From Talkleft.com on Tuesday April 6, 2008: "Barack Obama explained to a fundraising crowd in California this week why his VP nominee would not need extensive foreign policy experience. It's because he has it. Was he joking? No.
Not only that, here's how he described and differentiated his experience from Hillary's to conclude he's more experienced than Hillary or McCain:
"It's ironic because this is supposedly the place where experience is most needed to be Commander-in-Chief. Experience in Washington is not knowledge of the world. This I know. When Senator Clinton brags 'I've met leaders from eighty countries'--I know what those trips are like! I've been on them. You go from the airport to the embassy. There's a group of children who do native dance. You meet with the CIA station chief and the embassy and they give you a briefing. You go take a tour of a plant that [with] the assistance of USAID has started something. And then--you go."
"You do that in eighty countries--you don't know those eighty countries. So when I speak about having lived in Indonesia for four years, having family that is impoverished in small villages in Africa--knowing the leaders is not important--what I know is the people. . . ."
"I traveled to Pakistan when I was in college--I knew what Sunni and Shia was [sic] before I joined the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. . . ."
[More...]
Obama says he's passed the good judgment test while Hillary and McCain have not." The journalist-author of the linked article notes:
Secondly, even though I've researched and written on Hillary Clinton's trips abroad and consequently been critical of her claims, my estimation of her foreign travels is that they were sometimes quite a bit more than a dance, a briefing and a tour. What Barack Obama's remarks last night in San Francisco reveal, however, is his self-confidence--to the point of cockiness--right now. This is exactly the same demeanor on display last week in Pennsylvania.
Cockiness is an understatement. He lived in Indonesia from the ages of 6 to 10. He didn't visit Africa until he was an adult -- his first trip was in his late 20's, his second 14 years after that.
Does he really believe that being a child in a foreign country and having poor relatives in Africa makes one prepared to be Commander in Chief? Can he really think it compares to Hillary's years of service on the Armed Services Committee? If this is an indication of his "good judgment" I can't wait to see what his poor or mistaken judgment is like.
More on Obama's foreign policy decisions, from the Chicago Tribune:
After being sworn in as U.S. Senator, it took him 11 months to make a major speech on Iraq.
When did he first introduce legislation setting a timetable for troop withdrawal from Iraq? "In January 2007,shortly after announcing his presidential exploratory committee."
Obama the candidate for U.S. Senate spoke out forcefully against the Iraq war. For most of his tenure in Washington, though, Obama the U.S. senator has not been a moving force on Iraq.
He left it to others to lead public opinion. Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) and Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) emerged as the strongest voices against the war. Those critics all spoke out before Obama gave his first major policy speech on the war -- 11 months after he took office.
Several advisers said that during that time Obama wrestled with how to proceed, concerned about the worsening news from Iraq and convinced the public's mood was turning against the war more rapidly than most members of Congress appreciated.
In keeping with the pattern of his political career, he moved cautiously. During the summer of 2005 he considered proposing a plan to partition Iraq. But he backed off the idea as advisers raised two key concerns: that the proposal was fraught with complexities and that he could be seen as overstepping his expertise.
Ultimately Obama delivered a more modest speech in November 2005, five days after Murtha's call for a troop withdrawal. In that address, he called for reductions in U.S. troop strength but not a timetable for withdrawal.
In a Senate debate the following June, Obama voted against an amendment proposed by Feingold and former presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) to set such a timetable.
Only after Obama announced his presidential exploratory committee did he introduce legislation this January that sets a date for withdrawal of U.S. combat troops. By then the high-profile, bipartisan Iraq Study Group also had endorsed a deadline for troops to leave."
Showing posts with label Obama's Experience. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Obama's Experience. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Obama Claims More Foreign Policy Knowledge Then Clinton & McCain
From HuffingtonPost.com: "Last night at a fundraiser in San Francisco, Barack Obama took a question on what he's looking for in a running mate. "I would like somebody who knows about a bunch of stuff that I'm not as expert on," he said, and then he was off and running. "I think a lot of people assume that might be some sort of military thing to make me look more Commander-in-Chief-like. Ironically, this is an area--foreign policy is the area where I am probably most confident that I know more and understand the world better than Senator Clinton or Senator McCain."
"It's ironic because this is supposedly the place where experience is most needed to be Commander-in-Chief. Experience in Washington is not knowledge of the world. This I know. When Senator Clinton brags 'I've met leaders from eighty countries'--I know what those trips are like! I've been on them. You go from the airport to the embassy. There's a group of children who do native dance. You meet with the CIA station chief and the embassy and they give you a briefing. You go take a tour of a plant that [with] the assistance of USAID has started something. And then--you go."
"You do that in eighty countries--you don't know those eighty countries. So when I speak about having lived in Indonesia for four years, having family that is impoverished in small villages in Africa--knowing the leaders is not important--what I know is the people. . . ."
"I traveled to Pakistan when I was in college--I knew what Sunni and Shia was [sic] before I joined the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. . . ."
"Nobody is entirely prepared for being Commander-in-Chief. The question is when the 3 AM phone call comes do you have somebody who has the judgment, the temperament to ask the right questions, to weigh the costs and benefits of military action, who insists on good intelligence, who is not going to be swayed by the short-term politics. By most criteria, I've passed those tests and my two opponents have not."
There are a number of interesting things about Senator Obama's remarks. If Senators Clinton and McCain have not passed "those tests," likely they will be surprised to hear it. Secondly, even though I've researched and written on Hillary Clinton's trips abroad and consequently been critical of her claims, my estimation of her foreign travels is that they were sometimes quite a bit more than a dance, a briefing and a tour. What Barack Obama's remarks last night in San Francisco reveal, however, is his self-confidence--to the point of cockiness--right now. This is exactly the same demeanor on display last week in Pennsylvania.
So Bill Richardson and Joe Biden--to name two with foreign policy experience--should put aside any transient veep thoughts.
Another area--and this one is policy--in which Obama is not an expert is energy. Case in point is his ode to ethanol, which he delivered last week on his Pennsylvania bus tour at Molly's Amerigreen gas station in Manheim. This does not mean that he's going to give Al Gore the veep call--and by the by, Obama never said at the Wallingford, PA town hall meeting that he might offer Gore a cabinet position. He was very careful not to reply in the affirmative when he took the question about whether he would consider Gore. Obama said, "I will make a commitment that Al Gore will be at the table in figuring out these [global warming] problems." Well, at the table is one of Obama's favorite locutions. I've heard him say on several occasions that all Americans will be at the table one time or another. Obama's table is going to be a long one.
Last night Senator Obama had a few more words on the subject of choosing a vice president. "That last thing I'd say about a vice president is--obviously, you want someone who can be president and who shares a broad vision of where I want to take the country; don't have to agree with me on every particular, but shares with me a bias for opening up government, adding a rational discourse about how we're gonna solve problems, a bias towards empowering individual citizens." Those seats at the table again.
Note Obama's delicate sentence constructions. Never a gender pronoun--a he or a she--anywhere.
The San Francisco fundraiser was Senator Obama's fourth and final of the day. He had made appearances earlier in Atherton, Marin and around the corner at another Pacific Heights mansion. Even the Obama Campaign, I suppose, can never have too much money. The folks who came out on Sunday were not the very rich, even though these events were for people who have "maxed out" their donations. The very rich have long since given. The fact that so many middle class Californians are giving $2300 to Obama shows both the depth of prosperity in the state and the allure of the scent of victory.
"It's ironic because this is supposedly the place where experience is most needed to be Commander-in-Chief. Experience in Washington is not knowledge of the world. This I know. When Senator Clinton brags 'I've met leaders from eighty countries'--I know what those trips are like! I've been on them. You go from the airport to the embassy. There's a group of children who do native dance. You meet with the CIA station chief and the embassy and they give you a briefing. You go take a tour of a plant that [with] the assistance of USAID has started something. And then--you go."
"You do that in eighty countries--you don't know those eighty countries. So when I speak about having lived in Indonesia for four years, having family that is impoverished in small villages in Africa--knowing the leaders is not important--what I know is the people. . . ."
"I traveled to Pakistan when I was in college--I knew what Sunni and Shia was [sic] before I joined the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. . . ."
"Nobody is entirely prepared for being Commander-in-Chief. The question is when the 3 AM phone call comes do you have somebody who has the judgment, the temperament to ask the right questions, to weigh the costs and benefits of military action, who insists on good intelligence, who is not going to be swayed by the short-term politics. By most criteria, I've passed those tests and my two opponents have not."
There are a number of interesting things about Senator Obama's remarks. If Senators Clinton and McCain have not passed "those tests," likely they will be surprised to hear it. Secondly, even though I've researched and written on Hillary Clinton's trips abroad and consequently been critical of her claims, my estimation of her foreign travels is that they were sometimes quite a bit more than a dance, a briefing and a tour. What Barack Obama's remarks last night in San Francisco reveal, however, is his self-confidence--to the point of cockiness--right now. This is exactly the same demeanor on display last week in Pennsylvania.
So Bill Richardson and Joe Biden--to name two with foreign policy experience--should put aside any transient veep thoughts.
Another area--and this one is policy--in which Obama is not an expert is energy. Case in point is his ode to ethanol, which he delivered last week on his Pennsylvania bus tour at Molly's Amerigreen gas station in Manheim. This does not mean that he's going to give Al Gore the veep call--and by the by, Obama never said at the Wallingford, PA town hall meeting that he might offer Gore a cabinet position. He was very careful not to reply in the affirmative when he took the question about whether he would consider Gore. Obama said, "I will make a commitment that Al Gore will be at the table in figuring out these [global warming] problems." Well, at the table is one of Obama's favorite locutions. I've heard him say on several occasions that all Americans will be at the table one time or another. Obama's table is going to be a long one.
Last night Senator Obama had a few more words on the subject of choosing a vice president. "That last thing I'd say about a vice president is--obviously, you want someone who can be president and who shares a broad vision of where I want to take the country; don't have to agree with me on every particular, but shares with me a bias for opening up government, adding a rational discourse about how we're gonna solve problems, a bias towards empowering individual citizens." Those seats at the table again.
Note Obama's delicate sentence constructions. Never a gender pronoun--a he or a she--anywhere.
The San Francisco fundraiser was Senator Obama's fourth and final of the day. He had made appearances earlier in Atherton, Marin and around the corner at another Pacific Heights mansion. Even the Obama Campaign, I suppose, can never have too much money. The folks who came out on Sunday were not the very rich, even though these events were for people who have "maxed out" their donations. The very rich have long since given. The fact that so many middle class Californians are giving $2300 to Obama shows both the depth of prosperity in the state and the allure of the scent of victory.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Newsweek and FactCheck.org Debunks Bogus Claims about Obama's legislative record
"Jess Henig
Newsweek Web Exclusive
Updated: 12:42 PM ET Apr 1, 2008
Summary
A misleading e-mail has been making the rounds, alleging that Clinton has fewer legislative accomplishments than Obama, and that they are less substantive. We've had questions about it from a number of readers, and blogs have jumped into the fray. So what's the real story on the Senate careers of the Democratic presidential candidates?
We find that the e-mail is false in almost every particular:
It sets up a face-off between apples and, well, broccoli, comparing only the Clinton-sponsored bills that became law with all bills sponsored or cosponsored by Obama, whether they were signed into law or not.
It includes legislation Obama sponsored in the Illinois state Senate, a very different legislative body.
It tells us that Obama has sponsored more legislation than Clinton, when in fact he has sponsored less.
It implies that Obama has passed more bills into law than Clinton, when the opposite is true.
Contrary to the e-mail's assertions, Clinton's and Obama's contributions are not qualitatively different, and quantitatively, Clinton has the edge.
Analysis
Several alert FactCheck.org readers have passed on the following e-mail, which purports to compare the legislative effectiveness of Sens. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.). We reprint it verbatim:
You judge for yourself!
Quite impressive!! It?s unfortunate that this information is not being communicated effectively.
Let's take a closer look at who's really qualified and or who's really working for the good of all of us in the Senate. Obama or Clinton.
Records of these two candidates should be scrutinized in order to make an informed decision.
Senator Clinton, who has served only one full term - 6yrs. - and another year campaigning, has managed to author and pass into law - 20 - twenty pieces of legislation in her first six years.
These bills can be found on the website of the Library of Congress www.thomas.loc.gov , but to save you trouble, I'll post them here for you.
1. Establish the Kate Mullany National Historic Site.
2. Support the goals and ideals of Better Hearing and Speech Month.
3. Recognize the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.
4. Name courthouse after Thurgood Marshall.
5. Name courthouse after James L. Watson.
6. Name post office after Jonn A. O'Shea.
7. Designate Aug. 7, 2003, as National Purple Heart Recognition Day.
8. Support the goals and ideals of National Purple Heart Recognition Day.
9. Honor the life and legacy of Alexander Hamilton on the bicentennial of his death.
10. Congratulate the Syracuse Univ. Orange Men's Lacrosse Team on winning the championship.
11. Congratulate the Le Moyne College Dolphins Men's Lacrosse Team on winning the championship.
12. Establish the 225th Anniversary of the American Revolution Commemorative Program.
13. Name post office after Sergeant Riayan A. Tejeda.
14. Honor Shirley Chisholm for her service to the nation and express condolences on her death.
15. Honor John J. Downing, Brian Fahey, and Harry Ford, firefighters who lost their lives on duty.
Only five of Clinton's bills are, more substantive.
16. Extend period of unemployment assistance to victims of 9/11.
17. Pay for city projects in response to 9/11
18. Assist landmine victims in other countries.
19. Assist family caregivers in accessing affordable respite care.
20. Designate part of the National Forest System in Puerto Rico as protected in the wilderness preservation system.
There you have it, the fact's straight from the Senate Record.
Now, I would post those of Obama's, but the list is too substantive, so I'll mainly categorize.
During the first - 8 - eight years of his elected service he sponsored over 820 bills. He introduced
233 regarding healthcare reform,
125 on poverty and public assistance,
112 crime fighting bills,
97 economic bills,
60 human rights and anti-discrimination bills,
21 ethics reform bills,
15 gun control,
6 veterans affairs and many others.
His first year in the U.S. Senate, he authored 152 bills and co-sponsored another 427. These inculded **the Coburn-Obama Government Transparency Act of 2006 - became law, **The Lugar-Obama Nuclear Non-proliferation and Conventional Weapons Threat Reduction Act, - became law, **The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act, passed the Senate, **The 2007 Government Ethics Bill, - became law, **The Protection Against Excessive Executive Compensation Bill, In committee, and many more.
In all, since entering the U.S. Senate, Senator Obama has written 890 bills and co-sponsored another 1096.
An impressive record, for someone who supposedly has no record according to some who would prefer that this comparison not be made public.
He's not just a talker.
He's a doer.
Pass it on....It's impressive!
What impresses us is how misleading the e-mail is. Its anonymous author doesn't apply the same standards to Clinton's record and Obama's, thus leading to false conclusions about their legislative records. For Clinton, the e-mail claims to examine bills that the senator has sponsored and that were passed into law during her Senate career. For Obama, however, it counts both sponsored and cosponsored bills, whether they were passed or not. And – something the e-mail doesn't state clearly – it counts bills Obama sponsored in the Illinois state Senate, before he was a United States senator.
Just counting bills sponsored by a particular senator is a poor way to gauge legislative clout or effectiveness, in our judgment. For example, one of the accomplishments that Clinton often boasts about – expanding health coverage for National Guard and Reserve troops – came about as a result of an amendment, not a bill. And Obama claims credit for having helped "lead the Senate to pass" an ethics and lobbying bill that he never sponsored or even cosponsored, on grounds that it "drew key provisions" from a bill that he and two other senators cosponsored in 2007. The e-mail falsely claims that Obama sponsored the ethics legislation that became law, which he did not.
Nevertheless, we dug into the records and produced a true tally of the bills for which Sens. Obama and Clinton were in fact the sole, original sponsors. We take no position on which senator deserves credit for the most or best legislation overall. What we can demonstrate is that the numbers in this e-mail are all wrong.
Here's how FactCheck.org tallies the real breakdown of bills and resolutions sponsored by the candidates in the U.S. Senate.
Obama Clinton
Years in Senate 3 7
Bills sponsored* 129 358
Bills passed by Senate 7 32
Bills signed into law 2 19
Sponsored, per year 43 51.1
Passed by Senate, per year 2.3 4.6
Signed into law, per year 0.7 0.7
*Sole original sponsor
We counted only bills for which Obama or Clinton was the sole, original sponsor. The e-mail inflates Obama's numbers by counting his cosponsored bills, but Sarah Binder, a fellow at the Brookings Institution and an expert on legislative politics, tells FactCheck.org that often "cosponsorship does not require a commitment of time, energy or resources – let alone the political or policy ingenuity that might generate a bill idea in the first place." Tallying sponsored bills, says Binder, is "a better metric of a senator's agenda, efforts and interests."
Clinton has been in the Senate a little more than seven years; Obama, a little more than three. Using the numbers above, we calculate that Clinton has been the sole sponsor of a few more bills and resolutions per year – 51, to Obama's 43. And she has steered twice as many through the Senate and almost four times as many into law per year, on average, as Obama has.
Clinton's Real Numbers
Clinton's campaign claims that 22 of the senator's solely sponsored bills have become public law, and the e-mail claims 20. We counted 19, three fewer than the campaign because it included several Clinton-sponsored provisions that were part of other major bills. (The measures were substantive, having to do with such issues as improving treatment for wounded service members, but they didn't fit the rules of this tally.) Nine of her successful bills had to do with naming post offices or courthouses, but others involved building safety, unemployment assistance and support for family caregivers.
The list of her accomplishments in the e-mail, though, is not, as the author claims, a rundown of Clinton-sponsored bills that became law; it is in fact a mishmash of some that became law and others that were only passed by the Senate, without being a complete roster of her bills in either category. She actually sponsored, by herself, 32 bills and resolutions that passed the Senate, including all of those mentioned specifically in the e-mail plus 12 others. The omitted bills include a resolution calling for the immediate and unconditional release of soldiers of Israel held captive by Hamas and Hezbollah, and a resolution condemning the murder of an American journalist. And she has been sole sponsor of a total of 358 bills in her seven-year Senate career.
Here's our list of bills solely sponsored by Clinton that became law (descriptions of each are verbatim from THOMAS.gov, the Library of Congress' database of legislative information):
110th Congress:
S. 694, A bill to direct the Secretary of Transportation to issue regulations to reduce the incidence of child injury and death occurring inside or outside of light motor vehicles, and for other purposes.
109th Congress:
S. 272, A bill to designate certain National Forest System land in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico as a component of the National Wilderness Preservation System.
S. 1283, A bill to amend the Public Health Service Act to establish a program to assist family caregivers in accessing affordable and high-quality respite care, and for other purposes.
S. 2376, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 80 Killian Road in Massapequa, New York, as the "Gerard A. Fiorenza Post Office Building."
S. 2722, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 170 East Main Street in Patchogue, New York, as the "Lieutenant Michael P. Murphy Post Office Building."
S. 3613, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 2951 New York Highway 43 in Averill Park, New York, as the "Major George Quamo Post Office Building."
S. 3716, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 100 Pitcher Street in Utica, New York, as the "Captain George A. Wood Post Office Building."
S. 3910, A bill to direct the Joint Committee on the Library to accept the donation of a bust depicting Sojourner Truth and to display the bust in a suitable location in the Capitol.
108th Congress:
S. 1241, A bill to establish the Kate Mullany National Historic Site in the State of New York, and for other purposes.
S. 1266, A bill to award a congressional gold medal to Dr. Dorothy Height, in recognition of her many contributions to the Nation.
S. 1425, A bill to amend the Safe Drinking Water Act to reauthorize the New York City Watershed Protection Program.
S. 2838, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 10 West Prospect Street in Nanuet, New York, as the "Anthony I. Lombardi Memorial Post Office Building."
S. 2839, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 555 West 180th Street in New York, New York, as the "Sergeant Riayan A. Tejeda Post Office."
107th Congress:
S. 584, A bill to designate the United States courthouse located at 40 Centre Street in New York, New York, as the "Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse."
S. 1422, A bill to provide for the expedited payment of certain benefits for a public safety officer who was killed or suffered a catastrophic injury as a direct and proximate result of a personal injury sustained in the line of duty in connection with the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
S. 1622, A bill to extend the period of availability of unemployment assistance under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act in the case of victims of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
S. 1892, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 375 Carlls Path in Deer Park, New York, as the "Raymond M. Downey Post Office Building."
S. 2496, A bill to provide for the establishment of investigative teams to assess building performance and emergency response and evacuation procedures in the wake of any building failure that has resulted in substantial loss of life or that posed significant potential of substantial loss of life, and for other purposes.
S. 2918, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 380 Main Street in Farmingdale, New York, as the "Peter J. Ganci, Jr. Post Office Building."
A Legislative Powerhouse?
The e-mail claims that Obama "authored 152 bills and co-sponsored another 427" during "his first year in the U.S. Senate." According to THOMAS.gov, this number is an accurate count of bills and amendments that Obama sponsored during the 109th Congress, which actually covered his first two years in the Senate, not one. (Amendments are changes to bills that were spearheaded by other lawmakers.) Discounting amendments and cosponsorships, Obama sponsored 66 bills during those two years. Clinton sponsored 90 in the same period. In his three years in the Senate, Obama has been the sole original sponsor of 129 bills.
The e-mail says Obama sponsored "over 820 bills" in the first "eight years of his elected service," never mentioning that for most of that time, Obama was in the Illinois Senate. Since the rules and operations of that body are quite different from those of the U.S. Senate, we hardly think it's fair to include the proposed legislation to which his name was attached in Springfield in any tally that's being compared with Clinton's record.
An accurate comparison with the Clinton bills listed in the e-mail would have included only the bills Obama has sponsored that have been signed into law. This comparison favors Clinton heavily, since 19 of her bills in seven years have become law, while Obama has had just two in his three years:
S. 2125, A bill to promote relief, security, and democracy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
S. 3757, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 950 Missouri Avenue in East St. Louis, Illinois, as the "Katherine Dunham Post Office Building."
The Meaning of Fluff
The question of whether a bill is "substantive" is often subjective. But the Clinton bills that the e-mail seems to characterize as frivolous have to do with such goals as recognizing and establishing national observances, honoring individuals' memories, marking important events and congratulating sports teams. Five of the seven Obama-sponsored bills passed by the Senate have similar goals. So do more than 40 percent of all the bills that have been passed by the Senate since the beginning of 2008.
Surely we don't elect senators just to name post offices. But given the contention that meatier bills can prompt, it's much easier to push a seemingly frivolous bill through Congress. Every one of the Clinton and Obama bills that passed the Senate did so by unanimous consent. Bills that generate more opposition, meanwhile, can be struck down or left to languish. According to GovTrack.us, a legislative research site, 308 of 356 bills Clinton has sponsored haven't made it out of committee. In the current (110th) Congress, that includes several bills on foreign policy, nuclear safety, poverty, housing and education, not to mention 19 bills regarding public health and coverage, 13 benefiting the armed forces, and 12 addressing children's care and safety. Likewise, 120 of Obama's 129 sponsored bills haven't made it past the committee level – including, in the 110th Congress, nine bills on energy and environmental policy, nine on public health and eight benefiting the military and veterans, as well as multiple bills on education, foreign policy, product safety and voter access. These bills, being more substantive than, for instance, Clinton's regarding the men's lacrosse team or Obama's on National Summer Learning Day, are also more likely to die in committee.
Blog Showdown
Several blogs have picked up and repeated the idea that Obama has sponsored more, or more important, legislation than Clinton has. One writer on the political blog Daily Kos looked at the senator's record in detail but did not evaluate Clinton's legislation. Another went through legislation from each candidate, analyzing the impressiveness of each bill from her perspective. On the other side, noted blogger Ezra Klein wrote, in his blog for the liberal magazine The American Prospect, that the second Kos article was "not anything even approaching a fair comparison of [the candidates'] legislative records" and that Clinton had in fact proposed important bills.
Since the value of a piece of legislation is so often a matter of opinion, that's a blogspat we won't get into. We can say for sure, though, that Clinton has been the sole original sponsor of more bills than Obama at a slightly higher annual rate; that she's been more successful than Obama at passing bills through the Senate and into law; and that, while she has sponsored a number of seemingly frivolous bills that were signed into law, these are comparable to many of Obama's bills and common in the Senate generally.
One final thought: Recently we published a special report warning readers about the high level of inaccuracy in chain e-mails. This one is no exception. In fact, with its anonymous author and grammatical errors, not to mention a redundancy or two, it's a classic of the genre. If you find one of these e-mails in your in-box, our suggested course of action remains the same: Just hit delete.
Republished with permission from factcheck.org . "
Newsweek Web Exclusive
Updated: 12:42 PM ET Apr 1, 2008
Summary
A misleading e-mail has been making the rounds, alleging that Clinton has fewer legislative accomplishments than Obama, and that they are less substantive. We've had questions about it from a number of readers, and blogs have jumped into the fray. So what's the real story on the Senate careers of the Democratic presidential candidates?
We find that the e-mail is false in almost every particular:
It sets up a face-off between apples and, well, broccoli, comparing only the Clinton-sponsored bills that became law with all bills sponsored or cosponsored by Obama, whether they were signed into law or not.
It includes legislation Obama sponsored in the Illinois state Senate, a very different legislative body.
It tells us that Obama has sponsored more legislation than Clinton, when in fact he has sponsored less.
It implies that Obama has passed more bills into law than Clinton, when the opposite is true.
Contrary to the e-mail's assertions, Clinton's and Obama's contributions are not qualitatively different, and quantitatively, Clinton has the edge.
Analysis
Several alert FactCheck.org readers have passed on the following e-mail, which purports to compare the legislative effectiveness of Sens. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.). We reprint it verbatim:
You judge for yourself!
Quite impressive!! It?s unfortunate that this information is not being communicated effectively.
Let's take a closer look at who's really qualified and or who's really working for the good of all of us in the Senate. Obama or Clinton.
Records of these two candidates should be scrutinized in order to make an informed decision.
Senator Clinton, who has served only one full term - 6yrs. - and another year campaigning, has managed to author and pass into law - 20 - twenty pieces of legislation in her first six years.
These bills can be found on the website of the Library of Congress www.thomas.loc.gov , but to save you trouble, I'll post them here for you.
1. Establish the Kate Mullany National Historic Site.
2. Support the goals and ideals of Better Hearing and Speech Month.
3. Recognize the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.
4. Name courthouse after Thurgood Marshall.
5. Name courthouse after James L. Watson.
6. Name post office after Jonn A. O'Shea.
7. Designate Aug. 7, 2003, as National Purple Heart Recognition Day.
8. Support the goals and ideals of National Purple Heart Recognition Day.
9. Honor the life and legacy of Alexander Hamilton on the bicentennial of his death.
10. Congratulate the Syracuse Univ. Orange Men's Lacrosse Team on winning the championship.
11. Congratulate the Le Moyne College Dolphins Men's Lacrosse Team on winning the championship.
12. Establish the 225th Anniversary of the American Revolution Commemorative Program.
13. Name post office after Sergeant Riayan A. Tejeda.
14. Honor Shirley Chisholm for her service to the nation and express condolences on her death.
15. Honor John J. Downing, Brian Fahey, and Harry Ford, firefighters who lost their lives on duty.
Only five of Clinton's bills are, more substantive.
16. Extend period of unemployment assistance to victims of 9/11.
17. Pay for city projects in response to 9/11
18. Assist landmine victims in other countries.
19. Assist family caregivers in accessing affordable respite care.
20. Designate part of the National Forest System in Puerto Rico as protected in the wilderness preservation system.
There you have it, the fact's straight from the Senate Record.
Now, I would post those of Obama's, but the list is too substantive, so I'll mainly categorize.
During the first - 8 - eight years of his elected service he sponsored over 820 bills. He introduced
233 regarding healthcare reform,
125 on poverty and public assistance,
112 crime fighting bills,
97 economic bills,
60 human rights and anti-discrimination bills,
21 ethics reform bills,
15 gun control,
6 veterans affairs and many others.
His first year in the U.S. Senate, he authored 152 bills and co-sponsored another 427. These inculded **the Coburn-Obama Government Transparency Act of 2006 - became law, **The Lugar-Obama Nuclear Non-proliferation and Conventional Weapons Threat Reduction Act, - became law, **The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act, passed the Senate, **The 2007 Government Ethics Bill, - became law, **The Protection Against Excessive Executive Compensation Bill, In committee, and many more.
In all, since entering the U.S. Senate, Senator Obama has written 890 bills and co-sponsored another 1096.
An impressive record, for someone who supposedly has no record according to some who would prefer that this comparison not be made public.
He's not just a talker.
He's a doer.
Pass it on....It's impressive!
What impresses us is how misleading the e-mail is. Its anonymous author doesn't apply the same standards to Clinton's record and Obama's, thus leading to false conclusions about their legislative records. For Clinton, the e-mail claims to examine bills that the senator has sponsored and that were passed into law during her Senate career. For Obama, however, it counts both sponsored and cosponsored bills, whether they were passed or not. And – something the e-mail doesn't state clearly – it counts bills Obama sponsored in the Illinois state Senate, before he was a United States senator.
Just counting bills sponsored by a particular senator is a poor way to gauge legislative clout or effectiveness, in our judgment. For example, one of the accomplishments that Clinton often boasts about – expanding health coverage for National Guard and Reserve troops – came about as a result of an amendment, not a bill. And Obama claims credit for having helped "lead the Senate to pass" an ethics and lobbying bill that he never sponsored or even cosponsored, on grounds that it "drew key provisions" from a bill that he and two other senators cosponsored in 2007. The e-mail falsely claims that Obama sponsored the ethics legislation that became law, which he did not.
Nevertheless, we dug into the records and produced a true tally of the bills for which Sens. Obama and Clinton were in fact the sole, original sponsors. We take no position on which senator deserves credit for the most or best legislation overall. What we can demonstrate is that the numbers in this e-mail are all wrong.
Here's how FactCheck.org tallies the real breakdown of bills and resolutions sponsored by the candidates in the U.S. Senate.
Obama Clinton
Years in Senate 3 7
Bills sponsored* 129 358
Bills passed by Senate 7 32
Bills signed into law 2 19
Sponsored, per year 43 51.1
Passed by Senate, per year 2.3 4.6
Signed into law, per year 0.7 0.7
*Sole original sponsor
We counted only bills for which Obama or Clinton was the sole, original sponsor. The e-mail inflates Obama's numbers by counting his cosponsored bills, but Sarah Binder, a fellow at the Brookings Institution and an expert on legislative politics, tells FactCheck.org that often "cosponsorship does not require a commitment of time, energy or resources – let alone the political or policy ingenuity that might generate a bill idea in the first place." Tallying sponsored bills, says Binder, is "a better metric of a senator's agenda, efforts and interests."
Clinton has been in the Senate a little more than seven years; Obama, a little more than three. Using the numbers above, we calculate that Clinton has been the sole sponsor of a few more bills and resolutions per year – 51, to Obama's 43. And she has steered twice as many through the Senate and almost four times as many into law per year, on average, as Obama has.
Clinton's Real Numbers
Clinton's campaign claims that 22 of the senator's solely sponsored bills have become public law, and the e-mail claims 20. We counted 19, three fewer than the campaign because it included several Clinton-sponsored provisions that were part of other major bills. (The measures were substantive, having to do with such issues as improving treatment for wounded service members, but they didn't fit the rules of this tally.) Nine of her successful bills had to do with naming post offices or courthouses, but others involved building safety, unemployment assistance and support for family caregivers.
The list of her accomplishments in the e-mail, though, is not, as the author claims, a rundown of Clinton-sponsored bills that became law; it is in fact a mishmash of some that became law and others that were only passed by the Senate, without being a complete roster of her bills in either category. She actually sponsored, by herself, 32 bills and resolutions that passed the Senate, including all of those mentioned specifically in the e-mail plus 12 others. The omitted bills include a resolution calling for the immediate and unconditional release of soldiers of Israel held captive by Hamas and Hezbollah, and a resolution condemning the murder of an American journalist. And she has been sole sponsor of a total of 358 bills in her seven-year Senate career.
Here's our list of bills solely sponsored by Clinton that became law (descriptions of each are verbatim from THOMAS.gov, the Library of Congress' database of legislative information):
110th Congress:
S. 694, A bill to direct the Secretary of Transportation to issue regulations to reduce the incidence of child injury and death occurring inside or outside of light motor vehicles, and for other purposes.
109th Congress:
S. 272, A bill to designate certain National Forest System land in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico as a component of the National Wilderness Preservation System.
S. 1283, A bill to amend the Public Health Service Act to establish a program to assist family caregivers in accessing affordable and high-quality respite care, and for other purposes.
S. 2376, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 80 Killian Road in Massapequa, New York, as the "Gerard A. Fiorenza Post Office Building."
S. 2722, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 170 East Main Street in Patchogue, New York, as the "Lieutenant Michael P. Murphy Post Office Building."
S. 3613, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 2951 New York Highway 43 in Averill Park, New York, as the "Major George Quamo Post Office Building."
S. 3716, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 100 Pitcher Street in Utica, New York, as the "Captain George A. Wood Post Office Building."
S. 3910, A bill to direct the Joint Committee on the Library to accept the donation of a bust depicting Sojourner Truth and to display the bust in a suitable location in the Capitol.
108th Congress:
S. 1241, A bill to establish the Kate Mullany National Historic Site in the State of New York, and for other purposes.
S. 1266, A bill to award a congressional gold medal to Dr. Dorothy Height, in recognition of her many contributions to the Nation.
S. 1425, A bill to amend the Safe Drinking Water Act to reauthorize the New York City Watershed Protection Program.
S. 2838, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 10 West Prospect Street in Nanuet, New York, as the "Anthony I. Lombardi Memorial Post Office Building."
S. 2839, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 555 West 180th Street in New York, New York, as the "Sergeant Riayan A. Tejeda Post Office."
107th Congress:
S. 584, A bill to designate the United States courthouse located at 40 Centre Street in New York, New York, as the "Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse."
S. 1422, A bill to provide for the expedited payment of certain benefits for a public safety officer who was killed or suffered a catastrophic injury as a direct and proximate result of a personal injury sustained in the line of duty in connection with the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
S. 1622, A bill to extend the period of availability of unemployment assistance under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act in the case of victims of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
S. 1892, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 375 Carlls Path in Deer Park, New York, as the "Raymond M. Downey Post Office Building."
S. 2496, A bill to provide for the establishment of investigative teams to assess building performance and emergency response and evacuation procedures in the wake of any building failure that has resulted in substantial loss of life or that posed significant potential of substantial loss of life, and for other purposes.
S. 2918, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 380 Main Street in Farmingdale, New York, as the "Peter J. Ganci, Jr. Post Office Building."
A Legislative Powerhouse?
The e-mail claims that Obama "authored 152 bills and co-sponsored another 427" during "his first year in the U.S. Senate." According to THOMAS.gov, this number is an accurate count of bills and amendments that Obama sponsored during the 109th Congress, which actually covered his first two years in the Senate, not one. (Amendments are changes to bills that were spearheaded by other lawmakers.) Discounting amendments and cosponsorships, Obama sponsored 66 bills during those two years. Clinton sponsored 90 in the same period. In his three years in the Senate, Obama has been the sole original sponsor of 129 bills.
The e-mail says Obama sponsored "over 820 bills" in the first "eight years of his elected service," never mentioning that for most of that time, Obama was in the Illinois Senate. Since the rules and operations of that body are quite different from those of the U.S. Senate, we hardly think it's fair to include the proposed legislation to which his name was attached in Springfield in any tally that's being compared with Clinton's record.
An accurate comparison with the Clinton bills listed in the e-mail would have included only the bills Obama has sponsored that have been signed into law. This comparison favors Clinton heavily, since 19 of her bills in seven years have become law, while Obama has had just two in his three years:
S. 2125, A bill to promote relief, security, and democracy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
S. 3757, A bill to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 950 Missouri Avenue in East St. Louis, Illinois, as the "Katherine Dunham Post Office Building."
The Meaning of Fluff
The question of whether a bill is "substantive" is often subjective. But the Clinton bills that the e-mail seems to characterize as frivolous have to do with such goals as recognizing and establishing national observances, honoring individuals' memories, marking important events and congratulating sports teams. Five of the seven Obama-sponsored bills passed by the Senate have similar goals. So do more than 40 percent of all the bills that have been passed by the Senate since the beginning of 2008.
Surely we don't elect senators just to name post offices. But given the contention that meatier bills can prompt, it's much easier to push a seemingly frivolous bill through Congress. Every one of the Clinton and Obama bills that passed the Senate did so by unanimous consent. Bills that generate more opposition, meanwhile, can be struck down or left to languish. According to GovTrack.us, a legislative research site, 308 of 356 bills Clinton has sponsored haven't made it out of committee. In the current (110th) Congress, that includes several bills on foreign policy, nuclear safety, poverty, housing and education, not to mention 19 bills regarding public health and coverage, 13 benefiting the armed forces, and 12 addressing children's care and safety. Likewise, 120 of Obama's 129 sponsored bills haven't made it past the committee level – including, in the 110th Congress, nine bills on energy and environmental policy, nine on public health and eight benefiting the military and veterans, as well as multiple bills on education, foreign policy, product safety and voter access. These bills, being more substantive than, for instance, Clinton's regarding the men's lacrosse team or Obama's on National Summer Learning Day, are also more likely to die in committee.
Blog Showdown
Several blogs have picked up and repeated the idea that Obama has sponsored more, or more important, legislation than Clinton has. One writer on the political blog Daily Kos looked at the senator's record in detail but did not evaluate Clinton's legislation. Another went through legislation from each candidate, analyzing the impressiveness of each bill from her perspective. On the other side, noted blogger Ezra Klein wrote, in his blog for the liberal magazine The American Prospect, that the second Kos article was "not anything even approaching a fair comparison of [the candidates'] legislative records" and that Clinton had in fact proposed important bills.
Since the value of a piece of legislation is so often a matter of opinion, that's a blogspat we won't get into. We can say for sure, though, that Clinton has been the sole original sponsor of more bills than Obama at a slightly higher annual rate; that she's been more successful than Obama at passing bills through the Senate and into law; and that, while she has sponsored a number of seemingly frivolous bills that were signed into law, these are comparable to many of Obama's bills and common in the Senate generally.
One final thought: Recently we published a special report warning readers about the high level of inaccuracy in chain e-mails. This one is no exception. In fact, with its anonymous author and grammatical errors, not to mention a redundancy or two, it's a classic of the genre. If you find one of these e-mails in your in-box, our suggested course of action remains the same: Just hit delete.
Republished with permission from factcheck.org . "
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Obama's Legal Career: "He Didn't Try Any Cases"
From Chicago Sun-Times December 17, 2007: "The oratorical skills White House hopeful Barack Obama has shown on the stump -- and in his "There's not a black America and white America ... there's the United States of America" speech -- would seem to make him a natural for wowing juries.
So why did Obama never make impassioned speeches in court when he returned to Chicago from Harvard Law School in the early '90s to, as his Web site says, "practice as a civil rights lawyer"?
A review of the cases Obama worked on during his brief legal career shows he played the "strong, silent type" in court, introducing himself and his client, then stepping aside to let other lawyers do the talking.
Only once did Obama appear before the prestigious 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, where Judge Richard Posner is legendary for tearing into inexperienced lawyers. But Posner knew Obama as a fellow senior lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School and kept his grilling polite. Obama never lost his cool, and he won the case.
Obama campaigns as a Harvard Law grad but never claims to match the courtroom skills of rival John Edwards, who won multimillion-dollar verdicts for his clients; or even of Hillary Clinton, whom opposing counsel remember as a formidable adversary during 15 years as a litigator at Little Rock's Rose Law Firm.
Obama admits he played a mostly behind-the-scenes role at his law firm, Miner Barnhill & Galland. He researched the law, drafted motions, prepared for depositions and did other less glamorous work during his three years full-time and eight years "of counsel" to the firm. Many trial lawyers spend their time similarly, part of a trend over the last 20 years of settling a greater percentage of cases before trial.
"I was an associate, and a lot of my work was in the research and writing," Obama told the Sun-Times on Sunday.
"I was one of the better writers. I ended up doing the more cerebral writing, less trial work," Obama added. "That's actually something I regret -- not doing more trial work."
"He wrote lots of substantial memos, but he didn't try any cases," said Judson Miner, a partner in the firm who was Obama's boss.
A search of all the cases in Cook County Circuit Court in which Obama made an appearance since he graduated from Harvard in 1991 shows: Zero.
His practice was confined mainly to federal court in Chicago, where he made formal appearances in only five district court cases and another five in cases before the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals -- a total of 10 cases in his legal career. He was on the winning side of just about all those cases. Miner said there were 30 cases to which Obama contributed in some way."
So why did Obama never make impassioned speeches in court when he returned to Chicago from Harvard Law School in the early '90s to, as his Web site says, "practice as a civil rights lawyer"?
A review of the cases Obama worked on during his brief legal career shows he played the "strong, silent type" in court, introducing himself and his client, then stepping aside to let other lawyers do the talking.
Only once did Obama appear before the prestigious 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, where Judge Richard Posner is legendary for tearing into inexperienced lawyers. But Posner knew Obama as a fellow senior lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School and kept his grilling polite. Obama never lost his cool, and he won the case.
Obama campaigns as a Harvard Law grad but never claims to match the courtroom skills of rival John Edwards, who won multimillion-dollar verdicts for his clients; or even of Hillary Clinton, whom opposing counsel remember as a formidable adversary during 15 years as a litigator at Little Rock's Rose Law Firm.
Obama admits he played a mostly behind-the-scenes role at his law firm, Miner Barnhill & Galland. He researched the law, drafted motions, prepared for depositions and did other less glamorous work during his three years full-time and eight years "of counsel" to the firm. Many trial lawyers spend their time similarly, part of a trend over the last 20 years of settling a greater percentage of cases before trial.
"I was an associate, and a lot of my work was in the research and writing," Obama told the Sun-Times on Sunday.
"I was one of the better writers. I ended up doing the more cerebral writing, less trial work," Obama added. "That's actually something I regret -- not doing more trial work."
"He wrote lots of substantial memos, but he didn't try any cases," said Judson Miner, a partner in the firm who was Obama's boss.
A search of all the cases in Cook County Circuit Court in which Obama made an appearance since he graduated from Harvard in 1991 shows: Zero.
His practice was confined mainly to federal court in Chicago, where he made formal appearances in only five district court cases and another five in cases before the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals -- a total of 10 cases in his legal career. He was on the winning side of just about all those cases. Miner said there were 30 cases to which Obama contributed in some way."
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Judicial Watch: Obama ‘intended to leave no paper trail’
From TheHill.com on March 26, 2008: "The president of a prominent watchdog group said Wednesday that he believes Democratic presidential frontrunner Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) “intended to leave no paper trail” during his time in the Illinois Senate. Judicial Watch, which has been seeking access to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s (D-N.Y.) records from her time in the White House, argued Wednesday that the Illinois senator, who has criticized the former first lady for a lack of openness, has his own “records problem.”
“The more we learn about the Illinois Senator, the more obvious it becomes that he is anything but the ethically upright outsider he purports to be,” said Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch.
The group rose to prominence when it repeatedly took on former President Bill Clinton during his time in office. It also sought records from the Bush administration regarding Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy task force.
In a statement, Fitton noted that his group has sought access to Obama’s records as a state senator and questioned whether the presidential candidate has been forthcoming with regard to what happened to those documents.
He said that “nobody knows where they are, if they exist at all” and claimed that “Obama’s story keeps changing.”
However, the Obama campaign said the senator’s records are available.
“All of Sen. Obama’s correspondence with state agencies and records of requests Obama made to them on behalf of his constituents are available to the public and have been accessed by our opponents and members of the news media,” said Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt. “Illinois State senators have limited staff – Obama did not have a scheduler – and so no detailed record exists of all of his daily activities in Springfield.”
Fitton argues that Obama’s public accounts of what happened to his records do not mesh with information from the Illinois Office of the Secretary of State. He added that the Judicial Watch investigation “suggests” that the senator could have had his records archived in a way that would grant the public access to them.
“It appears that Obama never kept records of his time in the Illinois state legislature, or he discarded them,” Fitton stated. “Either way, he clearly intended to leave no paper trail.”
“The more we learn about the Illinois Senator, the more obvious it becomes that he is anything but the ethically upright outsider he purports to be,” said Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch.
The group rose to prominence when it repeatedly took on former President Bill Clinton during his time in office. It also sought records from the Bush administration regarding Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy task force.
In a statement, Fitton noted that his group has sought access to Obama’s records as a state senator and questioned whether the presidential candidate has been forthcoming with regard to what happened to those documents.
He said that “nobody knows where they are, if they exist at all” and claimed that “Obama’s story keeps changing.”
However, the Obama campaign said the senator’s records are available.
“All of Sen. Obama’s correspondence with state agencies and records of requests Obama made to them on behalf of his constituents are available to the public and have been accessed by our opponents and members of the news media,” said Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt. “Illinois State senators have limited staff – Obama did not have a scheduler – and so no detailed record exists of all of his daily activities in Springfield.”
Fitton argues that Obama’s public accounts of what happened to his records do not mesh with information from the Illinois Office of the Secretary of State. He added that the Judicial Watch investigation “suggests” that the senator could have had his records archived in a way that would grant the public access to them.
“It appears that Obama never kept records of his time in the Illinois state legislature, or he discarded them,” Fitton stated. “Either way, he clearly intended to leave no paper trail.”
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Obama's Resume Embellishments
From NoQuarterusa.net on March 26, 2008: "“Senator Obama has called himself a constitutional professor, claimed credit for passing legislation that never left committee, and apparently inflated his role as a community organizer among other issues. When it comes to his record, just words won’t do. Senator Obama will have to use facts as well,” Clinton spokesman Phil Singer said.
Sen. Obama consistently and falsely claims that he was a law professor. The Sun-Times reported that, “Several direct-mail pieces issued for Obama’s primary [Senate] campaign said he was a law professor at the University of Chicago. He is not. He is a senior lecturer (now on leave) at the school. In academia, there is a vast difference between the two titles. Details matter.” In academia, there’s a significant difference: professors have tenure while lecturers do not. [Hotline Blog, 4/9/07; Chicago Sun-Times, 8/8/04]
Obama claimed credit for nuclear leak legislation that never passed. “Obama scolded Exelon and federal regulators for inaction and introduced a bill to require all plant owners to notify state and local authorities immediately of even small leaks. He has boasted of it on the campaign trail, telling a crowd in Iowa in December that it was ‘the only nuclear legislation that I’ve passed.’ ‘I just did that last year,’ he said, to murmurs of approval. A close look at the path his legislation took tells a very different story. While he initially fought to advance his bill, even holding up a presidential nomination to try to force a hearing on it, Mr. Obama eventually rewrote it to reflect changes sought by Senate Republicans, Exelon and nuclear regulators. The new bill removed language mandating prompt reporting and simply offered guidance to regulators, whom it charged with addressing the issue of unreported leaks. Those revisions propelled the bill through a crucial committee. But, contrary to Mr. Obama’s comments in Iowa, it ultimately died amid parliamentary wrangling in the full Senate.” [New York Times, 2/2/08]
Obama misspoke about his being conceived because of Selma. “Mr. Obama relayed a story of how his Kenyan father and his Kansan mother fell in love because of the tumult of Selma, but he was born in 1961, four years before the confrontation at Selma took place. When asked later, Mr. Obama clarified himself, saying: `I meant the whole civil rights movement.’” [New York Times, 3/5/07]
LA Times: Fellow organizers say Sen. Obama took too much credit for his community organizing efforts. “As the 24-year-old mentor to public housing residents, Obama says he initiated and led efforts that thrust Altgeld’s asbestos problem into the headlines, pushing city officials to call hearings and a reluctant housing authority to start a cleanup. But others tell the story much differently. They say Obama did not play the singular role in the asbestos episode that he portrays in the best-selling memoir ‘Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.’ Credit for pushing officials to deal with the cancer-causing substance, according to interviews and news accounts from that period, also goes to a well-known preexisting group at Altgeld Gardens and to a local newspaper called the Chicago Reporter. Obama does not mention either one in his book.” [Los Angeles Times, 2/19/07]
Chicago Tribune: Obama’s assertion that nobody had indications Rezko was engaging in wrongdoing ’strains credulity.’ “…Obama has been too self-exculpatory. His assertion in network TV interviews last week that nobody had indications Rezko was engaging in wrongdoing strains credulity: Tribune stories linked Rezko to questionable fundraising for Gov. Rod Blagojevich in 2004 — more than a year before the adjacent home and property purchases by the Obamas and the Rezkos.” [Chicago Tribune editorial, 1/27/08]
Obama was forced to revise his assertion that lobbyists ‘won’t work in my White House.’ “White House hopeful Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) was forced to revise a critical stump line of his on Saturday — a flat declaration that lobbyists ‘won’t work in my White House’ after it turned out his own written plan says they could, with some restrictions… After being challenged on the accuracy of what he has been saying — in contrast to his written pledge — at a news conference Saturday in Waterloo, Obama immediately softened what had been his hard line in his next stump speech.” [Chicago Sun-Times, 12/16/07]
FactCheck.org: `Selective, embellished and out-of-context quotes from newspapers pump up Obama’s health plan.’ “Obama’s ad touting his health care plan quotes phrases from newspaper articles and an editorial, but makes them sound more laudatory and authoritative than they actually are. It attributes to The Washington Post a line saying Obama’s plan would save families about $2,500. But the Post was citing the estimate of the Obama campaign and didn’t analyze the purported savings independently. It claims that “experts” say Obama’s plan is “the best.” “Experts” turn out to be editorial writers at the Iowa City Press-Citizen - who, for all their talents, aren’t actual experts in the field. It quotes yet another newspaper saying Obama’s plan “guarantees coverage for all Americans,” neglecting to mention that, as the article makes clear, it’s only Clinton’s and Edwards’ plans that would require coverage for everyone, while Obama’s would allow individuals to buy in if they wanted to.” [FactCheck.org, 1/3/08]
Sen. Obama said ‘I passed a law that put Illinois on a path to universal coverage,’ but Obama health care legislation merely set up a task force. “As a state senator, I brought Republicans and Democrats together to pass legislation insuring 20,000 more children. And 65,000 more adults received health care…And I passed a law that put Illinois on a path to universal coverage.” The State Journal-Register reported in 2004 that “The [Illinois State] Senate squeaked out a controversial bill along party lines Wednesday to create a task force to study health-care reform in Illinois. […] In its original form, the bill required the state to offer universal health care by 2007. That put a ‘cloud’ over the legislation, said Sen. Dale Righter, R-Mattoon. Under the latest version, the 29-member task force would hold at least five public hearings next year.” [Obama Health Care speech, 5/29/07; State Journal-Register, 5/20/04]
ABC News: ‘Obama…seemed to exaggerate the legislative progress he made’ on ethics reform. “ABC News’ Teddy Davis Reports: During Monday’s Democratic presidential debate, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., seemed to exaggerate the legislative progress he has made on disclosure of “bundlers,” those individuals who aggregate their influence with the candidate they support by collecting $2,300 checks from a wide network of wealthy friends and associates. When former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel alleged that Obama had 134 bundlers, Obama responded by telling Gravel that the reason he knows how many bundlers he has raising money for him is “because I helped push through a law this past session to disclose that.” Earlier this year, Obama sponsored an amendment [sic] in the Senate requiring lobbyists to disclose the candidates for whom they bundle. Obama’s amendment would not, however, require candidates to release the names of their bundlers. What’s more, although Obama’s amendment was agreed to in the Senate by unanimous consent, the measure never became law as Obama seemed to suggest. Gravel and the rest of the public know how many bundlers Obama has not because of a ‘law’ that the Illinois Democrat has ‘pushed through’ but because Obama voluntarily discloses that information.” [ABC News, 7/23/07]
Obama drastically overstated Kansas tornado deaths during campaign appearance. “When Sen. Barack Obama exaggerated the death toll of the tornado in Greensburg, Kan, during his visit to Richmond yesterday, The Associated Press headline rapidly evolved from `Obama visits former Confederate capital for fundraiser’ to `Obama rips Bush on Iraq war at Richmond fundraiser’ to `Weary Obama criticizes Bush on Iraq, drastically overstates Kansas tornado death toll’ to `Obama drastically overstates Kansas tornado deaths during campaign appearance.’ Drudge made it a banner, ensuring no reporter would miss it.” [politico.com, 5/9/07]
Courtesy of AndreWalker’s MyDD diary, “Just Embellished Words: Obama’s Record of Exaggerations & Misstatements” and campaign press releases."
Sen. Obama consistently and falsely claims that he was a law professor. The Sun-Times reported that, “Several direct-mail pieces issued for Obama’s primary [Senate] campaign said he was a law professor at the University of Chicago. He is not. He is a senior lecturer (now on leave) at the school. In academia, there is a vast difference between the two titles. Details matter.” In academia, there’s a significant difference: professors have tenure while lecturers do not. [Hotline Blog, 4/9/07; Chicago Sun-Times, 8/8/04]
Obama claimed credit for nuclear leak legislation that never passed. “Obama scolded Exelon and federal regulators for inaction and introduced a bill to require all plant owners to notify state and local authorities immediately of even small leaks. He has boasted of it on the campaign trail, telling a crowd in Iowa in December that it was ‘the only nuclear legislation that I’ve passed.’ ‘I just did that last year,’ he said, to murmurs of approval. A close look at the path his legislation took tells a very different story. While he initially fought to advance his bill, even holding up a presidential nomination to try to force a hearing on it, Mr. Obama eventually rewrote it to reflect changes sought by Senate Republicans, Exelon and nuclear regulators. The new bill removed language mandating prompt reporting and simply offered guidance to regulators, whom it charged with addressing the issue of unreported leaks. Those revisions propelled the bill through a crucial committee. But, contrary to Mr. Obama’s comments in Iowa, it ultimately died amid parliamentary wrangling in the full Senate.” [New York Times, 2/2/08]
Obama misspoke about his being conceived because of Selma. “Mr. Obama relayed a story of how his Kenyan father and his Kansan mother fell in love because of the tumult of Selma, but he was born in 1961, four years before the confrontation at Selma took place. When asked later, Mr. Obama clarified himself, saying: `I meant the whole civil rights movement.’” [New York Times, 3/5/07]
LA Times: Fellow organizers say Sen. Obama took too much credit for his community organizing efforts. “As the 24-year-old mentor to public housing residents, Obama says he initiated and led efforts that thrust Altgeld’s asbestos problem into the headlines, pushing city officials to call hearings and a reluctant housing authority to start a cleanup. But others tell the story much differently. They say Obama did not play the singular role in the asbestos episode that he portrays in the best-selling memoir ‘Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.’ Credit for pushing officials to deal with the cancer-causing substance, according to interviews and news accounts from that period, also goes to a well-known preexisting group at Altgeld Gardens and to a local newspaper called the Chicago Reporter. Obama does not mention either one in his book.” [Los Angeles Times, 2/19/07]
Chicago Tribune: Obama’s assertion that nobody had indications Rezko was engaging in wrongdoing ’strains credulity.’ “…Obama has been too self-exculpatory. His assertion in network TV interviews last week that nobody had indications Rezko was engaging in wrongdoing strains credulity: Tribune stories linked Rezko to questionable fundraising for Gov. Rod Blagojevich in 2004 — more than a year before the adjacent home and property purchases by the Obamas and the Rezkos.” [Chicago Tribune editorial, 1/27/08]
Obama was forced to revise his assertion that lobbyists ‘won’t work in my White House.’ “White House hopeful Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) was forced to revise a critical stump line of his on Saturday — a flat declaration that lobbyists ‘won’t work in my White House’ after it turned out his own written plan says they could, with some restrictions… After being challenged on the accuracy of what he has been saying — in contrast to his written pledge — at a news conference Saturday in Waterloo, Obama immediately softened what had been his hard line in his next stump speech.” [Chicago Sun-Times, 12/16/07]
FactCheck.org: `Selective, embellished and out-of-context quotes from newspapers pump up Obama’s health plan.’ “Obama’s ad touting his health care plan quotes phrases from newspaper articles and an editorial, but makes them sound more laudatory and authoritative than they actually are. It attributes to The Washington Post a line saying Obama’s plan would save families about $2,500. But the Post was citing the estimate of the Obama campaign and didn’t analyze the purported savings independently. It claims that “experts” say Obama’s plan is “the best.” “Experts” turn out to be editorial writers at the Iowa City Press-Citizen - who, for all their talents, aren’t actual experts in the field. It quotes yet another newspaper saying Obama’s plan “guarantees coverage for all Americans,” neglecting to mention that, as the article makes clear, it’s only Clinton’s and Edwards’ plans that would require coverage for everyone, while Obama’s would allow individuals to buy in if they wanted to.” [FactCheck.org, 1/3/08]
Sen. Obama said ‘I passed a law that put Illinois on a path to universal coverage,’ but Obama health care legislation merely set up a task force. “As a state senator, I brought Republicans and Democrats together to pass legislation insuring 20,000 more children. And 65,000 more adults received health care…And I passed a law that put Illinois on a path to universal coverage.” The State Journal-Register reported in 2004 that “The [Illinois State] Senate squeaked out a controversial bill along party lines Wednesday to create a task force to study health-care reform in Illinois. […] In its original form, the bill required the state to offer universal health care by 2007. That put a ‘cloud’ over the legislation, said Sen. Dale Righter, R-Mattoon. Under the latest version, the 29-member task force would hold at least five public hearings next year.” [Obama Health Care speech, 5/29/07; State Journal-Register, 5/20/04]
ABC News: ‘Obama…seemed to exaggerate the legislative progress he made’ on ethics reform. “ABC News’ Teddy Davis Reports: During Monday’s Democratic presidential debate, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., seemed to exaggerate the legislative progress he has made on disclosure of “bundlers,” those individuals who aggregate their influence with the candidate they support by collecting $2,300 checks from a wide network of wealthy friends and associates. When former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel alleged that Obama had 134 bundlers, Obama responded by telling Gravel that the reason he knows how many bundlers he has raising money for him is “because I helped push through a law this past session to disclose that.” Earlier this year, Obama sponsored an amendment [sic] in the Senate requiring lobbyists to disclose the candidates for whom they bundle. Obama’s amendment would not, however, require candidates to release the names of their bundlers. What’s more, although Obama’s amendment was agreed to in the Senate by unanimous consent, the measure never became law as Obama seemed to suggest. Gravel and the rest of the public know how many bundlers Obama has not because of a ‘law’ that the Illinois Democrat has ‘pushed through’ but because Obama voluntarily discloses that information.” [ABC News, 7/23/07]
Obama drastically overstated Kansas tornado deaths during campaign appearance. “When Sen. Barack Obama exaggerated the death toll of the tornado in Greensburg, Kan, during his visit to Richmond yesterday, The Associated Press headline rapidly evolved from `Obama visits former Confederate capital for fundraiser’ to `Obama rips Bush on Iraq war at Richmond fundraiser’ to `Weary Obama criticizes Bush on Iraq, drastically overstates Kansas tornado death toll’ to `Obama drastically overstates Kansas tornado deaths during campaign appearance.’ Drudge made it a banner, ensuring no reporter would miss it.” [politico.com, 5/9/07]
Courtesy of AndreWalker’s MyDD diary, “Just Embellished Words: Obama’s Record of Exaggerations & Misstatements” and campaign press releases."
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Rosanne on Experience vs Inspiration
From HuffintonPost.com on February 22, 2008: "When I fly in an airplane I want the pilot with the most experience, not the one who can inspire hope in me that I get to where I am going. When I pay my taxes, I want the person filing them to be experienced, not the new person who inspires hope in me that he can do the job. When I hire someone to fix my washing machine, I want the tried and true experienced person, not the one who inspires me to hope that he can fix it. When I go to the doctor I do not want to get the one who inspires hope in me that s/he can cure what's wrong, but the one who knows what the hell to do the minute I call. It's not really the job of a public servant to inspire, but to get the job that the people demand done. The democrats think that if they have hope and are inspired things will get better, but they actually won't. When Oprah makes her employees sign her fifty page non-disclosure statement, she doesn't "hope" they can't break it, she pays teams of experienced lawyers to MAKE SURE they can't break it, or be sued in an experienced court by an experienced judge."
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