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MORE ON THE CLINTON/OBAMA CHOICE FRACAS.
I'm hoping for a response from the Obama campaign as to Clinton's accusations that his Planned Parenthood robocall violates the law. But in the meantime, I want to respond to commenters who criticized me for reporting this as a "he said, she said." As I stated in a December post on the controversy, "I'm inclined to trust Planned Parenthood's recollection of these events. But the Clinton campaign's aggressive focus on the 'present' votes illustrates a growing dynamic in the race ... Clinton is attacking Obama from the left on domestic policy, even as he attacks her from the left on foreign policy."
My feeling today: This is an unfortunate tactic from the Clinton folks that creates division on an issue -- reproductive rights -- around which, thankfully, the Democratic front-runners are united.
UPDATE: The Clinton campaign said the Obama pro-choice robocall violates the law, first, by calling phone numbers on the Do Not Call list, and second, by waiting 38 seconds to signal the call is funded by the Obama campaign, an announcement that is supposed to take place within the first 30 seconds.
But here's a key point in Obama's favor: The federal Do Not Call registry exempts political calls, which are protected under free speech. That's controversial, because some campaign experts believe unwanted calls have an adverse effect on voter participation. See this Campaigns & Elections article for more.
The Obama campaign emailed me the following response to the whole episode, from New Hampshire campaign co-chair Ned Helms: "Every hour since Hillary Clinton lost in Iowa, her attacks have become more and more desperate. This call was in direct response to one of many 11th-hour false attacks Clinton has made at the end of the New Hampshire campaign. Our disclaimer absolutely complies with the federal law and our vendor has assured us that he scrubbed the list for people on the Do Not Call registry. However, if this call went to someone who should not have received it, we will make sure the vendor takes every step to make sure this doesn't happen again."
UPDATE II: The blog BlueHampshire found that the 30-second idenitification law also does not apply to national primaries.
--Dana Goldstein
COMMENTS (10)
While Clinton was speaking about womens' rights issues in China, Obama was voting "present" on those issues in Illinois.
One of those actions is Presidential and audacious, the other is not.
Considering Obama's habit of skipping out on politically tough votes (Kyl-Lieberman, Move-on), I think it's entirely appropriate to examine his public record.
Talk v. action. Don't tell me what you're going to do, show me in your recored what you've done!
Posted by: JoeCHI | January 7, 2008 2:24 PM
JoeCHI: So, let me get this straight, Obama was part of a successful Planned Parenthood strategy in the Illinois Senate as an elected official, and Clinton was in China "talking" about womens' rights and Hillary is supposed to be the Doer and Obama the talker--the one who needs to prove to you what he has done? Does that make any sense?
Maybe you can explain exactly what Hillary has been doing for the 35 years as the wife of a Governor and President, that Barack wasn't as a community organizer and state senator?
Posted by: d | January 7, 2008 2:38 PM
Adam B already examined the "did not identify" accusation and it is completely false at the Breaking Blue section of MyDD. The other seems like it could be troublesome but as long as Obama's firm does stop right now, I can chalk that up to a mistake.
Posted by: MNPundit | January 7, 2008 2:52 PM
Dana, I usually don't say this sort of thing, but your coverage of this nonsense has been abysmally bad. You have used the thoroughly discredited techniques of the MSM (candidate x says this, candidate y says that) instead of looking into the law yourself. As the folks at BlueHampshire did.
Are you incapable of doing that yourself? If you can do it, please do so. If not, please find other work.
Posted by: cvcobb01 | January 7, 2008 3:28 PM
There is an update at BlueHampshire you may have missed:
http://bluehampshire.com/showComment.do?commentId=28402
The claim that it does not apply to presidential primaries is incorrect.
AdamB is an Obama supporter who should have done a bit more digging.
Posted by: corinne | January 7, 2008 3:40 PM
When are we going to stop falling for young guys with one page reume that we could wish to have beer with, but never can? The ones that promise to be uniter and not devider, outsider and not insider. Eveyone can drive, almost on one safely on ice. We need someone who knows how to drive on ice. Meaning experienced. Republicans are so out to touch with us that they think we can afford $15000/ hear health insurance. Avg income of people in my area is 32000/y we can't afford the paper that health insurance is written on. Vote Clinton, the only experienced one on Democratic side
Posted by: homi | January 7, 2008 3:43 PM
Corinne, that's *exactly* what I said. One of the charges is baseless, because that law does not apply to presidental primaries; the other is a vendor error being handled by the campaign.
I'm sure the readers of this site have better things to worry about than your personal attacks on bloggers.
Posted by: Adam B. | January 7, 2008 3:59 PM
When Obama was not in a leadership position in the IL senate, he took part in various consensus-building operations, including these 'present' votes, to kill anti-abortion legislation.
The point of the vote was to draw a group of voters who were nominally anti-choice or had constituents who didn't support a pro-choice agenda and lend them political cover for a present vote, which had the same substantive effect as a no vote, thus killing the legislation.
This gambit was effective and led to the defeat of these anti-choice bills in the illinois legislature.
After Obama took a leadership position on the relevant committee, he personally took the heat and killed all of these bills, himself, without subjecting himself to the political cover of even holding a vote.
And for this he's being labeled not supportive enough of the pro-choice position? This is a bullshit accusation of the highest order.
There's a reason PP is making phone-calls on his behalf.
Posted by: dbt | January 7, 2008 4:18 PM
Adam
Of course , it is ironic, is it not, that Obama has legislation in congress to deal with the misleading robocalls of the 2006 elections. this legisalation also deals with the long time it takes to identify the actual caller in order to annoy and mislead the voter. Now the law hasn't passed. But it does tell you something about him that he won't live up to the letter and spirit of the law he authored.
Secondly the present votes tell you a great deal about his fundamental political and character flaw.
There were many other bills....scores actually...besides those 7 choice votes....where he voted present and there was no activist groups plotting tactics. It tells you that the strategy was his ...to keep from having to vote on controversial bills that would limit his political viability.
Hillary Clinton could have effectively done the same with the Partial Birth Abortion Ban...she could have not been on the floor that day. But she didn't do the easy thing. She showed up, she voted against the bill. he didn't do that. No profile in courage he.
Posted by: debcoop | January 8, 2008 12:06 AM
Is it just me, or does relabeling abortion rights as "reproductive rights" grate like fingernails on a chalkboard to anyone else? If abortion is indeed the privacy right that dare not speak its name, isn't it more accurate to say, er, non-reproductive rights?
Posted by: John in Nashville | January 8, 2008 12:30 PM