Obama (D)
Credit crunch
Here’s the scariest thing about the credit crunch. We don’t know whom to credit anymore. In boardrooms and showrooms all over America all you see are incompetence, failure and overpaid losers. Entire industries are about to go away, to China, to Japan, to nowhere, and the best the CEO’s of America can do is beg. Business by the incompetent, of the incompetent and for the incompetent is killing us.
We’ve got the top job covered. I’m pretty sure we hired a competent guy for that. If anybody can pull off the miracle of making Washington work, Obama can.
But the rot in New York and now Detroit is devastating, and we don’t get to fire those idiots, like we did our nation’s First Idiot. It scares me to death.
I don’t know how you take an industry that thrived for a century, whose brands were once beloved, coveted and iconic as a GTO’s split grille, and drive it straight into the ground, just because gas went up for a couple of quarters. I don’t know how you plow through a hundred years worth of profits in two. Call me naïve, but I actually thought it wasn’t possible to screw up that bad.
This isn’t Amalgamated Buggy Whip we’re talking about. Cars haven’t gone away, they’re still as necessary as ever. It’s not even an American crisis, the Toyota plants in the USA will survive just fine. It’s a management crisis of what we still call The Big Three, for no good reason.
General Motors gone? Ford history? Chrysler, Chevy, Caddy disappeared? Who did that? Is it possible to be that stupid by accident? Or were the Big Three killed on purpose? Maybe there was a hostile takeover by the Republican Guard when we weren’t looking.
And, of course I mean the Iranian Republican Guard, not the GOP Republican guard. Not that there’s all that much difference.
Sorry, that was a cheap shot, but I’m feeling real cheap these days. Great Depressions will do that to you. And this one is looking greater every day.
Seriously, where is the competence? Wall Street firms that survived two world wars and the first depression killed dead in six months. Auto companies that put the world on wheels, now reduced to begging for bailouts, threatening to go bust and take the entire American economy with them.
I want to help, but I don’t consider Detroit’s current management credit worthy. It’s not just money they’re fresh out of, it’s ideas, it’s smarts, it’s competence. That’s the real credit crunch.
I’m scared that 25 billion won’t do it. Detroit has blown through several times that much in the past few years. There is no end to their failures. These guys could screw up a wet dream.
Hell, these guys did screw up a wet dream. Most of us had our first taste of sweet, forbidden sex in their products. I mean, they used to call it parking. You didn’t walk to Lover’s Lane, you drove. In daddy’s car. And it wasn’t a Subaru.
So, what’s the solution? I don’t know. If I did I’d be sending off my resume right now. But I have one idea.
From what I hear, Detroit is well-endowed with homeless people. That is a class of folks who have loads of experience in Making Do With Less. Surely there is among them a genius of thrift, an Edison of improvisation, a Rockefeller of the Streets.
Find him. Or her. Job one for the auto companies for the next few years will be begging. Why not hire a professional?
2nd Amendment - right to keep and bear arms
Obama Questionnaire Has 2nd Amendment Underwear In Bunch.
Alarm klaxons are clanging at the National Rifle Association (NRA); Illinois State Rifle Association (ISRA), and among hunters and gun owners over question 59 on the 63-question application to work in the Obama administration. The question in the miscellaneous section asks: “Do you or any members of your immediate family own a gun?” and demands to list details.
It is unclear whether owning a gun would disqualify an applicant or not but the question seems to show a distaste for and a desire to “weed-out” people who own a firearm. After all if it was not important in the vetting and selection process why would it be included?
ISRA issued a statement that “as an Illinois State senator — voted for SB1195, which included a provision calling for gun owners to be registered in the same manner as sex offenders.”
“[A]s this litmus test shows, they have every intention of putting together an administration that is hostile to firearms ownership and to Second Amendment rights,” said NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre.
President-elect Obama’s disparaging comment about people clinging to their guns and Bibles inflamed many and this disclosure last week fanned the blaze and suspicions.
The day after election gun sales spiked across America as citizens scrambled to buy guns before stiffer regulations and even efforts to ban private ownership. In 1996 during his run for the Illinois State Senate, Obama told non-profit organization Independent Voters of Illinois that he supported a ban on the manufacture, sale and possession of handguns, a de facto national annulment of the second amendment. During the campaign he said, Americans have a right to bear arms.
But, he qualified that in April 2008 Obama stating, “As a general principle, I believe that the Constitution confers an individual right to bear arms. But just because you have an individual right does not mean that the state or local government can’t constrain the exercise of that right.”
Obama cosponsored bills to limit gun purchases , supported the 2008 D.C. gun ban, voted against allowing persons who had obtained domestic violence protective orders to carry handguns for their protection, and has consistently supported measures against concealed carry.
Obama is also a board member of the Joyce Foundation, which funds gun control groups in the U.S.
His appointment of long time anti-gun crusader Rahm Emanuel has also deepened concerns of 2nd Amendment advocates.
The U.S. Supreme Court, in District of Columbia v. Heller (June 26, 2008), protected the pre-existing individual right to possess and carry weapons in a case that overturned Washington DC’s bas on gun ownership.
Fiduciary Fornication in Fund Raising
Illegal Foreign Contributions Could Top $60 Million
Barack Obama reneged on his pledge to limit campaign spending to the federally funded $86 million maximum. McCain has stuck to his pledge which frankly has put him at a distinct disadvantage being outspent 4 and 5 to one in swing states. Many Republicans say McCain’s decision will be fatal to his campaign.
More than half of Obama’s contributions have come from small donors giving $200 or less. But unlike John McCain’s campaign, Obama won’t release the names of these donors.
The Obama camp claims to have 2.5 million donors in all. That’s likely hype. According to a Newsmax analysis, the Obama campaign finance records contain just 370,448 unique names. Newsmax contacted some of the donors that have been revealed and discovered some could not recall giving anything although their name and address appears on the reports.
A Newsmax canvass of disclosed Obama campaign donors shows many anomalies, including outright violations of federal election laws. For example, Obama has numerous donors who have contributed well over the $4,600 federal election limit. Many of these donors have never been contacted by the Obama campaign to refund the excess amounts to them. If an excess contribution is not returned in 60-days penalties can be applied to the campaign and contributor.
Most troublesome are the more than 37,000 Obama donations that appear to be conversions of foreign currency. There is little or no regulation of foreign donations and a common practice is to use false names and cashiers checks to cover up the actual course.
According to a Newsmax analysis of the Obama campaign data before the latest figures were released, potential foreign currency donations could range up to a stunning $63 million in all. With the addition of $150 million raised in September, this amount could be much more
Obama leaves half-brother in abject squalor while lecturing on neighborliness
Statement near perfect “lift” from Das Kapital by Karl Marx.
“If I am sitting pretty, and you’ve got a waitress who is making minimum wage plus tips, and I can afford it and she can’t — what’s the big deal for me to say, ‘I’m going to pay a little bit more.’ That is neighborliness,” said Barack Obama to Bill O’Reily this week.
Meanwhile George Obama who lives in a 6′ X 8′ hovel without sanitation or running water in a Kenyan slum told Vanity Fair “I live here on less than a dollar month,’ and ‘if anyone says something about my surname, I say we are not related. I am ashamed.’ Hypocritically Obama has done absolutely nothing to help his unfortunate half-brother since he found him living there in 2006.
The Bible says, “”Give, and it shall be given to you. For whatever measure you deal out to others, it will be dealt to you in return.”
Superball-like bounce for McCain-Palin
There will be new electoral college totals by mid week.
Rasmussen has been projecting a 193-183 edge for Obama-Biden in the Electoral College with 132 considered leaning one way or the other or pure toss-ups. But there are big shifts underway as the McCain-Palin ticket has taken the lead over Obama-Biden by two to ten percent depending on the polls.
State-by-state polls released by Rasmussen include:
- OHIO - In 2004 Ohio gave the Presidency to George Bush and all eyes are again on the “Buckeye State” this year with the electoral college close and drawing closer. McCain now leads Obama there 51% - 44%. Over half of Ohio voters (51%) have an unfavorable opinion of the presumptive Democratic nominee. 47% of Buckeye State voters offer a positive opinion of Obama. That’s fifteen points below the 62% with a favorable opinion of McCain.
- VIRGINIA - McCain now leads in the toss-up state of Virginia 47-45% with the trend moving to the McCain-Palin ticket. With its 13 electoral votes.
- COLORADO - McCain is viewed more positively. Sixty-one percent (61%) of Colorado voters have a favorable opinion of the Republican while 54% say the same about the Democratic hopeful. But Obama–Biden still lead in the state although the trend is against them there too.
- FLORIDA -In the Sunshine State finds John McCain and Barack Obama each earning support from 48% of voters and once again the trend line is in McCain-Palin’s favor.
- PENNSYLVANIA - Obama-Biden leads McCain-Palin 47% to 45% in the Keystone state.
- North Carolina-with 15 Electoral College votes-moved from Leans Republican to Likely Republican. This change was based on the latest Rasmussen Reports polling
- Wisconsin-with 10 Electoral College votes-moved from Likely Democratic to Leans Democratic. That move was prompted by the latest Rasmussen Reports polling which shows McCain closing to within four percentage points of Obama.
- Colorado-with 9 Electoral College votes–moved from Leans Democratic to Toss-Up, based primarily upon the latest Rasmussen Reports poll in which McCain holds a statistically insignificant two-point lead over Obama.
- Oregon-with 7 Electoral College votes-moved from Likely Democratic to Leans Democratic. While the latest Rasmussen Reports polling shows Obama with a 10-point lead, the average of other polls and a national trends adjustment places the state in the leaner category.
- South Dakota-with 3 Electoral College votes–shifted from Leans Republican to Likely Republican based upon Rasmussen Markets data and a national trends adjustment.
Other states had more minor changes: Connecticut from Safely Democratic to Likely Democratic, Louisiana from Likely Republican to Safely Republican, Maine from Safely Democratic to Likely Democratic, and Tennessee from Likely Republican to Safely Republican.
Market expectations have consistently given Obama a roughly 60% chance of victory. However, in the wake of John McCain’s successful Republican National Convention, Obama’s prospects have dimmed. On Monday morning, September 8, Rasmussen Markets data gave Obama a 50% chance of winning the White House while expectations for a McCain victory are at 49%.
The biggest change comes as a result of McCain picking Palin and Obama taking Biden as their VPs. Most notably this resulted in a 20% shift toward McCain-Palin among white women voters. There will be new electoral college totals by mid week.
Most Americans (51%) say media is trying to harm Palin and that apparently contributed to NBC cutting Mathews and Olberman loose from political coverage until after the election because of complaints about their bias.
Former Governor Calls Obama Socialist
Pete Wilson Drops Usually Moderate Way to Slap Obama as Socialist
Former California Governor Pete Wilson stood in for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (whose locked up because he can’t get a state budget passed) at the California delegation’s daily breakfast with a red-meat message that belied his past moderate persona. After California delegation chairman Bill Jones suggested it would be a day to focus less on politics than hurricane relief, Wilson wasted little time in promoting Republican John McCain and assailing Obama’s record.
“The audacity that Barack Obama is offering to us and our children, the change he is offering, is not new,” Wilson said. “The audacity he is offering, quite frankly, is socialism.”
McCain’s High Water Mark
Democrats like to panic. The past eight years have left them Rove-shocked, they have political PTSD after being Florida-ed and Swift Boated in the last two generals, but they need to buck up. It’s not going to happen this time.
John McCain has peaked. This is it, his high water mark. Maybe, just maybe he’ll pull even or a point or so ahead in this weekend’s polls, but it’s all downhill from there.
I don’t like crow, even though I hear it tastes like chicken, and I’m sure my fellow hypocrisy blogger, Righty Rich Cochrane will serve me a big heaping plate if I’m wrong, but it says here McCain/Palin is a losing ticket.
Al Gore polled 600,000 more votes than his opponent in 2000—which is about 85 times the total population of Wasilla Alaska—but lost because of an electoral college quirk, and a few hundred votes in Florida by Jewish retirees whose cataract surgeries were scheduled after November and voted for Pat Buchanan by mistake.
John Kerry lost in 2004 because he was a hairdo in search of a personality who ran a wussy campaign. Kerry proved that not only can you not beat somebody with nobody, you can’t beat nobody with nobody.
But this time it’s the GOP that is saddled with the superannuated grump and the empty dress. Barack Obama is no wuss, he’s smarter than Gore, Kerry, McCain and Palin put together, and cooler than George Bush’s true feelings about the Maverick from Arizona. He’s what the Democrats have been looking for since Bill Clinton. A winner. Just ask Mr. Clinton’s wife.
Once the convention bounce is over, and the two candidates appear side-by-side and commercial-by-commercial, it will become clear—Barack Obama wears well, John McCain is worn out.
Right now the Republican faithful are giddy about Sarah Palin, a woman nobody ever heard of until last week. That seems like good fortune, a game-changer appearing out of nowhere to save the day, but it’s not. It’s desperation. When a party has to reach into the low minors to fill the second spot at the top of the ticket it says two deep things: The party doesn’t have a deep bench, and the party is in deep trouble.
I listened to her speech. I didn’t hear an original thought, I didn’t sense a penetrating mind, I was not inspired to great dreams or deeds, I didn’t wet myself with enthusiasm, like the desperate GOP delegates, I wasn’t wracked with chills of fear, like some chicken-s**t Democrats. What I saw, all anyone saw, was a nice lady reading a nice, safe, mediocre speech. If you saw more than that, you weren’t watching, you were projecting. You were fooling yourself.
Do you want to know who wasn’t fooled, watching Sarah Palin deliver her ghost-written lines? Vladimir Putin. Ho Jintao. Hugo Chavez. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Or anyone else who took the measure of the woman who could be one melanoma away from the oval office in four months, and smiled.
Joe Biden is a man of many parts, too many of them mouth, but he’s up to the job if Something Happens To Obama, God Forbid.
In three months Sarah Palin will be back in the frozen north. The conservative base is bonkers over her now, but she’s just a rental.
John McCain said he is the candidate of change—no, he’s not. John McCain said he’d fix the mess that is Washington—no, he won’t. John McCain said he can cure our energy problems—no, he can’t. All he can offer is four more years of Republican rule. America can’t stand that, and won’t.
This election will be close. Barack Obama needs to convince the electorate that he’s a smart, tough-minded liberal who will help restore our most precious commodity—American self-confidence. He can do that because he is living proof of those ideals. It won’t be easy, but he’ll get it done. His opponent, John McCain, is a man who has done great things for his country; he’s made many sacrifices. And he’s about to make one more.
Obama 49, McCain 47, others 3. The margin in the electoral college? Bigger.
The Republicans had a good week. I hope they enjoyed it because it’s all over now. John McCain has peaked.
Obama’s Additional Ties to Radical Left Exposed
Close Ties to Top Black Panther Backer Revealed. |
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Evidence has emerged that Barack Obama was closely associated to a key adviser to a Saudi billionaire who had mentored the founding members of the Black Panthers. Percy Sutton, the former borough president of Manhattan, revealed the unusual circumstances about his first encounter with the young Obama. “I was introduced to (Obama) by a friend who was raising money for him,” Sutton told NY1 city hall reporter Dominic Carter. “The friend’s name is Dr. Khalid al-Mansour, from Texas,” Sutton said. “He is the principal adviser to one of the world’s richest men. He told me about Obama.” Sutton, the founder of Inner City Broadcasting, said al-Mansour contacted him to ask a favor: Would Sutton write a letter in support of Obama’s application to Harvard Law School? “He wrote to me about him,” Sutton recalled. “And his introduction was there is a young man that has applied to Harvard. I know that you have a few friends up there because you used to go up there to speak. Would you please write a letter in support of him?” Sutton said he acted on his friend al-Mansour’s advice. “I wrote a letter of support of him to my friends at Harvard, saying to them I thought there was a genius that was going to be available and I certainly hoped they would treat him kindly,” Sutton told NY1. Sutton did not say why al-Mansour was helping Obama, how he discovered him, or from whom he was raising money on Obama’s behalf. A Sutton aide told Newsmax that Sutton, 88, is ailing and is unlikely to do additional TV interviews in the near future. The aide could not provide additional comment for this story. As it tu rned out, Obama did attend Harvard Law School after graduating from Columbia University in New York and doing a stint as a community organizer in Chicago. The New York Times described how transformative his Harvard experience became for the young Obama: “He arrived there as an unknown, Afro-wearing community organizer who had spent years searching for his identity; by the time he left, he had his first national news media exposure, a book contract and a shot of confidence from running the most powerful legal journal in the country.” Why would al-Mansour, an activist African-American Muslim, would be a key backer for a young man from Hawaii seeking to attend the most Ivy of the Ivy League law schools. Khalid al-Mansour a.k.a. Don Warden In an exclusive interview with Newsmax from his home in San Antonio, Texas, al-Mansour said he would not comment specifically on the statement by Percy Sutton because he was afraid anything he said would get “distorted.” “I was determined I was never going to be in that situation,” he said. “Bloggers are saying this is the new Rev. Wright - in drag! - and he is a nationalist, racist, and worse than Rev. Wright. So any statement that I made would only further this activity which is not in the interest of Barack.” But in the lengthy interview, al-Mansour confirmed that he frequently spoke on university campuses, including Columbia, where Percy Sutton suggested he met Obama in the late 1980s, and confirmed his close relationship with Prin ce Alwaleed. “I am not surprised to learn about this,” said Niger Innis, spokesman of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). “It is clear that Barack Obama’s ties to the left are familial, generational, and have lasted for several years.” Although many Americans have never heard of Khalid Abdullah Tariq al-Mansour (his full name), he is well known within the black community as a lawyer, an orthodox Muslim, a black nationalist, an author, an international deal-maker, an educator, and an outspoken enemy of Israel. A graduate of Howard University with a law degree from the University of California, al-Mansour sits on numerous corporate boards, including the Saudi African Bank and Chicago-based LaGray Chemical Co. LaGray, which was formed to do business in Africa, counts former Nigerian President General Abdusalam Abubakar on its advisory board. He also sits on the board of the non-profit African Leadership Academy, along with top McCain for President adviser Carly Fiorina, and organized a tribute to the President of Ghana at the Clinton White House in 1995, along with pop star Michael Jackson. But his writings and books are packed with anti-American rhetoric reminiscent of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama’s disgraced former pastor. In a 1995 book, “The Lost Books of Africa Rediscovered,” he alleged that the United States was plotting genocide against black Americans. The first “genocide against the black man began 300 years ago,” he told an audience in Harlem at a book-signing, while a second “genocide” was on the way “to remove 15 million Black people, considered disposable, of no relevance, value or benefit to the American society.” In the 1960s, when he founded the African American Association in the San Francisco Bay area, he was known as Donald Warden. According to the Social Activism Project at the University of California at Berkley, Warden, a.k.a. Khalid al-Mansour, was the mentor of Black Panther Party founder Huey Newton and his cohort, Bobby Seale. Newton later had a falling out with Warden, who was described in a 1994 book as “the most articulate spokesperson for black nationalism” at the time. The falling out wasn’t purely political, according to author Hugh Pearson. “Sometimes Newton and the other members of (Warden’s) security detail got into fights with young whites who didn’t like what Warden had to say about whites. Rather than ‘throw down’ along with the security detail, Warden refused to fight,” Pearson wrote in “Shadow of the Panther: Huey Newton and the Price of Black Power in America.” U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee of California entered an official statement of appreciation of Warden and his Black Panther colleagues in the African-American Association in the Congressional Record on April 23, 2007. “Among the founding members (of the Association) were community leaders such as Khalid Al-Mansour (known then as Don Warden); future Judges Henry Ramsey and Thelton Henderson; future Congressman and Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums, and future Black Panthers Huey Newton and Bobby Seale,” the Democratic representative’s statement said. Al-Mansour’s more recent videotaped speeches focus on Muslim themes, and abound with anti-Semitic theories and anti-Israel vitriol. “Today, the Palestinians are being brutalized like savages,” he told an audience in South Africa. “If you protest you will go to jail, and you may be killed. And they say they are the only democratic country in the Middle East. … They are lying on God.” He accused the Jews of “stealing the land the same way the Christians stole the land from the Indians in America.” The Saudi Connection But al-Mansour’s sponsorship of Obama as a prospective Harvard law student is important for another reason beyond his Islamic and anti-American rhetoric and early Black Panther ties. At the time Percy Sutton, a former lawyer for Malcolm X and a former business partner of al-Mansour, says he was raising money for Obama’s graduate school education, al-Mansour was representing top members of the Saudi Royal family seeking to do business and exert influence in the United States. In 1989, for example - just one year after Obama entered Harvard Law School - The Los Angeles Times revealed that al-Mansour had been advising Saudi billionaires Abdul Aziz and Khalid al-Ibrahim in their secret effort to acquire a major stake in prime oceanfront property in Marina del Rey, Calif., through “an elaborate network of corporate shells in California, the Caribbean and Europe.” At the same time, he was also advising Prince Alwaleed bin Talal in his U.S. investments, and sits on the board of his premier investment vehicle, Kingdom Holdings. Prince Alwaleed, 53, is the nephew if King Abdallah of Saudi Arabia. Forbes magazine ranked him this year as the 19th richest person on the planet, with a fortune in excess of $23 billion. He owns large chunks of Citigroup and News Corp., the holding company that controls Fox News. He is best known in the United States for his offer to donate $10 million to help rebuild downtown Manhattan after the 9/11 attacks. But after the prince made a public comment suggesting that U.S. policies had contributed to causing the attacks, Mayor Rudy Giuliani handed back his check. “I entirely reject that statement,” Giuliani said. “There is no moral equivalent for this (terrorist) act. There is no justification for it. The people who did it lost any right to ask for justification for it when they slaughtered 4,000 or 5,000 innocent people.” Sinc e then, Prince Alwaleed’s Kingdom Foundation has given millions of dollars to Muslim charities in the United States, including several whose leaders have been indicted on terrorism-related charges in federal courts. He also has given tens of millions of dollars to Harvard and other major U.S. universities, to establish programs in Islamic studies. The casual statement by Percy Sutton to NY1 is the first time anyone has hinted at a relationship between Obama and the Saudi royal family. Although al-Mansour glosses over his ties to the Saudi mega-billionaire in some of his public talks, he has represented the Saudi’s interests in the United States, in Britain, and in Africa for more than a quarter century, according to public records. He told Newsmax that he has personally introduced Prince Alwaleed to “51 of the 53 leaders of Africa,” traveling from country to country on the Saudi prince’s private jet. He knows virtually every black leader in America, from the business community, to community activists, to the worlds of politics and entertainment. When Michael Jackson was on the ropes in the mid-1990s following a series of lawsuits by the parents of children accusing him of sexual abuse, al-Mansour introduced him to Prince Alwaleed, whose Kingdom Entertainment signed a joint venture with Jackson in 1996. “Jackson and Alwaleed became pals in 1994, when a mutual friend from Alwaleed’s college days in California arranged a lunch meeting aboard the prince’s yacht in Cannes,” Time magazine reported about the new partnersh ip in 1997. The mutual friend was al-Mansour. “As a black American, I am exceedingly proud at the American people’s response to Barack Obama’s candidacy,” said CORE’s Niger Innis. “But to deny that he has long-standing ties to left-wing elements in our polity is to deny reality. If you want to be president of the United States, it is not racism if you ask these kind of questions, and he has to come up with an answer, hopefully the truth.” Sutton gives no clues as to why al-Mansour would be raising money to help Obama go to law school. Obama has said during his campaign that he paid his way through Harvard with student loans. For Jesse Lee Peterson, founder of the Los Angeles-based Brotherhood Organization of a New Destiny (BOND), these latest revelations about Obama’s ties to Saudi financiers were an important wake-up call. “To me, this opened up more questions about Barack Obama and his relationship to the Muslim world,” Peterson told Newsmax. “A lot of people are caught up with the emotional aspect of Barack Obama, the movie star aspect, the false promises that he’s going to take care of everyone and their Mama.” But when the full story of Obama’s ties to radical preachers such as Wright and to black Muslim leader Louis Farrakhan comes out, Peterson believes that Obama’s star power will fade. “I think there’s more to this story and to Barack Obama than we realize,” Peterson said. “As all the truth comes out before the election, I don’t think he has a chance. I can’t see American’s taking that kind of risk.” The Obama campaign did not respond to requests for comment. |
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Media Temper Tantrum
A good day for Republican Women is a bad day for the press
The attack on Sarah Palin scares me. The media no longer even tries for impartiality. They are full force against her and are pulling out all the stops to attack this woman on all levels. They have stooped so low that they even published her Social Security number, address and phone number simply to harass and possibly endanger her and her family. The media doesn’t care if they contradict themselves or who else they take down just as long as they get Sarah Palin.
I never thought I would hear the liberal media suggest that a woman should stay at home with her infant rather than work, but I heard it. I never thought I would hear the same people who fawned over the movie Juno now imply that it is a sign that this teenage girl was “forced” to have the baby because of her mother’s values. I never thought I would hear the same people who defended Obama’s lack of experience go after someone for their supposed lack of experience.
Sometimes I feel as if I am watching a two year old having a tantrum. They are howling and screaming and stomping their feet on the ground. They were so sure that McCain would pick Romney or some other white male who they were sure they could beat. But this? McCain did it again. True to his maverick nickname he picked an unknown woman. And the liberals and media were taken unaware. They really don’t like that. The media is so damn smug because they are always in the loop and know what will happen before the little people do. Not this time.
So the media and liberals are angry. McCain didn’t play by their rules and for that they want to punish him. They will tear Sarah Palin apart and make McCain regret he ever picked her. Except in doing so they are showing their true colors. They are looking more and more like a pack of wolves going after their prey. And it isn’t simply the TV reporters but even the scandal papers like US are going after Sarah. She is being hit from every side while the liberals begin whisper campaigns to raise doubt about her by hinting that McCain might drop her. He won’t. But as I said the liberals will try everything to take down the McCain and Palin ticket. And for the stark fact that they are afraid this ticket might win. And that scares them.
Palin Speech Most Important For GOP
Palin Picks Scab From McCain Age Issue.
Tonight Governor Sarah Palin, McCain’s VP pick will have a steep hill to climb to overcome a weekend of very personal nastiness by leftist bloggers and biased media attacks. Negatives have been focused on her (in)experience, McCain age, and whether she is ready to be president.
The Palin pick has forced Barack Obama’s campaign into, as the New York Times put it, “recalibrating their strategies for the presidential campaign - and reconsidering some of their basic assumptions about which states and voters are in play. …”
Voters by a substantial majority think a woman is likely to be elected president of the United States in the next 10 years. Nearly half (48%) think Hillary Clinton is at least somewhat likely to be the one.
While 85% of voters say they are willing to vote for a woman for president nine percent (9%) disagree and seven percent (7%) are undecided. Ironically, men are more willing to vote for a woman president than women voters by an 89% to 81% margin.
If men have their way they prefer Sarah Palin over Clinton 49% to 45% according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. Women prefer Clinton over Palin 57% to 35% if they were the presidential candidate some think that is because Palin is just too attractive.
Overall 52% has a favorable opinion of Palin and those opinions are sharply split along partisan and racial lines- only 15% of Democrat and blacks say they could vote for Palin.
This survey seems to points away from Palin helping McCain close the 10-12% Obama holds over him among women.
After weeks of running neck-and-neck with McCain in the Rasmussen daily Presidential Tracking Poll, Obama has begun to pull away in recent days. It will take another week or so to determine if the Republican convention can overcome the bounce Obama received from Obama’s convention in Denver. Wednesday morning Obama gets 50% to McCain’s 45% according to Rasmussen’s daily tracking poll.
RNC, Gustuf and God
Sometimes you simply couldn’t make this stuff up. You’ve probably read about this but it bears repeating. The former DNC Chairman, Don Fowler had an interesting conversation while on a flight back from Denver with his seatmate, S.C. Congressman John Spratt. Apparently sitting immediately behind them was a blogger with a phone which had a video camera. And did I mention he was a conservative blogger? Oops.
All You Need Are Friends
Over the weekend, something by Charles Krauthammer caught my eye. Unfortunately I now can’t find the exact article but I clearly recall his question; Where are Barack Obama’s friends?
I have read a lot about Obama, seen two different biographies on him and watched him during the DNC Convention. Yet I don’t recall ever seeing any mention of or interview with his friends. Whenever a man runs for president there have always been interviews with old high school friends, basketball teammates, college roommates, and past girlfriends. But I don’t think I have seen any of these in regards to Obama. Have you?
Doesn’t that seem a little bit strange? Even now, other than his wife, who would he call his best friend? In direct contrast, John McCain seems to have made friends in every stage of his life. In the Senate, he has friends on both sides and though his Democrat friends may strongly disagree with his politics, they still like him as a man. But where are these friends for Barack Obama?
Yes, this man does give wonderful, warm and stirring speeches but that is not out of character. When you give a speech there is this invisible wall separating the speaker from the audience. Plus the speaker is in complete control and is speaking prepared lines. On the other hand, Barack does not do at all well in Town Hall forums. This forum requires that the wall separating him from the audience is gone and instead he has to interact with people and do so extemporaneously.
Not surprisingly, John McCain is the exact opposite. He does very poorly when giving speeches because there is that invisible wall separating the speaker from the audience. Instead he is wonderful in a Town Hall or one on one forum. John is definitely a people person who truly enjoys being with people and talking to them. (This must have made all those years as a POW and in solitary confinement so much worse for him.) Senator McCain comes across as someone you would enjoy having a drink with but I am not so sure the same could be said about Obama.
So to repeat my question, where are Barack Obama’s friends, roommates, teammates or even old girlfriends? I have often thought that he appears aloof and even cold at times. That he is not a people person, and is more comfortable dealing with law or procedures or strategies than dealing one on one with people. Yet it is one thing to be a loner and self sufficient but not to find anybody who was his friend is ridiculous. What does that say about how he would govern or interact with other leaders?
Ironically, the one man who has been found to be his friend was Reverend Jeremiah Wright. We know how voters thought of that friend! And was Obama really a closer friend to that 1960’s radical and former Weathermen, Ayers? Are there more “friends” like this out there but keeping quiet for fear of doing further damage to Obama’s image?
It does make you wonder. Here is this candidate for President who seems to have very few friends and the only close associates found so far are extreme radicals. Someone needs to do some more digging into Obama’s life. Either through out his entire life he never made any close friends, or his friends are like the two discovered, Wright and Ayers, who are so radical that Obama had to disown their friendship. In either case, it doesn’t bode well for someone who wants to be the next President.
Phenoms
In April 2005, friends and family of golfer Chris DiMarco were crossing their fingers when Chris found himself tied with Tiger Woods by the end of the Masters. In the first sudden death hole, we thought Chris was going to win as Tiger was off to the left and long. But then the impossible happened. As the AP reported, Tiger chipped in and his ball aimed straight and true to the hole, where it paused right on the cup’s lip. After a second or two, which felt like an eternity, the ball slowly rolled over into the hole giving Tiger another Master’s win. To this day, that shot is considered one of the most amazing golf shots in history. How could Chris have possibly competed against that?
I think Chris and that guy who lost to Michael Phelps by a fingernail should get together and talk. I should probably extend that invitation to anyone who lost to Tiger Woods or Michael Phelps or Bolt, that amazing runner. But it doesn’t only happen in sports. Ask Hillary.
Tiger, Phelps and Bolt are all what I would call “Phenoms”. And heaven help anyone who competes against them. I truly feel sorry for the DiMarcos, and other swimmers for if it had not been for these rivals they would have easily won. But they had the bad luck to be on the playing field when these Phenoms are at the top of their game.
Obama is not a true Phenom, such as these athletes. It wasn’t until he started to gain momentum earlier this year that he turned into a Phenom. Even though people still were voting heavily for Hillary, the media had crowned him the next political whiz kid, the next JFK. It was to be expected that because of their similar racial mix, there were more and more articles comparing Obama to Tiger Woods, thereby implying that Obama was as much a winner as Tiger. The stories grew until everyone, even Obama, assumed that he was unstoppable. That Obama was “The One”.
The convention this week will work to convince the rest of the world (and I do mean world and not just the USA) that Obama is the chosen. Once both conventions are over the race moves into overdrive for the next two months. As DiMarco, and many of the Olympic athletes would tell you, it is not easy to defeat a Phenom.
McCain’s campaign is doing a brilliant job. Athletes are Phenoms based on measurable results. But other than barely beating Hillary, Obama is a Phenom because the press said so. It is sort of like the old story about the king’s clothes. This time it is McCain’s campaign which is pointing out that the king isn’t wearing any clothes, or rather that Obama is not a Phenom. In fact, McCain is ridiculing Obama for even thinking that he is “The One”.
Will this strategy work? I don’t know but I sure hope so. Making fun of Obama is better than believing the hype. For then McCain would be trying to compete against Obama as a Phenom, and as Chris DiMarco and many many others can tell you, it is nearly impossible to win against a true Phenom.
Biden Time
After all is said and done I think Biden was a one-sided selection. If you have had any news
on then you’ve heard how he will shore up Obama’s lack of foreign experience and it could be said help Obama’s lack of experience in total. Biden is also supposed to be a good attack dog which will allow Obama to stand above that sort of thing. Overall, he will help Obama nationally with the independent voters.
However, I am guessing that the core Democrats involved in this race are not happy. To be honest, the Clinton supporters would not be happy with anyone other than Hillary. I think they might have been more understanding if Obama had picked some outsider. Instead they go with someone who is old school, which she is, too. Why go for someone with a good resume when you could have someone with a great resume? And already PUMA is arguing that Biden had a whopping 9,500 votes during the primary vs. Hillary’s 18 million. (I know it isn’t a fair comparison as Biden dropped out early but who ever said politics is fair?)
But it is the core Obama people who are also rumbling a little bit this morning. Obama’s entire campaign is based on change. But his first important decision to select his running mate and he completely turns his back on the idea of change. Instead of an outsider he went with Biden who is yet another old white guy who has been in DC since Watergate. Or as I heard one African American reporter tell it - she wasn’t even born when Biden was first elected.
I would also think that Obama’s advisors aren’t that pleased either. There are two primary jobs for a VP candidate. The obvious one is to step in as President in case the President is unable to perform his job. The other purpose of a VP is to bring in votes that the President elect may not have been able to capture himself. I am not sure how much Biden will help Obama in this. In the past VP candidates have come from large electoral states or from swing states or from geographical areas that normally go for his opponent.
As everyone now knows - Biden is from Delaware which has a whopping 3 electoral votes. Nor is Delaware a key transitional state. Some analysts are saying that Biden may not readily have a large group of people that will now be for Obama. But he might have large corporations and big bucks behind him. And every candidate always could use more money.
Later today Obama and Biden will officially announce this in Springfield Ill. (And didn’t Obama’s idea of texting his supporters first backfire. But more on that another time.) Anyway, back to the picture of the two of them standing together, most likely with raised hands held together as you always see it. And how will that look? How will America react to this picture of a youngish good looking black man holding hands with an old grey haired white man? In spite of what the picture might indicate, is America ready for an African American President?
Now that the Olympics are wrapping up tomorrow, let the real games begin!
Obama’s Bio
CNN had two interesting features last night; one on McCain and the other on Obama. I am not sure if I learned many new things about Obama but this was the first time I saw his life laid out in a chronological order. It is both impressive and scary. Underneath his friendly demeanor is a man who goes to almost any length not just to win but to undermine his opponents. Based on that CNN show and Biography.com I have put together a timeline of his life including how he won (or lost) each of his elections. I think this gives a look into his life and what we might expect from him in the future. To help, I have included his age after the year and key political events in his life are in red.
August 1961 – Born to Ann Dunham and Barack Obama
1963 – (2) Parents separated and later divorced
1965 – (4) Ann Dunham marries Lolo Soeturo
1965 – (4) Moves to Jakarta Indonesia with mother and step-father
1966 – (5) Attends Catholic school and then a public Indonesian school
1971 – (10) Obama sent back to Hawaii to live with grandparents and received a scholarship to an exclusive private school
aprox. 1976-1979 (15-18) Uses alcohol, marijuana and cocaine
1979 – (18) – Graduates high school. Goes to Occidental College in LA
1981 – (20) Transfers to Columbia University in NY
1983 – (22) Graduates from college with a degree in political science
1983 – (22) Takes a job with Business International Corp in NY
1985 – (24) Moves to Chicago to be a community organizer. Joined Trinity Church
1988 – (27) Attends Harvard Law school. He is first black editor of Harvard Law Review
1991 – (30) Graduates magna cum laude.
1991 – (30) Moves to Chicago. Works as a civil rights lawyer (where he meets Rezco), heads Project Vote where he has the most successful voter registration drive in Chicago’s history and teaches at University of Law School
1002 – (31) Barack and Michele are married by Reverend Wright
1995 – (34) Writes autobiography Dreams of My Father
1996 – (35) Runs for State Senate against favored incumbent. Found invalid names on opponents nominating petition and knocked the incumbent off the ballet, as well as all three other candidates.
1997 – 2005 – (36 - 41) Illinois State Senator
2000 – (39) Decides to run for Congress against four term incumbent Bobby Rush. Race became personal and nasty. Rush beat him by nearly 2:1.
2000 - (39) Tries to network with leaders at 2000 DNC Convention but not even allowed on the floor.
2000 – (39) Told by many that politics is people not just policies. So he began to cultivate a network including Rev. Wright and Illinois State Senate President
2001-2003 – (40-43) In the Senate, Barack starts to have more bills with his name on them. But he also votes “present” 129 times and wouldn’t commit on controversial votes.
2002 – (41) Begins to run for Senate. Gives speeches opposing the war.
2003-2004 (42-43) In the US Senate race there are unsubstantiated scandals which force both the Republican candidate and the favored Democratic candidate to leave the race. Barack is now the Democratic candidate against a last minute replacement for the Republican candidate – Alan Keyes.
2004 – (43) Gives the keynote speech at Democratic Convention. He then wins the Senate race by a landslide.
2005 – (44) Freshman Senator but with high recognition due to speech yet “like most Senate Freshmen, legislature record is thin”.
2006 – (45) Obama joined partisan group, including McCain to write an Immigration Bil