Posted on 07/26/2008 11:14:59 AM PDT by kristinn
At a morning press conference after a meeting with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in London, Barack Obama got caught up in the web of lies his campaign has spun about the cancellation of his planned visit to wounded troops at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany on Friday.
Obama stated: "We had scheduled to go, we had no problem at all in leaving, we always leave press and staff off -- that is why we left it off the schedule."
Not true, Washington Post reported this morning: When Obama arrived in Germany on Thursday, a printed schedule said he would fly to the military hospital Friday. Asked at the time about the schedule, an Obama adviser said it was incorrect, that the stop had been considered but ultimately rejected.
The American news media would have let the cancellation go unmentioned were it not for Free Republic picking up on the blurb on Der Spiegel Thursday morning. As the story spread in the blogosphere the American media picked it up and the Obama campaign issued their first lie about the cancellation courtesy of spokesman Robert Gibbs:
"During his trip as part of the CODEL to Afghanistan and Iraq, Sen. Obama visited the combat support hospital in the Green Zone in Baghdad and had a number of other visits with the troops. For the second part of his trip, the senator wanted to visit the men and women at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center to express his gratitude for their service and sacrifice. The senator decided out of respect for these servicemen and women that it would be inappropriate to make a stop to visit troops at a U.S. military facility as part of a trip funded by the campaign.”
That lie was exposed by Obama himself today at the press conference:
"I was going to be accompanied by one of my advisors, a former military officer. And we got notice that he would be treated as a campaign person, and it would therefore be perceived as political because he had endorsed my candidacy but he wasn’t on the Senate staff."
Later on Thursday, the retired general Obama referenced, Air Force Maj. Gen. Scott Gration, who joined the Obama trip in Amman Jordan on O-Force One with the rest of the campaign staff and media, issued a second lying statement:
"We learned from the Pentagon last night that the visit would be viewed instead as a campaign event. Sen. Obama did not want to have a trip to see our wounded warriors perveived as a campaign event when his visit was to show his appreciation for our troops and decided instead not to go."
Gration lied by omission by not informing the press that he was the issue and instead blamed the Pentagon.
Friday morning, as O-Force One headed to Paris instead of Ramstein Air Force Base, the Obama campaign held three separate press briefings within forty-five minutes in an effort to spin their way out of the damaging snub of the wounded warriors at Landstuhl. A transcript of the briefing was posted at Fox News.
Again, spokesman Gibbs put the blame on the Pentagon:
"...it was pretty clear from the people at the Pentagon that the trip would be seen as a campaign stop."
Obama, in his press conference today tried to take himself out of the loop on the discussions about the visit to Landstuhl:
"The staff was working this so I don’t know each and every detail but here is what I understand happened,"
Here's what Gibbs said on Friday in the briefing:
"...This is all local time in Germany we made the decision in the air to not go. In the air from Tel Aviv, we talked about this on the ground, it was a very quick decision and as far, and I will double check this, I believe the call was made once we landed that we were not going to go."
And..."Sen. Obama decided having made that decision he was far more willing to take the criticism from some political people or political opponents in a political atmosphere than to put our troops in the middle of our campaitn (sic) back-and-forth."
Gration was on the plane with Obama. Gibbs makes clear that Obama was in on the decision and had analyzed the consequences.
Obama had no problem landing his campaign plane at Ramstein and neither did the Pentagon. Everyone knew the rules about no campaign staff or media accompanying Obama to nearby Landstuhl.
Yet, when the Pentagon enforced the rules by denying Gration access to Landstuhl with Obama, that's when Obama decided to cancel. The spin that Obama was concerned about the visit being seen as political is a lie.
Between the retired general's bruised ego and having to face the troops alone, Obama decided it was better to be seen snubbing the troops and to lie repeatedly about it to boot.
He even lied about the circumstances of his making phone calls to the wounded at Landstuhl on Friday:
"what we decided was that we not make a visit and instead I would call some of the troops that were there. So that essentially would be the extent of the story."
Not once in all the lying spinning statements by the Obama campaign did they say that Obama would be making phone calls to make up for the cancellation. The decision to make the phone calls was made after the obama had hit the fan.
This is all very strange, very un-presidential and very unbecoming of a man who wants to be commander-in-chief.
Update: Fox News' Bill Hemmer asked Obama if he thought it was a mistake to cancel the Landstuhl visit. Obama said, "No."
Good Job Kristinn
He’s worse than the Clinton’s!
“........It’s not the crime. It’s the cover-up.........”
Obama could sacrifice his first born, BBQ her and the press would swoon about what a great cook he is.
Since the Black Messiah is, obviously, the God-like candidate of the media, someone with gonads has got to expose this disastrous, hate-America liar.
When I read his words I hear “Tea for Two” playing in the background.
I can not think of a person on the face of the earth that would be worse than BO.
The decision that Sen. Obama made with that information was that we would not put our wounded men and women in that position of being involved in a campaign stop and therefore he made the decision not to make the stop.
Those maroons must think I am an idiot. ....we would not put our wounded men and women in that position of being involved in a campaign stop...
Mankind has nothing to fear with the demise of the Drive-By Media.
They even said B. Hussein Obama had "avoided major pitfalls" while on the foreign trip. See? The local media says he is the BEST. So it must be so.
Very good summary. It’s valuable to compile a timeline on such events before the leftists agree on which lie they’re going to use and issue marching orders to the media.
Congratulations on a decade (in 5 days) for being in the Right forum.
bookmark and bump
Excellent work, Kristinn. I appreciate you staying on top of this incident.
Good post devolve!
I’m looking for a certain background, it’s a job, lol.
That Marxist Puke couldn't care less about honoring our troops!
“There is no vice... so contemptible; he who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and a third time, till at length it becomes habitual...” Thomas Jefferson
Dittos on congratulating Kristinn.
Nice term "Citizen Journalism."
As for PIDS and EBIDS, I would change those to PDIDS and EBDDS...that would be due to the "disinformation" instead of "information."
Did I hear them floating yet another lie about this Thursday evening as I was channel surfing past Fox News? It seems to me that I heard someone saying the Obama camp claimed McCain had called the Pentagon, pressuring them to not allow the Landstuhl visit.
bookmark
That boy’s expression while accepting the flag just rips your heart out.
You got that right. Amazing photo.
That’s been out there, too, as a rumor they’re spreading. Their bullschitt is getting pretty desperate and pathetic.
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That pretty much says it all. Great job.
Unfortunately, the email from a soldier in Afghanistan has already been debunked at snopes.com.
It would be a useful story to have out there, if it were true, but we don’t want to try to rely on fake stories and false emails to beat this guy.
There is plenty of true stuff about the guy that we can use to beat him. No need to make stuff up.
Snopes link here:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/afghanistan.asp
Thanks I’ll try and get it removed!
I believe that was Andrea Mitchell "reporting" a rumor.
The Messiah never makes a mistake!
Had to get the story behind that photo as I’d somehow missed it.
The photographer’s comment under the picture says it all.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=3140316
He was afraid to face the troops alone because he knows they know he’s a phony who has done everything he could to undermine them.
He’s giving all sorts of signals (like telling Petraeus he needs the money spent on Iraq for other things) as to what he intends to do to the military if he is elected.
Obama is a racists, why else associate with known racists for most of his life.
That's one of the strenghs of the internet in general and FR in particular. It's self correcting. And in real time to boot.
What a disgusting remark.
Great quote. I thought I'd seen it all with Slick Willie, but Obama hasn't even been elected yet, yet I think he might have already lied more times in the last 6 months than Clinton did in 8 years. He lies, he sees that the press never holds him accountable for his lies, so he lies more and more, enabled by his willing media sycophants. The "MSM" is truly disgusting and frightening.
Great job tying all that Liebama information together, Kristinn. It must feel great to put something together like that, knowing it will reach thousands of people on this site, who will then forward the information to other people. Another fork in the eye of the shameless scum propagandists in the leftist media.
I am sure Obama would have received a poor reception.
“what we decided was that we not make a visit and instead I would call some of the troops that were there. So that essentially would be the extent of the story.”
Here Obama is openly retroactively lying about how in the past they plotted to manage a story so he could get out of meeting the injured.
This guy is worse that John Kerry.
Tell me lies Tell me sweet little lies (tell me lies, tell me, tell me lies) Oh, no, no you cant disguise (you cant disguise, no you cant disguise) Tell me lies Tell me sweet little lies
BOHICA...
National Security force huh? Yeah, I know they are protecting him. Scary looking ‘graduates’ there!!
Andrea Mitchell stated that the Obama camp suspected it was McCain who suggested the Pentagon not allow Obama to visit.
Spreading the rumor only made Obama look worse, if that was possible.
It is simply not something McCain would have or could have done.
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