If a picture is worth a thousand words, Time magazine correspondent Mark Halperin must be happy. A photo that accompanied one of his srecent article has set off a heated controversy on the political blogs. The opinion piece was about the dangers of Senator Barack Obama employing negative campaign tactics to counter those leveled against him by Senator Hillary Clinton, Halperin used a famous photo of The Rat Pack in Oceans Eleven - with an embarrassed looking Obama substituted for Sammy Davis Jr. In place of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop are the faces of notorious campaign dirty tricksters as Lee Atwater, James Carville, Bob Shrum, and Karl Rove. The implication of the story is that if Obama utlizes such tactics, he will be lumped into the same category as these high profile politcal strategists who will use Machevellian methods to win elections. However, as columnist Michael Shaw of The Huffington Post points out, for those who don't read the article, the picture gives the impression that Obama is already using such tactics - and that the expression on his face indicates he's ashamed of doing so. Shaw writes a blistering rebuttal to the article's theme. Shortly thereafter, the article and photo were taken down from Time's web site. For the Shaw opinion piece, click here.
Then again, Warner Brothers will be happy with the free publcity- they will be releasing a special edition of the original Oceans Eleven soon!- Lee Pfeiffer
