Turning the Tables on Obama's Complaints

Peter Wehner asks some good questions about the uproar Obama and the left are having over the ABC debate:

Consider this thought experiment: Assume that a conservative candidate for the GOP nomination spent two decades at a church whose senior pastor was a white supremacist who uttered ugly racial (as well as anti-American) epithets from the pulpit. Assume, too, that this minister wasn’t just the candidate’s pastor but also a close friend, the man who married the candidate and his wife, baptized his two daughters, and inspired the title of his best-selling book.

In addition, assume that this GOP candidate, in preparing for his entry into politics, attended an early organizing meeting at the home of a man who, years before, was involved in blowing up multiple abortion clinics and today was unrepentant, stating his wish that he had bombed even more clinics. And let’s say that the GOP candidate’s press spokesman described the relationship between the two men as “friendly.”

Do you think that if those moderating a debate asked the GOP candidate about these relationships for the first time, after 22 previous debates had been held, that other journalists would become apoplectic at the moderators for merely asking about the relationships? Not only would there be a near-universal consensus that those questions should be asked; there would be a moral urgency in pressing for answers. We would, I predict, be seeing an unprecedented media “feeding frenzy.”

The truth is that a close relationship with a white supremacist pastor and a friendly relationship with an abortion clinic bomber would, by themselves, torpedo a conservative candidate running for president. There is an enormous double standard at play here, one rooted in the fawning regard many journalists have for Barack Obama. They have a deep, even emotional, investment in his candidacy. And, as we are seeing, they will turn on anyone, even their colleagues, who dare raise appropriate and searching questions–the kind journalists are supposed to ask. The reaction to Stephanopoulos and Gibson is a revealing and depressing glimpse into the state of modern journalism.

The lefty blogs are in a tizzy over the debate. One particularly immature diarist at the DailyKos actually proposed getting back at ABC by trying to destroy Mickey Mouse. Really.

So, why is the left so apoplectic? For one thing they are still in Obamamessiah mode and can't stand the thought of seeing their chosen messenger befuddled by straightforward questions. Secondly, lefties only want to hear wonky policy questions and Bush bashing. They don't want to hear character questions because character doesn't mean anything to them. As long as the candidate espouses the politically correct lefty views he can hump goats in his spare time and the revelation of that fact wouldn't change their votes at all.

Now that the press has finally figured out that Obama has a weak spot on these character issues, the questions are not going to go away. It'll just get tougher for him in the general election campaign.