Last Night on Dan Abrams, the program after Olbermann, Rep Jack Kingston went on the air and managed to repeat the Patriotrism Smears against Obama which have been circulating the internet, and then proclaims that it's not an attack, it's just a "little banter".
On MSNBC’s Live With Dan Abrams last night, Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA) said it was okay to "question" Sen. Barack Obama’s (D-IL) patriotism because he doesn’t regularly wear an American flag lapel pin. Kingston claimed that "everybody" in politics "wears them."
The funny thing about this, besides the smug little "I've just discovered Kryptonite" smile on Kingston's face, is the fact that while he's attacking Obama for not wearing a flag lapel pin - he himself isn't wearing a flag lapel pin!
There's just a bunch of things that Kingston gets completely wrong in this beside his own hypocracy about the pin that Abrams doesn't catch him on.
Kingston: His reason for not wearing the pin is convoluted.
Obama: "You know, the truth is that right after 9/11, I had a pin," Obama said. "Shortly after 9/11, particularly because as we’re talking about the Iraq War, that became a substitute for I think true patriotism, which is speaking out on issues that are of importance to our national security, I decided I won’t wear that pin on my chest.
"Instead," he said, "I’m going to try to tell the American people what I believe will make this country great, and hopefully that will be a testimony to my patriotism."
"You show your patriotism by how you treat your fellow Americans, especially those who serve. And you show your patriotism by being true to your values and ideals. And that’s what we have to lead with, our values and ideals," Obama said.
This isn't "convoluted" - Obama is taking a stand against false patriotism - which is exactly what Kingston in presenting.
Kingston also flat out lies:
"Obama won't say the Pledge of Allegiance"
Except for the fact that the picture in question that has been shown around the net, which even my mother receiving a copy from a co-worker who claimed it was "scary", isn't of the pledge of allegiance, it was a picture taken during the national anthem, and there's really isn't a requirement for people to have their hand over their heart during the national anthem.
The photograph was taken on September 16, 2007, at Senator Tom Harkin's annual steak fry festivities in Iowa, an important ritual for Democratic presidential hopefuls. Contrary to the e-mails attacking Obama for disrespecting the flag, the candidates were not reciting the pledge of allegiance. They were standing for the national anthem.
It's an option, but it's not a requirment.
Plus there are pictures of Obama singing the national anthem and he does have his hand over his heart.
kingston says that Michelle Obama should come out and explain that she doesn't hate America, but then again why should she do that since she made it perfectly clear exactly what she was proud of in the first place - all you need to do is pay complete attention.
"What we have learned over this year is that hope is making a comeback. It is making a comeback. And let me tell you something -- for the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country. And not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change. And I have been desperate to see our country moving in that direction and just not feeling so alone in my frustration and disappointment. I've seen people who are hungry to be unified around some basic common issues, and it's made me proud."
Kingston: It's just banter, but it works. Apparently it's like scratching fingernails on the chalkboard to the leftists to say "Barack Hussein Obama".
Well it's not like that to me for two reasons because I've known the name "Hussein" mostly in reference to King Hussein of Jordon our long-time ally in the middle east. Second there is the fact that his name is actually Barack Hussein Obama Jr., Kingston is using that hame to attack his Kenyan father not our current democratic front-runner.
So what do we have so far? Obama will say the Pledge of Allegiance, no one, has provided evidene to the contrary. He sometimes wears a flag lapel-pin when he feels like it (just like Kingston and for that matter - John McCain), he will put his hand over his heart during the National Anthem, his wife was proud that for the first time "people were being unified around some basic common issues", and there's nothing wrong with having "Hussein" as your middle name.
But that isn't all the right-wing is coming after Obama for - not by a long shot.
Real Time w/ Bill Marr featuring David Frum, Jack kingston & Matt Taiibe
Frum attacks Obama over the idea of meeting with not just our friend but our enemies.
He's been drinking his own bath-water, he thinks he will apply that "Obama Magic" to meeting our enemies.
Well it's not like John Kennedy met with Krushchev, or Nixon went to China or Reagan talked to Gorbachev. It's not like any of those efforts helped turn some of those "enemies" into friends.
Except that they did, eventually.
Barack is offering a genuine different approch to governing, which does include reaching out across the isle - or across the ocean - but also means defying meaningless convention - like flag-pins, and refusing to Talk to people as if having a conversation is itself some kind of concession.
Frankly, there isn't a single thing here the Kingston gets right - not one. He claims that Obama has "never accomplished anything" in the Senate or attempted to "reach across the isle" - except of course for the Ethics Bill and the Lugar-Obama Bill to fight weapons proliferation and the... oh, you get the picture. He's yet again playing the Fear Card, the only one in the Republican Deck. But it appears that Kingston and his fellow cohorts in terror such as Bill Cunningham, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity are going to have to put forth these smears - without the aid of John McCain.
In Ohio yesterday, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) appropriately apologized after right-wing talk radio host Bill Cunningham opened his campaign rally by pejoratively referring to Sen. Barack Obama’s middle name Hussein while calling him "a hack." "I did not know about these remarks, but I take responsibility for them. I repudiate them," McCain told reporters.
McCain’s repudiation stung Cunningham, who bellowed against the senator on his show later in the day. Cunningham claimed McCain "threw me under the bus for the national media" and then said that he would now "throw" his "support behind Hillary Clinton."
Right-wing radio host Mark Levin, who also blogs for National Review, called McCain a "loser" for distancing himself from Cunningham’s caustic comments. Listen to it:
Because he won’t stoop to their low rhetorical level, right-wing radio is now telling McCain that he can "say good-bye to any hope of winning over the conservative base." Apparently McCain doesn’t have enough hate for "hate radio."
So much for the post New York Time Lobbying Story after-glow.... McCain's honeymoon with the Radical Reich-wing seems to be over already.
If Barack does become the Democratic nominee, we will see many more of these attacks - but if John McCain continues to repudiate them we just might actually see something else. We just might see these types of cheap smear and phony patriotism reduced to the dustbin of history where they belong.
Patriotism isn't about symbols, it's about action! It's not about whether you put your hand over your heart, it's about whether you'll take a bullet for your buddy - whether you put your hand over their wounds to staunch the bleeding, whether you'll help take that bullet OUT of him by making sure HE HAS HEALTHCARE TOO - it's about whether you'll fight for you're fellow American - your fellow man - not just who you'll fight against.
We have to remember that Kingston and Frum are part of the party that distributed purple-heart band-aids in order to denegrate the service of a man who won the Silver Star and the Bronze Star.
These are the people that attacked children for daring to want health care - gleefully.
These are the people who let an entire American City Drown, then Rot with neglect.
I Got Yer FLAG RIGHT HERE, Kingston!
And where were Bush and McCain while this was going on? Obviously doing their patriotic duty... by having a party. (Can you tell who has a flag-pin and who doesn't in this photo?)
These people don't have the slightest clue what Real Patriotism is.
But Barack does.
"You show your patriotism by how you treat your fellow Americans, especially those who serve. And you show your patriotism by being true to your values and ideals."
Patriotism is being true to your values and ideals, it's not doing your best to copy the tactics of the Khmer Rouge with Waterboarding and wearing a flag-pin while you do it.
Waterboarding Table used by the Khmer Rouge
Of Course they're going to come after Obama on these kinds of issues, because they think it's a "winner" for them, but it's not. This is all that the right-wing can try to do against him - and so I say - Bring It On - Beeyotches
Bring it On.
Vyan
