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Nov. 24, 2009
Rabbi Avi Shafran : The Atheists' unintended gift
JWisdom.com: You are a Philanthropist with Aliza Bulow (5 minutes)
Nov. 23, 2009
JWisdom.com: Actually, it really is all about you with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff
Nov. 20, 2009
Rabbi David Aaron: How to make every second of your life come first
Caroline B. Glick: Whither American Jewry
Nov. 19, 2009
Binyamin L. Jolkovsky: Please Listen to this Godcast (5 minutes)
Jonathan Tobin: ADL Crosses the Line with Report Bashing Obama Critics
Nov. 18, 2009
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: What Judaism has to say about the secret of the Mona Lisa's smile
JWisdom.com: The (Jewish) Dating Game with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (8 minutes)
Nov. 17, 2009
Steven Emerson: How Does the 4th Amendment Impact Terror Finance Investigations?
JWisdom.com: If Frank Sinatra married Edith Piaf with Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein (2 minutes) Life lessons from what would be regarded as the most inappropriate lyrics ever sung
Nov. 16, 2009
The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : When borrowing is stealing
JWisdom.com: Deconstructing faith with Rabbi Warren Goldstein (9 minutes)
Nov. 13, 2009
JWisdom.com Sarah's subjective reality with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 6 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick: Obama's failure, Netanyahu's opportunity
Nov. 12, 2009
The Kosher Gourmet By Marialisa Calta : A sweet sweet potato treat
JWisdom.com Does God get tired? with Rabbi Harvey Belovski ( 5 minutes)
Nov. 11, 2009
Rabbi Avi Shafran: Jews and money: When anti-Semitism isn't
JWisdom.com Marriages are not made in Heaven with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (VERY fast 15 minutes)
Nov. 10, 2009
Michael Doyle: Author of book exposing CAIR ordered to remove supporting documents from Web
JWisdom.com If the creation so loudly shouts the existence of the Creator, why aren't more people believers? with Rabbi Naftali Brawer (9 minutes)
Nov. 9, 2009
Mark Steyn: Shooter exposes hole in U.S. terror strategy
JWisdom.com It's never too late to have a happy childhood with Sarah Chana Radcliffe (5 minutes)
Nov. 6, 2009
Rabbi Berel Wein: Choosing to hear
JWisdom.com Zero to 1/60th: How to Empower An Hour with Gavriel Aryeh Sande (7 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick The mullahs' big week
Suzanne Fields A Fallen Wall for Fallen Man
Nov. 5, 2009
The Kosher Gourmet: Three scrumptious -- but simple -- butternut squash dishes
JWisdom.com Hidden Hints: Unlocking Faith & Prayer with Rabbi Jay Yaacov Schwartz (10 minutes)
Nov. 4, 2009
Tom Hamburger and Kim Geiger: Should prayers be covered?
JWisdom.com When God played peacemaker With Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes)
Nov. 3, 2009
Martin Peretz: Beware, Barack. Beware, Rahm. Beware, Axelrod
JWisdom.com Are you are closet idolater? With Sara Yoheved Rigler (10 minutes)
Nov. 2, 2009
Paul Greenberg: The Holocaust is now on Facebook
JWisdom.com Abraham's Strange Change With Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer (5 minutes)
Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review Nov. 3, 2008 / 5 Mar-Cheshvan 5769

The media have done too little to explore mystery candidate Obama

By Jack Kelly

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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | "After all this time with him, I still can't say with certainty who he is," wrote Peter Nicholas of the Los Angeles Times Tuesday about Sen. Barack Obama, with whom he's spent roughly 18 hours a day for most of this campaign.


Mr. Obama rarely engages in banter with the reporters who travel with him, and typically is in "robo-candidate mode" on those occasions he does speak with them, Mr. Nicholas said. "Ironically, those of us who were sent out to take his measure in person can't offer much help in answering who he is, or if he is ready. The barriers set in place between us and him were just too great."


Less is known about Barack Obama than about any major party candidate for president in modern history. His public resume is thin — eight years in the Illinois Senate, four in the U.S. Senate, with two of them spent running for president.


And no candidate for president has had more problematic associations. Barack Obama's first major financial backer was Antoin "Tony" Rezko, currently awaiting sentencing on corruption charges. For nearly 20 years Mr. Obama attended services where the Rev. Jeremiah Wright preached hatred of the United States, and of white people. The radical group ACORN has been committing voter registration fraud on a massive scale. Mr. Obama taught classes for ACORN organizers, and represented the group in a lawsuit against the state of Illinois. The most significant managerial responsibility Barack Obama has ever had was as chairman of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a project conceived of by unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayers.


These associations have been less explored by the mainstream news media than has Joe the Plumber's divorce and a tax lien against him.


Mr. Nicholas' colleague at the Los Angeles Times, Peter Wallsten, wrote a story in April about a testimonial dinner Mr. Obama had attended in 2003 for Rashid Khalidi when Prof. Khalidi left the University of Chicago for Columbia University. Mr. Khalidi and his wife, Mona, had worked for WAFA, the propaganda arm of the Palestine Liberation Organization. He later co-founded the rabidly anti-Israel Arab American Action Network. Among the contributors to a book of testimonials presented to Mr. Khalidi at that dinner were Sen. Obama and Mr. Ayers.


Mr. Wallsten's account of the event was based on a videotape of it supplied by an anonymous source. That videotape could answer some relevant questions. What exactly was said at the dinner? How did Mr. Obama respond? Were Mr. Ayers and Ms. Dohrn there? But the L.A. Times — which thought it newsworthy to put a video clip of Sarah Palin competing in the swimsuit competition in the Miss Alaska contest in 1984 on its Web site — has refused to make the tape public.


Times Editor Russ Stanton said the paper would not make the video public because "it was provided to us by a confidential source on the condition that we not release it." That's the fourth different explanation the newspaper has offered.


Michael Malone, one of the country's leading technology writers, said he's embarrassed to admit he's a journalist because "the sheer bias in the print and television coverage of this campaign is not just bewildering, but appalling."


The problem hasn't been the tough reporting on Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin, Mr. Malone wrote for the ABC News Web site Oct. 24. It's been the virtual absence of such reporting on the Democrats:


"Are Bill Ayers and Tony Rezko that hard to interview?" Mr. Malone asked. "All those phony voter registrations that hard to scrutinize? And why are Sen. Biden's endless gaffes almost always covered up?


"If the current polls are correct, we are about to elect as president of the United States a man who is essentially a cipher, who has left almost no paper trail, seems to have few friends (at least who will talk) and has entire years missing out of his biography," Mr. Malone said.

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JWR contributor Jack Kelly, a former Marine and Green Beret, was a deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration. Comment by clicking here.

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