Obama Nuance

UPDATE: More "nuance" from the NY Times to the point of lies. Not just sanitizing Obama's radical friends, but misrepresenting his radical positions. Powerline. (More updates below.) *** Veteran political columnist John Kass, Chicago Tribune, on the Obama narrative embraced by the media. Read it all, but I can't draw attention to this enough, especially after seeing a bland David Axelrod on FoxNews Sunday:

Obama had nothing to do with the Duff deal. But he kept mum. He has endorsed Daley, endorsed Daley's hapless stooge Todd Stroger for president of the Cook County Board. These are not the acts of a reformer, but of a guy who, as we say in Chicago, won't make no waves and won't back no losers.

Obama the reformer is backed by Mayor Richard M. Daley and the Daley boys. He is spoken for by Daley's own spokesman, David Axelrod. He was launched into his U.S. Senate by machine power broker and state Senate President Emil Jones (D-ComEd).

Sen. Obama did give his word of honor that if elected president, he would retain corruption-busting U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, no easy vow, given that Daley is threatened by Fitzgerald, and that the corruption case against Rezko is about to be handed to the jury.

Closing arguments today in the Rezko trial. Closing arguments underway for Barack Obama and Democrat primary voters. And the MSM are mostly Obama defenders, peddling the phony reformer narrative:

An untraditional politician who at times uses traditional political tactics, Mr. Obama, 46, was portrayed in dozens of interviews with political leaders and longtime associates in Chicago as the ultimate pragmatist, a deliberate thinker who fashions carefully nuanced positions that manage to win him support from people with divergent views.

It's that magical Obama nuance, you see. Multiculti mosaic masks the prosaic politico. But once again we meet a radical friend of Barack Obama:

“He has a pattern of forming relationships with various communities and as he takes his next step up, kind of distancing himself from them and then positioning himself as the bridge,” said Ali Abunimah, a Palestinian-American author and co-founder of the online publication Electronic Intifada, who became acquainted with Mr. Obama in Chicago.

More curious minds than the NY Times can acquaint themselves with the Electronic Intifada here. Then there's SDS, sanitized nicely by the Times:

As a leader of Students for a Democratic Society then, Ms. Katz organized Vietnam War protests, throwing nails in the street to thwart the police. But like many from that era, Ms. Katz had gone on to become a politically active member of the Chicago establishment, playing in a regular poker game with Mr. Miner while working as a consultant to his nemesis, Mayor Daley.

“For better or worse, this is Chicago,” said Ms. Katz, who has held fund-raisers for Mr. Obama at her home. “Everyone is connected to everyone.”

And Bill Ayers is a reformer too, just part of the neighborhood. Lots of room for nuance.

UPDATE: OpEd in the WSJ thinks Obama should wear the flag lapel pin, in spite of the risk.

UPDATE: Hmm, President Obama might have more to dither about than whether to wear or not to wear a lapel pin. An excellent illustration of the limits of multiculturalism.

UPDATE: My friend El Rider at Flying Debris: Hyde Park Group Demands New State, and related post, Chicago: the City That Works to Screw You

Finally, if I were Hillary, I wouldn't get out anytime soon. Barack Obama may not be dumb enough to put a helmet on his head like Dukakis, but at this point he couldn't do any kind of patriotic gesture and be believed. And his liberal base would feel betrayed--better that he betray America.