Obama the Untouchable (Slate)

[scheming daemons]

Those that are worried that Obama campaign is starting to look like the Kerry campaign, relax.

Obama is made of teflon, Kerry was made of fly-paper.

(with respect to their ability to avoid a "swiftboating")

You're welcome to believe otherwise, but I don't think the press has gone in the tank for Barack Obama.

As long ago as March, the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz demolished charges that the press was soft on Obama by cataloging the tough pieces published by reporters exhuming the candidate's past: his financial relationship with friend and fundraiser Antoin "Tony" Rezko, who is now a convicted felon; his friendship with former Weather Undergrounder William Ayers; his casting of 130 "present" votes as an Illinois legislator; his nuclear energy compromise in the U.S. Senate, said to benefit a contributor; incendiary comments made by his pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright; and more.
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Obama's poise and discipline allow him to resist whatever bait the press and politicians dangle in front of him. When he does address scandalous material, he generally does so to his advantage. In June, when the Web and cable news advanced false rumors that Michelle Obama had called white people "whitey" on a videotape, Obama squelched the gossip with a denial and, as Ben Smith of Politico reported, put the press on notice by questioning the appropriateness of the question. Smears undermine a politician only when they appeal to voters' pre-existing idea of what sort of person a politician is. Seeing as the pre-existing idea of Obama is so positive, the Obama-haters have had trouble portraying him either as a literal bomb thrower, like William Ayers, or a figurative one, like the Rev. Wright. When the smear artists dress him up as a radical or as "madrassa"-educated, the ploys only backfire.

Full article:
http://www.slate.com/id/2196196/

[scheming daemons]

1. self-kick (shameless)