I’ve grown tired of the ridiculous attacks on Obama. Maybe it’s a visceral reaction b/c of all the “if you do X, you’re clearly a self hating jew/anti-semite” bs that gets lobbed around, especially in the j-blogosphere. But Tim Russert, on a national stage of a Presidential debate no less, took the old yarn out for a spin and spent almost seven minutes on it.
I don’t know how many times we have to be over these moronic smears. But Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo lays it out:

That’s not what Russert did. He launches into it, gets into a parsing issue over word choices, then tries to find reasons to read into the record some of Farrakhan’s vilest quotes after Obama has just said he denounces all of them. Then he launches into a bizarre series of logical fallacies that had Obama needing to assure Jews that he didn’t believe that Farrakhan “epitomizes greatness”.
As a Jew and perhaps more importantly simply as a sentient being I found it disgusting. It was a nationwide, televised, MSM version of one of those noxious Obama smear emails.

Don’t worry, Josh, I won’t call you an Anti-semite for the “perhaps more importantly” bit. Seriously, for me, personally, this is my equivalent to the Hillary NH moment. Some folks felt that the harsh attacks on Hillary made a lot of people angry and turned out her supporters, making the difference in the primary. I’ve had it with this smear nonsense.
Don’t get me wrong. I still have some strong reservations on Obama. I don’t think he’s where I want him to be on economic issues. But he’s solid on a lot of things, he’s bringing better people with him, getting new and more people involved, and the fact that he’s done community organizing gives me more faith in him than in the other candidates still standing. But I’m tired of the mainstream media getting this shit wrong, at best lazy perpetuation of a baseless story, and at worst purposefully trying to attack and derail on innuendo. Look, ask them hard questions about trade, about the war, about whatever. But this bullshit is old, tired, and has been answered repeatedly and as thoroughly as possible. It’s been rejected and denounced, debunked and dismissed, and still, it somehow remains around.
So congratulations, Russert. Pushing that smear actually made me go from a moderate supporter to a volunteer (with ten years of organizing experience). Just call me a snowball in hell.
Or, as the Hip Hop Hoodios say, Shalom Obama!