Dirt begins to fly at Obama
War opens with hints about 'suspect' backers http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/art icle3177684.ece WHEN Hillary Clinton warned that Barack Obama had not been thoroughly "vetted", as she has been, she was hinting darkly at trouble to come over her rival's radical pastor and shady patron in Chicago, the Illinois senator's home town. Clinton is convinced that her opponent will be eviscerated by the Republican attack machine should he win the Democratic presidential nomination. That, at any rate, is her camp's excuse for doing everything it can to discredit him behind the scenes. The battle to tear down Obama and his claim to represent "hope" has begun. His momentous victory in Iowa and his humbling in New Hampshire have launched a war of attrition between the two camps. At enormous rallies, Obama's new slogan, "Yes, we can", is rekindling the fervour of his supporters in defiance of Clinton's accusation that he peddles false hopes. The same determined message was whispered by slaves and abolitionists and was proclaimed by Martin Luther King, who "took us to a mountaintop", Obama said to cheers in the formerly segregated city of Charleston, South Carolina, last week. There, in a boost for his campaign, Obama was introduced by John Kerry, the 2004 Democratic presidential candidate. Kerry vowed that Democrats would never again allow themselves to be "swiftboated", a reference to the Vietnam war veterans who impugned his war record. But for Obama it has already begun. "Swiftboating" has become a metaphor for attacking a candidate's strengths head-on, instead of their weaknesses. In Obama's case, it means calling into question his multilayered racial and religious background and his reputation for scrupulous integrity. The smear that Obama is secretly a Muslim, or too close for comfort to that religion, has already taken hold among some voters. "We have to peel back his identity," said one elderly white voter in South Carolina, a state Obama must win on January 26. "Did you know his middle name is Hussein? He is a Muslim and was raised in an Islamic school." In fact, Obama was not brought up to follow any religion, although his African grandfather and Indonesian stepfather were Muslim. He became a Christian as a community organiser in Chicago and in the late 1980s joined the Trinity United Church of Christ, an African-American mega-church with an 8,000-strong congregation. The same southern voter, who did not wish to be named, then threw another piece of Obama's biography into the frame. "I looked at his church's website. It said it was 'unashamedly black'. They don't want any whites there. I wouldn't feel real comfortable if I tried to worship there." The unorthodox pastor of Trinity church is the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, who is refusing all interviews. He married Barack and Michelle Obama and baptised their two daughters. He is already attracting attention on right-wing websites for describing the September 11 attacks as a "wake-up call" to America for ignoring the concerns of "people of colour", and for claiming that Americans "believe in white supremacy and black inferiority . . . more than we believe in God". Wright travelled to meet Muammar Gadaffi, the Libyan leader, in the 1980s with Louis Farrakhan, the black supremacist leader of the Nation of Islam, and subscribes to the "Black Values System", which preaches self-reliance but claims "middle-classness" is ensnaring blacks. "When [Obama's] enemies find out that in 1984 I went to Tripoli to visit Colonel Gadaffi with Farrakhan, a lot of his Jewish support will dry up quicker than a snowball in hell," Wright once said. The other potential threat to Obama comes from the indictment of one of his leading donors, Antoin "Tony" Rezko, a Syrian-born property developer in Chicago, who is accused of extortion. Rezko has been indicted by Patrick Fitzgerald - the prosecutor who brought down the White House official Lewis "Scooter" Libby and the press magnate Conrad Black - for seeking millions of dollars in kickbacks from companies bidding for state business in Illinois. He is due to appear in court on February 24. On the day the Obamas bought a new home in Chicago for $1.6m in 2005, Rezko's wife purchased an adjoining piece of land, giving the senator's family more privacy and a larger expanse of green than they had paid for. Obama later paid $104,000 for a strip of the land, even though it was known that Rezko was under investigation. Obama has admitted that the deal was "bone-headed" and has given $37,000 of political donations by Rezko to charity. The website www.hillaryis44.com <http://www.hillaryis44.com/> , widely viewed as an unofficial arm of the Clinton war room, has taken up the scandal with gusto and is offering a Rezko for Dummies guide on its site. "Imagine this," it crows. "A Chicago politician wants things he can't afford. Wifey likes expensive things and wants a big mansion to live in." Whether Wright's sayings or Rezko's indictment can seriously damage Obama's appeal to primary voters remains to be seen. Clinton has been through so many ethical scandals and has been attacked so many times by what she called a "vast right-wing conspiracy" that Obama's controversial connections may appear inconsequential. If the polls are to be believed, Obama is leading Clinton in South Carolina by 13 points. But their findings in New Hampshire were so hopelessly flawed that Obama's supporters will not make the mistake of savouring victory in advance of the voters' verdict again. Bill and Hillary Clinton have worked hard to retain the affection and loyalty of black southerners. However, the former president's suggestions that Obama is not all he is cracked up to be have caused some offence. Carrie Dennison, a retired union organiser in Charleston, said: "I have nothing against Bill Clinton. I went to his inauguration, but I don't like what he's been saying about Barack Obama. It's underhand. "Hillary Clinton thinks she is more experienced, but she's had 35 years of what? All I know about her is that she was the wife of the president." Kenneth Richardson, 63, an African-American who works in the insurance industry, believes that Obama has the "divine spark" of greatness, while Clinton is more pedestrian. He doubts, however, that this alone can deliver victory. In a remarkable book, A Bound Man: Why We Are Excited about Obama and Why He Can't Win, Shelby Steele, a conservative intellectual who like Obama had a white mother and black father, writes that Obama's iconic status as an inspirational African-American also represents his biggest weakness. Steele argues that Obama offers white voters a chance to free themselves from white guilt, but if he becomes too specific about policy or shows flashes of anger about injustice, they recoil. Obama looks "messianic" set against "the shame of America's racial past". If you are an icon, he writes, "you have thoughts to touch everyone's base, thoughts that recognise and flatter everyone. But you have few visible convictions". Anything that helps Clinton to bring Obama down to earth serves her purpose. Kenya's wonderboy: They are thousands of miles away, but Barack Obama has no more loyal supporters than his humble Kenyan family, writes Jon Swain in Nairobi. In the village of Kogelo, Obama is known as the "Kenyan wonderboy in the US". Though he was narrowly defeated by Hillary Clinton in the New Hampshire primary, his grandmother Sarah Obama, 85, is still hopeful. "Don't lose heart. Keep on trying, is what I will tell him if I speak to him," she said. Obama's father was a goatherd who won a scholarship to university in Hawaii. There he met Obama's mother. He deserted the family when Obama was two and returned to Kenya but died in a car crash in 1982. Obama has visited Kogelo several times. In 2006 he gave a powerful speech warning Kenyan university students of the dangers of corruption and tribal politics. (F)AIR USE NOTICE: All original content and/or articles and graphics in this message are copyrighted, unless specifically noted otherwise. All rights to these copyrighted items are reserved. Articles and graphics have been placed within for educational and discussion purposes only, in compliance with "Fair Use" criteria established in Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976. The principle of "Fair Use" was established as law by Section 107 of The Copyright Act of 1976. 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