THE PLANK APRIL 24, 2008
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... and "facts" for that matter. When you title your Huffington Post piece "The Top Ten List of Undisputed Facts Showing Barack Obama's Weakness in the General Election Against John McCain," you probably don't want the first sentence of item number one to be demonstrably false: "Hillary Clinton won by 10%, 220,000 votes."
But creative rounding up from less than 9.5% and 215,000 is small beer compared to some of the subsequent howlers Davis offers. There are the twin assertions of numbers 4 and 5, for instance ("Most of [Obama's] ads were personal negative attack ads against Senator Clinton, meaning attacks on her character and integrity" and "There were no personal attack ads run by Hillary Clinton in Pennsylvania," respectively). There's the claim that "rural voters" are one of the "core constituencies in the Democratic base." There's the assertion that "Current polls show Senator Clinton runs ahead of John McCain nationally or dead even -- and Senator Obama runs only dead even," followed by a cherry-picked USA Today poll. (In fact, while Hillary runs better than Obama against McCain according to that poll and the AP/Ipsos poll, Obama outperforms Clinton--and by wider margins--according to ABC/Washington Post, Reuters/Zogby, and Cook/RT Strategies; in RealClearPolitics's poll of polls Obama currently edges out Clinton's performance by just under a percentage point.)
I could go on, but what's the point? Davis is either a hack who's happy to peddle "facts" he knows are false and/or misleading, or he's an utter moron. I'm generous enough to assume the former.
--Christopher Orr
11 comments
Or option 3: he's kooking for another job in the White House.
- maldini
April 24, 2008 at 10:25am
"I could go on, but what's the point? Davis is either a hack who's happy to peddle "facts" he knows are false and/or misleading, or he's an utter moron. I'm generous enough to assume the former."
Ha. That's what I just set in the post above. The Clintons really take the superdelegates/press to be dumb. While that's not a stretch for many members of the establishment press (Wolf Blitzer, I'm looking at you), the superdelegates are folks who have either (a) run for office or (b) run campaigns. These are folks who understand politics...
- virginiacentrist
April 24, 2008 at 10:27am
Does this lexicographic revisionism mean I finally get to be the "undisputed" heavyweight champion of the world? Cause that'd be sweet.
- adaglas
April 24, 2008 at 10:32am
Such generosity, while laudable, is also woefully misplaced. Davis has gone 'round the bend these last few weeks with his patently absurd yammering.
Doesn't really matter to people like Davis, his only goal is the Clinton Restoration, else he fades into obscurity. Another reason not to vote for Senator Clinton, all the hangers-on that are itching to get back into power.
- kgrant1054
April 24, 2008 at 10:40am
By Lanny's logic, if HIllary is the nominee, McCain will get 92% of the African American vote.
- miceelf
April 24, 2008 at 10:49am
Adaglas, to my knowledge, I have never met anybody that disputed that I was the middleweight champion of the world. We should form a club.
- bigfish
April 24, 2008 at 10:51am
Lanny Davis is a Joe Lieberman guy too. Let's not forget that!
- virginiacentrist
April 24, 2008 at 11:10am
None of the above seemed to bother many Dems I know when he was peddling his crap in defense of serial liar Bill Clinton back in the Lewinsky matter. Now all of a sudden you guys get standards? :-)
- butchie b
April 24, 2008 at 11:54am
butchie, not true, many just thought a bj did not constitute an impeachable offense, but I am starting to wish old Bill had been convicted and we would just now be finishing up Al's nearly 10th year in office. And whoever he would have picked as his VP would be now probably be the nominee (I don't know if it would have been Lieberman in such a case)
We are coming down to the end of this people, Hillary is running out of road, all that is left is for her to perform her kamikaze effort of her 2008 campaign to destroy Obama, in hope that 2012 will be hers.
These last few months will get really, really ugly. Hillary herself has said we ain't seen nothing yet.
- blackton
April 24, 2008 at 12:56pm
"Davis is either a hack who's happy to peddle "facts" he knows are false and/or misleading, or he's an utter moron. I'm generous enough to assume the former."
I think the former is actually *worse*. A moron cant help it; he's just a moron. But to know better and yet consciously spin this kind of lies is just reprehensible.
- jobeek2
April 24, 2008 at 7:00pm
Yeah, Lanny's been good for comedy the last few months. Has he always been so awful? I remember him being excessively friendly to Bush in 2004; I guess he knew him at Yale. He seems to epitomize the careerism that makes modern life so depressing.
- skipper2379
April 25, 2008 at 7:29am