March
13 Peacock Politics

That, and other news, in today's Political Panorama.

Here's a dream team, in the name of party unity: Keith Olbermann and the cast of "Saturday Night Live."

After Olbermann's criticism of Hillary Clinton, and "SNL"'s mocking of Barack Obama, they've pretty much got the bases covered on the growing rift within the Democratic party. (For the record, GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt has given to Clinton).

Olbermann's harsh words about Clinton's campaign marked the first time he's taken his Edward R. Murrow-esque commentaries and turned it against a Democratic candidate in the primary race. If you're an Obama supporter, you may be cheering; If you're a Clinton supporter, it's more proof that the MSNBC deck is stacked against you. (And they're not likely to believe Olbermann's claim that he's not taking sides in the race).

Clinton's communications director, Howard Wolfson, claims he's still an Olbermann fan. "We obviously, vigorously disagree with that characterization, although many of us remain fans of Keith and enjoy watching the show on nights other than last night," he said.

Meanwhile, the folks at "SNL" are doing a full-scale barrage in the national media in which they deny that they are biased. In addition to a New York Times story, they have the cover of Entertainment Weekly. And in the Los Angeles Times, executive producer Lorne Michaels says that charges that they are pro-Clinton are a "major concern."

"I can assure you that there is no agenda, that there's only a reaction to what's going on in the world."

Question: Who in the cast looks most like Geraldine Ferraro?

Another Outrage: At the rate they're going, so many surrogates connected to the presidential campaigns of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama will be forced to resign over controversial comments that we'll be left with just the candidates themselves. And is that such a bad thing?

Here's a new wrinkle: A day after Geraldine Ferraro took herself off the Clinton campaign's finance committee ---  defiantly, it should be noted --- ABC News aired a segment on Obama's pastor Jeremiah Wright that is destined to keep the words "denounce" and "reject" in the election lexicon for quite some time.

"An ABC News review of dozens of Rev. Wright's sermons, offered for sale by the church, found repeated denunciations of the U.S. based on what he described as his reading of the Gospels and the treatment of black Americans.

""The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people," he said in a 2003 sermon. "God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme.""

And there's this:

"In addition to damning America, he told his congregation on the Sunday after Sept. 11, 2001 that the United States had brought on al Qaeda's attacks because of its own terrorism.

""We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye," Rev. Wright said in a sermon on Sept. 16, 2001."

Perhaps Marion Cotillard could weigh in?

Wright has an informal role in the campaign as a member of Obama's African American Religious Committee, according to the Politico's Ben Smith.

Obama's aides concede that his remarks are "inflammatory rhetoric." And spokesman Bill Burton told ABC News, "Sen. Obama has said repeatedly that personal attacks such as this have no place in this campaign or our politics, whether they're offered from a platform at a rally or the pulpit of a church. Sen. Obama does not think of the pastor of his church in political terms. Like a member of his family, there are things he says with which Sen. Obama deeply disagrees. But now that he is retired, that doesn't detract from Sen. Obama's affection for Rev. Wright or his appreciation for the good works he has done."