A New Round of Anti-Obama Emails Spreads Virally Through the 'Net

[Scurrilous]

<snip>

"An active member of the Jewish community, I received last month no fewer than 25 emails about Barack Obama, spreading lies as facts, and innuendo as confirmed information. Forwarded by friends and colleagues to warn recipients of the dangers of an Obama presidency to the Jewish community and to Israel, they originated elsewhere. I will not repeat here the nature of those rumors and falsehoods other than to say that they are simply wrong, spread maliciously, and cynically calculated by their originators to adversely affect Obama’s support within the Jewish community. What is more disturbing is that so may of the lies are easily refuted and verifiably wrong. But as they say, if you tell it often enough, a lie, no matter how blatantly wrong, becomes validated as “truth.”

Spreading rumors about candidates is not new. It is that dismal underbelly of campaign politics that reaches back through the generations. But the potency and speed of information traveling along those broadband pipelines, grants easier access and greater voice to those who seek to abuse it. Insinuation, innuendo and lie all spreading virus-like into exponentially ever-expanding circles.

Just as the first barrage of emails began to slow to a trickle, a brand new version has begun to circulate within the community. These new anti-Obama emails have been forwarded to me by friends, who received them from someone else. I was one of 10 to 20 addressees on each email. And I guarantee that several of those 10 or 20 people will forward it to 10 more. And thus will it spread virus-like until it dies out. Or doesn’t. And it doesn’t matter that the statements in them are untrue. The anticipated damage will already have been done.

Again, the originators have clearly targeted Jewish voters intending, this time, to perpetuate innuendos and lies that had already been countered not just in the press, but had been decried as scurrilous and unfounded in widely-distributed open letters to the Jewish community from diverse groups of Jewish community leaders.

A letter signed by rabbis of every denomination as well as the leadership of several major Jewish organizations asserted that “these tactics attempt to drive a wedge between our community and a presidential candidate based on despicable and false attacks and innuendo based on religion. We reject these efforts to manipulate members of our community into supporting or opposing candidates.”

Additionally, a prominent group of Jewish senators also expressed great concern about the epidemic of “anonymous” emails attacking Obama. “We find it particularly abhorrent that these attacks are apparently being sent specifically to the Jewish Community. Jews, who have historically been the target of such attack,” read a widely-widely distributed open letter from the senators."

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[Chasing Dreams]

1. Who is doing the spreading? They need to be exposed.

[Scurrilous]

6. The sources are hard to pin down.

For example:

A New Smear Email: Obama Gave an Anti-Israel Speech at a Black Church

[Behind the Aegis]

2. Nothing new.

It is just a new way to attack the Jewish community, as well as a current candidate. Ironically, I have never received an anti-Obama email from any Jew, all of them have been positive.

[Skittles]

3. is this just more rightwing wedge-type crap? nt

[FrenchieCat]

4. This is what this was for......

send this out to your friend then.....

January 15, 2008


An Open Letter to the Jewish Community:

As leaders of the Jewish community, none of whose organizations will endorse or oppose any candidate for President, we feel compelled to speak out against certain rhetoric and tactics in the current campaign that we find particularly abhorrent. Of particular concern, over the past several weeks, many in our community have received hateful emails that use falsehood and innuendo to mischaracterize Senator Barack Obama's religious beliefs and who he is as a person.

These tactics attempt to drive a wedge between our community and a presidential candidate based on despicable and false attacks and innuendo based on religion. We reject these efforts to manipulate members of our community into supporting or opposing candidates.

Attempts of this sort to mislead and inflame voters should not be part of our political discourse and should be rebuffed by all who believe in our democracy. Jewish voters, like all voters, should support whichever candidate they believe would make the best president. We urge everyone to make that decision based on the factual records of these candidates, and nothing less.

Sincerely,

William Daroff, Vice President, United Jewish Communities

Nathan J. Diament, Director, Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America

Abraham Foxman, National Director, Anti-Defamation League

Richard S. Gordon, President, American Jewish Congress

David Harris, Executive Director, American Jewish Committee

Rabbi Marvin Hier, Dean, Simon Wiesenthal Center

Rabbi David Saperstein, Director, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism

Phyllis Snyder, President, National Council of Jewish Women

Hadar Susskind, Washington Director, Jewish Council for Public Affairs

http://www.adl.org/internet/Letter_obama.asp <\div>

[Behind the Aegis]

5. Thanks, again!

I saw you posted this little nugget of truth into another bullshit thread. Good for you for standing up for the truth!

[Scurrilous]

8. B.S ?

I think not.

[Behind the Aegis]

9. It is bullshit.

We have all heard about the emails, but what Frenchie did is show that a good majority of Jewish groups are taking this head on and critizing the email campaign. It is nothing more than "Jew-bating" at the expense of Obama.

[FrenchieCat]

11. Of course it is bullshit, and poster's link "B" confirms it....

The "truth" of course is a lie, a lie so obvious that one would think no one would believe it. But apparently some people do (although campaign operatives who are pushing the story almost surely don't).

The big lie about Obama is that he is a practicing Muslim. He (and his wife, children, etc) only pretend to be church-going Christians in order to get into the White House.


It's hard to believe anything so stupid.

Think of it. If Barack Obama had decided to pretend that he was Christian so he could become President, he certainly would have changed his name. In fact, he did the opposite. Known in high school as "Barry," as an adult, contemplating a career in politics, he started going by the name "Barack" again, hardly what he would do if he was trying to deceive people about his background.

[Behind the Aegis]

13. Personally, I think some are using this for other reasons.

As odious as some of the things I have seen about candidates, I think some things are done with another agenda.

This type of crap that comes out at election time makes me ill. I guess if the dems don't win this go around it will be the Jews fault (of course, the gays will always be to blame). Sometimes, I really think the world is so lost, that there is no coming back from the brink.

[Scurrilous]

12. Yes..

..Frenchie posted a link to the letter referenced in the article I posted.

"A letter signed by rabbis of every denomination as well as the leadership of several major Jewish organizations asserted that “these tactics attempt to drive a wedge between our community and a presidential candidate based on despicable and false attacks and innuendo based on religion. We reject these efforts to manipulate members of our community into supporting or opposing candidates.”

Maybe you should have read the article before commenting. :thumbsup:

[Behind the Aegis]

14. I did read it.

I also understand the ramifications of its being posted.

[Scurrilous]

15. LOL

Do tell BtA.

[Behind the Aegis]

16. Yes, anti-Semitism is funny.

I am not surprised.

[Scurrilous]

18. No, anti-semitism is not funny. n/t

[Behind the Aegis]

19. Glad to hear it.

[Alexander]

7. Heck, look at GD:P. There were plenty of "Obama's an anti-Semite" topics today.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

10. he's kicking Hillary's ass so hard that even Nader has come out of hiding

The media, the right wingers, Hillary and now - Nader.

Funny how Nader didn't start a year ago, like the other candidates.

But his main goal is to stop the best democrat from winning.

He claimed to endorse Edwards, but when Edwards got out of the race, Nader
didn't announce then.

And what has Nader done to help any democrat get elected.

Hes a POS.

[casus belli]

17. That begs an interesting question...

If he supported Edwards, and Edwards has a change of heart and winds up being the VP pick for our candidate...will Ralphie drop out? Something tells me no.

[TexasObserver]

20. Cui bono? Who benefits? That's who did it. Hillary operatives did it.

Why?

Obama's top foreign policy adviser is Zbigniew Brzeziński, who offended hard line supporters of the rightwing party in Israel while working for President Carter in the 1970s. They didn't like the Camp David Accord.

This current effort is intended to smear Obama with Democratic Jewish voters. Now who would do that? Hillary.

[Jawja]

21. Here's one I recently received:

Say What, Barrack?

By Paul R. Hollrah

Tuning in to C-Span recently, I found myself listening to a speech by
Senator Barrack Hussein Obama, Jr. He was standing in the pulpit of a black
church in Selma, Alabama, and as I studied the body language of the dozen or
so black ministers standing behind the senator, I couldn't help but be
reminded of the little head-bobbing dolls that people used to place in the
rear windows of their 1957 Chevrolets. If their reactions are any
indication, the new "Schlickmeister" of the Democrat Party is actually a
pretty accomplished public speaker.

However, as he spoke, I found my b.s. alarm going off, repeatedly. But
I couldn't quite figure out why until I actually read excerpts of his speech
several days later. Here's part o f what he said:

"...something happened back here in Selma, Alabama. Something happened
in Birmingham that sent out what Bobby Kennedy called, "ripples of hope all
around the world." Something happened when a bunch of women decided they
were going to walk instead of ride the bus after a long day of doing
somebody else's laundry, looking after somebody else's children.

"When (black) men who had PhD's decided 'that's enough' and 'we're
going to stand up for our dignity,' that sent a shout across oceans so that
my grandfather began to imagine something different for his son. His son,
who grew up herding goats in a small village in Africa could s uddenly set
his sights a little higher and believe that maybe a black man in this world
had a chance.

"So the Kennedy's decided we're going to do an airlift. We're going
to go to Africa and start bringing young Africans over to this country and
give them scholarships to study so they can learn what a wonderful country
America is.

"This young man named Barack Obama got one of those tickets and came
over to this country. He met this woman whose great great-great-great-
grandfather had owned slaves; but she had a good idea there was some
craziness going on because they looked at each other and they decided that
we know that, (in) the world as it has been, it might not be possible for us
to get together and have a child. There was something stirring across the
country because of what happened in Selma, Alabama, because some folks are
willing to march across a bridge. So they got together and Barack Obama Jr.
Was born. So don't tell me I don't have a claim on Selma , Alabama. Don't
tell me I'm not coming home to Selma, Alabama."

Okay, so what's wrong with that? It all sounds good. But is it?

Obama told his audience that, because some folks had the courage to
"march across a bridge" in Selma, Alabama, his mother, a white woman from
Kansas, and his father, a black Muslim from Africa, took heart. It gave them
the courage to get married and have a child. The problem with that
characterization is that Barrack Obama, Jr., was born on August 4, 1961,
while the first of three marches across that bridge in Selma didn't occur
until March 7, 1965, at least five years after Obama's parents met.

Obama went on to tell his audience that the Kennedys, Jack and Bobby,
decided to do an airlift. They would bring some young Africans over so that
they could be educated and learn all about America. His grandfather heard
that call and sent his son, Barrack Obama, Sr., to America.

The p roblem with that scenario is that, having been born in August
1961, the future senator was not conceived until sometime in November 1960.
So if this African grandfather heard words that ''sent a shout across
oceans,'' inspiring him to send his goat-herder son to America, it was not a
Democrat Jack Kennedy he heard, nor his brother Bobby, it was a Republican
President, Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Obama's speech is reminiscent of Al Gore's claim of having invented
the Internet, Hillary Clinton's claim of having been named after the first
man to climb Mt. Everest, even though she was born five years and seven
months before Sir Edmund climbed the mountain, and John Kerry's imaginary
trip to Cambodia.

As one of my black friends, Eddi e Huff, has said, "We need to ask
some very serious questions of the senator from Illinois. It's not enough to
be black, it's not enough to be articulate, and it's not enough to be
eloquent and a media darling. The only question will be how deaf an ear, or
how blind an eye, will people turn in order to turn a frog into a prince."