Baghdad, Berlin, Barack

Excerpted from the Wall Street Journal:

For our money, the best line in Barack Obama's speech yesterday in Berlin came in the form of a quote from Ernst Reuter, the city's mayor during the period of the Soviet blockade and the American airlift, in 1948:

"But in the darkest hour," said Sen. Obama, "the people of Berlin kept the flame of hope burning. The people of Berlin refused to give up. And on one fall day, hundreds of thousands of Berliners came here, to the Tiergarten, and heard the city's mayor implore the world not to give up on freedom. 'There is only one possibility,' he said. 'For us to stand together united until this battle is won…. The people of Berlin have spoken. We have done our duty, and we will keep on doing our duty'." This, from a U.S. Senator whose consistent message to the people of Baghdad, a similarly besieged city, also dependent on America's protection, has been, in effect, to give up.

Mr. Obama reiterated this view earlier in the week while traveling in the Middle East, in an interview with ABC's Terry Moran. Mr. Moran asked the Illinois Democrat whether -- "knowing what you know now" -- he would reconsider his opposition to last year's surge of U.S. troops in Iraq. "Well, no," Mr. Obama replied.

What Mr. Obama "knows now" is that the surge he opposed has saved Iraq, much as Harry Truman's airlift saved Berlin and underlined America's intention to defend Europe throughout the Cold War. The surge has also saved American lives in Iraq, with combat-related deaths (so far, there have been seven this month) at an all time low.

Mr. Obama offered his own unwitting testimony to this fact by not donning body armor upon his arrival in Baghdad and during a helicopter tour with Gen. David Petraeus. "There have been few if any attacks of late on our aircraft, and the situation did not require them to be wearing body armor," explained Gen. Petraeus's spokesman.

Mr. Obama also knows that Gen. Petraeus opposes setting a fixed timetable for withdrawing U.S. forces from Iraq. This military judgment ought to count for something, particularly since Congressional Democrats have long scolded President Bush for failing to pay sufficient heed to the advice of generals such as former Army Chief of Staff Eric Shinseki. Yet Mr. Obama, who has always been careful to cite the views of military commanders to justify his 16 month withdrawal schedule, now says that heeding less congenial military advice would mean an abdication of his responsibilities as a prospective commander in chief....

In his Berlin speech, Mr. Obama was at his most forceful when he insisted that "this is the moment when we must defeat terror," adding that "the threat is real and we cannot shrink from our responsibility to combat it." This is well-said and true.

But it squares oddly with a political campaign whose central premise is that losing in Iraq -- and whatever calamities may follow -- is a matter of little consequence to U.S. or European interests. It squares oddly, too, with Mr. Obama's broader promise to "stand for the human rights of the dissident in Burma, the blogger in Iran, the voter in Zimbabwe" and virtually every other global cause. - Read in full

Obama Doles Out More Hypocrisy, Shuns Wounded US Soldiers In Germany!

Here's some more hypocrisy from the Obama campaign. Yesterday the Obama campaign tried to fend off critics who questioned whether Obama's Berlin speech, in front of two hundred thousand spectators and a specially assembled film crew, wasn't, in essence, a campaign rally, or better yet, a campaign gimmick.

"I don’t think the fact that large numbers of people gather to hear a speech makes it a campaign speech,” an aide said. “The substance of what he addresses is what’s important. And what he is addressing has nothing to do with campaigns. It has to do with his view of where we are today in the world.”

“It is not going to be a political speech,” said a senior foreign policy adviser, who spoke to reporters on background. “When the president of the United States goes and gives a speech, it is not a political speech or a political rally.

“But he is not president of the United States,” a reporter reminded the adviser.

“He is going to talk about the issues as an individual … not as a candidate, but as an individual, as a senator,” the adviser added.

However, now comes word that:

Sen. Barack Obama has scrapped plans to visit wounded members of the armed forces in Germany as part of his overseas trip, a decision his campaign said was made because the Democratic presidential candidate thought it would be inappropriate on a campaign-funded journey.

"Senator Obama did not want to have a trip to see our wounded warriors perceived as a campaign event when his visit was to show his appreciation for our troops and decided instead not to go."

An Obama spokesman said the stop was canceled because Obama decided "it would be inappropriate to make a stop to visit troops at a U.S. military facility as part of a trip funded by the campaign."

So essentially it was okay for Obama to speak in front of hundreds of thousands of spectators in Berlin because he was speaking "not as a candidate, but as an individual, as a senator". However, he couldn't possibly visit wounded US soldiers in Germany because he was touring the country as a candidate, not as an individual or a US senator, thus visiting US soldiers would be perceived as a campaign gimmick. Sigh....

In truth, Obama has complete control over the media, and he manages to keep the press pool out of his proximity whenever he so desires. [Just ask Andrea Mitchell.] He could have easily visited the troops without all the media fanfare.

Just another bit of hypocrisy from the Obama camp.

Meanwhile the McCain campaign immediately criticized the move.

"Barack Obama is wrong. It is never inappropriate to visit our men and women in the military," said Brian Rogers, a spokesman for the Republican contender.

The Complete "Ich Bin Ein" Roundup

In an effort to adhere to Barack Obama's latest directive that Americans begin learning foreign languages, I've decided to to link to Rachel Sklar's comprehensive roundup of all the "Ich Bin Ein" headlines in the news - including "Ich bin ein Commander", "Ich Bin Ein Jet-Setter", "Ich bin ein Amerikaner", "Ich Bin Ein Berlitzer", "Ich Bin Ein Starbucks" and "Ich bin ein Beginner." You could read it all at the Huffington Post.

In a follow up post, Sklar clears up some confusion about John F. Kennedy's famous "Ich Bin Ein Berliner" speech and whether or not he was actually proclaiming himself to be a jelly doughnut. Hmmm... Perhaps, that's why the Germans found JFK to be so tanatlizing! You could read her followup post here. And of course there's Gerald Warner's article, where he opines that "if Obama really wants to identify with Middle America and its appetites he should have chosen a different German city as the venue to declare: "Ich bin ein Hamburger". You could read his column - entitled "Barack Obama campaign just a JFK re-enactment Society" - by clicking here.

Obama's "Offer" of "Sticks", a Linguistic Dilemma?

From Left I On the News:

Barack Obama said today that he plans "to offer carrots and sticks" to Iran in order to deal with the alleged nuclear problem with Iran. But here's the thing. You "offer" people carrots. You don't "offer" people sticks. You threaten them with sticks... Obama understands this, of course. It just doesn't sound as pleasant when you say it.

Sounds like Obama's "gonna make them an 'offer' they can't refuse."

Heh, unfortunately, his "sticks" are more like twigs anyway.

Obama Falsely claims membership of Senate committee

Excerpted from CNN's Political Ticker:

Responding to an Israeli reporter’s question Wednesday on his commitment to protect the Jewish state, Barack Obama pointed to a bill “we passed” in the U.S. Senate Banking Committee that tightens sanctions and authorizes divestment from Iran. “My committee,” he called it.

Except that he isn’t a member of the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs.

“Just this past week, we passed out of the out of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee - which is my committee - a bill to call for divestment from Iran as way of ratcheting up the pressure to ensure that they don’t obtain a nuclear weapon,” Obama said at a press conference in Sderot, Israel.

Obama’s campaign has not yet responded to CNN’s request for clarification of his remark.

Read in full

"Silly Leg, why in the World Were You so Thrilled!?"

Several months ago, MSNBC's Chris Matthews described a certain tingling sensation that went up his leg while listening to a Barack Obama campaign speech:

"It's part of reporting this case, this election, the feeling most people get when they hear Barack Obama's speech. My, I felt this thrill going up my leg. I mean, I don't have that too often."

At the time, I felt Matthews had put his foot in his mouth and probably regretted uttering those words.

Nevertheless, I couldn't help but wonder if Mr. Matthews might have endangered himself by putting his foot in his mouth after the thrill had already penetrated his leg. Theoretically, upon putting his foot in his mouth, the thrill could have then entered his mouth, and eventually spread to his throat, esophagus and even further.

However, in an appearance on "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" on Monday, Matthews defended his remarks.

Leno told Matthews:

"I was watching you one day - and this seems to go against the newsman's credo - you said Obama's speech sent a thrill up your leg."

And Matthews replied:

"You know, some journalists only report what a guy says and what they hear and what they see, I report all senses... And I have to tell you..., I was there watching one of Barack's speeches on TV.. and there's something he said about black and white in America...... I just think it's inspiring! I admit it! Okay? You could it call it what you want! I was inspired about it. I said so at the time and I took some heat for it. But I'd rather be honest and say what I feel then sit there like some kind of statue and say, 'oh, that was noteworthy.' I'm a frickin' American.... And I do react emotionally to my country..." - Watch the video

So, if we are to take Mr. Matthews at his word, he did not put his foot in his mouth, but rather, he had been deliberate in describing the thrill that went up his leg.

However, upon seeing how his mouth seems to be exuding so much "thrill" over Obama, it is quite obvious that the "thrill" has already spread from his leg unto his mouth - which means he must have put his foot in his mouth.

Nevertheless, if Obama is elected President, I can assure you that a day will soon arrive when Mr. Matthews will excoriate his leg and ask it point blank:

"Silly leg, why in the world were you so thrilled!?"

Obama's Promise of "Change" Just Doesn't Smell Right!

The following anecdote has been making its way around the Internet:

Years ago, there was an old tale in the Marine Corps about a lieutenant who inspected his Marines and told the 'Gunny' that they smelled bad.

The lieutenant suggested that they change their underwear. The Gunny responded, 'Aye, aye, sir, I'll see to it immediately'.

He went into the barracks and said, 'The lieutenant thinks you guys smell bad, and wants you to change your underwear'.

'Smith, you change with Jones, McCarthy, you change with Witkowskie, Brown, you change with Schultz. Get to it'.

The moral:

A candidate may promise change in Washington, but don't count on things smelling any better.

Obama and Chavez, Sharing a Common Goal!

What do Barack Obama and Hugo Chavez have in common?

From Reuters News Agency:

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez visits a resurgent Russia this week on an arms shopping trip that raises the anti-U.S. leader's profile and will irritate his hosts' rivals in Washington.

Chavez, a firebrand socialist who supports Russia's increasingly bold opposition to U.S. foreign policy, will use the trip to burnish his own credentials as a fierce critic of what he calls the U.S. empire.

Okay, now let's rewrite that Reuters report with a few minor alterations:

Barack Obama visits Iraq this week on a trip that raises the anti-U.S. leader's profile, and is sure to irritate his rivals in Washington.

Obama , a firebrand socialist who supports the Iraqi insurgency's bold opposition to U.S. foreign policy, will use the trip to Iraq to burnish his own credentials as a fierce critic of what he calls the U.S. empire.

And that, my friends, is what Barack Obama and Hugo Chavez have in common.

NYT REJECTS MCCAIN'S EDITORIAL; SHOULD 'MIRROR' OBAMA

From the Drudge Report:

An editorial written by Republican presidential hopeful McCain has been rejected by the New York Times - less than a week after the paper published an essay written by Obama, the Drudge Report has learned.

The paper's decision to refuse McCain's direct rebuttal to Obama's 'My Plan for Iraq' has ignited explosive charges of media bias in top Republican circles.

"It would be terrific to have an article from Senator McCain that mirrors Senator Obama's piece," NYT Op-Ed editor David Shipley explained in an email late Friday to McCain's staff. "I'm not going to be able to accept this piece as currently written." - Read the rest

Barack Obama - the Second Coming of Jeremiah Wright!

"We have turned a blind eye to the poverty, helplessness and despair that exists throughout the world, and in doing so, we have killed far more than the thousands who died in New York and the Pentagon on 9/11, and we never batted an eye. We have nurtured a climate of hunger and destitution all across the globe and now we are indignant because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought right back into our own front yards! America's chickens are coming home to roost!"
Barack Obama - September 2001

Okay, okay, I admit, Barack Obama never uttered those words. It was Obama's pastor, Jeremiah Wright, who said something to that effect. But rather than blame the 9/11 attacks on America's indifference to global poverty, Rev. Wright said it was American agression - in places like Hiroshima and Nagasaki - that brought about the 9/11 attacks.

However, Barack Obama did say something eerily similar to the aforementioned quote, and one can only assume that Senator Obama gleaned his twisted ideology from listening to the sermons of Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

This is what Obama actually said in Sept. of 2001, shortly after the 9/11 attacks:

"Certain immediate lessons are clear, and we must act upon those lessons decisively...The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers.. Such a failure of empathy is not... unique to a particular culture, religion or ethnicity. It may find expression in a particular brand of violence, it may be channeled by particular demagogues or fanatics.

Most often, though, it grows out a climate of poverty and ignorance, helplessness and despair... We will have to devote far more attention to the monumental task of raising the hopes and prospects of embittered children across the globe...

Source The Real Barack Obama, Time Magazine, The New Yorker -
Obama’s response to the 9/11 attacks was published on September 19th in the Hyde Park Herald

Sadly, Barack Obama believes that the 9/11 attacks befell us because we failed to devote enough "attention to the monumental task of raising the hopes and prospects of" the world's "embittered" terrorists.

Translation: America's chickens came home to roost!

Barack Obama's message was in essence a more benign version of Rev. Wright's post 9/11 sermon, stripped from its original anti-American sentiment, and made to conform to American audiences. But make no mistake about it, it was vintage Rev. Wright, and may I add - vintage Barack Obama.

The media, in its blind fidelity to Barack Obama, chose to ignore this paragraph which was printed in the most recent edition of the New Yorker Magazine, and instead, vented its anger over the magazine's cover.

In truth, Barack Obama's words should come as no surprise to me. But nonetheless, every time I'm reminded of this man's convoluted ideologies, it sends a shudder down my spine and makes me wonder: 'Are the American people really so gullible as to elect this man - who is imbued with such twisted ideologies - to be the next President of the United States'?

Indeed, as I wrote in an earlier post, "For the first time in my adult life I am no longer proud to be an American". And yes, I concede, that sentence was merely a play on Michelle Obama's words, but as I wrote back then, "how can I possibly be proud of a country that is about to elect Barack Obama as its next Commander in Chief?"

Unfortunately, all I can do right now is pray and hope that Barack Obama does not become our next President. Meanwhile, I will continue to blog, simply to take my mind off the ominous cloud that hangs over our country.

Yes, indeed, I will continue to blog about Barack Obama's recent flip-flops, his waffling on global warming and his opposition to the Kyoto treaty, for it is much easier to jest about such relatively trivial matters than to discuss the convoluted mind of a man who blames the 9/11 attacks on America's indifference to Global privation.

Ah, yes, I really love talking about those flip-flops! It makes me feel so good!

McCain Clarifies his Position on Timeline to Get Obama Out of Iraq

In a post entitled, "McCain Backs Timeline to Get Obama Out of Iraq", Scrappleface editor, Scott Ott reported earlier today:

Republican presidential nominee John McCain today for the first time said he can now support a timeline to reduce the American presence in Iraq, specifically advocating the withdrawal from Iraq of Democrat presidential nominee Barack Obama, and several battalions of U.S. news anchors and reporters.

“It’s time to bring them home,” said Sen. McCain at a news conference attended by an journalism intern from the Des Moines Register. “The surge has worked, and it’s time to redeploy.”

Sen. McCain said bringing Sen. Obama home would help to ensure that “people in the U.S., who desperately need media attention, will get the help they deserve.”

“Our mainstream media forces are stretched too thin,” he said. “If news should break here in the homeland, who’s going to cover it? We’re vulnerable.”

However, "Obama Report" foreign correspondent, Bill Brandenburg tells us that Senator McCain has since issued a clarification of his earlier statement, now saying that "it would be perfectly fine" with him "if Obama and the mainstream media remain in Iraq for another 100 years".

"We've had a media presence in Japan for 60 years," McCain said, "We've had journalists and embassy officials in South Korea for 50 years or so. That’d be fine with me if Obama and the mainstream media remain in Iraq for 100 years, as long as they are not getting injured, and they agree to abandon their native tongue and adopt Arabic, Farsi or German as their new language."

Is Barack Obama Getting to You? No Need to Worry! Help is Only A Keystroke Away!

Attention Obama supporters: Do you feel like Barack Obama is leaving you out to dry and waffling on key issues that matter to you? Perhaps you feel all alone and wish you had someone to turn to in your time of need?

Well cheer up, because you are not alone! Indeed, there's a support group dedicated to people just like you.

FormerObamaSupporters.com is available to assist people just like you who feel disillusioned by Barack Obama and his vacuous, and disingenuous message of change!

On their website they have issued the following proclamation:

Abraham Lincoln once said: “You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.”

Dr. Martin Luther King said -”I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character“. We believe Obama is NOT a person with good moral judgment. He lacks the character and integrity to be the president of the greatest nation on the planet.

We are backing away from Senator Obama because he changed from the positions he ran on during the primary election. It is time to say ENOUGH. Say no to the kool-aids.

FormerObamaSupporters.com will help you get out of your doldrums and bring back joy and happiness into your life. Just visit their website, look around a while, and you'll see just how easy it is to regain that spark and energy you once possessed.

Question: Have you ever criticized one of Senator Obama's flip-flops only to be rebuffed by an Obama cultist who tells you: "Well, that's a distraction! Not this time! Not this election, there's too much at stake!?"

No need to fret! FormerObamaSupporters.com has a YouTube video that will help you address cultists just like that:



Are you feeling a bit overwhelmed by Senator Obama's disingenuous and hackneyed flip-flopping routine?

No need to fret! FormerObamaSupporters.com has just the right tonic for that too, a humorous YouTube video, sure to ease your nerves. And listen closely as "Curly" of the "Three Stooges" needles Senator Obama with his trademark sound bite! - "Nyuk, nyuk"!



And here's a post that sure to cheer you up! Barack Obama Flip Flop Express!

Just remember, you are not alone! There are thousands of former Obama supporters who share your pain, and they're readily available to assist you in your time of need!

Cheers!

Clinton Campaign Aides Buy 2012 Website

A company associated with Hillary Clinton's top presidential campaign advance staff has purchased a website domain that hints of a 2012 presidential bid for the vanquished senator from New York.

HRC2012.com was bought by the Markham Group on June 8, according to whois.com

Source - Marc Ambiner, The Atlantic

Obama Must See To it That Iran's "Execution" Program Remains Peaceful

From One News Now:

Lawmakers in Iran are considering a proposal to make the death penalty automatic for those who leave the Muslim faith.

Abe Ghafari of Iranian Christians International, Inc. (ICI) was at least a little surprised to learn the news. "Before, it was like an option that an Islamic judge could decide to use or not to use -- but now it will become an automatic thing. And from the language of the legislation, it seems like something that cannot be appealed," Ghafari contends. - Read in full

Hopefully, when Obama travels to the Middle East next week he'll talk with the Iranians and impress upon them that killing these converts for anything other than peaceful purposes is simply not in their best interest.

Obama, Once a Coal-Industry Backer, Shifts Stance

This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and the planets began to heal.
Barack Obama - Democratic Nomination Victory Speech

Excerpted from AZ Central:

In May 1998, at the urging of the state's coal industry, the Illinois Legislature passed a bill condemning the Kyoto global warming treaty and forbidding state efforts to regulate greenhouse gases.

Barack Obama voted "aye."

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee now calls climate change "one of the greatest moral challenges of our generation," and proposes cutting carbon emissions 80 percent by 2050. But as a state senator, from 1997 to 2004, he usually supported bills sought by coal interests, according to legislative records and interviews....

Obama, who touts his independence from special interests, made a point of embracing the coal industry as part of his quest for statewide office. When he ran for U.S. Senate in 2004, he was flanked by mine workers to proclaim that "there's always going to be a role for coal" in Illinois....

Employees of coal companies and electric utilities have contributed $539,597 to Obama's U.S. Senate and presidential campaign, according to the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics...

"He's definitely trying to straddle two politically irreconcilable objectives: Taking decisive action against global warming while keeping a healthy coal industry," said Frank O'Donnell, president of the non-partisan Clean Air Watch. "...

Obama's other votes on coal in the state Senate included:

In 1997, he voted to divert sales taxes to a fund for grants to help reopening closed coal mines and "incentives to attract new businesses that use coal."

In 2001, he voted for legislation that offered of $3.5 billion in loan guarantees to build coal-fired power plants with no ability to control carbon emissions....

In 2003, he voted to allow $300 million in taxpayer-backed bonds to build or expand coal-fired power plants.

Obama also drew criticism for sponsoring a bill in January 2007 to devote $8 billion in subsidies to a technology to convert coal to liquid fuel. The Sierra Club says liquid coal "releases almost double the global warming emissions per gallon as regular gasoline."

As the presidential campaign was well under way in June 2007, the Obama campaign issued a clarification: He would not support liquid coal processes unless they emit a fifth less carbon than conventional fuels.

"When you're running for president and you've got environmentalists biting your head off every day, that's to be expected," said Phil Gonet, head of the Illinois Coal Association. "We're still optimistic that he may be helpful at some point in the future."

Senator Biden Joins the Prestigious "Flip-Floppers' Club"!

“We find it a little disingenuous that Sen. Obama is hailing this as a new bold initiative when he has neglected to join his colleagues in the Senate when the opportunities have been there to redirect our forces into Afghanistan. It’s good to see Sen. Obama has finally arrived at the right position, but this can hardly be considered bold leadership.”
Statement issued by Senator Biden's campaign Manager, Luis Navarro - August 2007

Barack Obama is taking a lot of heat over a statement he made on Tuesday saying that he had argued for years that the US lacks the resources to "finish the job" in Afghanistan because of its commitment in Iraq.

Critics lashed out at Obama and pointed out that as chairman of the Foreign Relations Subcommittee on European affairs, Obama had not even held a single hearing on the NATO mission in Afghanistan.

However, Sen. Joe Biden, an ardent critic of the Bush administration and a champion of the Liberals' "surrender policy" in Iraq, came out in defense of Obama yesterday saying:

"The reason Senator Obama didn’t chair a NATO and Afghanistan subcommittee hearing is because I did, as Chairman of the Committee.... When it comes to the war in Afghanistan and the war in Iraq, we hold those hearings at the full committee level."

And on Thursday Biden stated:

"On the particular issue of NATO’s mission in Afghanistan, We have held three Full Committee hearings in the last 22 months".

However, Obama's detractors were quick to point out that Obama did not attend two of those three hearings -- and for the third meeting, on March 8, 2007, Obama only asked one question - unrelated to Afghanistan.

What's more, in the midst of the primary campaign last summer - when Obama made the call to deploy extra brigades to Afghanistan, Biden said that Obama had taken a "Johnny come-lately position" on Afghanistan and was late to the debate. And Biden’s campaign manager, Luis Navarro, said at the time:

“We find it a little disingenuous that Sen. Obama is hailing this as a new bold initiative when he has neglected to join his colleagues in the Senate when the opportunities have been there to redirect our forces into Afghanistan. It’s good to see Sen. Obama has finally arrived at the right position, but this can hardly be considered bold leadership.”

Now, you're probably wondering why did Senator Biden feel the need to flip-flop in defense of the quintessential flip-flopper, Barack Obama?

One possibility [aside from the fact that this is just another opportunity for Biden to attack the Bush administration]:

He's hoping to receive a prominent post in Sen. "Johnny come-lately's" administration, if, and when Sen. "Johnny come-lately" becomes President.

The GOP Website has more on this topic, but they don't seem to mention the statement issued by Senator Biden's campaign manager, Luis Navarro. Hmmm... Anybody care to remind them about it?

Obama Finally Approves of the Surge!

Barack Obama once said he is "not opposed to all wars". And I believe the same can be said about the "surge".

While he might have been opposed to the troop surge in Iraq, he can't possibly be opposed to all surges!

Take the following surge, for example:

Barack Obama surges past John McCain in fundraising stakes

Do you think Obama disapproves of that surge? I highly doubt it.

Free Movie Tickets, A Plan To Hide Homeless During DNC?

Organizers Deny They're Trying To Sweep Away Homeless Population!

From the Denver Channel:

When thousands of delegates converge in the Mile City in August, downtown Denver won't look exactly like it does now.

Free movie tickets and passes to Denver's cultural attractions will be given out to homeless people just in time for the Democratic National Convention.

Several groups that help the homeless announced Wednesday that they are making changes during the DNC. But the plan is seen, by some, as a plan to hide the city's homeless, estimated to be roughly 3,800 the summertime.

A DNC advisory committee devoted just to handling the homeless issue has been working on a plan for the past four months with the help of Denver police, the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless, the Denver Rescue Mission and other shelters.

The homeless will be offered free movie passes, tickets to the Denver Zoo, museums, and other cultural facilities.

Some shelters will open their doors during the daytime and have more cots available at night. A spokeswoman for the Denver Rescue Mission said the shelter will almost double its overnight capacity. Some shelters will also have big-screen TVs so the homeless can watch convention activities without being out on the busy streets, caught up in the chaos.

And here are some of the various, conflicting, and yes, peculiar explanations being given as to why the homeless are being offered all these amenities:

Organizers say it's not an attempt to sweep away the homeless but it's more of an effort to educate them.

"If anything, we're trying to educate the homeless population on what is available, what entertainment they can go to, you know...," said Denver Rescue Mission's Greta Walker.

Isn't that wonderful? They're providing the homeless with free education!

The committee thinks this is a way to make sure the homeless aren't harassed by police or Secret Service and aren't unknowingly caught up in the activities and protests in the area.

I suppose it wouldn't reflect too kindly on the DNC to have homeless people protesting the festivities. Nor would it reflect too kindly on the DNC if the Secret Service started harassing these people. So, out of the goodness of their hearts they've decided that some shelters will remain open during the daytime and that additional cots will be made available at night. Wow! If ever there was a magnanimous party, it would have to be the Democratic Party.

During the week, a voter registration drive will target homeless shelters and low-cost or free health clinics.

Seems only natural. You give the homeless a helping hand, you certainly have the right to squeeze them for what their worth!

But if you're still puzzled as to why these homeless people are being offered all these amenities, there's an additional explanation for that:

From the LA Times blogs:

The special measures are planned because advocates say they fear the convention might traumatize the homeless, many of whom are Vietnam veterans suffering from mental illness, according to Jamie Van Leeuwen, head of Denver’s Road Home.

“Homeless veterans get very scared when there are lots of helicopters and lots of guns,” he said. “And there’s going to be a lot of that here.”

Yes, indeed, the homeless get very scared when they see lots of helicopters and lots of guns!

Thank the Lord for the DNC and their all-caring Messiah, Barack Obama!

Independents Fleeing en masse from Obama

Barack Obama has recently been flip-flopping on many of the issues, hoping to fool middle-of-the-road voters into believing he is actually a Centrist who, all his life, was simply disguising himself as an extreme Left-Wing Liberal.

But has all this waffling paid off for him?

According to a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday, not only hasn't it paid off for Obama, it seems to have backfired on him.

Obama's 22-point advantage in June among independents, a critical voting bloc that could swing either way in the November election, shrunk to 3 points during a month in which the candidates battled on the economy and Obama was accused of shifting to the center on several issues.

Apparently, many of these "so called" Independents prefer the old Obama - the one who was dubbed "The most Liberal Senator in 2007", - over the new Obama.

So what does this mean for Obama?

It means he better stop this ridiculous dissemblance immediately and get back to being the extreme Left-Wing politician he really is, or he'll lose the support of all those independent voters who, for some inexplicable reason, long to see another Jimmy Carter-like President in the Oval Office.

Barack Obama campaign just a JFK re-enactment Society

Excerpted from the Telegraph UK blogs:

Barack Obama, in his quest to become the second black president of America after Bill Clinton.. is tottering perilously on the cliff-edge of caricature. Next week he will emulate John F Kennedy's speech in Berlin. Iconoclasts falsely claimed that Kennedy's famous line "Ich bin ein Berliner" translated idiomatically as "I am a jelly doughnut." Although that was untrue, if Obama really wants to identify with Middle America and its appetites he should have chosen a different German city as the venue to declare: "Ich bin ein Hamburger."

The hollow note in the Obama campaign is its relentlessly derivative character, constantly imitating popular precedents when it is supposed to be the vehicle for a uniquely New Deal...

The Obama campaign is... big on rhetoric, media manipulation and pzazz, short on substance. What there is of substance is deeply ominous for America. Obama is so liberal he is off the radar. The National Journal's rating system, based on votes in the Senate, showed Obama was the 16th most liberal senator in 2005, the 10th in 2006 and the most liberal senator in 2007.

He has massive approval ratings from all the harpie pressure groups whose obsession is to maximise the killing of American babies.... He opposed a bill in the Illinois State Senate to prevent the killing of infants accidentally left alive by abortion.

The impetus behind the Obama phenomenon is the recognition that at some point there will be a black president and it will be a holistic moment for America. On this basis, the liberal media have set a bandwaggon rolling, without regard to the quality of the candidate, who increasingly displays naivety on foreign policy and economics.

The truth is that a white candidate with Obama's liberal agenda would have been shunted off to join George McGovern in the dustbin of radical history round about the stage of the New Hampshire primaries. America does not do liberal. In terms of healing racial wounds, it would have been preferable if the first black contender had been a Republican or conservative Democrat, rather as Margaret Thatcher became our first woman prime minister owing nothing to the feminist sisterhood.

Obama's agenda fuels the paranoia of nocturnal cross-burners in Mississippi, just as his lack of originality inspires wider distrust. In America's current crisis, a JFK re-enactor is as useful as an Elvis impersonator.

Obama Cartoon Sparks Violent Protests

Gunfire and rioting erupted throughout the US on Monday as hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets to protest the publishing of a cartoon satirizing the prophet and venerable Messiah, Barack Hussein Obama.

Down, down, New Yorker Magazine," chanted a large crowd of Obama acolytes outside the New Yorker Magazine headquarters in New York City.

City streets were closed for traffic as hundreds of buses and trucks brought in people from all over the country to protest this blatant act of blasphemy.

The Reverend Jesse Jackson addressed the overflowing crowd, and pledged to personally neuter all those responsible for printing the despicable cartoon.

"They have made a mockery of our beloved prophet and revered Messiah," the Rev. Jackson said, "and they will be duly punished by means of castration!"

Schwarzenegger Waffles In Defense of Obama's Flip-Flops!

During an interview Sunday on ABC's "This Week" program, California governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger told host, George Stephanopoulos that there's nothing wrong with a Presidential candidate engaging in flip-flopping in order to win an election! However, Mr. Schwarzenegger engaged in a bit of waffling himself as he attempted to explain his position.

Here's a partial excerpt from the interview:

Stephanopoulos: "Here in California you [Schwarzenegger] won more than half of the independents, a quarter of the Democrats. If John McCain is going to win, he's going to have to do the same thing. How does he get those voters? He's not getting them now!"

Schwarzenegger: "Well, I think the most important thing is that you have to invade the center line.... You've got to cross and invade over that center line.. .I think what I have done in California is...I have crossed the line ..and took things that normally, traditionally, in California were democratic issues...That's what they have to do on a national level...."

Stephanopoulos: "So it sounds like you're saying Senator McCain should be even bolder in crossing the lines."

Schwarzenegger: "You have to be bold. But it is very, very hard to do that, because when you go through a campaign you try to first to win the primaries. And when you cross the line, it backfires. So you have to be very careful in order to get the nomination, and then after you get the nomination you can then wander a little bit more to [the other side]. and hopefully he[McCain] will do that. And the same is with Obama. What he has done consistently is he has been very much to the left and he is now more and more going to the right.."

Stephanopoulos: "You think that's smart?"

Schwarzenegger: "Well, that's what they have to do! In politics out there they always say, 'well now, I don't know anymore what he really stands for, he has just changed his mind and he's flip-flopping and all those kind of things. Let me tell you something, 'flip-flopping is a getting a bad rap'. Because I think it is great when someone has made a mistake..I mean someone has for 20 or 30 years been in the wrong place with his idea and with his ideologies and says, "you know something, I change my mind, I'm now for this". As long as he's honest...I think that's a wonderful thing..You can change your mind. There's nothing wrong with that. I've changed my mind on things, and there's is nothing wrong with that.. I just say to the people, 'I once thought this this way, now I think this way..."

Obviously, Schwarzenegger is being disingenuous. First he stated that a Presidential candidate must make a calculated shift and move to the center - after he's won his party's nomination - "because that's what they have to do" in order to win the election - which incidentally, is a preposterous statement, in and of itself.

But then he says "flip-flopping is a getting a bad rap, because ...when someone has made a mistake.. and says,'I change my mind'.... as long as he's honest...that's a wonderful thing.."

Now, making a mistake and admitting to it is not the same thing as intentionally shifting your position after the the primaries are over.

Schwarzenegger is clearly waffling! But if you watch the entire interview [you can watch it by clicking here] and listen closely to him as he discusses, among other things, his position on withdrawing US troops from Iraq, you'll see this guy is very similar to Obama in the way he waffles and straddles both sides of the issues.

In case you're wondering: why did Mr. Schwarzenegger go to so much trouble to defend Barack Obama's flip-flops?

Well, here's the deal: Schwarzenegger, who previously had endorsed John McCain and called him a Republican role model, has suggested that he would be willing to serve as an energy and environment czar under Senator Barack Obama should he win the presidency.

So now you have the answer.

And quite frankly, considering Schwarzenegger's proclivity for 'waffling', he seems perfectly qualified to work for Obama.

Obama: "If You'd Listen to My Flip-Flops, You'd Realize I'm Not Flip-Flopping!"

This past Tuesday Barack Obama said that anyone who claims he's flip-flopping on the issues is simply not listening to him.

The following day he voted in favor of the new FISA bill. Apparently, he was always in favor of it, we just weren't listening to him.

In a statement issued on his website last week, Obama explained his reason for supporting the new FISA bill:

"The ability to monitor and track individuals who want to attack the United States is a vital counter-terrorism tool, and I'm persuaded that it is necessary to keep the American people safe."

However, Rush Limbaugh on his radio program Thursday remarked:

Here is a man, a member of a party which has for the last year or longer done everything it can to weaken America's defenses and ability to be forewarned via surveillance of the next terrorist attack. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, the Democrat Party, have tried to undermine the FISA court, they've tried to undermine the FISA bill...

Now, if it's important for Obama to size up the need to prevent another terrorist attack with an election coming, why was it irrelevant to protect the country from a terrorist attack a year ago when the election was not right around the corner?

A year ago Obama can rail against FISA, rail and get all his left-wing troops all railed up about the fact that Bush is spying on them, intercepting their phone calls, reading their computer e-mails, violating everybody's civil rights, now all of a sudden when there's an election out there, it's okay because we gotta stop terrorism?

"Mega Dittos!"

Thomas Sowell: "Back in the days of “The Lone Ranger” program, someone would ask, “Who is that masked man?” People need to start asking that question about Obama."

The Audacity of Brandenburg

From the AFP:

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has slammed a request by Barack Obama to give a speech this month before the Brandenburg Gate as inappropriate, her deputy spokesman said Wednesday.

The conservative leader said that while she would be pleased to meet the US Democratic presidential hopeful, it would be wrong for him to hold a "campaign rally" at the historic symbol of German unity.

"It is unusual to do electioneering abroad," spokesman Thomas Steg told reporters.

"It is unusual to hold election rallies abroad. No German candidate for high office would even think of using the National Mall (in Washington) or Red Square in Moscow for a rally because it would not be seen as appropriate."

That Obama would even think of delivering a political campaign speech abroad, using the Brandenburg Gate as a backdrop, [and mimicking an official head of state] envinces an arrogance and audaciousness never seen before in a Presidential candidate.

This man never ceases to amaze me! Nothing is off limits to him!

Jeff Chidester comments:

Obama only needs to show up in Europe to receive an enthusiastic reception. Socialists can smell a fellow Socialist from across the ocean. In the crowd will be the usual Leftists holding their signs referring to President Bush as “Hitler,” and Obama will stand there smiling. Obama will explain how America under George Bush has failed the Europeans, and that when he is elected, Europeans will be equal partners with America.

Sigh....

Parlez-vous Francais?

McCain Decides To Play the "Race" Card

Apparently, Barack Obama is not only "the Messiah", he's a veritable prophet too. At a recent fundraiser he predicted that Republicans would inject race into the general election! He was right on the money!

On Tuesday, Nascar "Race" Champion, Jimmy Johnson endorsed Republican Sen. John McCain for president - a clear indication that Republicans are already playing the "race" card against Obama.

Warning: "Do Not Try To Reason With Them!"

Related post

For the First Time In My Adult Life I am No Longer Proud of My Country!

Dear readers,

After seeing the latest polls showing Barack Obama ahead of John McCain in the Presidential race, I must make the following confession to you:

'For the first time in my adult life I am no longer proud of my country'.

Sadly, our country - once full of hope and optimism - is now a country filled with morosity, despair, and resignation.

A nation, once brimming with confidence and sanguinity, armed with the belief that it could overcome tyranny and despotism, has now fallen prey to a presidential candidate who says the US is incapable of defeating its enemies.

"Winning is not an option!" he boldly proclaims. "We have no choice but to negotiate with our enemies and to give in to their blood-thirsty demands!"

This is an individual who purports to be the "embodiment of hope" and the "candidate of change", yet, at a time when our troops are finally winning in Iraq, he insists that 'retreat is our only option'.

Pray tell, is this the "hope" and "change" he constantly banters about?

Is this the "hope" and "change" many of us seem so eager to embrace?

Can we really be so forlorn as to elect a President who is the very essence of hopelessness and despair?

Have we lost faith in ourselves and in our ability to "bring about real change" by defeating our enemies and making the world a safer place to live in?

What's more, can we really be so ruthless as to elect a president who has consistently opposed the Born-alive Infants Protection Act?

"Yes, we can!", apparently.

And it is for this very reason that I sadly concede to you today that, "for the first time in my adult life I am no longer proud of my country."

I know Michelle Obama does not agree with this sentiment. She seems to be very proud of her country nowadays. But how can I possibly be proud of a country that's about to elect the quintessential pessimist as its commander in chief?

Obama Commits Double Flip-Flop on FISA

Just four days after Barack Obama announced his decision to support the new FISA reform bill, he reversed himself and told Code Pink member Jodie Evans that he would "vote against the bill".

Evans, who met up with Senator Obama at a Hollywood fundraiser on June 24th, told Obama: "We're worried because you aren't standing up against the FISA bill and for our rights not to be illegally spied on."

"I am going to vote against that bill," Obama replied.

Obama announced his support for the FISA bill only four days earlier, on June 20th.

Nevertheless, when the bill comes up for a vote in the senate next week Obama will have to vote one way or another and he will not be able to flip-flop any longer. If he decides to vote against the bill he'll have a difficult time continuing his latest ploy of portraying himself as a centrist [bear in mind, this is a man who's been dubbed 'The Most Liberal Senator In 2007'] . But, if he does vote in favor of the bill, it will only raise the ire of Code Pink, a group that tends to get nasty with politicians who betray them.

Of course, there is one more option for Obama: He could revert to an old tactic of his and just not show up for the vote.