Nicely done, eriposte. Again, thanks for the research!

Good posting. I like the way you presented and organized the material. The only thing I have to add is that primaries are like root-canals. Necessary, but really painful.

I really try not to engage Clinton supporters, but you're really engaging in some blatant propagandizing here.

Don't believe me? Ask Media Matters--after all you're using the same tactics you decry in Russert when the topic is the candidate you support:

http://mediamatters.org/items/200711110004

"Summary: Interviewing Barack Obama on Meet the Press, Tim Russert read a quote he attributed to Obama to suggest that he has "not been a leader against the [Iraq] war": "In July of 2004, Barack Obama: 'I'm not privy to Senate intelligence reports. ... What would I have done? I don't know,' in terms of how you would have voted on the war." Russert did not quote the very next sentence of Obama's statement, which was, "What I know is that from my vantage point the case was not made" for authorizing the war."

You conveniently ignore the context of the 2004 comments. Rosa Brooks noticed the Clinton surrogates doing this in March:

"The "evidence" — trotted out both by Clinton pollster Mark Penn and by none other than Bill Clinton — consists mainly of a statement Obama made in an interview during the 2004 presidential campaign. The interviewer contrasted Obama's consistent antiwar position with the 2002 votes to authorize the war cast by John Kerry, John Edwards and other Democratic leaders. But when he was asked to speculate on how he would have voted had he been in the Senate in 2002, Obama answered: "What would I have done? I don't know."

Hillary Clinton's campaign has been gleefully crying "gotcha!" about this. But in context, it's clear that Obama was hardly suggesting that his views on Iraq were more ambivalent than he'd originally claimed. Obama sensibly declined to say "I told you so" at the expense of his party's nominees. Instead, he refused to play the interviewer's game and condemn his Democratic colleagues. Unlike them, he noted, he wasn't "privy to the Senate intelligence reports." But, he continued, "What I know is that, from my vantage point, the case [for war] was not made."

That wasn't ambivalence about Iraq, that was simple courtesy, and the Clinton campaign shouldn't try to put a negative spin on it."

You can bet the Clinton campaign is going to pound on this, and disingenuously so. That doesn't mean observers should go along with it, however."

Anyhow, continue on with your decrying of media attacks on Clinton while you mimick them in your attacks on her rivals. Because you're just a noble truthseeker and everything. If only anyone who wasn't in the tank for Clinton or fiercely opposed to Obama and Edwards read your stuff.

Geek Esq.

Looks like you need a reading comprehension lesson again. Obama said two things that were completely consistent and nothing I said in my post changes that or challenges that.

a) He said that based on what *he knew* in the position of NON-US-Senator he opposed the war resolution. I have made it clear he opposed the war in 2002 when he was not a US Senator.

b) He said that if he had read the intelligence reports that he would have received if he had been a US Senator in 2002, he was not sure how he would have voted. This is exactly what I said - that it is unclear how he would have voted if he had been a US Senator - in Congress - at the time, as opposed to being an individual who was not in the Senate. The fact that, once he became a Senator, he voted essentially lock-step with Sen. Clinton on Iraq only reinforces the very valid question of how he might have voted on the resolution if he had been in the position of US Senator at the time.

I am well aware of the Media Matters report and it changes nothing in my observations or analysis. Nice attempt at bait and switch but some of us are a little less susceptible to propaganda than your other readers.

Rosa Brooks noticed the Clinton surrogates doing this in March

That's clever, isn't it? Catchphrases. Anyone who even appears to be defending Hillary is now a "surrogate." What a loaded word.

So, you were aware of the Media Matters article, and decided intentionally to leave out these comments from Obama:

"What I know is that from my vantage point the case was not made. What I don't think was appropriate was the degree to which Congress gave the president a pass on this."

Hmmmm. That kind of clears things up about what he would have done in the Senate, given that the actual intelligence made a less compelling case for war than did the information the administration allowed the public to see.

Russert left it out to deceive the audience and portray Obama's remarks out of context. If he had done that to Clinton, you would have objected. Since he did it to Obama, you mimicked him.

The truth be told, you and Russert differ only in that he is not a supporter of Hillary Clinton.

Furthermore, if you were aware of the Media Matters report, then you also knew about this discussion he had with Wolf Blitzer. Again, I can only assume that you, like your role model Russert, chose not to include it out of a desire to deceive through omission:

BLITZER: Had you been in the Senate when they had a vote on whether to give the president the authority to go to war, how would you have voted?

OBAMA: You know, I didn't have the information that was available to senators. I know that, as somebody who was thinking about a U.S. Senate race, I THINK IT WAS A MISTAKE, AND I THINK I WOULD HAVE VOTED NO.

BLITZER: YOU WOULD HAVE VOTED NO AT THE TIME?

OBAMA: THAT'S CORRECT

As I said above, you should not condemn Russertism and then practice it yourself. Just like you shouldn't pretend that you're goal is to engage in a Sommersbyesque quest to combat media bias rather than advocating for Hillary Clinton.

Geek Esq.

You said:

So, you were aware of the Media Matters article, and decided intentionally to leave out these comments from Obama:
"What I know is that from my vantage point the case was not made. What I don't think was appropriate was the degree to which Congress gave the president a pass on this."

I did not need to include that statement simply because I did not dispute it in any way in my writings! I never disputed that he thought, as a NON-US-Senator (his "vantage point" at the time) he opposed the war or that he thought that the resolution should not have been approved by Congress. All I did was use his own words and his voting record when he was in the Senate to make it very clear to anyone who understands basic logic that he said he was unsure how he would have voted if he had been in the Senate and viewed the intelligence reports that other Senators saw, that he could not see as a citizen who was not a US Senator. If you believe I am misrepresenting Senator Obama's position, then you should logically blame Sen. Obama for misrepresenting his position as well, for it was Sen. Obama, not me, who said:

I'm not privy to Senate intelligence reports.  What would I have done?  I don't know

Now, Tim, that first quote was made with an interview with a guy named Tim Russert on MEET THE PRESS during the convention when we had a nominee for the presidency and a vice president, both of whom had voted for the war.  And so it, it probably was the wrong time for me to be making a strong case against our party's nominees' decisions when it came to Iraq.

I'm trying to give you benefit of the doubt that you have a modicum of logic-based intelligence and good faith in your arguments, but my patience is limited.

And what you said:

Hmmmm. That kind of clears things up about what he would have done in the Senate, given that the actual intelligence made a less compelling case for war than did the information the administration allowed the public to see.

...is utterly false because it contradicts what Sen. Obama himself said. Unless you believe Sen. Obama was lying when he said "What would I have done? I don't know." If that, to you, means "What would I have done? I know." then we know who's deceiving who in this comment thread.

Geek Esq.,

For the record, I was not aware of Sen. Obama's response to Wolf Blitzer - the only portion I had read was the section which Russert had left out since I saw it excerpted in an email or a blog post.

That however changes nothing. Sen. Obama was unsure about how he would have voted in one interview (which, incidentally, occurred AFTER his interview with Wolf Blitzer) - so I see nothing wrong in any way in raising the question - which is all that I'm doing in this post - about how he would have voted. I said he "may have voted" for the resolution if he had been in the Senate in 2002 - I didn't say he *would* have.

If you are entitled to question other candidates like Edwards or Clinton about their true positions if they answered differently on the same question on different occasions, I am more than entitled to wonder about Sen. Obama's true position when he answered the same question differently on two occasions. In fact, you should be really wondering about it too, if you are concerned about candidates doing too much "double-talk."

So, any deception in this comment thread or post is not coming from me. Projection isn't good in general - and certainly not in a Democratic primary.

Since you both agree on what Obama actually said, I can't help but think that Geek Esq. is ultimately disturbed by your tone, eriposte. Makes sense, since Obama's all about the tone these days.

Iamcoyote,

My issue with Sen. Obama is that he is using myths about Sen. Clinton to indulge in false character attacks against her. I have no issue with his criticisms of her positions on issues - because that is what campaigns should be about. But when he attacks her character, especially using charges that are hypocritical or baseless, that to me is a no-no, especially coming from someone running on honesty and character.

I agree, eriposte. Even before your series began, I was getting more and more annoyed with how Edwards and Obama were reinforcing the myths as a way of distinguishing themselves from the front runner. After all these years watching the media do it to any Dem they didn't like, it's disconcerting to watch one Dem do it to another. Sorry to get so snarky, it's just fun to watch you smack down some of the silliness.