Posted by Jed Lewison on Sun Mar 30, 2008 at 12:10 PM Pacific

Well, they finally caught Obama...

So the WaPo discovered an inconsistency in Barack Obama's personal story -- apparently his father came to America during the administration of President Dwight Eisenhower, not John F. Kennedy as Obama had previously stated (and apparently believed). In addition, the WaPo notes a well-documented anachronism in Obama's story. He's said in his past his parents met after Selma, but Selma was four years after his birth.

These are the kinds of things people get wrong all the time about their personal histories -- or at least I do. I can't count the number of homes I lived in before college, but I was born in North Carolina, and then lived briefly in Denver, followed by Bainbridge Island, WA, Seattle, WA, New York, NY, and then Philadelphia, PA. Throw in a month or so in DC, a summer in Spain, and an exchange program to Mexico and it gets confusing.

It's similar to Hillary's story about being named after Sir Edmund Hillary, the first to summit Mount Everest. The problem: he did so a few years after she was born.

Just one of those things.

The article itself is very interesting and offers a window into Obama's personal story that make it worth a read, despite its emphasis on incongruities.

And don't get too frustrated with Michael Dobbs, who wrote the piece -- he's the journalist most responsible for exposing the Bosnia nonsense for what it was.

Well, they finally caught Obama...

So the WaPo discovered an inconsistency in Barack Obama's personal story -- apparently his father came to America during the administration of President Dwight Eisenhower, not John F. Kennedy as Obama had previously stated (and apparently believed). In addition, the WaPo notes a well-documented anachronism in Obama's story. He's said in his past his parents met after Selma, but Selma was four years after his birth.

These are the kinds of things people get wrong all the time about their personal histories -- or at least I do. I can't count the number of homes I lived in before college, but I was born in North Carolina, and then lived briefly in Denver, followed by Bainbridge Island, WA, Seattle, WA, New York, NY, and then Philadelphia, PA. Throw in a month or so in DC, a summer in Spain, and an exchange program to Mexico and it gets confusing.

It's similar to Hillary's story about being named after Sir Edmund Hillary, the first to summit Mount Everest. The problem: he did so a few years after she was born.

Just one of those things.

The article itself is very interesting and offers a window into Obama's personal story that make it worth a read, despite its emphasis on incongruities.

And don't get too frustrated with Michael Dobbs, who wrote the piece -- he's the journalist most responsible for exposing the Bosnia nonsense for what it was.

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