Comments made to blogs and news media during the 2008 Presidential Campaign

Is Reverend Jeremiah Wright a traitor? A subversive? An anti-Semite? A racist? A Terrorist? A madman? Satan? The Antichrist?

Judging from those ten-second clips of his sermons we keep seeing on TV, it would appear that he is all the above.

But before we pass judgment on the Reverend, we should first ask the news media to show us clips of the rest of those sermons, as well as clips from the 2,000 or so others he has delivered since he started preaching 30 years ago.

If the tenor of the Reverend’s sermons is consistent with the clips of the ten-second rants, then we should pillory the guy and call Barak Obama to task for not quitting his church. If not, we should we pillory the news media for deliberately distorting the truth.

We might also consider that, unlike that the armchair patriots who so vociferously condemn him--Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, Bill Cunningham, et. al. –Reverend Wright served six years in the U.S. Military, as a Marine and Navy corpsman (medic).

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A Bound Man--Shelby Steele's Book on Barak Obama

His conservative credentials notwithstanding, Shelby Steele is one those black intellectuals who makes his living writing and lecturing on the difficulty African Americans experience trying to assimilate into a racist white society—the old victimization theory in conservative guise.

If Barak Obama wins the Democratic nomination and goes on to become our next President, he will have blurred the racial divide, and Shelby Steele and others like him might be out of a gig. That’s probably why he is making the rounds on talk shows promulgating the idea that Obama is unelectable because, as a black politician, he is culturally compelled to conceal his true self, to wear a “mask,” as he puts it. The fact that Senator Obama is doing quite well in his bid to get elected, debunking Steele’s theory at every turn, doesn’t seem to dissuade Steele.

This mask idea, by the way, is not original of Shelby Steele. It appeared in a poem by Paul Lawrence Dunbar, “We Wear the Mask.” (1896), and discussed in depth by W.E.B. Dubois in his book of essays, The Soul of Black Folks. (1903)

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An Obama-Clinton dream ticket? No way!

An Obama-Clinton dream team would be out of the question, for two reasons:

1. Hillary and her husband Bill are inextricably joined at the hip. Choosing Hillary as Obama’s running mate would mean choosing Bill as well. And given the Clintons’ unquenchable thirst for power, they would not be inclined to play-second fiddle, especially to someone who wrested from them the political prize they had taken for granted. From day one the Clinton duo would be scheming to
to usurp control of the Presidency.

2. The news media have made much of Obama’s ties with his pastor, but until a student questioned Chelsea Clinton about the Monica Lewinski scandal and someone produced a video debunking Hillary’s account of her dodging sniper bullets in Bosnia, hardly any mention was made in the media of the Clintons’ past. Come general elections, however, one can expect that McCain’s handlers or, if not them, his supporters in the Blogosphere will dredge the well-documented lies, sleaze and corruption that have marked the Clintons since they teamed up 38 years ago. Recall:

--Her Marxists roots. Since her undergraduate days at Wellesely she has closely adhered to the teachings of the radical Marxists ideologue Saul Alinsky.

--Her alleged brilliance. Truth is that she flunked her D.C. bar exam, and her career was going nowhere until she teamed up with Bill. Without him, she would have ended up a obscure bureaucrat, if that.

--Her fake accomplishments. Not only did she not dodge sniper fire in Bosnia, but she never brokered a peace treaty or figured in any official diplomatic negotiations. Her role as First Lady was merely ceremonial, no different from that of Roslyn Carter, Nancy Reagan, Barbara Bush or any of her predecessors.

--Her false feminism. Rather to take Bill to task for his compulsive philandering, she retained a detective to dig up dirt on the women seduced.

--Her disdain for the military. At White House parties she used Marines in dress uniform as waiters and busboys.

--Her abusive behavior. She routinely cussed out her staff and rebuked underlings who dared make eye-contact with her.

--Her arrogance, backstabbing and inability to work with others. That so many former Clinton officials and associates have broken with her—Dick Morris, Bill “Judas” Richardson, Federico Peña, Robert Reich, to name some; that so many ranking Democrats in Congress—Ted Kennedy, Chris Dodd, John Kerry, John Lewis--don’t trust her; that even the former V.P. under Bill Clinton is reluctant to endorse her—all that speaks for itself.

--Her weak congressional record. Of the 20 bills she introduced and managed to get passed in her eight year as U.S. Senator, 16 were for inconsequential stuff like honoring individuals, naming post offices and courthouses, and congratulating lacrosse teams.

--The criminal connection. The Clintons business and political dealings with some 40 individuals and groups subsequently convicted of various crimes, Bills brother, Roger included. Their ties with the “Dixie Mafia” in Arkansas.

--The dubious cattle futures profit, Though she had no prior experience in futures trading, Hillary once managed to parlay a $1,000 investment into $100,000 in less than a year, an unheard of feat in the legitimate investment world.

--Whitewatergate. A crooked real estate scheme that went sour when Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas. Though the Clintons were legally cleared, there was ample evidence that they were involved.

--Travelgate. Ordering a trumped-up FBI investigation on seven long-time employees of the White House travel office, Hillary fired them to give the jobs to friends.

--Chinagate. Bill received generous contributions from Chinese operatives—later convicted as felons—in exchange for help in easing restrictions on the sale of technological equipment to China.

i--The punitive IRS audits. The Clintons routinely ordered IRS audits of organizations and individuals critical of them.

--Filegate. Hillary gained improper access to FBI files on some 700 individuals for political blackmail.

--Pardongate.. Before leaving office, Bill pardoned 140 convicted felons, most of whom had contributed to his political campaigns.

--The sudden wealth The Clintons left the White House saddled with huge debts, yet in less than a year they resurfaced as multimillionaires.

--The Impeachment. Bill Clinton was the first elected president in U.S. history, and only the second, to be impeached. Was acquitted by the Senate by a narrow vote of 55 to 45.

--The disbarments. Bill Clinton was disbarred by from trying cases in Federal Courts, and lost his license to practice law in Arkansas.

--The body count. During the Clinton regimes in Washington and Arkansas, some 50+ persons suffered untimely deaths by murder, suicide, accidents and unexplained causes.

Clearly, an Obama-Clinton “dream ticket” is a sure formula for losing the general election. Some voters may still think that the Clintons are for real, but once they know the truth and see through them, they’ll be bolting to McCain, or staying home the day of the election.

My advice to the powers-that-be in Democratic Party: Dump the Clintons. They no longer bring anything of value to the table, if they ever did.

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John McCain was right in comparing Rush Limbaugh to Bozo the Clown (Fox News, 2005) and then apologizing to Bozo for the comparison.

Listen to one of Limbaugh's show for its full three hours and you'll see what McCain was talking about--the staged phone calls, prepared scripts, tortured statistics, non-sequiturs, twisted logic, half-baked ideas, gasping changes of direction in mid thought, out-of- context sound bytes, wrong predictions, baseless information, false piety, relentless blustering, mockery and snickering. .

Also consider his background--a first-semester college drop-out, a stadium beer vendor, a draft dodger (claimed he had an incapacitating boil on his anus), and pill addict.

“El Rusho’s” ratings may be high. After all, he's a good entertainer, certainly a lot better than Bozo. But no listener of average intelligence can take his moronic pronouncements seriously--

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Now that Barack Obama has broken with his church, one would expect that the news media pundits who forced him to make the move will, in the name of fairness, sever ties with their own churches as well.

Truth is that the hate-America ranting of the Reverend Jeremiah Wright and the Hillary-mocking humor of Father Michael Pfleger pale in comparison with the evils perpetrated in the name of God by leaders and officials of mainstream religions.

To wit:

--The thousands of alleged heretics racked, dismembered, burned at the stake, deep fried in oil, buried alive, skinned alive by order of Roman Catholic Inquisitors, with the approval of the Pope.

--The witch hunts of menopausal women and the countless tortures and executions inflicted by Protestant churches during the Reformation. “I should not have compassion on these witches. I would burn all of them,” declared Martin Luther. And John Calvin had no qualm about arranging the slow roasting of anyone who dared question his theology. (Check what he did to Michael Servetus).

--The racist teachings of the Mormon Church. As narrated in the Book of Mormon, the good guys, the Nephites, were fair-skinned, whereas the bad guys, the Lamanites, being descendants of Cain, were punished by God with a dark skin. (Nephi 5:21, Alma 3:6) According to Brigham Young the “flat nose and black skin” of African Americans were likewise the stigma of Cain. It wasn’t until 1978 that an African American was accepted into the Church priesthood. Then there’s the Church’s history of polygamy and sexism. Only two women figure in the Book of Mormon, and only in minor roles.

--The genocidal mandates of the Hebrew Jehovah in the Old Testament (Joshua 11; I Samuel 15:1-35). The scurrilous disparaging comments against Gentiles in the Jewish Babylonian Talmud: “All Gentile children are like animals (Baba Kamma 113.a); “Gentiles prefer sex with cows” (Abodah Zarah 22 a.); "Gentile girls are in a state of filth since birth" (Abodah Zara 221-22b; "Jesus mother was a whore"(Sanhedrin 106A)

Those self-righteous media commentators bent on pillorying Barack Obama for his church affiliation should take a close look at the dark underbelly of their own religions.

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President Bush and John McCain may be right. Maybe the war in Iraq was necessary. Maybe our national security and freedom depends on our staying the course for however long it takes.

But their reasoning would be more convincing if they defined their terms more clearly.

What, exactly, do they mean by “winning”? We deposed Saddam Hussein, hanged him by proxy, got the Iraqis to hold democratic elections, helped them form a parliamentary government, reconstituted Hussein’s Sunni Republican Guard, enlisted them to battle Al Qaeda in a tactically successful “surge”— So how much more winning is needed?

And who is or are the enemy? Al Qaeda, insurgents, international terrorists, Muslim radicals, Iranian agents? All the above? Small wonder McCain is confused.

And what do President Bush, Senator McCain and their talk show adherents mean when they tell us that if we don’t “defeat them there, we’ll have to fight them here.” Does the enemy really have the means and resources to invade and occupy the United States? Don’t they operate in small terrorists cells armed with low-tech devices? Weren’t the 9/11 terrorists already here, legally, for years, on student visas? Doesn’t history show that a small group of fanatics is all it takes to terrorize a nation of millions? (Recall how effective the John Muhammad and Lee Malvo, the "Beltway Snipers, they terrorized with nothing but an old car and a hunting rifle.)

Moreover, how do we expect to win the heart and minds of the Iraqi people when they hear that we intend to keep fighting our foe “over there” in their neighborhoods?

The only clear and logical reason for staying the course in Iraq is to keep the vital oil supply in the Middle East from getting into the wrong hands. All that abstract talk about freedom, democracy, honor, helping the Iraq people (even as they die by the hundreds of thousands in the struggle) doesn’t ring true.

Like it or not, petroleum, is our lifeblood. Without it, our motor vehicles couldn't run, our airplanes couldn't fly, most our electric plants couldn't function, our hospitals couldn't serve the ill, our food stores would be empty—in short, our civilization would suddenly plunged into chaos.

If President Bush insists on spinning the issue, so be it. Presidential candidate John McCain, however, would be well advised to start telling the truth, or he’ll lose the election in landslide.

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Hillary Clinton had a health plan, an economic recovery plan, an education plan, a military plan—but, then, so did Barack Obama, John McCain, and millions of Americans, my own mother-in-law included. Great plans of all sorts can be had on the Internet at a click of the mouse.

What in the end swayed the intelligent voter against Hillary Clinton was her lack of political and social skills to get her plans enacted.

According to the U.S. Constitution (Article II) the President of the United States is not empowered to unilaterally pass into law any of those great plans that the three presidential candidates are offering the Nation. First he or she must convince Congress to enact and fund the plans. (Article I).

The most important qualification for a Chief Executive, therefore, is not the ability come up with plans, but to be able to reach across party lines and work with members of Congress and political leaders of all persuasions.

A good example is Abraham Lincoln. Compared with his opponents in the 1860 presidential race, Lincoln had no preconceived plans to deal with the turmoil then facing the Nation and scarcely any political experience. Four terms in the Illinois House of Representatives and one term in the U.S. House was all. (Less than Obama) What Lincoln had that his highly-experience opponents lacked was the ability to work with Congress and win the support of the best and brightest politicians of the day, Republicans, Democrat and Whigs alike. Half his cabinet was comprised of former political enemies.

By Lincoln standards the highly divisive, confrontational Hillary Clinton “Rockly” would not make a good President. That former officials in her husband’s administration did not endorse her—Bill Richardson, Dick Morris, Federico Peña, Robert Reich; that so many influential Democrats in Congress enthusiastically backed Barack Obama—Ted Kenney, John Kerry, Chris Dodd, John Lewis—did not speak well for Hillary’s political and social skills.
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Note that of the 20 bills she managed to get enacted during her eight years in the Senate, 16 were for ceremonial fluff, like naming court houses and post offices, honoring individuals, and congratulating lacrosse teams.

Then factor in the inevitable meddling of her scandal-tainted husband, her de facto running mate, and a Hillary Clinton administration would invariably have come to grief (maybe another impeachment) within its first year.

Nor, by the same token, would Hillary make a good Vice President. Choosing Hillary as Obama’s running mate would mean choosing Bill as well. And given the Clintons’ unquenchable thirst for power, they would not be inclined to play-second fiddle, especially to someone who wrested from them the political prize they had taken for granted. From day one the Clinton duo would be scheming to
to usurp control of the White House.

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Supporters of Sarah Palin don’t seem to realize that our next President will not only have to manage the nation but also play a leading role in international affairs. If the inarticulate, provincial George Bush was an embarrassment compared to the likes of Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Angela Merkel, Nicolas Zarkosy, Jan Peter Balkenende and other leaders of the free world, then should McCain die in office and Sarah Palin become President, she would be a total joke.

Palin's experience as PTA president, mayor of a small town, (pop. 5,000), two-year governor of a sparsely populated state (pop. 500,000) doesn’t quite cut it; nor does her hockey mom, beauty queen, academic disadvantaged, religious fundamentalist, folksy, persona do much for her presidential, world-leader image. Then there are the pending concerns that are likely to escalate into media-fodder scandals should she take office—her abuse of power, her pregnant daughter’s shotgun wedding, her involvement with the Alaska Independence Party, her allowing the First-Dude to meddle in government business, and other issues about her personal life and character that would no doubt crop up over time.

Barack Obama, of course, has his share of shortcomings. As a one-term Illinois senator and two-year U.S. senator, his experience is scant, but, at least, by serving in a various Senate committees, he has acquired some inside knowledge on national and international affairs.

John McCain at the outset was the better qualified candidate. Had he picked Joe Lieberman or someone else of equal stature as his running mate, he would now be double digits ahead of Obama in the polls. Sarah Palin did energize the lowest common denominator of the conservative base, but in so doing, she has alienated many undecided voters who would have made the difference on November 4. Joe Lieberman may be short on charisma, but by dint of his knowledge and unblemished record, he would eventually have won over the conservative base and most undecided voters as well.

Also, the fact that McCain allowed his staffers to foist Palin on him sight unseen (clearly, she was not on his short list) betrays a lack of leadership. He might yet win the election, but if he loses, it will be largely because of Sarah Palin.


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Given Sarah Palin’s harping on the evils of higher taxes and government spending—i.e. socialism-- I had assumed that her proposed $45 billion funding for special-needs children would be provided by the private sector or by donations from Christian charities. But no, if elected VP, she would pressure Congress into footing the bill. Either Governor Palin, like her equally uneducated hero, Joe the Plumber, is ignorant of the meaning of socialism, or else she’s a bald-faced hypocrite.

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If Sara Palin is the no-nonsense frugal hockey mom that she purports to be, she should have said “Thanks but no thanks,” to the RNC when they offered her a $150 K wardrobe and $11.4 K a week makeup artist, as she supposedly told Congress when they approved an earmark to Alaska for the infamous Bridge to Nowhere. Or did she take the money and spend on something else?

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Sarah Palin’s tendency to abuse her power for personal reasons, as she was shown to do as Governor of Alaska, is further evident in her plan, should she become VP, to pressure Congress into funding a $45 billion program for the benefit of special-needs children like her son Trig. Children with other health issues—diabetes, HIV, cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia, muscular dystrophy, etc.—do not figure in her plan. Parents of such children presumably would be left to negotiate health costs on their own with private insurers, provided they can afford or get the insurance.

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If Sarah Palin is such a loving mom, so solicitous of her children’s wellbeing as she claims, why does cart them around with her all over the country in her campaign appearances? Having them for emotional support in the safety of a hotel room is understandable, but using them as props, exposing them to hecklers and potentially dangerous characters in large crowds, is tantamount to child abuse. Especially at risk is her six-month old (?) son, Trig. Babies with Downs Syndrome tend to have a weaker than normal immune system, which renders them susceptible to respiratory and other serious infections. Or is this the way pit bulls with lipstick traditionally toughen up their litter for survival in the wilds of Alaska?

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The five former secretaries of state who endorsed McCain--Henry Kissinger, James Baker, George Shultz, Alexander Haig, and Lawrence Eagleburger--declared their endorsement back in January 2008, seven months before McCain selected Sarah Palin as his running mate. So the question arises: Would these distinguished elder statesmen have endorsed McCain had they known who his running mate would be? Have they made public their opinion of Sarah Palin? Can we assume, if they were asked today, that they would agree with John McCain that she’s eminently qualified to serve as VP of the United States?

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When John McCain accuses Barack Obama of socialism, as if the word were synonymous with tyranny and treason, does he realize that the nation he has sworn to defend to the death—Israel—is a socialist state, as is Sweden, Belarus, India and many of our allies? And is he aware that, the bail-out economic plan he supported, his scheme to buy up bad home mortgages and his continued insistence on funding of the open-ended Iraq war would further expand the power of the central government and, in so doing, take our country a giant step deeper into socialism?

The particulars of each agenda aside, the “spread-the-wealth” socialism of Barack Obama is, by definition, no more socialistic than the “powerful, imperial” regime advocated by John McCain.

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Barack Obama says he has a tax plan. John McCain says he has a tax plan. Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani—everyone who runs for President claims to have a tax plan of some sort. But what they all fail to mention is that the U.S. Constitution does not grant the President the power to craft tax plans and unilaterally make them into law, as is the case in dictatorial regimes.

According to Article II of the Constitution, the role of the President is limited largely to conducting international affairs, serving as Commander-in-Chief in times of war, and appointing federal judges, ambassadors, and heads of cabinets and certain agencies. The power to raise, lower, repeal or create taxes is the exclusive province of Congress (Article I, Section 7). Presidents do have the power to veto or sign off on tax bills passed by Congress and, as leaders of their political party, exert influence on members of Congress to get their tax plans passed. But Congress is not legally bound to comply (the separation-of-powers principle), and if they do, the changes they usually insist on tend to alter the original plan significantly.

So when Obama, McCain and other would-be Chief Executives tell
voters that they plan to raise taxes here, lower taxes there, give tax breaks to the middle-class, small businesses, working moms, the elderly, the poor, etc., voters should be warned that they are being mislead, if not conned, by professional politicians doing whatever they deem necessary to get elected.

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Sarah Palin, the First Dude, Joe the Plumber, Al Franken, Ann Coulter, Lou Dobbs, Carl Rove, Sean Hannity, Randi Rhodes, Rush Limbaugh, Neal Boortz, George W. Bush, Saturday Night Live, celebrity endorsements—-Peggy Noonan’s comment about the “vulgarization of American politics” was right on the money. For a philosophical perspective on what is happening in America today, I refer you the prophetic 1930 classic by José Ortega y Gasset, The Rebellion of the Masses.

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John McCain claims that because of the Surge he so staunchly supports we are at last winning the war in Iraq. But in truth, the kind of winning taking place in that devastated country is a false victory.

The so-called Surge in Iraq is nothing but a belated attempt to correct past blunders. Before we invaded, Iraq had a modern infrastructure and national security forces that were holding foreign terrorists and native criminals in check. But instead of taking out Saddam Hussein, declaring that a victory and returning home with our prestige intact, we stayed on with the pretext of creating an American-style democracy and, in short order, proceeded to destroy the country’s infrastructure and dismantle its security forces. In the chaos that ensued, criminal gangs terrorized law-abiding citizens, foreign terrorists poured into the country and, joining ranks with them, former cops and soldiers of the dismantled security forces resurfaced as the “insurgents” that for four years waged guerilla war against us.

Now, after blowing billions bringing Iraq to ruin, we are a spending even more billions rebuilding its infrastructure and hiring the same insurgents that killed and maimed thousands of our troops to fight on our side, with no guarantee that they will continue do so if we stop paying them off.

And there’s no reason to expect that a Surge in Afghanistan, as proposed by Obama as well as McCain would produced better results. In fact, given conditions in Afghanistan, an attempted Surge in that chaotic country is likely to even more disastrous.

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What population of voters does Sarah Palin hope to win over with her stay-the-course-in-Iraq, winning-with-honor, no-white-flag-of-surrender comments? Doesn’t she realize that the growing number voters in fear of losing their jobs, homes, and health benefits, if they haven’t already, are not inclined to continue blowing $9 billion a month on an open-ended war that should not have been waged to begin with? For proof that this imperialistic blunder doesn’t sell anymore, if it ever did, all Governor Palin has to do is hint that as VP she would support a reinstatement of the military draft, then watch her already slipping approval ratings plummet to zero.

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Educationally disadvantaged types like Sarah Palin, Joe the Plumber and their vociferous adherents can’t be expected to know the true meaning of the word socialism. To them, socialism is synonymous with anti-American, treason, tyranny, Arab, Muslim, Godlessness, evil or whatever else they imagine it to be. But surely John McCain and his better informed surrogates must know that the governments of our closest allies—Britain, Canada, Italy, Sweden, Germany, Holland and Israel, to name some—all have well-entrenched socialistic components, like universal health care and retirement plans. And aren’t our own Social Security, Medicare, NASA, National Park Service and mighty Armed Forces all government-funded socialistic programs? And how about Sarah Palin’s proposed $45 billion program for special-needs children? Isn’t that pure socialism?

The “vulgarization” of American politics, as noted by Peggy Noonan, would be more aptly described as rabble ignorance.








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