How low can you go..?

H/T: commenter “laplumelefirmament” at The Trail

It was bad enough, two days ago, when Hillary Clinton ended her ‘denial’ that Senator Barack Obama was not a Muslim in a televised interview with “.. as far as I know..“, but she may now have sunk to a new and disgusting low.

On the Daily Kos today, Troutnut posts: Hillary’s ad: debate footage doctored to make Obama blacker
(I apologize, I had the wrong link attached to this article..)

Is this what Hillary meant by “throwing the kitchen sink” at Obama? In this post by Troutnut, he looks at Clinton’s latest ad:

In case you needed yet another reason to despise Hillary Clinton and her vermin strategists, she’s now running an ad blatantly lying about Obama’s subcommittee. Her ad includes debate footage heavily doctored to make Obama blacker.

He shows the clip of Clinton’s ad and then puts it up against the actual footage that it was taken from. He goes even further and breaks down how Obama’s facial structure is also altered to change the shape as well as changing the skin color by altering the saturation and contrast.

Hillary’s ad:

Actual footage from Democratic Debate where the footage was taken from for the ad:

John Aravosis of AmericaBlog looks into this further:

John Aravosis writes:

I went and got the original footage from the Clinton ad, and then compared it to 3 different video clips of the same debate from 3 different sources. I did this so as to take into account any editing, or quality issues, that might have accounted for Obama having darker skin in any particular video. None of the 3 video sources I found showed Obama nearly as black as the Hillary ad does. Click the image above to see a larger version. Look at his lips. Look at his eyebrows. Look at how the red MSNBC background has turned more purple. Clearly the image was darkened. The question is “why.”

It just keeps happening again and again and again. The Clintons keeps doing things, saying things, that sound awfully racist. And we’re to believe that this, the – what? 8th, 10th time? – this has happened is again just a coincidence. The first half a dozen times you launch seemingly racist attacks on your black opponent, maybe – maybe – we can write it off as “boy you’re really dumb not to get it.” But having a seemingly-racist attack from the Clinton folks on Obama every single week, after a while, you don’t get to play the “I had no idea!” card anymore. After that many times, you’re race-baiting. You’re using racism to win. And you’re destroying your legacy and your husband’s. Enough already.

There is only one reason to need to take these steps, and it is unfortunate. She is trying to appeal to the basest of instincts – fear, hate and prejudice – in order to gain votes by trying to make Barack Obama seem more “black”. She is exploiting racism to further her personal ambition. It is despicable, adn she deserves to be called to the mat for it.

The second half of Troutnut’s (Daily Kos) post deals with her lies concerning the charge that Obama was too busy to even hold even one hearing on Afghanistan:

With all the attention to her race-baiting, people might overlook one other story here. She’s blatantly lying about his subcommittee. Her ad says:

As chairman of the oversight committee charged with the force of fighting al Qaeda in Afghanistan, he was too busy running for President to hold even one hearing.

That’s a lie. Not one of these subcommittees is “charged with the force of fighting al Qaeda in Afghanistan” (Hillary seems to have the Senate confused with the Army) but the one with the most direct jurisdiction would be the Subcommittee on Near East and South and Central Asian Affairs, which is chaired by John Kerry. Obama is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on European Affairs.

Furthermore, Obama’s subcommittee didn’t meet frequently before he the chair, either. I can’t find a record of their meetings online anywhere, but I vaguely remember hearing on the news when this “story” first broke months ago that the subcommittee had often gone years without meeting. If anyone can find that story, I’d love to put up a source. The subcommittee didn’t meet much because most important issues relating to NATO have been handled by the full Foreign Relations Committee. Obama has been an active participant in the full committee.

I keep hearing that politics and elections are tough. When do you call it crossing the line? Where is that line that no candidate should not go? This is too reminiscent to George Bush’s attack against John McCain in the 2000 election when Karl Rove put out that ‘Push Poll’ suggesting McCain had an illegitimate black child. That was low and too despicable for words – and it worked. It sparked peoples’ racial prejudices and McCain lost in SC, then the nomination.

Senator Obama IS black. What difference does that make if he is qualified to be president? Why would it be necessary for Hillary to alter his face and his color to make him look even MORE black except to incite fear and hatred to a higher degree that might tip the scales in her favor.. This is the same as leaving the question of whether Obama is Muslim or not hanging in the air, when she knows full well he is not, intending to incite fears and doubt. Its dishonest and shameful. We have been fed fear for 7 years now. No more!

Haven’t we had enough of this? Change sounds pretty good about right now. Hillary is more of the same, and I for one am tired of it. She isn’t entitled to this nomination, she doesn’t deserve this nomination, and if she can’t win the nomination by playing this straight and running (and winning) on her own record, then she should not be president. If she doesn’t stop, she is going to blow this party apart.

UPDATE: newsday.com has the text of the newest Clinton campaign sleaze tactic — Fake news reports. Sheesh…

An afterthought I wish I had added earlier..

There are a couple of posts by Brent Budowsky of The Hill that I wish Hillary would read and take to heart..
They are short and to the point:

Does Hillary Want Democrats to Lose in November?
Behind the scenes there are some Democrats becoming concerned that Hillary Clinton is pursuing a wrecking ball strategy in which she knows she will not defeat Barack Obama for the nomination, but will escalate personal attacks in the hope Obama loses in November, so Hillary can run in 2012.
This is not a widespread view, and I am not suggesting it is true, but there are some who are worried about this, which is one reason superdelegates could move en masse to Obama, very quickly.
Hillary Clinton must be very careful. This view will not in the end defeat Obama, but it could do major long-term damage to both Clintons.

Hillary Clinton and the ‘Muslim Issue’
Hillary Clinton’s equivocal comment on “60 Minutes” about whether Barack Obama is a Muslim was one of the most shameful moments I have ever heard from any leading Democrat, when asked about any other leading Democrat.
She couldn’t just say no, and tell the truth.

Photo from AmericaBlog.

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Tags: nwmuse @ TPZoo