Boy..that's a TOUGH call.....
Posted on 06/28/2008 10:36:43 AM PDT by kristinn
The Washington Post published an article today in the Style section about researcher Danielle Allen's efforts to track down who is behind allegations that presumed Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Hussein Obama (Illinois) is a Muslim. Allen is an Obama supporter who works for the Institute for Advanced Study.
The article was written by Matthew Mosk. A curious choice for The Post considering Mosk's involvement in the nefarious MD4Bush scandal in which Mosk claimed to have been given access to a Free Republic poster's account to expose a Maryland GOP government appointee who was alleged to have commented on rumors that a Maryland Democratic mayor was an adulterer.
Mosk displayed the same talent for exposing Freepers' identities in today's article that he did in the MD4Bush scandal. However, the only person he exposed then was the Republican. The person (or persons) behind the MD4Bush screen name was not reported by Mosk.
The article Mosk wrote today purports to be about efforts to track down where the 'Obama is a Muslim' allegations began. However, it is actually a warning shot across the bow to opponents of Obama that they will be tracked down and exposed for speaking ill of the Obamessiah.
Mosk even makes sure to let Obamaniacs know who is behind Free Republic and where he can be found:
Of the file folders that are spread in neat rows across Allen's desk, only one is bulging. It holds printouts of the reams of conversations about Obama's religion appearing on Free Republic. Since its start in 1996 by Jim Robinson of Fresno, Calif....
The effort by The Post to protect Obama from rumors is in stark contrast to how they promoted potentially candidacy-damaging rumors eight-years ago.
When George W. Bush ran for president in 1999, The Washington Post led the way in rumor-mongering about whether he used cocaine in his youth. Bush refused to deny cocaine use saying that denying rumors just leads to having to deny more and more rumors. No one ever came forward with allegatons that they had first-hand knowledge of Bush using cocaine, but that didn't stop The Post and the mainstream media as painting Bush as a cokehead. No reporter ever asked Bill Clinton about cocaine use, even though several people known to Clinton claimed to have first-hand knowledge of Clinton using the drug while in public office.
While Mosk ignores The Post's own rumor-mongering, he leaves the impression of Free Republic as the rumor mill of the right. A fair reporter would have noted that Freepers exposed the fraudulent Texas Air National Guard documents that CBS News used in its attempt to derail President Bush's reelection bid in 2004. Buckhead, the Freeper who called foul on the documents, was tracked down by the Los Angeles Times even though he did not post his name on Free Republic.
Mosk's article closes with Allen complaining that the Internet has become as influential as unions and political action committees (PACs) in elections. Unstated is that the political activities of unions and PACs are heavily regulated by the federal government.
Allen seriously misunderstands the right to anonymous political speech--equating political speech with the right of a citizen to face his accuser when charged with a crime by the government:
..."This kind of misinformation campaign short-circuits judgment. It also aggressively disregards the fundamental principle of free societies that one be able to debate one's accusers."
While Mosk and The Post are furiously protecting Obama from the Obama is a Muslim allegation, they steadfstly refuse to report on Obama's well-documented connection to the terrorist supporter and Osama bin Laden sympathizer, Jodie Evans, co-founder of the anti-American group Code Pink.
The Post article claims that the Internet's danger to politics is the ability to spread rumors anonymously. The real danger is the left's willingness to use the Internet to track down and destroy its perceived enemies. Allen and Mosk's teamwork exposing Freepers is one more example of that.
I just made a note on my calendar to buy new rounds for my rifles, pistols and shotguns on Monday. I did that in 2004, when it got nasty during the Kerry bs.
After I buy new ammo, I will go fire the old ammo to make sure my skills come back with my guns.
I’ve said that it is easier to discredit a large number of lingering questions about Obama by sprinking in a few obvious misattributed quotes and details.
The media doesn’t offer a point by point rebuttal, just pick out the strawmen arguments to disavow the emails in total.
Funny how that works. Almost as if it is by design.
You can see the same thing in some of the “rumors” about corporate support of liberalism or some scandal involving the Clintons that is “debunked” on Snopes by the libs who run that site.
Someone somewhere along the line takes several details and “enhances” them when the basic facts in some of these emails that are forwarded around have verifiable truth.
Is it a game of “telephone” where someone tells someone something and accidently miscommunicates part of it? Or is there an underlying reason for the alterations?
It seems odd for the media to focus on this candidate alone. Who started the rumors that McCain was inelligible for the Presidency? Who started the rumor about Bush’s cocaine use? Why isn’t the rumor of Obama’s cocaine use fair game this election?
Jan Brunvand has studied urban rumors (typically friend-of-a-friend tales) for something on the order of 40 years. It is his research (and books) that provide the basis for a number of Snopes’ apolitical rumors. And it is clear that some editors repeatedly would publish urban legends as news items long after they’d been debunked. It almost seems as if some editors would slip one in now and then because they were often funny or at least ironic and generally a bit of “harmless” filler.
Some tonight show guests have also been fed such stories to tell on the air as though they personally happened to them (long after the stories had circulated for decades as happening to “ordinary” people).
So to wrap this up Brunvand and other researchers generally tried to follow the variations and mutations of urban lore but seldom ever actually uncovered who generated the myth and who made alterations.
I guess in the age of the internet with time stamps and URL information it could be deduced given enough monkeys with keyboards banging away.
“Many don’t seem to understand the jeopardy to freedom and liberty that is posed by nObama.”
Amen Brother. I want to B$tch slap every insane poster who wants us to lose this election to punish the Republican Party.
We still haven’t recovered from the 8 years of Clintoons because of the same insanity.
Washington Compost reporter Matthew Mosk is the grandson of Stanley Mosk, a Democrat who was elected Attorney General of California, and who then was appointed by Dem Pat Brown to the California Supreme Court. On the court Mosk led the way in pioneering “progressive” court decisions that ignored both existing law and the will of the people.
The acorn doesn’t fall far from the oak....
Rumor mongering is the charge that the MSM uses when the internet has to flesh out stories that they do not have the journalistic skill or moral will to flesh out on their own. If anyone cares to put some flesh and blood and a story to names like Eileen Wellstone and Mary Mahoney, I am proud to say that Free Republic has done that with distinction. The internet simply practicing the journalism MSM hacks refuse to do.
These are two different things:
2. His stepfather was a Muslim
2b. he attended a Muslim school for four years.
Obama's staff has said that 2b. is false. That he went to a Catholic school.
The paperwork for his school showed him enrolled as a muslim.
His staff had no credible excuse for this except to claim it as some kind of error.
Search for the January statements from 2008 by Obama's staff.
Boy..that's a TOUGH call.....
"This kind of misinformation campaign short-circuits judgment. It also aggressively disregards the fundamental principle of free societies that one be able to debate one's accusers."
The way the Left "debates" its accusers is the way the Clinton White House took in the action against Free Republic back during the impeachment wars.
Call up a couple of your friendly in-house media organs, have them file a SLAPP suit, then line up a friendly federal judge to "hear" the case. Make sure the "judge" was appointed by you or your friends in government.
Then, let the show trial begin...
In the past month or so, with all the bad realities/garbage we have on Hussein ObamaMessiaHamas is being spiked, hidden, ignored or laughed at by most of the MSM.
The latest is this attack of the Compost by one of Obama’s elitist left wing politically correct Black Racist Professor on Free Republic, Beckwith and other Freepers.
The mediots and their elite left wing owners put $inator Hill out of the race, and now they are doing anything to defend Obama to put McCain out of the race to make Obama appear to be the great Messiah, who will save America.
What deals has Obama made with the elite MSM owners behind closed elite doors?
We know the shaky financial realities most of the owners of the MSM outlets face. If the trends continue against them, few if any will be around by the next big election in 2012
Did Obama promise federal funding if he is elected or bailouts like the one Chrysler got decades ago if the MSM elites and their mediots protect and shield Obama to get him elected?
They are counting on something to save them, and it appears to be electing Obama as POTUS.
_________________________________________
You underestimate them yourself...call them what they are...communists.
Exactly - why would they act as if it is a bad thing?
They publicly support muslims, terrorists, anti-America rhetoric, anti-military rhetoric.
Do they think we are that stupid?
When all you see in the media is anti-America, anti-military, anti-war, anti-Bush, anti-conservative, what is one to believe other than they are against America, against military, against war, against Bush, against conservatives.
Which is exactly why we are against Obama. He is the most liberal of all of them and will follow their agenda to the letter. Why would we believe any of their claims about Obama?
Yes, and I totally ignored that email and sent to no-one - how wasteful of me and anti-patriotic. I will bet that has gone around 10 or more times. Good luck in getting all emails stopped.
They seem to forget, people are free, people think, people act. That shows you what they expect from the public - no thinking, no freedom, no action other than that designed by Obama.
Well - they are not there yet and there will always be patriots willing to fight for America rather than seeing America destroyed by marxists, communists, liberals, democrats. So what?
Obama Photo
John McCain Photo
Sure that's how it works.
My friend, please put me on your ping list when the firewords start to rise in your part of the world.
Stay Safe!
Think we will have to foil the system with disinformation, disinformation, disinformation.
We will have to protect our own identities in addition to any security provided by websites. Most of us post numerous places.
Watch your back. Asian assassins are cheap and the BHO monster has long testicles.
In 2004 the media (Viacom owned MTV included) ran a whisper campaign taht George W. Bush was going to bring back the draft.
MTV even interupted entertainment programming to provide “news” updates (like a breaking news item, not something aired at the commercial breaks).
The Democrats in the Senate and the House were the only sponsors of such measures. And later when their hands were forced they voted against their own bills.
It was a political rumor designed to appeal to the youth vote.
I overheard a woman at a restaurant talking about her teenaged daughter had learned that the whole “Bush’s draft” thing was a lie put out there by the Democrats. She came into the election with a bad feeling about Bush (because of the “Bush’s draft” smear) and then learned to distrust the Democrats because they alone sponsored the measure and lied to her. She said that she wasn’t going to vote at all because she “couldn’t trust EITHER party”.
Way to go. If they won’t vote Rat, get them to opt out altogther. < /sarcasm >
They’ve used the strategy before. They aren’t FOR democracy. They aren’t FOR the open exchange of ideas. They aren’t FOR debate or dissent. They are for POWER and nothing but. By any means necessary.
And Obama is as “chill” with that strategy as any Democrat. He knocked another Democrat out of a primary because her paperwork wasn’t all in order. The press took out a Republican by demanding to see his divorce proceedings paperwork.
The resistance to letting the public see his birth records and question his eligibility is downright hypocrisy considering how he got where he is today.
There are youths who TRUST Obama when he says he is a new kind of politician who does not engage in the political stunts of old. Doesn’t go negative. Blah blah blah.
Liar. If he turns of youth to the election altogether, it is nothing to him so long as they don’t vote McCain.
MAJOR spell check error, I meant tentacles!
Danielle Allen
Matthew Mosk
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
