Bob Woodward is a White House Appeaser

NewZeal
By: Cliff Kincaid
Accuracy in Media

If the White House will push Bob Woodward around on such a mundane matter as Obama’s role in a budget stand-off, what else will they do? A look at Wikipedia’s page on Obama’s communist mentor Frank Marshall Davis might give us some indication. It is apparent that Obama supporters and Internet “trolls” have sanitized the page in order to eliminate any hint that Obama’s Marxist policies are being driven by the relationship he had for almost 10 years with a Communist Party operative under surveillance by the FBI.

In the current controversy involving Washington Post reporter Woodward and Obama White House official Gene Sperling, the email exchange publicized by Politico shows Woodward referring to “Gene” and being called “Bob” in return. This is a friendly exchange of views.

Alluding to how “Gene” had yelled at him and apologized, Woodward said, “You do not ever have to apologize to me. You get wound up because you are making your points and you believe them. This is all part of a serious discussion. I for one welcome a little heat; there should [be] more given the importance. I also welcome your personal advice. I am listening.”

Can you imagine famed Watergate reporter Woodward referring to Nixon Administration officials in such friendly terms?

This exchange has all the earmarks of a “journalist” who, rather than being threatened, is being fed a line by the Obama White House and wants more of it. Woodward comes across not as a tough reporter engaged in an adversarial relationship with the White House but rather a whiner who wants more access to Obama.

Sadly, it is all too typical of how the liberal media do Obama’s bidding. The treatment of Frank Marshall Davis is a case in point.

The 600-page FBI file on Frank Marshall Davis covers the years 1944-1963, meaning that he was under investigation or surveillance for at least 19 years. One document refers to Frank Marshall Davis having CPUSA affiliations dating back to 1931. Davis was included in the FBI’s security index, meaning that Davis could be arrested or detained in the event of a national emergency. The FBI material also documents Davis’s anti-white and pro-Soviet views, and the Communist infiltration of the Hawaii Democratic Party.

Wikipedia’s page on Davis ignores Obama’s relationship with Davis, except in a footnote on the bottom, and does not mention Davis’s CPUSA membership. It also ignores Paul Kengor’s authoritative 2012 book on Davis, The Communist.

Wikipedia says Davis’s “actions were tracked” by the FBI. But without the facts about Davis’s involvement in a subversive Soviet intelligence network on the island of Hawaii, a major strategic target of the Soviets, this makes it seem as though Davis was an innocent victim of government authorities.

Wikipedia refers to Davis as an “avid photographer” without noting that the FBI was suspicious of Davis taking photographs of the Hawaii coast, an activity that suggested espionage on Davis’s part.

One of the most disturbing FBI documents refers to information that Davis “was observed photographing large sections of the [Hawaii] coastline with a camera containing a telescopic lens.” The FBI information states:

“Informant stated that DAVIS spent much of his time in this activity. He said this was the third different occasion DAVIS had been observed photographing shorelines and beachfronts. Informant advised that it did not appear he was photographing any particular objects.”

AIM’s original piece on Davis, Obama’s Communist Mentor, was published on February 18, 2008, about nine months before Obama was elected for his first term. Trevor Loudon, a New Zealand-based writer and activist, had noted evidence that the mysterious “Frank” in Obama’s book, Dreams from My Father, was Frank Marshall Davis, in a posting in March of 2007.

There was plenty of time for the major media to “vet” Obama. But they were not interested. And that includes Bob Woodward and his Washington Post colleagues. Now, all of a sudden, there is a controversy over Woodward reporting something that seems negative about Obama’s position on the sequester. This is so minor in the overall scheme of things that you wonder if it is all just a diversion from the big picture.

The big picture is that Obama operatives have been actively trying to suppress the truth about Obama’s relationship with Frank Marshall Davis and a Soviet-sponsored network in Hawaii since Jerome Corsi, in his 2008 book, The Obama Nation, cited some of the facts during the presidential campaign. As we noted at the time:

“Barack Obama’s 40-page so-called ‘rebuttal’ to Jerome Corsi’s book, The Obama Nation, acknowledges for the first time that the senator once had a personal relationship with identified Communist Party USA (CPUSA) member Frank Marshall Davis, a key high-level operative in a Soviet-sponsored network in Hawaii.
“But the 40-page report, advertised and sold to the media as a refutation of Corsi’s ‘lies,’ doesn’t identify Davis as a hard-core communist and it dishonestly edits an article about Davis to eliminate references to his admitted involvement in CPUSA activities and make the black revolutionary writer and ‘poet’ look like a civil rights activist.”

Corsi had largely drawn the facts about Davis from blogger Trevor Loudon and this columnist, who confirmed Davis’s identity and obtained the 600-page FBI file on Davis. All of this information was available in 2008.

Incredibly, Wikipedia continues the essential cover-up that began during the 2008 campaign. Here’s how the entry begins:

“Frank Marshall Davis (December 31, 1905 – July 26, 1987) was an American journalist, poet, and political and labor movement activist.”

In fact, he was also a Communist, pornographer, a pedophile, heavy drinker and dope smoker. Davis, who was black, was a racist who blamed white people and corporations for much of what was wrong in the U.S. and the world. His influence on Obama helps explain his policies as President.

While Wikipedia quotes Davis as saying that he worked with “all kinds of groups,” including some “labeled Communist, Socialist or merely liberal,” it makes no mention of the fact that he was actually a member of the Communist Party USA. The only other reference to Communist activities was a charge that Davis wrote for what appeared to be a Communist front publication.

While Wikipedia confirms that he “authored a hard core pornographic novel,” Sex Rebel: Black, its page on Davis, a self-described sex “specialist,” makes no mention of the fact that Davis, using a pseudonym, refers to having sex with children.

In an analysis of Sex Rebel: Black, Andrew Walden wrote:

“Children are a target of the sex ‘specialist.’ Davis explains: ‘Undoubtedly an individual’s sexual patterns can be traced back to early childhood experiences.’ (p 35) Davis later writes of a threesome between himself, his first wife and a thirteen year old Jamaican girl. (p 71-78) His account begins, ‘Spring: warmer weather, children playing on the sidewalk in front of our building. An unusual looking child stared solemnly at me each day as I approached the entrance, then turned away when she caught my eye. I knew she was a niece of dad’s former landlady, but that was all. Someday she’d be brightly beautiful; she now had it in miniature.’ The next seven pages are a detailed description of their sexual encounters.”

Footnote number 25 on the Wikipedia page on Davis refers to an August 22, 2008, Toby Harnden story from the London Telegraph, “Frank Marshall Davis, alleged Communist, was early influence on Barack Obama,” as the source of the information about the novel. Harden also wrote that Davis “had been suspected of being a member of the Communist Party in the 1950s,” though Davis’s membership was confirmed in his FBI file, which we had publicized in August of 2008.

Trevor Loudon says Wikipedia’s treatment of the Obama-Davis relationship demonstrates that “It is a waste of time adding something about a contemporary politician’s socialist ties or communist background… it will be deleted faster than you can type it. The left has armies of trolls, surfing the net, purging all information that reflects badly on their heroes.”

Loudon analyzes the Wikipedia page on Davis and comments:

“Zero about Davis’s long time membership of the Communist Party USA. Zero about the FBI’s 600 page file on the man. Zero about Davis’ mentorship of the young Barack Obama. The two most important features of Davis’ life get ZERO coverage in Wikipedia. Woefully inadequate and misleading to put it mildly! Dangerous even, because many people swear by Wikipedia.”

By contrast, the page on Davis maintained by KeyWiki, a site established by Loudon, goes into substantial detail about the Communist and other activities of Davis. It also examines his relationship to Vernon Jarrett, who was later to become the father-in-law to Valerie Jarrett, now a senior advisor to President Obama.

While Bob Woodward’s spat with the White House makes for interesting reading and gets headlines, the famed Watergate reporter has barely scratched the surface of what Obama and his people will do to suppress the truth about the nature of this administration and its policies.

On one level, it seems too late, since Woodward was asleep on these matters as Obama won the presidency and re-election. But at least he could now begin to set the record straight.

The Davis-Obama relationship was a Watergate-type story which, if told by Woodward and his colleagues in the “mainstream media,” could have spared America from the domestic and foreign policy catastrophes that now grip the United States.

Woodward should not be praised for standing up to the Obama White House’s alleged “threats.” Rather, he should be asked what he was doing for the last several years as Obama and his allies ruthlessly suppressed the truth about his Marxist background and agenda for America and the world.

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Cliff Kincaid is the Director of the AIM Center for Investigative Journalism and can be contacted at cliff.kincaid@aim.org.