Free Republic

(Second part of a three-part series) Here are more reasons to vote against Barack Obama. This part and the first part of the series, which ran on Thursday, can be found on The Bulletin's Web site at www.thebulletin.us. * This different kind of politician is different in still another way besides changing his mind on issues faster than any other politician in history. He doesn't want to be criticized, and doesn't respond to it. When criticized for associating with an anti-American, racist pastor or an unrepentant terrorist, he tries to fob that all off by saying that's the old politics....

And it came to pass, in the eighth year of the reign of the evil Bush the Younger (The Ignorant), when the whole land from the Arabian desert to the shores of the Great Lakes had been laid barren, that a Child appeared in the wilderness. The Child was blessed in looks and intellect. Scion of a simple family, offspring of a miraculous union, grandson of a typical white person and an African peasant. And yea, as he grew, the Child walked in the path of righteousness, with only the occasional detour into the odd weed and a little blow....

We may not be getting effective governance from movie star-turned-governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, but we can count on a steady diet of grandiose, and usually hollow, political gestures. Who could forget, for instance, the time that Schwarzenegger posed with a gigantic faucet, out of which flowed a red liquid, to dramatize budget deficits? Or the time he denounced the Legislature as "girlie men" for delaying budget action? Having promised and utterly failed to end "crazy deficit spending," Schwarzenegger is resorting once again to cheesy stunts, this time a threat to reduce the salaries of tens of thousands of state employees to...

State workers chanted Thursday outside the Capitol to assail Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's plans to pay 200,000 state employees the federal minimum wage until a budget is signed, providing some of the most compelling budget-related scenes of angry Californians this year. It may have been what the governor wanted all along, even if they shouted his name in disgust. The governor's draft executive order to withhold a portion of state workers' pay, obtained Wednesday by The Bee, has generated public attention for the state's budget situation in a way that months of Schwarzenegger town halls never could. Whether Schwarzenegger's attempt to...

Two articles in one post discussing the Berlin speech. ‘This Is the Moment’  And now we are loved again? It’s America, ObamaA modest dissent to the citizen of the world July 24, 2008Given the size of the audience in Berlin Thursday, the enthusiastic response, and the standard lines about how we-were-, -are-, and -will-be-friends boilerplate, one wonders whether all it took to win the Euro-hearts and minds was to have a charismatic, multiracial American spice up a standard George W. Bush speech about helping the world, addressing AIDs, more troops in Afghanistan, etc.? So supposedly sophisticated Europeans, who constantly dissect...

Presidential candidate Barack Obama has taken his pander machine on the road around the world in an effort to demonstrate two points vital to the success of his campaign for the office of Commander-in-Chief… * That he is willing to step into the hot zone and confront facts on the ground as defined by military and security experts before setting his official international security policy in stone. * That despite a nearly blank résumé, void of any military or security experience whatsoever, executive or otherwise, he has what it takes to become the next Commander-in-Chief of the last remaining super-power...

In a stunning upset, Barack Obama this week won the Iraq primary. When Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki not once but several times expressed support for a U.S. troop withdrawal on a timetable that accorded roughly with Obama's 16-month proposal, he not only legitimized the plan. He relieved Obama of a major political liability by blunting the charge that, in order to appease the MoveOn left, Obama was willing to jeopardize the astonishing success of the surge and risk losing a war that is finally being won. Maliki's endorsement left the McCain campaign and the Bush administration deeply discomfited. They underestimated...

The Sixties Won’t Go Away What more can anyone say about the 1960s and all its legacies? By Victor Davis Hanson Those who protested some 40 years ago often still congratulate themselves that their loud zeal alone brought needed “change” to America in civil rights, the environment, women’s liberation, and world peace. Maybe. But critics counter that the larger culture that followed was the most self-absorbed in memory. Everyone can at least agree that the spirit of the “Me Generation” is not going quietly into the night — especially since that generation ushered in a certain coarseness and self-righteousness that...

For our money, the best line in Barack Obama's speech yesterday in Berlin came in the form of a quote from Ernst Reuter, the city's mayor during the period of the Soviet blockade and the American airlift, in 1948: "But in the darkest hour," said Sen. Obama, "the people of Berlin kept the flame of hope burning. The people of Berlin refused to give up. And on one fall day, hundreds of thousands of Berliners came here, to the Tiergarten, and heard the city's mayor implore the world not to give up on freedom. 'There is only one possibility,' he...

Sweetheart mortgages given by Countrywide Financial, the nation’s biggest mortgage lender, to elected officials and government bureaucrats seem tailor-made for an ethics inquiry by Congress, especially as the country is seeing a rising tide of voter anger in this presidential election year due to the massive $300 bn bailout of the housing industry at taxpayers’ expense. The mortgages at issue were allegedly given to Congressional members and staffers championing this record bailout, a bailout that now surpasses the taxpayer cost of the S&L crisis in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. But Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Rep. Mark Souder...

Every political campaign has its weak spot. Every human being has his own blind spots. In politics and war, it's those blind spots that eventually make for victory or defeat. When an opponent discovers that weak spot, he just needs to hit it over and over again to win. In Iraq, Al Qaida's blind spot was its penchant for bloody random killing of innocent civilians. It turned the tribes against AQ. Every time they car-bombed another peaceful marketplace they made more mortal enemies. That's why they lost. For Barack and Michelle Obama, the biggest blind spot is Ego Tripping --...

The federal minimum wage rose by 70 cents yesterday to $6.55 per hour, and left-wing advocates are celebrating the increase as a boon for the so-called working poor. Not to be party poopers, but the reality is that most poor people in the U.S. already earn more than the minimum wage, and most workers who do earn the minimum wage aren't poor. The wage hike is the second of three annual increases mandated by a 2007 law. Next year the federal wage floor will rise to $7.25. This year's increase will touch some 1.5 million workers, in a workforce numbering...

"The bad news about the Army’s treatment of wounded soldiers keeps coming. The generals keep apologizing and insisting that things are getting better, but they are not..." "Staff members of the House subcommittee who visited numerous warrior transition units June 2007 to February found a significant gap between the Army leadership’s optimistic promises and reality."

"Too close to call." "Within the margin of error." "A statistical dead heat." If you've been following news coverage of the 2008 presidential election, you're probably familiar with these phrases. Media commentary on the presidential horserace, reflecting the results of a series of new national polls, has strained to make a case for a hotly contested election that is essentially up for grabs. Signs of Barack Obama's weaknesses allegedly abound. The huge generic Democratic Party advantage is not reflected in the McCain-Obama pairings in national polls. Why, according to the constant refrain, hasn't Obama put this election away? A large...

Whistling Past the Graveyard   By John PerazzoFrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, July 25, 2008 Last week, columnist Paul Weyrich reported that there is credible evidence that Osama bin Laden has acquired twenty suitcase-sized nuclear bombs from Chechen rebels in the former Soviet Union and smuggled them into the United States by way of the Mexican border. If that is true, the al Qaeda kingpin has laid the groundwork for an “American Hiroshima” plan that he intends to carry out in the very near future. Once bin Laden gives the signal, his henchmen will proceed to detonate their explosives in a...

Whistling Past the Graveyard   By John PerazzoFrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, July 25, 2008 Last week, columnist Paul Weyrich reported that there is credible evidence that Osama bin Laden has acquired twenty suitcase-sized nuclear bombs from Chechen rebels in the former Soviet Union and smuggled them into the United States by way of the Mexican border. If that is true, the al Qaeda kingpin has laid the groundwork for an “American Hiroshima” plan that he intends to carry out in the very near future. Once bin Laden gives the signal, his henchmen will proceed to detonate their explosives in a...

Three good men are dead thanks largely to San Francisco’s outrageous sanctuary-city policy, which forbids city authorities from notifying federal immigration authorities when they arrest illegal aliens for crimes they commit, and it’s time for President Bush to crack down on all the cities in the United States that follow this absurd policy. On June 22, Anthony Bologna and his sons Michael and Matthew were shot to death by Edwin Ramos, 21, after a brief traffic incident when Anthony Bologna allegedly briefly blocked Ramos' car from making a left turn, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Ramos, an alleged member...

The Germans were ecstatic when Barack Obama landed in Berlin. They called him the "American Idol," a political superstar they expected to walk on the River Spree. He didn't walk on water, but he didn't disappoint. He promised to remake the world where everybody would love everybody. "There is a sort of 'Obamamania' in Germany right now," says an aide in German Chancellor Angela Merkel's office, "but I think a lot of people will have their illusions shattered if he does become president." He's a novelty who causes skeptics to suggest he paraphrase JFK's famous boast at the Berlin Wall:...

America’s gas prices are continuing to spiral out of control and Washington has done nothing to give our nation’s motorists the relieve they deserve. Record high prices are having a major impact on American consumers and businesses, from the way people travel to the way they do business to the food they buy at the grocery store. Congress has the ability to decrease prices at the pump and get our nation back to $2 a gallon gas – and it means accessing our nation’s available resources and opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) today. Last weekend, I traveled...

So Barack Obama, whose father is from Kenya and who attended school in Indonesia, now appears before a crowd of 200,000 cheering Germans in Berlin to proclaim himself a "citizen of the world." It makes you wonder whether he's running for president of America or secretary general of the United Nations, and it is reminiscent of Senator Kerry's ill-fated 2004 debate pledge to subject American policies to a "global test." Not that these columns are against a judicious internationalism. Mr. Obama's turn toward the idea of global responsibility is actually a welcome note coming from someone who spent the primary...

MOSCOW - Russian strategic bombers may soon be deployed at airbases in Cuba, Venezuela and Algeria as a response to the U.S. missile shield in Europe and NATO's expansion, Russian daily Izvestia said on Thursday. Moscow has strongly opposed the possible deployment by the U.S. of 10 interceptor missiles in Poland and an accompanying tracking radar in the Czech RFepublic as a treat to its national security. Washington says the defenses are needed to deter a possible strike from Iran, or other "rogue" states...

Obama Flipping and Floundering in Middle East July 24, 2008 Kenneth R. Timmerman Everything seemed planned for the future campaign commercials — at least, that’s how it seemed to a U.S. Air Force captain when Sen. Barack Obama and his entourage swooped into Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan for an hour-long visit last Saturday at the start of a week-long foreign tour. “He got off the plane and got into a bullet proof vehicle” without pausing to acknowledge the U.S. troops who had been waiting all day just for the opportunity to meet him, the officer told the Blackfive...

n equities, moving the interest yield on the U.S. Treasury 10-year note to more than 4 percent. The dollar has been strengthening, too, relative to overseas currencies. Also improving the long-term outlook on Wall Street are better second-quarter corporate earnings reports that showed many companies were doing better than expected. McDonald's, AT&T and Pfizer reported upbeat earnings that signaled there's still a lot of resilience in the U.S. economy. Even the financials were showing some life at midweek, despite the credit and mortgage debacle. Wells Fargo and troubled Wachovia, the nation's fourth-largest bank, saw its stocks jump significantly. Even so,...

The enormous improvement in Iraq's security situation caused by the surge has been so undeniable that even the mainstream press has started alternating between ignoring Iraq completely and acknowledging, albeit reluctantly, that the surge has put victory within reach in Iraq. So with that in mind, it's worth taking the time to look back at what the crème de la crème of the Democratic Party has had to say about the war and the surge over the last few years. "We cannot support the increase in troops unless George Bush disavows the NeoCon strategy and presents a new strategy. George...

Now that Barack Obama's photo-op safari through the Middle East is over -- "Look, Obama-nation, I bagged the Western Wall!" -- I find there's still that detail about Jordan's King Abdullah II himself chauffeuring America's Sen. Obama (also himself) to the airport worth lingering over. There the two men were, alone on the road -- at least, alone on the road in the middle of a full-metal motorcade -- cruising in the king's Mercedes 600 to the candidate's "Change you can believe in" Boeing 757 charter jet. What did they talk about? Since the traveling press didn't even find out...

Americans should be outraged at the latest sweetheart deal in Washington. Congress will put U.S. taxpayers on the hook for potentially hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It's a tribute to what these two institutions — which most Americans have never heard of — have bought with more than $170-million worth of lobbyists in the past decade. With combined obligations of roughly $5-trillion, the rapid failure of Fannie and Freddie would be a threat to mortgage markets and financial markets as a whole. Because of that threat, I support taking the unfortunate but...

The professional odds-makers favor Barack Obama two-to-one to win the election. It's no wonder. Americans overwhelmingly believe the country is on the wrong track. They can't stand the current Republican occupant of the White House. The economy is weak and shows little sign of getting significantly stronger before the election. The country is fighting an unpopular war. And Obama, as he reminds us every time he opens his mouth, is all about "change." So why hasn't Obama closed the deal? Most national polls show Obama ahead -- but by margins so thin it can hardly give comfort to the putative...

Barack Obama concedes that America's troops have contributed to improvements on the ground in Iraq, but he still stands by his vote against the surge. Why not just admit that he was wrong? Come on, senator, this is a lot easier than changing churches. Say: "As a proud American, I'm delighted that the surge has worked so we can move forward with my timetable for withdrawal. Look, if I'd known how successful it was going to be, I would have voted for it. At the time it didn't seem like a good bet, but prognosticators go broke in wartime." See,...

By Wiley Smith; July 24, 2008 Just saw that Los Angeles banned plastic bags and will charge 25 cents for each paper bag the store supplies to customers. Three percent of the bag fee will be returned to the retailer (0.045 cents), 3 percent (0.045 cents) will go to the state, and the rest (0.16 cents) will go back to the city to fund an education campaign. Of course, some enterprising individuals likely will be selling the bags for less, buying them at a landed cost of 0.05 cents and doubling their money for a sell price of 0.10 cents...

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office announced today that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing in action from the Korean War, have been identified and will be returned to his family for burial with full military honors. He is Master Sgt. Cirildo Valencio, U.S. Army, of Carrizo Springs, Texas. He will be buried on Aug. 4 in Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, D.C. Representatives from the Army met with Valencio’s next-of-kin to explain the recovery and identification process on behalf of the Secretary of the Army. Valencio was assigned to Company L, 3rd Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 1st...

John McCain's vice presidential running mate selection should be put in perspective. In a presidential campaign, there are only a handful of occasions when a running mate has news value: the day of the announcement and the few days following; the nominee's convention speech debut; the joint kickoff rally; and the televised debate with the counterpart running mate. Otherwise, by mid-September John McCain's VP choice will be consigned to secondary media markets in critical electoral states, along with tours through solid red states for fund raising, party-building and local-candidate support. National television and cable networks will include the vice presidential...

An indignant Don Perata made fun of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for his brigade of "13 armed escorts" today. The Senate president pro tem was mocking Schwarzenegger as out of touch with the average Californian at a rally protesting the plan to temporarily slash the pay of state workers to $6.55 an hour. Visibly fired up, the Oakland Democrat declared he had only one question for Schwarzenegger now that the governor had revealed his plan to conserve cash during the budget crunch by cutting workers' pay. "Who in the hell do you think does the work around here?" he shouted to...

The rich man in his castle, The poor man at his gate, God made them, high or lowly, And order'd their estate. The 1982 Episcopal Hymnal omits that stanza, the second of Mrs. Alexander’s original six (not counting the refrain). It also omits her fifth: The tall trees in the greenwood, The meadows where we play, The rushes by the water, We gather every day … Understandable, in both cases. The fifth stanza might possibly be re-cast for a modern child (the hymn comes from Mrs. Alexander’s 1848 Hymns for Little Children), perhaps along lines like: The Xbox and the...

The anointed one's pilgrimage to the Holy Land is a miracle in action - and a blessing to all his faithful followers. And it came to pass, in the eighth year of the reign of the evil Bush the Younger (The Ignorant), when the whole land from the Arabian desert to the shores of the Great Lakes had been laid barren, that a Child appeared in the wilderness. On the Seventh Day he walked across the Channel of the Angles to the ancient land of the hooligans. There he was welcomed with open arms by the once great prophet Blair...

NEW YORK -- Painfully high vehicle- and jet-fuel prices are propelling popular demands for extracting the estimated 18 billion barrels of petroleum that rest beneath America's coastal waters. After rescinding previous executive-branch objections, President Bush said July 14, "the only thing standing between the American people and these vast oil resources is action from the U.S. Congress." Capitol Hill Democrats claim offshore drilling poses unacceptable ecological risks. This is yet another overblown worry. Democrats and other environmental naysayers cite the 80,000 barrels that spilled six miles off of Santa Barbara, Calif., inundating beaches and aquatic life. This hydrocarbon Hindenburg haunts...

Barack Obama's visits to the Israeli town of Sderot, which was struck by Palestinian rocket attacks, and the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial are smart moves. They underline that he stands, beyond any doubt, in solidarity with Israel against "terrorism". You assume that it is smart to exploit the suffering and death of millions of Jews in the Holocaust for Israeli and/or American political goals. But how does his visit to Sderot square with any solidarity with the decades-long dispossessed, oppressed and occupied Palestinians? Well, that is why he visited Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, and Salam Fayyad, the Palestinian prime...

In a stunning upset, Barack Obama this week won the Iraq primary. When Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki not once but several times expressed support for a U.S. troop withdrawal on a timetable that accorded roughly with Obama's 16-month proposal, he not only legitimized the plan. He relieved Obama of a major political liability by blunting the charge that, in order to appease the MoveOn left, Obama was willing to jeopardize the astonishing success of the surge and risk losing a war that is finally being won. Maliki's endorsement left the McCain campaign and the Bush administration deeply discomfited. They underestimated...

It was as if the fates had conspired to give Barack Obama the kind of foreign affairs photo-op that a campaign manager would only see in his wildest dreams. Damp, gray Berlin was alive with bright sunshine. A crowd police estimated at more than 200,000 filled the heart of the city. They cheered not only when he talked about global warming or called for a world without nuclear weapons, but also when he spoke of the fight against terrorism and the need for Europe to remain engaged in Afghanistan and Iraq. "In Europe, the view that America is part of...

Sen. Barack Obama claims there has been only a "shift in emphasis," not "wild shifts," in his political positions. Many already know the list: Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, NAFTA, public financing of campaigns, abortion, gay marriage, Social Security taxes, the death penalty and negotiating with rogue nations.Possibly one of the more remarkable changes has been his position on guns. But despite Obama's recent concession on "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer" that there has been a "shift in emphasis" on various issues, on guns he held firm: "You mentioned the gun position. I've been talking about the Second Amendment being an...

Media: The gaffes Barack Obama has committed would have crushed the typical Republican politician. But the reporters who can't get over Dan Quayle's misspelling of "potato" have little to say about their man's slip-ups.Sometimes it's hard to tell if Obama is really fouling up or simply puffed up when he tries to live up to his media-fed image as a leader ready for prime time. Consider his claim during a news conference Wednesday in Israel that "just this past week, we passed out of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, which is my committee, a bill to call for divestment from...

Georgetown, S.C — "What’s this guy running for, ‘Emperor of the world?’” asked the sunburned fellow at the next table where we stopped for lunch. Mr. Sunburn was holding a copy of The Charleston Post and Courier and pointing to a headline, “Obama pledges to work for peace.” The inquiry, addressed to those sitting beside him elicited only shrugs, so he answered his own question: “Just doesn’t make any sense to me.” The Obama machine’s, “Hope & Change World Tour” has left more than a few people perplexed. Some – like the gentleman beside us at the restaurant – are...

When the media start backing away from supporting a candidate or a cause, read it as a sign the media elite understand the public is seeing through the media's neutrality ruse. MSNBC's coverage of Sen. Barack Obama's trip abroad streamed online shows one commentator waxing poetic about the senator's rave visuals. Another equally valid interpretation of the video of Obama shooting hoops with the troops is that it made him look less credible as a world leader, not more. A second commentator in the segment takes a deep breath, steps back and states that the Obama campaign has manipulated media...

Islamofascism: A new study confirms our "ally" Saudi Arabia is still poisoning young Muslim minds with anti-Western textbooks. So? Its hate-filled graduates are enrolling at our colleges.The Hudson Institute reviewed the 2007-08 textbooks distributed by the Saudi Ministry of Education and found that, despite promised reforms, the kingdom still teaches students to "hate the infidels." The texts assert that it's "permissible" for a Muslim to kill an "apostate," an "adulterer," a "homosexual," as well as non-Muslims practicing "polytheism," or Christianity. The violent ideology is introduced in a religion textbook in the first grade and reinforced and developed in following years...

Here are some questions that Katie Couric, Brian Williams and Charles Gibson should be asking Barack Obama as they follow him on his trip: Q: Before your trip to Iraq, you said that you intend to give the military a "new mission" — all of the combat troops withdrawn within 16 months. Why bother traveling to Iraq and consulting with commanders on the ground, if you've already decided on a new mission? Q: In 2004, you called it unwise to announce a timetable. By 2008, however, you announce a 16-month timetable. Only a few days ago, your top campaign strategist...

Energy: It has become something of an article of faith among those who oppose drilling in the Arctic that it's too much trouble for too little oil. Well, how about 90 billion barrels of oil? Too little for you?That's how much oil is estimated to be in the Arctic region, with at least a third of it under sovereign U.S. territory, according to a new study by the U.S. Geological Survey. Put into perspective, the U.S. "official" estimate for total oil reserves is 21 billion barrels. So by putting our Arctic resources into play, we would more than double our...

Campaign '08:<.b> Presidents Kennedy and Reagan both visited Berlin to champion freedom against its 20th century enemies. Barack Obama just showed Berliners no understanding of the 21st century's threats to liberty.At nearly 3,000 words, the most hyped speech in the long history of American political campaigns, delivered by Sen. Obama before Berlin's Victory Column on Thursday evening, was longer than both John F. Kennedy's and Ronald Reagan's Berlin speeches. Yet in content and import it was almost meaningless by comparison. "I speak to you not as a candidate for president, but as a citizen," Obama claimed to the massive crowds....

- Jerry Taylor is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. Virtually every claim made by T. Boone Pickens to justify the lavish subsidies he is seeking for his wind energy investments is flat wrong. First, oil imports are not the cause of high gasoline prices. On the contrary, oil imports serve to keep gasoline prices down. After all, we import oil for a reason -- it's cheaper than the domestic alternative. If we were to restrict our energy diet to energy produced in the United States, it would make domestic energy producers (like Mr. Pickens) far richer and energy...

It is axiomatic that a knowledge of history is a prerequisite for understanding the present. But the question is: How much weight should we give to controversial figures from the past when deciding how to think about current conflicts? According to the authors of a new book about the grand mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini (1893-1974), a man who played a key role in fomenting and exacerbating the struggle between Jews and Arabs during much of the 20th century, the answer is quite a lot. The book, Icon of Evil: Hitler’s Mufti and the Rise of Radical Islam, by...

Words come and words go. Some disappear completely, while others vanish into the jargon of our vocabulary. Few succeed in capturing center stage in our consciousness. One that has succeeded is a four-letter word that embellishes countless monuments, organizations, billboards and publications. Its sound enlivens the soul, its melody softens the heart. The word? H-O-P-E. “Hope is a waking dream,” Aristotle famously said. Indeed, hope can pull a person from the agonies of despair. Yet its essential meaning remains unclear. Is hope a realistic thought or a mere fantasy? Is it a pragmatic idea or a wishful illusion? Our sages...

RUSH: Cookie is working on a couple of audio sound bites and Drive-By Media reaction to the Messiah's speech in Germany. I have an idea what she's going to send. I never know what she's going to send unless I specifically asked for it. But Cookie is so good I seldom have to ask for it. I get what I want anyway. Now, one thing about this speech. I'll wait until we get the bites and see if what I'm expecting in these, citizen of the world stuff. When he started talking about that, that's when the red flags went...