Friday, February 8, 2008

Barack Oba-moderate?

It's one of the great MSM rituals of presidential politics: the labeling of leading Dems as "moderates" or "centrists." Gail Collins honors the tradition in her New York Times column of today. We'll do a reality check, but first let's look at the excerpt from Collins's column:

"Most Americans want a moderate government, but nobody has ever before been able to make moderate seem interesting, let alone sexy."
Newsweek's Richard Wolffe, a frequent Olbermann guest, did the same think back in July, calling Obama a centrist. I wrote about it at the time, so let me dust off that same list of some of the interest group ratings, culled from Project Vote Smart, that Obama has earned over the years.

0% from Americans for Tax Reform
100% from the NAACP
8% from the American Conservative Union
100% from the NEA [teachers union]
100% from NOW
88% from the American Immigration Lawyers Association
0% from the Federation for American Immigration Reform
100% from the American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees
100% from Americans for Democratic Action [gold-standard of old lefty groups]
[and more...][snip]

Question: How would the MSM react if a conservative with ratings that were the mirror-image of Obama's tried to present himself as a 'moderate'?

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