I've stayed away from the petty squabbling between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for several reasons. One, it's all phony. Under normal circumstances, these two would agree on far more things than they would disagree. The media has hyped them up and pushed them to quarrel when in reality we all know they should be concentrating on what really matters. Two, the real campaign is against the Republicans, the party of fiscal responsibility that turned a record surplus into a record deficit, the party of limited government that has made the federal government larger than it has ever been, the party of the military which has stretched our armed forces so thin in an illegal war that we are unprepared for real threats at home, the party of less government violation of civil liberties that spies on American citizens. Yes, that party. So, until the candidates can talk honestly about what has happened under eight years of Bush and what another eight years will look like, it is stupid for me to comment. Three, ever since his mind blowing speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, I've been an Obama fan.

There was a six month period (which ended when John Edwards dropped out of the race) when I switched to supporting other candidates (Dennis Kucinich and/or John Edwards) but that was only because John Edwards was saying and campaigning for things which I liked a lot more than what Barack Obama was saying or campaigning for. Since his departure, I've come "back" to the fold (I never really left; in all honesty I was hoping some of Kucinich's progressivism and Edward's populism would rub off on Obama) and I think any commentary of mine when Barack Obama is still campaigning against Hillary Clinton would not be useful.

They're both great candidates, and I would be proud to vote for either one of them. I just happen to like Barack Obama more.

That said, I haven't completely ignored the recent right-wing attempts to smear Obama. To be completely honest, it's actually somewhat funny. Their smears are so pathetic it just proves that they cannot beat Obama come November. They know they've got nothing, he can beat anything they throw at him, and that he is far more qualified a candidate than John "Lobbyist Hypocrite" McCain, Mitt "Magical Underpants" Romney (Sorry about that last one, but you gotta hand it to Bill Maher, it's funny), or Mike "Theocracy Now" Huckabee combined.

The right wing has thoroughly duped the Bible Belt dittoheads into believing outlandish claims about Barack Obama, like he's a Muslim (he's not) or that he wants to be inaugurated on a copy of the Qu'ran (he doesn't). Don't believe me? Watch this video:



But, we, in the Jewish community, need to repudiate the smears being done in our name. Mobius at Orthodox Anarchist has detailed his own frustrations with the Jewish right-wing on this very topic (See here and here). He goes into length the smear being propagated by the right-wing in our own midst (yes, they exist, and they've been tarnishing our name with their stupid policies from within the Bush Administration and outside with their cheerleading).

The current smear, repeated incidentally by Christopher Hitchens on the February 29, 2008 broadcast of Real Time With Bill Maher, goes something like this:

"Barack Obama's middle name is Hussein. Let's start every sentence with Barack Hussein Obama. He belongs to a church that likes Louis Farrakhan. This church is racist. Why won't Senator Obama disassociate himself from this church and Farrakhan?"

Ok, yes, his middle name is Hussein. Big flippin' deal. His dad was from Kenya. The fact that the son of an immigrant from Africa will become America's next President is a testament to the American Dream (leaving aside my commentary on the pessimistic realities of the so-called "American Dream" for another day).

His church? Well, if you read Mobius' post, any Jew will find that if you substitute certain words from the church's list of principles with Jewish words or even the words "Jew" or "Jewish" they would find the principles not only very benign and certainly not racist, but actually quite enlightening and a representation of the principle of self-determination.

As Mobious says perfectly: "It should go without saying that being committed to your community, taking pride in your heritage, and upholding your tradition’s values is hardly a statement of racial superiority. Thus, just as we would not accept the charge that this doctrine is 'supremacist' were it leveled against Jews, we should not accept the charge when it is leveled against the Black community."

As for Louis Farrakhan, Obama already has distanced himself from Farrakhan.

Which is more than anyone can say for Mel Gibson and his Holocaust denying and white supremacist father.

My friend Chad is also upset by this, and in fact his request of me to spread the word against these smears is what prompted this post. Read all of Chad's post on the subject and sign his petition.

In essence, we, both Jews and non-Jews, must combat these smears as they are not only completely untrue and defamatory, they also are a distraction from what is really important.

Let's quash these dirty rumors before they start so that the Karl Rove Machine-for-Political-Campaigns doesn't do to Barack Obama what it did to John Kerry and, ironically, John McCain.