Say Anything Blog

WASHINGTON (AP)—Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama acknowledged Sunday that he was probably too flip when he said it was “above my pay grade” to answer a question about when is a baby entitled to human rights.

Obama gave his answer last month at a nationally televised religious forum sponsored by minister Rick Warren at his megachurch in Orange County, Calif.

Asked on Sunday whether the “above my pay grade” answer was too flip, Obama said: “Probably. ...What I intended to say is that, as a Christian, I have a lot of humility about understanding when does the soul enter into ... It’s a pretty tough question [Well, only if you don’t read the Bible].

“And so, all I meant to communicate was that I don’t presume to be able to answer these kinds of theological questions,” he said in an interview broadcast Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” [Obamaspinmeister: It was not a theological question, it was asked and answered by SCOTUS and every politician should have a position as it impacts abortion.]

In a separate interview, the answer to a similar question came easier for Obama’s running mate, Sen. Joe Biden.

A Roman Catholic, Biden said he accepts his church’s teachings that life begins at conception, but that the issue is personal for him. He said it wouldn’t be right to impose his views on others who are just as religious as he is. [But he imposes his views on others by supporting choice and opposing Life. He is a backer of abortion (State sponsored murder of the innocent) on demand)

“I’m prepared as a matter of faith to accept that life begins at the moment of conception. But that is my judgment,” Biden said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “For me to impose that judgment on everyone else who is equally and maybe even more devout than I am seems to me is inappropriate in a pluralistic society.”

The Democrat Party: All spin all the time! We spin everything at supersonic speed until it is impossible to know what we believe about anything.

At least Biden had the guts to say he believed life begins at conception, even though he acts against that alleged belief everyday. Obama still totally avoided taking a stand of any kind, he makes Billy Jeff proud!

The companies, which together own or guarantee about $5 trillion in home loans, about half the nation’s total, have lost $14 billion in the last year and are likely to pile up billions more in losses until the housing market begins to recover.

An ABC News spokeswoman said the network had no comment.

This is from a WWI war poster.  So when Sarah Palin talks about a pit bull, she’s much better looking than the pit bull on this poster. Only tougher. 

Find it here

The media and the Obama campaign (but I repeat myself) are comparing the “experience” of’the Democrats’ presidential nominee to that of the GOP’s vice-presidential pick—meaning, one must assume, that the debate over his experience vs. John McCain’s is over, in McCain’s resounding favor.

Let’s look back a couple of months at a post I put up on July 14 (with minor revisions) that gives a, uh, concrete example of one of Barack Obama’s management “experiences”—one that the national media has (of course) totally ignored.

______________________________________________________

Barack Obama’s $100,000 Gazebo

Here’s an interesting story I found in the Chicago Tribune archives (obtained from ProQuest library database; for fair use and discussion purposes):

ENGLEWOOD IS EYED FOR BOTANICAL GARDEN

Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Ill.: Jan 15, 2000. pg. 5

A group of politicians, school administrators and community activists unveiled a plan Friday for a $1.1 million botanical garden in the city’s Englewood neighborhood.

The proposal calls for a walk beneath the “L” tracks on Princeton Avenue, from 59th Place to 62nd Place. Backers said they hope it will help spur redevelopment in the impoverished area, boost neighborhood pride and soften the impact of traffic and pollution from the nearby Dan Ryan Expressway.

State Sen. Barack Obama (D-Chicago) said he planned to seek state funding for the effort and estimated that ground could be broken in early 2001.

The proposed garden also would include a gazebo, a parrot sanctuary and a walk of fame.

Gee, that sounds exciting. Let’s go visit:

[...]

Imagine that. No garden. No parrot sanctuary. No walk of fame.

How can that be? What happened? The Chicago Sun-Times tells us the answer, while revealing that “at least” there’s a gazebo—but not much of one (video is at link; HT Jennifer Rubin via the TIB All-Stars July 12 collection at Weapons of Mass Discussion):

Obama’s $100,000 garden grant wasted

He vowed to ‘work tirelessly’ to build an oasis for Englewood. It never happened.

July 11, 2008

As a state senator, Barack Obama gave $100,000 in state money to a campaign volunteer who failed to deliver on a plan to create a botanic garden in one of Chicago’s most blighted neighborhoods.

..... what was supposed to be a six-block stretch of trees and paths is now a field of unfulfilled dreams, strewn with weeds, garbage and broken pavement.

Kenny B. Smith, whose nonprofit group got the money, said it was spent legitimately, mostly on underground site preparation. But he admitted Thursday that the garden is a lost cause because other government money never came through.

..... Smith—an early Obama supporter who gave $550 to his state and congressional campaigns—said he gave his paperwork documenting the work to a state agency and no longer has it.

..... a reporter walked the site last week with a landscape architect from the Illinois Green Industry Association who found no evidence of the work Smith cited. The only major changes since 2000: A gazebo was added, and some trees were cut down.

Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, said through a spokesman he wasn’t responsible for monitoring the work; the staffs of Gov. Blagojevich and former Gov. George Ryan were.

..... In 2001, at Obama’s direction, a $100,000 Illinois FIRST grant went to Smith’s group. The garden site was part of Rosewood Estates, an affordable-housing development being built by the group, whose unpaid board chairman was Brian Washington, a Sun-Times security guard.

Plans called for more than 50 homes, but only a dozen were built, Smith said.

The remaining $1 million for the botanic garden was never raised.

Those legendary $400 hammers for the military have nothing on this $100,000 gazebo.

A trifling matter? I don’t think so. More like a revealing one:

* Obama feels no sense of responsibility for the results of money directed to someone HE chose. This isn’t “the buck stops here” of Harry Truman fame; this is “the buck went somewhere else.”

[...]

The larger point is this: The guy is hopelessly gullible, can’t even get a $100,000 grant right, and now wants to have the final say in matters relating to a $3-plus trillion federal budget and a $14-trillion economy in a town chock full of con artists and tricksters.

Yikes.

It would be cool if some enterprising photo-opster could make up a “Barack Obama $100,000 Gazebo” sign (or something more clever—use your imagination), take some pictures at the site, and post them. Until that happens, this will have to do:

Obama should never get anywhere near the controls of the US economy.  He’s either totally incompetent, or he’s a thief.

Res ipsa loquitur.

THE ONE and his moonies were very sure they’d have a double-digit lead at this point.

oh dear...Dr. Phil is gonna have lots of work to do

(more...)

How long will it take before folks realize that there is a lot of truth to the age-old saying that violence begets violence? With it now obvious that there was U.S. complicity in the war in Georgia, it does not take a genius to realize that this mess could get real ugly.

With Russia angry over U.S. efforts to expand Nato eastwards, they now are thinking of a few responses, one of which is increasing nuclear assistance to Iran.

Said a western diplomat: “After the war in Georgia it’s difficult to imagine relations between Russia and America getting worse, Russia giving greater nuclear assistance to the Iranians would do the trick– that’s for sure.”

How many days before Bush/Cheney are gone? Do we really want more of McCsame?

Joke- A group of college Republicans at the RNC had a contest drinking shots of whiskey. “let’s all take a shot everytime one of the speakers mentions Bush’s or Cheney’s name, said one.” At the end of the night they all left the convention completely sober. Ha!!!!!

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article4692237.ece

By Bruce Walker

Sin is an unpopular topic. In Hollywood today, unmarried pretty faces procreate and then splash baby pictures on the front of every women’s magazine in America.  No one dares question if the parents of this child have sinned, but, of course, they have.  Indeed, they have sinned in several ways.  They have conceived a child out of wedlock, which is a sin.  They have also provided an example for millions of young women who lack the money to hire nannies and who imagine that their idols would not lead them into miserable lives.  These unwed mothers, their children, and the unwed fathers too have rejected not just the rules of God, which—amazingly!—do not just deliver us from evil but also make our lives happier, healthier, and more successful.

Psychologists and other social experts take the sting out of sin.  If sexually aroused young people make a child, this inconvenient debris can always be snuffed.  If the pregnant mother chooses to have her baby, a host of government programs, from WIC to child support enforcement, will insure that the biological sperm donor is relegated to irrelevance in the life of the child.  The idea that both parents have done something fundamentally wrong is as absent as the idea that people still sin.  Even the word “sin” makes many of us uneasy.  Who are we to say what is right and wrong?  “We” are, indeed, nothing.  Sin is a principle of God, not men.

But put faith aside for a moment.  Take God out of the picture.  What are the consequences of a child growing up with only one parent, a mother, who is dependent upon government largess and coercive child support programs to survive?  Poverty, for one thing, is much more likely in this fatherless home.  The child is more likely to grow up contemptuous of work and of school.  He is more likely to be crippled by drugs, alcohol, depression, and delinquency.  Rather than taking care of society, as we have expected new generations to do, this child is much more likely to need society to take care of him.

[...]

A society that condemns sin and urges people to reject sin produces just that sort of people.  Couples marry before they have children; they raise children in a two family home; they work, stay sober, care for family members and members of their church or synagogue, draw happiness and confidence from religious faith, plan ahead, study (how quickly we forget, in our infatuation with public education, that the idea of literacy was uniquely religious in origin - Jewish boys and Scottish girls and boys were the first children compelled to become literate, and the reasons had entirely to do with religious injunctions.  Sins of omission and sins of commission bring us into a society which must be supported by props of massive social programs, huge public relations campaigns, and an enormous amount of our energy.  And all this does not work.  Pseudo-morality simply makes us feel better for awhile.  When people begin to believe that sin is a myth, then they lose all immunity to the soul disease which will slowly kill them.

Because our Leftist overlords of education and culture have scolded us for thinking sin is real, we become ashamed of wanting to minimize sin in our society.  What Bill Clinton did, for example, was despicable, but what was the response from the bosses of establishment punditry?  “Everyone lies...” was bad enough, but they had to push the envelope against any idea of sin “...and often lying is therapeutic.” Lying to Nazis about D-Day may be good, but making mendacity chic unleashes the monsters of our lusts.  And even for people who are not particularly religious, the economic costs of pandemic dishonesty are almost incalculable.

[...]

What would happen if we all believed that stealing and that lying were sins and if we then behaved as if those sins would be punished by G-d?  Remove the danger of massive theft and lying from our economy, and we can dispense with a whole host of baggage that drags down the usefulness of cyberspace.  How much software is intended just to protect us from viruses, identity theft, and related moral crimes?  How much do corporations waste on this?  The wages of sin are very expensive to us.

What would happen if poor people rejected the sin of envy, which is the seed of socialism, and did not rage against those who had more then them?  God forbids this rage, but it is nursed and treated as if it was not a sin but a virtue.  What would happen if, along with the people rejecting envy, the wealthy rejected the sin of miserliness and embraced serious charity?  God insists that we help those with less, but when men doubt sin is real then that divine order loses power.  If we listened seriously to God - all of us - then the “problem” of inequality of wealth would go away as much as it can in a world of mortal men.  We would not have Heaven - we cannot have Heaven here - but we would have a much better world.  The economy would boom because the help that the rich gave the poor would be targeted and intended to really end poverty (the fewer the poor, the more the religious rich can keep - an angle the atheist Marx never quite got.)

[...]

Yet the cool, practical, financial argument against sin is so overwhelming, the number crunching of any serious cost-benefit analysis of the trillions lost through our acceptance of sin is so convincing, that hopeful people can dream that a wise leader will champion the fight against sin as the clearest way to make us wealthier and happier people.  That assumes, of course, that our leaders have guts.  It assumes as well that big chunks of influential powerbrokers among the establishment do not have a private and profound interest in the rest of us seeing sin as harmless.

Many people, me included, worry about our loss of freedoms.  We fret about the size of government.  We look at the Leftist establishment and wonder how we can survive.  Somewhere in our maze of doubts and fears, we have forgotten that sin is not a joke of God.  Sin is not some topic for religious fanatics or end-of-the-world kooks.  We cannot make sin into goodness any more than we can make life immortal or otherwise make our mortal selves into little gods and goddesses.  Whatever paper rights we have, whatever institutions of liberty we enshrined, all will wilt and spoil unless we, the people, believe in sin and fight it in our lives.  Our leaders can do nothing unless they, too, begin with the First Principle of social living:  sin is real and sin is wrong.

Human liberty is constructed around the ancient ideas of Christians and of Jews.  These ideas embraced many things, but central in our living together as people and being successful is seeing sin as slavery and grasping that fighting sin is the beginning of freedom.  This freedom, we all know, makes us prosperous, but this freedom itself cannot survive unless we see well the problem of sin.  Just as freedom is a delightful spin-off of fighting sin, prosperity is a delightful spin-off of freedom as well as righteous living.  All of our problems today - especially and emphatically, our economic problems - are simply problems of sin.  If we want to fight poverty and create affluence, begin by making common cause to attack those things which we know, in our hearts, are sinful.  Corny and old-fashioned?  Truth almost always is.

Read the whole thing.

I awoke today to an envelope from a friend containing the affidavit of Omar Ahmed Khadr.

Omar was brought to Afghanistan at the age of 10 when he met Osama bin Laden. He was captured during a firefight at the age of 15, severely wounded. Subsequently, he was tortured extensively and offered blatantly false statements under extreme coercion. His chief interrogator‘s unit was known by the military to have killed two men with their interrogation techniques, both ruled homicides by the military. After his capture...

[Omar] had been denied forms of surgery to punish him for not cooperating with military forces. Later attempts to acquire darkened sunglasses to protect his failing eyesight were denied for “state security” reasons.

In Bagram...

[Omar] was refused pain medication for his wounds, that he had his hands tied above a door frame for hours, had cold water thrown on him, had a bag placed over his head and was threatened with military dogs, was flatulated upon, forced to carry 5-gallon pails of water to aggravate his shoulder wound. Unallowed to use washrooms, he was forced to urinate on himself.

In Guantanamo...

[Omar] was told “Your life is in my hands” by a military interrogator, who spat on him, tore out some of his hair and threatened to send him to a country that would torture him more thoroughly, making specific reference to an Egyptian Askri raqm tisa ("Soldier Number Nine") who enjoyed raping prisoners. The interrogation ended with Khadr being told he would spend the rest of his life in Guantanamo. A few weeks later, an interrogator giving his name as Izmarai spoke to Khadr in Pashto, threatening to send him to a “new prison” at Bagram Airbase where “they like small boys”.

In all, Khadr has been reported to have been kept in solitary confinement for long periods of time; to have been denied adequate medical treatment; to have been subjected to short shackling, and left bound, in uncomfortable stress positions until he soiled himself. ...his interrogators “dragged [him] back and forth in a mixture of his urine and pine oil” and did not provide a change of clothes for two days in March.

Omar’s case was dismissed in late June because the illegal tribunal trying him decided they lacked jurisdiction. In early July, the government appealed.

I wonder if McCain/Palin will continue the US’s kiddie torture and trying child soldiers in illegal tribunals?

Does anyone actually think that useful or accurate information can be obtained in these extremely coercive situations?

Rolling Stone has a long article here. "The Unending Torture of Omar Khadr"

Sarah Palin Emerges As New Ronald Reagan
By: Michael Reagan

I’ve been trying to convince my fellow conservatives that they have been wasting their time in a fruitless quest for a new Ronald Reagan to emerge and lead our party and our nation. I insisted that we’d never see his like again because he was one of a kind.

I was wrong!

Wednesday night I watched the Republican National Convention on television and there, before my very eyes, I saw my dad reborn; only this time he’s a she.

And what a she!

In one blockbuster of a speech, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin resurrected my dad’s indomitable spirit and sent it soaring above the convention center, shooting shock waves through the cynical media’s assigned spaces and electrifying the huge audience with the kind of inspiring rhetoric we haven’t heard since my dad left the scene.

In a few words she managed to rip the mask from the faces of her Democratic rivals and reveal them for what they are — a pair of old-fashioned liberals making promises that cannot be kept without bankrupting the nation and reducing most Americans to the status of mendicants begging for their daily bread at the feet of an all-powerful government.

Most important, by comparing her own stunning record of achievement with his, she exposed Barack Obama for the sham that he is, a man without any solid accomplishments beyond conspicuous self-aggrandizement.

As hard as you might try, you won’t find that kind of plain-spoken, down-to-earth, self-reliant American in the upper ranks of the liberal-infested, elitist Democratic Party, or in the Obama campaign.

Sarah Palin didn’t go to Harvard, or fiddle around in urban neighborhood leftist activism while engaging in opportunism within the ranks of one of the nation’s most corrupt political machines, never challenging it and going along to get along, like Barack Obama.

Instead she took on the corrupt establishment in Alaska and beat it, rising to the governorship while bringing reforms to every level of government she served in on her way up the ladder.

Sarah Palin emerges as the new Ronald Reagan

I usually don’t pass on these email stories but then I usually don’t get one with name, address, phone, fax and website attached. (more...)

Most voters and Catholics oppose a president who doesn’t know when life begins and would reject legal recognition of same-sex marriage, according to a new poll.

Recently, Barack Obama was asked when he thought life begins, in reference to the issue of abortion. Obama responded by saying that decision was above his pay grade. Knowing that the next president may be able to appoint two or three U.S. Supreme Court Justices, who may be called to make rulings on the issue of abortion, do you support or oppose a president who does not know when life begins?

O’Leary, the former NBC Westwood One talk show host who has authored 11 books and penned political columns for USA Weekend that drew 90 million readers, looked at the potential consequences of an Obama administration and reached the following conclusions:

* Obama will be a radical on the abortion issue as signaled by his blocking of emergency medical aid for babies who survive abortion;

* Obama will attempt to ban the use of firearms for defense by law-abiding citizens;

* Obama will raise tax rates up to 60 percent;

* Obama will push for health care reforms that will let government determine which procedures and operations senior citizens are allowed to have;

* Obama will “transform the U.S. Treasury into the United Nations’ ATM”;

* Obama will choke off America’s domestic energy resources, sending gas, electricity and food prices through the roof;

* Obama will raise the percentage of Americans who pay no taxes at all, from 30 percent to 40 percent – at the expense of those who do;

* Obama will transfer child-rearing responsibility and authority from parents to the federal government with his “0 to 5” program.

In one chapter of “The Audacity of Deceit” called “The Barack Obama Test,” O’Leary gathers results from America’s top pollsters, including Zogby, Rasmussen, Gallup and CNN, demonstrating how Obama’s positions on a broad array of issues are in stark contrast to the values held by the vast majority of Americans.

People can see the contrast for themselves at The Obama Test, The Barack Hussein Obama Test where visitors can take a 39-question survey to see how closely their values line up with Obama’s professed positions.

The tax-funded Chicago organization cited as a probable model for programs to integrate youth into the social and political world under an Obama tenure in the White House is the epitome of “Big Brother” that shovels impressionable youth through a course of brainwashing, according to critics. The organization is called Public Allies.

“Big Brother had nothing on the Obamas,” said Investor’s Business Daily (IBD). “They plan to herd American youth into government-funded re-education camps where they’ll be brainwashed into thinking America is a racist, oppressive place in need of ‘social change.’”

The organization itself doesn’t seem that alarming. It describes itself as serving communities “while developing better leaders for tomorrow.” Young adults are placed in “community leadership” posts with various agencies and given weekly “training.” They get $1,800 plus health and child care.

But IBD warns the real mission is something else.

That, the editorial said, “is to radicalize American youth and use them to bring about ‘social change’ through threats, pressure, tensions and confrontation – the tactics used by the father of community organizing, Saul ‘The Red’ Alinsky.”

Dr. Jerome Corsi, the author of the No. 1 New York Times best-seller “The Obama Nation,” agreed. He said the overall intent of the program is much the same as the goals of William Ayers, an Obama acquaintance who spent the 1970s and 1980s as an unrepentant radical, during his various programs regarding public education.

“Remember, Obama has followed Saul Alinsky’s ultimate advice,” Corsi explained. “Saul Alinsky said radicals like Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman could not organize a picnic. Alinsky told his radicals to cut their hair, buy business suits and run for public office,” he said.

“Ayers and Obama are both aimed at producing radical socialist change from within – working today to radicalize our institutions, instead of bombing them. Alinsky considered this approach to be much smarter because it was more likely to produce lasting ‘change’ and less likely to produce a backlash. In other words, the Alinsky-trained radical could apply more easily the Machiavellian technique of lying by denying they were pursuing radical goals if they appeared to be members in good standing of the establishment they were trying merely to ‘change,’” he said.

The organization boasts more than two-thirds of its recruits are “people of color,” and 15 percent of “LGBT.” When they’re not out protesting, IBD said, “they’re staffing AIDS clinics, handing out condoms, bailing criminals out of jail and helping illegal aliens and the homeless obtain food stamps and other welfare.”

The Allies’ own website confirms it has volunteers working for Planned Parenthood, LGBT centers and Boys & Girls Clubs.

Obama’s Re-education Training Camp for Youth

Released: September 06, 2008

UTICA, New York - Republicans John McCain and Sarah Palin left St. Paul, Minnesota, with a smallish bounce overall and some energy in key demographic groups, as the race for the presidency enters a key stage and voters begin to tune in to the contest, the latest Zogby Interactive poll finds.

The McCain/Palin ticket wins 49.7% support, compared to 45.9% backing for the Obama/Biden ticket, this latest online survey shows. Another 4.4% either favored someone else or were unsure.

The Ticket Horserace
9-5/6
8-29/30

McCain-Palin
49.7%
47.1%

Obama-Biden
45.9%
44.6%

Others/Not sure
4.4%
8.3%

In the two-way contest in which just McCain and Obama were mentioned in the question, the result was slightly different, with McCain leading, 48.8% to 45.7%.

One-on-One Horserace
9-5/6

McCain
48.8%

Obama
45.7%

Others/Not sure
5.5%

In a Zogby Interactive survey conducted last weekend, just after the McCain announcement that Palin would join his ticket, McCain Palin won 47.1% support, while Obama/Biden won 44.6% support.

The interactive survey of 2,312 likely voters nationwide was conducted Sept. 5-6, 2008, and carries a margin of error of +/- 2.1 percentage points.

Pollster John Zogby: “Clearly, Palin is helping the McCain ticket. She has high favorability numbers, and has unified the Republican Party. The striking thing here in this poll is that McCain has pulled ahead among Catholics by double-digits. On the other hand, Palin is not helping with likely voting women who are not aligned with either political party. The undecided independent women voters decreased this week from 15% to 7%, but those women went to Obama. Palin is also helping among men, conservatives, notably with suburban and rural voters, and with frequent Wal-Mart shoppers, who tend to be “values” voters who like a good value for their money.”

McCain’s favorability rating increased from 50% favorable last week to 57% favorable now, a significant jump that indicates the GOP convention was a success. Among independent voters, 61% now have a favorable impression of him, compared to just 49% who said the same a week ago.

Nearly half - 49% - said they had a favorable opinion of Barack Obama, while 50% they had a negative impression of him. Among independent voters, 47% gave him favorable marks, compared to 46% who said the same thing last week.

Among the vice presidential candidates, 54% said they now hold a favorable view of Palin, while 42% hold an unfavorable view. While 49% have a favorable opinion of Joe Biden, 47% hold an unfavorable view of him. 

Just one week ago, 23% told Zogby that they did not know enough about Palin to make a judgment about whether they held a favorable or unfavorable view of her - but this most recent survey shows just 4% were unfamiliar with her - another indication that likely voters paid attention to the GOP convention this week, which won the highest television viewership numbers ever earned by an American political convention.

===========

Zogby International was the most accurate pollster in every one of the last three presidential election cycles, and continues to perfect its telephone and interactive methodologies using its own live operator, in-house call center in Upstate New York, and its own secure servers for its online polling projects.

In the 2004 presidential election, not only was Zogby’s telephone polling right on the money, its interactive polling also nailed the election as well. In 2006, the Zogby Interactive online polling was on the money in 17 of 18 U.S. Senate races (the 18th was within the margin of error) a record of accuracy that is unmatched in the industry - as no other leading firm even attempts to poll statewide political races using an interactive methodology for public consumption.

For a complete methodological statement on this survey, please visit:

http://www.zogby.com/methodology/readmeth.dbm?ID=1332

(9/6/2008)