Debunking the Punditry’s Latest Attempts to Smear Hillary Clinton

Lately, Media Matters for America has been busy calling pundits to account who have persisted in twisting, distorting, and often truncating Hillary Clinton’s comments made during a recent 60 Minutes interview. I’ve personally come across at least five or six op-ed columns in the Washington Post and NY Times in which the authors accuse Clinton of implying that Obama is a Muslim in response to Steve Kroft’s badgering her on the issue.

Most recently, Media Matters for America has debunked Bob Herbert’s attempt to smear Clinton in his NY Times column:

“Herbert wrote, "[60 Minutes correspondent Steve] Kroft asked Senator Clinton if she believed that Senator Obama is a Muslim. In one of the sleaziest moments of the campaign to date, Senator Clinton replied: 'No. No. Why would I? No, there is nothing to base that on. As far as I know.'

" But as Media Matters for America has repeatedly documented, during the interview on the March 2 edition of CBS' 60 Minutes, Clinton repeatedly made clear that she believes Obama is not a Muslim.”

To read the full account in Media Matters for America, go here.

I was a day late in reading E.J. Dionne’s column that appeared in Sunday’s Washington Post. Titled Culture Wars? How 2004, Dionne’s piece is a refreshing change from the dishonest, calculated drivel in the op-ed columns mentioned above. Dionne actually states in print:

“On the Democratic side, cultural and religious questions have played almost no role in the battle between Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton. They have spoken instead about economics, health care and the war in Iraq. Strikingly, both have been intent on putting an end to religious divisions in the electorate and have sought to welcome the devout to the Democratic Party.”

Dionne continues:

“Obama has been explicit about the need to broker political peace between Democrats and believers. ‘If we don't reach out to evangelical Christians and other religious Americans and tell them what we stand for, then the Jerry Falwells and Pat Robertsons and Alan Keyeses will continue to hold sway,’ he said in an important speech at a 2006 meeting organized by the progressive evangelical Jim Wallis. ‘More fundamentally, the discomfort of some progressives with any hint of religion has often prevented us from effectively addressing issues in moral terms." Clinton has also spoken movingly of the role of faith in public life. "I'm living by the Scripture that says we are all members of God's household," she told a Baptist convention in Atlanta in January.’”

To read Dionne’s column in its entirety, go here.

I’m hoping those who would continue their cynically misguided efforts to inject the race/religion card into the Democratic campaign by smearing Hillary Clinton will soon wise up and realize the bitter irony in resorting to such means to try to secure the nomination for a leader presented as the harbinger of the “new politics.”

By the way, after remaining silent about the earlier false accusations of racism against both Bill and Hillary Clinton until after the South Carolina primary was over, Barack Obama managed to hang his head during a later debate and publicly acknowledge that the Clintons are not racists.