The Irony of Obama

From an article entitled "GOP Trying to Scare Voters" in regard to Obama's townhall meeting in Springfield, MO on July 30, 2008:

Democrat Barack Obama, the first black candidate with a shot at winning the White House, says John McCain and his Republican allies will try to scare them by saying Obama "doesn't look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills."Here

From Obama's speech in Berlin on July 24, 2008:

"I know that I don’t look like the Americans who’ve previously spoken in this great city. The journey that led me here is improbable. My mother was born in the heartland of America, but my father grew up herding goats in Kenya. His father – my grandfather – was a cook, a domestic servant to the British". Here

So. It is okay for Obama to exploit his race to his advantage in his “this is our moment” speech rhetoric to offer visions of a world transformed.

However, apparently Camp Obama also believes it is perfectly acceptable for him to use the race card to his advantage by surmising that it just may be possible that McCain could hypothetically say:

"You know, he's not patriotic enough, he's got a funny name, you know, he doesn't look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills."

McCain isn't saying this at all. Obama is. He said it in his Berlin speech.

Obama is using his race to appeal to you. And, Obama is using his race as his excuse if he doesn't. For Obama, it is all about race.

Mucho Grande Balls

"In His closed door meeting with House Democrats this evening, presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama delivered a real zinger. According to a witness, He was waxing lyrical about last week’s trip to Europe, when He concluded, “this is the moment, as Nancy [Pelosi] noted, that the world is waiting for.”

The 200,000 souls who thronged to His speech in Berlin came not just for Him, he told the enthralled audience of congressional representatives.

“I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions,” He said.

Pass it around!

Hillary08or12

We are disenfranchised ex-Democrats, appalled by the Caucus frauds and the coup perpetrated by George Soros, Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi and Donna Brazile, as the DNC allowed for 30 people to supersede the voice of 600,000 Americans and ignored their votes by hijacking Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's delegates and giving them to Barack Obama. The DNC is no longer our party as it disenfranchised all of us Americans when it made the people of Florida and Michigan half voters. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote and all the key States. We do not think on the other hand that Barack Obama shares our values and are outraged by his twenty year relationship with Rev. Wright, his friendship with Rev Fledger, his Friendship with admitted terrorists such as William Ayers and terrorists sympathizers Rashid Khalidi as well as his and Michelle Obama's friendship with Louis Farrakhan. We disapprove of B Obama's dealings with Tony Rezko. B.O. was selected not elected.

Democratic Party maybe presumes too much - about women

By Robin Lakoff
Why did the superdelegates move in such numbers to support Obama? Why did this occur, especially after Clinton victories? For example, I am thinking here of Robert Byrd. After Clinton's impressive victory in West Virginia, the senator and elder statesman representing that state came out in support of Obama. Because the superdelegates were created to ensure that the Democratic candidate be a centrist, why did so many superdelegates - including liberals and many women - support Obama? Two arguments were made: They wished to follow the will of the people in their district; and they believed that Obama was more electable. But as the Byrd case shows, the first claim was often false; and no one has any idea which of the two, Clinton or Obama, would be more electable in November. It seemed to me that the term was more often used as a kind of excuse, "I'm voting for Obama, but I can't really tell you why," than a reasoned argument.

Read it here

Barrry & Michelle are the new Ozzie and Harriet

From Bonnie Fuller on Team Obama's Tabloid Strategy:

It's official. The Obamas are just like us. With their latest PR move -- being photographed as a family for this week's People magazine cover story titled "The Obamas At Home" -- it's apparent that Team Obama has a clear and clever presidential marketing strategy: present Michelle and Barack as the beloved Brangelina of the political world.

Like every in-demand A-list couple who concedes to allowing a peek behind the curtain, the Obamas insist this will be the "first and last" up-close and personal look at them as a family. What they don't admit to is that this was a carefully orchestrated, well-thought-out brand presentation. And it isn't actually the first highly personal look at the photogenic family. No, it's the culmination of a publicity campaign designed to take advantage of the couple's charisma and Hollywood-worthy good looks. Team Obama is using popular mass-media vehicles such as People, Us Weekly, "The View," "Access Hollywood" and "The Colbert Report" to familiarize the American public with the candidate and his wife, and to dispel myths about the couple, in a far more aggressive way than has ever been done before in a presidential election.

Read the rest here

Donna Brazile Hearts Karl Rove

It's not every activist politico who gets to write a post in the Washington Times that begins like this: "As I sat by my window and staring out at the wonderful Washington, D.C., landscape, my office announced a phone call from Air Force One."

Evidently, Donna Brazile was reminding all the little people on Capitol Hill that she had friends in high places. In summer of 2007, Bush senior advisor Karl Rove wasn't answering any subpoenas from Congress, but he didn't mind talking to Brazile. From his perch at 20,000 feet, he informed her that this was probably a good time for him to get out of Dodge.

“Mr. Rove's resignation is not a retirement,” Brazile reassured readers of the right of center newspaper. “It's just another opportunity for him to create that lasting Republican majority he envisioned years ago and to spend his waking days doing what he so enjoys — beating Democrats in the alleys and gutters. Just ask Sen. Hillary Clinton, Mr. Rove's target when he called in to speak to Rush Limbaugh. He couldn't help it. Mr. Rove just had to take one last shot before riding out of town. More to come, Team Clinton.”

Brazile's breezy account confirms what many have long since suspected. Rove’s claim to be sitting out the 2008 race is hogwash. The mastermind of today's unraveling U.S. constitution is in no position to kick back, down gin fizzes and watch the country collapse under an Administration he put into office twice. The list of crimes that Bush's top henchman could potentially be charged with - everything from fraud to war crimes - should be enough to keep him and his fellow Sopranos in hair-trigger mode until the next president gets sworn in. And the notion that he'd leave the choice of commander-in-chief in less capable dirty hands than his own requires more than the willing suspension of disbelief. It requires medication.

That's why the Rove-Brazile tryst merits further exploration. They first hooked up some time in 2002, according to a New York Times article. The connection might have been a means for Brazile to expand her clientele, but she dismissed that angle in an interview, implying she had bigger fish to fry. It was the Democrats' lackluster relations with African Americans and poor track record in elections, she said, that led her to start trailblazing new frontiers. To put it in a Brazile nutshell, the Republicans had a better machine. Finish Reading Here

Cost of Loan Bailout, if Needed, Could Be $25 Billion

The Congressional Budget Office said a proposed rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could appear on the federal budget as a $25 billion cost to taxpayers.

read more | digg story

Obama's Sermon on the Mount (as channeled through his surrogate Michelle)

“We have one candidate who essentially is telling us every day that the world as it is just fine. That what we’ve been doing for the last eight years is fine,” Obama said. “Stay the course. Don’t make too many changes.

“And then we have this other candidate — Barack Obama — who is saying every day that the world as it is not right. It’s not good enough,” she said. …

“I wish we had time to be divided. I wish we had time to be upset. To be angry. To be disappointed. I wish we did,” Obama said. “Because if we had time for that, then things wouldn’t be so bad right now. Instead, we’re in a place where another four or eight years of the world as it is will devastate the life of some child.”

Michelle Obama, Colorado, sometime last week.

Obama says:

"Let me be absolutely clear," Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, said today at a press conference in Amman, Jordan. "Israel is a strong friend of Israel's. It will be a strong friend of Israel's under a McCain...administration. It will be a strong friend of Israel's under an Obama administration. So that policy is not going to change."
Political Punch
Yeah. Got it? Just in case you've been losing sleep over it. Now go call a Super D.

Bush the 2nd - Obama's Fake Interviews

Be afraid. Very, very afraid. Barack Obama is even worse than Dubya. He is faking interviews before he even gets the nomination. He had "free speech" areas in Unity, NH - no anti-Obama signs or peaceful protest there. He is trying to control everything from what female journalists wear, to Hillary's roll at the Convention, to the DNC's money raising. Be afraid. Very, very afraid.

Obama's Dress Code for Female Reporters

From Politico
Politico's Carrie Budoff Brown, accompanying Obama on his trip to the Middle East and Europe, emails:

Reporters traveling overseas with Sen. Barack Obama were thrown a bit of curve last week when the campaign emailed a “dress code” for Israel and Jordan. Aides had passed along as a courtesy the list that they had distributed to their staff to follow.

But some of the tips raised a few eyebrows, particularly among the female reporters.

“Do not wear green.” (Explained later as the color of Hamas)

“Do not wear nail polish.”

“Women should only wear a limited amount of jewelry.”

“Shoulders and arms must be fully covered (no strapless tops, no tank tops, no short sleeve shirts.)"

“Closed-toe shoes, women should also wear stockings.”

At historical and religious sites, a suit or slacks should be worn, shoulders and arms must be covered (“no strapless tops, no tanks tops no short sleeve shirts”), shoes might need to be removed, and women may be asked to cover their heads and “should be prepared with a scarf/pashmina,” the email stated.

As the traveling press prepared to depart tonight from Chicago for Jordan, there was a dash to cover toes and arms – or at least be prepared upon arrival in the Middle Eastern country tomorrow. Still spotted on the bus en route to the airport: plenty of jewelry, tank tops, and nail polish.

Apparently, female reporters cannot be trusted to know what is proper dress. Or, Obama really does own the media. Or, Michelle wrote the dress code.

Tom In Paine: ARROGANCE AND STUPIDITY: WHY OBAMA WOULD BE THE THIRD BUSH TERM, NOT McCAIN.

Tom In Paine: ARROGANCE AND STUPIDITY: WHY OBAMA WOULD BE THE THIRD BUSH TERM, NOT McCAIN.

Hell or High Water

Click Here at Once!

OK! Great job. You are a fellow freedom fighter or a Sista or just your typical hardworking good guy fed up with the process. Now go here to donate. Any amount will help get the word out. No donation is too small. We do have a voice and it must be heard. Help save the democratic process before it's taken over by Boss Barack. You think we had it bad in 2000 and 2004 with the Bush loyalists stealing elections? Go - Give $5.00 bucks if you can afford it. More if you are able. This is Custer's Last Stand. It is that important. Remember the 60's? Get going. There is too much at stake. Now. Just do it.

Obama Revealed

It SO shows what a lame ass, empty suit he is. The Party is now crapping their pants over The Chosen One's arrogance and failure to recognize anyone but Himself. Oh, yeah, and he is still blaming Hillary for his failures. Jackass.

John BresnahanTue Jul 15, 5:34 AM ET Get it Here

After a brief bout of Obamamania, some Capitol Hill Democrats have begun to complain privately that Barack Obama’s presidential campaign is insular, uncooperative and inattentive to their hopes for a broad Democratic victory in November.

“They think they know what’s right and everyone else is wrong on everything,” groused one senior Senate Democratic aide. “They are kind of insufferable at this point.”

Among the grievances described by Democratic leadership insiders:

• Until a mailing that went out in the past few days, Obama had done little fundraising for Democratic candidates since signing off on e-mailed fundraising appeals for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee immediately after securing the Democratic nomination.

• Obama has sometimes appeared in members’ districts with no advance notice to lawmakers, resulting in lost opportunities for those Democrats to score points by appearing alongside their party’s presumptive presidential nominee.

• The Obama campaign has not, until very recently, coordinated a daily message with congressional Democrats, leaving Democratic members in the lurch when they’re asked to comment on the constant back and forth between Obama and John McCain — as they were when Obama said earlier this month that he would “continue to refine” his Iraq policies after meeting with commanders on the ground there.

• Coordination between the Obama campaign and the House and Senate leadership is so weak that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) — who will chair the Democrats’ convention in August — didn’t know of Obama’s decision to move his final-night acceptance speech from the Pepsi Center to Invesco Field until the campaign announced it on a conference call with reporters.

Snip`````````````````````````````````````````
Privately, however, there is a different message coming from some Democratic quarters on the Hill and on K Street. Some Democratic leadership staffers complain that, having defeated the vaunted Clinton political machine in the primaries, the Obama campaign now feels a “sense of entitlement” that leads to “arrogance.”

One Democratic aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity, compared the Obama campaign unfavorably to President Bush’s administration.

“At least Bush waited until he was in the White House before they started ignoring everybody,” the aide said.

“These relationships matter,” said a House Democrat close to the leadership. “I really hope these guys try to get off on the right foot. We all know what happened to [former President] Jimmy Carter and [former President] Bill Clinton. We don’t want to see a repeat of that.”

Brian Wolff, the DCCC’s executive director, said that some of the “supposed arrogance” coming from the Obama camp is in reality a misinterpreted sense of confidence in the campaign’s plan for winning the Oval Office, including grass-roots mobilization, in-state political infrastructure, messaging and get-out-the vote operations.

“They have to set the tone, and they are setting the tone,” Wolff said. “Arrogance is sometimes mistaken for competence. I think having a real competent approach to your campaign, whether it’s field [operations] or politics, or overall message, I think it’s really important. ... They’re really doing a really good job at this.”

Some of the complaints about the Obama campaign are the result of tensions inherent in any presidential campaign — Democratic or Republican — as a candidate’s staff tries to deal with the Washington establishment.

Others are the result of the circumstances in which Obama finds himself: Having battled Hillary Rodham Clinton into June, Obama hasn’t had much time for the normal interaction between a campaign and Congress. And having to struggle to help Clinton pay off her own debt, he hasn’t had the time or the resources to raise money for Democratic House and Senate candidates.Editorial remark: LIE!

But some problems are specific to the choices Obama has made — to run as a “change” candidate and to base his operations in Chicago rather than Washington. In distancing himself from “politics as usual,” Obama has shown little interest in being seen with Reid, Pelosi or other members of the Democratic congressional leadership.

Why Bush Breaks Laws and Congress Lets Him Get Away With it

Key members of Congress sanctioned torture, so many of those who might ordinarily be counted on to lead the charge are themselves compromised. As we witness not just Republicans, but also Democrats in Congress, acting repeatedly to immunize executive branch lawbreaking and to obstruct investigations, it's vital to keep that fact in mind.

read more | digg story

Clinton Diehards Want Convention Vote

By Shawn Zeller, CQ Politics

She may have given up, but a few of Hillary Rodham Clinton ’s people haven’t.

The senator from New York is said to be negotiating a respectful presence followed by a graceful exit from next month’s Democratic convention, and last week the party announced that Barack Obama would formally accept the party’s nomination in the stadium built for the Denver Broncos. But there are Clinton supporters clinging to the hope that if her name is placed in nomination and the roll call of the states is conducted, she might — might — still win.

Heidi Li Feldman, a Georgetown University law professor, insists there’s still “no way of predicting” the outcome should there be a fair vote. That’s because Obama has not secured enough pledged delegates to ensure the magic number of 2,118 needed to claim victory; the Illinois senator has gone past that benchmark only with the pledges of about 390 superdelegates — and they can change their minds at any time up to the moment they cast their ballots.

“If they had a meaningful vote, I have no idea who would win,” Feldman says. “But I know that if Sen. Obama were sure he would win, there wouldn’t be a negotiation” about Clinton’s role at the convention.

So Feldman, who says she has raised about $100,000 for Clinton, has turned her prowess to raising money for advertising demanding a convention vote, and she has teamed with a fellow pro-Clinton blogger, Marc Rubin, to form the Denver Group to lobby the Democratic National Committee, much of the staff of which has already moved from Washington to Chicago to work for Obama.

Feldman says she won’t vote for Obama if Clinton doesn’t get a convention vote. Rubin says he might not. Both say they aren’t worried that their efforts will continue to divide Democrats at a time when they should be uniting to take on Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona. In fact, they argue, many Democrats might stay home if they feel Clinton gets short shrift.

“What they have to do is make it possible for people to say to themselves that there was a fair and correct process,” Feldman says.

Obama Supporters On Far-Left Disgusted, Crying Foul

Before the Oregon primary, Martha Shade did what thousands of other people did: she registered as a Dem to vote for Barack Obama. Now after Obama is shifting positions on issues like Iraq, guns & Bush’s program of wiretaping, she is switching back to the Green Party. “I’m disgusted with him,” Shade said, “I can’t even listen to him anymore...."

read more | digg story

Tom In Paine: THE NEW OBAMA, THE NEW NIXON AND THE SAME OLD NEW YORK TIMES

Tom In Paine: THE NEW OBAMA, THE NEW NIXON AND THE SAME OLD NEW YORK TIMES

The New Revolution

Leverage

One of the ironies of this election is the argument that, no matter how much Obama may disappoint us, we still have to vote for him in order to preserve Roe v. Wade. We must have a President Obama to appoint liberal judges to the Supreme Court! cry the possums. The problem is that Obama is the wrong Democrat for that argument.

The truth is that if Obama himself were being floated as a possible Supreme Court appointment, progressives would be opposing him as too conservative.

Read What Violet Says

Ricorso on the Potomac: The Murderers of Democracy Return

"....the thunderclap, the ricorso, which, in Vico’s famous philosophy of history, presages the end of democracy and the return of leaders claiming to rule by divine sanction."

Chris Floyd Nails It

Today the United States Senate voted by a wide margin to gut the Fourth Amendment and give the president dictatorial powers to violate the privacy of every American citizen, while also granting immunity to wealthy corporations who colluded with the president for years in a patently illegal program of warrantless surveillance. The vote was 69-28, with Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama breaking with the (slim) majority of Senate Democrats who voted against the measure and joining instead with the Republicans, who voted in their usual zombified lockstep with the president's wishes.

As is well known, Obama once vowed, unequivocally, to support a filibuster of any bill that included the immunity provision for the president's corporate co-conspirators; today he voted with the zombified Republicans to choke off any attempt at a filibuster, so the bill could proceed to the final vote of approval.

I have little to say about this shameful action, beyond repeating what I said almost two years ago, when the Senate passed the infamous "Military Commissions Act," which gutted the 900-year-old doctrine of habeas corpus, approved the principle of presidential dictatorship and authorized the use of torture. (This "law" has not been repealed by the Democratic-led Congress, by the way.) That 2006 piece was called "Thunder on the Mountain: The Murderers of Democracy." And although a few omissions are necessary in the reprise below, due to the differing details between the two bills, the sentiments expressed are exactly the same -- as are the sinister ramifications of today's vote.

“Shame on your greed, shame on your wicked schemes.
I'll say this, I don’t give a damn about your dreams.”
-- Bob Dylan, “Thunder on the Mountain”

Who are these people? Who are these useless hanks of bone and fat that call themselves Senators of the United States? Let’s call them what they really are, let’s speak the truth about what they’ve done today....

Who are they? The murderers of democracy.
Sold our liberty to keep their coddled, corrupt backsides squatting in the Beltway gravy a little longer.

Who are they? The murderers of democracy.
Cowards and slaves, giving up our most ancient freedoms to a dull-eyed, dim-witted pipsqueak and his cohort of bagmen, cranks and degenerate toadies.....

Who are they? The murderers of democracy.
Traitors to the nation, filthy time-servers and bootlickers....

Who are they? The murderers of democracy.
Threw our freedom on the ground and raped it, beat it, shot it, stuck their knives into it and set it on fire.

Who are they? The murderers of democracy.
If there was an ounce of moxie left in the American system, these white-collar criminals would be in shackles right now, arrested for high treason, for collusion with a tyrant who is gutting the constitution, pushing terrorism to new heights and waging an unholy, illegal war of aggression that’s killed tens of thousands of innocent people and bled our country dry.

There is no honor in them. There is no decency, no morality, no honesty – nothing but fear, nothing but greed, nothing but base servility. Cringing, wretched little creatures, bowing to the will of a third-rate thug and his gang of moral perverts. This is their record. This is their doing. This is the shame they will have to live with. And this is the darkness, rank, fetid and smelling of blood, that now covers us all.

The Denver Group

Courtesy of NoQuarter, a Bud White exclusive interview with Denver Group founders Heidi Li Feldman and Marc Rubin.

Add NoQuarter Radio Interviews to your page

Obama in FISA Land and other short stories

Glen Greenwald
The choices Obama makes about how he campaigns and the positions he takes are extremely consequential in how political issues in this country are perceived. In the last two weeks alone, Obama has done the following:

*intervened in a Democratic Congressional primary to support one of the worst Bush-enabling Blue Dogs over a credible, progressive challenger;

* announced his support for Bush's FISA bill, reversing himself completely on this issue;

* sided with the Scalia/Thomas faction in two highly charged Supreme Court decisions;

* repudiated Wesley Clark and embraced the patently false media narrative that Clark had "dishonored McCain's service" (and for the best commentary I've seen, by far, on the Clark matter, see this appropriately indignant piece by Iraq veteran Brandon Friedman);

* condemned MoveOn.org for its newspaper advertisement criticizing Gen. Petraeus;

* defended his own patriotism by impugning the patriotism of others, specifically those in what he described as the "the so-called counter-culture of the Sixties" for "attacking the symbols, and in extreme cases, the very idea, of America itself" and -- echoing Jeanne Kirkpatrick's 1984 RNC speech -- "blaming America for all that was wrong with the world";

* unveiled plans "to expand President Bush's program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups and -- in a move sure to cause controversy . . . letting religious charities that receive federal funding consider religion in employment decisions," a move that could "invite a storm of protest from those who view such faith requirements as discrimination" -- something not even the Bush faith programs allowed.

Tom In Paine: HOW OBAMA LOSES THE ELECTION IN 30 SECONDS.

Tom In Paine: HOW OBAMA LOSES THE ELECTION IN 30 SECONDS.

Let the Banks Go Under, Sell 10 Million Houses for $1 Each

From Charles Hugh Smith:

Today's target: the notion that the collapse of the insolvent U.S. banking system would be so terrible. Really? Terrible for who? Certainly not the nation at large.

In fact the dissolution of the insolvent parts of the U.S. banking sector--yes, the investment banks, the money-center banks, the regional banks, and the savings and loans--would actually be an enormously positive development for the nation and indeed the world.

Let's start with the fact that a huge number of these lenders are insolvent. If all their bad loans, bad derivative bets and off-balance sheet losses were forced to be marked to market/liquidated to raise capital, then major bank after major bank would fold/enter bankruptcy.

And what exactly would be so bad about that? Businesses go under all the time. The truth is these banks will never ever recover the loans they wrote, so why try to prop them up with taxpayer funds? To bail out the ultra-wealthy owners of those banks, of course.

Continue Reading

John McCain

In my new role as a former Democrat and present PUMA (and my vow never to vote for Opossum), I am taking a look at my alternatives. In my research, I've come across some articles about John McCain and I was quite surprised by the character and internal strength of this man, especially as they are qualities sorely missing in the present Democratic presumptive nominee. Here is one article I found of particular interest.