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Breaking From CNN: Republican Says Bad Things About Obama

Check out this headline on the front page of the CNN politics section:

So who is this "fellow legislator" who says Obama isn't as bold as his rhetoric suggests? If you click through to the article, you discover that it's Dan Cronin -- a Republican. Yet there's no indication in the hed that this is a partisan attack.

And as a special bonus, the bogus hed is packaged with that photo of Obama looking all glum and caught out. Just Godawful. Kind of funny to think that someone actually signed off on this.

Special thanks to TPM Reader PW for sending this one in.


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Can you find a "Paid for by Hillary Clinton for President" anywhere on there? I wouldn't be surprised.

Next she'll be telling the country how Dan Cronin (a total bastard by the way) has crossed the commander-in-chief threshold, and how he would be a better president than Obama.

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Cronin is a McCain supporter! Of course he'd say that!!

I will say as a credit to CNN that they've presented political coverage for most of the afternoon today with a group of reporters and pundits composed entirely of women and African-Americans.

Here's something Obama and Clinton supporters can agree on (I'm trying to find them wherever I can):

There is no way this would be the case if the leading Democratic candidates were not a woman and an African-American.

So we can all be happy about that at least.

Media bias my ass.

I'm so sick of the MSM. When are they finally going to reveal that Obama is an angry black Muslim intent on destroying America from the inside out?

Kill the messenger.. That's Obama supporters are about these days?

"There were no bold solutions; there were no creative approaches; there were no efforts to stand up to the establishment," said Cronin. How about addressing those points.

Ahem. Videotaped confessions. Look into it.

what the hell are you talking about? why would we give credence to the comments made by a single Republican state senator that are contradicted by a great many of Senator Obama's Democratic colleagues and more than a few Republican ones?

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I can't think of any bolder solution than standing up to the establishment Clinton machine. Until we defeat that, all we have is two Republicans parties.

I don't seem to recall Clinton supporters addressing the merits of whether or not Hillary was a monster.

So this is goes into the election section but Clinton lying about her foreign experience doesn't...

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Oh come on, that's not news. She lies about everything. Now if she told the truth about something, that would be news.

Well CNN being biased to Clinton isnt really new either.

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That's true as well. I was just kidding by the way.

SINBAD!!

McCain supports torture, and........

Hillary has been running around endorsing John McCain. He has said that he is going to have the same foreign and domestic policies as George W. Bush. Yet Hillary has endorsed him, over Senator Obama. That makes Hillary just another traitor to the party. She is just the same as Joe Lieberman, and should be given the same treatment. She should be driven out of the party. She is not a loyal Democrat, any more than Joe Lieberman was.

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Greg,

Do a search of all the negative stories about Obama from Lege Members in the last year--Cronin is primarily the only one to say much negative.

There were negative reviews while he was in the Lege but that was mainly from other African-American Lege Members. What's noticeable about Cronin, he's the only Republican even out there saying these things.

Typical Clinton News Network bias...

C'mon now. I really don't think this is bias. Conflict and profit drives the media more than anything.

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Apparently this isn't the first time this has happened with Cronin.

See media matters report:
http://mediamatters.org/items/200802280007

Cronin is part of John McCain's "Illinois leadship team."

Hillary really has been treated unfairly in the media.

Wait....what?...

Today Bush did what John McCain urged him to do and yet Hillary keeps on endorsing John McCain over Senator Obama. She is worse than Joe Lieberman ever was.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush said Saturday he vetoed legislation that would ban the CIA from using harsh interrogation methods such as waterboarding to break suspected terrorists because it would end practices that have prevented attacks.

Kill the messenger.. That's Obama supporters are about these days?

If by messenger you mean partisan hack, then yes. Do you lack all crtical faculties or is anything negative about Obama worth reading into the record without considering whether the person saying it has ulterior motives?

I guess this whole low information voter thing has more legs than I'd given it credit for.

Please tell me someone is going to make Sinbad their avatar? (I'm not good at that stuff or I would.)

Cyntax, you still didn't address his assertion that Obama had no bold solutions, no creative approaches or no efforts to stand up to the establishment.

Unless you call voting 'Present' 130 times a form of standing up to the establishment.

You're forgetting that he's in a minority on that point. And that Obama's already refuted the Present argument, as the Pro-Abortion group REQUESTED that Obama vote present on the Abortion issue to help their group.

Opposing Clinton = Standing up to establishment
2002 Iraq speech = Standing up to establishment
And note: If you disagree on the latter, CLinton's advisors cited her China feminism speech as a significant accomplishment. That was the only thing they cited. So either Clinton and Obama haven't done anything significant, or they both have. Personally, I think both speeches were acts of courage and proof of strength of character

being completely ignorant as it pertains to the use of "present" votes in IL is EXCELLENT NEWS!! FOR HILLARY!!!

Thanks for the laugh, idiotic! You truly are excellent news, as always.

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You forgot to throw in rezko. Did you lose your copy of the clintons' talking points? The 130 present votes have been addressed ad nauseum. Try again.

I got one for you. At least he didn't vote to give the king a blank check to invade a country and kill hundreds of thousands of innocent americans and iraqis based on lies. Or how about, he knows how to read, as in read a national intelligence estimate that revealed the lies.

The fact is that voting "present" is a practice in the Illinois state senate, and has been discussed extensviely. In case you missed it here's a link:

>"After having put some thought into it, I don't think that Barack Obama was necessarily a coward for voting present on those bills. In fact, I think he believed that he was doing the right thing, because something, in his mind, might have been unconstitutional," Miller says.

Mooney and other state capitol watchers and players say Illinois lawmakers often vote "present" as part of a larger party or issue bloc strategy.

Pam Sutherland is the president and CEO of the Illinois Planned Parenthood Council. She says Obama voted "present" at least seven times to provide cover to other abortion-rights supporters on such bills as the "Born Alive Infant Protection Act."


Now please explain why we should pay attention to a rehashing of these issues by someone who seems to have an ulterior motive.

As to bold solutions, here are some of the bills he's introduced as a US senator:

On veterans and military personnel: S.1084 : A bill to provide housing assistance for very low-income veterans;

On global warmingS.1324 : A bill to amend the Clean Air Act to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transportation fuel sold in the United States;S.1389 : A bill to authorize the National Science Foundation to establish a Climate Change Education Program; S.AMDT.599 to S.CON.RES.21 To add $200 million for Function 270 (Energy) for the demonstration and monitoring of carbon capture and sequestration technology by the Department of Energy. (This last one passed both the House and the Senate as part of the budget bill.)

On campaign finance and lobbyists S.2030 : A bill to amend the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to require reporting relating to bundled contributions made by persons other than registered lobbyists; and S.AMDT.41 to S.1 To require lobbyists to disclose the candidates, leadership PACs, or political parties for whom they collect or arrange contributions, and the aggregate amount of the contributions collected or arranged.

On Blackwater S.2044 : A bill to provide procedures for the proper classification of employees and independent contractors, and for other purposes, and S.2147 : A bill to require accountability for contractors and contract personnel under Federal contracts, and for other purposes.

On global poverty S.2433 : A bill to require the President to develop and implement a comprehensive strategy to further the United States foreign policy objective of promoting the reduction of global poverty, the elimination of extreme global poverty, and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goal of reducing by one-half the proportion of people worldwide, between 1990 and 2015, who live on less than $1 per day.

On global nuclear proliferation S.1977 : A bill to provide for sustained United States leadership in a cooperative global effort to prevent nuclear terrorism, reduce global nuclear arsenals, stop the spread of nuclear weapons and related material and technology, and support the responsible and peaceful use of nuclear technology.


How about this:

With the assistance of Senator Jones, Mr. Obama helped deliver what is said to have been the first significant campaign finance reform law in Illinois in 25 years. He brought law enforcement groups around to back legislation requiring that homicide interrogations be taped and helped bring about passage of the state’s first racial-profiling law.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/30/us/politics/30obama.html

Well,

Can anyone point to anything legislative Obama has done that is especially bold?

justinh,you're kidding right? being too lazy to read is EXCELLENT NEWS for someone I guess. BTW

http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2008/02/obama-actually.html

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I copied this from wwjb, to avoid any plagiarism charges:

During the first (8) eight years of his elected service he sponsored over 820 bills. He introduced
233 regarding healthcare reform,
125 on poverty and public assistance,
112 crime fighting bills,
97 economic bills,
60 human rights and anti-discrimination bills,
21 ethics reform bills,
15 gun control,
6 veterans affairs and many others.
His first year in the U.S. Senate, he authored 152 bills and co-sponsored another 427. These included:
**the Coburn-Obama Government Transparency Act of 2006 (became law),
**The Lugar-Obama Nuclear Non-proliferation and Conventional Weapons Threat Reduction Act, (became law),
**The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act, passed the Senate,
**The 2007 Government Ethics Bill, (became law),
**The Protection Against Excessive Executive Compensation Bill, (In committee), and many more.
In all since enter the U.S. Senate, Senator Obama has written 890 bills and co-sponsored another 1096.
To say nothing of his achievements while he was a community organizer in Chicago.

Now your turn. What have the clintons done that was especially bold?????????? I'll give you a twofer. Anything from their first two terms in the whitehouse and her stellar senate career. Anything????????

By the way the two war votes don't count. They were just stupid, not bold.

why don't you look it up? there are many, many examples of his work in the Illinois senate, and a fair few from his brief tenure in the U.S. Senate, irrespective of what Jeff Zeleny likes to talk about.

Define "especially" bold? In terms of real accomplishment:

He co-authored (with Lugar) a substantive nuclear nonproliferation bill.

He established a public database of all government spending to increase transparency and thus accountability: http://www.usaspending.gov/

He has sponsored and otherwise put forth a variety of other legislation that hasn't become law -- here's one take on such a list: http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/02/dear-chris-matt.html

On the other hand, try listing the major legislation that the uber-experienced Hillary Clinton, with her 7 years in the Senate vs. Obama's 3, has her name on, and how she has made her mark in the Senate. I'm waiting.

Dear Justin,

Learn how to use Google.

Sincerely,
the Intertubes

Y'all think it's easy being Sinbad?

Brother goes to Kosovo and gets made of fun of.

Step off before I go Comic Relief on your asses.

What did the people of Kosovo say when they saw Sinbad depart on a Plane?

Answer: At last we are finally getting some Comic Relief!

Dude...easy.

No one's making fun of YOUR foreign experience.

(Jingle All The Way is another story, however)


Clinton/Sinbad '08

Obama's winning Wyoming in a landslide. The same's going to happen on Tuesday in Mississippi. He keeps stacking chips. All the Howard Wolfson spin in the world can't stop that.

For the nth time: videotaped confessions.

Consider a bill into which Obama clearly put his heart and soul. The problem he wanted to address was that too many confessions, rather than being voluntary, were coerced -- by beating the daylights out of the accused. ... Obama proposed requiring that interrogations and confessions be videotaped.

This seemed likely to stop the beatings, but the bill itself aroused immediate opposition. There were Republicans who were automatically tough on crime and Democrats who feared being thought soft on crime. There were death penalty abolitionists, some of whom worried that Obama's bill, by preventing the execution of innocents, would deprive them of their best argument. Vigorous opposition came from the police, too many of whom had become accustomed to using muscle to "solve" crimes. And the incoming governor, Rod Blagojevich, announced that he was against it. ... Obama proved persuasive enough that the bill passed both houses of the legislature, the Senate by an incredible 35 to 0. Then he talked Blagojevich into signing the bill, making Illinois the first state to require such videotaping.

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It is sad when Republicans eat their own.

McCain/Clinton '08

I suppose it depends on what we mean by "bold." The legilation listed above is all fine, but if we mean by "bold," anything risky politically, I can't see anything there at all.

Please point to a bold piece of Clinton legislation then so we have an example to reference. Thanks.

Politically risky? This certainly wasn't unequivocal:

In January 2007, Obama proposed legislation that would have prevented President Bush from sending more troops to Iraq and required troop withdrawals to begin that spring. Last November, he introduced legislation that would make clear Congress had not authorized military force against Iran. Neither measure received a vote on the floor of the Senate.

Clinton, on the other hand, voted for Kyl-Lieberman, again placing faith in the hands of a man she claims to have learned not to trust after her Iraq vote years earlier.

In all seriousness, here's a link to a dairy on DKos that gives a good explanation of how Hillary's legislation is "small ball" while Barack swings for the fences.

Let me know what you think.

The weather's nice, I gotta go log some miles on the bicycle.

Yes Greg it is god awful - and lord look-it, you decided to post it.

Where's the tax records Hillary?

Where's the Chicago Tribune story Greg?

And McCain and the other Republican members of Congress have been bold by saying yes to Bush for seven years? Boldly disastrous, maybe.

Clinton making a bold move legislatively?

I can't think of a single one.

Well it seems to me, at minimum, that it's reasonable to say Obama's legislative record is bolder than Clinton's, with the stipulation that his record doesn't meet your definition of boldness.

Though like I said down thread, I think his willingness to vote present on certain popular bills out of concerns for constitutionality and other issues, leaves him open to decontextualized criticism, so that's something to think about.

I am usually hard on Greg for all of his "Wolfson says" posts.

But this is a good catch. It shows the shameless pandering at what many are calling the Clinton News Network.

Are they the new FoxNews?

It says that Dan Lothian wrote it.

Who is he?

NYTimes also has some big piece on Obama in the Senate.

When will NYT get around to doing a front page piece on Hillary's stellar record of bridge naming???

maybe they should ask Eli Stephens how he feels about john mccain

just for "fairness"

The subject of this post has absolutely nothing to do with Hillary Clinton - a perfect excuse for the progressiver-than-thou wing of the Democratic Party posting here to launch their irrational, tiresome, kneejerk attacks on her.

No politics as usual to see here. Move along.

The title now reads, "GOP Legislator Found Little Bold About Obama."

You may want to update that in your main post.

Nice, CNN changed it. Thanks to all those who complained to CNN. Now ask CNN why they are showing all the WY counties that tied today as wins for Clinton.

MSM will NEVER on people's side, period.

"Nice, CNN changed it. Thanks to all those who complained to CNN. Now ask CNN why they are showing all the WY counties that tied today as wins for Clinton."

I think Greg helped put the spotlight on CNN.

We need more of a spotlight on these guys.

Really, is it too much to ask, for the love of god, that the Media just reports the facts and doesn't try to spin us in one direction or the other????

Sorry, I was dreaming there for a moment.

Now they just fixed their map that showed tied counties as Clinton wins. Keep up the pressure on CNN -- it's working.

Cyntax, you can cite Obama's accomplishments ad nauseum and CLinton supporters will still dispute you.

Yes, Clinton gave a speech in China that was bold, but what did she risk? Was there a chance the Chinese secret police would arrest her for "offenses against the state?"

She risked not getting her tea and cookies.

You're probably right. But while I was out on my bike ride I was thinking about it and interestingly enough, if we take JustinH's definition of bold as something risky, then Obama's "present" vote cited below fits his definition. Since JustinH never provided any clarification around how "risky" is intrinsic to the definition of bold, it's a little hard to know. "Risky" has mostly negative connations while "bold" has the opposite. But voting "present" on principle (as described below) seems bold to me since it opens Obama up to criticism from people like JustinH who are willing to cherry pick Obama's "present" vote without bothering to refer to the context within which the vote was cast.

Pam Sutherland is the president and CEO of the Illinois Planned Parenthood Council. She says Obama voted "present" at least seven times to provide cover to other abortion-rights supporters on such bills as the "Born Alive Infant Protection Act."

And how often has Hillary voted that way? AUMF? Landmine ban? Kyl-Lieberman? I'm not saying I know for sure that all her votes were politically triangulated to support her shot at the presidency but it seems many were...

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Guess maybe we're going to be re-fighting some of those old battles after all. Bummer.

Too right colonpowwow

Cronin is insanely jealous of Obama. The Cronins always thought they were the Kennedys of Elmhurst IL and that they would not so much climb the political ladder as take a personal escalator to the top.

In high school, his brother Tom's favorite song wa actually "Hail to the Chief" I s**t you not! Tom got beheaded in a race for DuPage state's attorney. Their sister Cindy got defenestrated from her post as Elmhurst City Treasurer.

As for Dan, how far has it gotten him? Well, he's chairman of the DuPage Republican Party, and he thinks he's going to be the next Republican nominee for Governor of Illinois. Even if by some weird Star Trek alternative universe crossover he somehow gets the nomination, he's going to get run over by a truck named Lisa Madigan.

But you gotta understand that Cronin has the personal integrity of... well of a Republican party hack. But to the nth degree: he lies even when he doesn't have to, which is funny and sad to see. And he'd throw his own mother under the bus for political purposes. (I've seen him do it. It was actually his mom. To be fair, she deserves it - she's the leader of the local political kook brigade - but, still!)

Anyway, poor CNN accidentally tapped into a pale white suburban Irish lawyer who deep within his inner core can't get over the fact that it's Barack Obama who's going to be President, and not himself.

JP


BTW I found a fantastic article…A MUST read for EVERYONE “The Hussein Dynamic” at http://savagepolitics.com.
Brilliant writing that goes beyond what the MSM is feeding us!!!!

Here is an excerpt: “The issue of Barack Obama’s religious definition has captivated many Americans to the point were charges of terrorism and counter charges of racism have been thrown into the fray of the discussion, aimed at either side. To many Liberal Americans, whether or not Obama is a Muslim (or was a Muslim) is irrelevant to the feelings of “hope” and “change” that he inspires in them, which they consider to have a higher merit than petty religious or ethnic associations. To many Conservative Americans, the mere allocation of any candidate within the realm of Islam is sufficient reason to vote against him, irrespective of the details that may lie in the penumbra of his personal story. Either way, it is impossible for any citizen to make an intelligent assessment of either perspective, without knowing the details and the relevant information regarding Mr. Obama’s past. Unlike the Mainstream Media, who has automatically assumed that Obama has no relation to Islam, in a vague attempt to paint themselves as “reasonable” and “progressives”, most thinking citizens should not follow suit. There is ample evidence to make any reasonable citizen conclude that the Obama campaign and the Media have been hiding some crucial elements of this candidate’s past that should become widely known and discussed in the open. Let us then ask ourselves; Is Barack Obama a Muslim?” get the rest at http://savagepolitics.com/?p=171

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