Ouch. And again I say, ouch.

Mary Katherine Ham at the Weekly Standard blog has assembled this collection of clips into what she calls “Obama’s Attack Ad on Himself”:

The number of fundamental policy positions on which Obama has simply and brazenly reversed himself is staggering, especially (as MKH puts it) while “floating above us all as the post-partisan redeemer of America.” Ham expresses regret at not having posted this video earlier; I regret it also, since it’s over three and a half minutes long (way too long for a TV spot) and won’t be carried anywhere but the Web; if it had been released earlier, it might well have filtered into TV news coverage. I should note that I don’t say that as a knock against her (it’s a very effective clip collection, and good on her for getting it out); just as a measure of agreement that it’s a shame it took longer to assemble the requisite video than she expected.

More here, here, here, and here. Jim Geraghty sums up the message: “All Barack Obama Statements Come With an Expiration Date. All Of Them.” The blog post that follows that title, a roster of major policy positions that make up Obama’s flip-flop playlist, is truly breathtaking; a wonder to behold.

Obamfomercial ratings match Perotgramming

Oh, that has gotta hurt bad.

Nielsen announces that TV ratings for Barack Obama’s multi-network blanket infomercial only slightly beats out the mind-numbing pie-chart party broadcast by billionaire circus sideshow Ross Perot on Election Eve in 1996. Perot went on to win slightly over 8% of the vote.

Now some people might say that a 21.7% share is pretty good. Those people would be right if it hadn’t been insanely hyped, broadcast over five networks, and featured one candidate of only a two-candidate race. (Captain Ed’s got my back.) As it stands, the Nielsen ratings reflect the expected audience of such a production. The people who watched were the ones predisposed in the first place to sit through a gauzy tribute to Barack Obama for half an hour. That is to say, those who are already hard-core supporters.

The rest of the viewing public already knew what was coming.

The Obama press purge continues

First it was radio. Then it was TV. Now, finally, the Obama campaign has completed the media-suppression trifecta by cracking down on unsympathetic newspapers.

In a report first broken by Drudge, it appears three newspapers have been booted from the Obama campaign plane: the Washington Times, the New York Post, and the Dallas Morning News. As it happens, all three are papers that had the nerve to endorse John McCain for president.

The campaign says it needed to make room on the plane for “network bigwigs” and reporters from the black magazines Essence and Jet, all of whom are naturally more interested in seeing a President Obama sworn in. The Washington Times feels especially aggrieved by the decision, since they have been with the campaign since Day One:

“We’ve been traveling since 2007 with him. … We’re a relevant newspaper — every day we break news,” Solomon said. “And to suddenly be kicked off the plane for people who haven’t covered it as aggressively or thoroughly as we are … it sort of feels unfair.”

He said the newspaper protested but was turned down again by the campaign.

“I can only hope that the candidate who describes himself as wanting to unite the nation doesn’t have some sort of litmus test for who he decides gets to cover the campaign,” Solomon said, noting that the Obama campaign’s decision came just two days after the paper endorsed McCain.

(Emphasis mine.) Thus falls the latest blow in the saga of what I’ve called Battered Media Syndrome. After swamping a radio show with shrill and hostile nuisance-calls to penalize it for hosting an Obama skeptic, then barring not one but two TV stations who had the temerity to ask Joe Biden uncomfortable questions, the campaign has now denied access to reporters from print newspapers who decline to pledge allegiance to The One.

Will their colleagues who still have their access shake off their Battered Media Syndrome and stand up for their fellow journalists? Or will each of them simply keep telling himself or herself “well, at least I know he still loves me” until their own next misstep gets them jettisoned as well?

If Obama is elected, I can’t wait to see what the evolution of the White House press corps makeup looks like.

(More reaction here and here. Don Surber is also noticing BMS symptoms; he tries his hand at explaining it, and may have some points, but frankly I’d rather just see them shape up.)

UPDATE: I’m getting emails calling to my attention how John McCain kicked Maureen Dowd and Joe Klein, both frequent McCain critics, off his plane, and that I should condemn that too, shouldn’t I?

Well, no. Dowd and Klein are opinion journalists, not reporters. When they lost their seats, the New York Times and Newsweek still had reporters aboard; the publications themselves were not barred as the WaTimes, NYPost, and DMNews were from Obama’s plane. Indeed, some time back a NYPost columnist was booted from the Obama plane for a less-than-flattering column he wrote about the candidate, and I didn’t say anything, because the Post still had a presence on the plane (their reporters), and frankly Obama isn’t obliged to give a seat to a guy with a history of slamming him.

There is no excuse, however, for ditching the entire press crew of a publication for their editorial board’s position, especially reporters; doubly especially in the last week before the election when such coverage is crucial.

Barbarians (AKA readers) at the gate

And here I thought this might actually go away.

The Obama-Khalidi tape, still in Los Angeles Times captivity, is drawing considerably more attention than the Times expected. The newspaper’s headquarters was confronted by a large crowd of Americans under the foolish, provincial impression that a videotape of a presidential candidate giving tacit approval to hours of Jew-hatred and Israel-bashing, and actively toasting its star purveyor, might actually be newsworthy, or at least that it might not be appropriate to stiffarm the thousands of people demanding that the videotape’s contents be released.

(Video courtesy of Mere Rhetoric, which has photos and more video at the link. More reaction here and here.)

So far, the reasons given by the Times for not releasing the tape (which was used as source material for a Times story by Peter Wallsten on Obama support among Palestinians), in chronological order over the course of the last five days, are:

1. In a conversation between and Gateway Pundit’s Jim Hoft and Wallsten: “When I asked him about the video he said that as far as he was concerned he was through with the story.”
2. Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs got an email from the readers’ rep saying their reporting should be good enough: “The Times did write about the tape, so I’m not sure what you mean about suppressing the video or information from the video. Here is a copy of the report about the video.”
3. Johnson blogged that Fox News’s Brit Hume asked the Times for their side of the story, to which they replied, “No comment.”
4. The Times said in a statement replying to accusations from the McCain campaign: ““The Los Angeles Times did not publish the videotape because it was provided to us by a confidential source who did so on the condition that we not release it…The Times keeps its promises to sources.”
5. Most recently, the Times expanded on that last one by telling an emailer the source might come to harm if the tape were released: “The reporter agreed with his source not to release the tape in return for getting acess to it…To break that agreement might put the source of the tape in jeopardy.”

So what do you think? Which one’s the truth, if any?

UPDATE: Gateway Pundit has Fox News video of Khalidi hiding from cameras and siccing security on the crew.

UPDATE II: Andrew McCarthy has an excellent rundown of the situation, explaining in great detail why the Times’s high-minded “journalistic ethics” blather isn’t worth the time wasted reading it.

UPDATE III: Jennifer Rubin at Pajamas Media has a link to a Khalidi lecture. Read the article and check the video…not a pretty picture.

Oh, sure, NOW they tell us…

Now that the Obamfomercial has filtered into the public consciousness, a spark of epiphany flickers in the unblinking eye of Barack Obama’s major-network entourage: the senator’s economic numbers — mirabile et horribile dictu! — don’t add up.

As I noted in my anti-liveblog on the mega-ad, the Associated Press was fairly quick to post a lengthy fact-check dossier on Obama’s cross-spectrum waste of time. CBS appears to be the latest to comprehend this late-dawning horror. Mercy me, can it be true?

If he closes every loophole as promised, saves every dime from Iraq, raises taxes on the rich and trims the federal budget as he’s promised to do “line by line,” he still doesn’t pay for his list. If he’s elected, the first fact hitting his desk will be the figure projecting how much less of a budget he has to work with – thanks to the recession. He gave us a very compelling vision with his ad buy tonight. What he did not give us was any hint of the cold reality he’s facing or a sense of how he might prioritize his promises if voters trust him with the White House.

And it only took them until the weekend before the election to put 2 and 2 together, so to speak.

Making the business tax argument funny

The Tax Foundation held a video submission contest for amateur YouTube videos explaining, quickly and simply, how the business tax works, what effects it has on the economy, and why American business taxes are too high. The winners range from the edgy, fast-paced crash-course:

…to the funny, kitschy period piece:

(That second one reminds me of the hysterical employee orientation video from “Harvey Birdman” [Part 1 and Part 2 on YouTube], except way shorter.)

The videos are imaginative, fascinating, and surprisingly instructive given the necessary limits on breadth and depth. The upshot of the argument, as the common thread running through these videos, is that virtually the only country in the world that is not benefitting from high American corporate tax rates is…well, America.

If only this contest had been held weeks ago, McCain might have saved himself a lot of grief, not to mention gained himself a few awesome ads…

(H/T the Corner.)

Obama as mail-order herbal enhancer

I got a call from my dad this evening. He said he “had a proposal” for me. He proposed that I liveblog the upcoming half-hour of major-network Obama paid programming. (Wouldn’t you know, Dad’s a WitSnapper fan.) I said that was an interesting proposal, but I was unclear as to how that would be beneficial. He explained that, well, if I liveblogged it, then he’d be able to find out what was in it without being forced to sit through it.

“Ah. I see.”

The results of this conversation, and my estimation of the omnipresent Obama-worship how-to video and its genesis, below the break.

Battered Media Syndrome: A line is crossed

It seems the bulk of media organizations will go to any lengths to keep information damaging to Barack Obama out of the public eye, even to the point of actively denying access to embarrassing footage, even as the Obama campaign clamps down hard on the occasional station that surprises someone on their side.

We saw early signs of the ruthlessness of the Obama campaign toward stations or papers that deviate from the prescribed code of conduct when a Chicago radio station had the temerity to have as a guest on one of its talk shows Stanley Kurtz, who had done tenacious work uncovering the true nature of Barack Obama’s connections to former Weatherman Bill Ayers. The station extended an invitation to the Obama campaign to send a representative (the station was five blocks away from the campaign headquarters). However, instead of accepting, the campaign used the invitation as advance warning to alert supporters to Kurtz’s presence on the show and urge them to flood the phone lines with abuse and harangues, making Q&A effectively impossible.

More recently, Sen. Joe Biden gave two interviews, one on Orlando TV station WFTV and the other on Philadelphia station CBS3. Neither one went well for Biden, as each interviewer showed rare bursts of aggressive questioning in the wake of Obama’s comments on redistributing wealth and Biden’s own comments about an impending crisis-testing of Obama within six months of his entering the White House. In retaliation, both stations have seen their access to the Obama campaign unceremoniously cut off, and more goon squads of the type summoned to swamp the Chicago radio station that hosted Stanley Kurtz descended upon these stations, burying them in avalanches of harassing and threatening emails. Liberal bloggers like Daily Kos (won’t dignify with a link…check at the above link to Mere Rhetoric) have taken up building a dossier on Barbara West, the offending anchor in Orlando.

And yet, in the face of such stormtrooper tactics and intimidation, some of the more egregious media organs actually take active steps to do the Obama squad’s dirty work for it. Peter Wallsten at the Los Angeles Times wrote an article last April about a tribute party Obama attended in 2003 for Rashid Khalidi, a former PLO operative and friend of Obama’s. (Yes, another terrorist friend.) According to witnesses, Rashidi and the other speakers spent much of their time bashing Jews and Israel, and Obama went so far as to say a special toast to the man. There is a videotape of the event in the Times’ possession, and many people, very anxious to know what is on it, have been trying for months to persuade them to release it. Their reaction, in short, has been a big middle finger; they will not release it for anyone.

This hardly bodes well for media prestige during a prospective Obama adminstration. No matter how many times Obama and Biden smack them around, these craven reporters will always come back for more. I mean, heaven forfend their golden boys should get really angry and abandon them.

UPDATE: Andrew McCarthy provides in-depth reporting and analysis on the Obama-Khalidi videotape, its contents, and why the Times is sitting on it.

How much more will it take to convince you?

[UPDATE: Welcome, Fox News “Embeds” readers! Feel free to have a look around.]

Joe the Plumber is getting more and more difficult to dismiss as the concoction of Fox News and Karl Rove. (By the way, I’m thinking of starting an informal betting pool on how many years it will take for Democrats to stop blaming their own PR goofs on Karl Rove’s mind control rays.)

With the emergence of a new audio clip from a 2001 radio interview with then-State Sen. Barack Obama, the uncomfortable whiff of socialism rising off Obama’s “spreading the wealth around” gaffe two weeks ago in his exchange with Joe Wurzelbacher is getting tougher to write off as something blown out of proportion by “desperate” McCainiacs.

Details and excerpts below the break. (Miz Michelle points out that a private citizen with no special resources uncovered this clip, scooping all major media organizations in doing so. Aren’t they supposedly paid to do this kind of thing?)

The Fairness Doctrine, resurrected from the Pit

Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) has finally made public intentions toward a plan whose existence many Democrats have been trying to deny for years: bringing back that speech-suppressing abomination, the Fairness Doctrine. (Links here and here, and with audio here and here).

More on the Doctrine’s history, why it’s a dangerous assault on the Constitution, and why Democrats like Bingaman love it so much and want it back so badly, below the break.

Sarah Palin plays a forbidden game…in public!

Well, this is new. Sarah Palin has asked the unthinkable question directly to a journalist: “Can you imagine if I woulda said such a thing?” CNN’s Drew Griffin has been asked on the air to play “Media Party Switch.”

Gov. Palin brought to the cable news networks (outside of Fox News) something that we in the blogosphere do on a regular basis.  She examined Joe Biden’s recent statement warning that an international crisis would test Barack Obama’s mettle as president before his first six months in the White House are up, and wondered aloud what might have happened if instead she had been the one to say something so bizarre (and manifestly unhelpful to the top of her ticket).

During this entire presidential campaign — and frankly, this pattern is not at all limited to presidential elections — bloggers like me have indulged in a time-honored thought experiment. I’ll call it “Media Party Switch.” Put briefly, it considers any given gaffe, smear, flub, reckless accusation, or other similarly outrageous or boneheaded statement by a Democrat that has gone unnoticed or unreported by the journalistic community, and poses the rhetorical question of what would have happened if the same type of statement had been made by a Republican under the same circumstances.

Readers of WitSnapper have seen me dabble in “Media Party Switch” here from time to time. It’s become a pseudo-regular feature of the Biden Gaffe Watch, in which I wonder more than once when the sum total of instances of Biden’s frothing mouth galloping away from him (also lovingly recapped here by Miz Michelle) might equal, for example, former Vice President Dan Quayle’s infamous misspelling of “potato.”  However, as widespread a practice as this thought experiment is among bloggers, it rarely, if ever, makes it to network or cable news, given how embarrassing such a look in the mirror could be (after all, it’s not the blogosphere that puts the “Media” in “Media Party Switch”).

In Griffin’s CNN interview with Gov. Palin, Griffin doesn’t go so far as to break the omerta among his colleagues and producers by openly musing what the media reaction might have been if Palin had said something like what Biden did. However, he must be given credit (I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt that he might have been able to see this coming) for opening the door by asking the more general question of whether Palin thinks Joe Biden has been “given a pass” by the media.  Palin strides right through that door, answering that he’d have to ask his own colleagues and bosses as to why Biden’s been given a pass, but she does wonder aloud (video here):

Can you imagine if I would’ve said such a thing?  No, I think we would be hounded and held accountable: “What in the world did you mean by that, VP/presidential candidate?  Why would you say that, ‘Mark my words, this nation will undergo an international crisis if you elect Barack Obama?'” If I would have said something like that you guys would clobber me!

Again, to his credit, Griffin doesn’t waste airtime trying to argue the point:

You’re right! [Both laugh.] You’re right.

Excellent.  Good to hear it.  In that spirit, I look forward to seeing Griffin call Sen. Biden on this statement, or whatever other bizarre statement he’ll inevitably let loose by the time CNN gets him to sit down with them, or for that matter any of the embarrassing wealth of past statements on which the senator has been “given a pass.”  How’s your game of “Media Party Switch,” Senator?

What is CNN’s problem?

All of a sudden, CNN appears to be taking some pretty underhanded steps to make things difficult for John McCain and Sarah Palin.  I say “underhanded” because my capacity for benefit of the doubt, at long last, has been depleted; neither of these screw-ups would ever have befallen a competent reporter or editor.

First, they reported Monday on their “Political Ticker” blog, wrongly, that the McCain campaign was ceding Colorado to Obama, prioritizing scenarios for winning without it.  Not only is this vigorously denied by the campaign, but this report came on the same day that Sarah Palin was drawing record audiences in Grand Junction, with four appearances across the state by Todd Palin scheduled for Tuesday.  How, when the McCain campaign looks to be concentrating especially hard on Colorado, does CNN possibly divine that they are giving it up for lost?

Now, CNN’s Drew Griffin has “dowdified” a passage from a column in National Review by Byron York to make it sound as if York thinks Sarah Palin is the dimmest of dim bulbs, when actually York is commenting on how the media are making every effort to make her look that way.  Here is York’s original passage (note especially the opening clause):

Watching press coverage of the Republican candidate for vice president, it’s sometimes hard to decide whether Sarah Palin is incompetent, stupid, unqualified, corrupt, backward, or — or, well, all of the above. Palin, the governor of Alaska, has faced more criticism than any vice-presidential candidate since 1988, when Democrats and the press tore into Dan Quayle. In fact, Palin may have it even worse than Quayle, since she’s taking flak not only from Democrats and the press but from some conservative opinion leaders as well….

Yes, there are legitimate concerns about Palin’s lack of experience. Who wouldn’t, at the very least, wish that she had more time in the governor’s office on her résumé? But a look at Palin’s 20 months in power, along with interviews with people who worked with her, shows her to be a serious executive, a governor who picked important things to do and got them done — and who didn’t just stumble into an 80 percent job-approval rating.

And here’s a transcript of Griffin’s question in an interview with Gov. Palin (video clip here):

The press has been pretty hard on you, the Democrats have been pretty hard on you, but also some conservatives have been pretty hard on you as well. The National Review had a story saying that, you know, I can’t tell if Sarah Palin is incompetent, stupid, unqualified, corrupt or all of the above.

Note the conspicuous absence of the previously emphasized opening clause.  York himself takes considerable exception to the distortion of his article in NRO’s The Corner.  National Review had no story saying any such thing; the story said such a conclusion might be drawn from the tenor and content of Palin’s media coverage.  (Kind of ironic that Griffin should make himself an example of just such coverage with this tailored misquote.)

Too bad…with Griffin’s recent more-in-depth-than-usual coverage of Barack Obama’s connections to ACORN and Bill Ayers, I’d begun to consider reassessing my estimation of CNN’s “in the tank for Obama” status.  Griffin, in his infinite consideration, has done his part to spare me a minor cris de coeur.

UPDATE: Griffin has apologized, pseudo-kinda-sorta. He was kind enough to stress that “Sarah Palin was delightful,” and also pointed out that the offending quote aired only once (they were notified of the misquote by National Review, after which the quote was cut from the interview). His explanation:

“I wanted to keep the interview moving, so I got to the heart of the question and really the heart of York’s article, and the National Review‘s article, which is that you are a successful Governor, and why aren’t you getting that message out, which she answered…In no way did I intend to misquote the National Review.“

OK. Saying you were rushed is a pretty weak excuse, and an apology would have been fitting (it was done out of his own carelessness, after all), but I give him credit for taking airtime out to explain. I still have trouble seeing how such a mistake can be made accidentally, but since he’s gone on the record admitting, at the very least, a “misquote,” then as far as I’m concerned, the matter’s closed. Too bad Kyra Phillips blew the whole thing when she ended off the segment with the following facetious yet self-pitying twaddle:

We should graduate not only with a diploma but a big target on our forehead, because no matter what we say during a political season, and you’re rushed and it’s tight time, there’s always going to be people out there that are going to criticize it. You did a great job Drew, appreciate it.

Excuse me? “No matter what we say??” What is Phillips trying to say, that an accurate quote would have generated the same backlash? Sorry, Kyra, but you’re not the victim here. Your testiness is undeserved and unprofessional, and however one might describe Griffin’s handling of that part of the interview, it was definitely not a “great job.”