Here's how the right's big eleventh-hour smear on Obama was carried out.
First the Murdoch-owned Times of London reported Thursday that Obama's aunt, Zeituni Onyango, is living in a Boston public-housing complex. It's unclear how the paper learned of the woman's presence in the U.S.
From there, the story quickly got taken up by the right-wing echo chamber. Fox News (also Murdoch-owned, of course), Drudge, the Boston Herald, and various ...
Full Story »
Roth has taken a bold look at the underpinnings of the latest smear on candidate Barack Obama. Isn't it interesting to note the critical timing of illegal "leaks" of information from federal agencies.
But note the way in which AP seems to have obtained the information. High up in the story, it reports: Information about the deportation case was disclosed and confirmed by two separate sources, one a federal law enforcement official. The information they made available is known to officials in the federal government, but the AP could not establish whether anyone at a political level in the Bush administration or in the McCain campaign had been involved in its release. In other words, it looks like someone in the Bush administration leaked the information, with the goal of throwing a last-minute wrench into Obama’s campaign. And someone else confirmed it, with similar motives. On the record, of course, the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, a unit of the Department of Homeland Security, is telling reporters it can’t comment on any individual person’s immigration status. It would appear to be a violation of department procedures, at the least, to leak such information.
How many times can this game work?
It seems implausible that this is not the tip of an investigative iceberg that will shame our government for many years to come.