that whatever wounds are opened during the campaign will heal before the general election.
What else can you make of her appearance on O'Reilly? When asked what she thought of J. Wright, she says, "I'll let the voters decide," as if a vote for Obama is a vote for Wright. John McCain has looked better on this than Clinton.
May 1, 2008 12:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
Perhaps dirty trick doesn't apply to tearing up. But some suspect it was a coached moment to appeal to women. I guess what I am getting at is the clear pattern of pre-election 'surprises' which have the look of a game plan: throw out all sorts of misleading crap that will get sorted out only after the votes. The MSM seems to eat this crap up too, makign it into a "bombshell" that they breathlessly cycle until the election and then drop.
* Yes, I forgot WVWV, which is also plausibly deniable, Josh wondering whether it was a msitake but their repeated violations having all the hallmarks of scheme. (Also worthnoting that HRC cut her teeth campaigning against "voter fraud" in Chicago as a Goldwater girl. Voter fraud being code for minorities voting)
* Also I forgot the "plagiarism" flap (remember that), which miraculously surfaced two days before Wisconsin and disappeared soon after.
* One more: ABC News' video greatest hits of Rev. Wright, was spliced up by trashy rightwing ABC news of course, but Politico hinted that ABC was encouraged to look into the material. Politico didn't say by whom but can we guess? (Hint: GOP would have pushed for this in late October)
May 1, 2008 12:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
What about the WVWV robocalls?
May 1, 2008 1:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good grief!
I generally think Democrats are a bit smarter than Republicans - that's why they're Democrats. Certainly I have been comfortable thinking WE are the reality-based community.
But lately? Sometimes I have to wonder if some of the self-proclaimed Obama supporters in this site really are Democrats, or even Obama supporters. Their idiotic allegations and conspiracies and paranoic ravings aren't part of the reality-based community. They are just plain nuts.
So....let me wander into conspiracy territory for a second and only because it would be so comforting to discover than these paranoid yahoos are really McCain supporters that are trying to tarnish the Obama campaign with idiotic and paranoid fantasies. I'm sure that's not true, but it would be lovely to discover that these raving wackos weren't really Democrats after all.
May 1, 2008 1:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
O give it a rest.
Jesus.
The majority on this board support Obama. It's rather hard to troll a board where you are the majority opinion.
In fact, it's almost impossible.
May 1, 2008 9:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Except some of you Obama supporters are so unhinged you tarnish your fellow supporters. In fact, you are one of the unhinged ones.
Your statement on another thread "I don't care what anyone says...." pretty much says it all. You don't care about facts, honesty or anything except hating on Clinton...so yes, you can be a troll since you have nothing positive to say, just clinton hatred.
Is that what supporting Obama is about? hating someone else? I don't think Obama would say that, but folks like you make it look like a hate-mongering campaign. I know that is not his value system, but that seems to be the values of the majority of his supporters here.
May 2, 2008 2:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Call me jaded, but I think Hillary's tears were semi-authentic. I don't think she's a good enough actress to cry on cue, and she certainly had reason to cry.
But, Hillary is a seasoned politician. She knows how to hold it back. She knows how to be professional.
I believe the tears were real, but she chose to let them show.
May 1, 2008 1:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
How interesting that Rev. Wright is asked to appear before the National Press Club. I wonder if the fact that he had been in the center of the news for weeks beforehand had anything to do with it.
Nah..it has to be Senator Clinton was behind it all.
And you forgot to mention that Senator Obama bowled a gutter ball just days before the PA primary. She had to be behind that also.
Sheesh folks get a grip!
May 1, 2008 1:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm supporting Obama. However, I cannot go there with you regarding Hillary Clinton tearing up in NH. I feel that was a genuine moment. Ofcourse, I still really liked her at that time, but still, that was genuine. She felt something and felt it deeply. I refuse to deny her that emotion. Denying someone their emotional reality is more violent than I'm willing to be.
May 1, 2008 2:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
She also teared up at Yale right before Super Tuesday. Maybe it was genuine, or more likely, she was told to "humanize" herself by her advisors. (And there was an effort to humanize her:
http://althouse.blogspot.com/2007/01/effort-to-humanize-clinton-is-underway.html)
May 1, 2008 2:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Unfortunately, Hillary has proven herself capable of great deceit and few ethics. So nothing is beyond imagination anymore.
The true believer Hillary cultists will believe her hands are clean, even when she is caught redhanded. These are the same ones who claim she didn't really play the race card, they claim she didn't mean anything by "as far as I know" he's not a muslim... They still pretend the Soviet-style elections in MI and FL were legit and that her pledge not to participate there doesn't matter.
Fact is, there is a clear pattern here of kitchen sink tactics and inpportune "surprises" that are linked to Clinton and her supporters. Don't believe me, check the dates! All of these things happen right before crucial primaries, and especially when HRC's back is against the wall.
Either she is incredibly lucky that time and again, these "surprises" just popup to save her, or more, plausibly, she and Bill make a phone call and call in a favor from a surrogate. Or perhaps her big money donors call in favors on her behalf.
Few doubt Hillary's willingness to do anything to win. Few doubt Hillary's capability and connections to pull the strings to have things happen.
So all we are left with is the goodness of Hillary's heart that she would never do such a thing. And nobody believes that!
May 1, 2008 2:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, observer, you could not have pulled a worse example than the "as far as I know" comment to make your case. Any honest and decent person seeing that entire segment with that idiotic reporter asking the same question again and again would completely acquit her of any malice there. Anyone who sees this as malicious is not worth talking to because they would say up is down and north is south in order to slander her.
“You don't believe that Senator Obama's a Muslim?” Kroft asked Sen. Clinton.
“Of course not. I mean, that, you know, there is no basis for that. I take him on the basis of what he says. And, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that,” she replied.
“You said you'd take Senator Obama at his word that he's not…a Muslim. You don't believe that he's…,” Kroft said.
“No. No, there is nothing to base that on. As far as I know,” she said.
“It's just scurrilous…?” Kroft inquired.
“Look, I have been the target of so many ridiculous rumors, that I have a great deal of sympathy for anybody who gets, you know, smeared with the kind of rumors that go on all the time,” Clinton said.
May 1, 2008 2:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
I see ABC's Nightline is doing yet another warm and fuzzy, just before a primary election profile, of HRC this evening. Cynthia McFadden is so in the tank for Clinton, I fully expect to see her conducting the 'promo' donned in Hillary 08 campaign swag.
May 1, 2008 2:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yep. With less than a week left I predict, based on every other time Hillary was up against the wall:
* Fuzzy, softball, pro-Hillary media appearances - softball Fox interviews, Hillary-friendly SNL skits, maybe some CNN-People fuzz piece on Hillary's roots. For equal time, I'm sure they'll do some Obama-Expose sometime after May 6.
* Kitchen sink "allegations" which will bantered about sans evidence 24-7 and finally fact-checked on May 7th.
* Rogue Clinton surrogates saying some controversial racial remarks that will get all sorts of attention. This will aid their race-divide strategy
* Ugly negative ad, maybe with a leering Osama bin Laden mixed up with Rev. Wright's speeches? Then the MSM will breathlessly repeat The Ad over and over for free.
May 1, 2008 3:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
LOL. Hillary had to be asked three times and still managed to hedge her answer with "as far as I know" and "I don't believe". A clear answer without the hedging would have been enough. Why hedge? The result was offensive to many, and at least appeared to be racist.
So either she is an incompetent moron who can't answer questions clearly without offending people or she's malicious. Which is it? If she's so competent as her supporters claim, then malice is the only possibility. Otherwise, she's just a terrible clwon of a politician who "accidently" appears to be racist over and over again.
Worse, her campaign was already caught red handed spreading muslim rumors:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/foreign/tobyharnden/dec07/obama-muslim.htm
Here's she implies that she's a real American as opposed to the vaguely foreign Obama:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-hbPmcMFxU
In debates, she's brought up McCarthyesque charges about various black and leftist "radicals" who she tries to associate Obama with. And this garbage from a Democrat. For shame.
May 1, 2008 4:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
Her first answer was OF COURSE NOT!
Doesn't get any clearer than that. It's idiotic to spin this into racism. You just dilute any legitimate claims you may have to make to work so hard on such an illegitimate one.
May 1, 2008 4:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
Of course that's wrong, she did not answer that:
It was "“Of course not." and then she had to throw in all sorts of caveats: "I mean, that, you know, there is no basis for that." But that wasn't enough, she continued: "I take him on the basis of what he says." Take on the basis of what he says??? " And, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that" LOL
Imagine a conversation where Obama was asked if he believed that Hillary had killed Vince Foster and he said "I take her word for it. There';s no real reason to doubt this. As far as I know".
But then you go all 'concern trolly' on us:
I didn't see any mention from you about legitimate claims. Instead you repeatedly cast doubt on any and all HRC wrong doing and blame Obama for HRC dirty tricks:
So, sorry, I don't believe you find any criticism of HRC dirty tricks legitimate.
May 1, 2008 5:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
In what world does "there is no basis for that." imply anything other than of course he is not a muslim.
That's not a caveat. That is a reiteration. She is emphasizing even more strongly that he is not muslim. only in Bizarro world would anyone argue that is implying something else.
May 2, 2008 2:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Except that isn't what she said.
May 1, 2008 9:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
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