Media covering Obama
After getting a complete pass by the mainstream media for obviously not knowing the name on the bracelet he supposedly carries in honor of a dead soldier (copying McCain, who has worn Mathew Stanley’s bracelet for more than a year) before he looked at it during Friday’s debate, one wonders if Barack Obama’s water carriers will overlook this…
From Warner Todd Huston at Publius’ Forum:
Barack Obama played the “me too” game during the Friday debates on September 26 after Senator John McCain mentioned that he was wearing a bracelet with the name of Cpl. Matthew Stanley, a resident of New Hampshire and a soldier that lost his life in Iraq in 2006. Obama said that he too had a bracelet. After fumbling and straining to remember the name, he revealed that his had the name of Sergeant Ryan David Jopek of Merrill, Wisconsin.
Shockingly, however, Madison resident Brian Jopek, the father of Ryan Jopek, the young soldier who tragically lost his life to a roadside bomb in 2006, recently said on a Wisconsin Public Radio show that his family had asked Barack Obama to stop wearing the bracelet with his son’s name on it. Yet Obama continues to do so despite the wishes of the family.
Warner updates his own story, writing at Newsbusters:
This afternoon the Associated Press was at last able to contact Tracy Jopek, mother of Sergeant Ryan David Jopek, the KIA soldier on the bracelet that Barack Obama is using on the campaign trail. Ryan’s Mother is confirming that she gave the bracelet to Mr. Obama, but is also confirming that she asked him to stop using her son’s name on the campaign.
After Tracy Jopek gave Sen. Barack Obama a bracelet in honor of her son who was killed in Iraq, she asked Obama not to mention the bracelet on the campaign trail.
She did, however, claim that she was "satisfied" with how Obama discussed the bracelet in the presidential debates last week.
But, we have another little mystery with these AP reports. The original headline for this report was "Soldier’s mother ‘ecstatic’ about Obama’s bracelet," released at about 7PM the evening of the 28th. But a few hours later, the AP changed it to "Soldier’s mom defends Obama’s mention of bracelet."
Apparently, Jopek’s mother did NOT say she was "ecstatic" about Obama continuing to use her son’s name on the campaign trail even after she told him to stop. The AP had to change its headline to reflect the truth.
As to Obama’s "shoulda stayed at a Holiday Inn" moment, Beldar writes at Townhall,
Sen. Obama treated that bracelet as a mere prop for a piece of political theater — and when he finally received what he recognized as a cue to perform, Sen. Obama still couldn’t even deliver his intended line without a prompt.
Why would the mainstream media report any of this? How could they? They’re too busy telling everybody that Senator Obama won the debate and John McCain interfered in the bailout process to do that…