Catfight! Hillary, Obama trade shots on "Somali" photos
Byron York, National Review
The brouhaha of the day in the Democratic race is the photo, on the Drudge Report, of Barack Obama, during a 2006 visit to Kenya, trying on what Drudge calls a "Somali Elder" outfit. Maybe I'm wrong, but in the photo, Obama appears to be wearing khakis and a red polo shirt, plus the African garb. Anyway, Drudge attributed the "smear photo" to the Clinton campaign. So the Obama campaign fired away with this statement from manager David Plouffe:
On the very day that Senator Clinton is giving a speech about restoring respect for America in the world, her campaign has engaged in the most shameful, offensive fear-mongering we've seen from either party in this election. This is part of a disturbing pattern that led her county chairs to resign in Iowa, her campaign chairman to resign in New Hampshire, and it's exactly the kind of divisive politics that turns away Americans of all parties and diminishes respect for America in the world.
Now the Clinton campaign has fired back with this statement from campaign manager Maggie Williams:
Enough.
If Barack Obama's campaign wants to suggest that a photo of him wearing traditional Somali clothing is divisive, they should be ashamed. Hillary Clinton has worn the traditional clothing of countries she has visited and had those photos published widely.
This is nothing more than an obvious and transparent attempt to distract from the serious issues confronting our country today and to attempt to create the very divisions they claim to decry.
We will not be distracted.
Fellow NR-er Jim Geraghty comments:
Hmm... Two weird things in this Team Hillary statement, about the picture of Obama in Somali garb.
1) They don't really deny distributing it, do they?
2) Doesn't this almost sound as if they're accusing Obama of using the Somali photo garb? Are they suggesting Team Obama put this out, in order to pin it on Team Hillary?
Posted by: Mike 2008-02-25 |