[Peace-discuss] Obama brochure

[Bob Illyes]

Unlike many AWARE members, I was pleased to see Carl's Guest
Commentary in the News Gazette on September 4th. This article,
"Liberals must call Obama on his support for the war",
consisted largely of Carl's brochure that was handed out
during the Obama town meeting, with an attack on liberals in
general and Al in particular (not named but known to all)
tacked onto the end.

I was pleased because there was no possibility of this
article being thought of as AWARE endorsed. The author is
named and the attack on an AWARE member also makes it clear
that AWARE does not endorse the content. This somewhat undoes
the damage I believe was done at the Obama event.

For those of you who don't see the problem with the brochure,
let me describe briefly my objections. On first reading, I found
the statements true while the style was excessively negative.
On closer reading, I found it to be not true.

There is a way of lying with the "truth". It is called the
half-truth. The quotes of Obama no more represent his full
position that the tiny quote of Al represents his true
position. It is easy to trash someone's position by taking
things they said out of context, i.e., by telling half-truths.
I do not believe that this sort of thing has any place in
AWARE literature, which is why I recommend that we be more
careful to ask for consensus on AWARE brochures in the future.

Bob