No one can know for sure if Barack Obama meant to take a shot at Sarah Palin's pit bull comment during the RNC, comparing her hockey mom persona to a pit bull with lipstick. That is, no one can know except for the Republicans. They KNOW that Obama purposefully insulted Palin and demanded for an apology for the "sexist remarks" made by the Illinois Senator. This could have potentially been disastrous for the Democratic Party, if it wasn't so swiftly and properly handled by Obama. "What their campaign has done this morning is the same game that has made people sick and tired of politics in this country. They seize on an innocent remark, try to take it out of context, throw up an outrageous ad because they know that it's catnip for the news media," Obama said in a speech in Virginia not long after his controversial remark. Obama played this very smart, where he could have been stupid. The wrong way to go at this type of defamation would be the general public's approach: if McCain said it in reference to Hilary Clinton, what's wrong with Obama saying it?, because not only would it belittle him to fight on the same level as the "lies and phony outrage and Swift-boat politics" of the Republican side, but effectively it would make him acknowledge -whether he apologized or not- that he used it in malicious content, instead of an "innocent remark". He dismissed it completely, opting to not defend his remark at all which would have made him look guilty. At the same time he chose to connect with the American people lamenting, "You know who ends up losing at the end of the day? It's not the Democratic candidate, it's not the Republican candidate. It's You. The American People, because, then, we go another year, or another four years, or another eight years, without addressing the issues that matter to you." How selfless of him...
For the record, both McCain and Obama used the "lipstick on a pig" phrase, and both directed this phrase not at a person, but at a person's policies. In fact the only difference between them was that McCain's comment was never under fire until now. And it's easy to see why it wasn't. It didn't come less than a week after the so-called person he was insulting made a very similar comment to his. It didn't come at the same time that one of his crowds began chanting in reference to the same so-called person he was making fun of, unlike the Obama supporters who recently chanted, "No pit bull, No pit bull!". We will never know if Obama meant to insult Palin. The bottom line is he shouldn't have taken the risk, especially so soon after Palin's RNC speech, as to give nothing for the Republican Party to go on. Now he has apologized to the American people, but on behalf of the Republicans, who are seemingly continuously trying to distract the American people from the real issues. But was it entirely their fault? Someone had to spark the issue in the first place. Obama started the mess, and cleaned the mess...for now.
Now on to the real issue, was Obama actually reading the "lipstick on a pig" comment from the palm of his hand during his speech?
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