Has it really been over two months since I posted? I guess the Euphoria after Obamas win was just too much for me. At any rate, I am very excited about Tuesday.
I am blown away at the opportunities and challenges that lie before us as Americans. Tuesday is going to be a huge day, with as many as 2 Millions Americans converging on Washington for the inauguration. It is fitting that it is one day after Martin Luther King's Birthday.
President Obama is going to face some tough challenges, an economy in shambles, two wars, instability in the Middle East... For the most part I have been happy with his choices for his cabinet and key appointees. Apart from his choice for CIA head, which leaves me dumbfounded, and the tax evader for Treasury, I think he'e doing pretty damned good...
Its funny, I have had people congratulating me since Tuesday night, and I am sure that most of it is becuase I am
a.) American and
b.) AfroAmerican....
But a lot of it has come from people who know how I have faught for Obama to win. A dear friend and Masonic brother of mine, calls Obama an, "empty suit."
Boyd is someone I love as much as any of my friends, and he has been a friend. But he is SOOOOO wrong. Empty suits do not create the phenomenon that Barack Obama has created. Will he live up to his potential and his promise? I truly think he will, because for him to fail is unthinkable. Empty suit implies someone who really does not have what they seem to. Obama's record in and of itself, including destroying two of the most powerful political machines in the country (The Clinton and GOP machines), on his way to a landslide victory, is proof that he is far more than pretty speeches...
Martin Luther King looked down from the mountain top and saw the promised land. It is highly unlikely that he saw Barack Obama looking up at him. But like Josua, Obama has claimed that Valley for all of us. It was so moving seeing veteran journalist cry or nearly cry on Tuesday night.
We did it. We elected an African American man, a progressive and a purveyor of HOPE to the Presidency. We have been in the Wilderness for eight years, and it is nothing less than incredible. I wish my parents, my older sisters and brothers and so many others who did not live to see this day, HAD lived.
The fact is that the world has witnessed something I never expected to see in my lifetime... US as a people, overcoming our prejudices and taking a chance on something called HOPE.
The haters, they will continue to hate. The doubters, they will continue to doubt, at least for a while. The war has been won, the little skirmishes that will contine are nothing but distractions from reaching our full potential as a United Nation. These days I will take my victories as they come, including seeing even old school Republican Sith Lords like Ed Rollins speak glowingly about how PRESIDENTIAL Obama looked today.
McCain got STOMPED by 201 Elecctoral votes and 7,970,660 yeah that almost 8 Million votes people... And the extreme Right Wing is still looking for issues to nitpick. I had a hilarious exchange yesterday on Wizbang, which has always been one of my favorite Wingnut sites.
As you can see, they are living in a very ANGRY fantasy world, anticipating doom and gloom while the rest of the nation... and even the world, celebrates, and even Old School Republican Operatives like Ed Rollins calls him, "Presidential."
The temptation is high to gloat. To get IN THE FACE of ignorant people like this.
Short, angry, bitter, and in the minority. I now feel as I believe Justice Ginsberg felt at that time. This election was not, despite the hype, the grand demonstration of egalitarian democracy and the fulfillment of promised ideals. Rather, it proved that a slick thug from Chicago with no executive experience whatsoever can get elected President if he has enough money, is protected from tough questions by a complicit media, and runs a campaign on pure style and hype. It's not just for con men anymore.
But I think Obama's speech last night, and the almost 63 Millon people who voted for him, demand something more of us.
I woke my son last night when the results were announced and shared the moment with he and my family. My wife and kids are thoroughly Costa Rican, so it has been a lonely 11 months for me, and I watched, celebrated and even cried... alone at times. But last night they got it, even my wife who was a Hillary fan if anything.... GOT IT. They looked at the huge crowd of people in Chicago. They watched the students gathered at the gates of the White House, they watched the reaction around the world, and THEY GOT IT.
My baby daughter asked me why I was crying last night... Why so many people were crying. I saved the copy of todays Costa Rican newspaper for her.
One day she will understand. One of the most moving things for me was watching people like Collin Powell weep...
Or watching the celebrations around the world. Something amazing happened yesterday, and honestly, I feel sorry for those people whos own personal prejudices, whether they be racial or partisan, prevent them from sharing in a very remarkable moment for our country and the world.
As a black man, born in 1960... someone who has dealt with discrimination... someone who has been called Nigger to his face... I can not describe in mere words this moment for me. Translate my tears of joy and share with me, this moment of sublime hope.
I feel myself quite unworthy of documenting this moment. The images we view today throughout the world are so much more powerful than mere words.
So a few petty, angry people, who would seek to belittle what we as a country have accomplished are to be pitied. Those who's racism would not allow them to vote for a black man yesterday missed out on a great opportunity to change forever for the better our great nation. Those who voted for McCain out of a sincere belief that he was a better candidate, have an open invitation from Our President Elect, to be part of the solution... Lets hope that they elect to do so. For the moment, I have no more words to contribute, instead I invite you to review the video of the President Elect's remarks from last night....
This clown is obviously a Republican plant. Put that moron from McCains rally that demanded that McCain bring up Reverend Wright, Ghettoize him and put him in front of a camera. Notice how he says, "Democrat," party? What a joke@
When word got around that the Barack Obama campaign had decided to make room on the official plane for some new journalists, from Ebony and Jet, by booting off the reporters from three newspapers who -- by an astonishing coincidence -- had recently endorsed McCain, a thought that had been bouncing around the back of my mind finally jelled: now we're finally seeing the true face of the Obama campaign -- and administration.
The message being sent: you're either with us or you're against us.
Ever since he first announced his candidacy, Obama has enjoyed tremendous support from the press. They've touted him, glorified him, praised him, and covered for him. They've also fought his battles for him, taking on such presumptuous upstarts like "Joe the Plumber" and Stanley Kurtz and anyone else who dares risk embarrassing Obama so he won't have to sully his saintly hands.
And in return, how has this slavish devotion worked out for them?
Ask any woman in a relationship with an abusive man.
Yeah, that sounds harsh. But I think it's not entirely inappropriate.
Barack Obama, both directly and through his surrogates, has been presumptuous, contemptuous, deceptive, demanding, and downright abusive to the press throughout their long relationship.
Now this was written by Jay Tea, someone whom I once considered to be a voice of reason in the conservative blogsphere.... I have since gone off my meds and see him for what he is...
Jay buddy, when you got to foaming at the mouth this morning, trying to turn this incident into something foul, evil and even SEXIST, though I dont know how that one got in there.... Did you think about THIS? Or did you just figure that the DIGITAL DITTOHEADS, who follow Wizbang would not know about it, or care.... Eh, thats called hypocrisy.
You guys are grasping at straws.... And in the process, losing any last illusions of credibility that you may have had. I, and a lot of other people, on BOTH sides apparently, are laughing at you. How's that workin' for ya?
Lou, I am an American Citizen living in Costa Rica. For many years I have been a fan of yours, but your contemptible behavior during this election has lost you a fan and more importantly, your credibility in many eyes. I am an Obama supporter, and I have no problem with you NOT supporting Mr. Obama, but your hateful comments and your SHAM of being independent, while presenting people from Conservative Publications to attack Obama, with commentary disguised as fact, does this country and your organization a great disservice. If you want to attack or question Obama, have the decency to do so as "opinion," and not under the guise of objective fact, backed up by Wingnut commentators from New Republic. And conversely, if you do have something of factual substance on EITHER candidate, share it as such and back up your accusation with documented fact. Likewise, assisting the Republicans to suppress voting by minorities and others by running scare stories on Acorn, while ignoring the very REAL issues with documented irregularities in recent early voting on voting machines that conveniently switch votes to Republicans, is shameless and ANTI American. I know you wont show this comment, but the thousands of people who read my blog daily will.
David in San Jose
It is getting almost impossible for Dobbs to continue to perpetuate the LIE that he is an objective independent. Yesterday's show was a complete SCAM, and if I were on Senator Obama's team, I would be demanding equal time.
Having a guy from the most notorious CONSERVATIVE website on your show to try and paint Obama as some sort of nut, is just another example of your FOX like coverage of this election. YOU ARE NO INDEPENDENT! You have become a joke, like another former Maverick, you have sold out.
And that little story about VOTER Fraud, like your friends at Fox, you focus on ACORN, while across the country Republicans look for ways to steal this election like they did in Florida in 2000 and Ohio in 2004. You are a self important buffoon Dobbs, and honestly, I for one am tired of your sham.
Will these people look back on how absolutely idiotic they have looked with this campaign, and with this Joe the plumber nonsense.
The guy is an idiot, and these guys are exploiting idiocy. I remember seeing Shep Smith in New Orleans, literally crying over the disaster there. It is nice to see someone at fox who is not a MORON.
This is one of the most inspiring things I have ever read.
2009 Inauguration Ball
Guests began arriving early. There are no place cards and no name tags. Everyone knows everyone else here. Now, there's a grand foursome - Malcolm X and Betty Shabazz sharing laughs with Martin and Coretta Scott King. Looks like Hosea Williams refused the limo again, keeping it real. And my goodness; is that Rosa Parks out there on the dance floor with A. Phillip Randolph?
Seated at a nearby table, Frederick Douglass has a captive audience in W.E.B. DuBose and Fannie Lou Hamer, and Medgar Evers has just joined them. Marian Anderson was asked to sing tonight, but she only agreed to do it if accompanied by Marvin Gaye, John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix. Look, there's Harriet Tubman. No one knows how she arrived, but there she is. And my guess is that, when the time comes, no one will see her leave.
There's Jackie Robinson swiftly making his way through the hall as the crowd parts like the Red Sea to the unmistakable sound of applause. "Run, Jackie, run!" Along the way he is embraced by Jessie Owens. Three beautiful young women arrive with their escorts – Schwerner, Goodman and Chaney. Ms. Viola Liuzzo flew in from Michigan, exclaiming, "I could not miss this."
Richard Pryor promised to be on his best behavior. "But I can’t make any guarantees for Redd Foxx and Moms Mabley," he chuckled. Joe Louis just faked a quick jab to the chin of Jack Johnson, who smiled broadly while slipping it. We saw Billy Eckstine and Nat King Cole greet Luther Van Dross. James Brown and Josh Gibson stopped at Walter Payton's table to say hello.
It made me cry, and I don't cry easy. My God, it spoke to me. My Mama is there too, and my Papi, and so are my grandparents, and probably some of yours too. I can see this scene playing out in my minds eye...
John McCain campaign manager Rick Davis expressed frustration Thursday that negative ads run by Barack Obama's campaign do not prompt the same press outrage as ads attacking the Democratic presidential nominee.
The difference is, for the most part, Obama's negative comments have been honest ones. While you guys brazenly lie, day after day.... Another thing is that Obama is more interested in talking issues than playing attack politics.
But then, isnt that what Republican Politics is all about:
And really, McCain has the stones to go on National TV and say that Obama runs a negative campaign? PUH-LEAZE you ever see what happens when people boo McCain at an Obama event? He says, dont boo, VOTE!
Some three dozen workers at a telemarketing call center in Indiana walked off the job rather than read an incendiary McCain campaign script attacking Barack Obama, according to two workers at the center and one of their parents.
Nina Williams, a stay-at-home mom in Lake County, Indiana, tells us that her daughter recently called her from her job at the center, upset that she had been asked to read a script attacking Obama for being "dangerously weak on crime," "coddling criminals," and for voting against "protecting children from danger."
Williams' daughter told her that up to 40 of her co-workers had refused to read the script, and had left the call center after supervisors told them that they would have to either read the call or leave, Williams says. The call center is called Americall, and it's located in Hobart, IN.
"They walked out," Williams says of her daughter and her co-workers, adding that they weren't fired but willingly sacrificed pay rather than read the lines. "They were told [by supervisors], `If you all leave, you're not gonna get paid for the rest of the day."
The daughter, who wanted her name withheld fearing retribution from her employer, confirmed the story to us. "It was like at least 40 people," the daughter said. "People thought the script was nasty and they didn't wanna read it."
A second worker at the call center confirmed the episode, saying that "at least 30" workers had walked out after refusing to read the script.
"We were asked to read something saying [Obama and Democrats] were against protecting children from danger," this worker said. "I wouldn't do it. A lot of people left. They thought it was disgusting."
You have to imagine the kind of courage it took in the Economy most Americans are facing, to make this kind of decision....
While ignoring anything that demonstrates their own hypocrisy.
"Now if the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms comes to disarm you and they are bearing arms, resist them with arms. Go for a head shot; they're going to be wearing bulletproof vests. ... Head shots! Head shots! Kill the sons of bitches!"
G. Gordon Liddy
"It's always a pleasure for me to come on your program, Gordon, and congratulations on your continued success and adherence to the principles and philosophies that keep our nation great."
While the Republicans fight amongst themselves, and try their scare tactics, Obama continues to bring a possitive message of hope to our country. And then there were the 100,000 who came out to see him in Denver.
Fifty-six times Americans have gone to the polls to select our presidents. This is the first time two sitting U.S. senators are facing off against each other. It is the first time since 1928 a sitting president or vice president is not a candidate. But two presidents, the incumbent and his immediate predecessor, cast giant shadows over this election season.
The biggest shadow of course is that of President Bush. Our 43rd president's goal in life was to surpass his father, 41, whom he admired but felt was weak.
Guided by his political guru, Karl Rove, it was Bush II's ambition to make the Republican Party the majority party for decades to come. He and Karl wanted to create a political realignment that would marginalize Democrats for at least a generation and maybe more.
Not satisfied to change only American politics, Bush and his neo-con advisers, led by Dick Cheney, wanted to use American military might to spread democracy to places that had been led only by tribal councils and ruthless dictators.
If Bush had accomplished these goals, he truly would have been a historic president much like his newfound hero Harry Truman. But his failures were unimaginable. W will go down in history, all right.
He will leave office with the lowest approval ratings of any president in modern times and will be judged as a catastrophic failure who destroyed his party, left his successor with two unpopular, unfinished wars and left the country in the worst economic condition in nearly eight decades. That's not even counting the Bush administration's inadequate response to Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath.
By comparison, his father's failed presidency looks pretty good. Barack Obama has very effectively tied John McCain to Bush and tried to convince voters that electing McCain means four more years of Bush's failed policies...
...
I will vote for McCain, but I do so knowing he has run one of the weakest presidential campaigns in modern times and is probably going to lose big.
I support him because I think he is a courageous man, a tested leader and a man who can direct this country through the tough times ahead. I also believe in what he stands for, even though he has not articulated it as well as I might have liked.
But unless some unforeseen event occurs, I believe McCain's quest comes to an end in a week.
Ad our morally and intellectually bankrupt friends on the Right continue to grasp at Straws...
Jay, a couple of points.
Micky Mouse can not vote.
McCain supported Acorn, until he didnt.
Are you really STUPID or hypocritical enough to want to discuss affiliations?
And when you talk Morality, you need to closely examin your guy ditching his cripple wife for a Barbie Doll Heiress, or Ms. Palin using the power of her office to try and chastise her ex brother in law.
Do you REALLY believe that Obama is a Socialist?
That he is not an American Citizen?
That he is a closet Muslim?
That he is a terrorist sympathizer?
Those arguments stink of a corrupt, sick, Party/Philosophy first attitude that has led to the analysis Rollins speaks of above! Your kind have poisoned political discourse in our country. The blame for the hatred and anger in our country rest squarely on your shoulders. Snake? You people are the snakes. Have you ever seen Anacondas mating ball? A big slimy ball of rutting predators? That is YOU, the Michelle Malkins, Powerlines and other Wingnuts out there who JUST CANT BEAR the idea of losing....
Its not like you dont know that Palin is not qualified. Yeah you know that. You knew it the first time that she sat down for an interview. But then you voted for an idiot two times, so what was the big deal about voting for another one.
You know that McCain does not have a CLUE about how to fix the economy, but that matters less than letting the Lefties run the show.
You claim not to be racist, and yet you secretly wink when that overblown GASBAG Limbaugh claims that Collin Powell's support of Obama is a "black thing."
You guys have lost, try to show a little bit of decency and respect, instead of going out like a bunch of By-ach-es! I dont expect any of you to show class. The only ones on your side with Class, like The Commissar and John Cole, left you a long time ago. Now all that is left is a bunch of bitter losers, and the rancid corpse of your party.
Okay, I am laughing my ass off at the moment. Forgive the vulgarity, but our Right Wing friends are losing their minds. If you thought that moron from Fox calling Michelle and Baracks first pump a, "terrorist jab," was over the top, you are gonna love this. An entire interview, with a Catholic priest no less, on the alleged deification of Obama.
Now looking at the Video at the top, did you see anyone praying to Obama, I sure as hell didn't.
They have lost it. They are simply beside themselves that Obama could win this thing. I mean this is plain and simple DESPERATION. Its really kind of scary that people who ride behind a banner that says COUNTRY FIRST, would so shamelessly try and destroy it. There is NOTHING that these people will not do to win. Obama is a socialist, no a terrorist, no a muslin, no a foriegn Muslim, Terrorist, Socialist, XXX fill in the blanks. Anyone stupid or partisan enough to vote for these people and their tactics, deserves the economic desolation to come.
Is this woman auditioning for Fox News? Well she did pretty good as they and the Republicans are STUPID enough to use this video as some sort of gotcha?
I just love talking points. These people are so used to using crap like this to scare Americans that they are still holding out that this RIGHT WING propaganda piece will actually convince any one. Hilarious!
Oh yeah Lorie, everybody isnt talking about the interview only Wingnut Propagandist who are so desperate for a gottcha moment, you have begun staging them.
I just dont understand... I mean I try not to harp on the obvious, but you look at McCain and Palin an their idiotic Joe the Plumber spiel, and you wonder how they keep a straight face. You wonder how many of the people that come out to their events can afford $150,000 dollars in clothes.... For a year, much less two months. Their attempt to identify with the WORKING GUY/GAL is cynical and insulting at best. And anyone who has seen the entire exchange between Joe and Barack.
knows that it was NOT the scene that the desperate McCain/Palin campaign paint it to be. Makes you wonder sometimes how many people have actually even seen the whole exchange. Of course does it matter to these people. When they have reached the point of practically accusing the man of being the antichrist? Or in league with the devil?
No, they dont care and they will stoop to any level to win this election. FAT on eight years of rule, they will swallow the koolaid or the poison pill, as long as it means they dont lose. Sad really...
Its gotten so bad that even the commenters in FAUXville have had enough. These days conservatives fall into three categories.
1. Those who truly believe in their philosophy and who stand by it regardless of the fringe on either side.
2. Those who just cant believe that they were wrong, are embarrassed as hell by it, and will NOT admit this for anything. This is the group that hopes if they keep chanting the Mantra, that like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, they will return to a simpler time where they were on top and there was no chance the LIBRULS could win an election...
3. Those who went cold turkey on the Koolaide and are scratching their heads at the 1's and 2's.
"Drudge has the headline in red. These Obama cultists are dangerous and out of control. What the hell will these people do if the messiah loses on November 4th? "
But then that comes from the same person who could not hear KILL HIM, in the McCain crowds. Good news is that this is almost over, and the Wingnuts are going to find themselves seriously on the outside. I cant wait.
The stupidity, the hypocrisy.... All of it.... It is hilarious,,, Read on baby, read on.
Sarah is a normal American with a $150,000 wardrobe! Hey another Uncle Tom sighting...
Now if you ask me why I call these people Uncle Toms, it has nothing to do with who they vote for. It has everything to do with them attending rallies filled with racist, where people are calling for the murder of another black person, or insulting them or excusing the same behavior.
"Drudge has the headline in red. These Obama cultists are dangerous and out of control. What the hell will these people do if the messiah loses on November 4th?"
This was the headline of yesterdays Wizbang post on the "attack" that never happened.
This post is so inflammatory, so incredibly stupid and racist, that it is beyond the pale. At first, I must admit, I got very angry about it. But now, I just have to shake my head and laugh. A man whom I once considered to be a hero, a patriot and someone above reproach when it came to honor. Is going to go down in History as a dispicable race baitor, liar and a man who flushed his honor for the sake of the winning. That is truly sad.
Wizbang, they have always had lunatic fringe elements like Paul, and Jay, despite his claims to the contrary, is as much a partisan as any of the other TALKING POINT READERS over there. But what do you expect from a group thats best writer works at a Kinkos for God's sake. Its over. The eight years of arrogance is over, the conservatives wrote checks with their mouth that they can not cash, and now they are being relegated to the sidelines as a new wave washes over our country. I wont be sad to see them go. The smart ones, the ones I respected like John Cole and The Commissar, woke up a long time ago.
They have been demonized by their far Right brethren, and not always embraced by us on the left, but I have always respected those two, even when they were cheering Bush. Because they were intellectually and morally honest.
I should have figured that the idiot fringe on Wizbang did not have the stones to go full tilt boogie on that story without marching orders. Man, this is a BIG deal.
This is race baiting folks... It is desperate, it is sick and honestly it is scary. These people have went off the deep end. The Bizzare conclussions that Preistap comes to are made even more bizzare by the appearance that she seems to actually believe this crap.
These people have stepped off the edge of the earth and have fully bought into the lunatic fringe... of the Right.
I can remember a time when Wizbang was reasonably respected as a good blog with a Right Wing point of view, now it has become just another member of the Racist Fringe of the Right, looking to Bring Obama down no matter what it takes.
It was a hoax, but then us rational people knew that already didnt we?
THESE PEOPLE NEED TO BE HAPPY THAT THEY ARE NOT MSM, otherwise they will get their silly asses sued off. I am not going to say the obvious, but read Kims line from the original post...
Is this the new strategy to get Obama McCain elected? Vote Obama McCain or we'll riot, mutilate people and destroy property? Good God fearing white folk like us will have to fear Black Men running wild and violating our women...
Wizbang was looking for a scandal, especially a delicious RACIAL Scandal, and they jumped all over it.
Is this the new strategy to get Obama elected? Vote Obama or we'll riot, mutilate people and destroy property? Keep in mind, community activists used intimidation to get banks to give home loans to minority and high risk customers. They stormed bank lobbies and scared away customers. They harassed bank presidents at their homes. It seems they're willing to go even further and actually mutilate a McCain supporter. Will voters with McCain signs in their front yards be targeted, too?
To me, this is an argument to defeat Obama soundly on November 4th. We will not be intimidated into voting for Obama.
Update: Here's the story. A woman was robbed at an ATM in Pittsburgh. The guy was apparently going to leave until he saw her McCain/Palin sticker on her car. That's when he attacked her and mutilated her, carving a "B" on her face. An Obama supporter robbing someone, at random it seems, at an ATM and then leaving the mark of the messiah on her face when he sees she supports McCain. Thug.
Update II: Ed Morrissey has more, including a photo of the victim. She's identified herself as Ashley Todd, who's a College Republican field rep.
Update III: I got an email from a reader:
Just spoke with my friend who is a McCain staffer here in Pittsburgh. She said the woman was attacked after she left a McCain campaign meeting last night on the University of Pittsburgh campus. The assailant is described as african american male and she has identified, in detail, the attackers shoes. He beat her up "really bad" she said. Pittsburgh Police are in possession of a horrific photograph of the victim.
Race Baiting and HATRED! Notice how the "attack" was painted as FACT (See my italics above).
Now they have egg on their face,
As many commenters here and at other blogs suspected upon seeing the picture of Ashley after she said she was attacked, she has admitted that she made up the story. I said at the end of my original post, after some began to think she was lying, that the ATM video would indicate what happened. Well, the ATM video proved that she was in fact lying. According the report, she will also face charges. As far as I'm concerned, she deserves everything she gets. I'd say she also needs some serious counseling because it's obvious she's messed up.
as do half the other folks who so desperate to paint fear on the face of this campaign did.
For those who like to call Obama an empty suit, maybe they should read this.
General David Petraeus deployed overwhelming force when he briefed Barack Obama and two other Senators in Baghdad last July. He knew Obama favored a 16-month timetable for the withdrawal of most U.S. troops from Iraq, and he wanted to make the strongest possible case against it. And so, after he had presented an array of maps and charts and PowerPoint slides describing the current situation on the ground in great detail, Petraeus closed with a vigorous plea for "maximum flexibility" going forward.
Obama had a choice at that moment. He could thank Petraeus for the briefing and promise to take his views "under advisement." Or he could tell Petraeus what he really thought, a potentially contentious course of action — especially with a general not used to being confronted. Obama chose to speak his mind. "You know, if I were in your shoes, I would be making the exact same argument," he began. "Your job is to succeed in Iraq on as favorable terms as we can get. But my job as a potential Commander in Chief is to view your counsel and interests through the prism of our overall national security." Obama talked about the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan, the financial costs of the occupation of Iraq, the stress it was putting on the military.
A "spirited" conversation ensued, one person who was in the room told me. "It wasn't a perfunctory recitation of talking points. They were arguing their respective positions, in a respectful way." The other two Senators — Chuck Hagel and Jack Reed — told Petraeus they agreed with Obama. According to both Obama and Petraeus, the meeting — which lasted twice as long as the usual congressional briefing — ended agreeably. Petraeus said he understood that Obama's perspective was, necessarily, going to be more strategic. Obama said that the timetable obviously would have to be flexible. But the Senator from Illinois had laid down his marker: if elected President, he would be in charge. Unlike George W. Bush, who had given Petraeus complete authority over the war — an unprecedented abdication of presidential responsibility (and unlike John McCain, whose hero worship of Petraeus bordered on the unseemly) — Obama would insist on a rigorous chain of command.
Countless people, even some critics on the Right have confessed Obama's superior intelligence. Argue as you may the suit claim. but it is clear that Obama is both more rational and more strategic than McCain. How 'bout that vetting process with Palin?
Read that article, damned interesting. ANYONE who reads that and still votes McCain is a PARTISAN who would vote for a Dog if one were on the ticket, or an idiot or both.
"The Sleuth has learned that Palin's high-paid traveling make-up artist is Amy Strozzi, who was nominated for an Emmy Award for her work as head of makeup on "So You Think You Can Dance." Strozzi was paid $13,200 by the McCain-Palin campaign last month alone, according to the campaign's latest financial disclosure report filed this week."
on any of the conservative Blogs, and you certainly wont see it on Wizbang, a blog that artfully ignores reality at every turn. NO... Poor little Sarah, oh how the LIBRUL Media picks on her...
Wonder how much Joe the Plumber pays to have that dome shaved and shined?
I am sitting here laughing my ass off as some Republican Bimbo excuses Sarah Palin's ignorance once again on Larry King Live. These people are beyond pathetic.... Did you hear the one about how The Vice President "sets the agenda for the Senate."
Well if you liked that one, you are going to find the Hockey Mom, Josephina Sixpacks latest exploits, to be a hoot!
First, the Republican Party spends $150,000 to outfit Gov. Sarah Palin and her entire family for the campaign trail.
Now we find out that over $20,000 for her children's travel expenses were billed to the state of Alaska since she's been governor.
Is there no end to this self-proclaimed hockey mom's expensive celebrity lifestyle?
Associated Press reports that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin charged the state for her children's travels to official business events. Even if the children were not invited, Palin would often ask to bring them.
According to MSNBC, "She said any event she can take her kids to is an event she tries to attend," said Jennifer McCarthy, who helped organize a June 2007 Family Day Celebration picnic in Ketchikan that Piper Palin attended with her parents.
Wonder what Joe and the Hockey Moms think about this???
NEW YORK (AP) - Who knew looking like a hockey mom was this darned expensive?
Certainly not Wanda Routier, a proud hockey mom in Hewitt, Wis., who spends her time in sweat pants, turtlenecks, ankle boots and heavy coats.
She was dismayed to hear Wednesday that the Republican Party had spent $150,000 in two months on clothes, hair styling and accessories for Sarah Palin and her family from such upscale stores as Saks Fifth Avenue and Nieman Marcus.
"I was put off by it," Routier said. "I mean I know they have an image to project, but that's a lot of money when we're talking about the economy the way it is! And the burden on ordinary Americans."
With "Joe Sixpack," struggling to stay in Levis, its nice to know that the Republicanshave Prada as a priority....
Oh yeah and....
The average U.S. household spent $1,874 on clothes and services in 2006, the last year for which figures are available from the government's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
If Obama loses, will there be rioting in the streets?
Maybe... But widespread I doubt. What I do see is that based on the nastiness of the McCain Campaign, and suspected attempts by the RETHUGLICAN wing of the Republican Party to suppress votes and steal the election.... Americans will not stand still for another 2000. I pray that Obama blows McCain out, because that is probably the only way that this thing will be put to bed.
I used to like Lou Dobbs, I am still not sure why I once did. He has always been a self rightous jackass. But I have a simple question, why doesnt he just admit that he is a Republican wanna be, and that he cant stand Obama. I wana gag every time I listen to the racist, XENOPHOBE! I mean you expect the idiots on Fox News to imply that Collin Powell's endorsement was a, "black thang." You would not expect that idea to come from someone on CNN. Dobbs is a double sized Bill O'rielly.
If the rhetoric in the last couple of weeks is ANY indication, the McCain camp is more divisive than Rove and Company could ever be. McCain is setting up the Nation for a very angry November, whomever wins...
These people are SCARY. They will do anything to win, including bringing back McCarthyism. I am getting angrier by they day, and my guy is winning...
Who is buying this crap? I can see how being Mayor of Wasilla really prepared Palin to lead the free world! This would be funny if it was not so scarry.
If you want to know why "NOT" to vote for Obama, Read this....
"I'm a middle-class white guy living in Jacksonville, Florida. I've got a wife and two kids. Because the kids had no school today, I took a vacation day from work, and took the kids downtown to vote early. Fifty-nine minutes later, two smiling children and I proudly sported "I Voted" stickers.
But I didn't vote for Obama."
Read the Rest of it. It blew me away.... And yeah, he did vote for Obama, he just didn't vote for a man, he voted for an idea.
What I find incredible is that people of color continue to be a part of this party. And that they actually express surprise.... When their party tells them what they think of them...
"If I was racist, I would have looked at it through racist eyes," she said. "I am not racist, which is why it probably didn't register."
Club member Kristina Sandoval agreed.
"None of us are racists," she said.
The use of watermelon, ribs and fried chicken was innocent, she said.
"Everyone eats those foods, it's not a racial thing."
That's not how club member Acquanetta Warren -- a Fontana city councilwoman and an African American -- saw it.
"My daughter who is 16 was standing over my shoulder when I opened the e-mail, and her mouth dropped wide open," Warren said. "I actually turned the screen away and sent her to her room so she wouldn't see. I don't want to talk to anyone; I want a written apology so the public knows that this is not right and this is not representative of the way Republicans think."
She's known Fedele a long time and is shocked by the newsletter.
"When she didn't see a problem with this, I knew something was wrong," said Warren, who is also vice chairwoman of the California Republican Party for the Inland Empire. "This is an isolated, crazy thing. Our chairman is outraged. We just don't do this."
Indeed, Fedele drew a sharp reprimand from Ron Nehring, California Republican Party chairman.
"Any material that invokes issues related to race is absolutely unacceptable, tarnishes our party, diminishes the hard work of the tens of thousands of volunteers who are working hard every day for our candidates, and must be condemned," he said in a statement Thursday. "This material I've seen inspires nothing but divisiveness and hostility and has absolutely no place in this election, or any public discourse."
His statement also referred to an image on the Sacramento County GOP website this week showing Obama in a turban beside Osama bin Laden with the words: "The difference between Osama and Obama is just a little B.S." The site also exhorted members to "Waterboard Barack Obama."
"I called the chairman and said, 'You need to take that off your website,' and he took it off," said Hector Barajas, spokesman for the state GOP.
Fedele and the others at the Chaffey Community Republican club are volunteers and can't be fired. Aside from politics, they also do volunteer and charity work throughout the community.
Gary Ovitt, a county supervisor and chairman of the San Bernardino County Republican Party, is scheduled to meet with Fedele on Monday to discuss the incident.
"He is disgusted and appalled by it, and he believes it is blatantly racist and offensive no matter what the intent was," said Burt Southard, Ovitt's spokesman. "These are individual clubs. This one in particular may be one of the largest in the state and is one of the most active."
What these women should have done is to resign this organization and immediately announce their support for Obama. To continue to stay in such an odious organization gives credibility to it.
Talking about a moron who sends her anti-democratic emails:
For some reason, he has felt it necessary to describe abortion to me in great detail while claiming that all Democrats are for abortion. According to him, all Democrats are to be hated and we are evil ... evil ... evil people with no morality or decency at all. No Christian can be a Democrat. Obama is the anti-christ and if he had his way all pre-born babies would die a horrible death. And, so on and so on and so on.
Plus, he wanted me to know that he detests all Democrats. Obama, Al Gore, John Kerry, Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter ... etc. He names them one by one and declares his hatred for them. Then he tells me how McCain is a godly man with godly principles and as a Christian he must stand behind McCain.
I think this response to an article on Salon.com says it all for me:
Anything that comes back on McCain now, from his Keating Five disgrace to his publicly obscene berating of his current wife, to his having been engaged to Cindy while still married to Carol, who was apparently not as attractive after her terrible accident, to his cancerous jaw to his near-the-bottom-of-his-class legacy graduation from Annapolis, to his "command" experience spent in a POW cell, is all fair game and he's pulled it all over on himself.
The smear campaign went into high gear today. Obama is and WILL BE, better than this. Presidential? It's all about answering lies and idiocy with intelligence and calm.
I just love the self righteous hypocrisy of these people...
Any thoughts my conservative friends...
In Spanish, the term "without shame," is used to describe a person who makes an ass out of themselves even when they KNOW they are wrong or are being hypocritical. Grampa has probably forgotten most of the stupid things he has said and done, and the Librarian is probably just too stupid and shallow... Or maybe they are both just....
Oct. 7, 2008 - "My government is my worst enemy. I'm going to fight them with any means at hand."
This was former revolutionary terrorist Bill Ayers back in his old Weather Underground days, right? Imagine what Sarah Palin is going to do with this incendiary quote as she tears into Barack Obama this week.
Only one problem. The quote is from Joe Vogler, the raging anti-American who founded the Alaska Independence Party. Inconveniently for Palin, that's the very same secessionist party that her husband, Todd, belonged to for seven years and that she sent a shout-out to as Alaska governor earlier this year. ("Keep up the good work," Palin told AIP members. "And God bless you.")
I am dying to know what Boyd and my silent conservative readers think of that one....
McCain was beaten again, 0-2. My prediction.... The Gloves will come off, McCain and his surrogates will get uglier and uglier... It will not work, Obama will win.
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (CNN) -- Lawmakers investigating Gov. Sarah Palin's firing of her public safety commissioner accused the McCain-Palin campaign on Thursday of stonewalling the probe by helping witnesses refuse to comply with subpoenas.
If Ms. Palin is innocent, why would she not cooperate?
The Straight Talk Bullshit Express, goes deeper into the muck!
It's being widely reported on CNN today that Palin is saying that Obama is chums with a known terrorist. Ohhhhhhh here we go baby. Lets whip out the "Lets scare the shit out of America," routin! "Nie-GROW with a Ay-RAB name, and a Black Panther Paster aint enough for ya? Well jee Golly, maybe he is a terrorist sympathizer to boot, out to rape, ravage and pillage Hockey Moms everywhere! Thank God we got guns!"
What do I think about last night's debate? Well, this guy, and this lady do a damned good job of speaking to the issue.
and THIS guy....
WAS SERIOUSLY on point!
But what do I think? (Turn the Page)
I think that the people who say she did well last night are either delussional, liars, or had such horrible expectations of how she would perform, that anything less than her showing up and barking on stage, would be a good performance.
We have had EIGHT YEARS of an idiot in office. This woman is not qualified to be a city council-person, much less President of the United States. And yeah I said President, because any realistic person has got to acknowledge that there is a reasonable chance that she could end up in that office.
I have watched for over 6 years while conservatives and Republicans did anything they could to win, and DAMN the results of winning. It was all about the wind. It is good to see that some of them have come to their senses and are no longer drinking the coolaid, While some people are absolutely DRUNK on it.
ANYONE, and I repeat, ANYONE who watched that debate and saw anything more than a confused person reading from a script, and avoiding questions, deserves what they have gotten with Bush, and what they will SURELY get with McCain.
It is incredible to me that these people can continue to pigheadedly deny the obvious, BUSH has FUBARED our country. Conservatives like to make this all about Liberal Elitism. My Brother Boyd likes to call Obama an empty suite. The ONLY empty suite in this campaign wears an Elephant on their lapel(s). I have come to the conclusion that most conservatives just don't get it. They are incapable of admitting their error. They Have to be right, no matter HOW WRONG, they are.
Revenge of the Hockey Moms, or "What Alaskans REALLY think about Palin
I have a feeling that the lipstick is coming off the pig.
And Alaskans are now on point in pointing this out. Wonder why this did not receive more play?
Does not look like the "Hockey Moms," are buying it either.
Alaska Women Reject Palin rally was to be held outside on the lawn in front of the Loussac Library in midtown Anchorage. Home made signs were encouraged, and the idea was to make a statement that Sarah Palin does not speak for all Alaska women, or men. I had no idea what to expect.
The rally was organized by a small group of women, talking over coffee. It made me wonder what other things have started with small groups of women talking over coffee. It's probably an impressive list. These women hatched the plan, printed up flyers, posted them around town, and sent notices to local media outlets. One of those media outlets was KBYR radio, home of Eddie Burke, a long-time uber-conservative Anchorage talk show host. Turns out that Eddie Burke not only announced the rally, but called the peopl e who planned to attend the rally "a bunch of socialist baby-killing maggots," and read the home phone numbers of the organizers aloud over the air, urging listeners to call and tell them what they thought. The women, of course, received some nasty, harassing and threatening messages.
I felt a bit apprehensive. I'd been disappointed before by the turnout at other rallies. Basically, in Anchorage, if you can get 25 people to show up at an event, it's a success. So, I thought to myself, if we can actually get 100 people there that aren't sent by Eddie Burke, we'll be doing good. A real statement will have been made. I confess, I still had a mental image of 15 demonstrators surrounded by hundreds of menacing "socialist baby-killing maggot" haters.
It's a good thing I wasn't tailgating when I saw the crowd in front of the library or I would have ended up in somebody's trunk. When I got there, about 20 minutes early, t he lin e of sign wavers stretched the full length of the library grounds, along the edge of the road, 6 or 7 people deep! I could hardly find a place to park. I nabbed one of the last spots in the library lot, and as I got out of the car and started walking, people seemed to join in from every direction, carrying signs.
Never, have I seen anything like it in my 17 and a half years living in Anchorage. The organizers had someone walk the rally with a counter, and they clicked off well over 1400 people (not including the 90 counter-demonstrators). This was the biggest political rally ever, in the history of the state. I was absolutely stunned. The second most amazing thing is how many people honked and gave the thumbs up as they drove by. And even those that didn't honk looked wide-eyed and awe-struck at the huge crowd that was growing by the minute. This just doesn't happen here.
Then, the infamous Eddie Burke showed up. He tried to talk to the media, and was instantly surrounded by a group of 20 people who started shouting O-BA-MA so loud he couldn't be heard. Then passing cars started honking in a rhythmic pattern of 3, like the Obama chant, while the crowd cheered, hooted and waved their signs high.
So, if you've been doing the math Yes. The Alaska Women Reject Palin rally was significantly bigger than Palin's rally that got all the national media coverage! So take heart, sit back, and enjoy the photo gallery. Feel free to spread the pictures around to anyone who needs to know that Sarah Palin most definitely does not speak for all Alaskans. The citizens of Alaska, who know her best, have things to say.
And before one of my conservative friends come along and tell me that the pictures are photo-shopped, just go check out here.
This woman is going to be a faint heartbeat away from running our country...
GRAND RAPIDS, Michigan (CNN) -- Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin took questions with her running mate Wednesday night, offering at one point to play "stump the candidate" with a mostly friendly Michigan crowd.
Asked for "specific skills" she could cite to rebut critics who question her grasp of international affairs, she replied, "I am prepared."
"I have that confidence. I have that readiness," Palin said. "And if you want specifics with specific policies or countries, you can go ahead and ask me. You can play 'stump the candidate' if you want to. But we are ready to serve."
KING: Let's assemble the panel. In Cleveland, Paul Begala, the Democratic strategist, CNN political contributor and author of "Third Way, Why George W. Bush Loves John McCain." In Washington, Todd Harris, former McCain press secretary, a former communications director for Fred Thompson, a supporter of John McCain. Here in L.A., Stephanie Miller, host of "The Stephanie Miller Show." And in New York, Andrea Tantaros, Republican strategist, and a supporter of John McCain.
Folks, Sarah Palin is talking a little more. Tonight, she took some questions at a town hall meeting in Grand Rapids. Asked to address her foreign policy credentials. Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Governor Palin, there has been quite a bit of discussion about your perceived lack of foreign policy experience. And I want to give you your chance. If you could please respond to that criticism and give us specific skills that you think you have to bring to the White House to rebut that or mitigate that concern.
PALIN: Well, I think because I'm a Washington outsider that opponents are going to be looking for a whole lot of things that they can criticize and they can kind of try to beat the candidates here, who chose me as his partner, to kind of tear down the ticket. But as for foreign policy, you know, I think that I am prepared and I know that on January 20th, if we are so blessed as to be sworn into office as your president and vice president, certainly we'll be ready. I'll be ready. I have that confidence. I have that readiness.
And if you want specifics with specific policy or countries, go ahead and you can ask me. You can even play stump the candidate if you want to. But we are ready to serve.
(END VIDEO CLIP
KING: Todd Harris, forgive me, was that question answered?
TODD HARRIS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Look, Larry, I'll happily take her two years of executive experience as Governor of Alaska to the year and a half that Obama was in the Senate before he ran off to --
KING: The question was, Todd, why didn't she answer the question?
HARRIS: Well, look, if you're going to compare foreign policy experience, Larry, she's got --
KING: That wasn't the question. The question was, what is your foreign policy experience? She didn't ask about Barack, she asked about her.
HARRIS: Well, and I would say compared to Barack Obama, she's got just as much experience as he does. And in terms of our entire ticket, when you've got John McCain and Sarah Palin, in terms of their foreign policy experience, in terms of their ability to keep this country safe, I feel very comfortable with where they are. But I'll tell you, if the Democrats want to make this an election about experience, I think they're making a huge mistake.
KING: OK. The question was asked, though, by a person at a town hall meeting. Paul, what did you make of the answer?
PAUL BEGALA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: You know, it was a non- answer. But that's a step up from her previous answer, which was preposterous. Her previous answer was, you know, from parts of my state, you can see Russia. Well, you know, from my backyard I can see the moon, but I'm not an astro-physicist. It's silly.
And Todd makes a good point. This is not necessarily about her qualifications. It's about John McCain. What kind of man at age 72, after four bouts of cancer, knowing he's got a 50/50 chance of being president, chooses somebody to be potentially the vice president of the United States, potentially even the president, based on one meeting two years ago and one phone call? He had no idea whether she was qualified when he chose her. And now I think we're learning perhaps she's not.
KING: Andrea, John McCain picked up the baton for her. This was part of his answer at the same place. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MCCAIN: And I'm proud of her obvious knowledge of this nation's energy needs because that's a national security issue. I also know, if I might remind you, that she's commander of the Alaska National Guard.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Does that work, Andrea?
ANDREA TANTAROS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Larry, look, we know that Sarah Palin doesn't have as much experience as someone like John McCain on foreign affairs. We all know that. But, you know, you want to talk about policy, I think silly policy, as Paul pointed out, is meeting with terrorist leaders without any kind of precondition. So I would rather have a candidate at the top of the ticket who is stronger on foreign policy and has the right position than somebody who has the absolute wrong positions.
I mean, Democrats had the chance to nominate someone who was experienced. That was Hillary Clinton. And they didn't do so. They nominated someone who on day one has zero foreign policy experience. Like Todd said, if you want to get into this debate about foreign policy experience and experience in particular, you're on shaky ground.
KING: Of the four, Stephanie, doesn't Joe Biden have the most?
STEPHANIE MILLER, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: Yes, I'm so scared of that clip. I would like you to hold me, Larry. I hope you don't mind. I'm terrified. Like Paul Begala said, by the way, I saw on the ocean on the way here, so I would like to be secretary of the Navy. That is terrifying. She did not answer the question and that is completely untrue. Barack Obama has been in the Senate. He has worked on loose nukes legislation with Senator Lugar. It is preposterous to say he has no foreign policy experience.
That -- what you just saw is what is terrifying to people about Sarah Palin. She is completely unqualified.
KING: Todd, is this going to get rougher?
HARRIS: Oh, I think so. We still have 50 some days left and you're already seeing -- you know, there was a shameful new Obama ad that just went on the air today. It's in Spanish, so it's not getting a lot of coverage in the mainstream media. But it accuses, you know, John McCain of walking lock step with people like Rush Limbaugh on the issue of immigration. And it's just an outright lie and they feel like they can get away with it because it's in Spanish. People aren't paying attention. They're not going to get away with it.
Yes, Larry. On both sides this is going to get really ugly.
KING: A major Hillary Clinton supporter defects to McCain. We'll discuss it next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOE BIDEN (D), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Just as George Herbert Walker Bush was nicknamed Bush 41 and his son was known as Bush 43, John McCain, if he wins, will easily become known as Bush 44.
PALIN: Americans are tired of the old politics as usual. And that's why we need that reform to get there. We need to take the maverick of the Senate and put him in the White House.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(NEWS BREAK)
KING: A major Hillary Clinton supporter, lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild, who was a major involvement in the Hillary campaign, has jumped ship and endorsed John McCain. Paul, what do you make of that?
BEGALA: I think McCain's lucky to have her. I think she's a very bright person. I know her. She's a very capable person. But, you know, I don't think that she's bringing a lot of people with her. In other words, for every one person who say jumps on the Democratic party, there's probably four or five or six ten Republicans who are saying, I've had enough of Bush and I don't want a third term of Bush, who say that they want somebody who has engaged in the economy and understands it.
When McCain went out the other day and said the fundamentals of the economy are strong, that was the biggest gaffe I've seen in a presidential campaign since Gerald Ford back in 1976 said the Soviet Union didn't dominate Eastern Europe. The fundamentals of the economy are strong. That's what Herbert Hoover said. I wrote it down. He said, the fundamental business of this country is on a very sound and prosperous basis. He said that after the stock market crashed in 1929.
So if you liked Herbert Hoover, you're going to love George Bush and John McCain.
KING: Andrea, do you regard this as significant?
TANTAROS: Not so much. I think a lot of women have already moved over to John McCain's side. I think one of the reasons for that is they see how Democrats are vilifying Sarah Palin the way they did Hillary Clinton. A lot of this has nothing to do with issues. A lot of women are upset and they're angry and they're connecting with Palin on a gut level. Maybe it's not even Palin. Maybe they're just tired of the way the Democrats are behaving. I can't really blame them.
But I do think -- you know, I watched her interview with Campbell Brown tonight. She didn't really offer any too compelling of a reason. I couldn't really make out why she had made the switch. She didn't really discuss issues. So for her separately, I'm not really sure why she made the move, but other women, they're moving over.
KING: Stephanie, you know?
MILLER: I know because Lady Rothschild, the billionaire, who is married to another billionaire, said that Barack Obama is an elitist.
KING: That was the reason she gave?
MILLER: She said that he's an elitist and you know it when you see it.
TANTAROS: That's my point, I'm not seeing any kind of compelling reason for her specifically. But other women, yes.
KING: All right. Todd, Obama has --
TANTAROS: It's not a not a good sign for Democrats. Come on, Stephanie, you can't defend that.
Oh and on the Hillary supporter who went over, what a joke. She was about as tongue tied as Palin when asked WHY she considered Obama an elitist.
The chairman of the Republican Party in Macomb County Michigan, a key swing county in a key swing state, is planning to use a list of foreclosed homes to block people from voting in the upcoming election as part of the state GOP’s effort to challenge some voters on Election Day.
“We will have a list of foreclosed homes and will make sure people aren’t voting from those addresses,” party chairman James Carabelli told Michigan Messenger in a telephone interview earlier this week. He said the local party wanted to make sure that proper electoral procedures were followed.
State election rules allow parties to assign “election challengers” to polls to monitor the election. In addition to observing the poll workers, these volunteers can challenge the eligibility of any voter provided they “have a good reason to believe” that the person is not eligible to vote. One allowable reason is that the person is not a “true resident of the city or township.”
The Michigan Republicans’ planned use of foreclosure lists is apparently an attempt to challenge ineligible voters as not being “true residents.”
One expert questioned the legality of the tactic.
“You can’t challenge people without a factual basis for doing so,” said J. Gerald Hebert, a former voting rights litigator for the U.S. Justice Department who now runs the Campaign Legal Center, a Washington D.C.-based public-interest law firm. “I don’t think a foreclosure notice is sufficient basis for a challenge, because people often remain in their homes after foreclosure begins and sometimes are able to negotiate and refinance.”
Christian-right leaders and conservative stalwarts have praised the decision of Bristol Palin, the daughter of Governor Sarah Palin, to carry her child to term. She is 17 and conceived this child out of wedlock. Now imagine she wasn't the daughter of a prominent Republican politician but an average person. Now imagine she was black.
What do you think conservatives would have to say about her? 'Typical, urban youth with no sense of responsibility raised with loose morals who plans to depend on the state to take care of her child.' You know it. It's not within dispute. That's exactly what they would say.
Barack Obama has told everyone to lay off this because it is a personal, family matter. Yes, but it also has public policy ramifications. Governor Palin is for abstinence only education. Well, that obviously didn't work. Has she learned her lesson? Will she now amend her policy position on this matter given her personal record of failure in implementing this ridiculous stance?
Notice I am not blamingBristol. Quite the opposite. People like me are the ones that defend the Bristols of the world. It is conservatives like James Dobson, Rush Limbaugh and yes, Governor Palin who usually attack people who find themselves in Bristol's situation. They demand a dogmatic adherenceto moral strictures and chastise and belittle women who have children out of wedlock. Especially if they are women of color.
Which brings us back to Obama. Do you think the Republicans would lay off of Obama if his 17 year-old daughter had gotten pregnant out of wedlock? You know the answer to that question. Everyone does.
Funny thing is... They will never admit that they would hold Obama to a differn't standard.
* Palin recently said that the war in Iraq is "God's task." She's even admitted she hasn't thought about the war much—just last year she was quoted saying, "I've been so focused on state government, I haven't really focused much on the war in Iraq." 1, 2
* Palin has actively sought the support of the fringe Alaska Independence Party. Six months ago, Palin told members of the group—who advocate for a vote on secession from the union—to "keep up the good work" and "wished the party luck on what she called its 'inspiring convention.'" 3
* Palin wants to teach creationism in public schools. She hasn't made clear whether she thinks evolution is a fact.4
* Palin doesn't believe that humans contribute to global warming. Speaking about climate change, she said, "I'm not one though who would attribute it to being manmade." 5
* Palin has close ties to Big Oil. Her inauguration was even sponsored by BP. 6
* Palin is extremely anti-choice. She doesn't even support abortion in the case of rape or incest. 7
* Palin opposes comprehensive sex-ed in public schools. She's said she will only support abstinence-only approaches. 8
* As mayor, Palin tried to ban books from the library. Palin asked the library how she might go about banning books because some had inappropriate language in them—shocking the librarian, Mary Ellen Baker. According to Time, "news reports from the time show that Palin had threatened to fire Baker for not giving "full support" to the mayor." 9
* She DID support the Bridge to Nowhere (before she opposed it). Palin claimed that she said "thanks, but no thanks" to the infamous Bridge to Nowhere. But in 2006, Palin supported the project repeatedly, saying that Alaska should take advantage of earmarks "while our congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist." 10
If the old saying about the VP only being a, "heartbeat away," from the Presidency... Do we REALLY want something like this testing Johnny, "I cheated on my wife who waited on me while I sat in a stinking Vietnamese Hellhole, and then married Malibu Barbie," McCain's heart on a daily basis?
I mean it aint right... The Great Senator from Arizona might just keel over the first time she leans over his desk to "advise." him...
Comeon people, I don't have a sexist bone in my body. But it is SO clear why McCain chose Palin. McCain has been out for a PUMA vote since Hillary stepped off the stage. This pandering reached a fever pitch during the convention when these sleazoids were running ads from an alleged Hillary supporter, claiming to have switched to McCain.
This all culminated in a rush to find a female for the ticket. The pregnant daughter with her stomach hidden behind her baby brother, the interview a few months back where she questioned what a Vice President does... Her support for Obama's energy policy.... All coming out in less than a week, demonstrating that she went through one of the worst vetting processes in Presidential election history.
Now we watch the Republicans roll out their traditional doublespeak campaign strategy. It is hilarious watching in interview after interview as they roll out the talking points... But after eight years of Bush, the old talking points are not resonating. And the theme of Moral superiority... Eh, it needs to be rethought.
I really enjoyed the Republican Convention last night. I mean the hypocrisy is astounding. Did you see, "Roger That," the tribute to the Medal of Honor winning fallen SEAL? Did he go into battle wearing a RNC patch on his shoulder? I mean the way these people beat the patriotism drum, you would think that only Republicans are REAL Americans. Hilarious, if it wasnt so sick.
Now as for our VP Candidate.... Lets look at the latest.
First, she announced that her unmarried 17-year-old daughter, Bristol Palin, was pregnant. Among the other revelations, none of which seem to have shaken McCain's confidence or undermined her support among GOP delegates:
*A private attorney is authorized to spend $95,000 of state money to defend her against accusations of abuse of power.
*Palin sought pork-barrel projects for her city and state, contrary to her reformist image.
*Her husband once belonged to a fringe political group in Alaska, with some members supporting secession from the United States.
*She has acknowledged smoking marijuana in the past.
McCain's aides rejected suggestions from Democrats that her selection was a hurried, last-minute attempt to shake up the campaign and wrest female voters from Barack Obama. They insisted Palin was a finalist from the start.
But one senior Republican familiar with the search, who requested anonymity because McCain did not authorize the conversation, said Palin had virtually fallen from the radar. Only late in the summer, when McCain asked for more alternatives, was she made a finalist.
As conservatives closed ranks behind their like-minded foe of abortion, former presidential candidate Fred Thompson used his prime-time address to defend Palin on Tuesday.
"Some Washington pundits and media big shots are in a frenzy over the selection of a woman who has actually governed rather than just talked a good game on the Sunday talk shows and hit the Washington cocktail circuit," Thompson said.
When she was introduced as McCain's running mate last week, Palin portrayed herself as a political maverick in McCain's mold: "I've stood up to the old politics as usual, to the special interests, to the lobbyists, the big oil companies and the good old boy network," she said.
But Alaska's first female governor has at times benefited from Alaska's entrenched political system.
For one thing, Palin accepted at least $4,500 in campaign contributions in the same fundraising scheme at the center of a public corruption scandal that led to the indictment of Sen. Ted Stevens.
Seems like little Miss Morality, has some issues... Or maybe McCain just saw the picture over there on the side, I mean the Old guy obviously likes young women. Hehe...
Whatever the case, I am feeling more and more each day that if the Republicans manage to pull this one out, America will get what it deserves...
Well other than appearing to be a nice person from Alaska with some Far Right political views, she does not appear to have much qualification for the job other than she is a woman, which McCain seems to think is all that is required to win Hillary voters. Other than that, she just seems to be your typical RW extremist who does not believe in Global Warming, loves her guns, thinks a woman even if she is raped or the victim of incest, should be forced to carry an unwanted child to term... Yada, Yada... See the link below for more info. Disclaimer, it is from MoveON.org.
Didn't that ONE Black dude in the crowd at the Palin announcement look lonely?
I have to admit a crush on Amy Holmes though. She is one beautiful, intelligent, insightful black woman.
And on the LEFT, Donna Brazile is a beautiful and spectacularly intelligent woman as well.
And our Future First Lady is pretty damned spectacular too.
I have ALWAYS appreciated strong, intelligent women, and this week we have had a glorious exploration of them, from Hillary and Michelle, to the aforementioned Amy. And Bidden and McCain seem to have done well for themselves as well, even if Mrs. McCain just looks too much like a Stepford Wife.
Is it just me, or is it condescending as hell to use Hillary as your spokesperson all week, claim Obama is too inexperienced to be President, and then while you are a banana peel away from death by Natural Causes... to invite Mrs. Little House on the Prairie to be your Running mate, she whose, experience was mayor of bum fuck Alaska, population 25 if ya count the Polar Bears, before becoming Governor? Is it just me, or is HE Clearly pandering to the Suicide wing of the Hillariites, the anti abortion, Nuke the Gays, and the, "you can rip my gun and fishin' pole out of my cold dead hand," wing of the Right Winger Death Brigade... Well you got the picture!
Did any of you catch the so called, "Republican Response," last night on Larry King live? The Hypocrisy of these people are absolutely astounding....
Check out this exchange...
KING: Obama took aim at John McCain on a number of issues, including the economy.
Here's an example, Tucker, and you can comment.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: While Senator McCain was turning his sights to Iraq, just days after 9/11, I stood up and opposed this war, knowing that it would distract us from the real threats that we face.
When John McCain said we could just muddle through in Afghanistan, I argued for more resources and more troops to finish the fight against the terrorists who actually attacked us on 9/11 and made clear that we must take out Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants if we have them in our sights.
(CHEERS)
OBAMA: You know, John McCain likes to say that he'll follow bin Laden to the gates of hell. But he won't even follow him to the cave where he lives.
(CHEERS)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: I said that was about the economy. Obviously, it was not.
What do you make of that moment, Tucker?
BOUNDS: Well, Larry, I'm really glad that you played that clip, because I think it was a perfect demonstration of some of the frustrations that we're having.
You know, this speech was billed as a very historic speech and indeed it was a historic evening, but the speech didn't come through that way across the board. There were a lot of very negative parts to that speech and I think that that was one perfect demonstration.
For Barack Obama to suggest that John McCain doesn't have the commitment to track down Osama bin Laden, that we have had him in our sights, and decided that it wasn't important to bring Osama bin Laden to justice, is absurd.
KING: Well...
BOUNDS: It's ridiculous and it doesn't do any justice to the serious discourse that the American people deserve.
KING: But...
BOUNDS: It...
KING: Did we not center away from Afghanistan and go to Iraq?
BOUNDS: I think he suggested a little bit more than that, Larry. I think what he said, and in his own words, said that when I have him in our sights, I will take it to Osama bin Laden, suggesting that John McCain wouldn't do the same thing, which is to ignore all the things and all the policies that John McCain has pursued to bring terrorists to justice.
I think that that is boiling down. I think it's an insult to voters. I think that that's where we stand on higher ground going toward election day, because the truth is that this is going to come down to experience.
It's going to come down to a choice between -- do you believe everything Barack Obama is telling you? Do you believe this laundry list of promises about...
KING: OK.
OMG! And did you see the guys face? It was like, "I dont believe this crap myself, but after that speech I sure as hell better come up with something...
Then they roll out Larry Elder, whose only claim to fame is a Rush Limbaugh in Blackface radio show, and whos greatest aspiration in life is to be accepted by people like Limbaugh... and Ben Stein, who I am not sure if he is a comedian, Conservative Goliath, Economist, Speechwriter... or a game show host? Here's a guy who who thinks it's okay to proposition people for sex in the mensroom....
In 2007, Stein chastised the police and the GOP leadership for their response to the Larry Craig scandal. Stein said that Craig's sexuality should be a non-issue: "A party that believes in individual rights should be rallying to his defense, not making him walk the plank."'
It is just amazing to me that Conservatives can sit back and with a straight face... Make an issue on how well Obama speaks or the crowds he draws or who designed the stage on which he gave his nomination acceptance speech, while our country heads straight for the crapper? WOW! It blows the mind!
His speech was typical Obama, soaring, full of hope and deliverd with class...
In our country, I have found that this cooperation happens not because we agree on everything, but because behind all the false labels and false divisions and categories that define us; beyond all the petty bickering and point-scoring in Washington, Americans are a decent, generous, compassionate people, united by common challenges and common hopes.
And every so often, there are moments which call on that fundamental goodness to make this country great again.
So it was for that band of patriots who declared in a Philadelphia hall the formation of a more perfect union; and for all those who gave on the fields of Gettysburg and Antietam their last full measure of devotion to save that same union.
So it was for the Greatest Generation that conquered fear itself, and liberated a continent from tyranny, and made this country home to untold opportunity and prosperity.
So it was for the workers who stood out on the picket lines; the women who shattered glass ceilings; the children who braved a Selma bridge for freedom's cause.
So it has been for every generation that faced down the greatest challenges and the most improbable odds to leave their children a world that's better, and kinder, and more just.
And so it must be for us.
America, this is our moment. This is our time.
Our time to turn the page on the policies of the past. Our time to bring new energy and new ideas to the challenges we face. Our time to offer a new direction for this country that we love.
The journey will be difficult. The road will be long.
I face this challenge with profound humility, and knowledge of my own limitations.
But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people.
Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on Earth.
This was the moment - this was the time - when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves, and our highest ideals.
Thank you, Minnesota, God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.
And by all rights I could say I don't give a shit if a bunch of Rednecks would rather lose their shacks and their corn pone stills, rather than vote for Obama...
Reflecting their discomfort with Obama, nearly half of Kentucky Democrats said they would not support him in a November election against John McCain, again similar to the result in West Virginia. In Oregon, by contrast, only 12 percent said they wouldn't vote for Obama against McCain, as many as wouldn't support Clinton as the nominee.
As in West Virginia, among other states, there were indications of some racially motivated voting in Kentucky. Nearly two in 10 whites said race was an important factor in their vote, and nearly nine in 10 of them voted for Clinton. More strikingly, among those whites who called race a factor, just 29 percent said they'd support Obama if he's the nominee in November – the fewest to date in states where the question's been asked. Four in 10 said they'd support McCain; the rest wouldn't vote.
I have never lost my fascination with those die hards out there who would cut off their nose with a dull, rusty knife, rather than admit that Bush is a moron, or vote for a black candidate. These people are just STUPID, even the so called intellectuals among them. I used to argue with some of the conservative bloggers. Today I don't even bother... I mean why???
Let them vote for this poor old man. I used to respect McCain back in the days when he was actually a maverick, but he lost all of that somewhere on the road to becoming a candidate for the 2008 elections. Now he and Hillary are just two pathetic, old school politicians who will say anything to be elected.
I knew it when I saw, "Farmer John," say on CNN that Obama needs to, "Stop being so black!" That one in five Kentuckians admitted tonight (Based on CNN exit polling), that they would not vote for a black person... is an embarrassment for the state of Kentucky... I am just glad that the CNN folks stopped dancing around the issue and just admitted that there is an issue with Redneck America.
The Pennsylvania campaign, which produced yet another inconclusive result on Tuesday, was even meaner, more vacuous, more desperate, and more filled with pandering than the mean, vacuous, desperate, pander-filled contests that preceded it.
Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.
If nothing else, self interest should push her in that direction. Mrs. Clinton did not get the big win in Pennsylvania that she needed to challenge the calculus of the Democratic race. It is true that Senator Barack Obama outspent her 2-to-1. But Mrs. Clinton and her advisers should mainly blame themselves, because, as the political operatives say, they went heavily negative and ended up squandering a good part of what was once a 20-point lead.
On the eve of this crucial primary, Mrs. Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11. A Clinton television ad — torn right from Karl Rove’s playbook — evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war and the 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden. “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,” the narrator intoned.
If that was supposed to bolster Mrs. Clinton’s argument that she is the better prepared to be president in a dangerous world, she sent the opposite message on Tuesday morning by declaring in an interview on ABC News that if Iran attacked Israel while she were president: “We would be able to totally obliterate them.”
An Open Letter to Hillary
Dear Hillary:
There was a time when I was a die hard supporter of the Clintons. One of my most cherished personal belongings is a signed letter from your husband, in a response to a letter I sent him during the Lewinski crises.
While I never looked at Bill as, "the first black president," I did look at him as being a person who understood black people and had an affinity for them. He has shown himself to be just another patronizing politician who used his black support base when it suited his needs, and shows his true colours when it comes to this race.
I am not one of those who insist that you should abandon your dream and the race for the nomination, but I do think you have done more to damage the chances of either of you to win the election in November, than you truly understand.
I will not vote for John McCain in November, but if you manage to win the nomination by continuing the insincere, sometimes racist and always divisive politics that have taken you this far, you will not get my vote... And more importantly, I suspect that a big part of the Democratic base, including the youth, will show you their back in November. I certainly will, because in this case, I cant even hold my nose and vote for you.
I just saw that clown who founded BET, you know, the Network that used to show big booty rap videos 24/7, talking again about how Barack is not electable... Funny... I guess no one told the 35,000 people who showed up to hear him speak the other night...
I guess Hillary being $10,000,000 in the hole, while Barack has what $40,000,000 in the bank is an indication too, right? Please...
PUSH THE BUTTON, give a couple bucks, sit back tomorrow and lets see how Barack does.
Hillary Clinton's campaign says the candidate will stop telling the story of an uninsured pregnant woman who lost the baby and died after being denied medical care, following a hospital raising questions over its accuracy.
Clinton has frequently told the emotional story of the woman from rural Ohio since late February. In the speech, Clinton said the woman made minimum wage working at a local pizza restaurant, without insurance, when she became pregnant. Clinton said the woman ran into trouble and went to a hospital in a nearby county but was denied treatment because she couldn't afford a $100 payment.
Another lie...
But an Athens, Ohio hospital is questioning the accuracy of the story. While Clinton never named the hospital in her speech, the woman she was referring to was treated at O’Bleness Memorial Hospital in Athens. The hospital said the woman did indeed have insurance, and at least at their hospital was never turned away.
Hospital chief executive officer Rick Castrop in a statement said, “we reviewed the medical and patient accounts of the patient” after she was named in a newspaper story about Clinton’s stump speech. “There is no indication that she was ever denied medical care at any time, for any reason. We clearly reject any perception that we ever denied any care to this woman.”
Women of my generation have clearly lost their minds. Not that I can blame them, apparently being invisible and all. Now with Geraldine Ferraro making outrageous nut-jobber remarks she doesn't even seem to understand, and realizing our tragic generation was once proud of her as a "pioneer," you can see how deluded we are as well. Worse, only this week, a heroine of mine, Tina Brown, got it utterly wrong in Newsweek, saying all boomer women had to be for Hillary. Tina drank the victim Kool Aid.
So I want my peers to meet an original (begged for him to run) pro-Barack boomer 50-something careerist woman, who chose Barack above and beyond -- hear me, Geraldine, you utter moron -- from the best field of Democratic candidates we've had for years, many of whom I've been big fans of forever, for their various courageous stands on Central America (Dodd,) Iraq (Biden, Richardson and Kucinich.)
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But Hillary? Never liked her. Many of my best friends and favorite women have always felt the same. Something unsettling about her. A feminist? Maybe. But a compromised one, having risen to fame as the victim of Monica and having been famously on bimbo eruptions in her White House patrol. She was the destroyer of Paula Jones and Gennifer Flowers, the very blue collar ladies she is now being saved by. Kind of yucky, really. And hanging in there, through all the humiliation, and that making her a star. Left a bad taste in my mouth. Moving on.
What about my generation's desperation that there will never be another female candidate? Why? Is our gender about to die out? Do you all know something I don't? I can understand the 80-year-olds, I guess. But to me, Hillary Clinton is merely the first credible candidate, and the most flawed. And the only one not to rise on her own coattails, which is the real reason she doesn't appeal to both me and many young, yes, in their own way, feminists. And what about Claire McCaskill? She's great! And she just emerged this year! Why do we act like Hillary is our last great chance? How damaged and pathetic. I see fantastic women in their 30s all the time. To wit, Chelsea's undamaged generation. Not polarizing, like us ceiling crashers. I can sympathize, I am, too.
To be honest... I dont get it with women getting behind Hillary because she is a woman.... It is like me getting behind that idiot Alan Keyes, becuase he is black. They are both arrogant, self righteous people, with little more than their sense of entitlement, jaded politics and manufactured outrage to propel them.
Ladies.... You can and will do better, just wait until Michelle runs in 10 years or so...
I dont ever want to see Obama stoop to the levels of a very hypocritical Hillary Clinton, but I do want to see him fight back. If anything is to be learned from Kerry's defeat at the hands of Karl Rove and the Swift Boat Liars.... It is that you can not assume that the American public will seek the truth...
They wont....
And while I dont want to see Obama criticized for being just another one of the same old school politicians, I do want to see him stand up to Hillary and smack that smug, arrogant look off her face, otherwise we might have to do it in November, and in that case, we will be cutting off our own nose to SPITE our face!
...as he was tapping into his inner 19-year-old, Hillary Clinton was winning three states out of four on the charge that Obama just wasn't man enough to protect the country from its enemies, foreign and domestic. In her mockery of Obama for his pretty speeches and airy promises, Clinton's subtext was always clear: you may like the music, but this guy is nowhere near tough enough for this job. It was a charge made explicit by the Red Phone ad, whose very existence testified to her own toughness: I'm prepared to do anything, including hand John McCain a grenade, to win this thing. She played on the guilty conscience of the national press corps, recasting herself as the vilified victim and Obama as the bubble-wrapped ingenue.
But you don't rise in Chicago politics or come this far this fast in a national race by being soft, naive or scared of a fight. What has distinguished Obama in this campaign is how hard he has battled without appearing to do so. The message that moves the crowds at his rallies is made possible by many layers of calculation underneath. His mild manner belies fierce self-control. The frequent self-mocking conceals a stubborn self-confidence. He not only plays hard; he plays to win, rubs it in sometimes if he does and takes losses hard. "He is," says a friend who has known his share of strivers, "one of the most competitive people I've ever met."
And he knows what game he's playing now. Talking to TIME the morning after the latest primaries, he promised that there would be no double standards. "If she continues, as over the last week, to bring up real estate transactions and the character of our supporters who have provided donations to our campaign, then we will make certain that she has to answer those same questions with respect to herself, her husband and her campaign," he said.
people say Obama's words are just words...
but...
when was the last time "words" weren't important...???...
when was the last time a great leader didn't use words to lead...??...
when was the last time a person didn't use words to describe how they felt...?...
when was the last time "words" weren't empowering...?...
and we can all recall the last time "words" were used to divide us and install fear...
Bush used words to fear us into voting for him the second time around...
terror this...
terror that...
nuclear here...
weapons of mass destruction there...
and those words effected a lot of people's choices...
"enough is enough"...
let's rebuild...
let's change ourselves...
let's allow positivity to guide us...
let's take action....
let's activate our passion...
we are Americans....
and this is the first time in forever that someone running for president represents "US"...
some say this is all excitement...
I call it "proud to be an American"...
some say this whole Obama movement is "cult like"...
well...
if it comes across cult like...
then...
the cult is called America...
the Obama movement is connecting America.
and it has made "US" realize our importance...
the youth is excited and activated...
adults are passionate and motivated...
the elderly are proud to know the country they built is in safe hands...
we are one...
for too long politics has been corrupt...
separate from the American people...
with agendas that go against what the American people "need"...
education...
health...
safety...
jobs
etc...
politicians have spoken a different language...
making it so the youth and poor people feel as if voting was only for the wealthy and old people...
making "US" feel as if "we" had no voice...
making "US" feel powerless...
making it feel like if "we" did vote it wouldn't change anything...
but wait...
that did happen...
some of us voted, and it didn't change anything...
we were in the dark...
we had no voice...
we were powerless...
because America was not a united America...
and "they" spoke a different language...
and they had an agenda different from our well being...
correct me if I'm wrong... or speak up if I'm missing something...
we want education, health, safety, and good jobs...right???...
oh yeah...
and "a healthy planet to live on"...
but here we are...
in a war... poor education... poor health programs... the dollar is down... the planet, polluted...
the rich, richer... and the poor, struggling...
with sky high gas prices to top it all off...
and now even the rich aren't really rich internationally because our dollar is has fallen so far down...
in our slumber... a very small few got really rich...
because when you're sleeping...
"it's hard to change agendas"...
we know what happened in 2000 and 2004...
but in 2008...
it's different...
we are awake...
and there is a movement...
and "it's hard to change a movement"...
last time "we" didn't have a movement...
America wasn't united...
and now "United and "Standing"...for something...
we know the power of "US"...
and we have a person who represents the "U.S."...
And you know what... Hillary may win tomorrow, but in the end, we will lose. Becuase in her quest to win at any cost, Clinton is destroying the Democratic Party. Oh no, I am not suggesting that she should just roll up her roll and go home. But does it have to be so nasty? Well I will tell you what... If she manages to turn this around, she will lose in November, you can bank on it.
And no matter what happens, we will have the moment, and the movement that Barack started...
SAN ANTONIO, Texas (AP) -- Barack Obama's senior economic policy adviser privately told Canadian officials to view the debate in Ohio over trade as "political positioning," according to a memo obtained by The Associated Press that was rejected by the adviser.
Rival Hillary Clinton on Monday held up the memo as evidence of doublespeak.
The memo is the first documentation to emerge publicly out of the meeting between the adviser, Austan Goolsbee, and officials with the Canadian consulate in Chicago, but Goolsbee said it misinterprets what he told them.
The memo was written by Joseph DeMora, who works for the consulate and attended the meeting.
"Noting anxiety among many U.S. domestic audiences about the U.S. economic outlook, Goolsbee candidly acknowledged the protectionist sentiment that has emerged, particularly in the Midwest, during the primary campaign," the memo said.
"He cautioned that this messaging should not be taken out of context and should be viewed as more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans."
Goolsbee disputed the characterization from the conservative government official.
"This thing about 'it's more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans,' that's this guy's language," Goolsbee said of DeMora. "He's not quoting me.
"I certainly did not use that phrase in any way," he said.
The meeting was first reported last week by Canadian television network CTV, which cited unnamed sources as saying that Goolsbee assured the Canadians that Obama's tough talk on the North American Free Trade Agreement is just campaign rhetoric not to be taken seriously.
The Obama campaign and the Canadian embassy denied there was any inconsistency between what the candidate was saying publicly and what advisers were saying privately.
NAFTA is widely opposed in economically depressed Ohio, which holds its presidential primary Tuesday and is a key battleground between Obama and Clinton.
Both candidates said in a debate in Cleveland last week that they would renegotiate the trade agreement between the United States, Canada and Mexico, which is the largest trading partnership in the world, and threaten to pull out if it doesn't include more protections for workers and the environment.
Clinton said Monday that Obama's campaign gave the Canadians "the old wink-wink."
"I think that's the kind of difference between talk and action that I've been talking about," Clinton told reporters while campaigning in Ohio. "It raises questions about Senator Obama coming to Ohio and giving speeches against NAFTA."
The memo obtained by the AP was widely distributed within the Canadian government. It is more than 1,300 words and covers many topics that DeMora said were discussed in the February 8 "introductory meeting" between himself, Goolsbee and the consul general in Chicago, Georges Rioux.
Goolsbee "was frank in saying that the primary campaign has been necessarily domestically focused, particularly in the Midwest, and that much of the rhetoric that may be perceived to be protectionist is more reflective of political maneuvering than policy," the memo's introduction said.
"On NAFTA, Goolsbee suggested that Obama is less about fundamentally changing the agreement and more in favour of strengthening/clarifying language on labour mobility and environment and trying to establish these as more 'core' principles of the agreement."
Goolsbee said that sentence is true and consistent with Obama's position. But he said other portions of the memo were inaccurate.
"I think we should use the hammer of a potential opt-out as leverage to ensure that we actually get labor and environmental standards that are enforced," Obama said in the debate last week.
In a statement, the Canadian Embassy expressed regret on how the discussions have been interpreted.
"In the recent report produced by the Consulate General in Chicago, there was no intention to convey, in any way, that Senator Obama and his campaign team were taking a different position in public from views expressed in private, including about NAFTA," the statement said.
The embassy also said, "Canada will not interfere in this electoral process."
If I have to look at Hillary's SMUG, arrogant face for one more week, I think I will just shoot out my TV screens.
It's more than an election... It is a movement, and it makes me very, very proud to be an American!
The Black Eyed Peas frontman on Friday released another star-studded music video in tribute to the presidential campaign of the Democratic senator — this one is titled "We Are The Ones."
Backed by a simple vocal refrain of "O-BA-MA! O-BA-MA!," stars such as Jessica Alba, Ryan Phillippe, Kerry Washington, George Lopez and others explain why they support Obama while others such as Macy Gray croon the candidates' last name to the will.i.am-penned melody.
The song is a follow-up to his inspirational video "Yes We Can," a viral sensation that has garnered more than 5 million hits on YouTube.com alone. That song features Obama's voice from a New Hampshire concession speech set to will.i.am's music and melody, plus vocalizations of the speech from the likes of Scarlet Johansson, John Legend, Kate Walsh, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Herbie Hancock and other celebrity supporters. The chorus is one of Obama's campaign slogans: "Yes We Can."
The "We Are The Ones" video comes before Tuesday's Democratic primaries in Texas and Ohio. Obama is leading his rival, Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, in the delegate count for the nomination.
WASHINGTON - Early in Senator John McCain's first run for the White House eight years ago, waves of anxiety swept through his small circle of advisers.
A female lobbyist had been turning up with him at fund-raisers, in his offices and aboard a client's corporate jet. Convinced the relationship had become romantic, some of his top advisers intervened to protect the candidate from himself - instructing staff members to block the woman's access, privately warning her away and repeatedly confronting him, several people involved in the campaign said on the condition of anonymity.
When news organizations reported that Mr. McCain had written letters to government regulators on behalf of the lobbyist's clients, the former campaign associates said, some aides feared for a time that attention would fall on her involvement.
Mr. McCain, 71, and the lobbyist, Vicki Iseman, 40, both say they never had a romantic relationship. But to his advisers, even the appearance of a close bond with a lobbyist whose clients often had business before the Senate committee Mr. McCain led threatened the story of redemption and rectitude that defined his political identity.
It had been just a decade since an official favor for a friend with regulatory problems had nearly ended Mr. McCain's political career by ensnaring him in the Keating Five scandal. In the years that followed, he reinvented himself as the scourge of special interests, a crusader for stricter ethics and campaign finance rules, a man of honor chastened by a brush with shame.
But the concerns about Mr. McCain’s relationship with Ms. Iseman underscored an enduring paradox of his post-Keating career. Even as he has vowed to hold himself to the highest ethical standards, his confidence in his own integrity has sometimes seemed to blind him to potentially embarrassing conflicts of interest...
It aint about being aggressive. Its about being desperate.
(CNN) - Hillary Clinton and her presidential campaign Wednesday pounced on a recent television interview with a surrogate of Barack Obama who was unable to identify a single accomplishment in the Illinois Democrat's Senate record.
"My good friend Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones from Ohio represented me on one of the TV programs in the last day or two - some of you may have seen her," Clinton said during a speech at Hunter College in New York City Wednesday. "And she was on against someone representing my opponent and for the first time, actually, the host, asked the representative of my opponent to name one accomplishment."
The interview in question was with Tubbs Jones and Texas State Sen. Kirk Watson on MSNBC Tuesday night. Host Chris Matthews asked Watson, a supporter Obama, to name the Illinois senator's chief legislative accomplishments.
"Well, I am not going to be able to name you specific items of legislative accomplishment," Watson said.
Asked if it was a problem he was unable to name any of Obama's accomplishments, Watson said, "Well no I don't think it is. Because I think one of the things that Sen. Obama does is he inspires. He's able to lay out a vision, he's able to lay out solutions."
The Clinton campaign called the interview "Must See TV," and e-mailed a clip of it to reporters Wednesday morning - shortly before the New York Democrat mentioned it in her speech.
"That is all we’re asking," Clinton also said of the interview in her speech. "We’re asking to compare our records. We’re asking to compare our years of service. We’re asking to compare our ideas, our solutions."
Good thing you arent asking to compare your attitude, your class, your capacity to show some basic dignity. Do you ever think to thank the hard working people who went out to canvass for you or vote for you, in those states where you had your a$$ handed to you?
Do you every consider that your nasty politics risks tearning the Democratic party apart. Is it so important to you to win NOW, that you don't care if you lose in November.
Keep it coming Hillary. Your negative spin did not work before, and it is not working now. What it is doing is just showing what a SHREW you are, what a hateful insignificant, spoiled little soccer mom you are. What a LOSER you are.
Sen. Barack Obama said Monday that he doesn't think it's a big deal that he borrowed lines from his friend Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, although he probably should have given him credit.
Patrick said during his gubernatorial campaign a year and a half ago that words matter, like "I have a dream" and "all men are created equal."
Obama used the same lines Saturday night in Wisconsin. Obama said that Patrick suggested he use the lines to respond to Hillary Rodham Clinton's suggestion that Obama is more of a talker than a doer.
Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson accused Obama of plagiarizing Patrick, and that's particularly troubling since Obama's appeal is based in large part on his rhetorical skills.
"It raises questions about the premise of his candidacy," Wolfson told reporters in a conference call.
Obama, D-Ill., says that's going too far.
"Now hold on a second. Let's see — I've written two books, wrote most of my speeches," Obama told reporters at a news conference after touring a titanium plant.
"I'm happy to give Deval credit, as I give credit to a lot people for spurring all kinds of ideas," he said. "But I think that it is fair to say that everything that we've been doing in generating excitement and the interest that people have in the election is based on the core belief in me that we need change in America."
Asked whether he wished he would have given him credit given the criticism he's facing, Obama responded: "I was on the stump, and he had suggested that we use these lines. I thought they were good lines. I'm sure I should have — didn't this time."
"I really don't think this is too big of a deal," he said. He said he's noticed Clinton using his phrases sometimes, like "it's time to turn the page" and "fired up, ready to go."
Man when you cant win on ideas...
This is about as MANUFACTURED a scandal as there is... CHEAP POLITICAL Points....
Be careful Hillary.... If you do manage to win, you will need a whole lot of Black people to vote for you in November.
I got this bit of absolute nonesense last night from a Good friend. He had fallen victim to another idiotic URBAN LEGEND. With a difference.... Like this one, this email is designed specifically to HURT Senator Obama..
KENTUCKY - USA - Imperial Wizard, Ronald Edwards has stated that, "anything is better than Hillary Clinton."
White Christian Supremacist group the Ku Klux Klan has endorsed Barack Obama to be the next President of the United States of America.
Speaking from his Kentucky office in Dawson Springs, the Imperial Wizard exclaimed that anything or anyone is better than having that "crazy ass bitch" as President.
This is the first time in Klan history that any member of the KKK has ever publicly supported an African American candidate for the presidency.
KKK lodges all over America have been gathering and holding rallies supporting the black presidential candidate.
KKK members in Tennessee rally against Hillary Clinton and support Barack Obama
Grand Turk Cletus Monroe has also been very vocal about the election and has donated thousands of dollars to Obama's election fund.
"The boy's gonna do it. My Klan group has donated up to $250,000 to the Obama fund. Anything is better than Hillary Clinton. Hell I'll even adopt a black kid from Africa before I vote for Hillary."
"A few years back we were lynching negroes. Now we're gonna vote for one to be president of the US of motherfu**ing A, damn it! Anyone or anything is better than Hillary Clinton - anything!!"
Placards for Barack Obama have been put up around the Klan's Headquarters and the KKK have announced a television ad campaign to support the African American candidate.
Can you imagine the UPROAR and outrage if it were true? I can not blame my friend for sending out the email. Many of us are constantly looking for news on the Obama candidacy. He inspires and motivates us. But in a time where we are SO CLOSE, we must all be diligent about doing anything that will play into the hands of those who wish to end this candidacy BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY.
Yesterday, I was sitting in a bar in downtown San Jose, talking with a couple of guys from New York State. They were both white guys in their mid to late 30's, on their umpteenth trip to the Party Capital of the Americas. We had already done some serious drinking, eatin' and admirin', and finaly got down to talking politics. We shared our amazement at how the primaries had went the day before, and both of them expressed awe at what Obama had accomplished so far. Awe seems to be the word of the day, as Obama continues to generate excitement all across America. Especially after the epic spanking he gave Hillary on Tuesday. Yeah I know, the numbers were about even, but it was a trouncing none the less, considering that just a week ago, he was down by 20 points.
CHICAGO, Feb. 5 -- The crowds boggle the mind, and the fervor verges on the religious: "We believe!" the 17,000 people jamming Hartford's civic center started chanting Monday. There were 13,000 in Boise, lining up in the cold at daybreak in a state where only 5,000 voted in the Democratic caucuses four years ago. And 20,000 converging on a downtown square in Wilmington, Del., on Super Bowl Sunday, like nothing that small city had seen in years.
There is, without doubt, a nationwide wave building behind Sen. Barack Obama, one given new life by his win in South Carolina 10 days ago, his forceful victory speech and the Kennedy family endorsements that followed, and his campaign's record-shattering fundraising last month. But the Super Tuesday primaries offered a reminder of the distance Obama must yet travel and the time he needs -- but might not have -- to translate the euphoria of packed basketball arenas into hard numbers at the voting booth.
Obama fared better in the 22-state crush than appeared possible a couple weeks ago, when he was coming off two straight losses in Nevada and New Hampshire and facing the prospect of having to compete in a slew of states against a better-known candidate with widespread establishment backing.
Yet he fell well short of the clear win that some of his supporters could not help but fantasize about as he shot up in the polls in the past week. He lost in New Jersey and Massachusetts after appearing to threaten upsets in the two states, where Clinton maintained solid leads until recently.
The campaign seems aware of the challenge facing it. No longer does it allow itself to be lulled into complacency by the sight of big crowds, as it might have been in the closing days before the New Hampshire primary.
Trying to limit expectations in recent days, campaign officials and Obama himself said they were encouraged by the enthusiasm they were finding on the trail. But they also acknowledged that millions of other voters either had no interest in Obama or would not be able to see him, given the constraints of the compressed schedule of 22 states to cover in 10 days.
Obama directly acknowledged the need to broaden the campaign's reach in his speech to supporters here tonight, addressing "all those Americans who have yet to join this movement and yet still hunger for change.
"They know in their gut that we can do better than we're doing," he said. But "they are afraid, they've been taught to be cynical. They're doubtful it can be done. I'm here to say tonight to all those who harbor those doubts: We need you. We need you to help us through."
The campaign is betting on closing the gap further in the next week, when there are six primaries or caucuses, in places where Obama is fairly well-positioned: Maine, Louisiana, Washington state, Virginia, Maryland and the District. And the campaign says it will have the time to do the more intense kind of campaigning it prefers in big states that do not vote until next month, such as Ohio and Texas.
As a young black man raised during the 60's, I am very proud to see how Obama is impacting the nation.
Still, for all the campaign's caveats, there is a hard-to-explain disconnect between the muddled results and the near-delirious enthusiasm at Obama's recent rallies, which far exceeds anything at Clinton's smaller, more sedate events.
In Boise, Debbi Taylor, a 50-year-old court clerk, said she drove six hours through bad weather from Ogden, Utah, to see Obama. "When my kids are excited and vote early and e-mail me to tell me about it, that's change in the world. That's something," she said.
In Minneapolis, Kevin Worden, a Habitat for Humanity director, gawked at the sight of the city's basketball arena packed to the rafters. "It's a snowball running down a steep hill and picking up all along," he said.
And in St. Louis, some of the 20,000 who attended a rally at the city's domed football stadium marveled that the event had drawn far more people than the city's popular Mardi Gras celebration the same night.
"Look at these numbers!" Helen Douglas-Taylor, a teacher, exclaimed. "We're just ready as a nation for something fresh, and he's fresh."
Boise, Idaho? Ogden Utah? This is something special. It is a bit sad to see the old school Civil Rights leaders like Andy Young missing thier opportunities to usher in a new age, and instead maintaining loyalties to the old political machines that perhaps they are too indebted to... to sever. They will find that in the end, if Obama wins, and I expect he will... Their relevance in the 21sth Century will be limited, and they will have missed the very opportunity to see to fruition, the very things they fought for.
It is time for a change... And for the first time in my life, I DO BELIEVE that this change is possible.
Vote for Change, Vote for Obama!
"In the language of metaphor, Clinton is an essay, solid and reasoned; Obama is a poem, lyric and filled with possibility. Clinton would be a valuable and competent executive, but Obama matches her in substance and adds something that the nation has been missing far too long - a sense of aspiration." The Los Angeles Times
A lot of people are going to get this, and believe it... These people are the same West African Scammers that are running the other 419scams.
THE FONDATION DE FRANCE(FDF).
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http://www.fdf.org.
The Fondation De France(FDF) would like to notify you that you have
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development. The FDF, established 1977 by the Multi-Million groups and
now supported by the Economic Community for West Africa States
(ECOWAS),United Nations Organization (UNO) and the Europian U
nion (EU) was conceived with the objective of human growth,
educational, and community development.
In conjunction with the ECOWAS, UNO and the EU, We are giving out a
yearly donation of US.$.1,350,000.00 (One million, Three hundred and
Fifty thousand United states dollars only) each to 100 lucky
recipients. These specific Donations/Grants will be awarded to 100
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Based on the random selection exercise of internet websites and
millions of supermarket cash invoices worldwide, you were selected
amongst the lucky recipients to receive the award sum of
US$1,350,000.00 as charity donations/aid.
Please note that the release of your cash aid/donations is to be
administered by The Fairweather Base Foundation under delegated powers
fromthe UN Foundation. You are hereby advised to keep this whole
information confidential until your donations have been duly remitted
to you. There have been many cases of double and unqualified claim, due
to beneficiaries divulging details of donations to third parties.
You are required to contact the Executive Secretary below, for
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And if you dont believe me when I talk about how stupid these people are...
Only equally stupid, and GREEDY people actually lose money to these morons, but there are people who fight back.
Just remember one thing, you can not win a lottery you did not enter. There are no magical agencies from far away countries that are giving away millions to email addresses. If you believe crap like that, you deserve to be taken.
Oh yeah and you did not win the lottery either:
Attn Lucky Winner,
We are pleased to inform you that you have emerged a winner in the annual
draw of our Lottery International Programs. Your email address was selected
by our Electronic Random Selection System (ERSS) from an exclusive list of
250,000,000 e-mail addresses of individual and corporate bodies generated
from an internet resource database.No tickets were sold.
Your email address is identified with Batch Number: 444821545-NL/2007 and
Ticket Number: PP 3812 /2007-07 in Category "A" and your claims portfolio is
filed with Ref Number:MARKT 80 ES 9414.You are therefore to receive a cash
prize of $2,500,000.00. (Two Million Five Hundred Thousand United States
Dollars) from the total payout
CONGRATULATIONS!!!.
Your prize award has been insured under a bonded depository policy with
your e-mail address, and will be transferred to you upon meeting the claims
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To file for the processing of your prize sum payment, you are advised to
contact our Certified and Accredited claims agent for category "A" winners
with the information below:
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Name: Mr. Edward Lestra
Tel:+31 619 289 696
Email: info_marktclaims03@yahoo.no
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You are advice to provide him with the following information:
NOTE: All winnings must be claimed not later than 14 days, thereafter
unclaimed funds would be included in the next stake. Remember to quote your
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Yours Faithfully,
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PRIVACY STATEMENT
1. Personal and winning data provided by winners to THIS PROMO remains
known ONLY to the winner and INTERNATIONAL PROMOTIONAL PROGRAMS
ORGANISATION.
2a. All e-mail addresses, contact information, photographs and/or personal
data of winners SHALL NOT be published or disclosed on ANY public or in any
other public place or via any medium accessible to the
public.
2b. All e-mail addresses, contact information, photographs and/or personal
data of winners SHALL NOT be disclosed to or made available to any third
party or agent outside the claims office.
3. All e-mail addresses, contact information and/or personal data of
winners are kept in an isolated database server protected from any external
access using SSL locking on 6th level binary pharse. This data is made
accessible ONLY to MARKT INTERNATIONAL CYBER LOTTERY staff and authorized
agents directly involved with the processing of winners claims.
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Looks like this is spreading, I got it from CFLF. Thanks Michael! And like Michael, I have not blogged much the last year. A lot of it had to do with a general sense of malaise, I just wasn't into it., I also had the best business year I have ever had, which kept me out of the country a good part of last year. Barack has got me excited, perhaps more excited than I have been in a long time. No matter who gets the final nod as the Democratic Presidential Candidate, Barack Obama has taught us that, "yes we can!"
I am not sure if a MoveOn endorsement will help a Democratic candidate in the General Election, but this has the potential to be HUGE!
(CNN) MoveOn.org, the liberal political action committee that claims over 3 million members, endorsed
Barack Obama's White House bid Friday, the first time the group has made a primary endorsement.
The endorsement came after the group allowed its members to vote over the last two days on either Obama
or rival Hillary Clinton. Obama overwhelmingly beat the New York Democrat, 70 percent to 30 percent.
"Our members' endorsement of Sen. Obama is a clear call for a new America at this critical moment in
history," MoveOn.org's Executive Director Eli Pariser said. "Seven years of the disastrous policies of
the Bush Administration have left the country desperate for change. We need a president who will bring
to bear the strong leadership and vision required to end the war in Iraq, provide health care to every
American, deal with our climate crisis, and restore America’s standing in the world."
The group says it has 1.7 million members across the 22 states set to weigh in on Super Tuesday, and it
is now actively recruiting volunteers on Obama's behalf. It also boast an impressive Get out the Vote
campaign, in 2006 its members made 7 million calls on behalf of Democratic candidates.
Results from a Daily KOS poll taken this week show that Obama is really taking it to Clinton in progressive circles.
If you are interested in helping MoveOn to mobilize voters for Obama, click here, or here.
There is a feeling in the air these days... Hillary may win, but it is just incredible the effect Obama has. Even watching the crowds outside the debate the other night, the energy was obviously Obama energy.
Linda Pacifica: "I'm surprised more people don't see through [Obama]. People say his speeches inspire? All he did was bash the Clintons and act like a victim. I didn't see inspiration from that. From what I saw in the debates, he was throwing low blows. ... I think he is becoming more like Bush and his tactics when he was running -- deceitful, unethical, and dishonest."
WASHINGTON (CNN) - Standing before a capacity crowd of several thousand students Monday at American University, Sen. Edward Kennedy announced he is endorsing Sen. Barack Obama for president.
"Like you, we want a president who appeals to the hopes of those who still believe in the American dream," he said to screaming applause.
Kennedy said he has always planned to "support the candidate who inspires me, who inspires all of us, who can lift our vision and summon our hopes and renew our belief that our country's best days are still to come."
And picking up on Obama's central campaign theme, he said, "I feel change in the air. What about you?"
And that change does not bode well for Bill or Hillary. It has been rumored for weeks now that Bill Clinton's thinly veiled race politics were starting to irritate the party power structure. Well Kennedy's endorsement was about as strong a message as could be sent to the Clintons that, "it's not about them."
I got the sense today that I was watching History take place. Not exactly a new experience for a guy who has lived through the 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's and is now staring into a new century.
These words from Obama's South Carolina victory speech, seem to take on a new significance...
This election is about the past vs. the future. It's about whether we settle for the same divisions and distractions and drama that passes for politics today or whether we reach for a politics of common sense and innovation, a politics of shared sacrifice and shared prosperity.
There are those who will continue to tell us that we can't do this, that we can't have what we're looking for, that we can't have what we want, that we're peddling false hopes. But here is what I know. I know that when people say we can't overcome all the big money and influence in Washington, I think of that elderly woman who sent me a contribution the other day, an envelope that had a money order for $3.01 along with a verse of scripture tucked inside the envelope. So don't tell us change isn't possible. That woman knows change is possible.
When I hear the cynical talk that blacks and whites and Latinos can't join together and work together, I'm reminded of the Latino brothers and sisters I organized with and stood with and fought with side by side for jobs and justice on the streets of Chicago. So don't tell us change can't happen.
When I hear that we'll never overcome the racial divide in our politics, I think about that Republican woman who used to work for Strom Thurmond, who is now devoted to educating inner city-children and who went out into the streets of South Carolina and knocked on doors for this campaign. Don't tell me we can't change.
Yes, we can. Yes, we can change. Yes, we can.
Yes, we can heal this nation. Yes, we can seize our future. And as we leave this great state with a new wind at our backs and we take this journey across this great country, a country we love, with the message we carry from the plains of Iowa to the hills of New Hampshire, from the Nevada desert to the South Carolina coast, the same message we had when we were up and when we were down, that out of many, we are one; that while we breathe, we will hope.
And where we are met with cynicism and doubt and fear and those who tell us that we can't, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of the American people in three simple words - yes, we can.
A ringing endorsement from the family who helped to shape and create the new Democratic party, and who as much as anyone, symbolized HOPE in America. Teddy was a lion today. There can be no doubt about the sincerity of his endorsement or the impact it will have. No one can doubt now that Barack Obama is a real candidate, and for anyone who now chooses to vote for Hillary Clinton now with the excuse of, "He cant win."
Obama absolutely DESTROYED Hillary Clinton in tonight's South Carolina Primary. And all those Black Folk who still believe that the "time aint right," for a Black Person in the White House, all those who felt he could not win, all those who flet like he could not attract any white support of significance, have been soundly spanked and should just STFU!
You see Barak aint never been about being a BLACK candidate, and the staggering 50% of the young Whites who voted for him, are a testament to this.
Bill Clinton's race baiting, and Hillary's shrill attacks on Obama's charecter did little to hurt him and it appears may have significantly hurt her. You all know how much of a Bill Clinton fan I was before this election. Without becoming to racially focussed myself, I can truly say that I have lost all respect for BOTH the Clintons.
Tonight Obama made another spectacular speech, the following was the part that hit me the hardest. I am really buying in to his vision.
So understand this, South Carolina. The choice in this election is not between regions or religions or genders. It's not about rich vs. poor, young vs. old. And it is not about black vs. white.
This election is about the past vs. the future. It's about whether we settle for the same divisions and distractions and drama that passes for politics today or whether we reach for a politics of common sense and innovation, a politics of shared sacrifice and shared prosperity.
There are those who will continue to tell us that we can't do this, that we can't have what we're looking for, that we can't have what we want, that we're peddling false hopes. But here is what I know. I know that when people say we can't overcome all the big money and influence in Washington, I think of that elderly woman who sent me a contribution the other day, an envelope that had a money order for $3.01 along with a verse of scripture tucked inside the envelope. So don't tell us change isn't possible. That woman knows change is possible.
When I hear the cynical talk that blacks and whites and Latinos can't join together and work together, I'm reminded of the Latino brothers and sisters I organized with and stood with and fought with side by side for jobs and justice on the streets of Chicago. So don't tell us change can't happen.
When I hear that we'll never overcome the racial divide in our politics, I think about that Republican woman who used to work for Strom Thurmond, who is now devoted to educating inner city-children and who went out into the streets of South Carolina and knocked on doors for this campaign. Don't tell me we can't change.
Yes, we can. Yes, we can change. Yes, we can.
Yes, we can heal this nation. Yes, we can seize our future. And as we leave this great state with a new wind at our backs and we take this journey across this great country, a country we love, with the message we carry from the plains of Iowa to the hills of New Hampshire, from the Nevada desert to the South Carolina coast, the same message we had when we were up and when we were down, that out of many, we are one; that while we breath, we will hope.
And where we are met with cynicism and doubt and fear and those who tell us that we can't, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of the American people in three simple words -- yes, we can.
I started to believe after IOWA, and then I watched the attacks beging, the nasty gutter politics that Clinton himself survived, now turned against a fellow Democrat. Tonight I saw a another little piece of history. With the victory came additional news, perhaps even more powerful in a symbolic way...The endorsement of Caroline Kennedy....
OVER the years, I've been deeply moved by the people who've told me they wished they could feel inspired and hopeful about America the way people did when my father was president. This sense is even more profound today. That is why I am supporting a presidential candidate in the Democratic primaries, Barack Obama.
My reasons are patriotic, political and personal, and the three are intertwined. All my life, people have told me that my father changed their lives, that they got involved in public service or politics because he asked them to. And the generation he inspired has passed that spirit on to its children. I meet young people who were born long after John F. Kennedy was president, yet who ask me how to live out his ideals.
Sometimes it takes a while to recognize that someone has a special ability to get us to believe in ourselves, to tie that belief to our highest ideals and imagine that together we can do great things. In those rare moments, when such a person comes along, we need to put aside our plans and reach for what we know is possible.
We have that kind of opportunity with Senator Obama. It isn’t that the other candidates are not experienced or knowledgeable. But this year, that may not be enough. We need a change in the leadership of this country just as we did in 1960.
Most of us would prefer to base our voting decision on policy differences. However, the candidates' goals are similar. They have all laid out detailed plans on everything from strengthening our middle class to investing in early childhood education. So qualities of leadership, character and judgment play a larger role than usual.
Senator Obama has demonstrated these qualities throughout his more than two decades of public service, not just in the United States Senate but in Illinois, where he helped turn around struggling communities, taught constitutional law and was an elected state official for eight years. And Senator Obama is showing the same qualities today. He has built a movement that is changing the face of politics in this country, and he has demonstrated a special gift for inspiring young people known for a willingness to volunteer, but an aversion to politics to become engaged in the political process.
I could have left out all of the above after the title, the title says it all, doesn't it.
It is one thing for members of the Obama campaign, or gushing supporters to compare him with JFK, or Bobby. It is entirely another story for the daughter of one of our most beloved Presidents to do so. For black people.... who have iconized the Kennedy's for almost 50 years, this endorsement should be the final statement that says.... "YES WE CAN!"
I knew this all along... And I have a feeling that a lot of the people who voted for Bush, did too, and they just didn't care. It FELT too damned good to be Large and in Charge! These are the same people who called many of us traitors, and yet they are the ones who gleefully welcomed a Forrest Gump Presidency, a war based on Lie and Lie, and a ruined economy, congrats guys, you must feel real proud of yourself.
The Clintons “have introduced the politics of personal destruction” to the presidential race and they “bear responsibility for cheapening the tone of the contest.” Um hmmmm... And we are just now figuring this out. Truth be known, the Clintons, mainly Bill, have poisoned the well so badly at this point that neither the Clinton's nor Obama will have a chance of winning...
Bill Clinton was not the first black President, and I am sick of this stupid question. Its about as STUPID as this picture...
Man it hurts me to say this, becuase I loved Clinton, but what he and his wife are doing in this election shows just how jaded and hypocritical they truly are. They are on the path to destroying ANY chance of Democrats winning the Presidency... Clinton has shown his TRUE colors for the last couple of months. And oh, Wolf and Genie Most, the commentary you put up today was ridiculous and racist.
Is the media trying to make this a two way thing. The Clintons started this, and continue in a desperate and destructive pattern of attacks against Obama. The media, including Time Magazine, make this a two way thing, when it is pretty clear that Obama has done little more than defend himself.
Whenever longtime Democrats gather to note how the chemistry and calculus of the 2008 campaign seem to favor their party this year, one or another will always add some version of the following: "Yeah, but we could screw this up before it's over."
After the past few days, the pertinent question to ask is, is the crack-up happening already? Far-fetched as it would have seemed a month ago, the seeds of self-destruction are being planted in the war of coded words about race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. The bickering has exploded in the space of a week into Topic A in the Democratic race, supplanting for the moment the war and the economy and health care — and shows no sign of a quick resolution.
So yes, are the Democrats about to screw it up yet again?
Both campaigns are stoking this fire — and worrying at the same time about what this could do to them in the fall. They ought to be concerned: Keep this up and neither candidate may be able to marshal the votes from the various corners of the Democratic coalition that he or she will need in the fall. As pollster Andrew Kohut has noted, a party which found that it had at least two candidates who were seen as widely "acceptable" to its various factions just a few weeks ago could soon find that happy consensus has evaporated.
The mess began —as these things almost always do — in a normal tit for tat between the candidates. After Obama was poised to surge past Clinton after Iowa, Clinton charged that Obama was raising "false hopes" with his soaring rhetoric that emphasized ends over means. Obama skewered Clinton right back in New Hampshire, asking where the nation would be if both JFK — in making a manned mission to the moon a goal — or Martin Luther King Jr. (in his 1963 Lincoln Memorial speech) had instead shut down their visions and told America they were simply too hard to achieve. Delivered with humor and always to soaring applause, Obama's was a devastating rejoinder.
But then Clinton came back and, far less artfully, said that King's visions were great, but it took an experienced politician like Lyndon Johnson to get them enacted. At the very least, Clinton had equated the sometimes crass master of the legislative backroom with one of America's patron saints. (The real problem is that Clinton seemed to put LBJ on a pedestal higher than King's.) That was probably not her intention, but neither was this her best example in the deeds-not-words crusade she was on. In any case, at that point, things began to unravel.
Now we have both campaigns accusing the other of stoking the fire, of deliberately misunderstanding the other (and there is a lot of that going on, here, too) and both sides have had their various lieutenants and seconds trying to "help" explain things, which almost always makes things worse. That much was clear over the weekend, when BET founder Bob Johnson, in trying to defend the Clintons, appeared to all the world to be bringing up Obama's admitted history of drug use (Johnson later claimed he was actually referring to Obama's history as a community organizer, a laughable explanation that only dug the hole deeper.)
I have always like Jack Cafferty, and it is pretty clear that he has been moved by Obama's campaign. He was one of the first journalist I have seen to point out that this has been mostly a Clinton thing, while Wolf Blitzer appears to fall all over himself trying to make this a 50/50 thing.
Jack wrote an excellent piece on the subject on his blog:
For one brief moment after Barack Obama won the Iowa caucuses, it looked like we might have actually outgrown our petty racial bickering in this country.
It didn’t matter that Obama had run a dignified, intelligent campaign without so much as the mention of race. The people who have an interest in keeping the country divided along racial lines couldn’t wait to get started. Do you realize how many morons would go through the rest of their lives ignored and irrelevant if we could ever get over the racial garbage?
Now the racial fires are burning brightly once again.
The last two days, we’ve seen the Obama and Clinton camps embroiled in accusations that are steeped in race. Hillary Clinton is defending her recent remarks on civil rights. She’s suggesting that Obama’s campaign distorted what she said in an effort to inject race into the contest.
For his part, Obama has dismissed Clinton’s suggestion, saying “the notion that somehow this is our doing is ludicrous.” Obama is also describing her earlier comments about the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. as “unfortunate” and “ill-advised.”
The Clintons find themselves in unusual territory here, when you consider that Bill Clinton was once dubbed “America’s first black president.”
I was one of Bill Clinton's biggest supporters, and while I never went to far as to call him "The first black president," I did believe that Clinton had a special affinity for African Americans. Now as I look back across the years, I realize that that was all a bit of careful imaging. Bill is one of those individuals, and it is proven by his fairy tale comment, who is fine with Black Folk as long as they dont try and rise above their station.
Hillary will likely win the nomination, and she will get STOMPED by whoever survives the Republican wars. You see, Republicans are real good at the same kind of Piolitics that Hillary is playing right now, HELL you might even say theyinvented it.
I had hoped that this would not happen, and that Obama would not get dragged into this kind of conversation. The big news now is about old school politics and how the Clintons especially will use surrogates, especially BLACK ones, to try and plant the seeds of doubt about Obama.
Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama have become embroiled in racially tinged disputes as large numbers of black voters prepare to get their first say in the Democratic presidential campaign.
The candidates and their surrogates are heating up their rhetoric, and it could prove to be combustible beyond South Carolina's Jan. 26 primary.
Clinton, on defense over comments that she and her husband made regarding Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy and Obama's fitness for the White House, tried to turn the tables on her top primary rival. She accused his campaign of looking to score political points by distorting their words.
Hillary Clinton had said King's dream of racial equality was realized only when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, while Bill Clinton said Illinois Sen. Obama was telling a "fairy tale" about his opposition to the Iraq war. Black leaders have criticized their comments, and Obama said Sunday her comment about King was "ill-advised."
"I think it offended some folks who felt that somehow diminished King's role in bringing about the Civil Rights Act," he told reporters on a conference call. "She is free to explain that, but the notion that somehow this is our doing is ludicrous."
As evidence the Obama campaign had pushed the story, Clinton advisers pointed to a memo written by an Obama staffer compiling examples of comments by Clinton and her surrogates that could be construed as racially insensitive. The memo later surfaced on some political Web sites.
"This is an unfortunate story line the Obama campaign has pushed very successfully," the former first lady said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press." "I don't think this campaign is about gender, and I sure hope it's not about race."
Clinton taped the show before appearances in South Carolina, where at least half the primary voters are expected to be black. On Monday, she planned to attend a union event honoring King's legacy in New York City.
But no sooner had Clinton said she hoped the campaign would not be about race than it got even more heated. A prominent black Clinton supporter, Black Entertainment Television founder Bob Johnson, criticized Obama and seemed to refer to his acknowledged teenage drug use while introducing Clinton at her next event.
"To me, as an African-American, I am frankly insulted the Obama campaign would imply that we are so stupid that we would think Hillary and Bill Clinton, who have been deeply and emotionally involved in black issues — when Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood; I won't say what he was doing, but he said it in his book — when they have been involved," Johnson said.
Jay Tea has some interesting onsite analysis of yesterdays primary results. Read the entire thing.
Well, wasn't that... um... interesting.
I gotta admit I am absolutely gobsmacked over the results of New Hampshire's primary. I did not expect the results we got.
My gut said that we would not go for Hillary Clinton. I thought we'd kick her sorry ass to the curb. But that vapid twit I met Saturday night apparently showed up with all her insipid little friends and voted with their... well, it wasn't their overly-perforated heads, that's all I'll say.
The vibe I got right up through the primary was that Obama would take it running away. But the morning of the primary, I heard one of those babbling idiots call in a local talk show and ask if it was true that Obama was a secret Muslim who took his Senate oath of office on a Koran and all that bullshit. The host immediately went to Snopes and read the entry, but somehow missed the "false" at the top and presented it as all true. I called in and howled in protest, and she did correct it after the commercial break.
But I think that the morons and assholes who are pushing these rumors did their damage here in New Hampshire. Of the four top Democrats, I thought we'd see through the guises of Hillary Clinton and John Edwards and send their asses packing. I figured Obama and Richardson would do better.
I guess there's still some life in the Clinton political machine.
What I think happened is that Hillary won over enough Female voters with "the crying game," and McCain's siphoning of independents, led to Obama's loss.
Obama lost, but you know what.... The real losers are the Clintons. They have shown their ass in the last couple of days, while he has shown nothing but class. Even in defeat, the man has class. And you know what, this speech is unbelievable! The man is awesome...
"The real gamble in this election is to do the same things, with the same folks, playing the same games over and over and over again and somehow expect a different result," he said. "That is a gamble we cannot afford, that is a risk we cannot take. Not this time. Not now. It is time to turn the page."
If the New Hampshire Democratic Party’s 100 Club dinner is any bell weather – Barack Obama will handily win here. When Obama, the dinner’s last speaker, took the stage the crowd surged forward chanting “O-bam-a” and “Fired Up, Ready to Go!” So many people pressed toward the stage that an announcer asked people to “please take their seats for safety concerns.”
By comparison Hillary was twice booed. The first time was when she said she has always and will continue to work for "change for you. The audience, particularly from Obama supporters (they were waving Obama signs) let out a noise that sounded like a thousand people collectively groaning. The second time came a few minutes later when Clinton said: "The there are two big questions for voters in New Hampshire. One is: who will be ready to lead from day one? The second," and here Clinton was forced to pause as boos from the crowd mixed with cheers from her own supporters. "Is who can we nominate who will go the distance against the Republicans?”
I hear that Bill wants to go Negative in a big way... At this stage of the game, I think that would be a BIG mistake. In fact, I could not have said it better than this commentator to the above article...
I think Hillary did a good job; but the huge bounce Iowa got is in the contrast Obama provided. He talked about creating a new coalition and a new majority: that's heady stuff. And when he laid out his definition of hope; that was powerful.
Clinton is apparently trying to label him a flip-flopper for not proposing universal single-payer health care; despite the fact that its an impossible sell. And she's trying to make him out to be the boogeyman of the democratic party.
And its hard to re-define Obama when he's done a good job defining himself.
I think the Clinton's will lose New Hampshire if the debates don't make news against Obama. And there is a palpable feeling that the Clinton camp has an uphill climb. They need to go nuclear on Obama; and the risk of doing so is huge for both Hillary AND Bill.
I have been fortunate enough to have lived through a great deal of history.... 50 years of wars, scientific breakthroughs and amazing political events... Tonight, I witnessed another piece of important history, and I was moved to tears by the experience of it. Before tonight, I was not even an Obama fan... It was all too cliche for me... Me, Progressive, African American Blogger, wasnt it expected that I would be part of Obama Nation? Well I wasnt. I felt that Joe Bidden was the best hope for America, and for getting some sanity back into the White House...
I am saddened that Bidden may chose to leave the race, but MY GOD, Obama had a moment tonight... A moment that spoke to MOST OF US.... A moment that reminded us that there have been giants who have strode across the stage of American Politics, and we may have just seen the birth of one tonight.
My wife and son are far to Costa Rican to understand the real significance of what happened tonight. I insisted that they sit down and watch... They did not, "get it..." But it doesnt matter. I have a feeling that a whole lot of people did, and they are starting to "Believe in Change!"
I know I am, and part of me is now HOPING that he can take it all the way...
The Huffington Post has an interesting article on the Clinton/Obamma war.
WASHINGTON, Iowa — Barack Obama suggested Friday that he has more foreign policy experts from the Clinton administration backing his candidacy over Hillary Rodham Clinton's, but lists provided by both campaigns show hers is nearly twice as long.
Clinton's campaign provided more than 80 names of her husband's former foreign policy advisers who are publicly backing her, while Obama's campaign provided 47.
Asked how Obama backs up the claim of greater support, campaign spokesman Bill Burton said the senator was referring to an article that ran in The New York Times Magazine last month, which quoted an anonymous foreign policy expert saying most of the community was backing Obama.
Obama's comment, at a campaign stop with just 13 days until Iowa's presidential caucus, came in response to a questioner who asked him to compare his foreign policy vision with the former first lady's.
My response to this is quite simple... WHO CARES? Those are the same advisors that sat idle during the Rwandan Genocide, and Black Hawk Down fiasco... I would love, as an African American to Support Obama, and Hillary does nothing for me. But I wish both of them had taken a pass and let Joe Biden lead the Democratic ticket..
Even the other candidates seem to agree... Amen to Joe Biden.
No matter how many times Hillary uses Surrogates, and tries to talk down Obama, the truth will come through. Obama scares the hell out of Hillary, and rightfully so. What she does not realize is that smear campaigns will lose her the African American vote. I am not even an Obama partisan and I am pissed off.
Jay Tea of Wizbang is in an uproar over a post by Oliver on Mormonism. The post is under Jay's "Asshat," category. Well add me to the Hat Brigade. Unlike Jay though, I have lived in Salt Lake City, and have many Mormon friends. What this gentleman says about the CULT of Joseph Smith,
Is absolutely true. Most of the Mormons I have known are far more likely to ask you about Joseph Smith than Jesus Christ. The Guy in the above video destroys the two "missionaries." I respect Mormons as good, decent people, who really believe the nonsense they have been taught. I dont care what religion Mitt Romney adheres to, but I do wonder about a guy who believes that a huge civilization of Israelites existed in North and South America thousands of years ago, and that Upstate New York was the site of battles involving millions of warriors...Or that there are Magic undies that protect Mormons...
Although on that point it could be a good thing, think of how much money we would save from the secret service budget. Hell, I think Mormons should share their magic drawers with all of us... Just think we would never have to worry about terrorism again!
The fact is that Joseph Smith stole a bunch of the Masonic rituals and converted them for use by his church.
Any Master Mason will recognize quite a bit from the following video.
Not to mention the fact that Joseph Smith died hoping that a Mason would save his ass...
Smith was a disgrace to the Masonic Brotherhood of which I belong, and his church is nothing more than a cheap copy of freemasonry, and of my religion...
His best debate performance so far. Stood up to sustained questioning on his alleged inexperience, which led the first seven minutes of the event, without losing his cool or backing down. He even made a well-received joke about preparing for the debate by riding the bumper cars at the Iowa State Fair. Tripled down on standing up for his recent controversial foreign policy statements on nuclear weapons, meeting with foreign leaders, and hunting al Qaeda, with firmness and good humor. Drew audience applause for again playing the I-opposed-the-Iraq-War card to tout his judgment. Sounded almost (Bill) Clintonesque in talking about trade and merit pay for teachers. Displayed the confidence of a leader.
I did not get a chance to see this debate, but have heard all day that he clearly won it... Good for him.
Republican presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani said Friday that he misspoke when he said he spent as much time, if not more, at ground zero exposed to the same health risks as workers combing the site after the Sept. 11 attacks.
"I think I could have said it better," he told nationally syndicated radio host Mike Gallagher. "You know, what I was saying was, 'I'm there with you.'"
The former New York mayor upset some firefighters and police officers when he said Thursday in Cincinnati that he was at ground zero "as often, if not more, than most of the workers."
"I was there working with them. I was exposed to exactly the same things they were exposed to. So in that sense, I'm one of them," he told reporters at a Los Angeles Dodgers-Cincinnati Reds baseball game.
Fire and police officials responded angrily, saying Giuliani did not do the same work as those involved in the rescue, recovery and cleanup from the 2001 terrorist attacks, which left many workers sick and injured.
On Friday, Giuliani said he was trying to show his concern for the workers' health.
"What I was trying to say yesterday is that I empathize with them, because I feel like I have that same risk," he said.
"There were people there less than me, people on my staff, who already have had serious health consequences, and they weren't there as often as I was," Giuliani said, "but I wasn't trying to suggest a competition of any kind, which is the way it come across."
Giuliani's explanation further angered his ground zero critics, prompting several to issue a statement demanding an apology.
"He is such a liar, because the only time he was down there was for photo ops with celebrities, with politicians, with diplomats," said deputy fire chief Jimmy Riches, who spent months digging for his firefighter son.
"On 9/11 all he did was run. He got that soot on him, and I don't think he's taken a shower since."
Harold Schaitberger, president of the International Association of Fire Fighters, a union that fiercely opposes Giuliani, said he doubted Giuliani misspoke. "I think he was simply showing what his true character is - a self-absorbed, self-deluded promoter who got caught and is now just simply trying to backtrack," Schaitberger said.
Emphasis mine... Maybe we will be spared another Republican Convention draped in American flags and served up with the blood of true heroes, while people like Guilliani, and Bush utilize heroism as their very own personal campaign tools...
The Republican Party’s putative 2008 nominee St. John McCain has hired Terry Nelson as his campaign manager.
In the Tennessee senate campaign this year, Nelson produced the racist television commercial for Sen.-Elect Bob Corker that depicted a blonde actress who says she met Corker’s opponent, former Rep. Harold Ford, who is black, at a "Playboy party." Toward the end of the ad, she whispers seductively, "Harold, call me."
Pensito
McCain just lost my vote... Hehe...
It's going to be real hard to find a blonde who can claim she met Obama at a party.
If the old saying about the VP only being a, "heartbeat away," from the Presidency... Do we REALLY want something like this testing Johnny, "I cheated on my wife who waited on me while I sat in a stinking Vietnamese Hellhole, and then married Malibu Barbie," McCain's heart on a daily basis?
I really enjoyed the Republican Convention last night. I mean the hypocrisy is astounding. Did you see, "Roger That," the tribute to the Medal of Honor winning fallen SEAL? Did he go into battle wearing a RNC patch on his shoulder? I mean the way these people beat the patriotism drum, you would think that only Republicans are REAL Americans. Hilarious, if it wasnt so sick.
