Clinton Attacks Obama Using Kindergarten and Third Grade Essays. Seriously!

(h/t Eva)

I’m totally serious. The Clinton camp again is not challenging Obama on policy and is instead going after him on other issues. They challenge his claim that he is not running for President to fulfill some long-held ambition. They pull out his kindergarten and third grade essays as proof. The Hillary Clinton campaign’s press release says:

In third grade, Senator Obama wrote an essay titled ‘I Want To Be a President.’ His third grade teacher: Fermina Katarina Sinaga “asked her class to write an essay titled ‘My dream: What I want to be in the future.’ Senator Obama wrote ‘I want to be a President,’ she said.” [The Los Angeles Times, 3/15/07]

In kindergarten, Senator Obama wrote an essay titled ‘I Want to Become President.’ “Iis Darmawan, 63, Senator Obama’s kindergarten teacher, remembers him as an exceptionally tall and curly haired child who quickly picked up the local language and had sharp math skills. He wrote an essay titled, ‘I Want To Become President,’ the teacher said.” [AP, 1/25/07 ]

I’m not lying. Go read the press release yourself. I feel like I’m writing for The Onion or something right now.

The Obama campaign press secretary responded:

“I’m sure tomorrow they’ll attack him for being a flip-flopper, because he told his second grade teacher he wanted to be an astronaut.”

John Edwards stated:

”It’s fine to talk about our records and about issues,” he said. ”But we probably ought to stop at age 14.”

So let’s pretend that it’s true that Obama has been scheming since kindergarten to become President. How do we explain that 300+ long essay he wrote right after law school explaining aspects of his life that no one who is scheming to be President would want to have out in the open? Was that also a part of Obama’s Great Kindergarten Presidential Conspiracy?

Now in all seriousness, yes, Obama has ambition as do all the candidates running. Anybody who goes through the tiring campaign season and all the crap candidates have to put up with has to really really want it. However, there is a decided difference in whether a candidate’s sole purpose for running is for “I’m in and I’m in to win” or for “fundamentally changing the nature of our politics.”

UPDATE:

The New York Sun writes:

In March, the Chicago Tribune reported that Mr. Obama’s third-grade teacher, Fermina Katarina Sinaga, said the future senator “wrote he wanted to be president” in response to an assignment about what he wanted to be when he grew up. The Clinton research sheet picks up that part of the story but ignores the quote that comes next. “He didn’t say what country he wanted to be president of. But he wanted to make everybody happy,” Ms. Sinaga said. The similar kindergarten anecdote, which comes from an Associated Press dispatch, has no indication of what country Mr. Obama hoped to lead.

…

Yesterday may not have been the first time the Clinton campaign seized on the report about Mr. Obama’s kindergarten dreams. A Web logger for Time magazine, Ana Marie Cox, reported on November 11 that “a little birdie” had urged her to fact-check the Illinois senator’s claims against his kindergarten record.

She did not indicate whether the tip came from Mrs. Clinton’s campaign, but many who posted comments online assumed that was the source.

He wanted to be President as a kindergartener “to make everybody happy.” Aww. That’s too cute.

Just a few days ago, a Hillary spokesperson was telling black Americans, “We don’t need to be filling our heads with hopes and dreams.” I guess all this then is to be expected.

Also see “Kindergarten Kiddies For Truth.”

UPDATE: Obama stays above the fray

UPDATE: The Hillary campaign is now saying that they meant the kindergarten reference as a joke, but The New York Times reports that when the campaign distributed the information to the media, it did not come across that way.

UPDATE: The Politico has an editorial cartoon running in today’s Des Moines Register about this controversy.