War Room

Obama's easy "Sister Souljah moment"

It's now Day Two of Jessegate, one of the sillier "controversies" to have broken out in this presidential election year.

And for the second day in a row, Dan Balz of the Washington Post has the Quote of the Day:

Barack Obama leads a charmed life. He finally had his Sister Souljah moment and didn't even have to show up. Jesse Jackson did it for him solo.

Balz, of course, is alluding to the 1992 incident in which Bill Clinton followed rapper Sister Souljah at a gathering of Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, and scored points for political courage by deploring her alleged encouragement of violence against white people.

Jackson wasn't happy about that incident, but as Balz suggests, he has managed to duplicate it without Barack Obama having to say a word (though Obama's campaign did take the opportunity to republicize some of his comments on responsible fatherhood that Jackson may have been talking about). Worse yet for Jackson, he suffered the indignity of being criticized for the moment by his own son and namesake, a congressman from Illinois, who said: "I thoroughly reject and repudiate his ugly rhetoric."

So convenient is this for Obama that one right-wing gabber today on Fox News (which for reasons beyond my understanding has been running the story as though it were the biggest news of the year), the Rev. George Autry Jr., actually suggested the Obama campaign cooked up the whole thing.

Amazing.

Burris won't run in 2010
The Illinois senator had little hope of being elected to a full term
Picture of the day
President Obama gets caught enjoying those famous Italian vistas just a little too much
Ensign says parents gave $96,000 to his mistress' family
The senator's lawyer says the payment was made out of concern for the family's well-being
On national security, Republicans trust Palin
A new poll shows continued high support among Republicans for familiar faces from 2012

Current Salon Politics Stories

Salon Politics Blogs

Recent Posts

Picture of the day
President Obama gets caught enjoying those famous Italian vistas just a little too much
Ensign says parents gave $96,000 to his mistress' family
The senator's lawyer says the payment was made out of concern for the family's well-being
On national security, Republicans trust Palin
A new poll shows continued high support among Republicans for familiar faces from 2012
Previous Posts…

War Room RSS Feed

Posts by date

July 2009
SuMoTuWeThFrSa
1234
567891011
12131415161718
19202122232425
262728293031

About War Room

War Room is written and edited by Alex Koppelman, with contributions from Salon reporters around the country.