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Did Obama, the Media’s Favorite Candidate, Create a Cult of Personality to Win the Presi... Page 1 of 6

Did Obama, the Media’s Favorite Candidate, Create a Cult of
Personality to Win the Presidency? 69
By Chris Chen

Barack Obama’s meteoric rise to become the first
African American President is historic not only for its
celebrated shattering of the racial barrier but equally for
how the mainstream elite media failed to critically vet
him during the primary campaign as the first “post
racial” Democratic presidential nominee. Obama first
came to national prominence in 2004 after delivering an
inspiring key note address at the Democratic National
Convention in Boston while he was still running for the
United States Senate. Just two short years later he
would launch his momentous “cult of personality”
campaign for the presidency under the guidance of
chief strategist David Axelrod. Surprisingly, he would
under extreme odds triumph over much older and
experienced politicians including Hillary Clinton the
presumptive democratic leader who had command of
See all 21 photos
the national political stage when Obama was still a
community organizer for the south side public housing
BARACK OBAMA THE MEDIA'S FAVORITE
projects of Chicago. CANDIDATE

How did Barack Obama do it? What was the secret to
his phenomenal success? Of course for anyone to ascend to the presidency there must be the favorable
convergence of numerous factors but even then it also requires lots and lots of money which Obama raised in
copious amounts via the internet (in fact a record half a billion dollars). However, perhaps the most important factor
was the unprecedented favorable news coverage of this young charismatic African American politician received by
the national print and broadcast news media. One could even argue that the media’s unabashed even shamelessly
enthusiastic support of Obama was essential to put his audacious candidacy over the top and past his political rival
Senator Clinton.

In support of this thesis I will proffer three largely overlooked aspects of Obama’s political career and campaign the
media by and large failed to develop and disclose to the American people that would certainly have been relevant if
Obama was either a republican or not an African American democrat. Although much of this information is public
record and has been published in several partisan books critical of Obama they were not pursued or reported in any
coherent way by any of the mainstream news media including nationally circulated newspapers (NY Times, Wall
Street Journal, Washington Post) and prominent news magazines (Newsweek, Time, US News & World Report) as
well as major television networks (NBC, ABC, CBS). These mostly obscure facts were originally reported in several
critical books on Obama, the most telling and first negative biography “The Case Against Barack Obama” by David
Freddoso argues, based on his senate voting record, against Obama as either an agent of change or as a political
reformer.

Freddoso’s investigation as a reporter for the National Review reveals that Obama was an integral part, indeed
another political cog, in the “Chicago Political Machine” only now receiving increased scrutiny in light of the recent
conspiracy accusations against the Illinois governor Rod Blogoavich. Freddoso claims Obama essentially has no
record of going up against his own party while an Illinois senator nor did he introduce or support any legislation to
abolish the “pay to play” dealing of Chicago patronage politics. In fact Obama used the machine to advance his
political career by obtaining the blessing of Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley and aligning himself with the powerful
leader and President of the Illinois General Assembly Emil Jones who became his political mentor routinely steering
high profile pieces of career-building legislation toward Obama to artificially boost his Senate accomplishments. If his
public record as an Illinois Senator was largely ignored by the national press what else in Obama’s political life did
the elite media overlook and fail to disclose to the American people. Appropriately, Freddoso subtitled his best selling
book "The Unlikely Rise and Unexamined Agenda of the Media's Favorite Candidate".

MEDIA OVERSIGHT #1

Barack Obama arose from and was an integral part of the "Chicago Political Machine". In1996 Obama's first foray
into Illinois politics was duplicitous and tainted by controversy. In his first political race Obama with the blessing of

http://chrischen.hubpages.com/hub/Did-Obama--the-Medias-Favorite-Candidate--Created-... 9/25/2011


Alice Palmer contested for the State Senate and used
Illinois' arcane and unconstitutional election laws to
disqualify every other candidate on the ballot including
the former holder of the office Alice Palmer an African
American woman who after her unsuccessful Senate
bid decided to withdraw her support for Obama to run
again for her old job. Obama knew he would have a
very difficult time defeating the popular Palmer and
resorted to typical “Chicago Machine” politics
challenging her petition signatures in the hope of REZKO WITH TIES TO THE "CHICAGO
MACHINE" WAS A MAJOR FUND RAISER
getting them disqualified which he did along with other FOR OBAMA
lesser known candidates. With Palmer and the others
ineligible Obama won office without opposition.

Throughout his tenure in the Illinois General Assembly,
Obama generously bestowed favors and steered
lucrative state contracts to campaign contributors and
friends. In particular, he had close ties to real estate
developers such as public housing mogul and convicted
felon Tony Rezko who benefited handsomely from
Obama’s state legislative career. In 2004, the ever
ambitious Obama ran for the US Senate but the sexual
dalliances of his main primary opponent doomed his
rival. Likewise, in the general election race his
republican opponent, Jack Ryan, bowed out after his
divorce files were made public. Obama eventually ran
against the ultra conservative outsider Alan Keyes who
FOR 20 YEARS OBAMA HEARD ANTI
barely offered any resistance to Obama’s political AMERICAN SERMONS AS A REGULAR
onslaught. Again Obama won without any substantial MEMBER OF REV JEREMIAH WRIGHT'S
CONGREGATION
opposition. Remarkably, with just a decade in public
office Obama faced his first true political challenge
when he went up against the Democratic establishment
candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton and prevailed thanks
in part to a complicit media.

THE CASE AGAINST BARACK OBAMA: THE
UNLIKELY RISE AND UNEXAMINED AGENDA
OF THE MEDIA'S FAVORITE CANDIDATE

EMIL JONES PRESIDENT OF IL
LEGISLATURE WAS OBAMA'S MENTOR IN
CHICAGO MACHINE POLITICS

MEDIA OVERSIGHT #2

Barack Obama’s explicit even extreme support for abortion on demand. Obama supports unequivocally the legal right
to abortion as defined by Roe v Wade and has a 100% rating from NARAL (National Abortion & Reproductive Rights
Action League) and Planned Parenthood the largest abortion provider in the US. As an Illinois legislator Obama
opposed the bill to ban partial birth abortion and the state’s “Born Alive Infants Protection Act” that ensures the rights
of children who survive failed abortion attempts by giving them life saving medical treatment. He also voted against



legislation banning state funding for abortions. Indeed,
Obama has never supported any limitation of abortion
to either lessen the availability or government funding
for abortions. He has made it clear that he opposes any
and all restrictions on abortion, including partial-birth
abortions. Obama has earned a rating of 0% by the
National Right to Life Committee the largest prolife
advocacy organization.

If that isn’t pro-abortion enough in July 2007 Obama
gave a speech to Planned Parenthood promising "The OBAMA VOTED AGAINST THE "BORN ALIVE
first thing I'd do as president is sign the Freedom of INFANTS PROTECTION ACT"
Choice Act (FOCA)," which as co-sponsor along with 18
other pro abortion senators would nullify every federal,
state, and local law limiting or regulating abortion
including the federal ban on partial birth abortions.
Besides making abortion on demand a "fundamental
right" throughout the United States, FOCA would
effectively invalidate all laws on informed consent and
parental notification as well as waiting periods, and
would eliminate all state restrictions on taxpayer
funding of abortions and health safety regulations for
abortion clinics. It would also for the first time require BARACK OBAMA PROMISED PLANNED
Catholic and other religious hospitals to provide PARENTHOOD TO SIGN THE FREEDOM OF
CHOICE ACT
abortions. Perhaps Obama’s most revealing and
personal statement regarding abortion was when he
said if his daughters "make a mistake, I don't want them
punished with a baby." Not exactly a ringing
endorsement for family values. In another interview
when asked when life begins Obama glibly replied “I
don’t know” that “is above my pay grade”. Now as the
44th President of the United States and new
commander in chief, it is surely no longer above his pay
grade since he will likely have the opportunity to select
the next Supreme Court justice. As for the type of
justices he might choose, Obama believes the
constitution is a “living document” and is likely to
appoint liberal non strict constructionalist to the bench
along the lines of Breyer, Ginsberg, and Souter. Obama
voted against both of Bush’s appointments, Chief OBAMA VOTED AGAINST BANNING STATE
Justice John Roberts and Sam Alito each confirmed by FUNDING FOR ABORTIONS
comfortable senate margins.

PRESIDENT BUSH SIGNED THE BAN ON
PARTIAL BIRTH ABORTIONS IN 2003;
CONSTITUTIONALITY OF THE BAN WAS
UPHELD IN 2007; OBAMA CRITISIZED THE
RULING

OBAMA OPPOSED IN 1997 THE ILLINOIS
BILL BANNING PARTIAL BIRTH ABORTIONS



MEDIA OVERSIGHT #3

Barack Obama down played issues during the primary
instead relying on a “cult of personality “campaign to
endear himself to the electorate. The Obama campaign
effectively exploited Barack Obama’s soaring rhetoric,
charismatic persona, and ubiquitous themes of “hope”
and “change” as well as his mixed racial background
and diverse cultural upbringing to promote a powerful
personality cult. Obama under the guidance of chief
strategist David Axelrod ran an effective cult of
personality campaign emphasizing the grandiose
overarching themes of hope and change packaged in
slogans like “Yes We Can” and “Change We Need”. All
the while Obama purposely and skillfully skirted the
most important campaign issues. Obama’s cult of
personality was not so much an oversight of the
fawning media as much as they were sycophants in its
creation. Case in point, contrast the media’s treatment
of Obama with Sarah Palin. The media all but ignored
Obama’s associations with the domestic terrorist Bill
Ayers and radical preacher Rev. Jeremiah Wright and
convicted felon Tony Rezko. In contrast, Palin’s
daughter’s out of wedlock pregnancy and her firing of a
state trooper were plastered all over the main stream
media.

Since the election Obama has taken his cult of
personality to new levels and it seems the press now
has an agenda to get Obama elected “celebrity in chief”
with his visage on the cover of nearly every tabloid and
celebrity magazine on the newsstands (People, Us,
Self). Recently, a shirtless photo of Obama made front
page news on the New York Post under the
headline “Fit for Office” with the subtitle “Buff Bam is
Hawaii Hunk”. Obama is so photogenic and so
universally appealing he even made the cover of Tiger
Beat Magazine. His cult of personality is also becoming
lucrative business. Acolytes as well as his minions can
now buy almost anything with Obama’s image on it
from patriotic gold coins to hip T-shirts, ball caps, and
coffee mugs. NBC has even produced a
commemorative DVD titled “Yes We Can the Story of
Barack Obama” an unusual offering for a hard news
organization since I don’t recall a DVD called “Bush
Political Dynasty the Story of Father and Son
Presidents”. Obama’s election as the first African
American President may be viewed as an ultra-historic
event that could easily make him the first president to
be on a US postage stamp while still living, or if the
media has its way, while still in office. Obama’s historic
inauguration will be the most lavish and expensive in
US history and will be covered by nearly every major
news outlet in the country and will likely get
unparalleled worldwide coverage. In Great Britain the
BBC is devoting an unprecedented five hours of in
depth coverage to the new President’s inauguration. The total cost of $150 million will be 4 times more than Bush’s
inauguration in 2004 which was vociferously criticized by the mainstream media for the administration’s profligate
spending in a time of war. I’ll stick my neck out and guarantee there will not be a peep out of the press for Obama’s
outlandish spending.

As further evidence to the power Obama’s cult of personality campaign pollster Frank Luntz asked college students
at a pre-election focus group to name the presidential candidate they were going to vote for. All of them said Obama,
but when Luntz followed up by asking them to name an accomplishment of the senator, nobody could name one, not
a single accomplishment. A recent Zogby poll commissioned by John Ziegler in which 512 Obama voters were asked
12 multiple choice questions and a Wilson poll that also included McCain voters found that Obama voters were
significantly less politically informed than McCain voters; 35% of McCain voters answered at least 10 correct
compared to only 10% for Obama voters. Voters who knew which party controlled congress voted by a margin of 56



to 43 for McCain. A particularly telling question revealed
that 82.6% of Obama voters could not correctly say that
Barack Obama won his first election by getting
opponents kicked off the ballot. In contrast, only 6.2%
of Obama voters failed to identify Sarah Palin as the
candidate with a pregnant teenage daughter and 13.7%
failed to identify Palin as the person on which their party
spent $150,000 in clothes. The striking disparity in the
performance of the McCain and Obama voters suggest
a strong media bias exists that is affecting the political
information being presented to these two different
groups of voters.

Interestingly, the Wilson poll also asked voters to
identify the media source of their news. Those exposed
to Fox news got the “congressional control” question
correct 64-24 (+39) whereas those exposed to network
news only got 48-39 (+9). Fox news viewers voted 70-
29 for McCain while viewers of the network newscasts
voted 62-37 for Obama and those exposed to national
newspapers voted 64-36 for Obama. These stunning
differences lend credible support for the thesis that the
mainstream news media including network newscasts
and national newspapers as well as certain cable news
channels (MSNBC and CNN) have a decidedly liberal
bias that favored the Democratic candidate. Just how
long the media’s love affair with President elect Obama
will continue only the news media can answer but this
country certainly deserves better from its press since
the founding fathers guaranteed a free independent
press in the constitution as a further check on the
power of government. From this past presidential "cult
of personality" campaign it now appears that the press
is “in bed” with the government instead of playing its
traditional adversarial role. As Sean Hannity recently
declared “2008 will be known as the year that
journalism died”.

Related Articles by Chris Chen
Barack Obama
 OBAMANIA! How Obama's Personality Cult Made
Him "Celebrity in Chief"
Barack Obama’s spectacular achievement to become the first African American President is historic not only for



its celebrated breaking of the racial barrier but also
for the unprecedented favorable...
 OBAMABORTION: What is Barack Obama’s
agenda for abortion?
Barack Obama the 44th President of the US It has
been over 35 years since the controversial Roe v
Wade Supreme Court (7-2) decision to make early
term abortions legal in the US. Despite the
landmark decision...


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