You Don't Get Free Passes in Politics

I've written before about Barack Obama attempting to claim that his wife should not be subject to political criticism in the presidential campaign. He makes the same claim in an interview with David Brody of CBN News.

If you think about Michelle, I mean here's somebody who's done everything right. She grew up in modest means. She grew up in a nuclear family. Her parents looked after her. She went to college on a scholarship. She's worked hard for everything that she has.

She is the best mother I know. She has made repeated sacrifices on behalf of her family and has said that her children and her husband are her number one priority.

So the fact that people have tried to make her a target, based essentially on a couple of comments in which she was critical of what's happening to our American dream and the enormous difficulties that people are experiencing -- the difficulties that she hears directly as she is traveling across the country, I think is really distressing. And you know I've said publicly before, and I'll say it again - I think families are off limits. I would never consider making Cindy McCain a campaign issue, and if I saw people doing that - I would speak out against it.

I agree that families of presidential candidates should be off limits in a presidential campaign. However, that does come with a condition. As long as family members of the candidate don't make themselves a part of the political campaign, they should be off limits. But if they become a part of the political campaign, as Michelle Obama has by giving political speeches on the campaign trail, all claims of immunity should be null and void.

Obama throws in a red herring as well. The criticism of Michelle Obama's political speeches has nothing to do with how good of a mother she is. It has to do with her political rhetoric. Obama is trying to portray anyone who criticizes his wife as a barbarous Neanderthal targeting the innocent. Don't you just love the smell of demonization in the morning?

It's perfectly reasonable to argue whether criticism of Michelle Obama is well founded or not. However, it's arrogant to argue that any criticism of Michelle Obama is necessarily a bad thing. It's attempting to get a political free pass, giving political speeches and then claiming immunity from criticism. But I thought Obama was above such disingenuous arguments, after all he is the "new politics."

Meet the new politics, same as the old politics.

(Hat tip: Hot Air)