Holier than thou Rush Limbaugh

I listen to the Rush Limbaugh show from time to time at the earliest available opportunity for the purpose of both entertainment as well as to contextualize some issues from the perspective of American conservative viewpoint. And very rarely do we see eye to eye on issues. Hence his ranting today about Barack Obama being associated with a racist minister in Chicago flies in the face of  Rush’s long history of bigotry and racism which have become a daily staple in  his show that spews racist platitudes with impunity. He has no credibility on issues of race. The only people who would buy whatever he says on this issue are only those who were not going to vote for Barack Obama any way. Even his professed solidarity with Geraldine Ferraro in the wake of her racist remarks is’nt surprising to me in light of what Rush really is on this issue. Thus his holier-than-thou posture on this issue leaves him no credibility at all beyond his confused circle of diehard bigots.

The Specter of the Bill Clinton Scandals

By comparing  Barack Obama to Kenneth Starr simply because he is demanding the release of Hillary’s latest tax returns as well as other documents related to her years as first lady, the Clinton campaign is in fact engaging in an effort to cow Obama into silence through their usual intimidatory tactics which have worked for them in the past and must not be allowed to work this time. While this invocation of Starr’s name further crystallizes the desperation that underlies Hillary’s attempt to suppress the release of the documents in question at all cost and whatever it takes, even if it means tagging further smears on her opponents. With this in mind, furthermore, it cannot be in doubt that they are —for all intents and purposes— bringing into public discourse (wittingly or unwittingly)  the specter of the Clinton  scandals. The Clintons campaign have no one else to blame but themselves for  implicitly and indirectly bringing up that sad chapter of American history that will without question be a furtile ground for invevitable Republican attacks.

Republican-style Hillary dirty Tricks

It is easy to look at the results in Texas and Ohio and give Hillary and her campaign all the credit for her victories. To be sure there is no denying that she deserves some of the credit. But at what cost? At the cost of relegating herself to the lowest gutter, and perhaps to the irreparable damage to Barack Obama whose above-the-fray style may not necessarily be a conducive one to the rough and tumble of American politics. Where voters are gullible to negative advertizing even as they claim otherwise. Where negativism unconfronted grows  like a cancer in our body politic. Hence Hillary’s all-out attacks, ensconced in desperation, but extremely effective, must be addressed by the Obama campaign to seriously rethink the fatality of their non-response philosophy. All they need to do is not look far back at the sad implosions of the campaigns of Mike Dukakis, Al Gore, John Kerry all of whom suffered fatal blows under the devastating attacks of the Republican attack machine. Hence Hillary has adopted the methodology of Republican hard-nosed tactics and perfected them to a high-valued weapon against his opponent. The circulation of racially-tinged falsehoods,rumors and outright lies in the internet, as well as inflamatory campaign ada, have been used very effectively by the Clinton campaign to sow doubts about Obama. But as for the crossing over of Republicans to vote for Hillary at the urging of Rush Limbuaugh there is’nt much Obama can do about it. The Republicans are trying to steal an election one more time by orchestrating a sustained and drawn-out contest between Hillary and Obama hoping that when its all sad and done either of these Democratic candidates will be so hopelessly muddied and easy to defeat by their nominee John McCain who would have fortified his position and ready to go.

Beating the Clintons in their own Game.

Hillary Clinton likes bragging that her life experience for the past 35 years has been on the cutting edge of social change in American politics. But what she fails mention is that most of those years she spent defending the status quo in Washington D.C., as well as big business and corporations for nearly 20 years as a partner with the Rose Law firm in Arkansas. Furthermore, she has gone on to make sweeping claims about what  clearly are her pseudo-credentials on national security, foreign policy as well as international crisis management which her opponent have’nt really made serious inroads toward debunking and exposing her for the phoney character happens to be.

It is safe to say, however, that the nearest thing to a crisis perhaps she may ever have had to handle was having to navigate delicately through a constitutional crisis sparked by her husband’s sexual predatory impulses that led to his impeachment. Hence the Clintons have yet to be called on this, if only because they seem so self-righteous as to deem themselves entitled to political power in America to the exclusion of everyone else. Their false sense of entitlement has more often than not driven them into desperation to seize whatever they want to believe is theirs. To achieve their political ends, and, uninhibited by the constraints of decency, there is no moral limit to what they can do. Their failure to put out of action Barack Obama by Super Tuesday 1 had all but convinced them of the imperative of the utility of underhanded means. The ruthless below-the-belt attacks against Obama, the leaking of falsehoods as well as their internet circulation of dirt on him are only the latest last ditch and desperate means they have waged with impunity. They have gotten as much mileage as they could  get out of a situation in which their opponent has often chosen to stay above the political fray rather than stoop to the gutters with them. Yet clearly these attacks are working, as they seem to have slowed Obama’s momentun to a large extent as evidenced by the tactical impasse reflected in the proportionality of  individual shares in poll numbers of both candidates in both Ohio and Texas.

With the foregoing in mind, then, it is important to ask: what will it take for the Obama campaign to understand that the American people are more gullible to negative ads than they profess to eskew. But to ask this question is not to suggest they should castigate themselves to the low the Clinton campaign has relegated itself to.  All there is to it is for them to not just tepidly deny what they view as falsehoods tagged on them by the other side, they should be well equipped with  research on Hillary sufficient to provide effective utility for an uncompromising counter-attack.  Hence the centrality of the Obama campaign war strategies should unequivocally be the prioritization of their initiatives within the context of maximazing their impact through advertising and rapid dissemination of information as a counter-measure to debunk misinformation as well as to initiate a resolute undertaking to define his opponent before she has the chance to define herself.  And, toward this end, they should ”leave no stone unturned”.