Politico has an article today reporting on a Farleigh Dickinson poll in which 36% of voters believe that president Obama is "hiding important information about his background and early life". The Politico article treats the subject as if those with that belief are delusional. So then here's the question:
Why is Barack Obama the first president in 50 years to refuse to release his medical records for the period before he took office? Why indeed is Obama the first president since John Kennedy to hold back such records?
Kennedy, you may recall, kept his records confidential since he did not want it known that he suffered from Addison's disease. When that information came out after his death, there was pressure on subsequent nominees of both parties to release all of their medical records. That practice was reinforced in 1972 when it came out that the Democrat nominated for vice president had received electric shock therapy for mental illness. (He subsequently resigned from the ticket before the election.)
When Obama ran for election in 2008, he would only release a letter from his doctor saying that he was then in good health. That was all. Of course, since the media adored Obama and was operating as part of his campaign staff, there was little said about Obama's break from the tradition of full disclosure. But the issue of what, if anything, he was concealing still filtered out into the electorate. John McCain chose not to make anything of it, however.
So what is it that Obama is concealing in his medical records? The most common explanation offered is that Obama was treated for clinical depression in the late 1990s at a point when he lost his first race for public office and when he was supposedly on the verge of divorce with his wife. I have no proof that this is true; it is just the most prevalent rumor. Is it relevant for the electorate to know that the man who has his finger on the nuclear button has a history of depression? You bet it is. But we just don't know. Why? Because Obama is hiding important information about his background.
In other words, the people who agreed in the poll that Obama was hiding information were correct. No matter how much scorn a site like Politico places on the people who recognize the truth, that truth will not change.
Why is Barack Obama the first president in 50 years to refuse to release his medical records for the period before he took office? Why indeed is Obama the first president since John Kennedy to hold back such records?
Kennedy, you may recall, kept his records confidential since he did not want it known that he suffered from Addison's disease. When that information came out after his death, there was pressure on subsequent nominees of both parties to release all of their medical records. That practice was reinforced in 1972 when it came out that the Democrat nominated for vice president had received electric shock therapy for mental illness. (He subsequently resigned from the ticket before the election.)
When Obama ran for election in 2008, he would only release a letter from his doctor saying that he was then in good health. That was all. Of course, since the media adored Obama and was operating as part of his campaign staff, there was little said about Obama's break from the tradition of full disclosure. But the issue of what, if anything, he was concealing still filtered out into the electorate. John McCain chose not to make anything of it, however.
So what is it that Obama is concealing in his medical records? The most common explanation offered is that Obama was treated for clinical depression in the late 1990s at a point when he lost his first race for public office and when he was supposedly on the verge of divorce with his wife. I have no proof that this is true; it is just the most prevalent rumor. Is it relevant for the electorate to know that the man who has his finger on the nuclear button has a history of depression? You bet it is. But we just don't know. Why? Because Obama is hiding important information about his background.
In other words, the people who agreed in the poll that Obama was hiding information were correct. No matter how much scorn a site like Politico places on the people who recognize the truth, that truth will not change.
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