This is a very long article but worth reading if you dare to learn about the questionable mudslinging that has been going on.
McCain has had to reel in the people that have been shouting out stories that have no facts to back them up...
when a woman told Sen. John McCain at a town-hall-style meeting, "I have read about him," and "he's an Arab." McCain corrected her.
Please, please read this, even if you are a McCain backer.
Man behind the whispers about Obama
By JIM RUTENBERG
NEW YORK TIMES
Published: Monday, October 13, 2008 at 4:24 a.m.
Last Modified: Monday, October 13, 2008 at 4:19 p.m.
The most persistent falsehood about Sen. Barack Obama's background first hit in 2004 just two weeks after the Democratic convention speech that arguably set him on the path to his presidential candidacy: "Obama is a Muslim who has concealed his religion."
Andy Martin does not deny his influence regarding Obama rumors.
That statement was contained in a press release and it spun a complex tale about the alleged ancestry of Obama, who is Christian.
The press release was picked up by the conservative FreeRepublic.com Web site and spread virally and steadily as others elaborated on its claims over the years in e-mail messages, Web sites and, ultimately, books. It continues to be an engine that drives other false rumors about Obama's background to this day, with one finding national, public voice Friday, when a woman told Sen. John McCain at a town-hall-style meeting, "I have read about him," and "he's an Arab." McCain corrected her.
Until this month, the man who is widely credited with starting the cyber-whisper campaign that still dogs Obama was a secondary character in news reports, with deep explorations of his background largely confined to liberal blogs where he is a bete noir.
But an appearance in a documentary-style program on the Fox News Channel watched by 3 million people last week thrust the man, Andy Martin, and his past into the foreground. The Fox program allowed Martin to assert falsely and without challenge that Obama had once trained to overthrow the government.
An examination of legal documents and election filings, and interviews with those from his past, revealed Martin, 62, to be a man with a history of scintillating if not always factual claims, who has left a trail of animosity -- including some provoked by anti-Jewish comments -- among political leaders, lawyers and judges in three states over the course of more than 30 years.
A law school graduate, his admission to the Illinois state bar was blocked in the 1970s after a psychiatric finding of "moderately severe character defect manifested by well-documented ideation with a paranoid flavor and a grandiose character."
Though he is not a licensed lawyer, Martin went on to become a prodigious filer of lawsuits, and he also made various unsuccessful attempts to run for public office in three states, as well as for president at least twice, in 1988 and 2000. Based in Chicago, he now identifies himself as an author and writer who focuses on his anti-Obama Web site and press releases.
Martin, in a series of interviews, did not dispute his influence in Obama rumors.
"Everybody uses my research as a take-off point," Martin said, adding, however, that some take his writings "and exaggerate them to suit their own fantasies."
As to his background, he said, "I'm a colorful person, there's always somebody who has a legitimate cause in their mind to be angry with me."
When questions were raised last week about Martin's appearance and claims on "Hannity's America" on Fox News, the program's producer said his views were expressed as his opinion and not necessarily fact, and, as such, were not unwarranted.
It was not his first turn on national television.
The CBS News program "48 Hours" devoted an hour-long program to his legal efforts in 1993 titled, "See You in Court; Civil War, Anthony Martin Clogs Legal System with Frivolous Lawsuits."
Martin has also used the name Anthony Martin-Trigona. He has filed so many lawsuits a judge barred him from doing so in any federal courthouse without preliminary approval.
He prepared a Democratic run for Congress in Connecticut -- where paperwork for one of his campaign committees listed as one purpose "to exterminate Jew Power." He ran as a Republican for the Florida state Senate and the U.S. Senate in Illinois. When running for president in 1999, he aired a television advertisement in New Hampshire that accused George W. Bush of cocaine use.
In the mid-1990s he was jailed in relation to an assault case in Florida. He admits that he has been imprisoned on other occasions, sometimes on contempt charges.
His newfound prominence, and the persistence of his line of political attack -- updated regularly on his Web site and through press releases -- amazes those from his past.
"Well, that's just a bookend for me," said Tom Slade, a former chairman of the Florida Republican Party who says the party spent hundreds of thousands of dollars defending against lawsuits Martin brought for Slade's refusal to support his bid for state office.
Slade said he's driven like "a run-over dog. But he's fearless."
Copy & paste to friend: (Click inside box; Ctrl + C to copy; Ctrl + V to paste)
|
|
read more blogs!
Blogs by WouldntItBeGr8To:
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Man behind the whispers about Obama----Rumors running wild! Part 1 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|