SOUTH DAKOTA STRAIGHT TALK

Good politicians like good salesman accentuate the positive and never speak of the negative. Barack Obama has proven to be a great salesman.

Elected officials often target their remarks when speaking to interest groups and that can border on pandering, and the soon Presumptive Democrat nominee like most politicians deserves some leeway.

The weekend news that the Illinois Senator is quitting his church after twenty years is just the latest edition of the Obama Continuous Reinvention Machine. It has only been a short two and one-half months (March 18th) in his “A More Perfect Union Speech” when he said, "I can no more disown [Rev. Wright] than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother.” Since then he disowned Wright and now the Church.

Then there was his gaff about meeting hostile foreign leaders without any preconditions – but reinvention interceded.

But consider his difficulty with the facts when he spoke last year in Selma, Alabama. As reported on his Obama08 campaign website - from a “Washington Post” news article –

“During his speech he said “ "Something stirred across the country because of what happened in Selma, Alabama, because some folks were willing to march across a bridge," Obama said, explaining that, as a result, his parents "got together and Barack Obama Jr. was born." Earlier in the day at a prayer breakfast, the Illinois Democrat said: "If it hadn't been for Selma, I wouldn't be here."

"This is the site of my conception. I am the fruits of your labor," Obama told an audience of civil rights movement veterans. "When people ask me if I've been to Selma before, I tell them I'm coming home."

Obama’s truth and revision problem here is that he was born about four years before the Selma march. When confronted with this rather large inconsistency – the WaPo article continues, “ An aide later said the senator did not mean to imply that his birth was a literal result of the Selma marches but rather of the movement overall.”

Suggesting as Obama did that his birth was a result of his parents getting together in Selma is a biographical fact and not something that is subject to revision.

I do give it to him – he makes a great speech and is mega charismatic!

Beyond my issue that Senator Obama continually revises and extends his remarks and re invents himself - he is an empty suit (he has little experience, has no legislative accomplishments, no administrative accomplishments and a little understanding of economics or foreign policy).

Barack Obama appears to be on the brink of becoming the Democrat’s presumptive nominee, but what you see in June will not be what you see in November.

Endbar – For a look at what’s next from the Clinton Camp, see what their mega spin master, Lanny Davis has to say. Check it out at South Dakota Straight Talk’s issuesandanswers.info.