Obama’s Trip: No Bounce, Flags, or Wounded Soldiers
Sunday, July 27, 2008 8:15 PM
By: Newsmax Editorial Article Font Size
Sen. Barack Obama’s international globe-hopping to the Mideast and Europe was meant to burnish his credentials as a foreign policy and potential military leader – the strong suit of his Republican rival Sen. John McCain.
Despite the media love fest over the political junket, Obama has yet to pull away from McCain in the polls. His campaign had expected a minimum eight-point lead after Obama clinched the Democratic nomination back in June, with even more momentum moving his way as the campaign progressed.
Both the most recent Real Clear Politics rolling average and the Rasmussen tracking poll that coincided with the end of Obama’s trip this weekend show Obama with just a five-point lead over McCain -- consistent with his numbers for the past two months. [Press reports this weekend have almost completely ignored the Rasmussen poll to only report on a Gallup poll, which showed Obama with a nine-point lead. Not as good as the Newsweek poll from June, which had Obama 15 points ahead of McCain.]
With President Bush suffering low approval ratings, the economy moving into a recession as gas prices surge above $4 a gallon, and growing resentment about the unending war in Iraq, Obama should be pulling away in the polls.
But he isn’t.
The Obama campaign has been quick to be out front on the bad news, claiming -- at the end of the trip -- it never expected a poll bounce from Obama’s trip anyway.
Obama campaign manager David Plouffe told Politico’s Mike Allen: “We wouldn’t expect any sort of -- I guess the term people use is ‘bounce.’”
In fact, during Obama’s global meet-and-greet tour, McCain’s poll numbers have risen in key battleground states like Ohio.
As crowds cheered Obama globally, Americans here on the homefront were left wondering if the Illinois senator wants to be their president -- or the president of some other country. [And whether the major U.S. media would at least offer the pretense of objectivity. An MSNBC poll from last week found that 47 percent of the public thought the coverage of Obama’s trip was “excessive.”]
After Obama’s speech to an estimated 200,000 Germans in Berlin, a columnist for Britain’s Guardian newspaper began his review this way: “Barack Obama has found his people. But, unfortunately for his election prospects, they're German, not American.”
Obama's speech to the Germans left much to be desired, from an American’s perspective.
For starters, the crowd’s size was beefed up by the fact that the event was billed as a free rock concert for German citizens, with popular musical performers helping to draw the big crowd. Scant U.S. media even noted the warm-up rock draws of reggae artist Patrice and rock band Reamonn.
Then there was the simple stage, with the podium surrounded by three potted plants. Missing was the American flag -- nowhere to be seen. Perhaps Obama’s staff might consider the U.S. flag offensive.
And then there was his speech, in which he proudly proclaimed he was in Germany as a “a fellow citizen of the world.”
And there was the spectacle of the presidential wannabe going to a foreign land to apologize about the United States.
Obama told his German audience he was sorry about his country because “I know my country has not perfected itself.” [This comment was made in the former seat of Nazi power. A letter to editor published in Obama’s hometown Chicago Tribune noted the irony: “While America may not be perfect, there is no reason to apologize to the Germans, architects of the Holocaust.”]
As for America’s role in saving Germany from the onslaught of Stalinist communism and the subsequent Cold War, there was nothing.
There was a rhetorical flourish about the Berlin Wall coming down, but nothing about the great American sacrifice, not to mention how our military might made President Reagan’s call -- “Tear down this wall, Mr. Gorbachev” -- a reality.
There was a fleeting mention of the famous Berlin airlift of 1948 that President Truman ordered to thwart the Soviet blockade that sought to starve West Berlin.
As Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby wrote, “Obama seemed to go out of his way not to say plainly that what saved Berlin in that dark time was America's military might.
“Save for a solitary reference to ‘the first American plane,’ he never described one of the greatest American operations of the postwar period as an American operation at all. He spoke only of ‘the airlift,’ ‘the planes,’ ‘those pilots.’ Perhaps their American identity wasn't something he cared to stress amid all his ‘people of the world’ salutations and talk of ‘global citizenship.’”
The Hollywood-staged Obama event for a man who has yet to ascend to the presidency didn’t sit well with all the Germans. Germany’s Stern magazine carried the headline "Barack Kant Saves the World."
One of their columnists, Florian Güssgen, wrote: "The man is perfect, impeccable, slick. Almost too slick … Obama's speech was often vague, sometimes banal and more reminiscent of John Lennon's feel good song 'Imagine' than of a foreign policy agenda."
Slickness without substance seemed to be the enduring theme of his trip. Among the little hiccups covered up by the major media, there were several gaffes on the global coronation trip.
Perhaps the most notable -- and reprehensible -- was Obama’s decision to cancel a visit to wounded American soldiers at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in southern Germany.
Apparently, the Pentagon informed Obama that since his visit was a political one, the hospital visit would be only open to him and his official Senate staff. This excluded the press and campaign officials.
The Pentagon did offer to allow Obama’s campaign plane to land at the nearby U.S. air base at Ramstein. The media also was to be accommodated there.
Without the photo opportunity and his press entourage, Obama declined to meet the wounded soldiers. At first, Obama’s campaign claimed to the press he decided to cancel the trip to visit the troops because it was "a trip funded by the campaign," and therefore somehow inappropriate. [What is inappropriate about a presidential candidate visiting wounded troops?]
But the Obama story belies the fact it was only after the Pentagon closed the event to his traveling press, that Obama’s campaign nixed the event.
Rightfully, McCain noted that it is never inappropriate for a candidate or official to visit U.S. troops.
"If I had been told by the Pentagon that I couldn't visit those troops, and I was there and wanted to be there, I guarantee you, there would have been a seismic event," McCain said.
McCain continued the attack on ABC News Sunday show “This Week”: “Those troops would have loved to see him, and I know of no Pentagon regulation that would’ve prevented him from going there” without the news media.
The McCain campaign has been quick to pounce on Obama’s obvious slight to the troops and double-talk, airing a new commercial this weekend.
“And now, he made time to go to the gym, but canceled a visit with wounded troops,” the ad says. “Seems the Pentagon wouldn’t allow him to bring cameras. John McCain is always there for our troops.”
McCain added that Obama “certainly found time to do other things."
One of those other things Obama did was visit Paris and hold a joint press conference with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, typical of an American president visiting the French capital.
Interestingly, The New York Times quoted Elysee officials that “Obama aides insisted that an American flag not be displayed alongside the French flag because Mr. Obama is only a visiting senator and not the president.”
There is no protocol preventing an American official from having the flag displayed when abroad.
America snubbed once again by a lame excuse.
© 2008 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
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Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Can a Junior Senator From Chicago Commit More Troops to Afghanistan? Barack Hussein Obama said he already had!!!!!!
July 29, 2008
Exclusive: Obama’s Rainbow Tour…Shades of EvitaPrint This
E-mail This
Pam Meister
Let’s hear it for the Rainbow Tour
It’s been an incredible success
We weren’t quite sure; we had a few doubts
Will Evita win through?
But the answer is yes…
(Lyrics from ‘The Rainbow Tour’ in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s ‘Evita)’
Presidential candidate Barack Obama just returned from a whirlwind tour in the Middle East and parts of Europe. He wowed ‘em in Germany with a speech in Berlin delivered to thousands. (Having a free concert just before the speech like there was in Portland, Oregon back in May couldn’t have had anything to do with the large crowd, right?) He played basketball with a handful of troops in Afghanistan (while snubbing those recuperating at the Landstuhl Medical Center in Ramstein, Germany because a photo op could not be obtained). He met with world leaders. He walked on water, healed the sick, and fed thousands with just a handful of loaves and fishes.
In other words, it was just another week on the Obama campaign trail, each moment reported in excruciating detail by his faithful followers in the media who have plenty of time for it, seeing as how they seem to have forgotten that this is not a one-man race. German public television’s original estimates of 20,000 spectators at the Berlin speech somehow grew to a miraculous 200,000. But what’s a hundred thousand or so among friends? The important thing here is that Obama has given Europe a reason to believe and hope in America once again.
Spain has fallen to the charms of Evita
She can do what she likes, it doesn't matter much
She's our lady of the new world with a golden touch
She filled a bull-ring, forty-five thousand seater
But if you're prettier than General Franco, that's not hard
Funny thing is, though, that as much as they wish they could, Europeans can’t vote in American elections. So one imagines they’re biting their nails over in the Old World, hoping the churlish, boorish, Luddite American voters in the New World do the right thing.
There you are, I told you so
Makes no difference where she goes
The whole world over just the same
Just listen to them call her name
And who would underestimate the actress now?
But how did Obama’s world tour go over with Americans? Were they convinced that Obama was merely on an extended fact-finding tour in order to bolster his foreign policy credentials? According to a Fox Opinion Dynamic poll, 47% believed that this was a campaign event, while only 19% thought it was a fact-finding mission. (25% thought the trip was a little of both.) And as for the big bounce this tour should have had, the race between Obama and John McCain remains in a statistical dead heat in most polls. Considering historic trends, this election should have been in the bag for Democrats. That McCain, who has had much less media coverage than Obama, is nipping at his heels is not a harbinger of great things to come in November.
As Carrie Budoff Brown notes, “[I]f Obama fails to win the White House because he couldn’t close the sale in Poughkeepsie rather than Paris, a trip that Republicans have described as an extended photo opportunity could appear silly in retrospect.”
But hold on…not everyone in Germany was impressed:
The Hollywood-staged Obama event for a man who has yet to ascend to the presidency didn’t sit well with all the Germans. Germany’s Stern magazine carried the headline "Barack Kant Saves the World."
One of their columnists, Florian Güssgen, wrote: "The man is perfect, impeccable, slick. Almost too slick … Obama's speech was often vague, sometimes banal and more reminiscent of John Lennon's feel good song 'Imagine' than of a foreign policy agenda."
It makes me wonder why we haven’t seen an Obama ad with the senator superimposed into one of those old Coca-Cola ads where everyone is standing around singing about “perfect harmony.” Maybe the same guy who ripped Hillary with his remake of the Apple 1984 ad can be persuaded to work his computer magic once again.
Eva started well, no question, in France
Shining like a sun through the post-war haze
A beautiful reminder of the care-free days
She nearly captured the French, she sure had the chance
But she suddenly seemed to lose interest
She looked tired
Someone else is tired from all of that globetrotting and flesh pressing. Obama checked in to a hospital upon his return to the U.S. because he had a sore hip from playing basketball. (He’s seen exiting the hospital here, looking more like a skinny kid running for class president than a grown man running for POTUS.) And even back in May it was noted that Obama was often tired. Don Surber wonders:
Tired? The man is all of 45. John McCain is 70 and served 5 1/2 years in a Vietnamese dungeon. He never complains about being tired. Why is Obama tired all the time? Has he no stamina at all?
Indeed. The president must be on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, even when he’s on vacation – national security crises don’t wait until his two weeks are up. But there’s nothing to see here, folks. Move along.
Like Eva “Evita” Perón, Obama had no official reason to make such a noisy splash overseas, reminiscent of the old Nestea plunge (ahh!). She was the wife of Argentina’s president; he’s a U.S. senator who is running for president. While a fact-finding mission is appropriate during a campaign – especially for a candidate with as little legislative or executive experience as Obama has – giving speeches that resemble political rallies (and that downplayed “American strength and resolve” during the Cold War “in a paean to international cooperation”) is not.
Also worth noting is that Evita was called Dama de la Esperanza (the Lady of Hope), and she didn’t believe in private charity, but social aid under the guise of the state, where all citizens were required to “voluntarily” contribute to her charity fund. Evita herself had this to say about private charity:
Charity humiliates and social aid dignifies and stimulates. Charity is given discreetly; social aid rationally. Charity prolongs the situation; social aid solves it…Charity is the generosity of the fortunate; social aid remedies social inequalites. Charity separates the wealthy from the poor; social aid raises the needy to the level of the well-to-do. (Evita: First Lady, John Barnes, Grove Press 1978, pg. 120)
Obama, seen by many as the arbiter of Hope, also believes charity begins not at home, but in the legislature:
“The idea here is to give everyone one big refund on their government — divvy it up into some tax breaks, hand them out, and encourage everyone to use their share to go buy their own healthcare, their own retirement plan, their own unemployment insurance, education, and so forth.”
In Washington, he said, “They call this the Ownership Society. But in our past, there has been another term for it — social Darwinism, every man and woman for him or herself.”
In other words, the people can’t be trusted to do the right thing, so taxes (“voluntarily” given, according to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid) collected and redistributed by the government are the answer. In fact, Obama’s generosity with American tax dollars extends beyond U.S. shores to the “global community,” – to the tune of $845 billion – and his Global Poverty Act would end up making Americans subservient to the whims of the incurably corrupt UN.
Are shades of Evita during the 2008 presidential campaign life imitating art or art imitating life? The American voter must be the judge.
Let’s hear it for the Rainbow Tour
It’s been an incredible success
We weren’t quite sure; we had a few doubts
Will Evita win through?
But the answer is yes…
Pam Meister is the editor of FamilySecurityMatters.org.
Exclusive: Obama’s Rainbow Tour…Shades of EvitaPrint This
E-mail This
Pam Meister
Let’s hear it for the Rainbow Tour
It’s been an incredible success
We weren’t quite sure; we had a few doubts
Will Evita win through?
But the answer is yes…
(Lyrics from ‘The Rainbow Tour’ in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s ‘Evita)’
Presidential candidate Barack Obama just returned from a whirlwind tour in the Middle East and parts of Europe. He wowed ‘em in Germany with a speech in Berlin delivered to thousands. (Having a free concert just before the speech like there was in Portland, Oregon back in May couldn’t have had anything to do with the large crowd, right?) He played basketball with a handful of troops in Afghanistan (while snubbing those recuperating at the Landstuhl Medical Center in Ramstein, Germany because a photo op could not be obtained). He met with world leaders. He walked on water, healed the sick, and fed thousands with just a handful of loaves and fishes.
In other words, it was just another week on the Obama campaign trail, each moment reported in excruciating detail by his faithful followers in the media who have plenty of time for it, seeing as how they seem to have forgotten that this is not a one-man race. German public television’s original estimates of 20,000 spectators at the Berlin speech somehow grew to a miraculous 200,000. But what’s a hundred thousand or so among friends? The important thing here is that Obama has given Europe a reason to believe and hope in America once again.
Spain has fallen to the charms of Evita
She can do what she likes, it doesn't matter much
She's our lady of the new world with a golden touch
She filled a bull-ring, forty-five thousand seater
But if you're prettier than General Franco, that's not hard
Funny thing is, though, that as much as they wish they could, Europeans can’t vote in American elections. So one imagines they’re biting their nails over in the Old World, hoping the churlish, boorish, Luddite American voters in the New World do the right thing.
There you are, I told you so
Makes no difference where she goes
The whole world over just the same
Just listen to them call her name
And who would underestimate the actress now?
But how did Obama’s world tour go over with Americans? Were they convinced that Obama was merely on an extended fact-finding tour in order to bolster his foreign policy credentials? According to a Fox Opinion Dynamic poll, 47% believed that this was a campaign event, while only 19% thought it was a fact-finding mission. (25% thought the trip was a little of both.) And as for the big bounce this tour should have had, the race between Obama and John McCain remains in a statistical dead heat in most polls. Considering historic trends, this election should have been in the bag for Democrats. That McCain, who has had much less media coverage than Obama, is nipping at his heels is not a harbinger of great things to come in November.
As Carrie Budoff Brown notes, “[I]f Obama fails to win the White House because he couldn’t close the sale in Poughkeepsie rather than Paris, a trip that Republicans have described as an extended photo opportunity could appear silly in retrospect.”
But hold on…not everyone in Germany was impressed:
The Hollywood-staged Obama event for a man who has yet to ascend to the presidency didn’t sit well with all the Germans. Germany’s Stern magazine carried the headline "Barack Kant Saves the World."
One of their columnists, Florian Güssgen, wrote: "The man is perfect, impeccable, slick. Almost too slick … Obama's speech was often vague, sometimes banal and more reminiscent of John Lennon's feel good song 'Imagine' than of a foreign policy agenda."
It makes me wonder why we haven’t seen an Obama ad with the senator superimposed into one of those old Coca-Cola ads where everyone is standing around singing about “perfect harmony.” Maybe the same guy who ripped Hillary with his remake of the Apple 1984 ad can be persuaded to work his computer magic once again.
Eva started well, no question, in France
Shining like a sun through the post-war haze
A beautiful reminder of the care-free days
She nearly captured the French, she sure had the chance
But she suddenly seemed to lose interest
She looked tired
Someone else is tired from all of that globetrotting and flesh pressing. Obama checked in to a hospital upon his return to the U.S. because he had a sore hip from playing basketball. (He’s seen exiting the hospital here, looking more like a skinny kid running for class president than a grown man running for POTUS.) And even back in May it was noted that Obama was often tired. Don Surber wonders:
Tired? The man is all of 45. John McCain is 70 and served 5 1/2 years in a Vietnamese dungeon. He never complains about being tired. Why is Obama tired all the time? Has he no stamina at all?
Indeed. The president must be on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, even when he’s on vacation – national security crises don’t wait until his two weeks are up. But there’s nothing to see here, folks. Move along.
Like Eva “Evita” Perón, Obama had no official reason to make such a noisy splash overseas, reminiscent of the old Nestea plunge (ahh!). She was the wife of Argentina’s president; he’s a U.S. senator who is running for president. While a fact-finding mission is appropriate during a campaign – especially for a candidate with as little legislative or executive experience as Obama has – giving speeches that resemble political rallies (and that downplayed “American strength and resolve” during the Cold War “in a paean to international cooperation”) is not.
Also worth noting is that Evita was called Dama de la Esperanza (the Lady of Hope), and she didn’t believe in private charity, but social aid under the guise of the state, where all citizens were required to “voluntarily” contribute to her charity fund. Evita herself had this to say about private charity:
Charity humiliates and social aid dignifies and stimulates. Charity is given discreetly; social aid rationally. Charity prolongs the situation; social aid solves it…Charity is the generosity of the fortunate; social aid remedies social inequalites. Charity separates the wealthy from the poor; social aid raises the needy to the level of the well-to-do. (Evita: First Lady, John Barnes, Grove Press 1978, pg. 120)
Obama, seen by many as the arbiter of Hope, also believes charity begins not at home, but in the legislature:
“The idea here is to give everyone one big refund on their government — divvy it up into some tax breaks, hand them out, and encourage everyone to use their share to go buy their own healthcare, their own retirement plan, their own unemployment insurance, education, and so forth.”
In Washington, he said, “They call this the Ownership Society. But in our past, there has been another term for it — social Darwinism, every man and woman for him or herself.”
In other words, the people can’t be trusted to do the right thing, so taxes (“voluntarily” given, according to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid) collected and redistributed by the government are the answer. In fact, Obama’s generosity with American tax dollars extends beyond U.S. shores to the “global community,” – to the tune of $845 billion – and his Global Poverty Act would end up making Americans subservient to the whims of the incurably corrupt UN.
Are shades of Evita during the 2008 presidential campaign life imitating art or art imitating life? The American voter must be the judge.
Let’s hear it for the Rainbow Tour
It’s been an incredible success
We weren’t quite sure; we had a few doubts
Will Evita win through?
But the answer is yes…
Pam Meister is the editor of FamilySecurityMatters.org.
Friday, July 25, 2008
"Barrack Hussein Obama Blows Off Soliders at Bagram........
HOME > PUBLICATIONS > Obama As Seen in the Eyes of a Soldier in Afghanistan
IN THIS SECTION
July 24, 2008
Obama As Seen in the Eyes of a Soldier in AfghanistanCPT J. P.
Editor’s note: This is an authentic e-mail from a soldier currently serving in Afghanistan, reprinted exactly from the original.
Hello everyone,
As you know I am not a very political person. I just wanted to pass along that Senator Obama came to Bagram Afghanistan for about an hour on his visit to 'The War Zone'. I wanted to share with you what happened.
He got off the plane and got into a bullet proof vehicle, got to the area to meet with the Major General (2 Star) who is the commander here at Bagram.
As the Soldiers where lined up to shake his hand he blew them off and didn't say a word as he went into the conference room to meet the General. As he finished, the vehicles took him to the ClamShell (pretty much a big top tent that military personnel can play basketball or work out in with weights) so he could take his publicity pictures playing basketball. He again shunned the opportunity to talk to Soldiers to thank them for their service.
So really he was just here to make a showing for the American's back home that he is their candidate for President. I think that if you are going to make an effort to come all the way over here you would thank those that are providing the freedom that they are providing for you.
I swear we got more thanks from the NBA Basketball Players or the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders than from one of the Senators, who wants to be the President of the United States. I just don't understand how anyone would want him to be our Commander-in-Chief. It was almost that he was scared to be around those that provide the freedom for him and our great country.
If this is blunt and to the point I am sorry but I wanted you all to know what kind of caliber of person he really is. What you see in the news is all fake.
In service,
CPT J. P.
IN THIS SECTION
July 24, 2008
Obama As Seen in the Eyes of a Soldier in AfghanistanCPT J. P.
Editor’s note: This is an authentic e-mail from a soldier currently serving in Afghanistan, reprinted exactly from the original.
Hello everyone,
As you know I am not a very political person. I just wanted to pass along that Senator Obama came to Bagram Afghanistan for about an hour on his visit to 'The War Zone'. I wanted to share with you what happened.
He got off the plane and got into a bullet proof vehicle, got to the area to meet with the Major General (2 Star) who is the commander here at Bagram.
As the Soldiers where lined up to shake his hand he blew them off and didn't say a word as he went into the conference room to meet the General. As he finished, the vehicles took him to the ClamShell (pretty much a big top tent that military personnel can play basketball or work out in with weights) so he could take his publicity pictures playing basketball. He again shunned the opportunity to talk to Soldiers to thank them for their service.
So really he was just here to make a showing for the American's back home that he is their candidate for President. I think that if you are going to make an effort to come all the way over here you would thank those that are providing the freedom that they are providing for you.
I swear we got more thanks from the NBA Basketball Players or the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders than from one of the Senators, who wants to be the President of the United States. I just don't understand how anyone would want him to be our Commander-in-Chief. It was almost that he was scared to be around those that provide the freedom for him and our great country.
If this is blunt and to the point I am sorry but I wanted you all to know what kind of caliber of person he really is. What you see in the news is all fake.
In service,
CPT J. P.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
"Am I a Racist? Are you a Racist? Read Below Article.......
New York Governor David Paterson gave one of the keynote addresses at the NAACP's 99th annual convention at Cincinnati last week. According to one newspaper account he “suggested that the defeat of Senator Obama in the presidential election would be a victory for racism in America.”
Huh????? Is Governor Paterson implying that anyone who votes against Barack Obama is a racist????? Can’t someone vote against him because they don’t trust his flip-flopping on major issues? Or they worry a President Obama will join the ranks of Presidents Hoover and Carter and raise taxes during a recession? Or they think Senator Obama’s plan for immediate withdrawal from Iraq would snatch defeat from the jaws of victory? Or they suspect his brand of “aggressive diplomacy” with Iran would result in an Iranian nuclear arsenal? Or they believe he’s too inexperienced and untried to be president in these precarious times?
Is this what political correctness has brought us to? That we are now a nation of people who are assumed to cast our votes, not on the basis of a candidate’s record or policies, but merely on the basis of his race and ethnicity?
If so, we can forget about America. Because our greatest strength, the reason for our vitality, our creativity, our energy, our unprecedented success, is that we are a nation of the most diverse people in history. That we believe through hard work and initiative a person can rise above the circumstances of his birth. That in America a person can be anything he wants to be.
Are we to take that extraordinary advantage, the quality that makes us the envy of the world, turn it on its head, and make it our greatest weakness? America will become a nation of broken dreams if we are a nation divided, balkanized into dozens of groups pitted against each other, divided by the color of our skin, or our gender, or the year of our birth, or where our grandparents came from.
In fairness to Governor Paterson, he did talk about the need for all Americans to move beyond race, and movingly about his own experiences as an African American. But his very premise, that Senator Obama’s defeat will be a victory for racism, is twisted logic. It is by very definition…well….racist.
Think about it. By Governor Paterson’s line of reasoning, is anyone who voted against Hillary Clinton a sexist who discriminates against women? Or anyone who votes against John McCain an ageist who discriminates against people over 65?
The fundamental principle of our democracy is that people vote. That means somebody has to lose. American voters hail from every racial, religious, and ethnic group. If you follow Governor Paterson’s logic, the most important difference between our two presidential candidates is race. Not only is that morally offensive, it is just downright wrong. And it is this line of thinking, this extreme political correctness, that pits American against American. It may have begun with the best of intentions, but political correctness has now become the very thing it was supposed to defeat.
Is it racist or sexist for a person to be sick and tired of political correctness? A number of journalists have remarked on the difficulty of applying the same scrutiny to America’s first serious African-American candidate for President lest they be accused of discrimination. So they have erred on the side of handling Sen. Obama with kid gloves. But no one disputes they traded the kid gloves for brass knuckles when it came to Hillary Clinton. She was running neck and neck with Barack Obama during the primaries, but the pundits chanted a constant chorus calling for her to get out of the race. Does that mean they are sexist?
Some people will no doubt brand me a racist for criticizing Governor Paterson’s speech, but it is about time someone stood up to say that political correctness has gone to far. It may have made sense years ago, but today stands in the way of us working together to solve our problems. Enough already. Let’s stop thinking of ourselves as African-Americans or Irish-Americans or Italian-Americans or Hispanic-Americans or Asian-Americans or native-Americans. Let’s all just be Americans.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor KT McFarland is a former top Pentagon official in the Reagan Administration and a frequent commentator on national security issues and foreign affairs. Feedback: editorialdirector@familysecuritymatters.org
Huh????? Is Governor Paterson implying that anyone who votes against Barack Obama is a racist????? Can’t someone vote against him because they don’t trust his flip-flopping on major issues? Or they worry a President Obama will join the ranks of Presidents Hoover and Carter and raise taxes during a recession? Or they think Senator Obama’s plan for immediate withdrawal from Iraq would snatch defeat from the jaws of victory? Or they suspect his brand of “aggressive diplomacy” with Iran would result in an Iranian nuclear arsenal? Or they believe he’s too inexperienced and untried to be president in these precarious times?
Is this what political correctness has brought us to? That we are now a nation of people who are assumed to cast our votes, not on the basis of a candidate’s record or policies, but merely on the basis of his race and ethnicity?
If so, we can forget about America. Because our greatest strength, the reason for our vitality, our creativity, our energy, our unprecedented success, is that we are a nation of the most diverse people in history. That we believe through hard work and initiative a person can rise above the circumstances of his birth. That in America a person can be anything he wants to be.
Are we to take that extraordinary advantage, the quality that makes us the envy of the world, turn it on its head, and make it our greatest weakness? America will become a nation of broken dreams if we are a nation divided, balkanized into dozens of groups pitted against each other, divided by the color of our skin, or our gender, or the year of our birth, or where our grandparents came from.
In fairness to Governor Paterson, he did talk about the need for all Americans to move beyond race, and movingly about his own experiences as an African American. But his very premise, that Senator Obama’s defeat will be a victory for racism, is twisted logic. It is by very definition…well….racist.
Think about it. By Governor Paterson’s line of reasoning, is anyone who voted against Hillary Clinton a sexist who discriminates against women? Or anyone who votes against John McCain an ageist who discriminates against people over 65?
The fundamental principle of our democracy is that people vote. That means somebody has to lose. American voters hail from every racial, religious, and ethnic group. If you follow Governor Paterson’s logic, the most important difference between our two presidential candidates is race. Not only is that morally offensive, it is just downright wrong. And it is this line of thinking, this extreme political correctness, that pits American against American. It may have begun with the best of intentions, but political correctness has now become the very thing it was supposed to defeat.
Is it racist or sexist for a person to be sick and tired of political correctness? A number of journalists have remarked on the difficulty of applying the same scrutiny to America’s first serious African-American candidate for President lest they be accused of discrimination. So they have erred on the side of handling Sen. Obama with kid gloves. But no one disputes they traded the kid gloves for brass knuckles when it came to Hillary Clinton. She was running neck and neck with Barack Obama during the primaries, but the pundits chanted a constant chorus calling for her to get out of the race. Does that mean they are sexist?
Some people will no doubt brand me a racist for criticizing Governor Paterson’s speech, but it is about time someone stood up to say that political correctness has gone to far. It may have made sense years ago, but today stands in the way of us working together to solve our problems. Enough already. Let’s stop thinking of ourselves as African-Americans or Irish-Americans or Italian-Americans or Hispanic-Americans or Asian-Americans or native-Americans. Let’s all just be Americans.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor KT McFarland is a former top Pentagon official in the Reagan Administration and a frequent commentator on national security issues and foreign affairs. Feedback: editorialdirector@familysecuritymatters.org
Monday, July 21, 2008
Barack Hussein Obama First Hours in Afghanistan and is now an Expert!
Obama Says Situation in Afghanistan Is Precarious
Sunday, July 20, 2008 11:30 AM
KABUL, Afghanistan -- Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama says the situation in Afghanistan "precarious" and "urgent."
In an interview broadcast Sunday during his first trip to Afghanistan, Obama said the U.S. needs to start planning now to send in more troops. He has called for an additional one to two brigades _ or about 7,000 troops _ to be sent to Afghanistan to help counter a resurgent Taliban and quell rising violence.
Obama told CBS News that Afghanistan has to be the central focus in the fight against terrorists.
He said the Bush administration allowed itself to be distracted by a "war of choice" but now is the time to correct the mistake.
Obama also sat down with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and pledged continued aid to the country.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) _ Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama pledged steadfast aid to Afghanistan in talks with its Western-backed leader Sunday and vowed to pursue the war on terror "with vigor" if he is elected, an Afghan official said.
On the second day of an international tour designed to burnish his foreign policy credentials, Obama and other U.S. senators held two hours of talks with President Hamid Karzai at his palace in the Afghan capital.
Obama has chided Karzai for not doing more to build confidence in the Afghan government, whose grip remains weak after the ouster of the Taliban in 2001.
U.S. Embassy spokesman Mark Stroh said the senators had discussed issues including the painstaking rebuilding of the country's government and economy, the security situation and corruption with Karzai.
The Afghan presidency said Obama's message was positive.
"Sen. Obama conveyed ... that he is committed to supporting Afghanistan and to continue the war against terrorism with vigor," said Humayun Hamidzada, Karzai's spokesman.
Both Democrats and Republicans "are friends of Afghanistan and no matter who wins the U.S. elections, Afghanistan will have a very strong partner in the United States," Hamidzada said.
Obama has made Afghanistan a centerpiece of his proposed strategy for dealing with terrorism threats.
The Illinois senator has said the war in Afghanistan, where Taliban and al-Qaida-linked militants are resurgent, deserves more troops and more attention as opposed to the conflict in Iraq.
While officially part of a congressional delegation on a fact-finding tour also expected to take him to Iraq, Obama traveled in Afghanistan amid the security accorded a likely Democratic nominee for president rather than a senator from Illinois.
Media access to Obama was limited, and his itinerary in the war zones was closely guarded. Traveling with him were Sens. Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, and Jack Reed, a Democrat from Rhode Island.
Obama made no public comment after the meeting with Karzai, which included a traditional lunch of mutton, chicken and rice washed down with a yogurt drink.
Earlier in the day, he praised U.S. troops during breakfast with soldiers at Camp Eggers, a heavily fortified military base in the city.
"To see young people like this who are doing such excellent work, with so much dedication ... it makes you feel good about the country," Obama said.
"I want to make sure that everybody back home understands how much pride people take in their work here and how much sacrifice people are making. It is outstanding," he said in footage filmed by the military and obtained by The Associated Press.
On Saturday, the delegation received briefings from U.S. commanders and a former Afghan warlord who is now the governor of Nangarhar, a province in eastern Afghanistan where militant attacks are spiraling.
Obama's first overseas tour since securing the Democratic nomination _ he is scheduled to travel to Europe through next week _ could be key to honing his foreign policy strategy with less than four months before the Nov. 4 election. His rival for the presidency, Republican Sen. John McCain, has criticized Obama for not spending more time in the region.
Obama advocates ending the U.S. combat role in Iraq by withdrawing troops at the rate of one to two brigades a month while increasing the military commitment to Afghanistan. Obama has proposed sending two more combat brigades _ about 7,000 troops _ to Afghanistan. McCain also is advocating sending more forces to the war-battered country.
U.S. military officials say the number of attacks in eastern Afghanistan, where most of the U.S. forces in the country operate, has increased by 40 percent so far this year compared to the same period last year.
Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, told The Associated Press on Saturday that after intense U.S. assaults there, al-Qaida may be considering shifting focus to its original home base in Afghanistan, where American casualties are recently running higher than in Iraq.
Obama also has expressed weariness with efforts by Afghanistan's neighbor, Pakistan, to go after militants in its territory. That frustration may strike a chord with Karzai, who has accused Pakistan's intelligence service of supporting the Taliban insurgency _ a claim that Pakistan denies.
But Obama also has chided Karzai and his government, saying it had "not gotten out of the bunker" and helped to organize the country or its political and security institutions.
Sunday, July 20, 2008 11:30 AM
KABUL, Afghanistan -- Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama says the situation in Afghanistan "precarious" and "urgent."
In an interview broadcast Sunday during his first trip to Afghanistan, Obama said the U.S. needs to start planning now to send in more troops. He has called for an additional one to two brigades _ or about 7,000 troops _ to be sent to Afghanistan to help counter a resurgent Taliban and quell rising violence.
Obama told CBS News that Afghanistan has to be the central focus in the fight against terrorists.
He said the Bush administration allowed itself to be distracted by a "war of choice" but now is the time to correct the mistake.
Obama also sat down with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and pledged continued aid to the country.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) _ Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama pledged steadfast aid to Afghanistan in talks with its Western-backed leader Sunday and vowed to pursue the war on terror "with vigor" if he is elected, an Afghan official said.
On the second day of an international tour designed to burnish his foreign policy credentials, Obama and other U.S. senators held two hours of talks with President Hamid Karzai at his palace in the Afghan capital.
Obama has chided Karzai for not doing more to build confidence in the Afghan government, whose grip remains weak after the ouster of the Taliban in 2001.
U.S. Embassy spokesman Mark Stroh said the senators had discussed issues including the painstaking rebuilding of the country's government and economy, the security situation and corruption with Karzai.
The Afghan presidency said Obama's message was positive.
"Sen. Obama conveyed ... that he is committed to supporting Afghanistan and to continue the war against terrorism with vigor," said Humayun Hamidzada, Karzai's spokesman.
Both Democrats and Republicans "are friends of Afghanistan and no matter who wins the U.S. elections, Afghanistan will have a very strong partner in the United States," Hamidzada said.
Obama has made Afghanistan a centerpiece of his proposed strategy for dealing with terrorism threats.
The Illinois senator has said the war in Afghanistan, where Taliban and al-Qaida-linked militants are resurgent, deserves more troops and more attention as opposed to the conflict in Iraq.
While officially part of a congressional delegation on a fact-finding tour also expected to take him to Iraq, Obama traveled in Afghanistan amid the security accorded a likely Democratic nominee for president rather than a senator from Illinois.
Media access to Obama was limited, and his itinerary in the war zones was closely guarded. Traveling with him were Sens. Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, and Jack Reed, a Democrat from Rhode Island.
Obama made no public comment after the meeting with Karzai, which included a traditional lunch of mutton, chicken and rice washed down with a yogurt drink.
Earlier in the day, he praised U.S. troops during breakfast with soldiers at Camp Eggers, a heavily fortified military base in the city.
"To see young people like this who are doing such excellent work, with so much dedication ... it makes you feel good about the country," Obama said.
"I want to make sure that everybody back home understands how much pride people take in their work here and how much sacrifice people are making. It is outstanding," he said in footage filmed by the military and obtained by The Associated Press.
On Saturday, the delegation received briefings from U.S. commanders and a former Afghan warlord who is now the governor of Nangarhar, a province in eastern Afghanistan where militant attacks are spiraling.
Obama's first overseas tour since securing the Democratic nomination _ he is scheduled to travel to Europe through next week _ could be key to honing his foreign policy strategy with less than four months before the Nov. 4 election. His rival for the presidency, Republican Sen. John McCain, has criticized Obama for not spending more time in the region.
Obama advocates ending the U.S. combat role in Iraq by withdrawing troops at the rate of one to two brigades a month while increasing the military commitment to Afghanistan. Obama has proposed sending two more combat brigades _ about 7,000 troops _ to Afghanistan. McCain also is advocating sending more forces to the war-battered country.
U.S. military officials say the number of attacks in eastern Afghanistan, where most of the U.S. forces in the country operate, has increased by 40 percent so far this year compared to the same period last year.
Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, told The Associated Press on Saturday that after intense U.S. assaults there, al-Qaida may be considering shifting focus to its original home base in Afghanistan, where American casualties are recently running higher than in Iraq.
Obama also has expressed weariness with efforts by Afghanistan's neighbor, Pakistan, to go after militants in its territory. That frustration may strike a chord with Karzai, who has accused Pakistan's intelligence service of supporting the Taliban insurgency _ a claim that Pakistan denies.
But Obama also has chided Karzai and his government, saying it had "not gotten out of the bunker" and helped to organize the country or its political and security institutions.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
"Obama’s Inexperience Tough to Ignore "
Obama’s Inexperience Tough to Ignore
Tuesday, July 15, 2008 8:56 AM
By: Ronald Kessler
A close look at Barack Obama's career reveals it has been even more mediocre than generally recognized.
Before being elected to the Illinois state Senate, Obama worked as a community organizer and a lawyer in Chicago.
In his memoir, Obama says being a community organizer taught him how to motivate the powerless and work the government to help them. His chief example is an effort to remove asbestos from Altgeld Gardens, an all-black public housing project on Chicago’s South Side.
But those who were involved in the effort say Obama played a minor role in working the problem and never accomplished his goal. A pre-existing group at Altgeld Gardens and a local newspaper, the Chicago Reporter, were working on the problem before Obama came on the scene, yet Obama does not mention them in his book, “Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.”
“Just because someone writes it, doesn't make it true,” says Altgeld resident Hazel Johnson, who had been pushing for a cleanup of the cancer-producing substance years before Obama showed up.
Rep. Bobby L. Rush, D-Ill., says it was Johnson's work, along with asbestos testing by the Chicago Reporter, that got Chicago officials interested in the issue. Rush, who launched an inquiry into the situation when he was a member of the Chicago City Council, says he is “offended” that Obama did not mention Johnson in his account.
“Was [Obama] involved in stuff? Absolutely,” says Robert Ginsburg, an activist who worked with Johnson and Obama on the problem. “But there was stuff happening before him, and after him.”
After three years working as an organizer, Obama could say he helped obtain grants for a jobs program and got asbestos removed from some pipes in the project. But as the Los Angeles Times has noted, the “large-scale change that was needed at the 1,998-unit project was beyond his reach.” To this day, most of the asbestos remains in the apartments.
Fruitless though his efforts were, Obama devoted more than 100 pages to his experiences at Altgeld Gardens and surrounding areas. Michelle Obama has said his work as a community organizer helped him decide “how he would impact the world,” assisting people to improve their lives. Yet, in a revealing passage in his book, Obama wrote, “When classmates in college asked me just what it was that a community organizer did, I couldn’t answer them directly.”
Instead, he said, “I’d pronounce on the need for change. Change in the White House, where Reagan and his minions were carrying on their dirty deeds. Change in the congress, compliant and corrupt. Change in the mood of the country, manic and self-absorbed. Change won’t come from the top, I would say. Change will come from a mobilized grass roots.”
Thus, Obama admitted that he accomplished little but that he was able to cover that up with fancy talk about change.
After going to Harvard Law School, Obama returned to Chicago, where he briefly headed a voter registration drive and then became a lawyer. While Obama’s campaign has touted him as a civil rights lawyer, “Over the nine years that Obama’s law license was active in Illinois, he never handled a trial and mostly worked in teams of lawyers who drew up briefs and contracts in a variety of cases,” according to David Mendell’s “Obama: From Promise To Power.”
A review of the cases Obama worked on during his brief legal career “shows he played the strong, silent type in court, introducing himself and his client, then stepping aside to let other lawyers do the talking,” the Chicago Sun-Times has reported.
“A search of all the cases in Cook County Circuit Court in which Obama made an appearance since he graduated from Harvard in 1991 shows: zero,” the article said.
Instead, his practice was “confined mainly to federal court in Chicago, where he made formal appearances in only five district court cases and another five in cases before the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — a total of 10 cases in his legal career,” the paper said.
If Obama had virtually no impact as either a community organizer or as a lawyer, he was even more invisible in the state Senate and later in the U.S. Senate.
In both bodies, Obama had a reputation for voting “present,” thus avoiding controversial decisions that could be used against him later. In the U.S. Senate, he has missed more than one in five votes.
Only one of the measures Obama has sponsored as a U.S. senator was enacted: a bill to “promote relief, security, and democracy in the Democratic Republic of Congo.”
Contrary to Obama’s portrayal of himself as a unifier, on every bipartisan effort in the Senate to forge compromises on tough issues, Obama has been missing in action.
In sum, it would be difficult to imagine a more mediocre record. Most candidates for dog catcher have contributed more to society. Yet with the help of adoring reporters, Obama has managed to parlay extraordinary speaking and political skills into a presidential campaign built on sand.
The idea that America might entrust its security and future to someone who has never demonstrated an ability to get anything of significance done is scary.
Look for John McCain to begin exploiting this vulnerability after Labor Day.
Ronald Kessler is chief Washington correspondent of Newsmax.com. View his previous reports and get his dispatches sent to you free via
e-mail. Go here now.
© 2008 Newsmax. All rights reserved
Tuesday, July 15, 2008 8:56 AM
By: Ronald Kessler
A close look at Barack Obama's career reveals it has been even more mediocre than generally recognized.
Before being elected to the Illinois state Senate, Obama worked as a community organizer and a lawyer in Chicago.
In his memoir, Obama says being a community organizer taught him how to motivate the powerless and work the government to help them. His chief example is an effort to remove asbestos from Altgeld Gardens, an all-black public housing project on Chicago’s South Side.
But those who were involved in the effort say Obama played a minor role in working the problem and never accomplished his goal. A pre-existing group at Altgeld Gardens and a local newspaper, the Chicago Reporter, were working on the problem before Obama came on the scene, yet Obama does not mention them in his book, “Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.”
“Just because someone writes it, doesn't make it true,” says Altgeld resident Hazel Johnson, who had been pushing for a cleanup of the cancer-producing substance years before Obama showed up.
Rep. Bobby L. Rush, D-Ill., says it was Johnson's work, along with asbestos testing by the Chicago Reporter, that got Chicago officials interested in the issue. Rush, who launched an inquiry into the situation when he was a member of the Chicago City Council, says he is “offended” that Obama did not mention Johnson in his account.
“Was [Obama] involved in stuff? Absolutely,” says Robert Ginsburg, an activist who worked with Johnson and Obama on the problem. “But there was stuff happening before him, and after him.”
After three years working as an organizer, Obama could say he helped obtain grants for a jobs program and got asbestos removed from some pipes in the project. But as the Los Angeles Times has noted, the “large-scale change that was needed at the 1,998-unit project was beyond his reach.” To this day, most of the asbestos remains in the apartments.
Fruitless though his efforts were, Obama devoted more than 100 pages to his experiences at Altgeld Gardens and surrounding areas. Michelle Obama has said his work as a community organizer helped him decide “how he would impact the world,” assisting people to improve their lives. Yet, in a revealing passage in his book, Obama wrote, “When classmates in college asked me just what it was that a community organizer did, I couldn’t answer them directly.”
Instead, he said, “I’d pronounce on the need for change. Change in the White House, where Reagan and his minions were carrying on their dirty deeds. Change in the congress, compliant and corrupt. Change in the mood of the country, manic and self-absorbed. Change won’t come from the top, I would say. Change will come from a mobilized grass roots.”
Thus, Obama admitted that he accomplished little but that he was able to cover that up with fancy talk about change.
After going to Harvard Law School, Obama returned to Chicago, where he briefly headed a voter registration drive and then became a lawyer. While Obama’s campaign has touted him as a civil rights lawyer, “Over the nine years that Obama’s law license was active in Illinois, he never handled a trial and mostly worked in teams of lawyers who drew up briefs and contracts in a variety of cases,” according to David Mendell’s “Obama: From Promise To Power.”
A review of the cases Obama worked on during his brief legal career “shows he played the strong, silent type in court, introducing himself and his client, then stepping aside to let other lawyers do the talking,” the Chicago Sun-Times has reported.
“A search of all the cases in Cook County Circuit Court in which Obama made an appearance since he graduated from Harvard in 1991 shows: zero,” the article said.
Instead, his practice was “confined mainly to federal court in Chicago, where he made formal appearances in only five district court cases and another five in cases before the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — a total of 10 cases in his legal career,” the paper said.
If Obama had virtually no impact as either a community organizer or as a lawyer, he was even more invisible in the state Senate and later in the U.S. Senate.
In both bodies, Obama had a reputation for voting “present,” thus avoiding controversial decisions that could be used against him later. In the U.S. Senate, he has missed more than one in five votes.
Only one of the measures Obama has sponsored as a U.S. senator was enacted: a bill to “promote relief, security, and democracy in the Democratic Republic of Congo.”
Contrary to Obama’s portrayal of himself as a unifier, on every bipartisan effort in the Senate to forge compromises on tough issues, Obama has been missing in action.
In sum, it would be difficult to imagine a more mediocre record. Most candidates for dog catcher have contributed more to society. Yet with the help of adoring reporters, Obama has managed to parlay extraordinary speaking and political skills into a presidential campaign built on sand.
The idea that America might entrust its security and future to someone who has never demonstrated an ability to get anything of significance done is scary.
Look for John McCain to begin exploiting this vulnerability after Labor Day.
Ronald Kessler is chief Washington correspondent of Newsmax.com. View his previous reports and get his dispatches sent to you free via
e-mail. Go here now.
© 2008 Newsmax. All rights reserved
Monday, July 14, 2008
Scary Resemblance.......Or Coincidence???????
PS: Don't Forget to Look In The Fireplace...........
It Will Take Him Less Than A Year To Grow A Full Beard and Begin Instilling Sharia Law.......
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