Speed Deemin': Dems Race toward Sunday 'Vote' by guest columnist, Tony Perkins, President of Family Research Council
The sun is streaming through windows across Capitol Hill, a striking picture of one of America's greatest skylines. But underneath the city's highest dome, few leaders are venturing out. Instead, they're hunkered down, preparing for one of the most important decisions of their political lives. For most of them, Sunday will not be a day of rest--but a day of unrest, as an exhausting year-long battle comes to an uncertain close. The President has postponed his overseas trip, trying to wring every last second out of his personal lobbying campaign. For shaky Democrats, that means uncomfortable sit-downs in the Oval Office where the President uses some familiar back-scratching to lean on "undecideds."
But it will take more than "rides on Air Force One" to woo party holdouts, particularly after the Congressional Budget Office's (CBO) latest score. New estimates from the CBO put the price tag of this reconciliation plan well over $1,200,000,000,000.00--most of which would be inherited by the lucky winner of the 2016 presidential election. Together with unsavory new taxes ($569.2 billions worth!), the CBO spotlights the bill's deep gashes in Medicare coverage ($523.5 million in cuts) and confirms that married couples will still be punished with steeper insurance premiums. Believe it or not, nearly half all the individual mandates under this bill will be paid by American families earning less than $66,150 per year. The CBO also points out that a million Americans will have to get their coverage from a bankrupt Medicaid program on the brink of collapsing.
And if you thought dealing with the IRS is a nightmare now, just wait. Republicans on the Ways and Means Committee say the agency's tentacles will strangle families under ObamaCare. According to their report, the IRS is on the verge of an unprecedented power grab under the President's bill. It will have the authority to: verify if you have "acceptable" health care coverage, fine you for failure to prove that you have purchased "minimum essential coverage," and even confiscate your tax refund.
Of course, the agency will need a massive cash influx ($10 billion!) to provide this kind of surveillance. That's why the GOP is predicting a huge increase in IRS audits and an army of 16,500 new agents and employees to hunt down taxpayers. For all the phony talk of "reducing the deficit," Democrats are neglecting to mention the very real deficits--of money and freedom--incurred by every American if this plan goes into effect. This legislation spells a loss of U.S. life, savings, doctors, and freedom in exchange for nothing but greater government involvement in our personal decisions.
Meanwhile, President Obama is meeting with Democrats and telling them, "Our fates are tied to the health bill." The reality is, the people whose fates are truly tied to this bill are the Americans that none of us have met. They're the unborn, who our dollars will be directed to kill. They're the next generation, who will survive abortion only to suffer the weight of this crushing debt. Like the great men before them, the 111th Congress will walk the long marble hallways to their seats this weekend, where the great voices still echo, "Independence forever!" Ultimately, every one of them will cast a vote heard throughout history. They will choose to pay for legislation with our country's future or stand with the millions of us who know that "liberty--once lost--is lost forever."
Originally published in FRC.org on March 20, 2010
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Mar 19, 2010
Obama and Democrats' Slaughter Solution Unconstitutional?
Obama's healthcare bill: Obama and Democrats' Slaughter Solution Unconstitutional?
CNS.com March 19, 2010 story about President Obama's spokesman Robert Gibbs and the Slaughter Solution (deem and pass strategy by Obama and the Democrats to pass the health care bill):
. . . Mark Levin, the president of the Landmark Legal Foundation, has noted that a lawsuit was brought in regards to a similar matter in the 1998 case of Clinton vs. City of New York, in which the U.S. Supreme Court found that the line-item veto was not constitutional.
That ruling cited the Constitution and stated that for a bill to become law it was necessary that “1) a bill containing its exact text was approved by a majority of the members of the House of Representatives; 2) the Senate approved precisely the same text; and 3) the text was signed into law by the president.”
Levin called the Slaughter Rule an “attempt to amend the Constitution without going through the process.”
“Gibbs’s incoherence is an attempt to deceive,” Levin told CNSNews.com on Thursday. “I have no doubt in my mind that the White House is working very closely with Pelosi and her lieutenants on this strategy of pretending they voted on an underlying bill when, in fact, they didn’t vote on it. So that’s why he is so deceitful.”
“His boss (Obama) yesterday, in an interview with Fox News and Brett Baier made quite clear that he’s well aware of what’s going on at the Hill and whatever comes to him, he’s going to sign,” said Levin. “So what we’ve learned from Brett Baier and you is that we have two branches of government that are absolutely committed to violating the Constitution in order to achieve an illegitimate ends.”
At the same White House briefing, another reporter asked Gibbs, “He’s (Obama) not worried that it’s constitutional?
Gibbs said, “He would sign that bill, yes.”
Another reporter also asked Gibbs if the White House was preparing a legal team to respond to lawsuits regarding the health care overhaul. Gibbs said, “Not that I’m aware of.”
The Landmark Legal Foundation is a conservative legal public interest group, led by Mark Levin, who also hosts a popular talk-radio show. Levin served as chief of staff to Attorney General Ed Meese in the Reagan Justice Department and as deputy solicitor for the Department of the Interior.
On Monday, March 15, Levin announced on his radio show that he intended to bring the lawsuit if the Senate health care bill is passed through the House without a yea-and-nay vote on the actual legislation and president signs it into law.
A draft of the suit names as defendants President Obama, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Attorney General Eric Holder and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.
“Because the House violated the Constitution by never voting on the Senate bill, the Senate bill cannot be and is not the law of the United States,” the draft says. “Defendants, charged by law and the Constitution with enforcing the law, must be prevented from treating the Senate bill as the law of the United States. Any signature by the president is a nullity, and the piece of paper he has stated that he will sign or has signed is nothing more than that: a piece of paper.”
The House Rules Committee drafts the terms under which bills are brought to the floor and debated. Under a plan put together by Rules Chairman Louise Slaughter (D.-N.Y.), the House would "deem" the Senate health care bill passed without ever holding a recorded vote on it as required by Article 1, Section 7 of the Constitution.
According to the plan, the House would pass a special rule governing debate on the budget reconciliation bill that has been crafted by the House Democratic leaders to make "fixes" in the Senate health care bill desired by House Democratic members. Under this rule, the Senate health care bill itself would be "deemed" to have been passed by the House if the full House subsequently voted to pass the budget reconciliation bill. At no time would the House actually hold a vote on the Senate health care bill itself before sending it to Obama to sign.
Article I, Section 7 of the U.S. Constitution states:
"Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it become a Law, be presented to the President of the United States; If he approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his Objections to that House in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the Objections at large on their Journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If after such Reconsideration two thirds of that House shall agree to pass the Bill, it shall be sent, together with the Objections, to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall become a Law. But in all such Cases the Votes of both Houses shall be determined by Yeas and Nays, and the Names of the Persons voting for and against the Bill shall be entered on the Journal of each House respectively.”
CNS.com March 19, 2010 story about President Obama's spokesman Robert Gibbs and the Slaughter Solution (deem and pass strategy by Obama and the Democrats to pass the health care bill):
. . . Mark Levin, the president of the Landmark Legal Foundation, has noted that a lawsuit was brought in regards to a similar matter in the 1998 case of Clinton vs. City of New York, in which the U.S. Supreme Court found that the line-item veto was not constitutional.
That ruling cited the Constitution and stated that for a bill to become law it was necessary that “1) a bill containing its exact text was approved by a majority of the members of the House of Representatives; 2) the Senate approved precisely the same text; and 3) the text was signed into law by the president.”
Levin called the Slaughter Rule an “attempt to amend the Constitution without going through the process.”
“Gibbs’s incoherence is an attempt to deceive,” Levin told CNSNews.com on Thursday. “I have no doubt in my mind that the White House is working very closely with Pelosi and her lieutenants on this strategy of pretending they voted on an underlying bill when, in fact, they didn’t vote on it. So that’s why he is so deceitful.”
“His boss (Obama) yesterday, in an interview with Fox News and Brett Baier made quite clear that he’s well aware of what’s going on at the Hill and whatever comes to him, he’s going to sign,” said Levin. “So what we’ve learned from Brett Baier and you is that we have two branches of government that are absolutely committed to violating the Constitution in order to achieve an illegitimate ends.”
At the same White House briefing, another reporter asked Gibbs, “He’s (Obama) not worried that it’s constitutional?
Gibbs said, “He would sign that bill, yes.”
Another reporter also asked Gibbs if the White House was preparing a legal team to respond to lawsuits regarding the health care overhaul. Gibbs said, “Not that I’m aware of.”
The Landmark Legal Foundation is a conservative legal public interest group, led by Mark Levin, who also hosts a popular talk-radio show. Levin served as chief of staff to Attorney General Ed Meese in the Reagan Justice Department and as deputy solicitor for the Department of the Interior.
On Monday, March 15, Levin announced on his radio show that he intended to bring the lawsuit if the Senate health care bill is passed through the House without a yea-and-nay vote on the actual legislation and president signs it into law.
A draft of the suit names as defendants President Obama, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Attorney General Eric Holder and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.
“Because the House violated the Constitution by never voting on the Senate bill, the Senate bill cannot be and is not the law of the United States,” the draft says. “Defendants, charged by law and the Constitution with enforcing the law, must be prevented from treating the Senate bill as the law of the United States. Any signature by the president is a nullity, and the piece of paper he has stated that he will sign or has signed is nothing more than that: a piece of paper.”
The House Rules Committee drafts the terms under which bills are brought to the floor and debated. Under a plan put together by Rules Chairman Louise Slaughter (D.-N.Y.), the House would "deem" the Senate health care bill passed without ever holding a recorded vote on it as required by Article 1, Section 7 of the Constitution.
According to the plan, the House would pass a special rule governing debate on the budget reconciliation bill that has been crafted by the House Democratic leaders to make "fixes" in the Senate health care bill desired by House Democratic members. Under this rule, the Senate health care bill itself would be "deemed" to have been passed by the House if the full House subsequently voted to pass the budget reconciliation bill. At no time would the House actually hold a vote on the Senate health care bill itself before sending it to Obama to sign.
Article I, Section 7 of the U.S. Constitution states:
"Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it become a Law, be presented to the President of the United States; If he approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his Objections to that House in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the Objections at large on their Journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If after such Reconsideration two thirds of that House shall agree to pass the Bill, it shall be sent, together with the Objections, to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall become a Law. But in all such Cases the Votes of both Houses shall be determined by Yeas and Nays, and the Names of the Persons voting for and against the Bill shall be entered on the Journal of each House respectively.”
Slaughtering the Constitution?
Slaughtering the Constitution?By Jeffrey T. Kuhner, Guest Columnist (original posted in the Washington Times, March 19, 2010)
The Democrats are assaulting the very pillars of our democracy. As the debate on Obamacare reaches the long, painful end, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is confronting a political nightmare. She may not have the 216 votes necessary to pass the Senate's health care bill in the House.
Hence, Mrs. Pelosi and her congressional Democratic allies are seriously considering using a procedural ruse to circumvent the traditional constitutional process. Led by Rep. Louise M. Slaughter, New York Democrat and chairman of the House Rules Committee, the new plan - called the "Slaughter Solution" - is not to pass the Senate version on an up-or-down vote. Rather, it is to have the House "deem" that the legislation was passed and then have members vote directly on a series of "sidecar" amendments to fix the things it does not like.
This would enable House Democrats to avoid going on the record voting for provisions in the Senate bill - the "Cornhusker Kickback," the "Louisiana Purchase," the tax on high-cost so-called "Cadillac" insurance plans - that are reviled by the public or labor-union bosses. If the reconciliation fixes pass, the House can send the Senate bill to President Obama for his signature without ever having had a formal up-or-down vote on the underlying legislation.
Many Democrats could claim they opposed the Senate bill while allowing it to pass. This would be an unprecedented violation of our democratic norms and procedures, established since the inception of the republic. Article 1, Section 7 of the Constitution stipulates that for any bill to become a law, it must pass both the House of Representatives and the Senate. That is, not be "deemed" to have passed, but actually be voted on with the support of the required majority. The bill must contain the exact same language in both chambers - and in the version signed by the president - to be a legitimate law. This is why the House and Senate have a conference committee to iron out differences of competing versions. This is Civics 101.
The Slaughter Solution is a dagger aimed at the heart of our system of checks and balances. It would enable the Democrats to establish an ominous precedent: The lawmaking process can be rigged to ensure the passage of any legislation without democratic accountability or even a congressional majority. It is the road to a soft tyranny. James Madison must be turning in his grave.
OTHER TWT STORIES:
• Democrats make final reform push
• Health-vote ally Nelson to get a new hospital for Nebraska
• Obama backs plan to legalize illegals
• Poll finds stubborn suspicion of census
Mr. Obama is imposing a leftist revolution. Since coming to office, he has behaved without any constitutional restraints. The power of the federal government has exploded. He has de facto nationalized key sectors of American life - the big banks, financial institutions, the automakers, large tracts of energy-rich land from Montana to New Mexico. His cap-and-trade proposal, along with a newly empowered Environmental Protection Agency, seeks to impose massive new taxes and regulations upon industry. It is a form of green socialism: Much of the economy would fall under a command-and-control bureaucratic corporatist state. Mr. Obama even wants the government to take over student loans.
Yet his primary goal has always been to gobble up the health care system. The most troubling aspect of the Obamacare debate, however, is not the measure's sweeping and radical aims - the transformation of one-sixth of the U.S. economy, crippling tax increases, higher premiums, state-sanctioned rationing, longer waiting lines, the erosion of the quality of medical care and the creation of a huge, permanent administrative bureaucracy. Rather, the most alarming aspect is the lengths to which the Democrats are willing to go to achieve their progressive, anti-capitalist agenda.
Obamacare is opposed by nearly two-thirds of the public, more than 60 percent of independents and almost all Republicans and conservatives. It has badly fractured the country, dangerously polarizing it along ideological and racial lines. Even a majority of Democrats in the House are deeply reluctant to support it.
Numerous states - from Idaho to Virginia to Texas - have said they will sue the federal government should Obamacare become law. They will declare themselves exempt from its provisions, tying up the legislation in the courts for years to come.
Mr. Obama is willing to devour his presidency, his party's congressional majority and - most disturbing - our democratic institutional safeguards to enact it. He is a reckless ideologue who is willing to sacrifice the country's stability in pursuit of a socialist utopia.
The Slaughter Solution is a poisoned chalice. By drinking from it, the Democrats would not only commit political suicide. They would guarantee that any bill signed by Mr. Obama is illegitimate, illegal and blatantly unconstitutional. It would be worse than a strategic blunder; it would be a crime - a moral crime against the American people and a direct abrogation of the Constitution and our very democracy.
It would open Mr. Obama, as well as key congressional leaders such as Mrs. Pelosi, to impeachment. The Slaughter Solution would replace the rule of law with arbitrary one-party rule. It violates the entire basis of our constitutional government - meeting the threshold of "high crimes and misdemeanors." If it's enacted, Republicans should campaign for the November elections not only on repealing Obamacare, but on removing Mr. Obama and his gang of leftist thugs from office.
It is time Americans drew a line in the sand. Mr. Obama crosses it at his peril.
Jeffrey T. Kuhner is a columnist at The Washington Times and president of the Edmund Burke Institute, a Washington think tank. He is the daily host of "The Kuhner Show" on WTNT 570-AM (www.talk570.com) from noon until 3 p.m.
The Democrats are assaulting the very pillars of our democracy. As the debate on Obamacare reaches the long, painful end, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is confronting a political nightmare. She may not have the 216 votes necessary to pass the Senate's health care bill in the House.
Hence, Mrs. Pelosi and her congressional Democratic allies are seriously considering using a procedural ruse to circumvent the traditional constitutional process. Led by Rep. Louise M. Slaughter, New York Democrat and chairman of the House Rules Committee, the new plan - called the "Slaughter Solution" - is not to pass the Senate version on an up-or-down vote. Rather, it is to have the House "deem" that the legislation was passed and then have members vote directly on a series of "sidecar" amendments to fix the things it does not like.
This would enable House Democrats to avoid going on the record voting for provisions in the Senate bill - the "Cornhusker Kickback," the "Louisiana Purchase," the tax on high-cost so-called "Cadillac" insurance plans - that are reviled by the public or labor-union bosses. If the reconciliation fixes pass, the House can send the Senate bill to President Obama for his signature without ever having had a formal up-or-down vote on the underlying legislation.
Many Democrats could claim they opposed the Senate bill while allowing it to pass. This would be an unprecedented violation of our democratic norms and procedures, established since the inception of the republic. Article 1, Section 7 of the Constitution stipulates that for any bill to become a law, it must pass both the House of Representatives and the Senate. That is, not be "deemed" to have passed, but actually be voted on with the support of the required majority. The bill must contain the exact same language in both chambers - and in the version signed by the president - to be a legitimate law. This is why the House and Senate have a conference committee to iron out differences of competing versions. This is Civics 101.
The Slaughter Solution is a dagger aimed at the heart of our system of checks and balances. It would enable the Democrats to establish an ominous precedent: The lawmaking process can be rigged to ensure the passage of any legislation without democratic accountability or even a congressional majority. It is the road to a soft tyranny. James Madison must be turning in his grave.
OTHER TWT STORIES:
• Democrats make final reform push
• Health-vote ally Nelson to get a new hospital for Nebraska
• Obama backs plan to legalize illegals
• Poll finds stubborn suspicion of census
Mr. Obama is imposing a leftist revolution. Since coming to office, he has behaved without any constitutional restraints. The power of the federal government has exploded. He has de facto nationalized key sectors of American life - the big banks, financial institutions, the automakers, large tracts of energy-rich land from Montana to New Mexico. His cap-and-trade proposal, along with a newly empowered Environmental Protection Agency, seeks to impose massive new taxes and regulations upon industry. It is a form of green socialism: Much of the economy would fall under a command-and-control bureaucratic corporatist state. Mr. Obama even wants the government to take over student loans.
Yet his primary goal has always been to gobble up the health care system. The most troubling aspect of the Obamacare debate, however, is not the measure's sweeping and radical aims - the transformation of one-sixth of the U.S. economy, crippling tax increases, higher premiums, state-sanctioned rationing, longer waiting lines, the erosion of the quality of medical care and the creation of a huge, permanent administrative bureaucracy. Rather, the most alarming aspect is the lengths to which the Democrats are willing to go to achieve their progressive, anti-capitalist agenda.
Obamacare is opposed by nearly two-thirds of the public, more than 60 percent of independents and almost all Republicans and conservatives. It has badly fractured the country, dangerously polarizing it along ideological and racial lines. Even a majority of Democrats in the House are deeply reluctant to support it.
Numerous states - from Idaho to Virginia to Texas - have said they will sue the federal government should Obamacare become law. They will declare themselves exempt from its provisions, tying up the legislation in the courts for years to come.
Mr. Obama is willing to devour his presidency, his party's congressional majority and - most disturbing - our democratic institutional safeguards to enact it. He is a reckless ideologue who is willing to sacrifice the country's stability in pursuit of a socialist utopia.
The Slaughter Solution is a poisoned chalice. By drinking from it, the Democrats would not only commit political suicide. They would guarantee that any bill signed by Mr. Obama is illegitimate, illegal and blatantly unconstitutional. It would be worse than a strategic blunder; it would be a crime - a moral crime against the American people and a direct abrogation of the Constitution and our very democracy.
It would open Mr. Obama, as well as key congressional leaders such as Mrs. Pelosi, to impeachment. The Slaughter Solution would replace the rule of law with arbitrary one-party rule. It violates the entire basis of our constitutional government - meeting the threshold of "high crimes and misdemeanors." If it's enacted, Republicans should campaign for the November elections not only on repealing Obamacare, but on removing Mr. Obama and his gang of leftist thugs from office.
It is time Americans drew a line in the sand. Mr. Obama crosses it at his peril.
Jeffrey T. Kuhner is a columnist at The Washington Times and president of the Edmund Burke Institute, a Washington think tank. He is the daily host of "The Kuhner Show" on WTNT 570-AM (www.talk570.com) from noon until 3 p.m.
Mar 18, 2010
The future of American free enterprise contra Obama and beyond
The future of American free enterprise contra Obama and beyond
American Enterprise Institute's Arthur Brooks was asked by Marvin Olasky (World, Jan. 16, 2010) about American free enterprise. Here are excerpts:
Q: Is the drive the drive to nationalize healthcare a special case or part of a bigger picture?
A: The current administration has two guiding principles, basically. Overseas, what they call diplomacy, which we call appeasement. At home, what they call fairness, which we call redistribution. Redistribution comes about because, for the current administration, the problem is that some people have more and some people have less. That's not a problem for me: I want more equality of opportunity for people to pursue their skills and passions, and individual opportunity will lead naturally to different outcomes.
Q: Once Congress finish with healthcare, one way or the other, what will be a hot issue during the rest of 2010?
A: Tax reform is coming around . . . . When people see that raising taxes cuts off opportunity for them, their kids, and their grandkids, and when we have to pay for the deficit by taxing the middle class, which inevitably will happen, this is going to become a hot, hot issue. It will start emerging in 2010. This is one area where AEI is utterly locked and loaded. We have the data and we're ready to go on this. I can't wait for that fight.
Q: Can candidates with strong conservative principles win elections?
A: Margaret Thatcher won in the U.K. Ronald Reagan won in the U.S. Our task has to be one of principle and not of political expediency in the 2010 midterm elections. It's a short-term vs. long-term problem: We're not working for one year or two years or 2012, but for the next hundred years. We're working for the free enterprise system that's going to benefit our kids and grandchildren and generations to come. The free enterprise system is a gift to America and America is a gift to the world, but only under the right circumstances. Those of us who believe these things need to hold our colleagues',m friends' and leaders' feet to the fire.
American Enterprise Institute's Arthur Brooks was asked by Marvin Olasky (World, Jan. 16, 2010) about American free enterprise. Here are excerpts:
Q: Is the drive the drive to nationalize healthcare a special case or part of a bigger picture?
A: The current administration has two guiding principles, basically. Overseas, what they call diplomacy, which we call appeasement. At home, what they call fairness, which we call redistribution. Redistribution comes about because, for the current administration, the problem is that some people have more and some people have less. That's not a problem for me: I want more equality of opportunity for people to pursue their skills and passions, and individual opportunity will lead naturally to different outcomes.
Q: Once Congress finish with healthcare, one way or the other, what will be a hot issue during the rest of 2010?
A: Tax reform is coming around . . . . When people see that raising taxes cuts off opportunity for them, their kids, and their grandkids, and when we have to pay for the deficit by taxing the middle class, which inevitably will happen, this is going to become a hot, hot issue. It will start emerging in 2010. This is one area where AEI is utterly locked and loaded. We have the data and we're ready to go on this. I can't wait for that fight.
Q: Can candidates with strong conservative principles win elections?
A: Margaret Thatcher won in the U.K. Ronald Reagan won in the U.S. Our task has to be one of principle and not of political expediency in the 2010 midterm elections. It's a short-term vs. long-term problem: We're not working for one year or two years or 2012, but for the next hundred years. We're working for the free enterprise system that's going to benefit our kids and grandchildren and generations to come. The free enterprise system is a gift to America and America is a gift to the world, but only under the right circumstances. Those of us who believe these things need to hold our colleagues',m friends' and leaders' feet to the fire.
Mar 15, 2010
Former N.Y. Times Editor Takes Aim at Fox News
Former N.Y. Times Editor Takes Aim at Fox News
Monday, 15 Mar 2010 09:59 AM
By: Ronald Kessler
When it comes to arrogance, former New York Times Executive Editor Howell Raines tops Dan Rather.
Raines has come out with a Washington Post opinion piece headlined, “Fox News: unfair, unbalanced, unchecked.”
Raines takes “America’s old-school news organizations” to task for failing to blow the whistle on Roger Ailes, chief of Fox News, for using the network to conduct a “propaganda campaign against the Obama administration.”
Specifically, Ailes has “overturned standards of fairness and objectivity that have guided American print and broadcast journalists since World War II,” according to Raines.
As a result, after “14 months of Fox’s relentless pounding of president Obama’s idea of sweeping [healthcare] reform, the latest Gallup poll shows opinion running 48 to 45 percent against the current legislation,” Raines complains.
“Why can’t American journalists steeped in the traditional values of their profession be loud and candid about the fact that [Rupert] Murdoch does not belong to our team?” Raines writes, referring to the head of News Corp, which owns the Fox network.
Raines is the same editor who presided over the Jayson Blair scandal. As a New York Times reporter for 3 ½ years, Blair not only routinely fabricated stories, he had 50 corrections.
After the 10th correction, Raines should have fired him. Raines brushed aside concerns raised by editors, including metro editor Jonathan Landman, who e-mailed newsroom administrators to say that management has to “stop Jayson from writing for the Times. Right now.”
Based on an investigation of Blair’s stories, the Times concluded, “The widespread fabrication and plagiarism represent a profound betrayal of trust and a low point in the 152-year history of the newspaper.”
In contrast, Fox News practices journalism the way The New York Times practiced it decades ago, when it was the pinnacle of the profession. Aside from opinion shows, Fox News has a rule that, on any controversial issue, guests from opposing sides must appear.
Ailes keeps track of the statistics religiously to make sure the rule is enforced. What could be more fair and balanced than that?
As a result, Public Policy Polling found in January that 49 percent of those surveyed trusted Fox News. In contrast, only 39 percent trusted CNN. Next came NBC, including its sister network MSNBC, with 35 percent. Least trusted were CBS with 32 percent and ABC with 31 percent.
That trust shows up in ratings and profits. While competitors have been laying off employees, Fox has been expanding.
Among cable networks, top-rated Fox News drew an average of 2.4 million viewers in prime time between Jan. 26 and Feb. 22, according to Nielsen Media Research. CNN was in second place with 1.2 million viewers; MSNBC posted an average of only 949,000 viewers.
Instead of spewing “propaganda,” as Raines suggests, Fox News is the most-trusted television news source. By any standard, that is news. Tellingly, neither The New York Times nor Fox News’ competitors ran a story on the poll results.
In posing as the conscience of journalism, Raines exceeds Dan Rather in arrogance. Rather and his CBS show “60 Minutes Wednesday” thought they could get away with airing damaging documents about George W. Bush’s Texas Air National Guard service even though their own experts warned that the documents were probably fake.
The supposedly typewritten documents were so crudely forged that they had proportional spacing that did not exist when they purportedly were written in 1972.
Last year, the same Dan Rather proposed that President Obama appoint a commission to address “the perilous state of America’s news media.” At stake, Rather says, is “our democratic republic.”
If Raines and Rather looked in the mirror, they would see what is wrong with the media today — and why their former news organizations are shriveling.
Ronald Kessler is chief Washington correspondent of Newsmax.com. View his previous reports and get his dispatches sent to you free via e-mail. Go here now.
© Newsmax. All rights reserved.
Monday, 15 Mar 2010 09:59 AM
By: Ronald Kessler
When it comes to arrogance, former New York Times Executive Editor Howell Raines tops Dan Rather.
Raines has come out with a Washington Post opinion piece headlined, “Fox News: unfair, unbalanced, unchecked.”
Raines takes “America’s old-school news organizations” to task for failing to blow the whistle on Roger Ailes, chief of Fox News, for using the network to conduct a “propaganda campaign against the Obama administration.”
Specifically, Ailes has “overturned standards of fairness and objectivity that have guided American print and broadcast journalists since World War II,” according to Raines.
As a result, after “14 months of Fox’s relentless pounding of president Obama’s idea of sweeping [healthcare] reform, the latest Gallup poll shows opinion running 48 to 45 percent against the current legislation,” Raines complains.
“Why can’t American journalists steeped in the traditional values of their profession be loud and candid about the fact that [Rupert] Murdoch does not belong to our team?” Raines writes, referring to the head of News Corp, which owns the Fox network.
Raines is the same editor who presided over the Jayson Blair scandal. As a New York Times reporter for 3 ½ years, Blair not only routinely fabricated stories, he had 50 corrections.
After the 10th correction, Raines should have fired him. Raines brushed aside concerns raised by editors, including metro editor Jonathan Landman, who e-mailed newsroom administrators to say that management has to “stop Jayson from writing for the Times. Right now.”
Based on an investigation of Blair’s stories, the Times concluded, “The widespread fabrication and plagiarism represent a profound betrayal of trust and a low point in the 152-year history of the newspaper.”
In contrast, Fox News practices journalism the way The New York Times practiced it decades ago, when it was the pinnacle of the profession. Aside from opinion shows, Fox News has a rule that, on any controversial issue, guests from opposing sides must appear.
Ailes keeps track of the statistics religiously to make sure the rule is enforced. What could be more fair and balanced than that?
As a result, Public Policy Polling found in January that 49 percent of those surveyed trusted Fox News. In contrast, only 39 percent trusted CNN. Next came NBC, including its sister network MSNBC, with 35 percent. Least trusted were CBS with 32 percent and ABC with 31 percent.
That trust shows up in ratings and profits. While competitors have been laying off employees, Fox has been expanding.
Among cable networks, top-rated Fox News drew an average of 2.4 million viewers in prime time between Jan. 26 and Feb. 22, according to Nielsen Media Research. CNN was in second place with 1.2 million viewers; MSNBC posted an average of only 949,000 viewers.
Instead of spewing “propaganda,” as Raines suggests, Fox News is the most-trusted television news source. By any standard, that is news. Tellingly, neither The New York Times nor Fox News’ competitors ran a story on the poll results.
In posing as the conscience of journalism, Raines exceeds Dan Rather in arrogance. Rather and his CBS show “60 Minutes Wednesday” thought they could get away with airing damaging documents about George W. Bush’s Texas Air National Guard service even though their own experts warned that the documents were probably fake.
The supposedly typewritten documents were so crudely forged that they had proportional spacing that did not exist when they purportedly were written in 1972.
Last year, the same Dan Rather proposed that President Obama appoint a commission to address “the perilous state of America’s news media.” At stake, Rather says, is “our democratic republic.”
If Raines and Rather looked in the mirror, they would see what is wrong with the media today — and why their former news organizations are shriveling.
Ronald Kessler is chief Washington correspondent of Newsmax.com. View his previous reports and get his dispatches sent to you free via e-mail. Go here now.
© Newsmax. All rights reserved.
It is not the rulers that produce wealth
Regarding Obama's federal decrees on the economy and health care:
"It is not rulers who produce wealth: they sit behind desks, give speeches, draft resolutions and supreme decrees, process documents, inspect, monitor and levy, but they never produce. It is the population that produces." That population demands a basic fairness: It is not prepared, either in Peru or the United States, "to accept a society in which opportunities, property, and power are distributed arbitrarily.
Marvin Olasky (Univ. of Texas at Austin commenting and quoting Peruvian economist Hernando De Soto Polar; to go to the primary source, read De Soto's The Other Path, 1989.
What do you think?
"It is not rulers who produce wealth: they sit behind desks, give speeches, draft resolutions and supreme decrees, process documents, inspect, monitor and levy, but they never produce. It is the population that produces." That population demands a basic fairness: It is not prepared, either in Peru or the United States, "to accept a society in which opportunities, property, and power are distributed arbitrarily.
Marvin Olasky (Univ. of Texas at Austin commenting and quoting Peruvian economist Hernando De Soto Polar; to go to the primary source, read De Soto's The Other Path, 1989.
What do you think?
Feb 16, 2010
CNN poll: 52% say Obama doesn't deserve reelection in 2012
CNN poll: 52% say Obama doesn't deserve reelection in 2012
By Michael O'Brien - 02/16/10 01:35 PM ET
52 percent of Americans said President Barack Obama doesn't deserve reelection in 2012, according to a new poll.
44 percent of all Americans said they would vote to reelect the president in two and a half years, less than the slight majority who said they would prefer to elect someone else.
Obama faces a 44-52 deficit among both all Americans and registered voters, according to a CNN/Opinion Research poll released Tuesday. Four percent had no opinion.
By Michael O'Brien - 02/16/10 01:35 PM ET
52 percent of Americans said President Barack Obama doesn't deserve reelection in 2012, according to a new poll.
44 percent of all Americans said they would vote to reelect the president in two and a half years, less than the slight majority who said they would prefer to elect someone else.
Obama faces a 44-52 deficit among both all Americans and registered voters, according to a CNN/Opinion Research poll released Tuesday. Four percent had no opinion.
Oct 19, 2009
Graham, on big issues, is a center-left opportunist
Graham, on big issues, is a center-left opportunist
by Dr. Ecarma (bio: Reggie Ecarma has a Ph.D. in political communication, teaches for North Greenville and Furman universities in mass communication and politics. He is also Republican precinct chairman of Travelers Rest, member of the Greenville County GOP Executive Committee, faculty advisor to the NGU College Republicans, and serves as fire commissioner at Tigerville, S.C. fire district. He can be reached at reecarma1@yahoo.com)
Fresh from a 67 percent GOP primary victory and the first state candidate to win more than 1 million votes in a general election, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham sounded confident, if not cocky, at the Greenville County Republican Convention this past April. He said that he wants to grow a center-right party, which reflects the country, to win elections. And if any Republicans in the room did not support his efforts, they could leave.
He echoed this sentiment at the Furman University town meeting last week. Question: If Graham is growing a big-tent center-right party, why is he telling a vocal and engaged group to leave. Doesn’t center-right include centrists and rightists; a big-tent includes activists from center to right. At both places, Furman and the GOP Greenville convention, Graham sounded downright condescending.
With all his heroics, Achilles has a weakness. Graham’s heel is his hometown region, the Upstate. As the biggest part of the Upstate, Greenville County voted against Graham in the primary. The 200 vote margin by little known Buddy Witherspoon should be a warning to Graham, perhaps humbling.
Apparently, after making rounds in the national media circuit and enjoying conclaves with the likes of Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and the late Ted Kennedy, his homies have become prudish party poopers. Just like a BMOC (big man on campus) football jock coming home to his small-minded family, Graham is getting too big for his britches.
Instead of being grateful to have the privilege of serving his home folks, Graham is becoming arrogant like Lonesome Rhoades of the 1950s movie A Face in the Crowd. An arrogant centrist, he is quickly outgrowing his humble conservative roots.
An explanation: In the Greenville News article “Graham vows to challenge ‘radical’ views” and editorial “Sen. Graham holds his own,” both articles miss the critical “constitutional” point: Graham says that he is conservative, fair enough, but on big constitutional issues, he is center left. Consider these landmark issues:
1. Constitutional option on judicial nominees of 2006: the leftists and the centrists, including Graham opposed it; constitutional conservatives like U.S. Sen. John Thune, R-S.C., supported it (see http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2005/5/31/32726.shtml
2. Illegal immigration of 2008: the center-right and center-left and far left supported the Kennedy-McCain –Graham bill, constitutional conservatives like U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint opposed it;
3. Climate change 2009: Graham is working with far left U.S. senator, John Kerry; constitutional conservatives oppose any new regulation on carbon emission whether by legislation or the Environmental Protection Agency;
4. Sotomayor U.S. Supreme Court vote of 2009: centrists and leftist voted for the nomination, conservatives like U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, opposed the high court nomination.
To be fair, Graham is a reliable pro-life vote, according to Citizens for Life. He is strong on military issues, and he also voted against Obama’s stimulus bill. It is also true that, as reported by the Greenville News, Graham has an 82 percent rating according to the American Conservative Union and votes 90.7 percent with his party (The Washington Post’s congressional vote database).
But the preceding record on big issues and the on-going record of Graham, including climate change and health care are troublesome. For example, the heated debate on health care clearly pits constitutionalists/conservatives vs. centrists/leftists. Where is Graham on this—in the center-left. Consider this quote from Greenville News on September 21:
“Graham, in signing on to the bipartisan Healthy Americans Act, has agreed to requiring people to buy health-care insurance, an unpopular idea among Republicans.
“I have found common ground with Democrats,” Graham said of the bill backed by seven Republicans and seven Democrats.
Such common ground or center-left decision of historical constitutional issues has moved Graham from right toward the center-left over the years. With the illegal immigration vote and the constitutional option on judicial nominees he took the center-left ground, along with his senior partner and senate mentor, U.S. Sen. John McCain , R-AZ. But in the Sonya Sotomayor vote for U.S. Supreme Court justice, even centrist and maverick McCain voted to oppose Sotomayor, while Graham voted for President Obama’s judicial “empathy” nominee and got kudos from the media and cultural elites.
As Clemson University political science professor, David Woodard, a one-time Graham confidant, said, he (Graham) “make[s] a point of his foray across the aisle to work with Democrats.”
Colluding with liberals is a prominent project for Graham. Furman University political science professor Danielle Vinson said Graham “needs to get past those headline-grabbing moves.”
Graham is not only moving from right to center -left, depending on the big issue, he is garnering more face time on the broadcast networks. If one watches national politics and the news on a regular basis, it is hard to miss Graham. Recently, on the Greenville News article of Sep. 21, Obama remarked about extremist talk: “The easiest way to get 15 minutes of fame is to be rude to somebody.”
Conversely, for a Republican, the easiest way to get 15 minutes or even 15 hours of fame is to work and act in concert with other maverick Republicans or liberal Democrats. Ask U.S. Sen. Olympia Snow during the Democrat health care and Obama stimulus bills debates during the last few months. It is awfully difficult to deny oneself of the red carpet treatment by the media and cultural elite of Washington, DC and NYC.
Graham’s timing also needs to be scrutinized. When it was popular to challenge the senate Republican majority in 2006 regarding the constitutional option on judicial nominees, Graham, as part of the “Gang of 14” (7 Republicans and 7 Democrats) went against President Bush and conservative Republicans. The Gang opposed Bush’s full slate of strict constructionist (constitutional and conservative) federal judicial nominees.
Social conservatives around the country were rallying in churches across the nation to encourage U.S. Sen. Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-TN to go for 51 senate votes instead of the customary 60 cloture votes to let the full slate of judicial conservatives ostensibly reverse Roe v. Wade.
So Graham short-circuited the social conservative effort to attempt to stop judicial promotion of abortion-on-demand.
In the health care issue, where is Graham in voicing his criticism on the constitutional option that is, most likely, to be employed by the Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV?
The political and media elites in DC are cheerleading health care through, so let’s see if Graham, their new “conservative” darling from the belt buckle of the Bible belt crows against their sacred health care for the uninsured, including (probably) illegal immigrants. Graham has had many months to voice his previous concern about using the constitutional option of 51 senators to pass a non-emergency and non-budget issue. Rather, he appears anxious to pass a health care bill by working hard with Democrats, again.
Ironically, Graham said in the same Greenville News article he also feels a responsibility “not to let the president have it both ways here.” Perhaps, the libertarians and constitutional conservatives feel the responsibility not to allow Graham to have it both ways either—calling himself a conservative and then chooses opportunities to grab the headlines and the TV lights by forging liberal leaning bills.
Graham seems more of pragmatic political opportunist than a principled, constitutional conservative.
Many Republican party loyalists will not openly oppose him, as Sam Harms, the former Greenville County Republican chair, who promptly lost his position. Party loyalists prefer acceptability and collegiality as a norm; however, if a credentialed and monied Jim DeMint like person arose to challenge Graham, he would humble Graham, if not defeat him in 2014.
Graham should take stock that Thomas Ravanel, former state treasurer, who lost his job and credentials in 2007 due to cocaine charges, could have effectively challenged him in 2008. Instead Graham got a free pass, relatively speaking. Is there going to be credible challenger in 2014 such as a David Beasley or a Jim DeMint clone or . . .
If he continues his centrist ways, Graham would lose big in the Upstate (his home region) and would have to fight hard and win big in the moderate Low Country, perhaps with the help of his new Democrat friends.
Why does Graham want to “grow” the party? Is it for altruistic reasons? Perhaps, but it may also be for power. Is he looking at the majority party leadership? Probably not. Is he looking at a presidential run in 2016? If he is, then he should look at his mentor McCain. McCain tried the maverick route for 10 years. He was loved by the liberal media elite in DC and NY, but when he ran for president as a Republican, his fawning media coverage dissipated.
By 2014, Graham will be feigning right to re-establish his conservative credentials, but by then, his Achilles heel may be overly exposed by video records in YouTube and other Internet sources. The SC Achilles needs to represent the felt needs of his state--the Upstate.
What do you think?
by Dr. Ecarma (bio: Reggie Ecarma has a Ph.D. in political communication, teaches for North Greenville and Furman universities in mass communication and politics. He is also Republican precinct chairman of Travelers Rest, member of the Greenville County GOP Executive Committee, faculty advisor to the NGU College Republicans, and serves as fire commissioner at Tigerville, S.C. fire district. He can be reached at reecarma1@yahoo.com)
Fresh from a 67 percent GOP primary victory and the first state candidate to win more than 1 million votes in a general election, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham sounded confident, if not cocky, at the Greenville County Republican Convention this past April. He said that he wants to grow a center-right party, which reflects the country, to win elections. And if any Republicans in the room did not support his efforts, they could leave.
He echoed this sentiment at the Furman University town meeting last week. Question: If Graham is growing a big-tent center-right party, why is he telling a vocal and engaged group to leave. Doesn’t center-right include centrists and rightists; a big-tent includes activists from center to right. At both places, Furman and the GOP Greenville convention, Graham sounded downright condescending.
With all his heroics, Achilles has a weakness. Graham’s heel is his hometown region, the Upstate. As the biggest part of the Upstate, Greenville County voted against Graham in the primary. The 200 vote margin by little known Buddy Witherspoon should be a warning to Graham, perhaps humbling.
Apparently, after making rounds in the national media circuit and enjoying conclaves with the likes of Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and the late Ted Kennedy, his homies have become prudish party poopers. Just like a BMOC (big man on campus) football jock coming home to his small-minded family, Graham is getting too big for his britches.
Instead of being grateful to have the privilege of serving his home folks, Graham is becoming arrogant like Lonesome Rhoades of the 1950s movie A Face in the Crowd. An arrogant centrist, he is quickly outgrowing his humble conservative roots.
An explanation: In the Greenville News article “Graham vows to challenge ‘radical’ views” and editorial “Sen. Graham holds his own,” both articles miss the critical “constitutional” point: Graham says that he is conservative, fair enough, but on big constitutional issues, he is center left. Consider these landmark issues:
1. Constitutional option on judicial nominees of 2006: the leftists and the centrists, including Graham opposed it; constitutional conservatives like U.S. Sen. John Thune, R-S.C., supported it (see http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2005/5/31/32726.shtml
2. Illegal immigration of 2008: the center-right and center-left and far left supported the Kennedy-McCain –Graham bill, constitutional conservatives like U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint opposed it;
3. Climate change 2009: Graham is working with far left U.S. senator, John Kerry; constitutional conservatives oppose any new regulation on carbon emission whether by legislation or the Environmental Protection Agency;
4. Sotomayor U.S. Supreme Court vote of 2009: centrists and leftist voted for the nomination, conservatives like U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, opposed the high court nomination.
To be fair, Graham is a reliable pro-life vote, according to Citizens for Life. He is strong on military issues, and he also voted against Obama’s stimulus bill. It is also true that, as reported by the Greenville News, Graham has an 82 percent rating according to the American Conservative Union and votes 90.7 percent with his party (The Washington Post’s congressional vote database).
But the preceding record on big issues and the on-going record of Graham, including climate change and health care are troublesome. For example, the heated debate on health care clearly pits constitutionalists/conservatives vs. centrists/leftists. Where is Graham on this—in the center-left. Consider this quote from Greenville News on September 21:
“Graham, in signing on to the bipartisan Healthy Americans Act, has agreed to requiring people to buy health-care insurance, an unpopular idea among Republicans.
“I have found common ground with Democrats,” Graham said of the bill backed by seven Republicans and seven Democrats.
Such common ground or center-left decision of historical constitutional issues has moved Graham from right toward the center-left over the years. With the illegal immigration vote and the constitutional option on judicial nominees he took the center-left ground, along with his senior partner and senate mentor, U.S. Sen. John McCain , R-AZ. But in the Sonya Sotomayor vote for U.S. Supreme Court justice, even centrist and maverick McCain voted to oppose Sotomayor, while Graham voted for President Obama’s judicial “empathy” nominee and got kudos from the media and cultural elites.
As Clemson University political science professor, David Woodard, a one-time Graham confidant, said, he (Graham) “make[s] a point of his foray across the aisle to work with Democrats.”
Colluding with liberals is a prominent project for Graham. Furman University political science professor Danielle Vinson said Graham “needs to get past those headline-grabbing moves.”
Graham is not only moving from right to center -left, depending on the big issue, he is garnering more face time on the broadcast networks. If one watches national politics and the news on a regular basis, it is hard to miss Graham. Recently, on the Greenville News article of Sep. 21, Obama remarked about extremist talk: “The easiest way to get 15 minutes of fame is to be rude to somebody.”
Conversely, for a Republican, the easiest way to get 15 minutes or even 15 hours of fame is to work and act in concert with other maverick Republicans or liberal Democrats. Ask U.S. Sen. Olympia Snow during the Democrat health care and Obama stimulus bills debates during the last few months. It is awfully difficult to deny oneself of the red carpet treatment by the media and cultural elite of Washington, DC and NYC.
Graham’s timing also needs to be scrutinized. When it was popular to challenge the senate Republican majority in 2006 regarding the constitutional option on judicial nominees, Graham, as part of the “Gang of 14” (7 Republicans and 7 Democrats) went against President Bush and conservative Republicans. The Gang opposed Bush’s full slate of strict constructionist (constitutional and conservative) federal judicial nominees.
Social conservatives around the country were rallying in churches across the nation to encourage U.S. Sen. Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-TN to go for 51 senate votes instead of the customary 60 cloture votes to let the full slate of judicial conservatives ostensibly reverse Roe v. Wade.
So Graham short-circuited the social conservative effort to attempt to stop judicial promotion of abortion-on-demand.
In the health care issue, where is Graham in voicing his criticism on the constitutional option that is, most likely, to be employed by the Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV?
The political and media elites in DC are cheerleading health care through, so let’s see if Graham, their new “conservative” darling from the belt buckle of the Bible belt crows against their sacred health care for the uninsured, including (probably) illegal immigrants. Graham has had many months to voice his previous concern about using the constitutional option of 51 senators to pass a non-emergency and non-budget issue. Rather, he appears anxious to pass a health care bill by working hard with Democrats, again.
Ironically, Graham said in the same Greenville News article he also feels a responsibility “not to let the president have it both ways here.” Perhaps, the libertarians and constitutional conservatives feel the responsibility not to allow Graham to have it both ways either—calling himself a conservative and then chooses opportunities to grab the headlines and the TV lights by forging liberal leaning bills.
Graham seems more of pragmatic political opportunist than a principled, constitutional conservative.
Many Republican party loyalists will not openly oppose him, as Sam Harms, the former Greenville County Republican chair, who promptly lost his position. Party loyalists prefer acceptability and collegiality as a norm; however, if a credentialed and monied Jim DeMint like person arose to challenge Graham, he would humble Graham, if not defeat him in 2014.
Graham should take stock that Thomas Ravanel, former state treasurer, who lost his job and credentials in 2007 due to cocaine charges, could have effectively challenged him in 2008. Instead Graham got a free pass, relatively speaking. Is there going to be credible challenger in 2014 such as a David Beasley or a Jim DeMint clone or . . .
If he continues his centrist ways, Graham would lose big in the Upstate (his home region) and would have to fight hard and win big in the moderate Low Country, perhaps with the help of his new Democrat friends.
Why does Graham want to “grow” the party? Is it for altruistic reasons? Perhaps, but it may also be for power. Is he looking at the majority party leadership? Probably not. Is he looking at a presidential run in 2016? If he is, then he should look at his mentor McCain. McCain tried the maverick route for 10 years. He was loved by the liberal media elite in DC and NY, but when he ran for president as a Republican, his fawning media coverage dissipated.
By 2014, Graham will be feigning right to re-establish his conservative credentials, but by then, his Achilles heel may be overly exposed by video records in YouTube and other Internet sources. The SC Achilles needs to represent the felt needs of his state--the Upstate.
What do you think?
Oct 11, 2009
President Jimmy Carter backtracks
Plains, Georgia man not plain spoken
President Jimmy Carter backtracks and revises history. He initially said the overwhelming number of people at the Washington, D.C. Tea Party who opposed President Barack Obama disagreed with due to his race (see YouTube.com).
Now Carter said that he really said a "fringe" element oppose Obama.
Should we believe our ears and eyes as we view YouTube or should we believe Carter's revisionism?
This Plains, Georgia man is not plain spoken but has a forked tongue, or a double-minded mind, or simply an aging opportunist who should know better. With age, comes wisdom, unfortunately, not so with this 85-year-old former democrat president.
President Jimmy Carter backtracks and revises history. He initially said the overwhelming number of people at the Washington, D.C. Tea Party who opposed President Barack Obama disagreed with due to his race (see YouTube.com).
Now Carter said that he really said a "fringe" element oppose Obama.
Should we believe our ears and eyes as we view YouTube or should we believe Carter's revisionism?
This Plains, Georgia man is not plain spoken but has a forked tongue, or a double-minded mind, or simply an aging opportunist who should know better. With age, comes wisdom, unfortunately, not so with this 85-year-old former democrat president.
Sep 20, 2009
The Politics of Race: America 2009
The Politics of Race: America 2009
Former President Jimmy Carter, by definition, accused political opponents of President Barack Obama as racists saying that they "just cannot accept a black man as president."
Carter's accusation smacks of racist politics. Black economic experts including Thomas Sowell, a Hoover Institute scholar and former University of Chicago economics professor and Walter Williams of George Mason University, both vociferously oppose Obama for his attempt at federal takeover of the United States economy, health care and banks. Black political leaders such as former Ohio secretary of state Ken Blackwell now with the nonpartisan Family Research Council and former Maryland lieutenant governor Michael Steele now the Republican National Committee chairman both strongly reject such race-based attacks.
Oftentimes, the last and desperate ploy for liberals is the race card. Meant to shut and shame the opponents, mostly white Republicans and Southern conservatives, such race baiting is not only a sham but destructive to free speech and robust political dialogue.
From Jimmy Carter and New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd, who accused U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) of racism, such elitists should pull back their collective fangs and argue based on the merits of their issues.
After all, their chosen leader in the White House is only in his 8th month in office. Such political bomb throwing is premature, unless their arguments are already being overwhelmed by the loud informed majority that opposes Obama's policies (see recent Pew and Gallup polls).
As a minority, I despise such talk from Carter and Dowd. From their elitist perch, they are not helping minorities. By vicariously but wrongly personifying minority victimhood, Carter and Dowd are helping us all become victims of an overbearing federal government by quickly forcing upon us a tyrannical nanny state.
According to Ronald Kessler of Newsmax, former Secretary of State and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice rejected the 1984 Democrat National Convention refrains appealing to "women, minorities and the poor, which basically means helpless people and the poor."
The shrill politics of victimhood threatens to dilute the dramatic steps advanced by Martin Luther King, Jr., U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Secretary of State Colin Powell and Rice.
Like Rice, who formerly was a Stanford University provost, "I'd rather be ignored than patronized."
As a senior professor of political science and mass communication, I know that this country--the United States of America--has more opportunities than any nation in history that I know of. My parents, who left the Philippines shortly before President Ferdinand Marcos’ dictatorship, staked their family's future on American exceptionalism—a belief that America will especially reward those who work hard for their posterity. I continue to believe in their faith in the American Dream. Let’s not accept divisive racial slurs nor squander liberty’s blessings.
Truly, freedom is the foundation of this constitutional republic--one nation under God indivisible. Let's defend liberty. Let’s pray to Providence, the personal and infinite God, as well as work because as Edmund Burke said, “vigilance is the price of liberty."
So as minorities and as Americans, the best play for personal and national success is not by embracing victimhood but living happy and contented lives.
Former President Jimmy Carter, by definition, accused political opponents of President Barack Obama as racists saying that they "just cannot accept a black man as president."
Carter's accusation smacks of racist politics. Black economic experts including Thomas Sowell, a Hoover Institute scholar and former University of Chicago economics professor and Walter Williams of George Mason University, both vociferously oppose Obama for his attempt at federal takeover of the United States economy, health care and banks. Black political leaders such as former Ohio secretary of state Ken Blackwell now with the nonpartisan Family Research Council and former Maryland lieutenant governor Michael Steele now the Republican National Committee chairman both strongly reject such race-based attacks.
Oftentimes, the last and desperate ploy for liberals is the race card. Meant to shut and shame the opponents, mostly white Republicans and Southern conservatives, such race baiting is not only a sham but destructive to free speech and robust political dialogue.
From Jimmy Carter and New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd, who accused U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) of racism, such elitists should pull back their collective fangs and argue based on the merits of their issues.
After all, their chosen leader in the White House is only in his 8th month in office. Such political bomb throwing is premature, unless their arguments are already being overwhelmed by the loud informed majority that opposes Obama's policies (see recent Pew and Gallup polls).
As a minority, I despise such talk from Carter and Dowd. From their elitist perch, they are not helping minorities. By vicariously but wrongly personifying minority victimhood, Carter and Dowd are helping us all become victims of an overbearing federal government by quickly forcing upon us a tyrannical nanny state.
According to Ronald Kessler of Newsmax, former Secretary of State and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice rejected the 1984 Democrat National Convention refrains appealing to "women, minorities and the poor, which basically means helpless people and the poor."
The shrill politics of victimhood threatens to dilute the dramatic steps advanced by Martin Luther King, Jr., U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Secretary of State Colin Powell and Rice.
Like Rice, who formerly was a Stanford University provost, "I'd rather be ignored than patronized."
As a senior professor of political science and mass communication, I know that this country--the United States of America--has more opportunities than any nation in history that I know of. My parents, who left the Philippines shortly before President Ferdinand Marcos’ dictatorship, staked their family's future on American exceptionalism—a belief that America will especially reward those who work hard for their posterity. I continue to believe in their faith in the American Dream. Let’s not accept divisive racial slurs nor squander liberty’s blessings.
Truly, freedom is the foundation of this constitutional republic--one nation under God indivisible. Let's defend liberty. Let’s pray to Providence, the personal and infinite God, as well as work because as Edmund Burke said, “vigilance is the price of liberty."
So as minorities and as Americans, the best play for personal and national success is not by embracing victimhood but living happy and contented lives.
Aug 26, 2009
Barack Obama on Being Human
Barack Obama: Being Human
By the end of Sunday, August 23, 2009, U.S. President Barack Obama's power waned, so did his popularity. This politically historic day occured while the Obama family enjoyed the place of the rich and powerful--Martha's Vineyard.
Popularity plummets
According to the most reliable pollster, John Zogby, Obama's popularity "has plummeted to a record low, with just 45 percent of likely voters now approving of his performance," reported Newsmax.
The Zogby International poll found 50.5 percent of all-important likely voters registering disapproval of the president's job performance.
Dick Morris, former advisor to President Bill Clinton said that dropping below 52 percent means serious political trouble due to the abandonment of almost 60 percent of the critical independent likely voters. The results point to a srong indication of disapproval of Obama's most recent push of nationalized healthcare.
Power receding
With popoularity waning, Obama's power to rein in Democrat leaning moderates is weakening. The first to escape Obama's grip is the Democrat leaning but Independent and influential senator from Connecticut, Joseph Lieberman.
Nationalized health care unhinged
Speaking to CNN's John King on Sunday August 23, 2009, Lieberman said, "There's no reason we have to do it all now." Asked if it was "time to hit the reset button," on federalized healthcare, Lieberman said "yes."
"In other words, we're in a recession." Lieberman concluded "I think it's a real mistake to try to jam through the total health insurance reform, [a] healthcare reform plan that the public is either opposed to or of very, very passionate mixed minds about."
Being human
With his popularity and poll numbers down, Obama's presidency has touched the ground where most presidents in the past had to tread. He will no longer have superhuman influence--except in the elite media.
By the end of Sunday, August 23, 2009, U.S. President Barack Obama's power waned, so did his popularity. This politically historic day occured while the Obama family enjoyed the place of the rich and powerful--Martha's Vineyard.
Popularity plummets
According to the most reliable pollster, John Zogby, Obama's popularity "has plummeted to a record low, with just 45 percent of likely voters now approving of his performance," reported Newsmax.
The Zogby International poll found 50.5 percent of all-important likely voters registering disapproval of the president's job performance.
Dick Morris, former advisor to President Bill Clinton said that dropping below 52 percent means serious political trouble due to the abandonment of almost 60 percent of the critical independent likely voters. The results point to a srong indication of disapproval of Obama's most recent push of nationalized healthcare.
Power receding
With popoularity waning, Obama's power to rein in Democrat leaning moderates is weakening. The first to escape Obama's grip is the Democrat leaning but Independent and influential senator from Connecticut, Joseph Lieberman.
Nationalized health care unhinged
Speaking to CNN's John King on Sunday August 23, 2009, Lieberman said, "There's no reason we have to do it all now." Asked if it was "time to hit the reset button," on federalized healthcare, Lieberman said "yes."
"In other words, we're in a recession." Lieberman concluded "I think it's a real mistake to try to jam through the total health insurance reform, [a] healthcare reform plan that the public is either opposed to or of very, very passionate mixed minds about."
Being human
With his popularity and poll numbers down, Obama's presidency has touched the ground where most presidents in the past had to tread. He will no longer have superhuman influence--except in the elite media.
Oct 8, 2008
Analysis of my analyses
Analysis of my recent analyses: Prediction of my prediction
After a reader recently pointed out that I was wrong about my prediction of a Hillary Clinton coronation back in December 13, 2006, I was to look back a little regarding my recent analyses.
Before reading or listening to the pundits, I concluded that John McCain won the first and second debates, while Sarah Palin effectively won her vice presidential debate against U.S. Sen. Joe Biden.
Before each debate, McCain had been slipping or losing in the polls, and after each event he gained a little. Palin's performance gave McCain a fighting chance to take a lead by bringing the ticket closer, by a few points, to the Obama/Biden ticket, as I predicted. Last night after viewing the debate, I immediately predicted that McCain would gain a point or two, and according to a recent Reuters/C-Span/Zogby daily tracking telephone poll from Oct. 5-7, 2008, McCain recovered about a point.
By deciding to think for oneself and to be right more than wrong, is encouraging; it is also a good test regarding one's political instincts. Try it sometime. Watch an event, and before talking to or listening to someone or the media, decide for yourself who won or lost, and why. You'd be encouraged, too!
My prediction back in December 13, 2006 (the same day that I was wrong about Obama not becoming the Democrat nominee), I predicted that if the Democrats win the White House and control the Congress, "With some tactical changes, all in all, little will change in Iraq during the next 12-18 months militarily . . . . With responsibility comes political moderation and electoral consideration."
Wait and see if I'm right that if Obama wins and the Democrats hold on to Congress, I'll bet you my old tennis balls, that my prediction will reflect reality. Let's see.
After a reader recently pointed out that I was wrong about my prediction of a Hillary Clinton coronation back in December 13, 2006, I was to look back a little regarding my recent analyses.
Before reading or listening to the pundits, I concluded that John McCain won the first and second debates, while Sarah Palin effectively won her vice presidential debate against U.S. Sen. Joe Biden.
Before each debate, McCain had been slipping or losing in the polls, and after each event he gained a little. Palin's performance gave McCain a fighting chance to take a lead by bringing the ticket closer, by a few points, to the Obama/Biden ticket, as I predicted. Last night after viewing the debate, I immediately predicted that McCain would gain a point or two, and according to a recent Reuters/C-Span/Zogby daily tracking telephone poll from Oct. 5-7, 2008, McCain recovered about a point.
By deciding to think for oneself and to be right more than wrong, is encouraging; it is also a good test regarding one's political instincts. Try it sometime. Watch an event, and before talking to or listening to someone or the media, decide for yourself who won or lost, and why. You'd be encouraged, too!
My prediction back in December 13, 2006 (the same day that I was wrong about Obama not becoming the Democrat nominee), I predicted that if the Democrats win the White House and control the Congress, "With some tactical changes, all in all, little will change in Iraq during the next 12-18 months militarily . . . . With responsibility comes political moderation and electoral consideration."
Wait and see if I'm right that if Obama wins and the Democrats hold on to Congress, I'll bet you my old tennis balls, that my prediction will reflect reality. Let's see.
Paglia: Pro-Obama, pro-Palin
I was so impressed with segments of pro-feminist academic and cultural icon, Camille Paglia's comments defendng Sarah Palin that I decided to do a first, import a generous portion of her Salon.com article.
Nobody's dummy
Liberals underestimate Sarah Palin's vitality and -- yes -- smarts at their own peril. Plus: Obama's presidential air, Biden's condescending mugging, feminism's lost sisters.
By Camille Paglia
Although nothing will sway my vote for Obama, I continue to enjoy Sarah Palin's performance on the national stage. During her vice-presidential debate last week with Joe Biden (whose conspiratorial smiles with moderator Gwen Ifill were outrageous and condescending toward his opponent), I laughed heartily at Palin's digs and slams and marveled at the way she slowly took over the entire event. I was sorry when it ended! But Biden wasn't -- judging by his Gore-like sighs and his slow sinking like a punctured blimp. Of course Biden won on points, but TV (a visual medium) never cares about that.
The mountain of rubbish poured out about Palin over the past month would rival Everest. What a disgrace for our jabbering army of liberal journalists and commentators, too many of whom behaved like snippy jackasses. The bourgeois conventionalism and rank snobbery of these alleged humanitarians stank up the place. As for Palin's brutally edited interviews with Charlie Gibson and that viper, Katie Couric, don't we all know that the best bits ended up on the cutting-room floor? Something has gone seriously wrong with Democratic ideology, which seems to have become a candied set of holier-than-thou bromides attached like tutti-frutti to a quivering green Jell-O mold of adolescent sentimentality.
And where is all that lurid sexual fantasy coming from? When I watch Sarah Palin, I don't think sex -- I think Amazon warrior! I admire her competitive spirit and her exuberant vitality, which borders on the supernormal. The question that keeps popping up for me is whether Palin, who was born in Idaho, could possibly be part Native American (as we know her husband is), which sometimes seems suggested by her strong facial contours. I have felt that same extraordinary energy and hyper-alertness billowing out from other women with Native American ancestry -- including two overpowering celebrity icons with whom I have worked.
One of the most idiotic allegations batting around out there among urban media insiders is that Palin is "dumb." Are they kidding? What level of stupidity is now par for the course in those musty circles? (The value of Ivy League degrees, like sub-prime mortgages, has certainly been plummeting. As a Yale Ph.D., I have a perfect right to my scorn.) People who can't see how smart Palin is are trapped in their own narrow parochialism -- the tedious, hackneyed forms of their upper-middle-class syntax and vocabulary.
As someone whose first seven years were spent among Italian-American immigrants (I never met an elderly person who spoke English until we moved from Endicott to rural Oxford, New York, when I was in first grade), I am very used to understanding meaning through what might seem to others to be outlandish or fractured variations on standard English. Furthermore, I have spent virtually my entire teaching career (nearly four decades) in arts colleges, where the expressiveness of highly talented students in dance, music and the visual arts takes a hundred different forms. Finally, as a lover of poetry (my last book was about that), I savor every kind of experimentation with standard English -- beginning with Shakespeare, who was the greatest improviser of them all at a time when there were no grammar rules.
Many others listening to Sarah Palin at her debate went into conniptions about what they assailed as her incoherence or incompetence. But I was never in doubt about what she intended at any given moment. On the contrary, I was admiring not only her always shapely and syncopated syllables but the innate structures of her discourse -- which did seem to fly by in fragments at times but are plainly ready to be filled with deeper policy knowledge, as she gains it (hopefully over the next eight years of the Obama presidencies). This is a tremendously talented politician whose moment has not yet come. That she holds views completely opposed to mine is irrelevant.
The hysterical emotionalism and eruptions of amoral malice at the arrival of Sarah Palin exposed the weaknesses and limitations of current feminism. But I am convinced that Palin's bracing mix of male and female voices, as well as her grounding in frontier grit and audacity, will prove to be a galvanizing influence on aspiring Democratic women politicians too, from the municipal level on up. Palin has shown a brand-new way of defining female ambition -- without losing femininity, spontaneity or humor. She's no pre-programmed wonk of the backstage Hillary Clinton school; she's pugnacious and self-created, the product of no educational or political elite -- which is why her outsider style has been so hard for media lemmings to comprehend. And by the way, I think Tina Fey's witty impersonations of Palin have been fabulous. But while Fey has nailed Palin's cadences and charm, she can't capture the energy, which is a force of nature.
Paglia above exposes the vulnerability and consequence of feminism, and the positive effects of an authentic woman in Sarah Palin and a secure husband and loving father in Todd Palin, faithful spouses both. Breath of fresh air, is it not?
Nobody's dummy
Liberals underestimate Sarah Palin's vitality and -- yes -- smarts at their own peril. Plus: Obama's presidential air, Biden's condescending mugging, feminism's lost sisters.
By Camille Paglia
Although nothing will sway my vote for Obama, I continue to enjoy Sarah Palin's performance on the national stage. During her vice-presidential debate last week with Joe Biden (whose conspiratorial smiles with moderator Gwen Ifill were outrageous and condescending toward his opponent), I laughed heartily at Palin's digs and slams and marveled at the way she slowly took over the entire event. I was sorry when it ended! But Biden wasn't -- judging by his Gore-like sighs and his slow sinking like a punctured blimp. Of course Biden won on points, but TV (a visual medium) never cares about that.
The mountain of rubbish poured out about Palin over the past month would rival Everest. What a disgrace for our jabbering army of liberal journalists and commentators, too many of whom behaved like snippy jackasses. The bourgeois conventionalism and rank snobbery of these alleged humanitarians stank up the place. As for Palin's brutally edited interviews with Charlie Gibson and that viper, Katie Couric, don't we all know that the best bits ended up on the cutting-room floor? Something has gone seriously wrong with Democratic ideology, which seems to have become a candied set of holier-than-thou bromides attached like tutti-frutti to a quivering green Jell-O mold of adolescent sentimentality.
And where is all that lurid sexual fantasy coming from? When I watch Sarah Palin, I don't think sex -- I think Amazon warrior! I admire her competitive spirit and her exuberant vitality, which borders on the supernormal. The question that keeps popping up for me is whether Palin, who was born in Idaho, could possibly be part Native American (as we know her husband is), which sometimes seems suggested by her strong facial contours. I have felt that same extraordinary energy and hyper-alertness billowing out from other women with Native American ancestry -- including two overpowering celebrity icons with whom I have worked.
One of the most idiotic allegations batting around out there among urban media insiders is that Palin is "dumb." Are they kidding? What level of stupidity is now par for the course in those musty circles? (The value of Ivy League degrees, like sub-prime mortgages, has certainly been plummeting. As a Yale Ph.D., I have a perfect right to my scorn.) People who can't see how smart Palin is are trapped in their own narrow parochialism -- the tedious, hackneyed forms of their upper-middle-class syntax and vocabulary.
As someone whose first seven years were spent among Italian-American immigrants (I never met an elderly person who spoke English until we moved from Endicott to rural Oxford, New York, when I was in first grade), I am very used to understanding meaning through what might seem to others to be outlandish or fractured variations on standard English. Furthermore, I have spent virtually my entire teaching career (nearly four decades) in arts colleges, where the expressiveness of highly talented students in dance, music and the visual arts takes a hundred different forms. Finally, as a lover of poetry (my last book was about that), I savor every kind of experimentation with standard English -- beginning with Shakespeare, who was the greatest improviser of them all at a time when there were no grammar rules.
Many others listening to Sarah Palin at her debate went into conniptions about what they assailed as her incoherence or incompetence. But I was never in doubt about what she intended at any given moment. On the contrary, I was admiring not only her always shapely and syncopated syllables but the innate structures of her discourse -- which did seem to fly by in fragments at times but are plainly ready to be filled with deeper policy knowledge, as she gains it (hopefully over the next eight years of the Obama presidencies). This is a tremendously talented politician whose moment has not yet come. That she holds views completely opposed to mine is irrelevant.
The hysterical emotionalism and eruptions of amoral malice at the arrival of Sarah Palin exposed the weaknesses and limitations of current feminism. But I am convinced that Palin's bracing mix of male and female voices, as well as her grounding in frontier grit and audacity, will prove to be a galvanizing influence on aspiring Democratic women politicians too, from the municipal level on up. Palin has shown a brand-new way of defining female ambition -- without losing femininity, spontaneity or humor. She's no pre-programmed wonk of the backstage Hillary Clinton school; she's pugnacious and self-created, the product of no educational or political elite -- which is why her outsider style has been so hard for media lemmings to comprehend. And by the way, I think Tina Fey's witty impersonations of Palin have been fabulous. But while Fey has nailed Palin's cadences and charm, she can't capture the energy, which is a force of nature.
Paglia above exposes the vulnerability and consequence of feminism, and the positive effects of an authentic woman in Sarah Palin and a secure husband and loving father in Todd Palin, faithful spouses both. Breath of fresh air, is it not?
McCain underperforms against Obama
2008 Presidential Debate Round 2: McCain underperforms against Obama
Pre-pundits
Again, before listening to the pundits and writing this blog during the latter part of the debate, allow me to provide you with my instant analysis.
Short jabs not strong punches
With U.S. Sen. McCain behind three points, according to a recent CBS poll of registered voters, he needed to land strong punches, instead he employed short jabs against U.S. Sen. Barack Obama. Though many jabs hit their mark, the required heavy blows to break out of second place were missing.
Obama connected again
Obama aimed for the middle class and the independent and mostly connected. He reacted to McCain’s jabs and pushed back. His smooth style and broad strokes regarding issues continued; he stumbled only once when he started to answer about energy with “you know” and said “and” seven to eight times in about 15-20 seconds. He came back strong by standing by succinctly that health “is a right” saying that his mom during her dying days were arguing with insurance companies. If this mom story is true, then it is hard to argue against.
McCain's lost opportunity
McCain did not come back by saying, “Who is going to pay for this trillion dollar bill?” Obama also said that preconditions should not be considered by insurers. McCain did not ask “Who is going to pay for risky lifestyle choices and daily decisions leading to debilitating diseases costing healthy taxpayers hundreds of billions?”
The big issues resulted into many wordy answers and rebuttals. NBC moderator, Tom Brokaw, wanted a “yes” or “no” whether Russia under Vladimir Putin is an evil empire, neither candidate answered yes or no. McCain said maybe, explaining that yes or no would be taken wrong. Obama used more words, as he did throughout the debate, frustrating Brokaw.
No tought talk from the Straight Talker
The talk before the debate was about McCain bringing the issue of Obama’s radical associations with: former self-proclaimed pro-violence 1960s founder of the Weather Underground, now Univ. of Illinois at Chicago professor William Ayers; campaign fundraiser, Tony Rezko who was recently convicted of 16 counts of fraud and money laundering; and, self-professed anti-American former pastor and advisor, Reverend Jeremiah Wrght.
No tough talk, no win
Before the debate began, a McCain aid said that such straight and blunt talk would not happen. Such a decision to hold back and remain civil at this critical juncture of the presidential election process may have cost McCain to underperform in the debate, and perhaps in the election. McCain may gain a point or two from this debate with one more debate left. Obama will keep his lead with 27 days left. It is still his election to lose.
Pre-pundits
Again, before listening to the pundits and writing this blog during the latter part of the debate, allow me to provide you with my instant analysis.
Short jabs not strong punches
With U.S. Sen. McCain behind three points, according to a recent CBS poll of registered voters, he needed to land strong punches, instead he employed short jabs against U.S. Sen. Barack Obama. Though many jabs hit their mark, the required heavy blows to break out of second place were missing.
Obama connected again
Obama aimed for the middle class and the independent and mostly connected. He reacted to McCain’s jabs and pushed back. His smooth style and broad strokes regarding issues continued; he stumbled only once when he started to answer about energy with “you know” and said “and” seven to eight times in about 15-20 seconds. He came back strong by standing by succinctly that health “is a right” saying that his mom during her dying days were arguing with insurance companies. If this mom story is true, then it is hard to argue against.
McCain's lost opportunity
McCain did not come back by saying, “Who is going to pay for this trillion dollar bill?” Obama also said that preconditions should not be considered by insurers. McCain did not ask “Who is going to pay for risky lifestyle choices and daily decisions leading to debilitating diseases costing healthy taxpayers hundreds of billions?”
The big issues resulted into many wordy answers and rebuttals. NBC moderator, Tom Brokaw, wanted a “yes” or “no” whether Russia under Vladimir Putin is an evil empire, neither candidate answered yes or no. McCain said maybe, explaining that yes or no would be taken wrong. Obama used more words, as he did throughout the debate, frustrating Brokaw.
No tought talk from the Straight Talker
The talk before the debate was about McCain bringing the issue of Obama’s radical associations with: former self-proclaimed pro-violence 1960s founder of the Weather Underground, now Univ. of Illinois at Chicago professor William Ayers; campaign fundraiser, Tony Rezko who was recently convicted of 16 counts of fraud and money laundering; and, self-professed anti-American former pastor and advisor, Reverend Jeremiah Wrght.
No tough talk, no win
Before the debate began, a McCain aid said that such straight and blunt talk would not happen. Such a decision to hold back and remain civil at this critical juncture of the presidential election process may have cost McCain to underperform in the debate, and perhaps in the election. McCain may gain a point or two from this debate with one more debate left. Obama will keep his lead with 27 days left. It is still his election to lose.
Sep 26, 2008
McCain v. Obama: Round 1 goes to McCain
Presidential Debates 2008 Round 1
Width and depth
After viewing the debate and before listening to pundits, I saw U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) provide significant depth and width to issues of foreign policy and national security. U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) also provide width but lacked depth.
Style vs. substanceSen. Obama presented his marquee style while Sen. McCain displayed seriousness, though both were relevant and sober about the issues. McCain showed substance, reflecting his 26 years of congressional experience and knowledge of foreign policy and national security.
Score: McCain 67 vs. Obama 33
Based on a 100 scale, I saw Obama garner 33 points with his style and limited grasp of the national/international issues. McCain significantly overcame Obama's effort with personal experiences, personal details and a wealth of understanding of leaders and foreign policy and national security issues.
Obama lost an opportunity but still has a chance--later
Obama has another opportunity later when the issues focus on domestic as well as economic issues. Obama was very competitive with McCain early in this first debate when the discussion concentrated on domestic and economic issues, but his lack of a substantive platform and bold details prevented him from taking an early lead. As the debate left the domestic context, McCain left Obama feeling the waves as McCain left with his Navy ship sailing around the Seven Seas with a strong grasp of the issues.
What are your thoughts, not the pundits thoughts, yours?
A Drudgereport.com poll of over 168,000 voters: 68% McCain, 31% Obama, 2% neither won (Sep. 27, 2008 at 1:ooam). Again, what do you think after seeing the debate with your own eyes?
Width and depth
After viewing the debate and before listening to pundits, I saw U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) provide significant depth and width to issues of foreign policy and national security. U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) also provide width but lacked depth.
Style vs. substanceSen. Obama presented his marquee style while Sen. McCain displayed seriousness, though both were relevant and sober about the issues. McCain showed substance, reflecting his 26 years of congressional experience and knowledge of foreign policy and national security.
Score: McCain 67 vs. Obama 33
Based on a 100 scale, I saw Obama garner 33 points with his style and limited grasp of the national/international issues. McCain significantly overcame Obama's effort with personal experiences, personal details and a wealth of understanding of leaders and foreign policy and national security issues.
Obama lost an opportunity but still has a chance--later
Obama has another opportunity later when the issues focus on domestic as well as economic issues. Obama was very competitive with McCain early in this first debate when the discussion concentrated on domestic and economic issues, but his lack of a substantive platform and bold details prevented him from taking an early lead. As the debate left the domestic context, McCain left Obama feeling the waves as McCain left with his Navy ship sailing around the Seven Seas with a strong grasp of the issues.
What are your thoughts, not the pundits thoughts, yours?
A Drudgereport.com poll of over 168,000 voters: 68% McCain, 31% Obama, 2% neither won (Sep. 27, 2008 at 1:ooam). Again, what do you think after seeing the debate with your own eyes?
Aug 29, 2008
Promises, Promises: Obama's big heart versus reality
In his historic speech last night, U.S. Sen. Obama, the Democrat nominee, stated that he felt everyone's pain, causing him to make many promises. If he made 100 promises, then how many do you think he will fulfill?
Of course, we should not expect him to fulfill 100% of his promises, but if he is the source of change and hope, then why shouldn't we expect a high fulfillment ratio? Shouldn't we expect that most of his promises will be fulfilled in his first term, then look for him to fulfill the rest during his second term?
Pessimistically, if he is a typical politician--long on promises, short on fulfillment, then half or even a quarter of the promises fulfilled would be satisfactory. If you look at his promises--health care for all, peace in the world under his open door leadership approach, ending Middle East oil dependency in 10 years and a tax cut for 95% of us and other such near universal promises, it may be that 10% of promises fulfilled would be realistic. Yet, it may be that only 1% of his promises would be fulfilled, starting with tax increases for the top 5% of earners.
After all, who would pay for all the new, universal federal programs? Truly, the top 5% of earners already pay about 80% to 90% of the taxes. So, where would the rest of the money to pay for the multi-billion dollar federal give aways come from?
Senator Obama's high minded rhetoric was very liberal with much populist appeal: the government and the rich are bad but the everyday man and woman are good. This attracts a broad constituency to win elections.
When the presidential campaign is complete, will Obama and his policies be able to resolve these national and international questions:
1) Will he be able to cut taxes for 95% of taxpayers while paying for an already bloated federal government with a budget approaching $2 trillion plus billions more for free healthcare for all?
2) Will he actually provide health care for legal and illegal immigrants and all the uninsured, which comprises the 47 million uninsured?
3) How will he end our Middle East oil dependency in 10 years when he will prevent, via bureaucratic regulations, the increase of nuclear energy and natural gas facilitation and offshore drilling?
4) Will face-to-face dialogue with the two remaining leaders of the "Axis of Evil" (Iran and North Korea) lead to their unilateral nuclear disarmament and peace co-existence with their neighbors?
5) Will he really and completely pull American solders out of Iraq within 60 days of an Obama oath of office, leaving a political and military vacuum thereby allowing nearly nuclear neighbor Iran to dominate the oil-rich region? Will he then take responsibility for the death of millions of Iraqis?
Wanted: rhetorical accountants, fact checkers and a federally mandated fulfillment department.
Of course, we should not expect him to fulfill 100% of his promises, but if he is the source of change and hope, then why shouldn't we expect a high fulfillment ratio? Shouldn't we expect that most of his promises will be fulfilled in his first term, then look for him to fulfill the rest during his second term?
Pessimistically, if he is a typical politician--long on promises, short on fulfillment, then half or even a quarter of the promises fulfilled would be satisfactory. If you look at his promises--health care for all, peace in the world under his open door leadership approach, ending Middle East oil dependency in 10 years and a tax cut for 95% of us and other such near universal promises, it may be that 10% of promises fulfilled would be realistic. Yet, it may be that only 1% of his promises would be fulfilled, starting with tax increases for the top 5% of earners.
After all, who would pay for all the new, universal federal programs? Truly, the top 5% of earners already pay about 80% to 90% of the taxes. So, where would the rest of the money to pay for the multi-billion dollar federal give aways come from?
Senator Obama's high minded rhetoric was very liberal with much populist appeal: the government and the rich are bad but the everyday man and woman are good. This attracts a broad constituency to win elections.
When the presidential campaign is complete, will Obama and his policies be able to resolve these national and international questions:
1) Will he be able to cut taxes for 95% of taxpayers while paying for an already bloated federal government with a budget approaching $2 trillion plus billions more for free healthcare for all?
2) Will he actually provide health care for legal and illegal immigrants and all the uninsured, which comprises the 47 million uninsured?
3) How will he end our Middle East oil dependency in 10 years when he will prevent, via bureaucratic regulations, the increase of nuclear energy and natural gas facilitation and offshore drilling?
4) Will face-to-face dialogue with the two remaining leaders of the "Axis of Evil" (Iran and North Korea) lead to their unilateral nuclear disarmament and peace co-existence with their neighbors?
5) Will he really and completely pull American solders out of Iraq within 60 days of an Obama oath of office, leaving a political and military vacuum thereby allowing nearly nuclear neighbor Iran to dominate the oil-rich region? Will he then take responsibility for the death of millions of Iraqis?
Wanted: rhetorical accountants, fact checkers and a federally mandated fulfillment department.
Jul 12, 2008
Jesse Jackson in Real Life
Jesse Jackson in Real Life
Greenville native
Greenville, S.C. native, Jesse Jackson was himself during a July 9 interview in Chicago with Dr. Reed Tuckson, a healthcare official. While thinking that the TV microphone was off, Jackson whispered castigating words against Democrat presidential nominee Barack Obama for "talking down" to black Americans.
During the interview, a microphone picked up the Reverend saying in part: "See, Barack, been,um, talkin' down to black people on this faith based [issue]. I want to cut his [male body part] off."
Jackson's venom?
Why is Jackson filled with hate when:
1) he's a very public minister of the Gospel;
2) the faith based initiative publicly supported by Obama would support his (Jackson's) charitable organizations;
3) his fellow black professing Christian leader (U.S. Sen. Obama) is talking about male responsibility in relationships;
4) Obama was speaking of responsible fatherhood for all ethnicities;
Victimization industry
As I've written in my previous articles about race and equality, "civil rights leaders," such as Jesse Jackson only grow when minority groups experience "victimization."
Victimization, money and irresponsibility
When other black leaders speak of black responsibility, including Bill Cosby, Juan Williams and now Obama speak positively on the issue, opportunists like Jackson get angry. He (Jackson), perhaps thinks, they are drying up my source of income--blaming the "white" system, blaming "white" America and blaming absolute and inherent inequalities.
Responsbility, truth and God
The truth is, minorites as myself, have a lot of responsibility for where we are. We have two hands, two feet, a mind and God given skills. With God, we do have hope and things can change especially if we have the will that is submitted to God's will. This country is sufficiently free for every legal citizen (and for many illegal aliens). There are opportunities galore in this free and abundant nation. So much freedom that it allows such charleton's as Jackson to thrive and gain tens of millions a year based on the suffering of other minorities. The real Jackson showed up on the interview, showing his real face.
Sharing the national spotlight
Though he has apologized since being caught on tape literally, Jackson was, is and continues to be simply jealous and petty. He has been on the top of the civil rights heap (even after fathering an illegitimate child), and now a new kid in-town (who isn't totally black in ethnicity and ideologically) is getting the national and media attention.
Obama over Jackson
With Obama in-town so to speak (from Chicago, in fact, Jackson's Rainbow Coalition's headquarters), Jackson is bumped out! As he said previous while running for president in the 1980s, he will be going from the "out house, the statehouse, to the White House). His dream of attaining the White House has dissipated but the nightmare of the media out house is coming to fruition. His rainbow may be crashing down. So now, maybe he will actually get a job that is outside of the protesting venue.
During the interview and with the microphone inadvertently left on, Jesse Jackson happened in real life.
Hope and Change
My hope is that Jackson will truly repent from all those years of cashing in the victimization of others. Though there is still racism in the hearts of many Americans, much of the system has been fixed. Jackson needs to change his tune so he can provide hope based on the Christian gospel.
Redemption and forgiveness
There can be redemption for many, including Jackson; the gift of forgiveness and freedom are available to all through faith in Christ. This biblical message flows from Moses to Abraham Lincoln to Booker T. Washington to Martin Luther King, Jr. to Jesse Jackson himself.
Your real thoughts?
Greenville native
Greenville, S.C. native, Jesse Jackson was himself during a July 9 interview in Chicago with Dr. Reed Tuckson, a healthcare official. While thinking that the TV microphone was off, Jackson whispered castigating words against Democrat presidential nominee Barack Obama for "talking down" to black Americans.
During the interview, a microphone picked up the Reverend saying in part: "See, Barack, been,um, talkin' down to black people on this faith based [issue]. I want to cut his [male body part] off."
Jackson's venom?
Why is Jackson filled with hate when:
1) he's a very public minister of the Gospel;
2) the faith based initiative publicly supported by Obama would support his (Jackson's) charitable organizations;
3) his fellow black professing Christian leader (U.S. Sen. Obama) is talking about male responsibility in relationships;
4) Obama was speaking of responsible fatherhood for all ethnicities;
Victimization industry
As I've written in my previous articles about race and equality, "civil rights leaders," such as Jesse Jackson only grow when minority groups experience "victimization."
Victimization, money and irresponsibility
When other black leaders speak of black responsibility, including Bill Cosby, Juan Williams and now Obama speak positively on the issue, opportunists like Jackson get angry. He (Jackson), perhaps thinks, they are drying up my source of income--blaming the "white" system, blaming "white" America and blaming absolute and inherent inequalities.
Responsbility, truth and God
The truth is, minorites as myself, have a lot of responsibility for where we are. We have two hands, two feet, a mind and God given skills. With God, we do have hope and things can change especially if we have the will that is submitted to God's will. This country is sufficiently free for every legal citizen (and for many illegal aliens). There are opportunities galore in this free and abundant nation. So much freedom that it allows such charleton's as Jackson to thrive and gain tens of millions a year based on the suffering of other minorities. The real Jackson showed up on the interview, showing his real face.
Sharing the national spotlight
Though he has apologized since being caught on tape literally, Jackson was, is and continues to be simply jealous and petty. He has been on the top of the civil rights heap (even after fathering an illegitimate child), and now a new kid in-town (who isn't totally black in ethnicity and ideologically) is getting the national and media attention.
Obama over Jackson
With Obama in-town so to speak (from Chicago, in fact, Jackson's Rainbow Coalition's headquarters), Jackson is bumped out! As he said previous while running for president in the 1980s, he will be going from the "out house, the statehouse, to the White House). His dream of attaining the White House has dissipated but the nightmare of the media out house is coming to fruition. His rainbow may be crashing down. So now, maybe he will actually get a job that is outside of the protesting venue.
During the interview and with the microphone inadvertently left on, Jesse Jackson happened in real life.
Hope and Change
My hope is that Jackson will truly repent from all those years of cashing in the victimization of others. Though there is still racism in the hearts of many Americans, much of the system has been fixed. Jackson needs to change his tune so he can provide hope based on the Christian gospel.
Redemption and forgiveness
There can be redemption for many, including Jackson; the gift of forgiveness and freedom are available to all through faith in Christ. This biblical message flows from Moses to Abraham Lincoln to Booker T. Washington to Martin Luther King, Jr. to Jesse Jackson himself.
Your real thoughts?
Mar 3, 2008
Alamo: Hillary Clinton's Last Stand
Much like Davy Crocket, Jim Bowie and Col. William Travis, U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton will make her last stand on similar terrain. After 10 consecutive losses and an uneventful debate performance, Clinton is also facing great odds in the Lone Star state.
Though the polls indicate a dead heat, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama has the “big mo,” mimicking the power of General Santa Anna, the Alamo’s eventual victor. Obama’s momentum seems insurmountable. Former President Bill Clinton, has said that his wife has to win Texas. Can she still win this state and the nomination?
Media prognosticators from left to right are already writing her political obituary: “Hillary Should Get Out Now,” said Jonathan Alter of Newsweek and “Who Will Tell Hillary?” asked Robert Novak of the Chicago Sun Times.
According to Real Clear Politics, it is a statistical tie — Clinton and Obama splitting four current polls. Clinton’s home state, Arkansas, is a close neighbor to Texas, so Clinton’s familiar face may be the one advantage she has left — and it may be enough.
Hillary can still win in one of three ways: 1) a successful last stand in Texas and future wins in a few big states; 2) seating of Michigan and Florida delegates; or 3) in a brokered convention, persuading super delegates to nominate her, thus, snatching the win from the jaws of defeat.
Clinton will need everything from tears to toughness, maternal instincts to meanness to win the next three big states (Texas, Ohio, Penn.) by even slim margins. In Ohio and Pennsylvania, she leads by 8 and 14 percentage points respectively. From these three states, Clinton can win most of 577 combined delegates, which would reshape the delegate race. Currently Obama has at 1,351 and Clinton for 1,262.
Another way of avoiding political ruination for Clinton emanates from the fluxed fate of the Florida and Michigan delegates.
Clinton won both states in questionable circumstances but by wide margins. If those delegates are seated, Clinton’s deficit to Obama would immediately close. A decision on those delegates, however, does not seem likely in the near future.
The Clinton camp would like to see them instated outright, which may happen if the Obama agrees to a compromise.
In any event, if the Clinton machine can reinstate those delegates, the race is once again summarily changed.
Finally, the last and least attractive scenario involves the unique concept of the Democrat Convention’s 796 super delegates. If neither Democrat candidate has the necessary 2,025 delegates by the convention, these super delegates will be the deciding factor.
With the power of the Clinton name within the Democrat Party, many of those super delegates could be swayed Clinton’s direction. Even if Obama goes into the convention with a slight lead in the popular vote and delegate count, Clinton may have the influence to overturn the will of the Democrat electorate and take the nomination.
Of course, that would be the least attractive avenue for winning and would require a major effort to reconcile and heal the party’s divergent interests and interest groups.
Crockett, Bowie and Travis lost at the Alamo during the Lonestar state’s decisive drive for Texas Independence. Hillary has a chance to reverse history by winning in Texas against the likes of Mexican Gen. Santa Anna, the Napoleon of the West. The general she’s fighting — Barack Obama — who is overseeing a new political army, however, is much more polite, polished and dynamic.
The Santa Anna winds seem to be blowing Obama’s way, but Clinton cannot be counted out.
Though the polls indicate a dead heat, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama has the “big mo,” mimicking the power of General Santa Anna, the Alamo’s eventual victor. Obama’s momentum seems insurmountable. Former President Bill Clinton, has said that his wife has to win Texas. Can she still win this state and the nomination?
Media prognosticators from left to right are already writing her political obituary: “Hillary Should Get Out Now,” said Jonathan Alter of Newsweek and “Who Will Tell Hillary?” asked Robert Novak of the Chicago Sun Times.
According to Real Clear Politics, it is a statistical tie — Clinton and Obama splitting four current polls. Clinton’s home state, Arkansas, is a close neighbor to Texas, so Clinton’s familiar face may be the one advantage she has left — and it may be enough.
Hillary can still win in one of three ways: 1) a successful last stand in Texas and future wins in a few big states; 2) seating of Michigan and Florida delegates; or 3) in a brokered convention, persuading super delegates to nominate her, thus, snatching the win from the jaws of defeat.
Clinton will need everything from tears to toughness, maternal instincts to meanness to win the next three big states (Texas, Ohio, Penn.) by even slim margins. In Ohio and Pennsylvania, she leads by 8 and 14 percentage points respectively. From these three states, Clinton can win most of 577 combined delegates, which would reshape the delegate race. Currently Obama has at 1,351 and Clinton for 1,262.
Another way of avoiding political ruination for Clinton emanates from the fluxed fate of the Florida and Michigan delegates.
Clinton won both states in questionable circumstances but by wide margins. If those delegates are seated, Clinton’s deficit to Obama would immediately close. A decision on those delegates, however, does not seem likely in the near future.
The Clinton camp would like to see them instated outright, which may happen if the Obama agrees to a compromise.
In any event, if the Clinton machine can reinstate those delegates, the race is once again summarily changed.
Finally, the last and least attractive scenario involves the unique concept of the Democrat Convention’s 796 super delegates. If neither Democrat candidate has the necessary 2,025 delegates by the convention, these super delegates will be the deciding factor.
With the power of the Clinton name within the Democrat Party, many of those super delegates could be swayed Clinton’s direction. Even if Obama goes into the convention with a slight lead in the popular vote and delegate count, Clinton may have the influence to overturn the will of the Democrat electorate and take the nomination.
Of course, that would be the least attractive avenue for winning and would require a major effort to reconcile and heal the party’s divergent interests and interest groups.
Crockett, Bowie and Travis lost at the Alamo during the Lonestar state’s decisive drive for Texas Independence. Hillary has a chance to reverse history by winning in Texas against the likes of Mexican Gen. Santa Anna, the Napoleon of the West. The general she’s fighting — Barack Obama — who is overseeing a new political army, however, is much more polite, polished and dynamic.
The Santa Anna winds seem to be blowing Obama’s way, but Clinton cannot be counted out.
Jan 28, 2008
How Obama overwhelmed Hillary in SC Primary
Key to Obama Victory
The key factor for U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's win in the South Carolina Primary was his win at the Iowa Caucus on Jan. 3. There, he became the frontrunner and a formidable presidential candidate. South Carolina black voters began switching their votes from U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton won after they saw the Iowa returns. Just like many evangelicals, black voters are pragmatic--they want a winner and support the power that comes with a winner.
How Obama can Florida
Though, Obama won 55% of the S.C. vote, along with 40% of the black vote, he only won 25% of the white vote. This percentage of white voter support may not be enough to win Florida this Tuesday since most of the voters there and the rest of the country are white voters. S.C. has the highest percentage of black voters in the U.S.
Obama has to expand his base across the country just as he did in Iowa.
The key factor for U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's win in the South Carolina Primary was his win at the Iowa Caucus on Jan. 3. There, he became the frontrunner and a formidable presidential candidate. South Carolina black voters began switching their votes from U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton won after they saw the Iowa returns. Just like many evangelicals, black voters are pragmatic--they want a winner and support the power that comes with a winner.
How Obama can Florida
Though, Obama won 55% of the S.C. vote, along with 40% of the black vote, he only won 25% of the white vote. This percentage of white voter support may not be enough to win Florida this Tuesday since most of the voters there and the rest of the country are white voters. S.C. has the highest percentage of black voters in the U.S.
Obama has to expand his base across the country just as he did in Iowa.
Aug 20, 2007
Presidential Run for the Roses: The Dems' Obama Factor
Barack Obama has made a big political splash ever since he keynoted the 2004 Democrat convention.
Obama's great speaking ability, brief but sterling credentials, including being a Harvard Law grad, fresh face and ideas continue to attract political coverage and potential voters. He is running for the roses, and running hard politically. Will his efforts and ideas be sufficient to overcome the mother of all candidates--U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY).
With all his positives, Obama is up against Hillary's hurricane force and the Clinton political machine. In the end, the Obama image will be paper mache'.
Since the 2004 election cycle, the Democrat presidential nomination has always been Hillary Clinton's province. She let it go to grow stronger in preparation for her historic presidential run for the roses--as the first woman representing a major party.
Obama's run is also historic--as the first ever minority nominee for a major party. But his inexperience is quite revealing of late. His foreign affairs comments lately have displayed immaturity to many long-time political observers. Obama's six year stint in the Illinois state senate and shorter stint in the U.S. Senate reflects little leadership experience, especially to be the leader of the free world. Many leftwing bloggers, Hollywood celebrities, monied people and voters are excited about his candidacy; his time may come, but it is not now.
Obama's great speaking ability, brief but sterling credentials, including being a Harvard Law grad, fresh face and ideas continue to attract political coverage and potential voters. He is running for the roses, and running hard politically. Will his efforts and ideas be sufficient to overcome the mother of all candidates--U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY).
With all his positives, Obama is up against Hillary's hurricane force and the Clinton political machine. In the end, the Obama image will be paper mache'.
Since the 2004 election cycle, the Democrat presidential nomination has always been Hillary Clinton's province. She let it go to grow stronger in preparation for her historic presidential run for the roses--as the first woman representing a major party.
Obama's run is also historic--as the first ever minority nominee for a major party. But his inexperience is quite revealing of late. His foreign affairs comments lately have displayed immaturity to many long-time political observers. Obama's six year stint in the Illinois state senate and shorter stint in the U.S. Senate reflects little leadership experience, especially to be the leader of the free world. Many leftwing bloggers, Hollywood celebrities, monied people and voters are excited about his candidacy; his time may come, but it is not now.
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