Organizing for America | Mark Davis's Blog: You Can Help (28 July 2008)

You Can Help (28 July 2008)

By Kaleokualoha - Jul 27th, 2008 at 7:15 pm EDT

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Tags: smears

Every person of integrity will probably agree that slander and libel are wrong, especially when the target is a dead poet who cannot defend himself. Yet this is exactly what is happening. By defaming the character of my father, Frank Marshall Davis, and exaggerating his radical influence on Barack Obama as “Obama’s Communist Mentor”[1] in February 2008, right-wing bloggers seek to portray Barack Obama as unworthy of becoming President of the United States.

They vilify a dead poet who loved the United States, and who was more likely to teach random acts of kindness than disloyalty to young Barack Obama. They deliberately misrepresent the values Obama may have internalized through this relationship, in a transparent attempt to smear Obama’s character. Like weeds in a garden of truth, such disinformation must be removed at the roots. Unfortunately, the right-wing Internet brigade is very efficient at spreading this disinformation. Fortunately, their credibility can be destroyed in the eyes of people of integrity, through irrefutable proof of their deliberate misrepresentation.

Some of their most egregious misrepresentations are claims that my father was a “lifelong member of the Communist Party USA,” that he was a “Stalinist” because he “stayed with the Communist Party even after the Hitler-Stalin pact”[2] of 1939, and that "his values, passed on to Obama, were those of a communist agent who pledged allegiance to Stalin.”[3] These unprecedented claims were made AFTER the release of “Obama’s Communist Mentor”[1], suggesting they were either fabricated or discovered since February 2008. They should be challenged at their source: Cliff Kincaid (editor of Accuracy In Media) and Bill Steigerwald, associate editor of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, in a 7 June 2008 interview [2].

WHAT YOU CAN DO

If YOU are a fair and honorable person, please email Cliff and his colleague, Bill Steigerwald, with two questions based on this interview, and post their responses (if any) in this blog [4]. If they cannot answer your questions, then you will know if THEY are also fair and honorable men. (If you are NOT a fair and honorable person, and if you swallow everything they dish out, then good luck to you in life!)

Please ask Cliff Kincaid (cliff.kincaid@aim.org): Why did you indicate that Frank Marshall Davis “stayed with the Communist Party even after the Hitler-Stalin pact,” in your 7 June 2008 Pittsburgh Tribune-Review interview with Bill Steigerwald, and that "his values, passed on to Obama, were those of a communist agent who pledged allegiance to Stalin”? What evidence do you have that he was even a CPUSA member in the 1930’s?

Please ask Bill Steigerwald (bsteigerwald@tribweb.com): Why did you print that Frank Marshall Davis “was a lifelong member of the Communist Party USA” in your 7 June 2008 Pittsburgh Tribune-Review interview with Cliff Kincaid? What evidence do you have that he was a lifelong member?

THANKS!!

References:

1. http://www.aim.org/aim-column/obamas-communist-mentor

2. http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/mostread/s_571431.html

3. http://www.aim.org/aim-column/media-excuse-obamas-false-advertising/

4. http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/Kaleokualoha/gGxdvX

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