Dana Milbank/WaPo misleads about Barack Obama links

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post - last seen here lying about Tom Tancredo - offers "Obama as You've Never Known Him!" (link), a sleazy slab of mockery attempting to portray those who have legitimate questions about the various links Barack Obama has as believers in UFOs.

He discusses a meeting yesterday conducted by Cliff Kincaid and attempts to claim that all the points raised were "implausible accusations", such as this:

The smoking gun? Obama's "mentor" during his teens, according to Kincaid, was "a key member of a Soviet-controlled network that was sponsored by Moscow and active in Hawaii."

These accusations fall somewhere between guilt by association and guilt by invention, but the accusers were just getting started.

Now, read the Kincaid article on that mentor:

through Frank Marshall Davis, Obama had an admitted relationship with someone who was publicly identified as a member of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). The record shows that Obama was in Hawaii from 1971-1979, where, at some point in time, he developed a close relationship, almost like a son, with Davis, listening to his "poetry" and getting advice on his career path. But Obama, in his book, Dreams From My Father, refers to him repeatedly as just "Frank."

The reason is apparent: Davis was a known communist who belonged to a party subservient to the Soviet Union. In fact, the 1951 report of the Commission on Subversive Activities to the Legislature of the Territory of Hawaii identified him as a CPUSA member. What's more, anti-communist congressional committees, including the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), accused Davis of involvement in several communist-front organizations.

Some of the claims made at the meeting might indeed be out there, but that one certainly isn't. Milbank is simply a hack who can't even use a search engine to verify claims and instead thinks mockery - rather than real journalism - will carry the day. At the WaPo he's right, but not elsewhere.

Politics · Fri, 05/23/2008 - 11:00 · · Importance: 4