Obama truth emerges--mass media minimizes

A pair of significant truths about likely Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama came forth in the news today, massively underplayed, unless you had a really sharp eye for short stories, hidden away.

One was the flowery, extended endorsement of Obama by Louis Farakhan, head of his own self-styled Muslim group, Nation of Islam. The speech was delivered yesterday in Chicago, Obama's hometown, before a convention of over 20,000 of Farakhan's loyal followers. The Obama campaign has tried to ignore and downplay it, as hard as they have sought endorsements from everyone else--this was one they didn't want.

This is not Obama's first brush with Farakhan. The Church of Christ Obama attends in Chicago, a very liberal congregation, named Farakhan its Citizen of the Year a couple of years ago. There was not a whimper of protest from Obama then.

The second big event was a release on the Drudge Report of a photo of Obama visiting Somalia, dressed in a full native War Lord costume. What an insult to the American troops and their families who lost their lives or where maimed during Bill Clinton's incursion into the civil war in that nation, a few years back.

A U.S. president must have discernment, discretion, knowledge of history and nuance. Obama showed none of these characteristics in allowing himself to be publicly photographed dressed in this manner. His campaign has tried to trivialize the picture by saying it was released by the Clinton campaign. So what? If the picture didn't exist in the first place, no one could have released it.

Obama's father, who he barely knew, was a Muslim. Obama did attend Muslim schools in Indonesia where he lived as a young boy. These facts are indisputable.

That's why Obama must be far more careful than your average U.S. pol, not to be identified with America's terrorist enemies, the radical minority of Muslims.

No wonder the Obama campaign was squealing, and the compliant mass media were doing their best to keep it under wraps.