Showing posts with label Spin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Spin. Show all posts

Sunday, May 25, 2008

The Obama Nation's Playbook


The recent Clinton RFK flap reminds me of the Vilnai comment on Gaza that used the Hebrew word "shoah". Aside from the fact that the meaning of "shoah" as Holocaust is always "Ha Shoah", or THE Holocaust, like most words in any language, "shoah" has several meanings including "catastrophe" and "disaster".

No matter. The Arab reporters of Reuters (Adam Entous and Joseph Nasr) who broke the story took it upon themselves to translate this in the most negative way they could and the world press swallowed it up. Of course no one stopped to consider the chutzpah inherent in appropriating a Hebrew word and then telling the speakers of Hebrew what it really means. Hamas not only lapped it up, but declared this as incontrovertible proof of Israel's Nazi intentions. (e.g. see the Electronic Intifada article on this.)

It does not matter what Clinton meant, the liberal media are doing their part for the cause and the Obaminators have borrowed a play from the Hamas playbook while also doing their best to emulate Soviet-era thought police. Any statement that could remotely have anything to do with their candidate (e.g. Bush's remarks on appeasement) or could somehow be twisted to imply racism is latched onto as paranoid "proof" of the nefarious forces out there.

Unfortunately for Obama, this approach will certainly backfire, as there are few things that cause resentment as being constantly told you must be a racist (e.g. 1, 2, 3) just because you do not support his candidacy. After all, it is possible that someone simply disagrees with his positions. Of course that would just prove that they are "bitter".