TelegraphBarack Obama attacked Hillary Clinton in negative campaign leaked memos show
Barack Obama agreed to using character assassination tactics against Hillary Clinton during his 2008 presidential campaign, White House memos show, despite a pledge to steer away from negative electioneering.
Rather than fight out their differences in policy, Mr Axelrod told Obama that the only way to secure a defeat was to attack Mrs Clinton's character. The goal was to paint Obama as the "authentic 'remedy' to what ails Washington and stands in the way of progress" and to discredit his main rival in the process.
The tactic, not uncommon in the electioneering arena, contradicted Obama's previous efforts to style himself as a political reformist who deplored negative assaults on his opponents.
"It was a character attack," Neera Tanden, who acted as policy director during Clinton's race for the presidential nomination, said. "I went over to Obama, I'm a big supporter of the President, but their campaign was entirely a character attack on Hillary as a liar and untrustworthy. It wasn't an 'issue contrast,' it was entirely personal."
Ms Tanden now works for Obama as director of domestic policy.
Now he even admits to saying one thing and doing another.
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