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CITIZEN CONFLICTED

Barack Obama’s potentially campaign-derailing bitterness comments were only published with real reservations:

The comments came to light as a result of the Huffington Post’s groundbreaking experiment in citizen journalism, Off The Bus. The website runs a network of about 1,800 unpaid researchers, interviewers and writers.

One of those writers, Mayhill Fowler, broke the story, despite being a paid-up supporter of Obama. She attended a fundraising event in San Francisco on April 6 and recorded Obama’s speech.

Fowler sat on the material for days, conflicted about what to do with it. She only published the comments last Friday.

"She had some real reservations about the story as an Obama supporter,” Amanda Michel, the director of Off The Bus, told the Guardian. “But she thought as a citizen journalist she had a duty to report the event, despite her support for Barack Obama."

Zombie has pictures and audio from the Obama fundraiser. And Iowahawk asks: “Can Barack Obama say something so stupid that I can milk two reruns out of it? Yes, Yes he can!

UPDATE. The Wall Street Journal:

Sen. Obama has encountered other problems in trying to connect with rural whites. At a campaign stop in Adel, Iowa, he drew cringes when he asked a crowd of farmers: “Anybody gone into a Whole Foods lately and seen what they charge for arugula?" The upscale, organics supermarket chain doesn’t have a single store in Iowa. Sen. Obama went on to win the state.

Posted by Tim B. on 04/13/2008 at 10:48 PM
  1. So a citizen journalist decided that a matter of genuine ‘public interest’ trumped her own political allegiances?  Tsk, tsk: she’d never make it through Columbia Journalism School with that kind of attitude.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2008 04 13 at 11:00 PM • permalink

  2. If more journalists had been honest about Obama from the start, the Democratic party wouldn’t be about to implode from internecine warfare right about now.

    Posted by RebeccaH on 2008 04 13 at 11:00 PM • permalink

  3. Citizen journalists are fine, but you still can’t do without the professionals.

    Posted by paco on 2008 04 13 at 11:08 PM • permalink

  4. What would Margo say? Time for the people’s court!

    Posted by Nic on 2008 04 13 at 11:09 PM • permalink

  5. And if Obama loses, Mayhill Fowler will have to go into the witness protection programme.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2008 04 13 at 11:09 PM • permalink

  6. One more comment before I lay me down to sleep. If Obama thinks that religion and gun ownership are unacceptable responses to economic misfortune, does that mean that if he’s elected and gets us a job, we have to burn our Bibles and hand in our guns? That ain’t gonna go over too well in North Carolina, is it boys? (Zeke’s Bar erupts in catcalls and jeers, shouts of “Sheeit, naw!” and “Commie bastard!")

    Posted by paco on 2008 04 13 at 11:37 PM • permalink

  7. What’s amazing is that so many liberals are saying that it’s sad Barack is being crucified for telling an inconvenient truth.

    Apparently, rural Pennsylvanians had no interest in hunting and religion before 1980. I did not know that.

    Posted by Dave S. on 2008 04 13 at 11:43 PM • permalink

  8. An article in Monday’s Wall St. Journal takes us back to the Iowa campaign:

    Sen. Obama has encountered other problems in trying to connect with rural whites. At a campaign stop in Adel, Iowa, he drew cringes when he asked a crowd of farmers: “Anybody gone into a Whole Foods lately and seen what they charge for arugula?" The upscale, organics supermarket chain doesn’t have a single store in Iowa. Sen. Obama went on to win the state.

    Posted by RichS on 2008 04 13 at 11:50 PM • permalink

  9. #6:

    It’ll make him a godlike figure in Chapel Hill.

    Posted by Attmay on 2008 04 13 at 11:51 PM • permalink

  10. #9: Well, now, you’re right about that, Attmay. But bein’ that Chapel Hill is a college town, that’s to be expected.

    The quote in the WSJ cited by RichS up there at comment #8 indicates how hard it is getting to parody the left; it sounds like something that would have appeared in a satirical piece by the Onion, or Scrappleface, or in one of Iowahawk’s brilliant pieces.

    Posted by paco on 2008 04 14 at 12:15 AM • permalink

  11. And what the hell is arugula, anyway? Sounds like a disease you’d get from drinking water out of a public fountain in Honduras.

    Posted by paco on 2008 04 14 at 12:17 AM • permalink

  12. I had to Google it myself, paco.  Sounds like a Euroweenie thang, y’know?

    Which is another way of looking at Obama’s problem of connecting with rural whites.....it being I’m white, and live in a rural area, and never heard of this plant before.

    Oh, and I gots lotsa guns as well.  Religion, not so much, but I’m sure that The Messiah™ will figure out other ways to insult me.

    Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2008 04 14 at 12:53 AM • permalink

  13. I doubt Obama has much to fear. Gun owning, religious Americans are probably as rare as sport loving, BBQ owning Australians.

    Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2008 04 14 at 01:10 AM • permalink

  14. #11 & #12 Paco and TRJ,

    We call it Rocket in Oz. It’s a peppery type of salad green.

    Posted by Pogria on 2008 04 14 at 01:36 AM • permalink

  15. OT, but here in Victoria, you can apparently fracture a cop’s wrist while speaking truth to power, and walk.

    Funny how many of these tools turn out to be law students.  But the takeaway quote comes from one of the defendants who was a Hare Krishna, for heaven’s sake:

    Jorm, a member of the Hare Krishna group, said he was a pacifist who had been drawn into the events around him and got carried away.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2008 04 14 at 02:42 AM • permalink

  16. You’ve got to love it don’t you.  Obamarama spends twenty years, almost half his life, enduring the rantings of some whackjob preacher in the hope of one day collecting a political pay off, and then gets caught giving a ‘religion is the opiate of the masses’ speech. 

    Obama might be a Christian in the sense that he lives his life according to certain Christian principles, but does anyone seriously believe that he believes in God and Jesus and shit?

    Posted by monaro on 2008 04 14 at 04:01 AM • permalink

  17. Please excuse me, but it seems that Bryla and I do have something in common, in that we both agree that Obama will become the next President of the US.

    Whereas Bryla desires it, I just think the US people will do a Carter and vote in the sexy alternative based on nothing but some ‘feel goods’.

    Similar to what has happened here in Oz with the populace electing a minor Minister’s level 3 trainee media assistant as the nations leader.

    Posted by mehaul on 2008 04 14 at 06:03 AM • permalink

  18. For the Obama-Crats,
    a Possible Trick Question:

    Smith & Wesson in one hand,
    King James in the other;
    One says ‘Do not fuck with me’,
    One says ‘Love your brother’.

    If you grab for either one,
    You best be really sure
    You know which holds the problem
    And which one holds the cure.

    Posted by lyle on 2008 04 14 at 06:30 AM • permalink

  19. #14 We call it Rocket in Oz. It’s a peppery type of salad green.

    ooohhhh, he was talking about rocket? Well why didn’t he just say so?

    Posted by daddy dave on 2008 04 14 at 07:43 AM • permalink

  20. #17 I’m confident that you’re both wrong.

    Posted by daddy dave on 2008 04 14 at 07:45 AM • permalink

  21. #15

    I thought that having a criminal conviction recorded against you precluded you from practising law.

    Dehm, who graduated with a law degree from Melbourne University and is completing her article clerkship with Victorian Legal Aid, was sentenced to a seven-month suspended sentence and a fine of $3000. Her position with Victorian Legal Aid will now be reviewed.

    What’s this about her position being reviewed? The goose has been convicted and had the conviction recorded. That to me looks like the end of any legal career for her. How stupid can you get?

    Posted by amortiser on 2008 04 14 at 08:16 AM • permalink

  22. #20 DD. I hope like hell you’re right. Are you confident of McCain? Is it worth $5?

    I’ll pay in drachmas or rands whatever gives you the most coin.

    Posted by mehaul on 2008 04 14 at 08:25 AM • permalink

  23. The US economy will have gone to hell by November and the Democrat will be elected, whoever that is.

    Posted by Harry Eagar on 2008 04 14 at 09:17 AM • permalink

  24. Barry does seem somewhat uncomfortable with the Toothless Inbred Gun-totin’ Baptist Rural Hick demographic, doesn’t he?

    I can’t believe this machine-bred moron is actually a possibility to head the Dem ticket.

    But then I look at his competition.

    Oy.

    Posted by mojo on 2008 04 14 at 10:24 AM • permalink

  25. #22 Here are the current odds from Centrebet:

    President - WINNER
    OBAMA, Barack 1.80
    MCCAIN, John 2.85
    CLINTON, Hillary 5.50

    I reckon they’re mad.

    Posted by Srekwah on 2008 04 14 at 10:31 AM • permalink

  26. I think the only way for Hillary to win is to assassinate everybody else.

    Posted by RebeccaH on 2008 04 14 at 11:26 AM • permalink

  27. #26—Stay out of Hillary’s files.

    As for Ms. Fowler, while I normally wouldn’t use HuffPo for virtual toilet paper, she at least has my respect for her integrity in this instance.

    Posted by richard mcenroe on 2008 04 14 at 11:38 AM • permalink

  28. #25 That’s a lot of drachma. 340 drachma to the Euro. $5 is approx 3 drachma which is about 1000 drachma.

    Daddy Dave. Do you have big pockets or a local Greek local store wanting cash for their annual holiday back home?

    That’s assuming the black barak wins. If he doesn’t then I’ll accept a sailing holiday off Corsica. Thank you.

    Posted by mehaul on 2008 04 15 at 09:05 AM • permalink

  29. geek me. $5 is approx 3 Euro...and so on

    Posted by mehaul on 2008 04 15 at 09:07 AM • permalink

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