She committed a slow suicide that began when she reveled that she hated Hillary Clinton and the poor in America, continued with her revelation that Barack Obama's 'pledge' to withdrawl all combat troops from Iraq was just pretty words and finally ended with her Friday announcement that she was resigning from Obama's campaign.
Samantha Power is a War Hawk. She has never been about peace. She has been about destruction and lying. Since 2005, we have written of her and her ilk repeatedly. So we were more than a little interested in how this would play out in Panhandle Media.
On Friday's Democracy Now!, Tired Whore for the Bambi campaign, Amy Goodman reduced it to one senence, declaring, "Meanwhile one of Obama's top foreign policy advisors, Samantha Power, described Clinton as a monster in an interview with a Scottish newspaper." Apparently having another trick lined up, that was it for Goody -- rather surprising when you consider the fact that February 22nd, on WBAI in the midst of a pledge drive, Goody felt the need to gush that Power was "the woman who some have said if Barack Obama were to become president could be his Secretary of State." She'd raise that prospect again on the February 25th broadcast of her show. For any who have forgotten or don't know, Goody made a mini-name for herself March 3, 1995 when asking New Gingrich why he hadn't apologized to American women for calling Hillary Clinton a "bitch." But Friday, Goody was all grins and we seriously doubt that she'll ever press Power the way she did Gingrich. See when Republicans do something, Goody calls them out, when Dems do it, she looks the other way.
Just like she ignored it when Hillary was wrongly accused of "pimping" Chelsea. Goody never covered that. Goody cares about "American women" when it suits her. When it doesn't? She's publishing in Hu**ler skin magazine.
The Scotsman was the name of the newspaper and here's what they reported:
Ms Power told The Scotsman Mrs Clinton was stopping at nothing to try to seize the lead from Mr Obama."We f***** up in Ohio," she admitted. "In Ohio, they are obsessed and Hillary is going to town on it, because she knows Ohio's the only place they can win. "She is a monster, too – that is off the record – she is stooping to anything," Ms Power said, hastily trying to withdraw her remark.
"Interestingly, the people in her innermost circle seem to not mind her; I think they really love her." But she added: "There is this middle circle – they are really on the warpath. But the truth is she has proved herself really willing to stoop."
[. . .]
"You just look at her and think: ergh. But if you are poor and she is telling you some story about how Obama is going to take your job away, maybe it will be more effective. The amount of deceit she has put forward is really unattractive."
It was more than smearing than Hillary as a "monster." It was every stereotype in the book and Goody so quick to stand up to Newt didn't have s**t to say on Friday. She certainly didn't both to defend the poor whom Power implied were imbeciles.
In fairness to Goody, Sammy Power's revelations to the BBC about Bambi's non-binding 'pledge' to the American people regarding Iraq weren't receiving traction on Friday morning. By Friday evening that would not be the case. So we looked around at the usual suspects, the usual Whores For Bambi.
The Nation -- the allegedy wants to end the illegal war weekly -- had not a word to say about Sammy Power informing (British) audiences that Barack didn't mean what he said about Iraq. Golly gee, Americans Against Escalation (or whatever that do-nothing faux grassroots group was called) implodes and there's Tommy Hayden with an article the next day at The Nation (one that then gets pulled because of a phone call to the magazine but then goes back up in rewritten form and with an addendum). Sammy Power declares the Iraq talk hollow and where's Tommy? Or, for that matter, anyone else at The Nation?
Maybe they missed it? For any who did, here's one exchange that took place:
Stephen Sackur: You said that he'll revisit it [the decision to pull troops] when he goes to the White House. So what the American public thinks is a commitment to get combat forces out within sixteen months, isn't a commitment is it?
Samantha Power: You can't make a commitment in whatever month we're in now, in March of 2008 about what circumstances are going to be like in January 2009. We can't even tell what Bush is up to in terms of troops pauses and so forth. He will of course not rely upon some plan that he's crafted as a presidential candidate or as a US Senator.
It's not "a commitment is it?" -- Power responds, "You can't make a commitment." Wow. No wonder they've hidden that point. It's kind of hard to get a crowd cheering to "No, I won't!"
John Nichols who allegedly cares about the illegal war (he allegedly cared about impeachment as well until his book didn't sell) rushed online Saturday to declare that poor Sammy Power had been the victim in all of this -- apparently the victim in her own attack of Hillary Clinton. He never noted her comments about the 'pledge' being lies, but he did make up the LIE that Power and Clinton had known each other for years. As C.I. pointed out, that was a lie: "October 16, 2007, Samantha Power declared to Charlie Rose, 'I have only met her once, and I find her very, very affable and actually very intellectually curious and not ideological.' According to Power herself, as of October 2007, she had met Hillary only one time but John's so busy lying for his ManCrush's campaign that he (wrongly) asserts that Power has 'known' Hillary 'for a number of years'."
One lie we heard repeatedly was that Sammy barely mattered to the campaign. She was unpaid! She was one of many foreign advisors! She barely knew Obama!
From The Harvard Crimson:
Power has been a member of Obama’s foreign policy kitchen cabinet since he was elected to the Senate in 2004. Before taking on the role of advising his campaign, Power worked for a year in his Senate office.