Los Angeles Times Sweeps Obama Tape Under the Rug

There's a huge bump under the rug at The Los Angeles Times.

What The Times has swept under the rug is a tape of Barack Obama in 2003 speaking at a celebration for a Chicago professor named Rashid Khalidi.

The Times reported on Obama and Khalidi back in April and identified Khalidi was a onetime spokesman for the PLO and even a negotiator for the terror group in peace negotiations.

The Times reported at that celebration Obama spoke of his long and close personal friendship with Khalidi and his wife; of the many dinners they shared at the Khalidi home; how talks with Khalidi had been quote, "consistent reminders to me of my own blind spots and my own biases" and how these enlightening conversations needed to be repeated quote, "around the world."

In the story, The Times made clear that Palestinians thought the friendship with Khalidi was influential on Obama's thinking about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and The Times admitted it had obtained a videotape of the party that night, including Obama's remarks.

Fast forward to today: The Times refuses to release the video. In other words: The public doesn't need to see the video.

Let's imagine it were John McCain speaking at that dinner celebration for a PLO spokesman and PLO negotiator.

Does anybody honestly think The Times would not have either already released the tape on its own Web site or would have passed it to a network to make sure Jewish voters knew that McCain had been consorting with a onetime PLO spokesman?

Of course it would have.

But it's not McCain. It's Obama and the media is protecting him.

My prediction: The tape swept under the rug at The L.A. Times will undoubtedly remain there, at least until after November 4th.

Actually, come to think of it, maybe much longer.

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