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........ummmmmmmm........Neither can Dubya......
........ummmmmmmm........Neither can Dubya......
change you said?
Neither can McCain. That just leaves....
Damn.
If you actually watch the video, the question Obama asked was if the Shia-led Iraqi government was complicit allowing the Iranian aid to flow and not trying to actually stop it.
This video doesn't say what you think it does, and shows a rather intelligent question that I myself would like to have answered, sorry, but nice try.
If you're going to try to make someone look foolish, you had better vet your material a little better than this. But hey, if your real purpose was to show everybody Obama asking an intelligent question, feel free to bump the thread.
Here is the flow of the conversation:
Dude:"Iranians are funding/aiding militia groups"
Obama:"Is the Iraqi government funneling this or just tolerating it?"
Dude: "The Iranian government..."
Seems more like the mistake was on the Dude's part, not Obama's. I think they guy answering the questions misunderstood the Senator.
I would love to see the follow up footage.
by dude you mean the expert.
so despite the so called "dude" was talking about iran at first, that means that obama corrected him and said it was the iraqi govt doing the shia funding and not the actual shia nation of iran?
yeah okay.
Yes, by "dude" I mean expert.
The dude wasn't talking about Iran.
He was talking about Iranian aid to shia militia in Iraq.
The question was essentially "Is the Iraqi government directing this aid or are they "tacitly tolerating it"?
Obama didn't correct him at all. He asked a pertinent question to what the guy was speaking to.
Sorry if the sloppy research on the part of the youtube ideologue and your own confirmation bias led you astray, but it did.
As I said, it was an intelligent question.
If you had the follow up footage so we could possibly ferret out a bit more context, it might help to clear up the ambiguity for you.
so it was the expert that was confused when he didn't mention iraq but went on and only talked about iran
.
Last edited by Ignignokt; 04-15-2008 at 07:51 PM.
Obama, Obama, Obama.................
Either that or it was an administration official that didn't want to admit that indeed the Shia dominated government was looking the other way when the Shia government in Iran was sending weapons to the Shia militias that are killing Sunnis.
Kind of hard to get Sunnis to the bargaining table with the Iraqi government if they think the government is helping arm the people who are trying to kill them, so an administration "expert" might have some reason to either provaricate or pretend he didn't hear the question and stick to his talking points like any other politician/diplomat.
Understanding the exchange takes a very nuanced understanding of the situation on the ground in Iraq. If you need some confirmation of this, try www.globalsecurity.org or some similar non-partisan think tank website to brush up on this.
Further, in a political context Obama's question makes even more sense, especially if you put him in the position to ask questions of an expert who might say something embarrassing to the administration of his political opponents if Obama could get him to admit that indeed the Iraqi government is helping Shia militias.
Wouldn't that be something of a talking point about Iraq, if the Iraqi government was complicit in helping arm the very militias we are fighting?
This video shows little more than either an expert who misheard a question, or a guy who simply didn't want to say something both diplomatically and politically damaging in such a public format.
Ask and ye shall receive.
Talking point
A talking point is a neologism (new word) for an idea which may or may not be factual, usually compiled in a short list with summaries of a speaker's agenda for public or private engagements. Public relations professionals, for example, sometimes prepare "talking points memos" for their clients to help them more effectively conform public presentations with this advice.
A political think tank will strategize the most effective informational attack on a target topic and launch talking points from media personalities to saturate discourse in order to frame a debate in their favor, standardizing the responses of sympathizers to their unique cause while simultaneously co-opting the language used by those discussing the specific subject.
When used politically in this way, the typical purpose of a talking point is to propagandize, specifically using the technique of argumentum ad nauseam, i.e. continuous repe ion within media outlets until accepted as fact.
In this case you get a guy whose talking point includes emphasizing the bad things that the Iranian government, and skirting questions about the bad things that the Iraqi government is doing in order not to embarass the administration and/or create a dimplomatic stink.
(shrugs)
Put it to the common sense test.
Which is more likely:
A Senator trying to score political points in a public hearing in front of a committee by asking a loaded question
or
A Senator has such a deep misunderstanding of a topic after sitting there for hours and hours and hours of testimony that he can't tell the difference between two neighboring countries?
The person who put the video on her youtube account as well as the OP is either horribly ignorant of politics and the general situation in Iraq, or they are cynically trying to lie by omission, with the hope that most people don't know enough about what is being discussed to come away believing the lie.
Which is it? Ignorant or lying?
I would tend to believe the former, as I have yet to meet many conservative ideologues who know from shinola when it comes to Iraq.
They all make mistakes as I'm sure any of us would. Is this what politics has come to?
Indeed. Unfortunately for the OP, this is not one of them.
bump. because this thread is mine. I own it.
"Special Groups" as Sen. Obama referred to almost explicitly refers to Iranian funded quasi militias, much like the term "security forces" would refer to Iraqi police. Not a big issue though; I don't think that it was indicative of any misunderstanding about the situation on the ground.
That's nice random .
i mean the man was talking about a Shia nation like Iran arming Shia militias. That was clearly the implication.
I mean a huge Shia nation like Iran arming shia militias in Iraq, why is that so hard for Barrack to mistake it as Iraq being the shia nation arming shia soldiers just so that they could in turn kill them.
SOunds like RG is just defending a dead horse.
Which is more likely:
A Senator trying to score political points in a public hearing in front of a committee by asking a loaded question?
or
A Senator has such a deep misunderstanding of a topic after sitting there for hours and hours and hours of testimony that he can't tell the difference between two neighboring countries?
When Hillary makes a mistake, it's the end of the world.
So, turnabout is fair play.
he should just refer to both of them as the people he wants to talk to.
(shrugs)
I haven't seen Hillary really make "mistakes" when it comes to such things. She is a pretty sharp cookie.
Quite frankly, I let the occasional brain fart go for any of the candidates. They don't get enough sleep and talk waaay to much not to make the occasional gaffe.
This is one of the reasons that McCain's repeated alqaeda/shia bit really DOES concern me, because it was so obviously not a simple brain fart, but a genuine misconception from a senior Foreign Affairs committee member.
I really don't care either.
I was just saying.
S'alright.
For what it is worth, for all the talk about Dems getting cheesed if their candidate doesn't win the nomination, I will work hard for Hillary to win in November if it all pans out that way.
I know you have the opinion that all Obama supporters are all starry eyed zealots, but I have yet to meet any that have seriously said they would vote for McCain if Hillary gets the nomination.
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