Let the sliming begin -- Part Quatre

So Barack Obama was wearing a Somali outfit..... My, my, my!

And the Obama campaign is slinging accusations at the Clinton campaign, and they're firing back.

But waiddaminnit!!!: Where did this all first show up?!?!?

Why, on the well-known lefty Obamaist Hillaryite news site, the Drudge Report!!!!:

The picture showing Obama in a turban during a visit to Kenya in 2006 first appeared on the Drudge Report website yesterday. The [Drudge] site said it was circulated by Clinton's staffers and quoted one saying: "Wouldn't we be seeing this on the cover of every magazine if it were [Clinton]?"

[emphasis added]

And then the "contoversy" catapults this all over the media (heard RW talk radio discussing this momentously important problem this morning) and the blogosphere.

This is like free money for the RW foamer slime machines! Drudge cites some supposed Clinton "staffers", and tries to blame Clinton (while getting all the publicity ... and reaping the reward of getting the picture into circulation without any "blame" for engaging in some sliming himself). Maybe it was some stoopid Clinton "staffers" (but maybe not; see below), but this is just what the RW Slime Machine wants: Get the two Democratic candidates sniping at each other and in the meanwhile get out their own 'message' free. What 'message', you say? What 'message' was that? Even if we assume arguendo that it was some inept Clinton staffers that were trying to circulate the picture (but who, for some reason, completely failed to do so until Matt Drudge 'gave them a hand'), are the Clinton staff going to try race-baiting?!?!? Yes? No? What would that gain the Clinton camp, when all the racist scum are in the Republican fold?

I'll tell ya: Here is the 'message' that someone was trying to convey by publicising (and drawing attention to) the picture. This was pre-emptive sliming of Obama ... done by the Republican Noise Machine, and done for free.

And neither the Obama or the Clinton camp has the brains to point fingers at Drudge and the rest of the RW foaming battalions. Well, I do.


Previous editions of "Let the sliming begin" here and here and here.


Update

Glenn Greenwald documents the M$M (main-stream media) sliming Obama with "patriotism" crapola here. They're essentially repeating pretty much verbatim the RW slime points about him not wearing a flag pin and not holding his hand on his heart for the national anthem. What's next? Some viral e-mail claiming he swears the oath of office on a Koran? Oh. Yeah. Forgot....


Update 2

Tom Tomorrow catches CNN piling on top of the scrum.


Update 3

Roger Hitchcock, on KSFO (San Francisco RW talk radio) this weekend (Mar. 2nd) stated outright that, yes, he's going to "Swift-boat" Obama. He characterises it as "just telling the truth", which is to say, translated from Republican into English, "repeating ad nauseam the RW slime points over and over....", including calling him "Barack Hooo-SAYYNNN Obama"....