Obama Shows Unexpected Pugnacity

Politico: Candidate Has Displayed Uncanny Ability To Fight Back When Attacked

(The Politico)  This story was written by Avi Zenilman and Ben Smith.

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Senator Barack Obama’s instantly infamous remarks on how small-town Americans “cling” to their faith, their guns, and their xenophobia began drawing attention around 3:30 p.m. Friday.

Obama’s aides went into radio silence, rebuffing requests to explain or respond while his rivals attacked him. At 6:30, his campaign put out a statement that, instead of explaining his words, threw the criticism back at his rivals. Then, just before 9:00 that evening, the candidate himself responded during a speech in Terre Haute, Indiana, with an attack of his own, expressing incredulity that his rivals had called him “out of touch.”

“Out of touch? Out of touch? I mean, John McCain - it took him three tries to finally figure out that the home foreclosure crisis was a problem,” he said, while also criticizing Hillary Clinton for her vote on to make declaring personal bankruptcy harder.

“She says I’m out of touch?”

The response was signature Obama: Attack first, sort out the details later, if at all. No apology, no immediate regret, just a sharp counterattack. For a candidate sometimes mocked for being too soft to win a political fistfight, he has shown an uncanny ability to take a punch, and then rear back and deliver one in return.

When Obama responds this way, it leaves him open to charges that he's undermining his so-called politics of hope. But, showing remarkable dexterity, he has a knack for using these flare-ups to pivot back to the central theme of his candidacy: that politics is broken, and he knows how to change it.

Obama, it turns out, has been a devout observer of a philosophy future President Bill Clinton laid out as far back as 1981.

"When someone is beating you over the head with a hammer, don't sit there and take it,” then-Governor Clinton told Time Magazine. “Take out a meat cleaver and cut off their hand.”

Many Democrats believe their two most recent nominees, Al Gore and John Kerry, ignored that rule, and they are loath to nominate another candidate susceptible to being portrayed as weak. So Obama and his inner political circle - strategist David Axelrod and campaign manager David Plouffe - have observed it religiously, dispelling an early perception that the candidate would wilt under fire from Clinton or Republicans.

Instead, when under attack, the candidate rarely acknowledges any fault - for such a move would offer critics an opening. In the case of his San Francisco remarks, perhaps the worst gaffe of his career, he conceded Saturday only that “if I worded things in a way that made people offended, I deeply regret that.”

Obama’s unexpected pugnacity also extends to include personal responses to tactical assaults, a level of sparring often left to spokespeople.

The examples are many, but the pattern first began to take shape last summer after a debate in South Carolina at which Obama said he would personally meet foreign dictators.

The remark appeared to be a slip, and in the spin room after the debate, Obama’s chief strategist, David Axelrod, tried to explain it away.

But the next day, Clinton told the Quad City Times, an Iowa daily, that Obama had been “naïve and irresponsible” to offer meetings, an attack reported on the paper’s website. That afternoon, Obama himself placed a call to the reporter who wrote the story.

It was Clinton, he said, who had been “irresponsible and naïve” to vote to authorize the war in Iraq. And he embraced his promise to meet the hostile leaders, casting Clinton’s reluctance - a line his campaign continued to amplify throughout the fall - as similar to the Bush administration’s stance.

Obama has eagerly pursued other attacks. He memorably mocked Clinton for finding evidence of untoward ambition in his elementary school writings. When Clinton called to “tur up the heat” on the Republicans, Obama suggested “more light” instead.

In late February, reporters traveling with Obama in Ohio learned - before the story hit the wires or the blogs - from Obama’s staff that McCain had accused the Illinois senator of ignorance of the presence of Al Qaeda terrorists in Iraq.

Obama, taking the stage at Ohio State University minutes later, responded with vigor.

"John McCain thought that he could make a clever point," said Obama. "I have some news for John McCain. And that is that there was no such thing as al-Qaida in Iraq until George Bush and John McCain decided to invade Iraq.”

More recently, when faced with the incendiary video of his former pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright attacking Clinton, followed by more video of the minister’s criticism of American, Obama eschewed the counterattacks. But nevertheless he hewed to a familiar course: no apology, no concession of wrongdoing. His position was that he hadn’t been in the pews for Wright’s reported controversial statements.

Obama’s immediate responses, the campaign quickly decided, were insufficient. And so just six days later Obama sought to cast the issue in his own terms with a major speech on the easier aspect of Wright’s words to address, race, while ignoring Wright’s anti-American comments.

But the most recent flap over his remarks about small-town Pennsylvanians represented a return to form as he moved first to attack Clinton and McCain.

Then came what seemed to a departure. In a slow-motion roll-out that may have slightly prolonged the story, Obama tiptoed up to an apology, before returning to his comfort zone. On Sunday evening, with particular glee, he turned to Clinton’s discussion of her childhood hunting.

"She's running around talking about how this is an insult to sportsmen, how she values the Second Amendment, she's talking like she's Annie Oakley!” he said at a stop in Pennsylvania. “Hillary Clinton's out there like she's on the duck blind every Sunday, she's packin' a six shooter! C'mon! She knows better. That's some politics being played by Hillary Clinton. I want to see that picture of her out there in the duck blinds.”

[xlib]

Well, it must have taken his speech writers a few days to come up with these "pugnacious" retorts. What a guy, what a guy.

[rowdytexan2]

Pugnacious! lmao! What a rip!

The arrogant arse still thinks he didn''t say anything WRONG when he thought no one was listening!

Stupid, stupid, bad judgment!

[rowdytexan2]

Posted by popstom1 at 01:36 PM : Apr 15, 2008

lol, Pops, tell it like it is!

[truth-hurts]

Well, Well, Another side of Obama. Now lets see the Dictator/Hitler White Genocide side.

[mudrose-2009]

Effendi Obama the Elitist who talks out of two sides of his mouth. He''''s the loose change agent. The one with the Audacity to Hoax. He chants change, change, change - Aretha style while the other side of his mouth he spews gun-toting, religious-clinging antipathetic-immigrant-hating bitter Blue Class bigotry propoganda. But you don''''t dare call this little magot "boy". Ya hear. How politically incorrect are ya.

Little boy, you touched the third rail - guns and god. You''re dead.

[leighg1]

Go Obama! The Bosnia lady has no judgment/integrity we can count on. I am bitter, I need the CHANGE!

[charisma9949]

RowdyTexan/Popstom: Whoa! Nasty, nasty! Your very juvenile insecurities are showing. Fortunately there are those of us still out here who put you right where you belong - exactly nowhere.

[suzyku]

The idiots who have blogged here can''t even spell! Gee they must be hillarycrites!!! Not too bright, they want the nasty, lying hillary to continue ruining this country! If they get their way there isn''t much hope for the future of this country, the dumbing down will continue.

[aldon61]

Clinton talking about hammers and cleavers reminds me to never bring a knife to a gunfight. Politics is a gunfight and every candidate should bring as much firepower to the race as they can.

[leighg1]

Bill Clinton called our people "scare of death" in 1991. You have problem with "bitter", no problem with that?

[jone775]

WOO HOO! Go Obama! You truly understand what it''s like to be a regular citizen. Lets win this thing!

[truth-hurts]

Oh boy, Obama followers, Lets rumble in the jungle.

[rowdytexan2]

RowdyTexan/Popstom: Whoa! Nasty, nasty! Your very juvenile insecurities are showing. Fortunately there are those of us still out here who put you right where you belong - exactly nowhere.


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Posted by charisma9949 at 01:43 PM : Apr 15, 2008

Well, pardon me, but I don''t take to being called an ignorant rural racist who can''t face real issues!

And your juvenile attitude in not researching an checking out this corrupt shill just shoes to go ya!

If you had done ONE piece of research taking a look at this man besides what the media has presented to you, you wouldn''t be putting a vote his way either.

[popstom1]

Hey He trys make himself out like He fought on
city streets of chicago the only thing he did on the streets was sell his AS$ too Emil Jones like I said
cheep whor

[aldon61]

Suzyku and Charisma9949: Good posts and accurate observations of the subjects in question.

[jone775]

RowdyTexan2: I take offense to your suggestion that Obama supporters have not done their homework. Before all this hoopla started, I already knew a lot about Obama. You can say whatever you want about some of his infamous supporters, but in the end, it''s about him, and he''s got it right. His recent comments on the state of poor America were right on!

[phillysage]

When this turkey, Barakh Husssein, gets mad and attacks the media who''s been propping him up all along call it a virtue of pugnacity. When Hillary criticizes she''s portrayed as a witch. If it weren''t for the misogynist media Hillary would have put this baby 3-year senator away a long time ago.

[popstom1]

jone take a cross county trip and get look at real
America

[truth-hurts]

Jone775, If you think that Obama''s right on etc. etc. Then you must beleive what he says about bitter small town people with their guns....nuff said!

[phillysage]

Mubarakh Hussein Ubama, the great black hope of the Nation of Islam, is applauded by the misogynist media for telling us the need to understand black anger. But when whites are angry, according to him, their being bigoted, ignorant and out of line. I suppose he''''ll make a nice speech and the smug misogynist media will forgive him again. Even now they are throwing him more pillows and giving him more foot massages to prop him back up from his remarks denigrating small-town America

[jack3213]

OBAMA IS ANGRY AS IS CLINTON BECAUSE THEY CAN''T SEEM TO GET ACROSS TO OTHERS ALL THE NONSENSE THAT THEY NEED TO SCAM AMERICANS FOR TO WIN A POSITION THEY ARE NOT QUALIFIED TO HAVE. IT IS SCARY AND I WOULD BE WORRIED IF ANY OF YOU BELIEVE THEM.

[sierra20071]

irresponsible and naove%u201D to vote to authorize the war in Iraq. Well, it is irresponsible and Naive to think the American People don''t know that Obama is running on the sound bite; "I was against the war from the betinning" and so naive to think the American People don''t know that he voted to fund that war that he was against. Also, taking credit as being first when Natalie Maines, Dixie Chicks, Whoopie Goldberg, Sean Penn, etc...Paid the ultimate price in being first against the war. Mr. Obama is an opportunist, he want''s it both ways. This unscrupled man thinks he is such a supreme being, that he is actually going to put his pitiful self up against a war hero, a man that has truly been in the trenches for the American People. Or, go up against a women that has devoted her life to serving the American People. Where does this greenthumb get off...and, then the ultimate he disses the backbone of America, by insinuating that we are ignorant, and we don''t know how to react sensible to hardship...I think O is bitter!

[truth-hurts]

phillysage, Oops, I read your post wrong. It''s denigrating.

[rowdytexan2]

RowdyTexan2: I take offense to your suggestion that Obama supporters have not done their homework. Before all this hoopla started, I already knew a lot about Obama. You can say whatever you want about some of his infamous supporters, but in the end, it''''s about him, and he''''s got it right. His recent comments on the state of poor America were right on!


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Posted by jone775 at 01:51 PM : Apr 15, 2008

So you agree with him that rural people are too ignorant to face real issues and that HE in his superior krakhead is the only one that can do our thinking for us?

Figgers! What a honker!

[jone775]

popstom1: I have traveled all across, and lived, all across the U.S. I was in the military once upon a time.

[jone775]

truth-hurts: I do indeed believe his remarks are right on...as your screen name implies, the truth hurts sometimes.

[phillysage]

Anybody but Mubarakh Hussein Ubama, the great black hope of Louis Farrakhan''s Nation of Islam, the dear friend of the Weathermen.
The blacks who are supporting him are doing so because they are more racist than whites. Hillary has done more for civil rights than Obama ever did. When she was reaching out to minorities to serve them, Ubama by his own words in his book, was smoking pot and drinking along with cocaine

[michael0004]

RowdyTexan2: I take offense to your suggestion that Obama supporters have not done their homework. Before all this hoopla started, I already knew a lot about Obama. You can say whatever you want about some of his infamous supporters, but in the end, it''''''''s about him, and he''''''''s got it right. His recent comments on the state of poor America were right on!

Which comments? Version 1 or Version 2?

[jone775]

all versions...

[truth-hurts]

jone775, actually your''re the one that will, sooner or latter, get hurt by the "truth".

[rowdytexan2]

all versions...


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Posted by jone775 at 02:08 PM : Apr 15, 2008

Fact is, unless you live in Chicago, you didn''t even know his name before this primary process! And he''s shilled you and millions of people presenting himself as something he''s obviously NOT!

I''ve got some swamp land down in here in Texas, I''ll sell ya cheap!

[jockh]

If Hillary is the best candidate, has the best policies, comes from a political dynasty, has the most experience and is most likely to win against McCain then why is she losing to Obama !!!!
If she cant even beat an inexperienced no good newcomer like Obama then she will be useless to the Democrats in november.

[jockh]

Sen. Clinton has run an incompetent campaign, half truths, outright lies, imaginary heroism, take-no prisoners politics, a presidential spouse given to wallowing in anger and self-pity, and a succession of aides and surrogates pushed under the bus when things don%u2019t go right. Her campaign has failed spectacularly despite being the Partys obvious favorite from the beginning.

She knows she cannot win the pledged delegates or popular vote; and she knows superdelegates will not destroy the party by backing her, so she is simply hanging around with a begging bowl asking for the nomination in case Obama makes a fatal mistake.

What kind of a leader would prefer to win a Presidential Election on account of her opponents mistakes rather than her ability?

How can Sen. Clinton manage the United States when she can%u2019t even run her own campaign.

[rowdytexan2]

If Hillary is the best candidate, has the best policies, comes from a political dynasty, has the most experience and is most likely to win against McCain then why is she losing to Obama !!!!
If she cant even beat an inexperienced no good newcomer like Obama then she will be useless to the Democrats in november.



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Posted by jockh at 02:12 PM : Apr 15, 2008

Actually she hasn''t lost. She has as much support as he does, or the DNC would''ve called the nomination already.

[jone775]

RowdyTexan2: When did this primary season kick off? When did Obama deliver his now-famous speech at the Democratic National Convention?

[destardi]

Doesn''t make what he said true.

The saddest part about Obama''s "mis-speaks" are that he''s telling the truth...HIS truth.

Just great, you 50% of so-called Dems...give the Republicans not only a dem they can call elitest, but give them proof positive, making it true for once..Yes, obama is an elitest.

Right down to all of those "wealthy and well educated" supporters of his, that have been trumpeted from the very beginning.

Um, kinda makes "elitest" an understatement; especially when those same supporters keep reminding Hillary supporters of those supposed facts, as if it lessens their vote any.

DISGUSTING OBAMA!

[jockh]

As a gun owner and hunter, I have trouble welcoming pistol packing mama Hillary Clinton into the gun fraternity.

And, as someone who used to toss down more than his share of shots, I have even more trouble imagining an evening at the local bar tossing back shots and beer with the Democratic Presidential pretender.

Yet claims of a hunting heritage and downing shots of Crown Royal and chasing it with a beer is part of Clinton''s pathetic attempt to prove she''s just one of us.

Memo to Hillary: You ain''t one of us, especially not with 109 million dollars in the pockets of your solid gold pant suits; so drop the charade, you are looking like a fool. We''re not looking for one of us. We''re looking for a leader.

Besides, if the phone rings at the White House at 3 a.m. and Hillary is spreadeagled across the bed, passed out in an alcohol-induced stupor, no one is available to answer the phone.

[jone775]

truth-hurts: it''s "later" not "latter."

[jockh]

Hillary is grasping at any and every straw, because of the depth of her desperation.
I have this vision of Hillary tumbling down a cliff and grabbing the little tree stumps on her way down, hoping that one of them will stop the fall, and keep her from crashing%u2026.can you smell the desperation wafting from Camp Clinton?

They know they have to beat Obama by over 20 points to give themselves even the most remote chance of catching him in the rest of the few remaining primary states. So they mount another desperate ploy from their hanging by a fingernail campaign, but ultimately this is much ado about nothing. ? It may cost Obama a few votes in Pennsylvania and it looks likely that Clinton will have her last hurrah by winning that state, but unless the superdelegates have a death wish for their party, he will still win the nomination; and finally Hillary will go home and take her pant suits with her.

[michael0004]

In today''s Washington Post, George F. Will, perhaps, said it best:

"Obama may be the fullfillment of modern liberalism. Explaining why many working-class voters are ''bitter,'' he said they ''cling'' to guns, religion and ''antipathy to people who aren''t like them'' because of ''frustrations.'' His implication was that their primitivism, superstition and bigotry are balm for resentments they feel because of America''s grinding injustice. By so speaking,, Obama does fulfill liberalism''s transformation since Franklin Roosevelt. What had been under FDR a celebration of America and the values of its working people has become a doctrine of condescension toward those people and the supposedly course and vulgar country that pleases them."

[jockh]

John McCain Should Go on Vacation, Hillary Clinton is Doing His Job for Him
By cynically twisting Obama''s comments about small town voters in a way that confirms every right-wing demagogic caricature of her own Party, Hillary Clinton has adopted the frames, lies, stereotypes and destructive clichis long embraced by the likes of Lee Atwater and Karl Rove. She has clearly decided that the road to victory runs through scorched earth. The question is, if she succeeds, what kind of Party will she be left to lead? She''s burning down the village to save it -- or to prove that she would make the best fire chief. But the village won''t be saved; only one house will be left standing. A house with room for just two occupants: Hill and Bill

[jockh]

Obama recently paid back is school loans. Hillary turned $1000 into a magical $100,000 through illegal insider trading and is sitting on 109 million dollars. Obama worked the streets in poverty and crime ridden areas of Chicago, seeing first hand the hopeless and the damage they have suffered. Hillary''s family had a summer cottage where she spent her summers.

Instead of a Wall street firm (easy to do for a Harvard Law Review editor) Obama worked for a small local firm. With her husband as governor, Hillary worked for the Rose Firm, the biggest corporate firm in that region. Obama donated his time, Hillary sat on the Wallmart Board of Directors, making anti-union and anti-worker decisions. Obama writes books, Hillary hires others to write them for her.

It just begs the question: JUST WHO THE HELL IS ELITE HERE.

[jone775]

michael0004: and despite all fake outrage, here is how Gallup weighs in:

"Three days'' worth of polling after the news broke that Sen. Barack Obama said some small-town voters are "bitter," he has edged out to his largest lead yet in Gallup''s daily national tracking survey."

[rowdytexan2]

RowdyTexan2: When did this primary season kick off? When did Obama deliver his now-famous speech at the Democratic National Convention?


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Posted by jone775 at 02:14 PM : Apr 15, 2008

I believe that would be back in 2002, while he was being a total failure in the Illinois legislation.

Fact is, he didn''t have a clue about what he was talking about, and he LUCKED out with a guess. But his arrogant opinion of himself will promote this LUCK as genius, when he didn''t even have a vote! Nor constituents that were yelling for us to go to war!

[jockh]

So Obama is the one tagged with the elite label, all the while that Little Hillary chartered a private plane to avoid rubbing shoulders with the media (at least until she ran out of money). Her husband earned a cool $800,000 in future bribe money from pro-Colombian trade pacts lobbyists, half of which she can use for her campaign.


Instead of firing Mark Penn for double dipping with Colombia, she merely changes his title. And all the while, she attacks Obama for no being strong enough on trade issues. Worst of all, Howard Wolfson also takes Colombian trade money, leaving Hillary as the only individual in her entire campaign that seems to have missed out on free money.

But she is against the trade agreement. Honestly. Trust her. Really.

[destardi]

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Posted by jockh at 02:13 PM : Apr 15, 2008


The true test of a manager, is righting the ship, when it has gone astray; Hillary has done exactly that, in case you haven''t noticed ALL of the polls recently...

And as far as the *** you spewed about "half truths" blah blah, have YOU ever been in a combat helicopter, with a fortified cockpit that you were ushered into, surrounded by soldiers with guns, while wearing a flak-jacket, while having the helicopter perform evasive manuevers (zigging/zagging), with the loud roar of the blades in your ears?

What would YOU have made of it?

You people disgust me, piling on for something you can never claim to imagine your own...WAS it a war zone or NOT?

Has Laura gotten even CLOSE to something like that?

Obama has divided the party with clear opportunistic racebaiting, and I will NEVER support him for that...
EVER. Take your "racist" insults, and stick them where the sun doesn''t shine...We can see who has been preoccupied with race, from the beginning, with Michelle''s "racial divide", to Wright''s founding of his church on Jim Cone''s madeup theology viewpoint.

NO THANK YOU

[truth-hurts]

Jockitch, You''re one dumb gun owner if your voting for Barack Obama. He''s afraid of guns. He''s gonna get rid a dem so no Black people get shot by one o dem country folk.

[rowdytexan2]

michael0004: and despite all fake outrage, here is how Gallup weighs in:

"Three days'''' worth of polling after the news broke that Sen. Barack Obama said some small-town voters are "bitter," he has edged out to his largest lead yet in Gallup''''s daily national tracking survey."




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Posted by jone775 at 02:17 PM : Apr 15, 2008

Ask where Gallup took their poll. Downtown Chicago among his corrupt money scamming buddies?

[guilden_nl-2009]

I am still rolling on the floor laughing at the clueless Evil One''s comments about being in touch. This after she''s been FOR and now AGAINST NAFTFA, this is after she and Slick Willie have raked in hundreds of millions of Dollars trading on their time spent on the public dole.

[jockh]

Hillary is NOT a liar.

I must admit that as a parent, it is all too easy to confuse a hug from a little girl with the terror of running from sniper bullets.