Extremely Lame

This is just classy. While the rumor of there being some tape of Michelle Obama using the term “whitey” has been around for a couple weeks, it’s gotten worse since Tuesday when Obama locked up the nomination. It reached critical mass yesterday when Barack Obama was asked about it by a reporter. Until then, it had only been bandied about by conservative and pro-Hillary bloggers and conservative talking heads.

The question, when asked without any sort of evidence whatsoever, is sort of like a “Have you stopped beating your wife?” kind of question; there’s really no right answer because even denying the accusation gives the question credibility. I have to admit that I like Obama’s response to the question. Instead of answering such a loaded question, he goes on the offensive and puts the reporter who asked it in his place.

“We have seen this before. There is dirt and lies that are circulated in e-mails and they pump them out long enough until finally you, a mainstream reporter, asks me about it,” Obama said to the McClatchy reporter during a press conference aboard his campaign plane. “That gives legs to the story. If somebody has evidence that myself or Michelle or anybody has said something inappropriate, let them do it.”

And then:

“It is a destructive aspect of our politics. Simply because something appears in an e-mail, that should lend it no more credence than if you heard it on the corner. Presumably the job of the press is to not to go around and spread scurrilous rumors like this until there is actually anything, an iota, of substance or evidence that would substantiate it.”

Doesn’t this kind of smear sans evidence smell a lot like the Republican primaries of 2000? Just before the South Carolina primary, there surfaced an equally baseless claim that John McCain had an illegitimate black child (he had adopted a Bangladeshi child) and pretty much killed his chances of winning the nomination.

David Wiegel over at Reason Magazine goes through the evolution of this most recent attack. It’s an interesting article in that you get to see just how many twists and turns this story has taken, how many of the details keep changing, and how no one claims to have actually seen the video. Everyone knows a friend who knows someone who has seen the video.

Now we can see why it was spot on to slam the reporter for asking the question in the first place. It’s like the telephone game, only the misinformation is spread maliciously and through unnamed sources so nothing comes back to the the people spreading it.

And before the thought even gets in your head that Reason is just dispelling the myth because they’re Obama flunkies, do your research. Reason Magazine is pretty decidedly libertarian in their philosophy. Which makes them pretty much anti-big government, so you can reasonably expect them to not be very big proponents of things like nationalized health care.