Obama campaign mum on NAFTA contact with Canada. Despite repeated requests, Barack Obama’s campaign is still neither verifying nor denying a CTV report that a senior member of the team made contact with the Canadian government — via the Chicago consulate general — regarding comments Obama made about NAFTA.

- Snip -

On Wednesday, CTV reported that a senior member of Obama’s campaign called the Canadian government within the last month — saying that when Senator Obama talks about opting out of the free trade deal, the Canadian government shouldn’t worry. The operative said it was just campaign rhetoric not to be taken seriously.

The Obama campaign told CTV late Thursday night that no message was passed to the Canadian government that suggests that Obama does not mean what he says about opting out of NAFTA if it is not renegotiated.

However, the Obama camp did not respond to repeated questions from CTV on reports that a conversation on this matter was held between Obama’s senior economic adviser — Austan Goolsbee — and the Canadian Consulate General in Chicago.

Earlier Thursday, the Obama campaign insisted that no conversations have taken place with any of its senior ranks and representatives of the Canadian government on the NAFTA issue. On Thursday night, CTV spoke with Goolsbee, but he refused to say whether he had such a conversation with the Canadian government office in Chicago. He also said he has been told to direct any questions to the campaign headquarters.

During a candidates’ debate Tuesday, both Democratic party leadership contenders — Obama and Hillary Clinton — suggested they would opt out of the North American Free Trade Agreement if core labour and environmental standards weren’t renegotiated.

- Snip -

On Thursday, the Canadian embassy in Washington issued a complete denial.

“At no time has any member of a presidential campaign called the Canadian ambassador or any official at the embassy to discuss NAFTA,” it said in a statement.

But on Wednesday, one of the primary sources of the story, a high-ranking member of the Canadian embassy, gave CTV more details of the call. He even provided a timeline. He has since suggested it was perhaps a miscommunication.

The denial from the embassy was followed by a denial from Senator Obama.

“The Canadian government put out a statement saying that this was just not true, so I don’t know who the sources were,” said Obama.

Sources at the highest levels of the Canadian government — who first told CTV that a call was made from the Obama camp — have reconfirmed their position.

- Snip -

However, Harper had a warning to anyone contemplating renegotiation of the trade deal.

“If a future president actually did want to open up NAFTA, which I highly doubt, then Canada would obviously have some things we would want to discuss,” Harper said.

My, my - was that really only a year ago? Oh, yes - Obama was saying one thing to people in the Midwest, and apparently, saying something quite the opposite on the down low in Canada.

Lo and behold, it seems the Canadian report was right, at least according to this NY Times article regarding Obama’s recent trip, Nafta Looming Over Obama’s Canada Trip :

As a candidate, Barack Obama courted votes in the Rust Belt by suggesting he might renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement, a pact he criticized as not “good for America.”

Now Mr. Obama is about to make his first foreign trip as president to Canada, the United States’ largest trading partner — and he is sounding a strikingly different message.

With Canadians up in arms over “Buy America” provisions in President Obama’s economic recovery package, and Prime Minister Stephen Harper warning the United States not to back away from its international treaty obligations, Mr. Obama, who will make a day trip to Ottawa on Thursday, is no longer emphasizing the idea of reopening Nafta.

Instead, he and his senior advisers are talking up the booming trade relationship between Canada and the United States — the largest trade partnership in the world, the White House says — and limiting their Nafta message to revamping side agreements on environmental and labor protections.

Well, golly gee. Yet another campaign promise proven to be a lie. Raise your hand if you are surprised! Yeah, I thought not.

The article continues:

In an interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on Tuesday, the president said there were “a lot of sensitivities right now” about renegotiating trade pacts “because of the huge decline in world trade.” As he tries to right the struggling American economy, Mr. Obama pledged to do so in a way that would enhance, rather than suppress, trade between the two nations.

“It’s not in anybody’s interest to see that trade diminish,” he said.

Trade is an issue that has long bedeviled Democrats, and this is especially so for Mr. Obama. Trade has split the party along regional and economic lines, pitting those who see a globalized economy as inevitable and productive against those in economically depressed areas of the nation, like Ohio and Michigan, who see the price of free trade, in lost jobs and declining wages, as simply too high for the American worker to bear.

The last Democratic president, Bill Clinton, fought hard to pass Nafta (sic), and made many in his party uncomfortable — including, eventually, his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, who like Mr. Obama talked of reopening the pact when she was running for president.

Interesting.

Ah, yes, Obama continues to renege on campaign promises made, now that he’s actually in the White House. His latest is yet another stand with a Bush Doctrine, Siding with Bush, Obama says Afghan detainees have no U.S. rights. Oh, what a surprise!!! Just like the Extraordinary Rendition and State Secrets part Obama kept - I have been saying this for MONTHS and months - Obama is Bush III. This is why he voted for FISA, too. He wanted all the same “tools” available to him that Bush managed to secure. Here’s the nitty-gritty:

The 600-plus detainees at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan cannot use U.S. courts to challenge their imprisonment, the Justice Department said today in a two-sentence court filing.

Last summer the Supreme Court gave al-Qaeda and Taliban suspects held at Guantanamo Bay the right to challenge their detention. But the Justice Department argues that Bagram is different: it’s in a war zone and the prisoners are the result of continuing military action.

“They’ve now embraced the Bush policy that you can create prisons outside the law,” said Jonathan Hafetz of the American Civil Liberties Union, who has represented several detainees.

“The hope we all had in President Obama to lead us on a different path has not turned out as we’d hoped,” said Tina Monshipour Foster, a human rights attorney representing a detainee at the Bagram. “We all expected better.”

The decision also disappointed Amnesty International, which issued a report calling for judicial review of the detentions.

Uh, yes. Again, groups are “disappointed” - the ACLU, Amnesty International, HRC, and on, and on. All “disappointed” that Obama is not doing what he said he would do.

They SHOULD be disappointed in themselves for believing his lies, for pretending that his “hope and change” message was a substitute for certifiable experience and an actual RECORD on which to base his claims. They’re “disappointed.” Yeah. Join the club. I’m “disappointed” that all of these groups bought this crap in the first place, and stuck us with this guy.

Sigh. Once again, though, there is one bright light, one adult in the room who DOES instill some faith. Oh, and she actually HAS a record on which to base her actions. Oh, yes, Sec. Clinton. She is winding up her first trip abroad as the Secretary of State, and has been doing a fine job of it. Here she is arriving in China:

And while in China, Secretary Clinton has been focusing on a number of issues, particularly Climate Change. Hopefully, this will be an issue on which our two countries can work together successfully (Sec. Clinton did mention Tibet, but for now, the Obama Administration is keeping a low profile on the issue of human rights).

Hmmm - I wonder what will be next on Obama’s list of promises to break? Oh, that could be a whole new party game, come to think of it! We already have the drinking game Jon Stewart proposed (taking a drink whenever Obama pauses while talking), so why not have a “Which Promise Is Going Down The Toilet Next?” game? Hey, it’s one the whole family can play together! What a uniter!! Which one do you think is next?

In a stunning about face this week, Barack Obama announced that “I’ve got an economic plan that is similar to Bill Clinton’s.” On its face, this would mean that, if elected, Barack Obama would raise taxes on all taxpayers, support NAFTA and reduce welfare, three cornerstones of the Clinton economic legacy. This would be a serious reversal of Senator Obama’s campaign promises and his stated policies.

Other than a crass attempt to hitch his fate to the Clinton star, the comment highlights the serious risk to our current economic situation that is posed by Barack Obama’s pledge to raise taxes on the producers of jobs and capital, increase welfare and abrogate our commitment to NAFTA. These policies create a serious probability of leading our economy into further economic dismay.

Barack Obama is wholly disingenuous in implying that his tax policy will have the same success as the Clinton policy when, in fact, the economic environment inherited by Bill Clinton was vastly different from today’s economy.

Obama’s assertion is similar to saying that because an aspirin cures a headache it will do the same for cancer. President Clinton benefited from an economy that grew by 4.2% in the first quarter of his Presidency, the Dow was up 5.8% for the year prior to his election, total national debt was 54% of national output and information technology was in its infancy. Tax rates inherited by Clinton had been reduced by 60% under Reagan and Bush Senior since the Carter years. When President Clinton increased taxes, he simultaneously brought our national budget into balance in sixteen months. He signed NAFTA against the will of his own party.

Yesterday, the country’s growth contracted by .3%, providing one-half of the technical verification of the recession being felt around the country and certain to be inherited by the next President. The Dow is down 32.5% for the year, our national debt is at nearly 70% of total GDP (after WWII national debt was 102% of GDP and America was at the beginning of its stunning economic success). Currently, unless investors are able to forcefully advance new energy technologies, there is no analog to the 1990’s information revolution which can give us the necessary economic stimulus for innovation and job growth.

Supporters of the Illinois Senator not only ignore the current fragile economy, but also the obvious consequences of Obama’s opposition to NAFTA and his destructive economic philosophy. In fact, Senator Obama’s policy of higher taxes and higher tariffs for our fragile economy at this time is exactly the wrong direction for the country.

One of the reasons that Barack Obama could well lose on Tuesday is because voters are beginning to realize that his policies will tank the economy and the markets. The stock market looks forward, not backward, and there is a direct correlation between the declining Dow and the increasing poll numbers for Barack Obama. According to the June Gallop Poll, by a margin of 87 to 13, Americans care more about improving the economy than they do about redistributing wealth.

According to his rhetoric, Barack Obama is helping working Americans. In fact, John McCain offers bigger tax breaks to the working class than Barack Obama. (The only reason you do not know this is because you have not looked at the fact that no one earning under $50,000 will pay any tax under John McCain and, on the famous “Obama Taxometer”, the untruthful Obama campaign does not include the $5,000 health care tax credit that John McCain in giving to every American). Moreover, almost 75% of Americans making $100,000 have some capital gains. As the value of their investments turns negative they will suffer badly, even if Barack Obama does not raise their taxes. A declining economy is bad for everyone.

It is dishonest for Senator Obama to claim he will fix this economy by taxing the top 5%. His spending increases on programs alone amount to $300 billion per year. The dishonesty is to say that this will be paid by his tax on the top 5%. It is simply not possible. As the Obama plan makes clear, the additional taxes of the “rich” have already been committed to his “refundable tax credits”. According to the Tax Policy Center, the Obama tax plan will take $70 billion from the top 5% of earners in the country and redistribute it to the 60 million Americans who pay no tax.

Senator Obama’s economic philosophy will make America neither stronger nor fairer. Today, the top 1% of earners contributes 40% of the nation’s $2.6 trillion tax intake and the bottom 50% pay 2.9% of our nation’s total needs. This is in contrast to the 17% of total tax paid by the top filers under the Carter Administration when the top marginal rate was 70%. It has been shown that reductions in tax rates increase tax revenues because incentives to private enterprise strengthen the economy and create jobs and a larger tax base.

As he exploits the current widespread economic uncertainty in the nation and blames the richest, Barack Obama not only ignites an insidious class war, but also ignores the inconvenient fact that America’s top earners have paid double in taxes since the reduction of their tax rates under George Bush. Namely, in 2003 the richest Americans paid $136 billion in taxes and after the tax cut in 2006 they paid $274 billion. Times of economic uncertainty are exactly when our government needs to cling to business and the generators of wealth and jobs, not use them as scapegoats.

Along with my Democratic “friends,” I used to make fun of Republicans by saying that they lived in an “evidence-free zone.” Well, I now see that it is the Democrats, swept away in the “narrative” and “transcendence” of Barack Obama, that are refusing to look at the facts about the likely consequences of electing Barack Obama. The same media outlets that failed to vet the Iraq War are now failing to vet Barack Obama. Unfortunately, they will never accept responsibility; it will be our country that takes the hit. For me, that is very sad.

John McCain may not be the most eloquent or sexiest candidate in this race, but he is the candidate who will best serve this nation for the next four years. He is reducing taxes for all Americans further than Barack Obama, cutting federal spending and encouraging free trade and energy independence as engines for domestic economic growth. More importantly, he and Sarah Palin actually have a record of taking on the vested interests and their own party (while working with Democrats) to make tough decisions. I have yet to be shown the same evidence of the junior Senator from Illinois.

Regrettably, the road kill of Obama’s reckless rhetoric and policies is not the rich taxpayer, but the entire American economy. The pain will be felt mostly by those who lose their jobs in the economic downturn and are the owners of 401ks and other savings who suffer at the stock market continues to decline. Barack Obama has not been held accountable for the obvious consequences of his tax and trade philosophy and policies. If elected, it will be all Americans who will suffer.

PS. Most readers have probably not read this far into the piece, but if you have, I have one more comment…..Since speaking out about this election, I have seen the Obama response is to attack me personally, particularly on the Internet. Fine, but just to let you know, eighteen months ago my husband wrote in the Financial Times that capitalism was in retreat because of the greed on Wall Street. We have subsequently invested only in tax-free government securities. So, my opinion is not driven by my economic interests. I am driven by what I said in the New York Times in June, “I love my country more than my party” … and it is ok with me if you hate me. xoxoxo

Related: Lynn Forester de Rothschild: Barack Obama’s America

Up first, we have this lovely button:

For the family that prays for Obama, stays together, or something like that. Well, if what the NY Post had about Obama potentially violating the Logan Act* by attempting to delay troop withdrawal from Iraq to suit HIS political purposes is true, risking lives as a result, he’s gonna need a lot of those prayers. See, it’s illegal - some might even say TREASONOUS - for a civilian to work against a presidential administration in a foreign country. Oopsy daisy!!

Then there is this nice little bumper sticker for all you Catholics out there! You can put this right next to the sticker for your parochial school!

Oh, great! Now I know what to get my good friend, Divine Democrat! Ahem.

And finally, last but not least, there is this:

All hail, the Obama Faithful!! Oh, wait - am I misreading that? Nope, I don’t think I am. That may not be exactly what they WANTED to convey, at least consciously, but that’s about what they seem to expect from their followers - complete and utter devotion. Praise Obama - he has come to liberate us from our pesky morals, our integrity, our sense of decency and fair play! That must be the “Change” Obama promised to bring us!! Hallelujah!!

And just in case you think I am making this up, here is the letter from the Obama Camp:

Dear friends,
Great news! We now have faith merchandise available for you to show your support for Barack Obama as a person of faith.

Check out the Believers for Barack, Pro-Family Pro-Obama, and Catholics for Obama buttons, bumper stickers and signs….

Believers for Barack rally signs and bumper stickers, along with all Pro-Family Pro-Obama merchandise, are appropriate for people of all faith backgrounds. We’ll soon be rolling out merchandise for other religious groups and denominations, but I wanted to get this out to you without delay.

Take good care,

Paul Monteiro
Deputy Director of Religous (sic) Affairs
Obama for America

Oh, YAY! And God-O-Meter said there will be more to come, like “Clergy for Change.” Oh, I cannot WAIT to get one of those! Actually, yes, yes I can. Many of you will like THIS one: “Pro-Israel Pro-Obama.” I wonder how HAMAS and The Nation of Islam will feel about that one…I guess Obama can ask his pastor, Jeremiah Wright, about that.

Now some of you heathens out there might be just a bit sceptical about Obama’s reaching out to the religious among us. Some of you might just be bitterly clinging to his comments about religious folk bitterly clinging to their guns and religion. Oh, ye of little faith!! He cares about you, he really does. Didn’t you see the BUTTON?? Or the STICKER?? C’mon! Don’t play hard to get! Obama loves you, this I know! For his minions have bludgeoned me with that claim for weeks now! I mean - because he shows us in so many ways: FISA, public campaign funds, off-shore drilling, NAFTA, gun control…Oh, I could go on and on with all the ways Obama’s Words have touched our lives. Praise the One who can stop the waters rising, and slow their very movement! Now the Faithful may proudly display the object of their veneration right on their cars and their lapels! Will wonders never cease?!

But wait! There is one more left to see. This courtesy of my talented partner who wanted to make sure we were all represented. Here it is:

Step right up! Order yours today!!

* Text of the Logan Act: Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.

• “Does he wear a flag pin on his lapel? Yes, but not always. Like many presidential candidates, sometimes he wears a flag pin, sometimes he wears a breast cancer awareness pin, sometimes he wears his U.S. Senate membership pin and other times he wears no pin at all.”

• “Is he a Christian? Yes. He is a committed Christian. In 1985, he began working as a community organizer with a Christian church-based group seeking to improve the living conditions in poor Chicago neighborhoods.”

The mailer missed the mark! It reminds of us those rumors, that he is unpatriotic and a Muslim, rather than dispels them. Once again our family, friends and neighbors will be discussing the rumors anew.

Here is the second mailer. Part of this mailer has an older white woman saying “I am voting for the candidate who will fix our health care system.” Today, it was revealed that a health care plan backed by the AFL-CIO and SEIU may derail Obama’s healthcare plan.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcdnlNZg2iM[/youtube]

And now this on a union backed health care plan is called “guaranteed affordable choice”. More on that:

If SEIU and the AFL-CIO get their way, the day that all Americans have affordable insurance will be pushed into the unforeseeable future.

The labor-backed plan, which they call “guaranteed affordable choice,” would create a public program like Medicare that would allegedly compete with the nation’s 1,500 insurance companies. Americans would get tax-financed subsidies to purchase insurance from either a private insurance company or the public plan. Competition, which has never worked in the health insurance industry, would magically come to life.

By leaving the bloated insurance industry smack in the middle of our health care system, “guaranteed affordable choice” would have taxpayers and premium-payers continuing to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on unnecessary administrative costs.

The other two faces on the mailer show white older males, one a retiree and one still employed. It will evoke memories of the comments spoken in front of wealthy donors in San Francisco. Here are Obama’s exact words:

“You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them,” Obama said. “And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

And of course we will be reminded of Obama’s stance on NAFTA. Or were those just words and he didn’t mean it?

“While Senator Obama was telling voters he would fix NAFTA, his chief economics advisor was telling Canadians that his position was just words.

The AFL-CIO wasted their money and time. The AFL-CIO needs to go back to the drawing board on these mailers! If the mailers evoke these memories in me, what will they do for the union members and the bitter people living in Pennsylvania? All those campaign gaffes during the primaries will haunt Obama’s dream again, while I sleep peacefully at night!

Obama’s Speechwriter: A Baby Faced, 26-Year-Old White Guy 

So, Obama is really, really successful at reading a teleprompter, and delivering someone else’s words. A puppet, you might say. 

Then we learned that Obama was regurgitating words originally given by his friend Patrick Deval. Not once, but many times. 

And we not only learned about *borrowed* speeches but also borrowed phrases. 

“Sí Se Puede” or “yes we can” is from the United Farm Workers. 

 “Together we can” was the campaign slogan of Deval Patrick in 2006

“Fired Up! Ready to Go!” is from the NAACP in South Carolina, used by Jondelle Harris Johnson in the Civil Rights marches. 

“We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.” is a Hopi Indian saying, used by Alice Walker as the title of her book.

But now we learn that not only is Obama a puppet when it comes to giving speeches, but his foreign policy isn’t his either. I knew he had very little foreign policy experience, if any, but doesn’t he have to do anything?? A cast of 300 prepare him daily? Who are these people that are affecting our foreign policy? Shouldn’t they be running for office, or at least vetted, since they are doing all the work? 

A Cast of 300 Advises Obama on Foreign PolicyEvery day around 8 a.m., foreign policy aides at Senator Barack Obama’s Chicago campaign headquarters send him two e-mails: a briefing on major world developments over the previous 24 hours and a set of questions, accompanied by suggested answers, that the candidate is likely to be asked about international relations during the day.One recent Q. & A. asked, for example, whether Mr. Obama supported the decision by Iraq’s prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, to include a timetable for American troop withdrawal in any new security agreements with the United States. The answer, provided to Mr. Obama with bullet points, was yes — or “a genuine opportunity,” as he put it in a speech on Iraq this week. Behind the e-mail messages is a tight-knit group of aides supported by a huge 300-person foreign policy campaign bureaucracy, organized like a mini State Department, to assist a candidate whose limited national security experience remains a concern to many voters.   

I do take some comfort in knowing that many are from the Clinton White House and from Hillary’s staff. (funny how Obama always wanted to distance himself from the politics of the past, and from the Clinton’s, but he always surrounds himself with people from the Clintons years.) 

I know all candidates, and all Presidents have advisors. I know they all have speech writers. But, if you take away Obama’s great speeches, and you take away his foreign policy advisors, what is left? Seriously. He has not accomplished anything. Nada. Zilch. And the LITTLE that he does do, now, (give speeches or comment on foreign policy) is totally scripted and provided by someone else. And when he speaks to groups like African Americans about taking responsibility, he is threatened with castration. And when he has taken a firm stance on an issue, he completely FLIPS and FLOPS on them - FISA, NAFTA, the surge in Iraq, campaign finance, guns, abortion… 

Well, I think we have a pretty good idea of what happens when Obama is left to his own devices. Here are some new ones: 

“Great” Moments in Presidential Speeches: Obama

Another Barack Obama Gaffe: A Civilian Army? (what is that all about??)

The Real Barack Obama, The Flip Flop Kid

The Obama Iraq Documentary: Whatever the Politics Demand

Barack Obama “Uh” Count 

And of course, the classics:

Obama VS. Robert Gibbs on the surge

Obama on Iran

 The Game of Expedience

Obama Just words - just speeches - just think

Obama on Lobbiest bill

Obama on the Race Card

Obama Claims He’s Visited 57 States

Obama on his dad and the flag?

Barack Obama Sees Dead People

Obama’s Memorial Day Gaffe

Obama in Sunrise 

Obama rally in Sioux Falls

Obama on Rezko

Obama Gets Afghanistan Language Wrong 

So, again I ask, is he just a puppet? A flip flopping, do nothing, know nothing, present voting, change jobs every two years, never having accomplished anything, hangs out with bigots, racists, and terrorists, gaffe machine, judgment lacking, slumlord buddy, vain, pandering puppet. 

What does he stand for, really? We thought he was very left. But now he is moving further and further to the right. We can’t look at his voting history, because it is very un-telling (130 present votes on tough issues- intentional, me thinks) We can’t look at his resume because it is very, very short - he has spent more time campaigning then serving in the Senate (146 days). And his state senate job was part time, meeting 55 days a year.  

Hell, we can’t even look at his birth certificate to know if he is who he says he is! We can’t even look to his books for information, because they are full of mistruths, and fictitious characters and situations.

I can’t figure out if he is super calculating and dangerous, or a puppet.  

But, who is controlling his strings? 

Published at American PUMA in Italy. 

And now? He’s not standing on principle, he’s running to the center. He has reversed himself on public campaign financing, late term abortions, gun control, FISA, Iraq, MoveOn.org, NAFTA, and Iran. How bad is it?

I got a call this afternoon from the Barack Obama campaign. (Apparently, they have hired Meyer Associates, who can be reached at 301 851-4961, to help them with fund raising.) The woman on the other end of the line opened with a pitch about Barack Obama representing “hope and change,” at which point I cut her off. I recounted the litany of Barack’s flip flops. Imagine my surprise (and my delight) when the woman sighed and said, “I agree with you.”

She went on to tell me that 70% of the people she had talked to during the last two days were telling her the same thing. Most, she said, were unwilling to vote for McCain and were vowing to stay home. Needless to say the fundraising was not going well. I mentioned that I had heard that Barack’s campaign failed to reach their fundraising goals for the second quarter. She confirmed that this was true. We had a very pleasant conversation. I wished her good luck and hung up.

A few minutes later I was checking email and came across this message from a NoQuarter reader (thanks dude):

Incidentally, I just now received my first fund-raising call from the Obama campaign — not the DNC, DCCC, or DSCC, but the campaign (the D groups probably won’t be calling me again). You would have loved hearing that call from the campaign, not so much for my opening rant about how “I will not be contributing to the Obama campaign or any other national Democratic groups after their treatment of Senator Clinton, race-baiting, and race slurring”, but for the young caller’s response to my rant, which was an exasperated “what is all this I’m hearing about how we treated Hillary? We took all the flack for Wright with no help from her, and now you people are saying we called her a racist!”

That told me that their fund-raising operation is running into more Clintonistas than they imagined. Or else, that one poor guy is somehow getting ALL OF US on the phone!

The only way Barack raises new money (because most of his major existing supporters are maxed out) is to get some coinage from Hillary supporters or disenchanted Republicans. Well, that ain’t happening. And if traffic at Barack’s website is an indicator then it certainly appears that Barack is not having much success in expanding his base. In fact, the base is contracting.

Coyote Ugly used to refer only to a situation that started with too much alcohol and led to casual sex with a partner that, in the soft low lights of a bar, appeared to be cute. But when the sun rises and you open you eyes, you discover that the beauty you thought you bedded was actually a beast. Like a coyote caught in a trap, you will chew off your arm rather than risk moving it and waking the sleeping horror show at your side.

Let’s face facts–Super Delegates are slowly discovering that they climbed into bed with a Barack Obama that does not really exist. He is not a new and different kind of politician. Nope. He’s an old style Chicago politician who has feasted on graft, compromised principles, got public money for slum lords who put black folks in homes not fit for pigs, and is now pandering to an imaginary conservative center. His decision yesterday to abandon his promise to fight George Bush for shredding the fourth amendment was not an aberration, it was a window into his soul. Will Super Delegates come to their senses and put a halt to nominating the fraud that is Barack Obama? We will see.

“In the primary, Mr. Obama:

• supported pulling out of Iraq within 16 months,
• called the D.C. gun ban constitutional,
• backed the subjection of telecom companies to expensive lawsuits for cooperating in the terror surveillance program,
• opposed welfare reform,
• pledged to renegotiate Nafta,
• disavowed free trade and
• was strongly against the death penalty in all cases.

“But in the past few weeks, Mr. Obama has reversed course on all of these, discarding fringe liberal views for relentlessly centrist positions. He also flip-flopped on accepting public financing and condemning negative ads from third party groups, like unions.

“By taking Nixon’s advice, Mr. Obama is assuming such dramatic reversals will somehow avoid voter scrutiny. But people are watching closely, and by setting a world indoor record for jettisoning past positions, Mr. Obama may be risking his reputation for truthfulness. A candidate’s credibility, once lost, is very hard to restore, regardless of how fine an organization he has built.”

The above excerpt is from today’s Wall Street Journal.

The bullet points were added to emphasize the number of 180-degree reversals.

Moving towards the center is one thing. Displaying no adherence to principles is another.

As Medusa notes, this is very unsettling to Obama’s most passionate supporters, many of whom are protesting on his own Web site.

Speaking of Obama’s campaign Web site:

Change & Experience blog linked to a story here the other day, and displayed an astonishing trend graph that shows that Obama’s popularity indeed is on the wane:

NoQuarter is reporting that Daily Kos and Barack Obama’s base is fracturing. He couldn’t be more right. Right now BarackObama.com is tanking in website hits. He is currently at pre-Iowa caucus levels (currently at around Jan. 2nd). John McCain’s site and Bob Barr’s site have remain constant. Barack Obama’s polling numbers have remained unchanged since May 18th. For a “popular” presumptive candidate, you would think you would see his numbers increasing.

When you write, “Who are these women, and why are they such buzzkills?”

When you fail to acknowledge the primary reason that PUMAs oppose Barack Obama — which is his utter lack of qualifications and experience?

Especially since you did not interview a single member of the JustSayNoDeal.com or PUMA08 coalition? Particularly since, without referring to the group by name, or speaking with (let alone interviewing) any of its leaders, you refer to our top-of-the-tier organizing force, JustSayNoDeal.com, and only in passing, as “this one“?

We’ve posted two reactions to Rebecca Traister’s June 23rd Salon story, “Why Clinton voters say they won’t support Obama,” with the subtitle, “The attack of the PUMAs, or a dozen reasons why Clinton voters are still too angry to come home“:

• “Rebecca Traister’s Safe Expectations — No Deal,” by Charles Lemos
• “A Response to Salon’s Story on PUMA: The Most Important Reason Clinton Voters Will Not Support Senator Obama,” by Ani

Here’s Ms. Traister’s YouTube response to the torrent of comments and e-mails:

Our MALE contributor, Charles Lemos, replied to Ms. Traister’s question, “Who are these women, and why are they such buzzkills?.”

A buzzkill? A buzzkill would be a disasterous Presidency from a dangerously inexperienced 46-year-old Senator who misspeaks on issues ranging from the status of Jerusalem to meeting global dictators and sponsors of global terrorism without preconditions and has no core convictions and for whom everything is a matter of political expediency. That’s a buzzkill. And PUMA, at least for me, stands for People United Means Action.

Ani emphasized the primary reason that millions of us oppose Obama’s candidacy:

Here is the main thing your article fails to take into account, and the main thing every single media outlet in this country likewise ignores: The number one reason we will not support Senator Obama for President is that he is not qualified for the job.

Surprised? Let’s examine this more closely.

This man has missed over 40% of his votes in the Senate. If one examines the votes he has missed, they actually are politically risky and require moral courage. So far, he has exhibited little.

He voted “present” 130 times in the Illinois State Legislature and voted “wrong” six times, i.e., he said “oops, I accidentally pressed the wrong button” — so either he is incapable of multitasking, or he is dishonest, just making choices for political expediency.

Aah. Thou hast hit it. What are the clues to his actions as nothing more than political expedience and opportunism:

A man who sits in a divisive and racist church for 20 years and lies about his knowledge of the contents of these sermons, then throws the church under the bus when it becomes politically critical for him to do so.

A man who is closely associated with the likes of the convicted criminal Tony Rezko, buys a house with his help, receives $250K in campaign contributions and allows Rezko’s slum holes to flourish in his State Senate district while likewise claiming ignorance — yet lies before the American people and says he barely knows the man and only did five hours of work for him years ago.

I will not even delve into his long working relationship with the man from the Weather Underground, ex-terrorist Bill Ayers, which he has likewise downplayed and/or denied.

This is a man with a questionable record on women’s rights, voting ‘present’ numerous times, who has also said “many pro-choice Democrats don’t understand that abortion is a wrenching moral issue.” Really? How insulting.

This is a Democrat who campaigns in South Carolina with Donnie McClurkin, an “ex-gay” man “reformed through prayer.” I wonder to whom Senator Obama was pandering in that state?

This is a man who runs slightly to the left of Hillary Clinton only to flip flop on every position he originally took including: public financing, FISA, his positions of Iraq withdrawal, the Iran threat, Israel, NAFTA and more.

Senator Obama is a man who insults the Bill Clinton presidency, a time of peace and prosperity, while extolling virtues of the disastrous Reaganomics. He calls himself a Democrat?

Most devastating, Senator Obama is a man who, together with his campaign manager and surrogates advantage themselves at every opportunity by playing the race card unjustly.

Senator Obama is the product of splendid marketing. Nothing more …

Read all of Ani’s story, “A Response to Salon’s Story on PUMA: The Most Important Reason Clinton Voters Will Not Support Senator Obama.”

A FINAL NOTE: Your story uses the pronoun “they” over and over and over. Did you SPEAK WITH any of the “they” PUMAs? Did you call a single one? Did you exchange any e-mails with any of the major activists in the JustSayNoDeal.com and PUMA collaborative movements? In Number 11 of your story, you link to 5 sites, at least one of which is not part of the PUMA / JustSayNoDeal.com movement.

Journalism 101 requires direct contact with, and interviews of, the principals involved in these movements — none of which you did for your story.

And then I got this email from Cathy in Michigan:

Larry,

I was a big Hillary supporter, but I just don’t understand why the negative stuff about Obama is coming from Dem Hillary supporters:

#1) Obama is ten times better than McCain

#2 The GOP will and is playing the race card (come on you got to face reality)

#3) I still think Obama and Hillary should run together

So where are you coming from? Do you really want McCain to win?

Cathy B.
Lincoln Park, Michigan

Fair questions Cathy, so here’s my answer.

I prefer that neither win. McCain, by virtue of temperament and his decision to put neo-cons in key foreign policy positions in his campaign, worries me. I cannot support him. But compared to Obama, McCain comes across as King Solomon. McCain at least has a history of legislative accomplishment and has demonstrated he can work with the most progressive of Democrats (McCain/Feingold anyone?).

Obama? He has no significant legislative accomplishments. He has claimed credit for things he did not do, but he has not actually put together the coalitions that he talks about in his stump speeches. The man, attractive and articulate, is an empty suit and a lightweight.

The color of Barack’s skin is irrelevant to the question of his qualification. People should not vote for him or against him because he is black. Doing either is racist. Similarly, you should not vote for or against Hillary because she is a woman. Her sex is equally irrelevant. Character and competence ought to be the issue and on both Obama is found wanting.

Consider how he has distanced himself from the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, the Reverend James Meeks, and the Reverend Michael Pfleger. [PHOTO: Father Pfleger, Rev. Wright, and Barack Obama.] We know now that these gentlemen espouse the most vile racist and homophobic messages.

Barack now claims he knew nothing about the views of these men. That is bullshit! Here is what Barack told Cathleen Falsani about his religious buddies in a 2004 interview:

GG:
Do you have people in your life that you look to for guidance?

OBAMA:
Well, my pastor is certainly someone who I have an enormous amount of respect for.
I have a number of friends who are ministers. Reverend Meeks is a close friend and colleague of mine in the state Senate. Father Michael Pfleger is a dear friend, and somebody I interact with closely.

GG:
Those two will keep you on your toes.

OBAMA:
And theyr’e good friends. Because both of them are in the public eye, there are ways we can all reflect on what’s happening to each of us in ways that are useful.

I think they can help me, they can appreciate certain specific challenges that I go through as a public figure.

And do you remember when Barack had trouble remembering whether he had heard Wright damn America or say any of the other outrageous crap that he spewed? In fact, Wright denounced the United States in 2001 after the 9-11 attacks. Barack now says he doesn’t remember being at Church when Wright spoke those words. Well guess what? That is not what he told Falsani in 2004:

GG:
Do you still attend Trinity?

OBAMA:
Yep. Every week. 11 oclock service.

Ever been there? Good service.

I actually wrote a book called Dreams from My Father, it’s kind of a meditation on race. There’s a whole chapter on the church in that, and my first visits to Trinity.

But it is not just on matters of faith that he lies and dissembles. As we have documented in this blog over the last two weeks he has changed his tune about his position on FISA, about public financing for presidential campaigns, and about NAFTA.

If Barack had simply taken time to chair a hearing on NATO’s role in Afghanistan or had traveled to Europe to fulfill his duties as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee with responsibility for NATO then I would give him the benefit of the doubt that he was trying to prepare himself. But he did not? Why? His words, not mine–he was too busy running for President.

And when it comes to playing the race card, Barack displays the gift of chutzpah. He recently told that Congressional Black Caucus that Hillary Clinton folks spread the rumor that he was a muslim. According to the Telegraph:

He reminded the congressmen and women that he had held his tongue even when Clinton allies had falsely suggested he was a Muslim and when the candidate herself had said he was not ready to be commander-in-chief.

It was not Hillary or her supporters. If anything, it was Barack himself who opened the door to the questions about Islam. He told Falsani:

As I said, we moved to Indonesia. She remarried an Indonesian who wasn’t particularly, he wasn’t a practicing Muslim. I went to a Catholic school in a Muslim country. So I was studying the Bible and catechisms by day, and at night you’d hear the prayer call.

We now know this was a flat out lie. He went to a Muslim school where he learned to recite the Muslim call to prayer. Nicholas Kristoff noted back in March of 2007:

Sorry to give offense to Alabama, but the reality is that Obama’s Muslim connections — his Muslim grandfather, his childhood in Indonesia, his middle name (Hussein), and, yes, his ability to recite the call to prayer — will turn off many voters in red states.

At the CIA we called that “no Shit” analysis. It is Obama’s own comments that raised the issue of his status as a Muslim (or not). That was not Hillary or her supporters. It was Barack himself. Like Nick Kristoff, I could care less if Barack is or was a muslim (I take him at his word that he was not affiliated formally with any religion until he signed up on the Jeremiah Wright Hate Train). What bothers me is he refuses to fully admit that Islam was a part of his life when he lived in Indonesia. He learned the call to prayer but nothing else? Yeah, that is change you can believe in.

Let me close with a terrific video, originating from New England Cable News (NECN), featuring Darragh Murphy. It is worth your time.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Here is the main thing your article fails to take into account, and the main thing every single media outlet in this country likewise ignores: The number one reason we will not support Senator Obama for President is that he is not qualified for the job.

Surprised? Let’s examine this more closely.

This man has missed over 40% of his votes in the Senate. If one examines the votes he has missed, they actually are politically risky and require moral courage. So far, he has exhibited little.

He voted “present” 130 times in the Illinois State Legislature and voted “wrong” six times, i.e., he said “oops, I accidentally pressed the wrong button” — so either he is incapable of multitasking, or he is dishonest, just making choices for political expediency.

Aah. Thou hast hit it. What are the clues to his actions as nothing more than political expedience and opportunism:

A man who sits in a divisive and racist church for 20 years and lies about his knowledge of the contents of these sermons, then throws the church under the bus when it becomes politically critical for him to do so.

A man who is closely associated with the likes of the convicted criminal Tony Rezko, buys a house with his help, receives $250K in campaign contributions and allows Rezko’s slum holes to flourish in his State Senate district while likewise claiming ignorance — yet lies before the American people and says he barely knows the man and only did five hours of work for him years ago.

I will not even delve into his long working relationship with the man from the Weather Underground, ex-terrorist Bill Ayers, which he has likewise downplayed and/or denied.

This is a man with a questionable record on women’s rights, voting ‘present’ numerous times, who has also said “many pro-choice Democrats don’t understand that abortion is a wrenching moral issue.” Really? How insulting.

This is a Democrat who campaigns in South Carolina with Donnie McClurkin, an “ex-gay” man “reformed through prayer.” I wonder to whom Senator Obama was pandering in that state?

This is a man who runs slightly to the left of Hillary Clinton only to flip flop on every position he originally took including: public financing, FISA, his positions of Iraq withdrawal, the Iran threat, Israel, NAFTA and more.

Senator Obama is a man who insults the Bill Clinton presidency, a time of peace and prosperity, while extolling virtues of the disastrous Reaganomics. He calls himself a Democrat?

Most devastating, Senator Obama is a man who, together with his campaign manager and surrogates advantage themselves at every opportunity by playing the race card unjustly.

Senator Obama is the product of splendid marketing. Nothing more. Even MoveOn.Org, naively endorsing him without vetting his true positions, is starting to turn on him — realizing that, they too, have served their purpose and are now going to be thrown under the bus as he must move to the center to shore up his flagging presidential bid, as his initial “American Idol” appeal is now waning.

So, please, do all of us ‘bitter’ voters a favor and stop mischaracterizing our motives. Some of us actually have principles and put our country before our party. We care deeply about America and about our fellow citizens of every background. We would like a person of solid character with a consistent record and sensible, coherent policies to lead our nation. Someone with a 35 year history of working for the rights of children, women, veterans’ benefits, first responders, health care and education. Someone who will take a tough stand on the issues and have the courage of his or her convictions.

For your information, I have just described Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.

:::::::

See my previous story here, “An Open Letter to Vice President Gore.”

This means, of course, that we have to take creative marketing guru David Axelrod’s word for it that he really spoke those words in 2002. By the way, after that unreported speech — unremarkable because he uttered those words safely ensconced in a very liberal neighborhood of Chicago — Obama never lifted a finger or spoke out again on Iraq. That is, until it became politically useful for him to make a major production out of that single unreported, unrecorded speech.

Sadly, his followers haven’t reviewed the true history of that one speech, haven’t questioned the authenticity of its reproduction in a recording studio, and haven’t factored in that Obama didn’t make any further effort to aid the anti-Iraq-war movement, even when he joined the U.S. Senate — where his voting record is identical to Hillary Clinton’s, except that he voted FOR the ill-suited Gen. George Casey, while Hillary Clinton did not. BELOW — and it’s a must-read — I have quoted Joseph Wilson’s writings about his memories of those opposed to the Iraq War and Obama’s notable absence from any participation in lobbying against the war before and since joining the U.S. Senate.

View more of TravisTCleveland’s videos. Like this one:

Now, the must-read section from Joseph Wilson’s op-ed, republished here at No Quarter:

A number of us, like then Illinois state senator Obama, opposed the second Gulf War. My own opposition from the beginning has been well documented. I fought the fight in the arena itself, Washington DC, against a ruthless administration and its supporters while the senator’s opposition came from a far distance and carried no risk, given that he represented in Springfield, Illinois the district encompassing the University of Chicago. As an obscure but safe provincial political figure, he never was granted access to the distorted intelligence that was used to drive the Congress and the media. When I looked to the left or to the right for support, I never saw the state senator. In fact, I never heard of Barack Obama until he announced his intention to run for the Senate in the 2006 election.

After he came to Washington, Obama’s views were thoroughly conventional and even timid. In 2004, he said about the 2002 congressional Authorization for the Use of Military Force: “I’m not privy to Senate intelligence reports. What would I have done? I don’t know.” On Iraq-related votes in the Senate, Obama’s record identically matches Senator Clinton’s–with the exception that Senator Clinton voted against the confirmation of General George Casey as Army chief of staff. Obama’s vote was typically passive.

In the run up to the war and thereafter, I was in frequent discussions with senior Democrats in Washington, including Senator Clinton, and I was keenly aware of her demand for the full exercise of international diplomacy and allowing the weapons inspectors to complete their mission. Many of the most prominent early opponents of the war, including former General Wes Clark and former ambassador to the United National Richard Holbrooke support Senator Clinton for President, as do I. We do so because we know that she has the experience and the judgment that comes from having been in the arena for her entire adult life–and from close personal participation with her in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy. And we have trust in her to end the war in Iraq in the most responsible way, consistent with our national security interests. …

Read all of Ambassador Wilson’s “The Real Hillary I Know — and the Unreal Obama.”

Washington DC, June 21 — Tonight political prisoner Larry Sinclair is spending his fourth night in the DC Jail, the victim of a Gestapo-style enemies’ list operation carried out just three blocks from the White House last Wednesday afternoon.

Sinclair had come to the National Press Club to detail his charges that the self-proclaimed Democratic presidential nominee Barack Hussein Obama had indulged in two homosexual encounters complete with crack cocaine in early November 1999, that Obama was complicit in the December 2007 assassination of Donald Young, the gay choirmaster of Jeremiah Wright’s Trinity United Church of Christ, and that’s Obama’s resident perception monger, David Axelrod, had paid the pornographic website Whitehouse.com $750,000 to organize a campaign of character assassination against Sinclair, culminating in a faked polygraph test. At the close of the press conference, Sinclair was arrested inside the press club by US Marshals and DC police, apparently based on an old Delaware warrant.

GESTAPO TACTICS IN THE NATIONAL PRESS CLUB, THE TEMPLE OF THE FIRST AMENDMENT?

Where are the civil libertarians? Where are the paladins of the ACLU? Where is the outcry and the indignation? Is no one concerned about threats to lynch a gay man for political reasons in the heart of the nation’s capital? Where are the left liberals who have been ostensibly so concerned about civil rights and civil liberties from Nixon to Bush-Cheney? Perhaps they are sleeping, or perhaps they have drunk the Obama Kool-Aid and have become morally insane.

Or perhaps they are so obsessed with the reform of the FISA law and the danger that Bush might be listening in to their telephone calls that they do not notice when a prominent critic of a presidential candidate who is infamously a darling of the establishment media is actually arrested, taken into custody and led away, the target of Gestapo tactics in the National Press Club, the sanctum sanctorum of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and the First Amendment generally.

Surely the weak sisters who have joined Obama’s fifth column are morally insane when they joke about how Barky’s Myrmidons were able to arrest Sinclair. If the First Amendment does not apply to speech which is not popular with the establishment and the mob, then the First Amendment does not exist at all, for anybody. Any journalist or writer should be able to see that they themselves may be next, now that the US Marshals are serving as the “Fight the Smears” enforcement arm of the Obama campaign. Selective and vindictive prosecution, anyone?

The mere fact that Larry Sinclair had been able to hold such a successful press conference was already a serious defeat for the corrupt and brutal Obama machine.

Sinclair had appeared in the Holeman Lounge before more than a hundred journalists, with 10 cameras set up on tripods in the back of the room. The number of handheld cameras, camcorders, and tape recorders was beyond counting. The press conference was dignified, businesslike, factual. There was no screaming, no disruption, no threats or insults.

Every journalist who wanted to ask a question was given ample opportunity to do so, and about three dozen questions were asked. Reasonable follow-ups were allowed.

There were journalists from Britain, from Germany, from India, from China. Most of the questions represented honest attempts to pin down the facts of what was being alleged.

Sinclair’s honesty compared favorably to most politicians today. He started his presentation with a detailed admission of his criminal record, jail time served, his pending court motion to dismiss an old Colorado warrant, and a statement that his troubles with the law date back more than 20 years to 1980-1986.

In the question-and-answer segment, Sinclair gave a straight answer to every question he was asked. He did not dodge questions, he did not prevaricate, he did not refuse to answer questions, and he did not bungle his answers. Sinclair has made serious mistakes in life, as he readily concedes. But Sinclair is not a candidate, not a person who has to be evaluated by the public and then accepted or rejected.

Sinclair comes forward as a witness with a series of allegations to make and a story to tell. It is up to public opinion and most emphatically the news media to evaluate those allegations and those facts, including through the efforts of enterprising investigative journalists anxious to make a name for themselves by finding out the truth about what is potentially the biggest political scandal of the century. Obama, after all, is the candidate of whom we know little and who needs urgently to be evaluated.

The issue posed is not what you think about Larry Sinclair. The overriding issue is the presidency in a time of military defeat, institutional crisis, and economic breakdown.

HOMOPHOBIC DEATH THREATS AGAINST SINCLAIR

Obama’s lemming legions, and especially his notorious mercenary squadristi of the Internet, had done everything possible to sabotage and disrupt Sinclair’s press conference. One Obama backer had issued a categorical death threat against Sinclair in terms that made it abundantly clear that a homophobic hate murder might be in the offing. The FBI and the District of Columbia police had shown zero interest in offering Sinclair protection against a possible hit by one of Obama’s fanatics.

Once it is accepted that police agencies can intervene in political campaigns, it is possible to a rest or detain almost anyone if the interest is great enough. The old warrant used to incarcerate Sinclair most probably refers to events already covered by the statute of limitations.

If nothing can be found at this level, there are always old parking tickets and library fines that can be ginned up. Any political candidate who has had dealings with the Federal Elections Commission can be hauled in on some minor technical violation. The precedent established by last Wednesday’s events at the National Press Club is exceedingly ominous for the public life of this country.

The irony is that repression is now being carried out not to help the Republicans but under ultra-left cover, to help the radical subversive Obama.

Since the warrant used as the pretext to arrest Sinclair apparently came from Delaware, our attention naturally turns to Senator Joe Biden, the incorrigible blowhard and defeated presidential candidate who is now known to be angling for the post of vice president or Secretary of State in a future Obama regime.

We also note that Biden’s son, the nepotist Beau Biden, is the current Attorney General of Delaware. As the cops would say, the Biden machine, anxious to ingratiate themselves with Obama, had the means, motive, and opportunity to arrange this outrageous arrest. For those gullible enough to believe that civil liberties might improve under an Obama regime, this ought to provide a reality shock.

Do not assume that civil liberties will get better under Obama; the evidence is now that they will get worse. Obama’s National Press Club caper is as blatant as anything seen under Bush – and Barky is not even in the White House.

At the end of his detailed indictment of Obama, Sinclair demanded information on four points. The first involves Obama as phone records for November 3, 1999 through November 8, 1999 — the time frame of the two allegedly encounters between Obama and Sinclair, mediated by Paramjit Multani of Five Star Limo at O’Hare Airport. The second involves Obama’s phone records for September 2007 — December 23, 2007, when Sinclair was receiving probing phone calls from Donald Young about how much Sinclair had revealed concerning Obama — calls that ended when Young was found dead from multiple gunshot wounds just before Christmas 2007.

Sinclair’s third demand for clarification touches communications from Obama, Axelrod, and campaign manager David Plouffe to Whitehouse.com in January and February 2008. Sinclair’s fourth point regards possible payments by Obama, Obama’s campaign, Axelrod, Plouffe, and Axelrod’s AKP Message and Media to Whitehouse.com in that same time frame of January-February 2008.

OBAMA MUST ANSWER, NOT EVADE

It is now up to Obama to answer these charges. It is imperative that this be done now, without further delay. No responsible citizen wants a president who can be blackmailed and thus turned into a puppet because he is hiding secrets about bisexual activities, crack cocaine, political murder, and character assassination campaigns.

It is also up to the great news organizations, including ABC, CBS, NBC, The New York Times, and the Washington Post, to carry out their responsibility to the public. These news organizations should not play the role of kept courtesans of those in political power. As Sinclair pointed out, he has told his story and has thus done everything he can.

It is now up to the great media concerns to locate and interview the limo driver Paramjit Multani, to investigate the relevant telephone records, and above all to question Obama himself about this very serious matter. It is not up to the corporate media to sit back and sniff about whether a Sinclair has conclusively proven his own case to their satisfaction or not; the proving or disproving is the responsibility of the media, and let them make damn sure that they get it right.

By today’s journalistic standards, Sinclair’s allegations are extraordinarily substantive already, especially when compared with some other major scandal allegations heard during the primaries. Sinclair has filed a federal civil suit against Obama and Axelrod, complete with sworn affidavits and court papers.

This means that he is willingly risking Rule 11 penalties for filing a frivolous lawsuit.

He has also made statements to the Chicago police about his contacts with murder victim Donald Young. These steps represent a very high degree of public commitment by Sinclair to the truth of what he is saying.

Compare this to the shoddy standards of the New York Times which, on February 21, 2008 published and prominently displayed on its front page an innuendo about a supposed sex affair between Senator McCain and a certain Vicki Iseman, a Washington lobbyist. Not one single solitary named source was cited to support this innuendo. Or, take the case of Vanity Fair magazine, the house organ of decadent left liberalism, which included a slander piece entitled “The Comeback Id” by Todd Purdom in its July 2008 issue. Here again, there was not one single named source who was willing to have his or her name publicly associated with Purdom’s sleazy allegations.

It is painfully obvious that there is one set of journalistic standards for the Perfect Master Obama, and another and much laxer set for the competition. This is intolerable.

NO PRIVACY FOR THOSE WHO WANT TO ACCESS THE NUCLEAR BUTTON

It is fair to say that the idea of a private sphere for US presidential candidates about which the general public is not entitled to know anything became obsolete at the same time that intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads became available around 1960 to 1965. Since then, every presidential candidate has in effect appeared before the public asking to get his or her hands on the thermonuclear button that can start World War III.

At this point, the notion of a private sphere for presidential candidates becomes wholly untenable. In this day and age, we have the right to know everything but everything about presidential nominees who are asking for our votes.

We have a right to know their full personal histories, with no exceptions, no omissions, and no withheld documents.

We have a right to know if they are HIV-positive and whether they ever registered for the draft.

We want to know if they have received electroshock, psychopharmaca, and whether they have been treated by a psychiatrist.

We have a right to see their birth certificate, their college transcript, their senior thesis if they wrote one, their law school transcript, their passport, papers from earlier times in public office, and all other relevant documents.

We have a right to know about their mother, their father, their sister, their brother, their Aunt Tilly, their best friends at all stages of life, their boyfriends, their girlfriends, their pets, their backers, their sponsors, their gurus, their controllers, and their associates of every kind.

More than a right to know these things, we have an imperative duty to find them out.

For they are asking to get their hands on the thermonuclear button, the misuse of which can unleash a thermonuclear fireball that will not respect any aspect of the privacy of ourselves and our family.

Naturally, candidates are free to make their own choices in life just like everybody else: they can choose their religion, their personal associations, their forms of recreation, and all the rest in any way that they like.

But none of this — absolutely nothing — can be claimed as a secret off limits to the attention of the public. All of it must be thoroughly investigated, aired, and published when the presidency is at stake.

An Air Force crewman at a missile silo in the Dakotas goes through a background check which leaves scant room for privacy. We must demand nothing less from presidential candidates.

OBAMA’S COGNITIVE IMPAIRMENT AND ALLEGED COCAINE USE

Larry Sinclair alleges that Obama has indulged in crack cocaine. Those familiar with the public literature about the current tenant of the White House know very well that there are many indications that his extraordinarily low level of performance may derive from cognitive impairment brought on by habitual cocaine use. How many more coke fiends in the White House are compatible with the further national survival of the United States?

Ronald Reagan notoriously suffered from cognitive impairment and constantly made his remarks off index cards which he kept hidden in his hands. Those index cards were a low-tech version of the glass plates of the Teleprompter upon which Obama relies.

As soon as he cannot read his words off those glass plates, Obama begins to stutter, to stammer and babble, to hem and to haw, repeatedly losing his syntax and constantly interjecting “um” and “you know.” What if Obama’s cocaine use really did extend beyond 1981, as he suggests in his memoir, and continued all the way to late 1999 at the very least, as Sinclair is alleging?

That might suggest that Obama suffers from greater cognitive impairment than Bush, as Obama’s incredible series of gaffes at the end of the primaries also indicates. Larry Sinclair stressed during his press conference that he has been a gay man all his life, and that he regarded the crack cocaine issue as the central one, at least until the time of the Donald Young murder.

During the press conference, Sinclair announced that he was willing to make his own personal medical records, including mental health records, available to responsible representatives of accredited news organizations, at their own expense.

That means that Sinclair is much more forthcoming about his medical history than Obama, who has withheld his medical records and offered a single meaningless page of advertising copy signed by his personal physician. And remember that Sinclair is not running for any office, while Obama wants to be president.

TWO MONTHS TO THE ROLL CALL OF THE STATES, AUGUST 27

The Democratic Party still has more than two months in which these very serious, substantive, and detailed allegations against its presumptive candidate can be thoroughly investigated.

It is unthinkable that any responsible political leader would be willing to see Obama receive the nomination while this sword of Damocles hangs over his head. Larry Sinclair’s videotape has been on the Internet since mid-January, and it has at various times been the object of discussion on something approaching a million websites.

The issues are Obama’s crack cocaine use, his bisexuality, his possible involvement in the Donald Young assassination, and the allegations of character assassination and harassment against Sinclair funded by the Obama campaign.

Karl Rove knows all about each one of these points, and there is no way to deter Karl Rove and his cohorts.

So, although it may seem incomprehensible to Obama’s drooling acolytes, the interest of the Democratic Party is best served by thorough airing of these allegations to before the roll call of the states is held on August 27, 2008 — and this is exactly what Sinclair has been trying to do since mid-January.

If Sinclair had been a GOP deployment, he would simply have waited for September or October to come forward.

There are of course those who lament and regret that it is necessary to dredge up the sordid details of a figure like Obama. They say that it is better to use political campaigns to talk about issues.

This document may sound plausible, but it is totally wrong, and the fault rests with Obama.

First, Obama does not campaign on issues in any systematic way. He presents himself as the Perfect Master, the Anointed One, the Savior, the Messiah, the Mahdi. His hysterical followers are obsessed, not with a political program or a set of issues, but with the personality cult of Obama. This means that any attempt to engage Obama on the issues is by definition an impotent and self-defeating tactic.

The only useful objections that can be made to Obama are ad hominem biographical revelations designed to show that he is not so anointed after all, and that his ability to walk on water has been overestimated.

Then there is also the matter of Obama’s notorious duplicity and flip-flops even where he does have specific positions on certain issues. First Obama wanted a fixed schedule for getting out of Iraq, but Samantha Power revealed that this was not the case at all. Barky said he wanted a different kind of foreign policy, and then he pandered to AIPAC, probably lying through his teeth in the process. First, Obama wanted to help the lower income brackets, but now he is talking about cutting the corporate income tax. Obama attacked free trade in Ohio and Pennsylvania, even as his top economic controller, Austan Goolsbee of the Friedmanite Chicago school reassured the Canadians that this was just election posturing; now Obama has told Fortune magazine that he likes free trade and is devoted to “free markets.”

First, Obama was going to be tough on FISA; now he is going along with the Democratic congressional leaders as they attempt to appease Bush.

Obama had built his career on ethics in government and reducing the role of political contributions; now he has turned his back on the only meager legislative achievements by becoming the first presidential candidate in modern times to repudiate matching funds in the general election.

On all these points, to attempt a substantive debate with Obama is a fool’s errand. The only way to pin Barky down is through pointed reference to crucial facts in his own background, biography, and associations which cannot be changed or swept under the rug. Any other approach is deliberate impotence and capitulation.

FREE LARRY SINCLAIR!

In the meantime, Larry Sinclair is still sitting in the DC jail. He could be extradited to Delaware at any time.

What kind of a presidential campaign are we going to have when critics of the most radical subversive to ever get this close to the presidency have to worry about a knock on the door in the middle of the night? It is time to put massive public pressure on the Obama campaign to drop their enemies’ list operation against Larry Sinclair, and to release him from jail at once.

Webster G. Tarpley is the author of Obama - The Postmodern Coup: Making of a Manchurian Candidate.

The biggest clue that such capital-H Hopes were not rooted in reality came months ago, when newspapers like USA Today, the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune exposed evidence that Obama had used back door ways to take buckets of money from lobbyists and corporate interests after Obama proclaimed that he would not accept such money.

Since Obama became the Democrats’ presumptive nominee, he has wasted no time further dashing the Hopes of progressives far and wide.

Yesterday, for example, the Savannah Morning News reported:

"In an unusual move, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is backing U.S. Rep. John Barrow [of Georgia] in a contested primary election.

"On July 15, Barrow, who is white, faces state Sen. Regina Thomas, who is black, in a Democratic primary likely to attract overwhelmingly
black turnout.

"The Savannah congressman supports policies such as the war in Iraq and President Bush’s tax cuts, which Obama and Thomas oppose."

Rep. Barrow also fought hard to promote the Bush Administration’s domestic-spying programs and Telecom Amnesty (i.e., retroactive immunity for telecom companies that broke the law when helping the Bush Administration spy on Americans).

Progressives capital-H Hate Telecom Amnesty.

In short, Sen. Obama has chosen to publicly support a congressman who stands for three major policies that are egregiously offensive to progressives.

Incidentally, this is not the first time that Sen. Obama has endorsed a Republican in Democrats’ clothing.  In 2006, Obama endorsed Joe Lieberman against anti-war candidate Ned Lamont (for whom progressive bloggers zealously campaigned).

Today, the picture became even rosier for progressives, when Sen. Obama (himself) publicly voiced support for a FISA bill that 1) broadens the Bush Administration’s domestic-spying powers, and 2) includes Telecom Amnesty.

If certain progressive bloggers were dead, they’d be spinning in their graves like the blades on a Sunbeam blender. Marcy at Firedoglake (who, fortunately, is alive) explained her take on Obama’s statement as follows:

1. I will make a showy effort in the Senate on Monday to get them to take out immunity. I will lose that effort 32-65. But hey! I can say I tried!

2. But don’t worry, little boys and girls, Inspectors General are an adequate replacement for our third co-equal branch of government!

3. Nice little bloggers! Aren’t you cute! After you demanded accountability we gave you piggy lipstick and fig leaves and told you it was time to move on while we important Senators told you–in polite terms–to fuck off.

Not all Telecom-Amnesty-hating bloggers have voiced such understandable outrage. TPM’s usually opinionated Josh Marshall (who seemed to lose his objectivity while campaigning for Obama during the primaries) merely quoted Obama’s statement but refrained from commenting.

Perhaps Mr. Marshall feels that crow tastes better in private. Or maybe he (a major opponent of Telecom Amnesty) is still in shock and doesn’t know what to say. Then again, he may be struggling to credibly phrase a defense of Obama’s capital-B Betrayal.

Supporting FISA and endorsing John Barrow are not Obama’s only recent acts of defecation upon progressives. Yesterday, Obama did a 180 on public financing for his campaign. Months ago, Obama said that if McCain agreed to public financing, then Obama would. Without even talking to McCain, Obama decided to skip public financing — meaning he is free to raise as much private (e.g., corporate and lobbyist-tied) cash as he can.

Obama’s campaign is spinning this reversal of position as a declaration of “independence” from the broken campaign-finance system. No, I’m not kidding.

Yes, it is a bit like McDonalds trying to sell Big Macs as health food to kids during Saturday morning cartoons — or President Bush’s trying to sell the Iraq war as aimed at securing freedom for the Iraqi people.

Some progressive bloggers have already convinced themselves that Obama has done the right thing by opting out of public financing. Of course, those bloggers are simultaneously choosing to ignore the fact that Obama flat-out broke a promise to them.

It’s amusing to watch people teach their logic to do gymnastics.

A few days ago, Sen. Obama admitted that his tough talk against NAFTA during the primaries was just talk: he doesn’t really plan to threaten to opt out of NAFTA as a means of re-negotiating for American workers’ benefit.

Obama’s campaign has tried to spin the 180-degree shift as a change in the tone of the rhetoric, but it’s much more than that. Check out this video, which shows Sen. Obama railing against NAFTA at a rally in NAFTA-hating Ohio in February (i.e., just before Ohio’s primary).

Then there’s the economy.  Just days after becoming the presumptive nominee, Sen. Obama professed love for the so-called "free market."  Basically, “free market” lovers want two things: less regulation and lower corporate taxes.

Other famous politicians who loved the so-called "free market" include George Bush and Ronald Reagan.

Since becoming the presumptive nominee, Sen. Obama has been looking more and more different from the person he’d represented himself to be during the first five months of 2008.

Maybe Sen. Obama has a sound, strategic reason for making himself look less progressive and more like John McCain — though I can’t imagine what it is.

If he resembles McCain too closely, all those democrats who are outraged by Obama’s Chicago-style campaign tactics will have good reason to vote against him in November: if the two candidates are so similar, why reward the one who misled voters, reversed himself on important issues, and fought to disenfranchise Michigan and Florida?

“I have always opposed NAFTA.”

“I don’t think NAFTA has been good for America - and I never have.”

“Ten years after NAFTA passed, Senator Clinton said it was good for America. … Well, I don’t think NAFTA has been good for America - and I never have.” –Senator Barack Obama in Toledo, Ohio on February 24, 2008

Now in an interview with Fortune magazine out on Monday June 23, 2008, the very junior Senator from Illinois wants us to believe that was just rhetoric. He really didn’t mean what he said.

“Sometimes during campaigns the rhetoric gets overheated and amplified,” –Senator Barack Obama in a Fortune magazine interview to be published Monday June 23, 2008

Never mind the heat of battle rhetoric, how about the more reflective printed word?

In his own flyer, Obama is quoted as saying that “one million jobs have been lost because of NAFTA, including nearly 50,000 jobs here in Ohio.” But those figures come from an anti-NAFTA source, the Economic Policy Institute written by Robert Schott. Other economists have criticized that report’s methodology and its conclusions as having overstated the impact of NAFTA, rather they point to a lax enforcement of regulations that have permitted an exodus of American manufacturing jobs and primarily to China, Korea and other East Asian countries not to Mexico or Canada. Other economic studies have concluded the trade deal resulted in much smaller job losses or even a small net gain. Here’s what the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has to say on NAFTA’s effects on American jobs:

NAFTA’s net effect on jobs in the United States has been minuscule, given the size of the U.S. economy and the importance of other trading partners.

The best models to date suggest that NAFTA has caused either no net change in employment or a very small net gain of jobs.

And that’s now after seven years of the Bush Administration failing to enforce regulations that shed American jobs. Under President Clinton, it was a far different story. Here’s Professor of Economics Brad Delong (an Obama supporter, I might add) of the University of California at Berkeley writing in July 2000:

It is time to conclude that NAFTA–the North American Free Trade Agreement–is a success.

His article largely is about the impact of NAFTA on Mexico but he finds that economic benefits accrued to all members of the trade pact. However, he does note the following:

Far from shrinking, employment in autos and auto parts in America has grown by more than twenty percent since the beginning of NAFTA. Far from falling, hourly earnings of U.S. automotive workers have risen since the beginning of NAFTA.

Even as recently as February 2008, just about the time Obama was making his comments in Toledo on how he had always opposed NAFTA, Professor Delong was writing that NAFTA was not the cause of Ohio’s woes.

And, of course, if we go back to his Senate campaign of 2004, Obama said this:

“The United States benefits enormously from exports under the WTO and NAFTA.” quoted in an article by Ron Ingram, Obama, Keyes Court Farmers, Decatur Herald & Review, on September 9, 2004. Source: Lexis/Nexis.

So he was for it before he was against before he was for it. Sound familiar? And so much for the “I never have” part of his argument.

And one more point, I may not remember what I had for lunch earlier this week, but I do remember what I have said over the years, maybe because I have core convictions and that is just it with Senator Obama, he has no core convictions. It’s always what is politically expedient for him at the time.

More on this topic and perhaps others once the full interview is out. He can excuse his “rhetoric” as a slip of the tongue but the printed word is a little harder to dismiss.

_________

From my blog, By The Fault.

1) One of the headscarf-wearing women denied a seat behind Obama is demanding a personal apology from the candidate.

Aref said she received a phone call and apology from an Obama campaign offiicial, but said that’s not enough.

“I do appreciate they’re taking the time to look into what happened,” Aref said. “I think it’s a huge deal. I was hoping for an apology from Sen. Obama himself. He needs to send a strong message this kind of discrimination won’t be tolerated.”
—————————–
“It is offensive and counter to Obama’s commitment to bring Americans together and simply not the kind of campaign we run,” Burton [a campaign official] was quoted as saying. “We sincerely apologize for the behavior of these volunteers.”

Of course, it’s the VOLUNTEER’S fault!! Probably a kid donating his/her time to help out and, WHAM! under the bus. Nothin’ but fumes.

Read the rest ->

2) Meanwhile, back at HuffyPot, Claudia Cividino, a Hillary supporter in the beginning, changed her mind when Clinton declined an invitation to appear in Vogue Magazine. Also, while some of her oh-so-progressive fellow typists at the ‘Pot felt Clinton’s misty eyes in PA were contrived to the point of conspiracy, Cividino felt she didn’t show enough emotion or know how to use her emotions.

After years of a bobble head in the top office, this country seems to be asking for competent leadership and a new approach to solving our problems, which will require intelligence in the classic sense, as well as emotional intelligence. As far as I’m concerned, Hillary disqualified herself on this last point.

Do the google. I don’t link to the ‘Pot.

3) And at NewsBusters, Matthew Balan calls out Roland Martin of CNN.

CNN contributor Roland Martin, when asked on Tuesday’s “Anderson Cooper 360″ if Michelle Obama was being held to a different standard than other presidential candidates’ wives, unequivocally placed the blame on conservative men. “No, I think what you have is you’ve got some weak men on the conservative side who, frankly, don’t like strong women. I mean, we saw the exact same thing take place for Hillary Clinton back in 1992…. All of a sudden… Michelle Obama is this angry black woman, when in fact, she’s an accomplished woman, a mother, a wife. And so, they are trying to define her in that way, because they don’t want to deal with the reality.”

I’d like to snark, but I truly don’t know where to begin and I’m trying to keep this entry short. Supply your own punchlines below, please.

4) While the Obama campaign is blasting McCain for his position on off-shore drilling, Fortune notes Obama has quietly toned down his opposition to NAFTA. Obama certainly used NAFTA as a club to pummel Hillary during the primary to the extent that she had to remind him as the first lady she didn’t actually write the legislation.

But now NAFTA doesn’t suck so bad, I guess. Nina Easton reminded Obama of his former words:

In an interview with Fortune to be featured in the magazine’s upcoming issue, the presumptive Democratic nominee backed off his harshest attacks on the free trade agreement and indicated he didn’t want to unilaterally reopen negotiations on NAFTA.

“Sometimes during campaigns the rhetoric gets overheated and amplified,” he conceded, after I reminded him that he had called NAFTA “devastating” and “a big mistake,” despite nonpartisan studies concluding that the trade zone has had a mild, positive effect on the U.S. economy.

Of course, after that, Obama’s handlers backed off Obama’s latest words:

Obama spokesman Bill Burton said that Obama-as the candidate noted in Fortune’s interview-has not changed his core position on NAFTA, and that he has always said he would talk to the leaders of Canada and Mexico in an effort to include enforceable labor and environmental standards in the pact.

But Nina noted:

Nevertheless, Obama’s tone stands in marked contrast to his primary campaign’s anti-NAFTA fusillades. The pact creating a North American free-trade zone was President Bill Clinton’s signature accomplishment; but NAFTA is also the bugaboo of union leaders, grassroots activists and Midwesterners who blame free trade for the factory closings they see in their hometowns.

Hmmmmmm. Take a position to beat up on democratic rivals, then switch to a smarter position as soon as the path is clear. Then have your handlers opine that you never actually switched! Brilliant.

Watch for all of Hillary’s policy positions to get “Obamized.” He’ll take credit for them the way he took credit in Il for legislation he did not work on and for glomming on in DC to yet more legislation he did not work on.

5) Signs of the Apocalypse
The WSJ today had a short but remarkable item by Susan Davis.

In a guest appearance on ABC’s “The View” today Michelle Obama sided with Sen. Hillary Clinton’s view that sexism played a role in the presidential primary campaign.

“Yes, there’s always a level [of sexism],” she said. “People are not used to strong women.” Obama credited Clinton for her race and for breaking down barriers for women.

“And I think that Hillary Clinton, as she said, has made 18 million cracks on the ceiling and we need to keep pushing it and pushing it.” She further credited Clinton for paving the way to make it easier for her young daughters, Sasha and Malia.
“She’s taken [the hits] so that when my girls come along they won’t have to fight it as badly,” she said.

You know, I’m going to really have to think about what she said.

Hmmmmmmm. Uh-huh.

Done.

Gag.

I call bs on that. Un-freakin-believable.

6) If you go to JohnMcCain.com, the picture leading to the section “Citizens for McCain” is of a woman holding up a Hillary Clinton poster now also sporting McCain bumper stickers.

Sweet.

Our first installment began the task of decoding Barack Obama’s curious appeal to our right-of-center friends and relatives. (His point man on domestic policy is also the DLC’s Senior Economist — a deregulatin’, free tradin’, globalizin’, sharp-shootin’ son-of-a-centrist-gun from Waco Texas, Milton Academy, Yale’s Skull and Bones society and the Chicago school.)

The second member of Obama’s policy advisor triad is Harvard’s Jeffrey Liebman. Specialty: “pensions and poverty”, i.e., “entitlements”, i.e., “Social Security“.

Liebman’s reputation: centrist alarmist and moderate privatizer. [CONTINUED below]

He has supported partial privatization of the government-run retirement system, an idea that’s anathema to many Democrats and bears a similarity to a proposal for personal investment accounts that Bush promoted, then dropped in 2005.

“Liebman has been to open to private accounts and most people in town would say he’s a moderate supporter of them,” said Michael Tanner, a Social Security expert at the Cato Institute

Again, this is from RonK Seattle’s “The Audiology of Hope: Dogwhistle Economics 102.” READ all of RonK Seattle’s diaries published at Daily Kos on his inestigative work in exposing the REAL Barack Obama. (It is no wonder that RonK Seattle fled Daily Kos — and the insidious thuggish Obamabot attack machine — for the more nurturing environs of The Confluence.)

SEE ALSO: RonK Seattle’s first installment, “The Audiology of Hope: DLC Dogwhistle Economics ,” in which he dissects the background and policies of Austan Goolsbee — yes that Goolsbee who shall forever be infamous for his conversations with the Canadian embassy to reassure them that Barack Obama wasn’t really against NAFTA. A RonK Seattle sampler on Goolsbee: He is “DLC senior economist.”

I am reminded of the column of Paul Krugman which I wrote about in February.

THE KEY POINT to keep in mind here is that the next president must be STRONG on policy as well as highly experienced and knowledgeable about the maneuverings of Congress in order to protect Social Security. That requires the next president be experienced in the ways of Washington, D.C. and be stalwhart in his/her determination to protect Social Security.

And must I add the obvious? That the next president must TRULY CARE about protecting Social Security?

Now, here’s what I wrote about and quoted from Dr. Krugman’s column in “Hmmm … who is Krugman talking about?“:

From “Don’t Rerun That ’70s Show,” NYT op-ed columnist and economist Paul Krugman, February 22, 2008 — the conclusion:

[E]ven if the next president is a Democrat, any serious stimulus plan would face intense, ideologically motivated opposition in Congress. Will the next president be prepared to fight for an effective plan? Or will we end up with a compromise like the one Congressional Democrats agreed to this year, legislation that assuages conservative objections at the cost of undermining the plan’s effectiveness?

Until recently, I thought the biggest political struggle facing the next president was likely to be over health care reform. But right now it looks as if the first thing on the next administration’s plate will have to be dealing with a weak economy.

And if effective action isn’t forthcoming, the next president will suffer the fate of Jimmy Carter, who began his administration with words of uplift — “Let us create together a new national spirit of unity and trust” — and ended up delivering America into the hands of the hard right.

Could Krugman be thinking about this candidate, whose first economic stimulus plan Krugman called “disreputable” and whose second plan the economist found “tilted to the right“?

I remain in a state of shock that the Democratic party leadership could be led by the nose by Barack Obama — who cares not a bit about policy — but instead is solely focused on grabbing complete and utter control.

That’s why he selects economic advisers — who themselves have great power and means — regardless of whether those advisers “tilt” to the right and advocate the privatization of Social Security.

What those advisers believe and advocate matters not to Obama. All he cares about is their ability to help him grab power. Goolsbee is a prime example of an economist with a POWER BACKGROUND, a man of means who is superbly CONNECTED to the elite power structure in this country.

RonK Seattle (I repeat this for emphasis) describes Goolsbee’s resume that shows how well-connected he is:

Goolsbee. Economic wunderkind, forensics champ, MIT PhD, Yale Bonesman out of Waco via Milton Academy, Obama’s chief / top / senior economic spokesman and senior policy advisor.

Oh, and DLC senior economist. … (Read more here.)

It is Goolsbee’s powerful connections that Obama desires. Not his policy views and advice. Which I maintain Obama cares not about.

One of the things most disconcerting about Obama is that he is the Master of Misdirection. Like a magician who distracts you in order to pull off a trick, Obama is the opposite of who he claims to be.

Here are some examples:

After the Wright story broke, Obama flatly told Anderson Cooper that he never heard Wright make those statements.

Then he lectures us on race, admits hearing those statements and, here’s the fake-out, equates Wright’s unacceptable hate sermons with Ferraro making an obvious observation about his candidacy.

Obama is running an ad in Pennsylvania touting the fact that he doesn’t take money from oil companies. Did you see that? No one takes money from oil companies; it’s illegal. But Obama does take money from oil executives.

Obama attacked Hillary on NAFTA while campaigning in economically troubled Ohio, and then a member of his inner circle tells the Canadians that all this talk is just politics. Vous devez être plaisante?

Obama is running as the unity candidate. He unexpectedly loses New Hampshire to Hillary and then his campaign runs a relentlessly negative and racially charged campaign heading into South Carolina. They accuse the Clintons of being racists. Come again?

While in the Illinois State Senate, Obama votes repeatedly against the right’s of gun owners. Now he is touting his credentials as a constitutional scholar and his belief in the 2nd Amendment. Watch out, Pennsylvania sportsmen!

Obama claims he is pro-choice, but when he was in the Illinois State Senate he voted ‘present’ on issues of choice — telling us he was keeping the seat warm but not voting to support women’s rights.

Obama’s campaign is based largely on one speech he gave in 2002. But he has done absolutely nothing to end the war in Iraq since entering the Senate in 2005, except to remind us about the speech he gave.

Obama tells us he believes every vote should be counted, but it’s his campaign that is the only thing holding up counting Michigan and Florida, or having a re-vote. Which is it, Senator Obama? Do Democrats count votes or not? A stolen nomination is a lost election.

This tiring magic act never ends. Some are fooled by the tricks; others are beginning to see.

I don’t like feeling that I wasn’t being dealt with honestly [about if he's smoking or not]. …

This isn’t the only time I’ve felt that way about the Obama campaign, of course — its response to the Austan Goolsbee controversy was a profile in dissembling. (Not that Sens. Hillary Clinton and John McCain or their campaigns are entirely innocent in this area either. Or even that Obama is necessarily the worst offender.)

_______________________________

Now, the floor is PsychoDrew’s: Amid more false attacks from the Obama campaign on NAFTA, the Clinton campaign called on Senator Obama to allow the campaign official privately directing Obama’s NAFTA policy take a more public role:

“The Obama campaign ought to have Austan Goolsbee on their call today [April 2],” Clinton Campaign Spokesperson Jay Carson said. “While Senator Obama was telling voters he would fix NAFTA, his chief economics advisor was telling Canadians that his position was just words. Instead of making false attacks on Hillary Clinton’s character, the Obama campaign should finally explain why it continues to mislead voters about Mr. Goolsbee’s meeting with the Canadian government.” [No reports indicate that Mr. Goolsbee joined in on the call.]

The audacity of hype is hitting a fever pitch in the Obama camp with another Obama surrogate accusing Hillary Clinton of re-writing history.

“I find it disturbing (she) would rewrite history at this point,” said California Rep. George Miller, an Obama supporter who voted in Congress against NAFTA in 1993.

If she was such a strong opponent of it, and spoke out so often about it, why did she never speak to those of us who were principals in that ._._. I don’t know who these audiences are that she refers to, but they weren’t members of Congress.

A careful analysis of the public record does not indicate that, as First Lady, Hillary Clinton ever gave a public speech denouncing NAFTA and calling on her husband to scrap the plan or even held meetings to mobilize forces to bring the trade pact down. Would such an action have prevented NAFTA from being passed by Congress? Perhaps. But it also would have created an image of a dysfunctional White House, providing further ammunition to the GOP in the 1994 midterm elections and the 1996 general election.
Can you imagine the America we’d have if Bob Dole had been elected in 1996?

There never would have been a surplus for George Bush to squander. Kosovo would not have declared independence last month, because Bob Dole would have sat on his hands and watched as Serbian forces carried out a genocide on the Kosovar Albanians.

What is really maddening about Obama’s attack is that he has asked us to accept a similar explanation for his own seemingly contradictory behavior. How many times have we heard about this famous speech in 2002 opposing the war? And we have all read his comments to the NY Times at the Democratic National Convention in 2004:

”But, I’m not privy to Senate intelligence reports,” Mr. Obama said. ”What would I have done? I don’t know. What I know is that from my vantage point the case was not made.”

But have you ever heard his explanation for this contradiction? When CNN’s Candy Crowley asked Obama about why he wavered in his opposition to the resolution in that interview, he said that it would not have been appropriate to criticize the Democratic nominees on the eve of the convention:

“The only time when I said I’m not sure what I would do if I were in the Senate was right before the Democratic convention, when we had two nominees that obviously I did not want to be criticizing right before they got up and received the nomination,” he said.

“But you didn’t mean it?” Crowley asked.

“So — well, no. What I’m suggesting is, everybody had difficult choices to make. And I — and these were difficult choices. I made the right choice.” Obama replied.

So the right choice was to shut up and stand behind the leaders of the party? And now he criticizes Hillary Clinton for having done the same thing when her husband was president!? Why is he peddling such a blatantly hypocritical attack right now? Well, the Leader-Post has a theory:

Aiming to undo political damage the Illinois senator himself has suffered because of the “NAFTA-gate” controversy with Canada, Obama’s campaign said Clinton’s White House records “completely contradict” the New York senator’s assertions she was a frequent and forceful critic of the deal her husband signed with the Canadian and Mexican governments.

But Obama lost Ohio’s Democratic primary on March 4 to Clinton after reports his senior economic adviser, Austan Goolsbee, told Canada’s consul general in Chicago that the Illinois senator’s tough talk on NAFTA was just campaign rhetoric. The controversy is thought to have contributed to Obama’s loss in Ohio, and Clinton has used it to hammer Obama among voters in Pennsylvania.

While Senator Obama avoids giving “straight answers to tough questions” by making false attacks against Senator Clinton, the one million workers who lost their jobs because of NAFTA are waiting for Senator Obama to decide which of the five explanations he’s provided for Goolsbee’s meeting with Canadian officials is true:

5. 3/10/08 - Sen. Obama: The meeting did happen, they did discuss NAFTA, but advisor just said Obama wanted to make NAFTA ’stronger for U.S. workers.’ “So here’s what happens. You’ve got one of my economic advisors goes and visits a Canadian embassy and they’re asking him questions and he says, ‘Well, Senator Obama isn’t planning to repeal NAFTA, but he wants to amend it to make it stronger for U.S. workers.’ The Canadian embassy writes it up as, ‘Well, maybe Obama is not as tough on NAFTA as you might think.’ And the Clintons start waving this and saying, ‘See? Actually, he’s the one.’” [Mississippi Rally, 3/10/08]

4. 2/29/08: Sen. Obama: ‘It did not happen.’ Anchor: “So, completely inaccurate, did not happen, end of discussion.” Sen. Obama: “It did not happen.” [WKYC TV, 2/29/08]

3. 2/28/08 - Rice: ‘There had been no contact.’ “The Canadian ambassador issued a statement that was absolutely false. There had been no contact. There had been no discussions on NAFTA. So we take the Canadians at their word…period.” [MSNBC, Susan Rice, 2/28/08]

2. 2/27/08 - Obama advisor just said ‘hello.’ “Goolsbee: Canada’s consul general in Chicago contacted him ‘at one point to say ‘hello’ because their office is around the corner.” [ABC, 2/29/08]

1. 2/27/08 - ‘No conversations have taken place’ with the Canadian government on NAFTA. “Earlier Thursday, the Obama campaign insisted that no conversations have taken place with any of its senior ranks and representatives of the Canadian government on the NAFTA issue.” [CTV, 2/29/08]

Oh, the audacity!

Regardless, the blunt statements of his earlier views, preserved on a questionnaire he filled out for an Illinois voter group that later endorsed him, would allow a Republican opponent to paint him as being way to the left of the nation’s electorate on questions that have historically been potent wedge issues.

It took a week for the Obama campaign to come up with its official response — Barack Obama did not fill out the questionnaire:

A week after Politico provided the questionnaire to the Obama campaign for comment, an aide called Monday night to say that Obama had said he did not fill out the form, and provided a contact for his campaign manager at the time, who said she filled it out.

The campaign went on to explain that Senator Obama had been very consistent in his views.  

Why does a four-month-old story matter now?  Because the campaign’s explanation in December 2007 may not be entirely accurate.  Politico received an amended copy of the questionnaire with notes on the front page written in Barack Obama’s handwriting.  The campaign’s response is rather difficult to believe:

Through an aide, Obama, who won the group’s endorsement as well as the statehouse seat, did not dispute that the handwriting was his. But he contended it doesn’t prove he completed, approved — or even read — the latter questionnaire.

“Sen. Obama didn’t fill out these state Senate questionnaires — a staffer did — and there are several answers that didn’t reflect his views then or now,” Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for Obama’s campaign, said in an e-mailed statement. “He may have jotted some notes on the front page of the questionnaire at the meeting, but that doesn’t change the fact that some answers didn’t reflect his views. His 11 years in public office do.”

So he was handed a voter questionnaire and all he did was jot some notes on the first page about his endorsements?  He didn’t even flip through the questionnaire to see how his aide had characterized his views?  And if the questionnaire was filled out by an aide, why was it amended?

Consider the question of whether minors should be required to get parental consent — or at least notify their parents — before having abortion.

The first version of Obama’s questionnaire responds with a simple “No.”

The amended version, though, answers less stridently: “Depends on how young — possibly for extremely young teens, i.e., 12- or 13-year-olds.”

The group for which Barack Obama filled out the questionnaire in 1996 is also upset with his shifting positions.  After supporting him in every election since 1996, the Independent Voters of Illinois — Independent Precinct Organization, deadlocked on an endorsement vote after Politico’s story first appeared in December.  Upon learning that he would not stand by his statements in his original questionnaire, the only 40% of the board members voted to support him:

“One big issue was: Does he or does he not believe the stuff he told us in 1996?” said Aviva Patt, who has been involved with the IVI-IPO since 1990 and is now the group’s treasurer. She volunteered for Obama’s 2004 Senate campaign, but voted to endorse the since-aborted presidential campaign of Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich (D-Ohio) and professed disappointment over Obama’s retreat from ownership of the questionnaire.

“I always believed those to be his views,” she said, adding some members of the board argued that Obama’s 1996 answers were “what he really believes in, and he’s tailoring it now to make himself more palatable as a nationwide candidate.”

I don’t expect Barack Obama to remember every piece of paper he ever filled out, but I do expect him to stand by his actions.  There is nothing wrong the evolution of politician’s political views.  Nothing at all.  We need leaders who are able to respond to changing circumstances rather than standing by ideas that aren’t working in the name of ideology.  Imagine where we might be in Iraq if our leaders were taking that strategy?

I have two problems with this.  First, the hypocrisy.  He has hit Hillary again and again on NAFTA, saying she supported it in 1993, but opposes it now.  It’s hard to ascertain with certainty what her position was in 1993 because she couldn’t very well go out and hold a press conference attacking her husband, could she?  Second, I am getting sick and tired of Barack Obama blaming his aides for his mistakes.  The Republicans are certain to use this to beat him over the head in the fall:

It could also provide ammunition for a line of attack quietly peddled for some time by Republicans. They allege Obama has a penchant for blaming his staff for gaffes ranging from missing a union event in New Hampshire to circulating opposition research highlighting the Clintons’ ties to India and Indian-Americans to underestimating the amount of cash bundled for his campaigns by his former fundraiser, indicted businessman Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

When is Barack Obama going to stand by what his past actions?  He has a slick explanation for everything.  At the Democratic National Convention in 2004, he backed off his opposition to the resolution to authorize force in Iraq because he didn’t want to criticize Senators Kerry and Edwards.  He didn’t really mean it.

This is part of a pattern of evasion from Senator Obama that he won’t be able to continue indefinitely.  He has a book that we can’t mention without being accused of playing the race card.   He has a voting record in Illinois that he runs away from.  He has done little since joining the Senate beyond take credit for the work of other Senators and brag about legislation that never passed.

He has hammered Hillary Clinton for her Iraq War vote in 2002 while dodging questions about his own inconsistent statements.  He has accused her of refusing to give straight answers to tough questions while dodging tough votes on Iran and the resolution condemning MoveOn.org.  Every time he is confronted with something, he comes up with an excuse.  Why didn’t he hold a single oversight hearing on NATO or Afghanistan?  He was too busy campaigning.  Why did he skip the vote on the Kyl-Leiberman amendment?  Because nobody told him about the vote.

Excuses.
Excuses.
Excuses.

That’s not leadership.  And that’s not the “straight answers to tough questions” that he promised voters and accused Hillary of not delivering.

Hope or hype?  I think the answer is obvious.

Also posted at MyDD.com.

Kentucky’s primary is May 20th. Here’s more from Lexington, Kentucky’s newspaper:

State Democrats feel primary passion
Clinton says Kentucky essential to her bid

MADISONVILLE – A slightly hoarse New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton declared Kentucky Clinton territory and a necessary electoral building block for her White House bid.

“As you know, this state has voted for a Clinton before — twice, in fact,” she told a nearly packed gym at the Madisonville North Hopkins County High School Saturday night.

[...]

Putting her spin on the message of hope often used by Obama, Clinton said that stumbles — on the campaign trail or on Wall Street — can be overcome.

“I’ve never stayed down, and America’s not going to stay down,” she told the nearly 3,500 Western Kentucky Democrats attending the Ruby Laffoon Dinner, a party fund-raiser that became a Clinton rally. “But I need your help.”

Clinton didn’t mention Obama by name at either stop, but repeated a familiar charge that she has more substance than the Illinois senator.

“This election is not about the speeches we give, but about the solutions we offer,” she said in Louisville.

She also hit on key Kentucky issues, such as coal mining and the shrinking manufacturing base.

“When I tell the people of Kentucky that I’m going to renegotiate NAFTA, I mean it,” she said — a line that resonated with the blue-collar crowd in Madisonville.

The Louisville crowd cheered loudly when she said there should be no tax benefit for any business that exports jobs from Kentucky.

She also said the nation needs stronger mine safety regulations and promised, if elected, to encourage ways for coal to ease the need for oil.

“I want to keep coal as a major part of our energy creation, but it’s got to be cleaned up,” she said. … Read all.