Obama Kenya Photo Has Legs

The photo of Barack Obama in Kenya, which we explained in detail yesterday, has become a two-day story. It may be the most important photo of the campaign so far. Here's why.

If you get your news from cable TV or the tabloids, you might have the impression that this photo was leaked to the press by Hillary Clinton's campaign as a smear tactic. False. It was a readily available AP archive photo that found its way from the pages of a supermarket tabloid to several conservative blogs on Saturday. It wasn't until Monday that The Drudge Report accused Clinton staffers of circulating the photo internally. This report, and the resulting back-and-forth between the campaigns, provided a semi-legitimate reason for the rest of the media to publish a two-year-old photo of Obama in an unfamiliar costume.

This photo has darker implications than other famously embarrassing political photos (like Michael Dukakis in a tank in 1988). On the surface, it's an innocent picture of a Senator on a trip to the friendly country of Kenya. However, this photo is showing up on blogs that portray Obama as a suspicious outsider, a Muslim (something he is not) and, by subtle implication, a terrorist sympathizer. The challenge for Obama is whether he can survive these persistent, below-the-radar attacks designed to bait to the most bigoted of voters.

(As an aside, there are at least two versions of this photo circulating. The one most frequently seen is an Associated Press photo credited to an unnamed stringer. The one seen on the front of today's New York Post and the Daily News is an epa photo credited to Ibrahim Elmi. Both are dated August 27, 2006.)

(As another aside, people who care about intellectual property might cringe when they watch this video of Hillary Clinton saying the photo is "in the public domain.")

(Update: Earlier I singled out cable TV and the tabloids, but Phillip Kennicott's essay "Obama Photo Swaddled in Mystery" in today's Washington Post Style section is the least illuminating piece of reporting I've read about this photo. Kennicott writes, "Successful political photographs emerge when an audience finds an image it is already inclined to believe. This photograph seemed to be an image in search of an audience, and it got shot down before it could find one." I'd invite Kennicott to do a Technorati search of "Obama Muslim" and reconsider this assessment.)

Comments

[Alan]

The challenge for Obama is whether he can survive these persistent, below-the-radar attacks designed to bait to the "most bigoted of voters".

Reality Check: There are muslims who decapitate those who don't agree with them i.e. Christians and Jews. I'd say that is a bit more "intolerant", wouldn't you? So if you fall into one of those categories you're considered a bigot? I guess you've forgotten about 911 and don't believe Iran's threats against Israel. Maybe you haven't read that his Chicago home was financed by a wealthy Iraqi/Brit?