“Wes Clark was not thrown under the bus; he is the bus.”
In mulling over how the media could be swallowing whole the Republican illogic that General Clark’s saying a presidential candidate’s early military service might not apply to Executive Office qualifications—after translation into some language only the media and Republicans understand—was equal to disrespect for John McCain’s military service, (since getting shot down 40-odd years ago is the same as running a country), I came across this statement at Democratic Underground:
“Wes Clark was not thrown under the bus; he is the bus.”
On the Ed Schultz radio show today, asked if he’d gone too far, Gen. Clark said: "If the sun is shining and someone asks you if the sun is shining, I suppose you could say, the sky is blue and there are no clouds, but I always try to answer the question asked of me."
The question asked of Wes Clark by Bob Schieffer on Sunday’s Face the Nation followed remarks about McCain’s particular military experience that included Clark’s reference to McCain as a personal hero of his.
Bob Schieffer: Could I just interrupt you. If-GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Sure.
Bob Schieffer: I have to say, Barack Obama has not had any of those experiences either, nor has he ridden in a fighter plane and gotten shot down. I mean-
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I don't think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be President.
Bob Schieffer: Really?!
Shock! Dismay!
The retired four star general and MSNBC military analyst and political commentator expressed an opinion about military service and politics, surprising hell out of pundits everywhere.
Shocked, I tell you. Paranoid even. Anything but objective or accurate.
"The media driven notion that Gen. Clark somehow attacked Sen. McCain's military service is patently false. In fact, the opposite is true -- he praised it. This controversy was created and fueled by a media unwilling to live up to the basic journalistic standard of accuracy and thoroughness," said Karl Frisch, a spokesman for Media Matters. "It is a fact that Gen. Clark praised Sen. McCain's military service while also saying that such service is not a 'qualification to be president.' The media have a duty not only to Gen. Clark but the public to correct the record."
So, anyway, Clark answered a question about being shot down in planes and presidential credentials with a response about being shot down in planes and presidential credentials. What’s even more, he gave the same opinion he has expressed on television and Web interviews for a month or more.
What changed? What happened? Why did the media wake up all of a sudden?
Answer: Clark hit a major nerve in the McCain campaign and the McCain-worshiping media.
The McCain camp, sensing an opportunity, complained that Clark had “attacked John McCain’s military service record.” Of course, Clark had done nothing of the kind. He had questioned the relevance of McCain’s combat experience as a qualification to be president of the United States. This is a distinction that you’d expect any reasonably intelligent nine-year old to be able to grasp.-snip
Ads like this just slipped through, I guess. Even if McCain weren’t running on his military record, it’s undoubtedly something that could convince many voters, rightly or wrongly, that he has the experience to be commander in chief. Why should it be out of bounds for Democrats to argue that McCain’s particular military experience has done little to prepare him for the decisions he’ll have to make as president?
McCain fights back using Swift Boat Veterans For Truth veterans like Bud Day, who falsely attacked John Kerry in 2004, to now attack Clark’s military service. McCain has also accepted $70,000 in donations from SBVT.
About the media, Josh Marshall called it like it is: DC Press Lords Lay Down Fire for McCain.
It's not surprising. But it is an example of the fatuous McCain worship that is the bread and butter of the Washington press corps that Wes Clark's comments this weekend on Face the Nation are being called 'swift-boating'. It's almost comical, but not much less than Bob Schieffer's incredulous responses to the fact that Clark had the temerity to argue that McCain's experience as a Navy pilot and a POW don't necessarily mean he'd be a good president.
Meanwhile, in a speech on patriotism written and scheduled two months ago, Obama said this yesterday:
For those who have fought under the flag of this nation – for the young veterans I meet when I visit Walter Reed; for those like John McCain who have endured physical torment in service to our country – no further proof of such sacrifice is necessary. And let me also add that no one should ever devalue that service, especially for the sake of a political campaign, and that goes for supporters on both sides. We must always express our profound gratitude for the service of our men and women in uniform.
I would have liked Obama to have made a small change there. On a day Gen. Clark was under right wing attack fired by media hysteria: “For those like John McCain and Wesley Clark who have endured physical torment in service to our country.”
Or something.
I do cut Obama slack: He’s running for president. He can’t always do what I want him to do. And he did walk it back a bit today:
"I notice that I think in at least one publication it was reported that my comments yesterday about Sen. McCain were in a response to Gen. Clark, I think my staff will confirm that was in a draft of that speech that I had written two months ago," Obama said.
And he indicated McCain was owed no apology by Clark.
McCain’s campaign sniffed back:
One day after earning praise for rejecting Gen. Clark’s attacks, Sen. Obama clarified that his remarks had been written months before and were not even aimed at Gen. Clark. After repudiating his own repudiation, he went on to ask why an apology to Sen. McCain from Gen. Clark would even be a priority.
Obama also said: “I don’t think that Gen. Clark, you know, had the same intent as the Swiftboat ads that we saw four years ago; I reject that analogy.”
It’s something.
But yesterday, out of the Obama campaign, came a statement that made my blood boil:
"As he's said many times before, Senator Obama honors and respects Senator McCain's service, and of course he rejects yesterday's statement by General Clark," said Obama campaign spokeman Bill Burton.
The media pounced.
I have to say here that I pounced, too. When it comes down to it being between two war heroes, one who is a Republican running against you, stick up for the one who is a Democrat out there fighting for you, I said in the note I dashed off to the Obama campaign, secure in my 10-month standing as an Obama supporter. When does the “not cowering” part begin? After months of bowing and scraping to the Clintons, not a minute for Wes Clark?
And furthermore on that order:
Who “devalued“ McCain’s military service? Not Clark. While you’re expressing "our profound gratitude for the service," Senator Obama, remember Wes Clark, as a young man, took four bullets for his country and later won a war in which no American soldiers died. Clark opposed the same war you did in 2002, the one that shouldn’t have been fought, the one John McCain authorized. The war Wes Clark can help you bring the country out of in the most sensible way possible when you are President of the United States of America.
On a day I would have spent writing LTTEs promoting and defending Obama, I wrote at least fifty defending Wesley Clark, who was, after all, the one under attack, having put himself out there, going straight at the opposition, and assaulting its strongest position (the way they define it). That is how I felt about it yesterday when the media used a pre-authored Obama address to bolster its attack on Clark.
How I feel about it today is a bit different: I can't stay mad forever when we have a president to elect, which brings me back to:
“Wes Clark was not thrown under the bus; he is the bus.”
There are all sorts of rumors flying around as Obama supporters try to discern just what is going on here. Good cop; bad cop. A rehearsal for VP. Obama doesn't see it as a valid critique relating to the presidency. But who knows? Clark and Obama aren’t saying, and while right wing conspiracy theories are fun to contemplate, they’re silly.
Since Clark made the same critique of McCain when he was still a Clinton supporter, I don’t see that Obama necessarily enters into this, except that Clark can go there and Obama can’t. But Clark can go there on his own, too, and perhaps he is. Obama probably does see it as something he can’t say out loud, but his campaign surely looks at polls and sees that national security is showing up as the one strength McCain has against Obama.
Somebody needed to break open that strength and get it looked at in the light, not shaded by the patriotic protection racket, and that is what will come of Clark's pressure. Wes Clark can do it and take the heat for doing it, while his own constituency, Democratic and nonpartisan veterans, get his back.
Clark has smashed open a gate that is not going to close. He runs a straight path at the qualifications McCain is claiming for the presidency. After this week, the media is not going to be able to keep spouting the Legend of John McCain. You can bet they won't, because it shows them up as the lazy ass cowardly collaborationists they are.
A public discussion has begun on McCain's military legend and whether or not it qualifies him for the presidency. This is a big thing. This is a good thing. This helps Obama, not hurts him. I'm not saying the Obama campaign is in collusion with Clark, mind you. I'm just not sure. But I am saying that Obama's too smart not to see the value of Clark's doing this. I would also say, if Obama wanted Clark to stop, he'd tell him to stop. Clark's not stopping, which tells me Obama's campaign hasn't asked him to stop. What I know about Clark is he would never set out to stomp on a candidate's message unless the campaign thinks the message needs stomping on.
The public now gets to scratch its collective head and ask the question: What exactly does being shot down in a plane or being a POW have to do with this election? Does military service, however honorable, earn anybody a free national security pass through the doors of the White House? If the media starts scratching, too, it’s all good. There should be no shield held out by the media to protect McCain’s legend from the scrutiny of voting Americans.
All in all, you gotta love the General, though:
Heh.
