For GOP only

[Controlled Chaos]

I like the 2nd article. But the 1st one is more appropriately aimed at the likes of Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and Alan Keyes.

The first one is by Thomas Sowell. He has one of the most brilliant minds, I have ever come across.

[NorthSideSox72]

The first one is by Thomas Sowell. He has one of the most brilliant minds, I have ever come across.

He may indeed be brilliant, I can't say I know. And I do actually agree with one of his two main themes - that we should not elect a black president for that cause's sake. I just think he's then going and painting Obama as a somehow invalid candidate who is there because he is black. That part is fairly absurd to me. I've been around for quite a few election cycles now, and I can confidently say that an Obama-McCain race will pit two of the best candidates I've seen run in my lifetime. One may like one or the other more or less, or feel that one is just a bad idea, of course. But to insinuate he's some sort of affirmative action candidate is ridiculous.

 

[Controlled Chaos]

He may indeed be brilliant, I can't say I know. And I do actually agree with one of his two main themes - that we should not elect a black president for that cause's sake. I just think he's then going and painting Obama as a somehow invalid candidate who is there because he is black. That part is fairly absurd to me. I've been around for quite a few election cycles now, and I can confidently say that an Obama-McCain race will pit two of the best candidates I've seen run in my lifetime. One may like one or the other more or less, or feel that one is just a bad idea, of course. But to insinuate he's some sort of affirmative action candidate is ridiculous.

I don't think he was insinuating that at all. IMO he's saying the Pres race shouldn't be discussed with such trivialities as demographics. Be it race, age or sex. Hitting the landmark of having a black POTUS isn't reason enough to vote for him. He thinks he is the wrong choice and he gives some of his reasons. He doesn't go in depth on the other candidates, but what I took from it was he feels the same about McCain getting elected or not, because of his age and Hillary because she is a woman.

 

 

Anyway...here are some of his other articles if you're interested.

 

[NorthSideSox72]

I don't think he was insinuating that at all. IMO he's saying the Pres race shouldn't be discussed with such trivialities as demographics. Be it race, age or sex. Hitting the landmark of having a black POTUS isn't reason enough to vote for him. He thinks he is the wrong choice and he gives some of his reasons. He doesn't go in depth on the other candidates, but what I took from it was he feels the same about McCain getting elected or not, because of his age and Hillary because she is a woman.

 

 

Anyway...here are some of his other articles if you're interested.

If that's the main point, then I agree in general. I just took a slightly different tone from it.

 

Thanks for the link, I may have to read a little more of his stuff.

 

[Controlled Chaos]

Obama says he's outraged by former pastor's comments

By MIKE GLOVER, Associated Press Writer

11 minutes ago

 

Democrat Barack Obama said Tuesday he was outraged and appalled by the latest comments from his former pastor, who asserted that criticism of his fiery sermons is an attack on the black church and the U.S. government was responsible for the creation of the AIDS virus.

 

The presidential candidate is seeking to tamp down the growing fury over Rev. Jeremiah Wright and his incendiary remarks that threaten to undermine his campaign.

 

"I am outraged by the comments that were made and saddened by the spectacle that we saw yesterday," Obama told reporters at a news conference.

 

After weeks of staying out of the public eye while critics lambasted his sermons, Wright made three public appearances in four days to defend himself. The former pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago has been combative, providing colorful commentary and feeding the story Obama had hoped was dying down.

 

"This is not an attack on Jeremiah Wright," Wright told the Washington media Monday. "It has nothing to do with Senator Obama. It is an attack on the black church launched by people who know nothing about the African-American religious tradition."

 

Obama told reporters Tuesday that Wright's comments do not accurately portray the perspective of the black church.

 

"The person I saw yesterday was not the person that I met 20 years ago," Obama said of the man who married him.

 

Wright criticized the U.S. government as imperialist and stood by his suggestion that the United States invented the HIV virus as a means of genocide against minorities. "Based on this Tuskegee experiment and based on what has happened to Africans in this country, I believe our government is capable of doing anything," he said.

 

Obama said he heard that Wright had given "a performance" and when he watched tapes, he realized that it more than just a case of the former pastor defending himself.

 

"What became clear to me was that he was presenting a world view that contradicts what I am and what I stand for," Obama said.

 

In a highly publicized speech last month, Obama sharply condemned Wright's remarks. But he did not leave the church or repudiate the minister himself, who he said was like a family member.

 

On Tuesday, Obama sought to distance himself further from Wright.

 

"I gave him the benefit of the doubt in my speech in Philadelphia explaining that he's done enormous good. ... But when he states and then amplifies such ridiculous propositions as the U.S. government somehow being involved in AIDS. ... There are no excuses. They offended me. They rightly offend all Americans and they should be denounced."

 

Wright recently retired from the church. He became an issue in Obama's presidential bid when videos circulated of Wright condemning the U.S. government for allegedly racist and genocidal acts. In the videos, some several years old, Wright called on God to "damn America." He also said the government created the AIDS virus to destroy "people of color."

 

Obama said he didn't vet his pastor before deciding to seek the presidency. He said he was particularly distressed that the furor has been a distraction to the purpose of a campaign.

 

[BearSox]

Obama sees nothing wrong with Wright for over 20 years, and now all of sudden, he disowns Wright... So, he doesn't get it for 20 years, but finally does get it after 1 day?

[lostfan]

Obama sees nothing wrong with Wright for over 20 years, and now all of sudden, he disowns Wright... So, he doesn't get it for 20 years, but finally does get it after 1 day?

Obama basically risked his political ass to try and take the high road not disowning Wright, partially succeeding, and Wright repaid him by acting a fool in a completely arbitrary manner and having his ego undermine Obama's campaign at a critical moment and threatened to torpedo the whole thing. So Obama finally threw him under the bus as if to say "fine, f*** it, I really don't want to deal with this anymore." Seems pretty simple to me, it's like Wright doesn't even care that he's damaging Obama right now by popping off at the mouth, however right he believes he is to defend himself.

[StrangeSox]

Obama basically risked his political ass to try and take the high road not disowning Wright, partially succeeding, and Wright repaid him by acting a fool in a completely arbitrary manner and having his ego undermine Obama's campaign at a critical moment and threatened to torpedo the whole thing. So Obama finally threw him under the bus as if to say "fine, f*** it, I really don't want to deal with this anymore." Seems pretty simple to me, it's like Wright doesn't even care that he's damaging Obama right now by popping off at the mouth, however right he believes he is to defend himself.

 

There's conspiracy-theory rumors floating around that the Clintons are paying/ encouraging Wright to continue to spout off.

[southsider2k5]

Obama basically risked his political ass to try and take the high road not disowning Wright, partially succeeding, and Wright repaid him by acting a fool in a completely arbitrary manner and having his ego undermine Obama's campaign at a critical moment and threatened to torpedo the whole thing. So Obama finally threw him under the bus as if to say "fine, f*** it, I really don't want to deal with this anymore." Seems pretty simple to me, it's like Wright doesn't even care that he's damaging Obama right now by popping off at the mouth, however right he believes he is to defend himself.

 

The interesting thing now is with Obama's HUGE support in the black community, does he now get painted as a sell out? He was in a real no win situation here.

[kapkomet]

Rev. Wright is in this for Rev. Wright. He's "DREAMED" (nice "pun", eh) about having a national audience of which to spout off his rhetoric, and now he has it. Rev. Wright's EGO is what is throwing Obama around, not the Clintons or anything else.

 

The man is a fanatical idiot - and his "round of defending himself" tells me all I need to know.

 

 

[EvilMonkey]

There's conspiracy-theory rumors floating around that the Clintons are paying/ encouraging Wright to continue to spout off.

I would be more inclined to believe that Jessie and/or Al would be paying him to keep spouting off. An Obama presidency without their help just hurts them in the long run, and diminishes their 'we are victims' mantra.

[lostfan]

The interesting thing now is with Obama's HUGE support in the black community, does he now get painted as a sell out? He was in a real no win situation here.

They more or less understand, they are pretty pissed at Rev. Wright for backing him into a corner like that for basically no reason except to get Wright's face in the media and for generally acting like a tool. Now, defending himself and his life's work is one thing, but why he felt the need to make sure everyone knows he thinks the gov't created AIDS after the talk about it started to die down I will never know.

[lostfan]

I would be more inclined to believe that Jessie and/or Al would be paying him to keep spouting off. An Obama presidency without their help just hurts them in the long run, and diminishes their 'we are victims' mantra.

I cannot stand those guys.

[Balta1701]

They more or less understand, they are pretty pissed at Rev. Wright for backing him into a corner like that for basically no reason except to get Wright's face in the media and for generally acting like a tool. Now, defending himself and his life's work is one thing, but why he felt the need to make sure everyone knows he thinks the gov't created AIDS after the talk about it started to die down I will never know.

Based on the various things I've read, I'm wondering if part of his motivation isn't personal. There's been reports that the last time he spoke to Mr. Obama was a couple months back and the results weren't pleasant. The Obama campaign has had to distance itself from him, he's been made to look like the bad guy, and I'll bet he doesn't like it. If he really wanted Sen. Obama to win the White House, he wouldn't be doing what he's doing right now. So I really am curious about whether or not there's some personal animosity driving his behavior right now.

[mr_genius]

Based on the various things I've read, I'm wondering if part of his motivation isn't personal. There's been reports that the last time he spoke to Mr. Obama was a couple months back and the results weren't pleasant. The Obama campaign has had to distance itself from him, he's been made to look like the bad guy, and I'll bet he doesn't like it. If he really wanted Sen. Obama to win the White House, he wouldn't be doing what he's doing right now. So I really am curious about whether or not there's some personal animosity driving his behavior right now.

 

It seems like he does have a bit of animosity towards Obama. His publicity tour isn't helping Obama at all.

[Controlled Chaos]

My syndicated column today deconstructs Barack Obama’s pitiful performance yesterday. Try as he might, he simply cannot disown the un-disownable preacher of hate. That press conference yesterday renders the Philadelphia speech from March null and void. And anyone who fell for the Philadelphia speech (unfortunately, there were several on the right side of the aisle) should feel especially embarrassed today. Try not to be fooled again.

 

Speaking of the Philly speech, Jeff Emanuel notes that Obama is actually selling DVDs of the speech to raise money. Yep. At the same time he was attempting to finally disown Jeremiah Wright, he was peddling his speech refusing to disown him.

 

Huckster.

 

***

 

The Jive Talk Express

Michelle Malkin

Creators Syndicate 2008

 

Barack Obama looked pale and wan at what he called his “big press conference” about the Rev. Jeremiah Wright on Tuesday afternoon. Numb. Chastened. Defeated. Extolled for his eloquence, Obama stuttered and stammered his way through the question-and-answer session. It appeared he was having an out-of-body experience.

 

Who knew that the greatest threat to his presidential campaign would come from the preacher who married him, baptized him, and prayed with him? Barack Obama should have known. That’s who. Take that judgment and shove it on a pretty campaign poster.

 

“Yes, we can”? Try “Yes, you should have.”

 

For the past 24 hours, Obama’s campaign too slowly grappled with how to handle the aftermath of Wright’s whirlwind tour of hatred this weekend — from Dallas, where he decried his “public crucifixion,” to Detroit, where he entertained NAACP bigwigs with impersonations of white people, mockeries of classical music and “white” marching bands, and lectures on racial brain theories, to the National Press Club, where he preened, strutted and head-wagged his way through an hour of bitter black liberation theologizing.

 

At first, Obama downplayed Wright’s public appearances. But Obama now tells us he had to wait 24 hours to convene a press conference to denounce Wright’s National Press Club speech because he “hadn’t seen it.” After all this time on the campaign trail, we’re back to the Obama-as-clueless-naif narrative again. When he finally did view the Washington speech, Obama explained, he was “shocked” and “outraged” and “saddened” because “the person I saw was not the person that I’d come to know over 20 years.”

 

What a load of pure unadulterated horse manure. Anyone with eyes can see that Wright’s performances are finely honed, time-tested acts. His anti-white, anti-American, “imperialist”-bashing shtick was not developed overnight or over the past few years. He’s been peddling AIDS conspiracies for decades. He’s been grievance-mongering about slavery for decades. He’s been flirting with the Nation of Islam, which provided security for his speeches, for decades. He’s been a shouting left-wing radical for decades.

 

Obama’s best-selling Audacity of Hope is named after the first sermon of Wright’s that he heard — decades ago — in which the pastor of racial resentment inveighed against an environment “where white folks’ greed runs a world in need, apartheid in one hemisphere, apathy in another hemisphere.” Yet, only now has Obama concluded that Wright’s sermons are “a bunch of rants that aren’t grounded in truth.”

 

Welcome to the Jive-Talk Express.

 

A reader of mine who is a clergyman e-mailed after Obama’s press conference: “As a pastor, I have this take: It is inconceivable that Obama had no knowledge of Wright’s views after 20 years as a member of that church. As a pastor, my heart-held, deepest beliefs and passions cannot be silenced. It is what I am. If I were given a microphone at the National Press Club, I would not speak on something that I had guardedly kept secret for most of my life. No, I would go to my main point, the center of my ministry, the core of my passion, to speak truth as I know it to be. How can Obama actually claim that this is news from his pastor? His mailman, butcher or plumber? No problem. His pastor? No way!”

 

It’s not Wright who has changed his loony tune.

 

It was just last year that Obama was telling the Chicago Tribune that Wright was his sounding board for truth: “What I value most about Pastor Wright is not his day-to-day political advice. He’s much more of a sounding board for me to make sure that I am speaking as truthfully about what I believe as possible and that I’m not losing myself in some of the hype and hoopla and stress that’s involved in national politics.”

 

It was just this March, in his Philadelphia racial reconciliation speech, that Obama was urging us not to dismiss Wright as a “crank or a demagogue” and protesting that he could “no more disown him than I can disown the black community.”

 

Now, realizing how gravely his self-serving association with Wright has wounded his campaign, Obama himself has attempted to do both those things — and expects the American public to believe him when he weakly and belatedly asserts that “when I say I find [Wright’s] statements appalling, I mean it.”

 

As those of us with non-European brains might put it: You be trippin’, Barry.

 

 

[BigSqwert]

CC,

 

You have obviously been 100% against Obama from the get go and have been hammering away on him repeatedly over the Rev Wright issue. How many more articles need to be posted slamming Obama on this one issue? I get the point that you think he is the worst candidate in the history of American politics. What more value is there posting additional anti-Obama perspectives on this one issue?

Edited May 1, 2008 by BigSqwert

[southsider2k5]

the best line that I have heard in the Voter ID debate here in Indiana went something like this...

 

With the Democrats spending WELL over $100 million in this Presidential Primary, you would think they could just pay for everyone who needs financial assistance for an ID, and the problem would be solved.

[Controlled Chaos]

CC,

 

You have obviously been 100% against Obama from the get go and have been hammering away on him repeatedly over the Rev Wright issue. How many more articles need to be posted slamming Obama on this one issue? I get the point that you think he is the worst candidate in the history of American politics. What more value is there posting additional anti-Obama perspectives on this one issue?

Well this is the GOP thread...

 

When I come across an article I like....I post it for others to check out. I'm not posting it in the main thread to put it up for discussion...so we can all rehash the same things... Just putting stuff I read out there....

 

EDIT: If people in the GOP sink or swim club...wish for me to stop posting articles...I'll will gladly do so.

Edited May 1, 2008 by Controlled Chaos

[NorthSideSox72]

Well this is the GOP thread...

 

When I come across an article I like....I post it for others to check out. I'm not posting it in the main thread to put it up for discussion...so we can all rehash the same things... Just putting stuff I read out there....

 

EDIT: If people in the GOP sink or swim club...wish for me to stop posting articles...I'll will gladly do so.

I for one like that you post these articles. At times I've condensed some into single threads for various reasons, but I like that people are posting professionally written stuff in here, even if I don't like or agree with the content.

 

[lostfan]

When it's in this thread, if I don't want to read it or talk about it I just ignore it mostly out of respect. However, I often do wonder if I'm expected to challenge opinions here or leave them be (hence thread title "GOP only", I feel like I sit on both sides of the fence though and I'm not a Democrat).

Edited May 1, 2008 by lostfan

[Steve9347]

When it's in this thread, if I don't want to read it or talk about it I just ignore it mostly out of respect. However, I often do wonder if I'm expected to challenge opinions here or leave them be (hence thread title "GOP only", I feel like I sit on both sides of the fence though and I'm not a Democrat).

I lurk since I'm a Democrat...

[EvilMonkey]

Check out this real classy guy asking McCain a question at a town hall meeting. I guess he was trying to see if Johnny has anger issues or something.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOl4iT46Eec

The guy asking the Q is identified as a former Biden worked who is a minister and a Huffpo contributor.

http://iowapolitics.com/index.iml?Article=125056

 

Maybe John should have responded with "No, but I DID call your mom that while I was a&&-f*cking her in the breakroom in the back. perhaps that is what you overheard", or would that have shown too much 'anger'?

[NorthSideSox72]

Check out this real classy guy asking McCain a question at a town hall meeting. I guess he was trying to see if Johnny has anger issues or something.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOl4iT46Eec

The guy asking the Q is identified as a former Biden worked who is a minister and a Huffpo contributor.

http://iowapolitics.com/index.iml?Article=125056

 

Maybe John should have responded with "No, but I DID call your mom that while I was a&&-f*cking her in the breakroom in the back. perhaps that is what you overheard", or would that have shown too much 'anger'?

Well, one good thing to note is that it appears McCain's "Town Hall" meetings really are open to the public. That as opposed to the Bush "Town Hall" meetings that were basically just groupie pep rallies.

 

But on the subject... why do people feel the need to do s*** like that?

 

[Balta1701]

But on the subject... why do people feel the need to do s*** like that?

As far as I can tell, so far it's been reported by three separate reporters from Arizona that he did call her that at one point in a public setting. The guy putting out the story in a book gave the names of some of the people who were involved as witnesses.

 

I'm actually genuinely curious....why is it inappropriate to ask someone about something that multiple sources confirm they did in the past even if it involves some language less than appropriate for the setting? And how is that question any more unfair than the Ayers one they hit Obama with?