Reply #8: No - Lynn Sweet doesn't dispute Obama did "lie" about leading asbestos fight - but does say he [View All]

[papau]

got in on the tail in of the asbestos fight and helped out
=============================================
http://rojname.com/show-all-last-minute-news.php?nuce=10105

Did Obama take too much credit?
L.A. Times questions his role in asbestos removal at Altgeld

February 20, 2007
BY LYNN SWEET Sun-Times Columnist
LOS ANGELES -- <SNIP>Obama, 45, is hoping to dilute questions about his experience by arguing that the totality of his career -- from community organizer to state senator to the U.S. Senate -- should count, and not just his last two years in Washington.

An apparently anxious Obama campaign sent out a detailed memo at 5:05 a.m. Monday, rebutting the thesis of the L.A. Times article and the "implication" Obama "partially fictionalized events" in Altgeld. The campaign memo contained testimonials of several people familiar with Obama's Altgeld role and said he downplayed his role in the asbestos controversy.<snip>

Fornek reports that Johnson, 72, objects to Obama taking credit for helping force the CHA to remove asbestos at Altgeld Gardens. Johnson has not read Obama's book. She said he played no role in the asbestos-removal fight. She said he did help get "angel hair," another type of dangerous insulation, removed from attics in the complex's row houses -- and worked on public transportation issues and helped get a library built. ''He was not with us on the asbestos,'' she said.

But Johnson told Fornek a different version of the events in 2004 during an interview for a profile on Obama during that year's U.S. Senate race. She said Obama worked on the asbestos removal after the angel hair project. "We worked together." Another colleague, Sun-Times reporter Tim Novak, talked to Cheryl Jackson, her daughter. She said her mother was exploited by Obama when he failed to include her efforts in his book.

"My mother worked too hard and too long of a time. That hurts when someone who has been a sole soldier for so long and continues to be a soldier for environmental issues . . . for someone to exploit the work that she has done is not fair."
==================================================================
http://cbs2chicago.com/topstories/local_story_051195408.html

Feb 20, 2007 6:51 pm US/Central
Obama's Community Service Called Under Question
Altgeld Gardens Resident Who Worked With Senator In 1980s Says He Is Exaggerating His Role
Get breaking news alerts

Mike Flannery Reporting