Fox News

Fox News Editor Pushed Emphasis On Obama 'Socialism' Ahead Of 2008 Election

Brian Beutler | February 1, 2011, 2:20PM

In late 2008, one of Fox News' top editors escalated his efforts to have the network portray then-Senator Barack Obama as a socialist and an anti-white racist during the waning days of the presidential election.

On October 27, 2008, then news-editor Bill Sammon emailed colleagues with references in Obama's first book Dreams From My Father to socialism, Marxism and Obama's past relationship with a white woman.

That email, obtained by Media Matters, was subject-lined "fyi: Obama's references to socialism, liberalism, Marxism and Marxists in his autobiography, 'Dreams from My Father.' Plus a couple of his many self-described 'racial obsessions'..."

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2010 elections

Dem '10 Strategy: Get First-Time '08 Voters To Make It A Second Time

Christina Bellantoni | April 28, 2010, 5:42PM

DNC Chairman Tim Kaine

Democratic National Committee Chariman Tim Kaine today outlined a new strategy aimed at keeping his party's large Congressional majority in this fall's midterm elections, and it's mainly geared around preserving the young, diverse voting coalition that helped elected President Obama in 2008.

He said the DNC will try to get those 15 million new, first-time voters from 2008 to show up in an election that does not attract as much interest by having Democratic grassroots operatives make "hand-to-hand" communication with them. He said if the DNC speaks frequently to these voters (1.3 million in Texas, 400,000 in Ohio and 750,000 in Colorado) and remind them that their vote for Democrats is integral to Obama's success that will make the difference. He said they are above all else loyal to Obama.

"We know who they are," Kaine (D-VA) said on a call today for reporters and bloggers. "If we are able to significantly increase by 8 to 10 percent, it can have a sizable affect."

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2008 campaign

Campaign Tactics They Could Believe In: Obama '08 Pushed Early State Pledge

Christina Bellantoni | November 12, 2009, 10:39AM

David Plouffe

Remember the mess that was Florida, Michigan and the earliest Iowa caucus in history?

Turns out some of the complications were orchestrated by the Obama campaign.

In his new book "The Audacity to Win" Obama campaign manager David Plouffe confesses they tried to "box in" Clinton after the Democratic National Committee's Rules and Bylaws Committee decided to strip Florida and Michigan of their delegates as punishment for holding primaries earlier than allowed. (In the end, it all worked out, but it caused complete chaos for months as the primary dragged on.)

Plouffe writes:

"Emboldened by the drift of the rules committee, we took it to the next level. I asked Steve Hildebrand to go on a secret diplomatic mission to speak with the four early-state party chairs, encouraging them to ask all the candidates to sign a pledge stating they would not campaign in any states (Florida and Michigan) that had violated the rules and were threatening the approved early states' primacy.

Yes, this was in our self-interest. But it was also in theirs. If these two big states were penalized as severely as possible, and we all committed not to campaign in them, then the role of the early states was protected with no ambiguity."

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