http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080911/wl_nm/russia_venezuela_dc
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Russia Watch
Two Russian bombers capable of carrying nuclear weapons have arrived in Venezuela for war games. Is the Monroe Doctrine still in effect? It will probably be ignored for now, but the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 stated no European power can interfere in the Americas. During the Cold War, however, the Monroe Doctrine was invoked to legitimize American efforts to stop the spread of communism in its hemisphere.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080911/wl_nm/russia_venezuela_dc
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080911/wl_nm/russia_venezuela_dc
Seven Years On
Today there are seven significant reasons to credit the Bush Administration: No major terror attacks repeated since 9/11/2001. Now recall if you can, the minutes, hours, and days after the attacks, when nearly every single American believed subsequent attacks would occur. If somebody on 9/12/2001 told you the country would go 7 more years without any grand terror attack from an Al-Qaeda type organization, would you have believed them? This nation's safety for the past 7 years should be greatly attributed to President Bush for taking the fight to the terrorists. After all, had an attack occured, Bush would have been completely blamed for it, so why not give him the credit for thwarting any attack?
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Russia Watch
Russia is planning to target U.S. missile shield sites in Central Europe. There are 10 interceptors proposed for the site, which is no match for the massive Russian arsenal consisting of thousands of nuclear missiles. Still, the Russians feel threatened by the site, and under Putin the nationalist, they are flexing their muscles. Of course, the missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic are a response to the Russians arming their Iranian friends with nuclear missile technology. Interestingly, the nations near Russia are now suddenly on board for cooperating with the U.S. after witnessing what happened to Georgia.
Michael Medved and David Frodosso on the Ideological Obama
Michael Medved recently interviewed David Freddoso, author of “The Case Against Barack Obama: The Unlikely Rise and Unexamined Agenda of the Media's Favorite Candidate.”
Michael Medved: What’s the most important thing people don’t know about Barack Obama?
David Freddoso: The carefully-crafted media image of Senator Obama as a reformer is a great lie. There is, in fact, nothing in his career to point to him as someone who bridges partisan divides for the sack of positive change. This is quite clear from his record in how he’s dealt with the machine politics of Chicago, how he’s essentially served as an enabler of some extremely corrupt politicians in that city, how he has championed the same old systemic corrupt arrangements that have existed in Washington, and existed in Springfield, and in Chicago, including the various forms of corporate welfare, the special advantages that certain lobbyists seek. Senator Obama has been right in the center of that for his entire career. There is so many cases of it. The pattern is completely unmistakable and I lay them all out in “The Case Against Barack Obama.”
Medved: What is surprising to me is you talk about Barack Obama’s deep and extremely sleazy involvement with the worst of the machine politicians and yet some of the reformers, some of the leading reformers—people like former congressman and federal Judge Abner Mikva who are known as reformers—kind of adopted him. Why?
Freddoso: Well, they took a liking to him. Part of it has to do with the ties that he had in High Park, and in fact they talked Emil Jones, the state Senate president, into adopting him. There is one piece of campaign finance legislation that had been written by and proposed by someone else that ended up given to Obama basically because of a conversation that occurred between Mickva and Jones who is the state Senate president in Illinois. So you can see, nonetheless, that when reformers run an election in Chicago, Senator Obama tends to endorse the other guy, he doesn’t endorse the reformers. This was clearest, as I point out in the first chapter, in a race that was very high profile that took place in 2006. So this is also a very recent phenomenon; this isn’t something from his distant past.
Medved: What about the idea of Obama as a far left candidate rather than a unifier? When did he start this conversation about him being a man of the center, somebody who is going to bring everyone together? When did he cease his identity as being somebody who is on the edge?
Freddoso: Well, you know another one of his biographers, David Mendell, refers to Obama’s charming lack of specificity. So this is something people in Chicago have noticed for quite a while—that he is able to talk about issues as though he’s taking everybody’s side. And people want to listen to him. They kind of want to believe and, as Obama himself says in “The Audacity of Hope,” he becomes something of a blank screen onto which everyone projects their own views and they all want to see him and think he agrees with them. Or, even if he doesn’t agree with them, he would be open to hearing their point of view.
In fact, when you look at Obama’s legislative record he’s really not terribly ideologically open minded. He tends to take a position that is at the far left and stick to it even when members of his own party, even when other liberals aren’t willing to follow him there. I mean one famous example that everyone knows about from this campaign is when he talked about meeting without pre-condition with world leaders of terrorists states. That was something that even his supporters like Tom Daschle couldn’t get behind, and of course Hillary Clinton didn’t agree with that, but also Joe Biden—people with a little more experience in foreign policy weren’t willing to follow him there.
Another terrific example of that, which I think is maybe the most dramatic of his career, was when he was the only Illinois senator in 2001 to speak against a bill that would have protected premature babies from being left to die after they’ve survived abortions. That was one of the very few times that Senator Obama took a really hard position that could hurt him politically and he did it for the sake of a very, very, very extreme abortion agenda that even such abortion advocates as Barbara Boxer were unable to support when the same bill came in front of her in the Unites State Senate. She gave a speech saying “I hope this [the Born Alive Infant Protection Act] passes unanimously”—and she voted for it and it did pass unanimously. So, Senator Obama definitely has an ideological, a rigid ideological view of just about every issue that you can think of.
Michael Medved: What’s the most important thing people don’t know about Barack Obama?
David Freddoso: The carefully-crafted media image of Senator Obama as a reformer is a great lie. There is, in fact, nothing in his career to point to him as someone who bridges partisan divides for the sack of positive change. This is quite clear from his record in how he’s dealt with the machine politics of Chicago, how he’s essentially served as an enabler of some extremely corrupt politicians in that city, how he has championed the same old systemic corrupt arrangements that have existed in Washington, and existed in Springfield, and in Chicago, including the various forms of corporate welfare, the special advantages that certain lobbyists seek. Senator Obama has been right in the center of that for his entire career. There is so many cases of it. The pattern is completely unmistakable and I lay them all out in “The Case Against Barack Obama.”
Medved: What is surprising to me is you talk about Barack Obama’s deep and extremely sleazy involvement with the worst of the machine politicians and yet some of the reformers, some of the leading reformers—people like former congressman and federal Judge Abner Mikva who are known as reformers—kind of adopted him. Why?
Freddoso: Well, they took a liking to him. Part of it has to do with the ties that he had in High Park, and in fact they talked Emil Jones, the state Senate president, into adopting him. There is one piece of campaign finance legislation that had been written by and proposed by someone else that ended up given to Obama basically because of a conversation that occurred between Mickva and Jones who is the state Senate president in Illinois. So you can see, nonetheless, that when reformers run an election in Chicago, Senator Obama tends to endorse the other guy, he doesn’t endorse the reformers. This was clearest, as I point out in the first chapter, in a race that was very high profile that took place in 2006. So this is also a very recent phenomenon; this isn’t something from his distant past.
Medved: What about the idea of Obama as a far left candidate rather than a unifier? When did he start this conversation about him being a man of the center, somebody who is going to bring everyone together? When did he cease his identity as being somebody who is on the edge?
Freddoso: Well, you know another one of his biographers, David Mendell, refers to Obama’s charming lack of specificity. So this is something people in Chicago have noticed for quite a while—that he is able to talk about issues as though he’s taking everybody’s side. And people want to listen to him. They kind of want to believe and, as Obama himself says in “The Audacity of Hope,” he becomes something of a blank screen onto which everyone projects their own views and they all want to see him and think he agrees with them. Or, even if he doesn’t agree with them, he would be open to hearing their point of view.
In fact, when you look at Obama’s legislative record he’s really not terribly ideologically open minded. He tends to take a position that is at the far left and stick to it even when members of his own party, even when other liberals aren’t willing to follow him there. I mean one famous example that everyone knows about from this campaign is when he talked about meeting without pre-condition with world leaders of terrorists states. That was something that even his supporters like Tom Daschle couldn’t get behind, and of course Hillary Clinton didn’t agree with that, but also Joe Biden—people with a little more experience in foreign policy weren’t willing to follow him there.
Another terrific example of that, which I think is maybe the most dramatic of his career, was when he was the only Illinois senator in 2001 to speak against a bill that would have protected premature babies from being left to die after they’ve survived abortions. That was one of the very few times that Senator Obama took a really hard position that could hurt him politically and he did it for the sake of a very, very, very extreme abortion agenda that even such abortion advocates as Barbara Boxer were unable to support when the same bill came in front of her in the Unites State Senate. She gave a speech saying “I hope this [the Born Alive Infant Protection Act] passes unanimously”—and she voted for it and it did pass unanimously. So, Senator Obama definitely has an ideological, a rigid ideological view of just about every issue that you can think of.
Biden Admits Hillary Best Choice
While out campaigning today, Joe Biden admits Hillary was a better choice for VP. Perhaps he was trying to be polite, but why say that? Everybody is already thinking that anyway. Biden just shot the campaign in the foot again this week. This puts Obambi's judgment into question because he chose Biden over what would appear to be a much better choice. It seems the best strategy for the Obama campaign to finish out the week would be just to avoid public appearances altogether.
Stand up Chuck.
Biden tells a guy in a wheelchair to stand up. If a Republican did this, it would be all the media would talk about.
Snob Alert
Matt Damon sits with the Associated Press and discusses how he needs to know if Palin thinks dinosaurs were here 4,000 years ago, because she is going to have the nuclear codes. Thank you, another Hollywood windbag telling us how to vote. Maaaaaaaaaaaatttttt Daaaaaaaaammmmon.
And for a little comedic relief after listening to Matt Damon's snobbery:
And for a little comedic relief after listening to Matt Damon's snobbery:
Another Attempt by a Democrat to Talk About Religion
Today, Representative Steve Cohen (D) spoke on the House Floor and compared Obama to Jesus, and Sarah Palin to Pontius Pilot. Simply brilliant! Why didn't I think of it this way before? Obama = Savior of all mankind, Palin = Satan. The left-wing attacks just keep coming but nothing is sticking. Keep it up Sarah, you are driving the libs mad!
I submit to you, Mr. Speaker, um, that the parties have differences, but if you want Change, but if you want change, you want the Democratic party, uh, Barack Obama was a community organizer like Jesus who our, uh, minister prayed about, uh, Pontius Pilate was a governor.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I submit to you, Mr. Speaker, um, that the parties have differences, but if you want Change, but if you want change, you want the Democratic party, uh, Barack Obama was a community organizer like Jesus who our, uh, minister prayed about, uh, Pontius Pilate was a governor.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
In Addition to the BBC Poll...
So it appears the whole world will hate us if we don't elect Barack Obama, but this is the same world that is uncertain who was actually behind 9-11. And the closer you survey to the Middle East, the more people think Israel was behind the terror attacks. Yes, as Americans we really need to care what these people think. We might as well vote Borat for president in '08, that way the Jews don't "Repeat their attacks of 9-11."
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Seven years after the Sept. 11 attacks, there is no consensus outside the United States that Islamist militants from al Qaeda were responsible, according to an international poll published Wednesday.
The survey of 16,063 people in 17 nations found majorities in only nine countries believe al Qaeda was behind the attacks on New York and Washington that killed about 3,000 people in 2001.
On average, 46 percent of those surveyed said al Qaeda was responsible, 15 percent said the U.S. government, 7 percent said Israel and 7 percent said some other perpetrator. One in four people said they did not know who was behind the attacks.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Seven years after the Sept. 11 attacks, there is no consensus outside the United States that Islamist militants from al Qaeda were responsible, according to an international poll published Wednesday.
The survey of 16,063 people in 17 nations found majorities in only nine countries believe al Qaeda was behind the attacks on New York and Washington that killed about 3,000 people in 2001.
On average, 46 percent of those surveyed said al Qaeda was responsible, 15 percent said the U.S. government, 7 percent said Israel and 7 percent said some other perpetrator. One in four people said they did not know who was behind the attacks.
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