This winter, article after article talked about the huge audiences Barack Obama was drawing. Experienced pundits like Fred Barnes were saying that Barack OBama was likely to be the 44th President of the United States. What nobody was paying attention to, though, was Sean Hannity talking about Jeremiah Wright or William Ayers.

Three months after Super Tuesday, and two months after the YouTube videos showed up of Jeremiah Wright screaming about the USKKK of A and talking about the United States government creating the AIDS virus just to commit genocide against the black population, Barack Obama isn’t seen as the candidate of inevitability anymore. This article essentially says that Barack Obama has ‘come back to the pack’. ALOT.

Sen. Barack Obama’s aura of inevitability in the battle for the Democratic presidential nomination has diminished in the wake of his loss in the Pennsylvania primary and the furor over his former pastor, said the latest New York Times/CBS News Poll.

The poll was conducted largely before Obama’s news conference Tuesday denouncing his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, and may not fully capture the impact of the controversy or the response. But it found that Obama, whose delegate lead has given him a commanding position over Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton since February, is now perceived to be in a much tighter fight.

Upheaval has taken a toll (continue reading post »)

If I were running Sen. Obama’s campaign, I’d be running for the door after Tuesday’s presser on Jeremiah Wright. (On a sidenote, I can’t call Wright Pastor or Reverend anymore because the beliefs he’s espousing aren’t part of any Christian theology.) Sen. Obama’s opening statement is so filled with laughable statements that it requires its own post. The opening paragraph is questionable at best:

Before I start taking questions I want to open it up with a couple of comments about what we saw and heard yesterday. I have spent my entire adult life trying to bridge the gap between different kinds of people. That’s in my DNA, trying to promote mutual understanding to insist that we all share common hopes and common dreams as Americans and as human beings. That’s who I am. That’s what I believe. That’s what this campaign has been about.

Considering the fact that Sen. Obama’s wife has talked in extremely divisive tones and considering the fact that Sen. Obama chose to attend a church with an extremist divisive pastor, I’m not convinced that it’s in Sen. Obama’s DNA to “bridge the gap between different kinds of people.” The best I can do is say he hasn’t proven that yet.

Granted, he talks a good game but that’s meaningless. The main thing that I pay attention to are his actions. He wasn’t part of the Gang of 14. He didn’t contribute to the Grand Bargain. He certainly didn’t seek middle ground on troop withdrawal. After weighing those things against his claims, I’m left wondering where the proof is of his being a uniter. At this point, I can’t even prove that he made an effort on the important issues of the day. (continue reading post »)

Wow!!! Greta van Susteren just posted something on the Pastor J-Wright-Obama controversy. To say that it was a blistering attack on Sen. Obama’s observational skills is understatement. First, here’s what the AP is reporting on Sen. Obama’s statement:

Democrat Barack Obama says he was outraged by the comments of his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, and saddened by the spectacle of his appearance on Monday. Wright said Monday that criticism surrounding his fiery sermons is an attack on the black church.

Obama told reporters Tuesday that Wright’s comments do not accurately portray the perspective of the black church. Obama said, “I am outraged by the comments that were made and saddened by the spectacle that we saw yesterday.”

Wright’s incendiary comments have dogged Obama’s presidential campaign.

Let’s give Greta credit for asking the most pertinent questions in this paragraph:

Reverend Wright is not the man he thought he was…..so naturally people will ask: what took you so long to figure it out? 20 years and only yesterday? are you that oblivious or is this statement political and calculating? and others will applaud him…saying what courage to address the issue…that he is standing up for what he believes even if it means denouncing someone you had admired..and that he is showing candor…

(continue reading post »)

God bless Jeremiah Wright!

For all his faults, he was the only man in America who could have arrested the presidential hopes of the smooth-talking Marxist from Hawaii. Wright’s God-given gift to do and say exactly the wrong thing at the right time transcends all human understanding, making Hillary and her husband look almost normal.

Like a cat burglar’s yappy Pomeranian, Wright doesn’t know when to shut up. Padding through a sleeping household at 3 AM, Obama’s free-spirited ankle-biter isn’t afraid to bark at the family mastiff, or his Bible-clinging-gun-toting owner.

Who could blame them?

While the Harvard-lawyer studied Wright’s genius of convincing Chicago’s poorest and most vulnerable families to drop their welfare and beer money in his offertory plate, Obama gave Wright the political legitimacy that his moral incompetence regularly subtracted. Wright baptized Obama with the black authenticity that his white mother and Harvard could not give him. Together, Trinity became the blackface Obama needed for his political minstrel show.

To the Democrat Party, Wright and Obama were invaluable in their control of Southside Chicago’s black voters. Like the Islamic theologians who blame Jews for the miseries of their primivitized flock, Trinity and similar pseudo-Christian scams that target vulnerable blacks throughout America have replaced the impolite tactics once used to control them by using Islam’s more nuanced forms of indoctrination. Instead of terrorizing “wayward Negroes” with white hoods and flaming crosses, Democrats now empower talented herdsmen like Wright to corral, feed, and provoke their livestock into blaming Republicans for the Democrat Party’s historical and political sins – and, of course, voting for more Democrats.

The problem with this minstrel show is that Wright doesn’t know how or when to shut up. Except for America’s loneliest moonbats, most Americans would be too embarrassed to spread lies about HIV and 9/11 – especially after being publicly pantsed by the facts. But after decades of audacity that comes from the corruption of ignorance, white guilt, affirmative action, and moral relativism, Wright has returned for more, while Obama tries to figure out a polite way to stop the yapping Pomeranian from humping his political legs.

While Wright insists that his marginalization is an attack on the black church, it’s hard to find real Christians who are willing to back his claims with more noise than a December cricket. Christian churches are not black or white, and any defense of Wright will likely come from Hamas, Jimmy Carter, or secularists who loathe real Judeo-Christian values.

The blowback Wright now sees isn’t an attack on the “Black Church,” but rather the convulsed nausea from mainstream Americans, black and white, who recognize Wright’s scam for what it is. Whether he knows it or not, Jeremiah Wright has saved America from his own dispiriting progeny.

The Lord works in mysterious ways – God Bless Jeremiah Wright!

George Will has penned another masterpiece, this time asking Sen. Obama a set of rather difficult questions, questions that actually require intellectual heft. Here’s the easiest question in the bunch:

You say, “The insurance companies, the drug companies, they’re not going to give up their profits easily when it comes to health care.” Why should they? Who will profit from making those industries unprofitable? When pharmaceutical companies have given up their profits, who will fund pharmaceutical innovations, without which there will be much preventable suffering and death? What other industries should “give up their profits”?

Sen. Obama can’t answer that question because it requires a capitalist answer, something that’d infuriate Sen. Obama’s ardent socialist supporters. This is the only time it’s difficult being a liberal. It’s easy being a liberal if you’re never asked thoughtful questions. It’s immensely difficult when they’re asked why questions. Liberals are used to giving answers to ‘what’ type questions. It’s difficult for liberals to answer ‘why’ questions because that requires logic.

If I’ve learned anything about politicking, it’s that most liberals can’t handle answering why questions because they’re so used to not having to defend their principles and policies. Altogether too often, liberals are asked a what question, which often gets accepted without further questioning. (continue reading post »)

Anyone that thinks that Sen. Obama has North Carolina wrapped up better rethink their thinking because of this news:

Gov. Mike Easley will endorse Hillary Rodham Clinton for president, The Associated Press has learned.

Easley was expected to announce the endorsement Tuesday morning in Raleigh, the state capital, one week before North Carolina’s primary on May 6, according to persons close to the governor and to Clinton. The individuals spoke on condition of anonymity because a formal announcement had not yet been made.

Easley is a Democratic superdelegate who has served two terms as governor. His decision comes despite several recent polls showing Clinton trailing rival Barack Obama ahead of the state’s May 6 primary.

The endorsement is a major boost for the former first lady. Besides being a respected figure among Democrats in the state, Easley is one of the all-important superdelegates likely to choose the party’s presidential nominee.

I didn’t buy into the punditry’s thinking that North Carolina would be a big Obama blowout. Beasley’s endorsement of Sen. Clinton a week before the primary is a momentum-changing event. Sen. Obama still might well win North Arolina but I’m betting that it won’t be a blowout. (continue reading post »)

The last thing Howard Dean wanted to do on yesterday’s Meet the Press was defend the process in the Democrats’ presidential nominating process. That’s what he was forced to do, though, thanks to this quote from Ed Rendell:

GOV. ED RENDELL (D-PA): The popular vote is, to me, a much fairer indicia than the pledged delegates because the pledged delegates are elected in a very undemocratic way.

Here’s Dean’s reply to Russert’s question:

MR. RUSSERT: Do you agree with that?

DR. DEAN: Well, no, I don’t. First of all, I don’t agree with it. And secondly, look, we have a set of rules. My job here is not to side with one candidate or the other and talk about pledged delegates or superdelegates or any of that stuff. My job is to take the rules that everybody started with and enforce the rules without fear or favor of any candidate. The–somebody’s going to lose this with 49 percent of the delegates in Denver, and that person has to believe that they were treated fairly if–otherwise, we can’t win. Look, John McCain is a weak candidate. He’s wrong on Iraq, as far as the American people are concerned. We don’t want to stay there for a hundred years. He’s wrong on the economy; it wasn’t the mortgage holders that, that, whose fault this was. He’s wrong on healthcare. We should have health insurance for all our kids. He is not a strong candidate.

The only thing that’s going to beat us is if we’re not unified. And my, in order to be unified, both the losing candidate and the winning candidate have to feel like the system was fair. So Senator Rendell may say–I mean, Governor Rendell may not like the rules, but the rules are what we started with. Most of them have been in place for the last 25 years. That’s what we’ve got to go by, whether you like the rules or you don’t like the rules.

Dean’s got a point that both sides knew the rules going in. That said, Gov. Rendell is justified because he’s saying that it goes against the Democrats’ own principles. How can Dean’s Democrats justify Hillary winning Texas by a healthy margin but Obama getting more delegates than Hillary? How can they call that proportional apportionment? That’s what Al Gore called fuzzy math throughout the 2000 campaign. (continue reading post »)

This morning, the Supreme Court ruled that Inidana can require voters show a government-issued photo ID. Here’s what they’re saying:

In one of the most closely watched cases of the term, the US Supreme Court has upheld Indiana’s requirement that voters show government-issued photo IDs at the polls. At least 17 other states were awaiting this decision before going ahead with similar laws of their own.

The vote was 6-3, with Justice John Paul Stevens joining the mostly conservative majority.

Democrats had attacked the law, saying it created a burden for poor, minority, and handicapped voters, who would have a harder time getting government-issued IDs. They accused Indiana officials of passing the law to suppress the minority vote.

Here’s what USA Today’s Joan Biskupic wrote about the ruling: (continue reading post »)

I received an e-mail from Howard Dean concerning John McCain’s now infamous “100 years” statement. The e-mail reads:

John McCain wants to stay in Iraq for 100 years. He’s said it, and it’s on tape.

But his campaign hates that he was caught. They’ve viciously attacked anyone who reminded the American people that he said it, including me. They’ve said that those who reference the 100 years comments are “deliberately misleading voters.”

So we’ve taken John McCain’s own words — video of him saying that 100 years would be “fine with me” — and made a TV ad. There’s no confusion, no distortion, no misleading – it’s John McCain, on tape, for voters to judge on their own./

So, what does the ad show? a small fraction of the entire quote:

QUESTION FROM AUDIENCE: President Bush has talked about our staying in Iraq for 50 years..

McCAIN: Maybe a hundred….That’d be fine with me.

The audio is then followed by a shot of two soldiers being blown up. Just for fun, lets look at the full quote:

McCain: Maybe a hundred. Make it one hundred. We’ve been in South Korea, we’ve been in Japan for sixty years. We’ve been in South Korea for fifty years or so. That’d be fine with me as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed. Then it’s fine with me. I would hope it would be fine with you if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where Al Qaeda is training, recruiting, equipping and motivating people every single day.

So, Mr. Dean. Let me get this straight. Taking of 8 words out of an 88 word response, splicing them together, while dropping the remainder of the sentence, and tacking on video of a soldier being injured (which was addressed in the original answer) isn’t misleading? Okay, lets try the shoe on the other foot.

Original quote from Obama’s “monumental” speech on race:

I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.

This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.

I am the son of a black man….Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans“.

Okay, now lets see what our non-misleading spliced, out of reference quote looks like next to some clearly appropriate pictures:

Barack Obama’s interview with Chris Wallace wasn’t a particularly convincing performance. Here’s a particularly noteworthy Wallace-Obama exchange:

WALLACE: Let’s take a look at the numbers. Among white union households, Clinton beat you 72 percent to 28 percent. Among white Catholics, again, same margin, 72 percent to 28 percent. Senator, why are you having such trouble convincing white working class voters that you’re their guy?

OBAMA: Well, keep in mind that Senator Clinton was well regarded in the state of Pennsylvania, just as she was well regarded in the state of Ohio. The fact that they voted for her shouldn’t come as a huge surprise. We started out 20 points down in that race, just like we started 20 points down in Ohio. And we actually made significant progress there.

And when you look at the polling that’s now being done post- Pennsylvania, about how we match up in a general election, I think Senator Clinton maybe does a couple of points better than I do, but it’s not substantial.

Most of the voters will vote for me. But you know, they are more familiar with her. She’s from a bordering state. On the other hand, in Wisconsin, I won those same voters over Senator Clinton. In Virginia, I won those voters over Senator Clinton. In Iowa, I won the voters over Senator Clinton.

So I think that, you know, I am confident that when you come to a general election, and we are having a debate about the future of this country, how are we going to lower gas prices, how are we going to deal with job losses, how are we going to focus on energy independence, that those are voters who I will be able to appeal to.

Good luck selling that after being tied to Jeremiah Wright’s racism, William Ayers’ terrorism and Tony Rezko’s corruption. (continue reading post »)