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Obama, U.S. troops, and two bogus smears

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There are two competing, conservative, anti-Obama smears going on at the same time regarding Barack Obama, his trip last week overseas, and U.S. troops. Both are completely wrong.

The first is the basis of the McCain campaign’s new television ad, which argues that Obama blew off wounded troops to go to the gym, because the Pentagon “wouldn’t allow him to bring cameras.” This is, as we discussed this morning, a blatant and disgusting lie.

The second is an email that’s making the rounds in far-right circles, ostensibly written by a National Guardsman stationed in Afghanistan.

“As the soldiers where [sic] lined up to shake his hand he blew them off and didn’t say a word as he went into the conference room to meet the general,” the e-mail said.

[Capt. Jeffrey S. Porter at Bagram Airbase] wrote that Obama then went straight to the base’s “Clamshell” or recreation facility to pose for “publicity pictures playing basketball” and “shunned the opportunity to talk to soldiers to thank them for their service. I swear we got more thanks from the NBA Basketball Players or the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders than from one of the Senators, who wants to be the President of the United States. I just don’t understand how anyone would want him to be our Commander-in-Chief. It was almost that he was scared to be around those that provide the freedom for him and our great country.”

This email has been widely circulated in right-wing circles, and has been trumpeted by far-right blogs, which not only promoted it widely, but accepted it at face value.

We now know a) that the version of events described in the email never happened; and b) the Guardsman responsible for the email has recanted.

On the first point…

“These comments are inappropriate and factually incorrect,” said Bagram spokeswoman Army Lt. Col. Rumi Nielson-Green, who added that such political commentary is barred for uniformed personnel.

Obama didn’t play basketball at Bagram or visit the Clamshell, she said. Home-state troops were invited to meet him, but his arrival was kept secret for security reasons.

“We were a bit delayed … as he took time to shake hands, speak to troops and pose for photographs,” Nielson-Green said.

…and on the second.

An Army officer’s negative e-mail account of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s visit with the troops in Afghanistan that set the blogosphere ablaze prompted Army officials to correct aspects of the e-mail and resulted in a statement from the message’s author that “some of the information that was put out in my e-mail was wrong.” […]

Army Times sent an e-mail to Porter, a Utah Army National Guard member assigned to the 142nd Military Intelligence Battalion, asking if he could verify that he wrote the controversial e-mail and requesting an interview.

Porter’s reply declined the interview request, but said:

“I am writing this to ask that you delete my e-mail and not forward it, after checking my sources some of the information that was put out in my e-mail was wrong. This e-mail was meant only for my family. Please respect my wishes and delete the e-mail and if there are any blogs you have my e-mail portrayed on I would ask if you would take it down too.”

All of this has been added to the Obama campaign’s “Fight the Smears” site.

When the email arrives in your inbox from your crazed, right-wing family member, feel free to set the record straight. It may not do any good, but it’s probably good to have the information on hand anyway.

Comments

  • Lance

    says:

    Okay, was he a Morman military intelligence analyst or MORON military intelligence analyst.

    If this is the kind of analysis he’s sending to his family about Obama, I shudder to think what he’s giving the front line troops about the Taliban.

  • Thomas Jackson

    says:

    I’m not surprised to learn that Republicans would use false information to smear Senator Obama. I spend the better part of my time online these days debunking all the right-wing smears I constantly receive via email. It’s good to know we have a strong voice for the truth in you, Mr. Benen. What worries me is that so many people believe these smears.

    Sometimes I think we need twice as many voices like yours to effectively counter all the lies and distortions distributed by Republicans and their cohorts. But we must remain vigilant. This election is too important to not be fully engaged.

    Keep up the great work, Steve!

  • Georgette Orwell

    says:

    Now let’s see, what’s this rule about personnel in the armed services not being allowed to egage in political activities? Or is he all right because he was in his pajamas instead of uniform?

    Smears by their nature are untrue, but it’s nearly impossible to unring such bells.

  • dave

    says:

    Steve,
    Thanks for the update on that e-mail.
    I help moderate at another site that covers a certain media organization and kept having the trolls bring this up as ‘proof’ that Senator Obama doesn’t respect the troops.

    I thought it was bogus and would delete whenever they posted it and kept getting accused of censorship.

    Ha!

  • st john

    says:

    What about the suggestion by McCain to limit VA services to only those injured in combat operations? What about circulating that in an email “authored” by a PTSD-diagnosed soldier denied or delayed services by the VA? Just make one up and give it a name. It doesn’t seem to matter if the writer even exists or if the allegations are accurate. It just has to be circulated to be accepted as truth. Make the sender a Republican who is now dismayed by his treatment by McCain.

    Dear [Family Member],
    I was returned from Iraq in November of 2007 and was having trouble adjusting to civilian life. I went to the VA in D.C. and had to fill out a whole bunch of forms, about 17 pages. I had a hard time because there was a lot of details I didn’t remember. I did as good as I could. Because I didn’t have any physical wounds, they said I could not get an appointment until all the wounded troops got in. So, I have been waiting for 6 months to see someone to help me. In the mean time, I cannot find a job and my girlfriend is beginning to think I am just making this all up.
    I just heard that John Mccain has said I am not entitled to treatment because I don’t have any combat-related wounds. If this is true, then I think he should not be running for president. I hope it is not.
    Please help me to get through this time.

    A recently discharged Iraq veteran

  • joey(bjobotts)

    says:

    McCain is a slime ball. If you can’t see it on him then you’re blind or you aren’t looking closely. Just watch him speak…all that repressed rage and anger laughing out lies. Thank god, I never have to worry about him becoming president.

  • Hannah

    says:

    I’m glad that Porter recanted, but I’m sure the righties will say that he was forced to recant or some other such idiocy. Even if he’s the only one who made that claim in the first place.

    It’s a shame people are so gullible that they’ll believe anything they see or read on TV, in newspapers or the internet. My hubby pointed out this commercial, by the Concerned Children’s Advertisers (Canada): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDOn639E114 (be sure to check it out)
    It could be easily modified for a Don’t Believe Everything you Read on the Internet commercial.

  • Keori

    says:

    “Utah National Guardsmen Lies To Smear The Black Candidate”

    Color me shocked and surprised.

    My younger (non-white) siblings were forced to go to high school in Utah. The kids there were some of the most racist, sexist, classist pigs I’ve ever encountered. My younger sister was called “dirty little n****r” to her face on a weekly basis. And you know who they learned those attitudes from? Hint: the right answer isn’t “the liberal media.” Though it just might have something to do with the fact that the Mormon church didn’t bow to social reality and accept blacks as actual people until June 1978.

  • Shalimar

    says:

    Porter’s reply declined the interview request, but said:
    “I am writing this to ask that you delete my e-mail and not forward it, after checking my sources some of the information that was put out in my e-mail was wrong. This e-mail was meant only for my family. Please respect my wishes and delete the e-mail and if there are any blogs you have my e-mail portrayed on I would ask if you would take it down too.”

    That isn’t a good enough apology or explanation. What sources? What information specifically was wrong? If only “some of the information” was wrong then that means he is still claiming that some of it was right.

  • barkleyg

    says:

    ““As the soldiers where [sic] lined up to shake his hand he blew them off and didn’t say a word as he went into the conference room to meet the general,” the e-mail said.”

    Wow! That sure sounds like a FIRST HAND account of what happened. Now he says:”after checking my sources some of the information that was put out in my e-mail was wrong. ” All of a sudden, his first hand experience of Obama is SECOND hand rumor, and not true. Ya think his parents appreciate such honest(?) letters from their good ol Mormon son?

    The right deserves derision over this because they want to believe anything negative about Obama, even when taken from private e-mails with no verification at all of the accusations.

  • Steve

    says:

    “I am writing this to ask that you delete my e-mail and not forward it, after checking my sources some of the information that was put out in my e-mail was wrong. This e-mail was meant only for my family. Please respect my wishes and delete the e-mail and if there are any blogs you have my e-mail portrayed on I would ask if you would take it down too.”

    Fuck off, Porter. I hope the whole damned country sees your garbage—word for word—and then dares you to justify why you used the uniform for this kind of crap.

    “Meant only for my family?” WTF is this piece of dog excrement thinking—that it’s more okay to lie through his teeth to his family than to a bunch of strangers? It’s really too bad that this reprehensible clump of filth isn’t from Ohio; I could probably round up a proper welcoming committee for when he got back home. Rocks, bottles, rotten vegetables, spoiled eggs, chucks of decaying roadkill, clumps of dung, “yellow-water” balloons….

    Hope the “McCain Point” was worth it….

  • jc

    says:

    “When the email arrives in your inbox from your crazed, right-wing family member, feel free to set the record straight. It may not do any good, but it’s probably good to have the information on hand anyway.”

    Woah, Just minutes after I finished reading this post, I was forwarded this e-mail by a right wing family member. Ahhhh, manufactured outrage.

  • JS

    says:

    Why didn’t McCain visit the troops at Landstuhl in March on his European tour, it is close to London and Paris, a writer on Daily Kos says it is because he was busy fundraising in London at the home of a British lord.

  • I Don't Like You Either.

    says:

    McCain’s Smear Campaign Against Obama…

    I don’t know which is more pathetic: McCain’s pathetic, hamfisted attacks to take down Obama with lame little smears or the eagerness of formerly McCain-hating right-wing bloggers to leap to his defense. Right wingers in America really have come roun…

  • st john

    says:

    As another poster suggests, this Cpt. Porter is wrong on several accounts. And the fact that he is an Intelligence Officer, disseminating this kind of false inuendo, is very disconcerting. What kind of intelligence is he providing if this is what he is sending to his family? Why has he not been brought up on charges? This is a serious violation (alleged) of military protocol and should not go without investigation. Many have lost their jobs in the linguistic area of intelligence for their sexual orientation; why would a father of six not be treated equally? The military is badly broken and this is just one more example of the irrelevance of using violence to resolve conflict. The military trains soldiers to comply with orders without question; then, excuses violations of those orders when it suits their political purposes. Military ethics is an oxymoron. Porter, if he is even a real person, should be suspended pending a full investigation of his behavior.

    I am committed to Oneness through Justice and Transformation
    peace,
    st john

  • Chris

    says:

    I think what happened was his intent all along. What he didn’t intend was to become the center of attention. The only reason he recanted was because 1) it became clear that what he wrote wasn’t true, and 2) his name became attached to the lie. So, all of a sudden, he “checks his sources” and plays the stand-up guy. Right…

  • JS

    says:

    Just watching morning Joe and sick of them saying Obama did not visit the troops, sent and email to the show which of course they did not respond to. When on his European trip John McCain did not visit Landstul, in spite of being a few hours away. He was busy fundraising at the home of a British lord.Also the British were shocked at how he did not seem to know why we are in Iraq, in an interview a reporter was shocked at how he had thick make-up plastered on to hide his scars from surgery, how much older than his years he was. Also apparently his priorities, apart from fundraising were shopping and saying he was related to Robert the Bruce (which they cannot validate1)

  • Matt

    says:

    So, is he going to be disciplined for abusing his position as an Army officer to make a political attack? Not to mention, a court would easily find his words libelous (defamatory and untrue).

    I wish I could say I was surprised that this event has been paid no attention by the news media. Unlike most smear attacks, this one has a real name and person attached to it, and as an Army officer, it pertains to the conduct of the military.

  • Pete Parker

    says:

    I’m a republican who rec’d this, and in attempt to valdiate its truth but wound up in this place. From reading the comments above, I can see that this is a fair and balanced site offering a balanced view of the political landscape. NOT…

    Way to lead by example. This site is the same exact thing it demonizes. To sit here all smug with your holier than thou rhetoric. I, for one, do not buy it.

    The liberals out there have forgotten all of the bad deeds of their own party and seem to live in a world where only republicans do bad things. Even this liberal loser Steve something or other (as if I care enough to look) had to admit this was the effort of a real person not a calculated effort by the “vast right wing conspiracy”. Had this been an organized effort the “vast left wing conspiracy”, err, I mean the media would have picked it up…
    I’m surprised the conspiracy theorists (this place should be crawling with them) here would believe an army official when they recant a story, but find it easily to NOT believe them when it comes to Roswell. I think its fun to watch the liberal left pick and choose when they believe the government.
    I wish Obama luck in the future, but not as president. Maybe if he stays in the Senate he can gain some experience and someday have another shot.

  • cj

    says:

    Obama and McCain both suck. Its the year of the NON-VOTE.
    Both parties need to go! Neither one is interested in the people only their party having power. They cant get ANYTHING done, because neither will allow the other to have a decent idea.