It seems like such a small thing. change.gov. What’s the big deal, huh? Just another small, rubber stamping thing for the Obama team to use to reinforce the message that the underqualified, inexperienced junior Senator-turned-president is indeed, well…presidential. Thus, the “seal” of his personal “office of the president-elect” (no caps deserved), the plethora of American flags that drape each every public non-announcement (they could have all been announced at once to save a lot of time and energy, but that would defeat the purpose), the pointless Grand Tours, and now, his very own transition team website, validated with the authority of the federal government. That the only thing all these juvenile machinations reinforce is the fact that the former inexperienced, unqualified, junior Senator is now an inexperienced, unqualified junior president-elect is of no importance, when kids play dress-up, it’s all about the image.
Now, Michelle Malkin exposes the truth, Barack Obama’s “change.gov.” is unethical:
I’ve obtained documents sent to a reader in response to his FOIA request regarding the creation of Barack Obama’s Change.gov website. It gives you the rest of the story. You’ll recall last month that I blogged several questions about the propriety of allowing the perpetual Obama campaign to use a .gov domain name for what appeared to be a fund-raising front. Readers and industry observers noted that the decision appeared to violate General Services Administration rules governing government domains.
Guess what? They were right. The FOIA documents sent to Lance O., which he forwarded to me, reveal that the GSA initially rejected Obama’s application for “Change.gov.” On Oct. 21, Peter Alterman, Deputy Associate Administrator of Technology Strategy at the GSA, denied the Obama campaign’s request for a government domain because:
1) It would be a a violation of the government’s naming conventions (too generic); and
2) using ‘change’ in the domain name would be political, since it was the trademark slogan of the Obama campaign.
The bottom line? Though they clearly are not supposed to use the “.gov” designation for anything not officially governmental, the petulant baby president-to-be stamped his foot until he got what he wanted, for the government agency charged with protecting the integrity of “.gov” use to bend the rules to his whim. That’s change all right, but is it the kind we want to believe in?
Obviously Team O is adept at manipulating appearances. More frightening is the fact that even when his true face is revealed, many of his staunchest supporters willfully indulge him in his fantasy. When he behaves as he always has, according to his values, which have always run counter to the “progressive” wing of the blogosphere, they whine and cry as they attempt to find some, any justification that allows them to embrace him anyway. “He’ll fix it later,” “he’s just “playing possum,” “he’s better than the alternative,” and other such nonsensical explanations have all been put forth on his behalf over and over again. Even when he tells them otherwise, point blank, as he did in his missive to the Daily Kos in 2005, and more recently, basically telling them to suck it up, he was going to do what he wanted no matter what anybody said, they support him. When he betrays them with his FISA vote, or Rick Warren invocation invitation, or arch-enemy cabinet appointments, at the expense of other ardent backers, they scramble around, twisting, turning and contorting themselves until they find a way to kiss their own sore behinds and make it all better. And they’ve been doing it all along:
But well before the Caucuses, on blog sites like Talk Left and Firedoglake, questions were being raised about an Obama candidacy based on what sometimes seemed like excessive efforts to reach beyond the Democratic base.
For many bloggers, the problem with Obama was—and is–that he’s been playing into a much-derided “triangulation” meme in appealing to voters without traditional Democratic credentials. As Ezra Klein said last Tuesday, Obama was using “old politics of centrist caution and status quo bias.” Markos Moulitsas walked back from his announced intention to vote for Obama, saying “you have to have your head stuck deep in the sand to deny that Obama is trying to close the deal by running to the Right of his opponents. And call me crazy, but that’s not a trait I generally appreciate in Democrats, no matter how much it might set the punditocracy’s hearts a flutter.” Matt Yglesias tempered his former enthusiasm for the candidate as well, writing “while there’s a lot I like about Barack Obama, if he wins Iowa it won’t have been by running hard on the things I like best about him.”
In truth, Obama hasn’t been afraid to strike back at all his critics with whichever tool best fits the job. Whether criticizing Hillary on health care or questioning John Edwards on the Iraq war, his campaign throws an effective punch. When he announced his intent to seek the presidency, there were real questions about whether Obama had the toughness to win — no longer. But to his online critics, Obama willfully ignored a crucial tenet of blogosphere doctrine — they accuse him of using right-wing talking points to criticize his opponents. And in their eyes, there is no greater sin than validating a GOP frame.
That was posted January 7, 2008, on Democratic Strategist. So, no matter how many PUMA sites point out their hypocrisy, like this one, and this one, and this one, just to name three off the top of my head, the Left Loonistanians will continue to gleefully assist their mysteriously Chosen One perpetrate his fraud, as they always have, crediting him for innovations he deserves no credit for, whining and crying all the way. As long as he looks the part, (black) I guess they, and the rest of the world, can content themselves with self-administered back pats for the appearance of “progress.”
