Obama's Billionaires

Speaking at a fund raising event among the very richest of San Francisco elite progressives, Obama made the following statement. Can you imagine the POTUS saying something this tasteless about the Chinese or the Italians or the Saudis?

[T]he truth is, is that, our challenge is to get people persuaded that we can make progress when there's not evidence of that in their daily lives. You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

The event occurred on what's known as "billionaire's row," probably the most expensive block in the world! The funniest part is that Hillary really can't jump on this because she lost her claim to authenticity a long time ago. Though with this kind of audacity, even Hillary would be allowed to call him a hypocrite.

Blogger Zombietime has lots of links to reactions, but it includes a photo essay of the mansions on billionaire's row. Nice job, actually.

Values, Morals, and Obama

"Look, I've got two daughters. 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them first of all about values and morals. But if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby."
-- Barack Obama.

He sure has a way with words, doesn't he?? Pathetic.

Wright's Awards

This problem is bigger than I thought. My impression was that this preaching was unique or contained. It may be pretty widespread in the Black church. (I used to say "black church" thinking it meant the color of the skin of the congregation. Does it mean the preaching they receive also?)
Retired pastor Wright is set to receive an award at Brite Divinity School, in Dallas, on the 29th. He was named the recipient of the award a year ago.
This article makes it plain that Wright is indeed a hero of sorts to folks in the black community of Christians.

Stacey Floyd-Thomas, director of black church studies at Brite, said Wright, like Martin Luther King Jr., represents the black church tradition in his harsh denunciation of social problems affecting the country, and said Wright's harsh criticism does not make him unpatriotic.
"Standing in the rich tradition of the African-American church, if he [Wright] is guilty of anything - this loving father, this prophetic pastor, this former U.S. Marine - is guilty of loving the United States enough to tell the truth," said Floyd-Thomas, who teaches ethics at Brite.

And later in the same article...

More than 15 black church scholars joined Floyd-Thomas and Haynes in their defense of Wright.
The Rev. Raphael Warnock, pastor at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, said the public has confused moral outrage with hatred in response to claims that black preachers promote hate from the pulpit.
"In fact, it's inappropriate not to feel outrage in the face of injustice," he said.

At the bottom of the page is the nearly 45 minute video (I have only seen snippets) of the news conference at which the black bible scholars defended pastor Wright.
Personally, I'm all for outrage over moral injustice and I'll be the last to argue that the media always portrays their stories accurately. I find it odd though, that the defenders are heavy on counter-attack and weak on content. But this has a while to play out now. I think this is either Obama's inexperience showing up (that this whole scenario was allowed to go on this long) or a confirmation that he really didn't expect to get this far in his quest for the office he seeks.

Obama's Advisers..."Obamanomics"Austan Goolsbee - Jeffrey Liebman - David Cutler

I gotta say, Obama confounds me. It's as if he's using his liberal reputation to win the primary activists' votes, but is building a much more centrist agenda for the general election.
We know that Bill and Hillary are both DLC'ers (Democratic Leadership Council). But the DLC is the attempt by Democrats to bring the party back to the center. What the press dubbed "triangulation" was often actually Clinton throwing a McCain type maverick action into the gears of the leftist ideological machine. Do you get it? Only McCain is a "maverick" BECAUSE he's a Republican. When Bill Clinton did the same sort of maneuver, he was a "political genius." McCain is a "thorn" in the party's side, while Clinton "triangulates," when he makes an out-of-character-for-his-party type of move.
And so I think we may be in for some strange maverick triangulation with an Obama administration. Obama's chief economist is the impressive chief economist for the DLC, Austan Goolsbee.
George Will's October 4, '07 column is devoted to Goolsbee's thinking on a range of issues and it's well worth the read. Will concludes with this paragraph...

Economics is the only academic discipline that in recent decades has moved in the direction that America and much of the world has moved, to the right. Goolsbee no doubt has lots of dubious ideas -- he is, after all, a Democrat -- about how government can creatively fiddle with the market's allocation of wealth and opportunity. But he seems to be the sort of person -- amiable, empirical and reasonable -- you would want at the elbow of a Democratic president, if such there must be.

I hesitate to link to any of the leftist opinion sites, not only because of what else one might find on their web pages but also because of the language used to describe the "sellout" Obama is committing by signing these guys on to his team. (So consider this fair warning, I don't think there's anything out of the ordinary on these provided links, and the reading is interesting, but...) They are in apoplectic tailspin over the trio's ideas that SocSec might be "partially privatized," or that health-care need not be single payer (completely nationalized) or that welfare isn't good for everyone, or that free trade is a good thing. Even the the semi-official publication to the paranoid left, "The Nation," has noticed, as evidenced by this note in an article about the various solutions to the "sub-prime crisis"....

As he has done on domestic issues like healthcare, job creation and energy policy, Obama is staking out a position to the right of not only populist Edwards but Clinton as well.

Not that Obama's presidency will have conservatives in all out party mode. From the NRO's Larry Kudlow ...

This is disturbing news on the taxation front. The Wall Street Journal’s Steve Moore says Obama’s tax plan would add up to a 39.6 percent personal income tax, a 52.2 percent combined income and payroll tax, a 28 percent capital-gains tax, a 39.6 percent dividends tax, and a 55 percent estate tax. In other words, Sen. Obama is a very-high-tax candidate. Whether Wall Street has fully discounted this, I have no idea. Probably not yet. But somebody in the investor class ought to be thinking about it, because it’s not good.

Interestingly, at least two of Obama’s top economic advisors — Austan Goolsbee and Jeffrey Liebman — are highly regarded free-market economists. Goolsbee from Chicago, Liebman from Harvard. But somehow their candidate has a very punitive high-tax campaign plan for the economy.

On healthcare, the libs fault Obama's plan for aloowing folks the freedom to opt out, as opposed to Hillary's "mandate" for participation. The following speaks of economist David Cutler on healthcare.....

But then you get a Harvard economist saying this about mandates: “A better approach is to do everything possible to make it affordable and available. When it is, almost everyone will have it.”

I think by “it” he’s referring to health insurance and this is the same Harvard economist who thinks our current health care system provides “reasonable value”.

I am eagerly awaiting Cutler’s explanation of how he reconciles the “reasonable value” we are allegedly currently getting from the health care system with the presumably massive reduction in prices/costs of health care that’s going to be needed to make insurance “affordable”. I guess we’ll just be getting excellent value then!

CODA: By the way if you doubt that Democrats favor single payer then consider these two questions from the recent Gallup Poll:

"Do you think it's the government's responsibility to make sure that everyone in the United States has adequate health care, or don't you think so?"

84% of Democrats say yes. compared to 54% of independents and only 32% of Republicans

The leftist blogger has a point. We are still detail "challenged" - shall we say?

Obama's Advisors;David Axelrod

If all you have is a dagger, and your opponent is a knight on a white stallion, your cause looks lost. But if you look closer, the knight's armor isn't always as solid as it looks from a distance. Those folks who can recognize weak links in the adversary's seemingly invincible polling data are called "political consultants."
This is Obama's man...

Given his rhetorical skills, Harvard Law pedigree, up-by-the-bootstraps bio and, well, his race, it is hard not to compare recently elected Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick to his friend Barack Obama. Both men entered crowded primaries in which they were definitively not favored. They both inspired a kind of personal pride among supporters that is rare in politics. On the evening of Obama's convincing primary victory, the crowd and the candidate joined in chanting, "Yes We Can!" and if you listen closely to video of Patrick rallies, you'll hear the crowd chanting the very same thing. When Patrick looked into the camera in one ad and said the state's problem wasn't a "deficit of dollars but a deficit of leadership," it was hard not to hear echoes of Obama's oft-used line that the country's biggest problem isn't a budget deficit but an "empathy deficit." And in Patrick's most effective ad, he stands on a stage delivering an impassioned speech to a crescendo of applause as Obama sits on a stool just behind him, nodding approvingly, his head perfectly framed in the shot.

Which brings us to something else the two men share: David Axelrod, the 51-year-old reporter turned media consultant who was the key media strategist for both men's campaigns. He's the one who wrote those ads, framed that shot and came up with the "Yes We Can" tag line.

Axelrod has done Chicago's mayor as well as Cleveland's. He did Paul Simon's presidential bid and Elliot Spitzer's New York gubernatorial victory.

This LATimes article from Feb 15, '08...

That's the essence of the Illinois senator's message: Obama equals change; Hillary Rodham Clinton equals status quo. All else cascades from there. In this contest -- where the candidates are but a micron apart on most policy matters -- message is everything.

...

The burly 52-year-old with the drooping mustache helped put together the team working to get Obama elected. He oversees ad creation and coordinates with the campaign's pollsters. During preparation for debates, he plays Clinton.

...

Axelrod is described as Obama's answer to Karl Rove and the most powerful political consultant not on a coast. And at a time when New York Sen. Clinton is shaking up her own campaign staff, he is someone, said one political observer, who "ain't going to be fired."

These articles are little more than self-puffery, of course. Whatever the byline, they were probably written by the campaign, handed to the politics desk, and then published verbatim. They still provide a little insight to what the campaign manager believes is important, and what they want us to know about them.

Obama's Advisers;Zbigniew Brzezinski

Zbigniew Brzezinski , Carter administration national security adviser, uber-globalist, author, Israel antagonist, and now Obama campaign foreign affairs consultant, recently led a Rand Corp financed delegation to Syria, of which Obama's campaign denies knowledge.
The Israeli media Ynet linked above contains the following;

Brzezinski, selected by Obama to advise him on foreign policy affairs, has taken a highly critical stance towards Israel in the past, and has defended an academic attack on the American Jewish lobby which has been branded by some as being anti-Semitic. He has previously served as a national security adviser to President Jimmy Cater.sic

It's suggested somewhere that Obama is using Brzezinski's endorsement and calling him an adviser to give his campaign the "gravitas" it lacks, and to counter the charge that Obama hasn't enough experience. It wouldn't be honest to leave Zbig out of this exposition of Obama's people, but it's either true that Obama didn't know about this Rand Corp trip, or Obama's campaign is naive to the point of being laughably out of control. It is quizzical that the "Change" advocate would call on the epitome of "same old, same old" policy expertise for advice - unless Mr Brzezinski has untried ideas, in reference with Israel in particular.
Self described "lunatic fringe" folks are very frightened of Zbig.

This is the same Brzezinski who created the Illuminati's Trilateral Commission with David Rockefeller in 1973. The Trilateral Commission is dedicated to a world government dictatorship and closely connects with other strands in the web like the Council on Foreign Relations (member: Barack Obama) and the Bilderberg Group.

Brzezinski's foreign 'policy' during the Carter administration, as he has since admitted without regret, was to entice the Soviet Union to invade Afghanistan in December, 1979. The idea, he said, was to weaken their rival superpower and the result was a ten-year occupation that cost the lives of an estimated 1.3 million Afghans and spawned the Mujahedin, Taliban and Osama bin Laden.

Deep breath: he's now advising Barack Obama on foreign policy ...

Obama's Advisers; Cass Sunstein and Samantha Power

It occurred to me that I couldn't get through to the real Obama during his campaign. If I wanted to know who he is, I'd have to learn more about who has his ear. At some point, it is he, the real Obama, who decides, "I like the way this person thinks." One of the reasons I was warm to the idea of a Giuliani presidency, in spite of his obvious personal flaws, was that I was familiar with his advisers. I believe, unless America grows out of its media induced stupor, Obama will be the next president, so I'm going to take a look at those to whom he listens.

A noontime speech by two of Obama's policy advisers, University of Chicago law professor Cass Sunstein and Harvard University government professor Samantha Power, was delayed an hour as the two explored Virginia's rural back roads.

This is Sunstein: (domestic policy advisor)

Supreme Court appointments: Sunstein described Obama as a "visionary minimalist," who would bring balance to activist conservative justices' efforts to "constitutionalize the Republican platform," but would not repudiate opposing views.

And this is Power: (foriegn policy advisor)

Iraq: Obama is "thinking about getting American troops out safely, but having full regard for those who have come to depend on us," Power said. She said Obama has a detailed withdrawal plan for Iraq that would include giving Iraqis fair notice of American departure and soliciting Iraqi opinions as to which neighborhoods should be evacuated first.

Middle East diplomacy: Obama "has said when he becomes president that he will go on a listening tour of Islamic countries," Power said. When dealing with "rogue regimes" such as Iran's, it's "better to be in the room than lobbing verbal grenades" from afar, she added.

China: In addressing Chinese human rights violations, exploitation of African economies and threats to American business interests abroad, Obama "is not going to be uncritical," said Powers. However, "We have to get our own house in order" first. Once Obama has restored international support for the United States, "The same backlash seen against colonialism is going to be seen against China."

Another S Power Time mag article.
There are scads of stuff on these two and the many other Obama advisers out there. I picked some articles that were in their own words, rather than written about them. From these self-revealing articles however, some of the articles that HAVE been written about them are more easily judged for apparent accuracy.

Obama Shows Christrian Deference and Respect (Not)

Once again my impeccable
timing is on display.
This article appeared June 24th,
but I've got a cache of blogs on the
burner waiting to be dispatched.

It's been said that when people realize how far left Mr Obama truly is, he'll quickly lose his appeal for possessing a Bobby Kennedy-type eloquence. I've wondered if that would pan out but Mr Obama just proved it with his junk references to the Christian Right. All (em) is mine...

The speech by Obama, a Democratic presidential candidate and member of the 1.2-million member denomination, dealt with the link between faith and politics

(as opposed to what right leaning Christians do - which is to demolish the much vaunted "wall of separation" between church and state!)

The phrase, "link between faith and politics" is repeated three times in the article.

"Our conscience can't rest so long as 37 million Americans are poor and forgotten by their leaders in Washington," Obama said. "We need to heed the biblical call to care for `the least of these' and lift the poor out of despair. That's why it's not just a policy issue when we fight to expand the Earned-Income Tax Credit and the minimum wage. If you're working 40 hours a week, you shouldn't be living in poverty."

In the United States it is possible to have the grandest income and still not be able to buy a decent meal. It comes down to how well you budget. I know a few hispanic immigrants who work 80 hrs a week, make less than the national median, and are still grateful for the oppurtunity to send money home.
It's can be very uncomfortable to watch those with higher incomes seemingly enjoy the rich life. Which is why class envy works so well for Democratic politicians in the first place. But the world knows poverty. The U.S. and most of the west does not.
In the west, Robin Hood IS the Sheriff of Nottingham. Stealing from the rich to give to the poor is not only a safe and legal practice, it's considered a societal step UP from getting a decent education and providing for your own family.

"Somehow, somewhere along the way, faith stopped being used to bring us together and started being used to drive us apart. It got hijacked," the Democratic presidential candidate said in remarks prepared for delivery before the national meeting of the United Church of Christ.

"Hijacked?"

I think it's helpful that Obama brings this up. His speech to the United Church of Christ convention in Hartford, Conn, is probably the strongest evidence that the Christian Church in America is at a frightfully weak point in its history. Democrats have proven time and again that the American people are dangerously ignorant of their own Constitution. It looks now that they will do the same for America's ignorance of the Bible.
Which is good. Perhaps Christians will then get serious about what their faith is supposed to be about - the offer of eternal life to a dead generation. I firmly believe that Christians belong in the public arena. But when a denomination that ordained its first openly gay minister 30 years ago and has been pro-abortion as long as the word's existed complains of "moral outrage" and "division" caused by the right, can we help but wonder if the word "Christian" has outlived its usefulness?

"Part of it's because of the so-called leaders of the Christian Right, who've been all too eager to exploit what divides us," the Illinois senator said.
"At every opportunity, they've told evangelical Christians that Democrats disrespect their values and dislike their church, while suggesting to the rest of the country that religious Americans care only about issues like abortion and gay marriage, school prayer and intelligent design," according to an advance copy of his speech.
"There was even a time when the Christian Coalition determined that its number one legislative priority was tax cuts for the rich," Obama said. "I don't know what Bible they're reading, but it doesn't jibe with my version."

My my, where to start? The wealthy are paying higher taxes than ever, and the cuts were across the board, which our democrat candidate fails to mention. And by the way, if we complain about the rich getting more access to the gov't, then perhaps we shouldn't expect them to pay for so much of it.

Rangel - Obama Quagmire

There are people, mostly younger voters, that really believe that somewhere, somehow, we are going to have a draft -- and that it is a Republican idea. This sort of misleading Reuters headline, and its accompanying article, does little to clear up the muck. Democrat Rangel has been introducing this legislation since the beginning of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, it has always been defeated overwhelmingly. It has always, somehow, been portrayed as something that is supposed to be embarrassing to the administration.

"We did not include that" in legislative plans for early next year, said Democratic Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, who will be House majority leader when the new Congress convenes in January.

Incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California noted her opposition to the draft in remarks to reporters. She said Rangel was trying to underscore that the U.S. war effort should be a "shared sacrifice" and his legislation was "a way to make that point."

Democrats want to run the war from DC. That idea went over well in Viet Nam. Harvard grads in the DOD and the Democrat majority telling four-star generals how to win a war "nicely." Fighting to win will upset the Fonda wing - not to mention the Syrians and the Iranians - with whom we are supposed to start "negotiating." They don't know what they're going to do, so they are floating trial balloons to see if anything resonates with whoever it is that listens to them.