Confronting Al Gore’s "Deafening Silence" in the Democratic Primary

In her post at No Quarter yesterday, Ani confronts Al Gore in an open letter about his “deafening silence” throughout the Democratic primary and in the process, she effectively and cogently nails each of the major offenses of the media, party leaders, and the Obama campaign in their abusive treatment of Hillary Clinton, the obviously better qualified candidate in the race.

Ani starts out like this:

“When so many of us begged you to run for office again this year, you jokingly stated you were a ‘recovering politician.’ Certainly, you have more than earned the right to walk away from what you consider to be a toxic environment. However, much as I appreciate your desire to remain neutral in this nominating contest, as you have sent me a fund raising letter on behalf of the DSCC, I feel I must now question your deafening silence in this most critical of primaries.

“You of all people understand what it is like to be the far more qualified candidate and be on the receiving end of ridicule by the drive-by hit squad media. You have rightly stated that television is a one-way medium, not encouraging discourse, critical thought or active participation. This year, we see even more clearly the influence and effect that favoritism of one and vilification and misogyny toward another has on the voting populace, as junk food is fed to a citizenry struggling to make ends meet, at points overwhelmed by their own responsibilities, without time to dig deeper for the truth of the story.”

In the following paragraph, Ani addresses a point that infuriated me every time I witnessed Obama deceitfully presenting himself as the candidate who opposed the war from the beginning, while never once explaining that he was not a member of the U.S. Senate when the vote on the Iraq War Resolution was taken.

“It is both amazing and unconscionable to me that some educated people, possessing a master’s degree no less, actually believe that Senator Obama ‘voted’ against the war. They are clueless to the fact he was not even a U.S. Senator at that time.”

Ani continues her analysis of the Democratic primary:

“Yet, with all of the advantages he had going into this year: the DNC clearly gaming Michigan and Florida in his favor, the media offering pillow fluffing soft stories about him, rather than vetting him, while exaggerating Senator Clinton’s every step to negative effect, he still was not able to close the deal until the Super Delegates raced to forcibly shut down this process.”

I urge Katalusis readers to go here to read Ani’s post in its entirety.

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