Reality sets in…. for some people anyway.

TW 

by NY Times columnist Maureen Dowd

On 9/11, President Bush learned of disaster while reading “The Pet Goat” to grade-school kids. On Tuesday, President Obama escaped from disaster by reading “The Moon Over Star” to grade-school kids.

“We were just tired of being in the White House,” the two-week-old president, with Michelle at his side, explained to students at a public charter school near the White House.

Even as he told the children his favorite superheroes were Batman and Spider-Man, his own dream of being the superhero who swoops in to swiftly save America was going SPLAT!

It just ain’t that easy.

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Obama is going to have a tough time getting the bipartisanship in the House that he wants. “The Bush standard for bipartisanship, as enunciated by former Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, was inclusion of a single Democrat on a bill. Obama may ultimately have to adhere to a similar standard…”

By Keith Koffler
From Roll Call

Former President George W. Bush, fresh from re-election in 2004, was preparing to launch his massive bid to overhaul Social Security with individual accounts carved out of the system. But some Republican leaders were wary. They dispatched staffers to advise Bush aides that jumping onto the third rail of U.S. politics was not a popular idea among segments of the GOP caucus, and that it might not pass. Better to do immigration reform first.

Word soon came back: Bush would move right ahead with Social Security. By the end of 2005, Bush had squandered huge piles of political capital on a legislative effort that never even got out of committee. And by the time he got around to seeking changes in immigration policy, he had too little mojo left on Capitol Hill to push his plans through.

For some Republicans, it was another example of a consistent imperiousness toward Capitol Hill exhibited by the Bush administration. They had gone to bat for Bush numerous times, ramming massive tax cuts through in 2001 and convincing many Congressional Republicans to go against their principles and support adding a huge new prescription drug benefit to Medicare. No matter. The White House still seemed to be marching mainly to its own drumbeat.

While Bush had his share of legislative victories, President Barack Obama clearly believes he can do better by replacing “my way or the highway” with “reach out and touch.” As president-elect, he made three trips to Capitol Hill before placing his hand on Lincoln’s Bible and being sworn in as president. He has regularly lit up the phone lines on Capitol Hill, personally lobbying and schmoozing with dozens of legislators as he works to set his agenda, find support for his nominees, and move stimulus and financial bailout bills through Congress. Bush, on the other hand, frequently had to be cajoled onto the phone by aides to sway a few last votes.

Perhaps none of Obama’s Congressional courtships has been more significant than that of Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine). Her opposition to Bush’s Social Security effort was a major factor in it never getting off the ground. As then-Finance Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) tried to drum up at least a bare majority on his panel for the legislation, Snowe could be seen walking the halls shaking her head, saying she just could not support private accounts. The White House was not happy. If Bush political guru Karl Rove lost more hair during the course of the administration, it’s a safe bet he pulled some of it because of Olympia Snowe.

Today, Snowe clearly feels that Obama is already doing more to reach out to her than Bush ever did. “I think it’s significant — the outreach and the willingness to initiate conversation is critical given the urgency of the times,” she said. It’s the best way to get things done, she believes.

Obama must attract moderates such as Snowe in order to realize his goal of generating bipartisanship, according to Congressional officials. The Bush standard for bipartisanship, as enunciated by former Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, was inclusion of a single Democrat on a bill. Obama may ultimately have to adhere to a similar standard, but his best chance of true bipartisanship lies in the middle.

“He’s reached out,” Senate Republican Conference Chairman Lamar Alexander (Tenn.) said. “He’s wise enough to know that success is based on” bipartisanship.

But if Obama wants bipartisanship in the House, he will have to reach further than the center, said one senior Congressional GOP aide. House moderates, this staffer noted, are nearly an extinct species.

Some Republicans believe Obama’s selection of Pastor Rick Warren to offer the invocation at the inauguration transcended the symbolic. Obama’s willingness to put aside his own views and bring in someone whose opinions on homosexuality and other matters are abhorrent to members of the Democratic base shows an unusual willingness to conceive of opposing views as legitimate differences rather than the root of all evil.

Since the move by itself won’t really convince conservatives he likes them and has antagonized Democrats, the only thing it may show is the nature of Obama’s approach. Genuineness may be the key to GOP hearts.

“Barack Obama pretty much treats everyone the same,” said Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), one of a handful of lawmakers on Capitol Hill who know him best.

But, if his motives are genuine, Republicans and Democrats may have to enter into a kind of couples’ therapy to change the way they treat each other. And their relationship has been bad news for a long, long time.

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So…. OBAMA has begun… his lies during the campaign are being opened… by OBAMA himself… He actually DOES have Muslim relatives… we can actually use HIS middle name now… (with written permission of course)

Read on below… It has only begun…

From National Post :

During the U.S presidential campaign, Barack Obama’s handlers vigourously pointed out his Christian faith whenever the misconception arose he may be Muslim (even though the politically correct response should have been his religion doesn’t matter).

The handlers also roundly denounced any conservative commentator who might mention (mischievously, admittedly) his Arabic middle name, Hussein.

They charged that such usage was “fear mongering.”

Once elected, however, he personally insisted on his middle name being spoken at his swearing-in ceremony. Continue Reading »

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Gary Markstein has put out a great cartoon that shows exactly what the new White House is shaping up to be.
It will be nothing more than the same old politics.

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Ed Lasky, at American Thinker:
Aluf Benn, the well-regarded correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, is reporting that the incoming Obama administration intends to offer Israel a “nuclear umbrella” to protect that nation from any nuclear attack launched by Iran. This might initially be perceived as being a positive development. Israel is a close ally, surrounded by adversaries intent on its destruction. Foremost among these enemies is Iran whose budding nuclear program continues apace in the face of dithering diplomacy and weak sanctions (when they are even enforced). Hillary Clinton’s campaign vow to destroy Iran should that nation launch a nuclear strike was well-received because it was believed that such a promise, so starkly made, would have a deterrent effect.

However, Benn notes problems with the offer:

But America’s nuclear guarantee to Israel could also be interpreted as a sign the U.S. believes Iran will eventually acquire nuclear arms.
 Granting Israel a nuclear guarantee essentially suggests the U.S. is willing to come to terms with a nuclear Iran. For its part, Israel opposes any such development and similar opposition was voiced by officials in the outgoing Bush administration.“What is the significance of such guarantee when it comes from those who hesitated to deal with a non-nuclear Iran?? asked a senior Israeli security source. “What kind of credibility would this [guarantee have] when Iran is nuclear capable?”

The same source noted that the fact that there is talk about the possibility of a nuclear Iran undermines efforts to prevent Tehran from acquiring such arms.

A senior Bush administration source said that the proposal for an American nuclear umbrella for Israel was ridiculous and lacked credibility. “Who will convince the citizen in Kansas that the U.S. needs to get mixed up in a nuclear war because Haifa was bombed? And what is the point of an American response, after Israel’s cities are destroyed in an Iranian nuclear strike?”

Benn and the experts he quotes are correct. Offering such an umbrella is a tacit sign that America has given up on preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear arms. This acceptance-or resignation-will only prompt other nations to cool their own efforts to strengthen sanctions. The French President Nicolas Sarkozy  reportedly has already expressed misgivings towards Barack Obama’s approach towards Iran. Other nations and companies in Europe are eager to strengthen business ties with the Iranian regime (in May the leader of the giant Austrian energy company OMV stated that it was eager to do business with Iran once a new administration was in Washington, D.C.).
Israelis — and Jews — have learned the hard way that trusting the good intentions of others is not a way to ensure survival. The world averted its eyes and closed its borders during the Nazi years. Result: 6 million Jews died. The UN offered numerous guarantees to Israel throughout its short life (among them, that it would protect navigation through the Straits of Tiran before the 1967 War: it did not: the UN placed forces between Israel and Egypt to prevent war from breaking out before 1967. When Egypt asked for these troops to be removed, the UN obeyed with alacrity-placing Israel in a perilous position; the list is endless of the broken promises made by others to Israel over the years).
Israelis are understandably reluctant to place the security of its citizens in the hands of others (this is the reason they have foresworn any other nation’s soldiers  fighting on behalf of Israel).  The idea of extending a nuclear umbrella may be hard to reconcile the pledge made by Senator Obama on the campaign trail when he pledged to maintain Israel’s qualitative military advantage:

One can think of a few other problems not broached by Benn.
Israelis will lose flexibility if it relies on American power to deal with its adversaries. Will America be able to confront Israel and coerce Israel to follow its policies because America has extended the “nuclear umbrella”? Will America prevent Israel from attacking Iran?
One more risk should be considered.
If such a “nuclear umbrella” is extended over Israel, will there be calls for Israel to give up its own nuclear arsenal? People who have advised Barack Obama have blamed Israel’s nuclear program for proliferation by other nations in the region and believe that stripping Israel of its own nuclear deterrent would lead other nations to disavow nuclear arms. Barack Obama’s goal of a nuclear arms-free world would comport with this view.
The Arab world and the International Atomic Energy Agency have long campaigned for pressure to be exerted to strip Israel of its nuclear weapons (Israel is under no obligation to do so because it never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty). The diplomats have complained that American acquiescence of a nuclear-armed Israel is a double standard that harms our image abroad and frustrates nuclear non-proliferation efforts. They would be ecstatic at the prospect of Israel being compelled to strip itself of its one defense against another Holocaust.
A hypothetical (hopefully, only a hypothetical) should also be considered. What if nuclear weapons are smuggled into Israel or launched from Gaza or Lebanon? There are no contrails that lead back to rocket launching sites in Iran — no return addresses with a Persian moniker.
What then? Will Israel have a policy that any nuclear attack presumably is the responsibility of Iran and that Israel will take appropriate measures to retaliate? That provides a level of security. Would such a policy be followed by America?

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From American Thinker:

Thanksgiving week marked the first challenge to the presidency of Barack Obama since the donut completed its rise on Election Day last month.

Anyone who thinks I’m rushing the advent of the messianic presidency is invited to take a closer look at recent media coverage. Obama has declared himself president in all but name. He has gone so far as to call for his policies to be put in place even before being inaugurated. The mass media, from Time magazine to barely-hanging-on fish wrappers like the Detroit Free Press have declared the current incumbent to be irrelevant, the “lamest of lame ducks”, in the words of Joe Klein. Numerous suggestions have been made that he either be run out of Washington or forced to resign to make way for the Obamiate. The rest of the world is shouting hosannas to the new age of Barack well before the kickoff date. Expatriate Americans are no longer being rolled in front of buses in European capitals, a trend unprecedented since the weeks following VE Day.
So it’s no surprise that the Jihadis have taken O at his word. As the massacre in Bombay unfolded, (I’ll change usage on that name when the Times of London does) the killers made a particular effort to locate American and British victims. Most of these were evidently murdered out of hand. Make no mistake; the attack had one target, and one target alone: America’s acting president-elect. The Australian’s Greg Sheridan stole the words right out of this machine when he wrote:

“During the US presidential campaign, Joe Biden said that the US’s enemies would challenge Obama in the first months of his presidency. Biden’s prediction has come true sooner than even he expected.”

And what was the PE’s response? On Wednesday, as the slaughter commenced, he was “handing out turkeys to the poor” in Chicago, and explaining that his daughters would be “required to do chores in the White House”. According to Indian media reports he at one point or another said that he “supported” Indian efforts against terror, a statement which could kindly be best characterized as “boilerplate”.

His supporters, of course, will insist that nothing more is required of him. And under normal circumstances, with a normal president-elect, they’d be quite correct. But Obama is neither. You can’t have it both ways; you cannot run around posing as president-in-being, demand that your policies be adapted by the incumbent, and all but encouraging your following in their attacks on the current administration, and then duck the first challenge the world throws your way.
There are any number of things O could have done. He could have gotten on the phone with a rep of the Indian government. He could have done the same with the White House. He could have made a personal, public statement. He could have outlined what he plans to do when — and not if — such attacks occur in American cities. But he did none of this. Instead, he sent out a spokesman. He ducked his first challenge, the same as he did the financial meltdown in the last stages of the campaign. Whatever might be said of John McCain’s response back then, it was a response. Mac was acting the way you’d expect a president to act. Obama, on the other hand, had to be dragged off the campaign trail while displaying all the gravitas of a pouting schoolboy. This is the kind of action that we — that small minority who made the effort of looking behind the “messiah” template — have come to expect.
And the kind of action that represents the upcoming Obama administration in a nutshell. It is to be a ritual presidency. Plenty of pomp, plenty of ceremony, plenty of rhetoric, and very little else. Problems that possess any form of glamour will get as many words thrown at them as O can pull together. Problems that no human being in history has dared contemplate will be given serious consideration by the messiah-elect — on the rhetorical level. But problems that have to be handled, have to be confronted in one way or another, problems that at the same time present a possibility of failure — such as terrorists mowing down Americans on distant shores — will not even be so much as acknowledged, not by the president, his administration, his party, or the media. In the same sense as occurred with the campaign, this will be an image presidency, to an extent that will make even the previous image champ Bill Clinton’s jaw drop open in sheer disbelief.
It will make for an interesting interlude. We have had image governors before — Jerry Brown and Mario Cuomo jump immediately to mind — along with image mayors in cities such as New York and Detroit, to mention only two metropolises out of dozens. Typically, these politicians inherited problems so enormous, complex, and overwhelming that they, usually no more competent than they had to be and representing a liberal ideology long on promises and short on performance, had no means whatsoever of addressing. So instead they threw around a lot of rhetoric (Cuomo), or fiddled with projects with no conceivable relevance to their actual situation (Brown’s space colonies), and kicked the can down the road.
Of course, much of this occurred over a generation ago, and we’ve become so used to people who get things done, such as Rudy Giuliani and the current anti-president, that we’ve begun to take such individuals for granted and treat them with impatience, if not open disdain. It’s as if they’re a dime a dozen, that there’s a constant supply available, a barrel full of capable pols somewhere in the back of the national warehouse that can be rolled out and opened up any time a crisis arrives. 
This is not necessarily the case, as a short glance at recent history will reveal. From roughly 1960 to 1980 there was scarcely a single politician in an executive position in this country who could be trusted to successfully tie his shoes as much as twice in a row. We lived through two entire decades of fancy prose, expansive ideas, grandiose programs, and zero performance. LBJ, Lindsey, Brown, Carter  — a generation-long roll call of ineptness. We’ve lost sight of exactly how incompetent politicians can be. If nothing else, O will change that.
Obama will be an image president because he does not have much choice. Simply put, he cannot provide what he promised during the campaign.
Social revolution is what the true believers, Obama’s core, were voting for. The middle class was voting for some vague sense of security, but the core — the sandal-wearers, the ACORN staffers, the Jeremiah Wright congregation, and every last student of Ayers and Dohrn over the past twenty years — are looking forward to some unimaginable combination of Woodstock, the October Revolution, the Book of Revelation, and the Barnum & Bailey Circus. A new world in which there are no Republicans, guns, Bibles, or Israelis, in which planning and collectivization work, in which there is such a thing as cheap, effective, and universal health care, in which Al Queda simply want to be good neighbors, in which their own varicose veins, incipient arthritis, and extra ten pounds around the middle have simply gone away, and in which Jerry Garcia never died.
That, purely and simply, is what they voted for. That’s what they want, and they will be satisfied with nothing less. So the question of the day is: can Obama provide this? I have my doubts. In fact, I will put my reputation on the line to state that no given combination of Jehovah, George Washington, the Maharishi, and the Good Witch of the West would be able to bring it to life. And Obama, furthermore, is well aware of this, which is why his staff has taken pains to “temper expectations“ 
The New Eden is on hold, and the true believers are going to have to live with that. They are not going to like it.
More rational heads will be satisfied with the New New Deal, some kind of rationalized, collectivist way out of our current economic dilemma. Apart from the fact that the old New Deal didn’t work particularly well (anyone who doubts this can consult Amity Shlaes’ The Forgotten Man), there’s the simple truth that no one has any clear idea what such a scheme would look like. FDR’s Brain Trusters knew exactly what they wanted: to transplant Mussolini’s corporatist economic system root and branch to this country.
But the economic staff O has selected are by no means ideologues of the Tugwell, Berle, and Hopkins school. Summers, Geithner, and Romer are technicians, best suited to maintaining the machinery while the system rights itself. In our state of economic knowledge, this is very likely the best we can do. Despite himself, Obama is going to oversee a conventional recovery. There will be no massive economic revolution remaking the entire country.
(I’m aware that several commentators think otherwise, including Thomas Sowell, Mark Steyn, and Daniel Henninger. These writers speak of a ratchet effect — a “point of no return” in which Obama’s actions will guarantee that the U.S. slides down the same social-democratic chute as Europe, to end up in much the same state — economic stasis, social disintegration, military nullity, with a falling birthrate and the Jihadis snickering in the new mosque next to the Mickey D’s.
Now these three are all men of respect — they are among the true elite who will never be accused of being RINOs. But I still think they’re mistaken. Their thesis appears to be based on the belief that the election embodied a serious national shift leftward. No such shift occurred. Evidence such as the votes against gay marriage and adoption clearly demonstrate the U.S. remains in essence a center-right nation. Obama took the laurels this year not due to any sea-change in the electorate, but because the discouraged center-right simply didn’t bother to show up this time around. More on that in a later piece.)
Down the ladder from the impossible to the merely very difficult, we have the prospect of various programs dear to the liberal heart, such as universal health care, a nationwide gun ban, the fairness doctrine, and the like. Obama has suggested that he will bring certain unnamed programs into existence by use of “executive orders”, which suggests that he’s not quite clear in his mind concerning the limitations of the office he was elected to. Any such attempt to shanghai policy — even to the benefit of the progressive program in general — is going to come up immediately against legislative and judicial prerogatives that O probably has no idea even exist. It would be pleasant to think that next Spring will see the Democratic congressional leadership itself spearheading the fight against White House attempts to hijack the legislature’s role, but since such an event would be a form of trouble, something that O has demonstrated himself desperate to avoid under all circumstances, it’s unlikely to happen.
This leaves few apparent alternatives for the would-be American Augustus. But a conventional presidency will not satisfy Obama’s messianic urges. So we will get ritualism instead. What form this will take remains to be seen. We have already witnessed the social-realist posters, the chanting Obama Youth, the hand gestures, and all the other examples of pure cultism. We will no doubt see plenty more of the same.
Will anything more serious ensue? The cult-oriented leader — the demagogue, not to put too fine a point on it — has several possibilities in his bag of tricks. The most promising of these, once all else fails, is the “enemy” stratagem. O may very well stoop to this. Such a move will be far from unprecedented. Recall Bill Clinton blaming the Oklahoma City bombing on Rush Limbaugh in the mid-90s. Obama would simply be following a fine liberal tradition.
But — as Big Bill himself discovered — something exists in this country today that did not exist in earlier periods of liberal supremacy — a healthy conservative movement. Liberals seem to have taken McCain’s defeat as a sign that conservatism is “over”. They will be enlightened in short order. As soon as the wavering members of the Northeastern elite complete their second thoughts and clamber over to the other side (David Brooks and Kathleen Parker have already reached the top of the fence), the movement will be once again unified, as it has not been since the days shortly following 9/11. Once unified, it will be formidable.
If O attempts a direct confrontation — and his disciples will demand it — he will learn, as Jimmy Carter did in 1978 when he moved against the Southern evangelicals, that in America one does not attack religion, motherhood, apple pie, or (in the millennial context) talk radio and the blogosphere. Carter’s error resulted in the creation of the religious right, liberalism’s deepest nightmare. What an equivalent error on Obama’s part would give issue to is worth speculation. Liberalism has a record of creating problems for itself — and opportunities for conservatives — through such abuses of power. So we should welcome efforts such as the “fairness” doctrine, universal abortion liberalization, even an attempt at creating an Alpha-Omega private army. As occurred in 1964, 1978, and 1993, such gratuitous kicks will serve to bring conservatism back to life, and in doing so will go a long way toward setting the political dynamic for the coming decade.
(O has already taken a step in that direction with his foolish and purposeless alienation of the Catholic bishops.One annoys the oldest and largest organization in human history at one’s peril. Obama is going to regret that move.)
So Obama cannot create a new Eden. He cannot revamp the old New Deal with a hybrid engine and make it work, any more than FDR could in the first place. He cannot make the right-of-center goblins disappear. He cannot even make the seas stop rising, sad to say, since available evidence suggests that this took place sometime during Bill Clinton’s last term.
So, solid achievements being out of reach, it will be a ritual administration, devoted to imagery and pantomime. Which will suit Obama just fine, because that’s life as he has lived it, shifting from one role to the next as soon as the old one began to make concrete demands on his time and energy. Community organizer, journal editor, author, state representative, senator, and now president — in every role Obama found ever-larger numbers gullible enough to swallow his act.
But there is one group that will never be that gullible, and they were heard from last Thanksgiving week. Bombay has proven, against all rhetoric over the past two years, that the Jihadis are still alive, and still capable of massacre. They have now tested Obama, and have found him not so much wanting as scarcely there, no more cognizant of the threat than the Clintons before him. Today they can only hit the subcontinent, but give them a year or two with FISA and the Patriot Act either canceled or curtailed, facing a demoralized intelligence establishment and an elephantine Homeland Defense bureaucracy, two years of a comic-opera Clinton State Department, and they will be back in force.
Bombay marks the beginning of the second phase of the War on Terror. The messiah’s new era will be defined, the same as the old one, by terrorism. The long line of presidents entangled in the Jihadi’s war — Carter, Reagan, Clinton, and Bush.– will be extended by one. And when the second holiday from history comes to an end, Obama will, in lieu of any other alternative, be forced to fall back on the policies of the lamest of lame ducks. And the story, in every respect, will have come full circle.J.R. Dunn is consulting editor of American Thinker.

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We mentioned this issue way back in July, and it is still coming up.

Here is some more info from American Thinker:

Does this Barack Obama birth certificate issue bug you because, although improbable, it’s possible that he’s not a natural born citizen, isn’t eligible to be President under the Constitution, and this issue could be bigger than Watergate — or any other “gate” in history?
 

Are you afraid that if you were even to raise the subject with your friends that they will think you wear a tinfoil hat, because Factcheck.org, the final arbiter of truth in the universe, said so?
 

Are you with the news media, and after spending so much money to get Barack Obama elected, you’d hate to ruin your investment?
 

Are you a talk radio host who thinks that if you say the burden of proof needed to demonstrate one is eligible to be Commander in Chief should be at least as high as, oh, say, the level to be eligible for Hawaiian homestead status (see 1.F. below), that you’d be forced to give equal time to someone who disagrees?
 

Are you a conservative, libertarian, or any conscientious constitutionalist from any ideological side of life, who’s convinced something’s not right, but you’re afraid your reputation might be tarnished because, after all, this could be one big Saul-Alinsky-style set-up, and the joke would be on you?
 

Fear not!  Joe the Farmer has prepared an outline showing that no matter how this issue is ultimately resolved, you have legitimate concerns, and that Barack Obama should, simply out of respect for the nation he was elected to lead, disclose the sealed vault copy of his birth certificate.
 

Given the circumstances, if Barack Obama respected this nation, he would prove it by the simplest and easiest of gestures - unless, of course, all this talk about change and hope was just a bunch of bull, and he’s just “another politician.”  Here’s the outline:
 

1.  Under Hawaiian law, it is possible (both legally and illegally) for a person to have been born out of state, yet have a birth certificate on file in the Department of Health.
 

A. From Hawaii’s official Department of Health, Vital Records webpage: “Amended certificates of birth may be prepared and filed with the Department of Health, as provided by law, for 1) a person born in Hawaii who already has a birth certificate filed with the Department of Health or 2) a person born in a foreign country“ (applies to adopted children). 
B. A parent may register an in-state birth in lieu of certification by a hospital of birth under HRS 338-5.
C. Hawaiian law expressly provides for registration of out-of-state births under HRS 338-17.8.  A foreign birth presumably would have been recorded by the American consular of the country of birth, and presumably that would be reflected on the Hawaiian birth certificate.
D. Hawaiian law, however, expressly acknowledges that its system is subject to error.  See, for example, HRS 338-17.
E. Hawaiian law expressly provides for verification in lieu of certified copy of a birth certificate under HRS 338-14.3.
F. Even the Hawaii Department of Home Lands does not accept a certified copy of a birth certificate as conclusive evidence for its homestead program.  From its web site:  “In order to process your application, DHHL utilizes information that is found only on the original Certificate of Live Birth, which is either black or green. This is a more complete record of your birth than the Certification of Live Birth (a computer-generated printout). Submitting the original Certificate of Live Birth will save you time and money since the computer-generated Certification requires additional verification by DHHL.”

 

2.  Contrary to what you may have read, no document made available to the public, nor any statement by Hawaiian officials, evidences conclusively that Obama was born in Hawaii.
 

A. Associated Press reported about a statement of Hawaii Health Department Director Dr. Fukino, “State declares Obama birth certificate genuine.”
B. That October 31, 2008 statement says that Dr. Fukino “ha[s] personally seen and verified that the Hawai’i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama’s original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures.“  That statement does not, however, verify that Obama was born in Hawaii, and as explained above, under Hawaiian policies and procedures it is quite possible that Hawaii may have a birth record of a person not born in Hawaii.  Unlikely, but possible.
C.  The document that the Obama campaign released to the public is a certified copy of Obama’s birth record, which is not the best evidence since, even under Hawaiian law, the original vault copy is the better evidence.  Presumably, the vault record would show whether his birth was registered by a hospital in Hawaii.
D. Without accusing anyone of any wrongdoing, we nevertheless know that some people have gone to great lengths, even in violation of laws, rules and procedures, to confer the many benefits of United States citizenship on themselves and their children.  Given the structure of the Hawaiian law, the fact that a parent may register a birth, and the limited but inherent potential for human error within the system, it is possible that a parent of a child born out-of-state could have registered that birth to confer the benefits of U.S. citizenship, or simply to avoid bureaucratic hassles at that time or later in the child’s life. 

 

1. We don’t know whether the standards of registration by the Department of Health were more or less stringent in 1961 (the year of Obama’s birth) than they are today.  However, especially with post-9/11 scrutiny, we do know that there have been instances of fraudulent registrations of foreign births as American births.
2. From a 2004 Department of Justice news release about multiple New Jersey vital statistics employees engaged in schemes to issue birth certificates to foreign-born individuals:  “An individual who paid Anderson and her co-conspirators for the service of creating the false birth records could then go to Office of Vital Statistics to receive a birth certificate . . . As part of the investigation, federal agents executed a search warrant of the HCOVS on Feb. 18, 2004, which resulted in the seizure of hundreds of suspect Certificates of Live Birth which falsely indicated that the named individuals were born in Jersey City, when in fact, they were born outside the United States and were in the United States illegally . . . Bhutta purchased from Goswamy false birth certificates for himself and his three foreign-born children.”
3.  Even before 9/11, government officials acknowledged the “ease” of obtaining birth certificates fraudulently.  From 1999 testimony by one Social Security Administration official:  “Furthermore, the identity data contained in Social Security records are only as reliable as the evidence on which the data are based. The documents that a card applicant must present to establish age, identity, and citizenship, usually a birth certificate and immigration documents-are relatively easy to alter, counterfeit, or obtain fraudulently.”

 

3.  It has been reported that the Kenyan government has sealed Obama’s records.  If he were born in Kenya, as has been rumored even recently, the Kenyan government would certainly have many incentives to keep that undisclosed.  Objectively, of course, those records may prove nothing.  Obama’s refusal to release records at many levels here in the United States, though, merely fuels speculation.
 

4.  Obama has refused to disclose the vault copy of his Hawaiian birth certificate.  This raises the question whether he himself has established that he is eligible to be President.  To date, no state or federal election official, nor any government authority, has verified that he ever established conclusively that he meets the eligibility standard under the Constitution.  If the burden of proof were on him, perhaps as it should be for the highest office of any individual in America, the more-than-dozen lawsuits challenging his eligibility would be unnecessary.
 

A. Had he disclosed his vault copy in the Berg v. Obama lawsuit (which was the first lawsuit filed on the question of his eligibility to be President), and it was established he was born in Hawaii, that would have constituted res judicata, and acted to stop other similar lawsuits being filed.  Without res judicata (meaning, the matter is adjudged and settled conclusively) he or government officials will need to defend other lawsuits, and valuable court resources will be expended.  Strategically from a legal standpoint, therefore, his refusal to disclose doesn’t make sense.  Weighing factors such as costs, resources and complexity of disclosing versus not disclosing, he must have reason of considerable downside in disclosing, or upside in not disclosing.  There may be other reasons, but one could speculate that he hasn’t disclosed because:

 

1. He was not born in Hawaii, and may not be eligible to be President;
2. He was born in Hawaii, but facts that may be derived from his vault copy birth certificate are inconsistent with the life story he has told (and sold);
3. He was born in Hawaii, and his refusal to provide the best evidence that he is a natural born citizen is a means by which to draw criticism of him in order to make him appear to be a “victim.”  This would energize his supporters.  This would also make other charges about him seem suspect, including his concealment about ties to Bill Ayers and others of some infamy.  Such a clever yet distasteful tactic would seem to be a Machiavelli- and Saul-Alinsky-style way to manipulate public opinion.  But while this tactic may energize his supporters, it would convince those who believe him to be a manipulator that he’s not only just that, but a real pro at it.  This would indeed be the basest reason of all, and would have repercussions about his trustworthiness (both here and abroad), which Americans know, is a characteristic sorely lacking in its leaders.

 

B. His motion to dismiss the Berg case for lack of standing could be viewed as contemptuous of the Constitution.  See, “Who Enforces the Constitution’s Natural Born Citizen Clause?“  Are we to expect yet another White House that hides behind lawyers, and expects Americans to swallow half-truths on a just-trust-me basis?
C. This issue poses the potential for a constitutional crisis unlike anything this country has seen.  Disclosure at this stage, however, could even result in criminal sanctions.  See, “Obama Must Stand Up Now Or Step Down.” Thus, he has motive not to disclose if he were ineligible.

 

The question not being asked by the holders of power, who dismiss this as a rightwing conspiracy, is what’s the downside of disclosing?  This is a legitimate issue of inquiry because Barack Obama has turned it into one.  The growing number of people who demand an answer in conformance with the Constitution are doing their work; the people’s watchdogs aren’t.
 

The pen name Joe the Farmer pays tribute to Joe the Plumber, who had the audacity to ask a question.

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Is that a question you want answered? Do you think you know the answer? We sure don’t! Look at who he is appointing! Obama’s has been going around saying “We need change, we want change”. All people I talked that were pro-Obama would tell me, “You see, Obama is not corrupted by Washington politics yet, so he is a better choice.” Well, after looking at who Obama is appointing to positions, I don’t think he really wants change. (He just wants to make sure that the Clintons are happy). Read the snippet from MSNBC below.

WASHINGTON - President-elect Barack Obama promised the voters change but has started his Cabinet selection process by naming several Washington insiders to top posts.

Obama is enlisting former Senate leader Tom Daschle as his health secretary. Hillary Rodham Clinton seemed more likely than ever to be his secretary of state. Clinton is deciding whether to take that post as America’s top diplomat, her associates said Wednesday.

Obama is ready to announce that his his attorney general will be Eric Holder, the Justice Department’s No. 2 when Clinton’s husband was president. Rahm Emanuel, Obama’s chief of staff , is another veteran of the Clinton White House.

Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano is Obama’s primary choice to be secretary of the Homeland Security Department, several news organizations reported Thursday. The New York Times, citing Democrats with knowledge of the process, said Napolitano was about to be offered the job. The Washington Post also reported that she was Obama’s choice.

Chicago businesswoman Penny Pritzker, who was national finance chairman for Obama’s presidential campaign, is his leading choice for commerce secretary, the Times reported. The newspaper said Pritzker was in the final stages of vetting by Obama’s transition team.

Does that sound like change to you! Not only is he putting Washington insiders in position, he is putting the main people of the Clinton White House BACK IN POSITION!!!! DOES THAT SOUND LIKE CHANGE!!! NO!!!
Sound off in our new poll on the sidebar.

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Obama has made many promises. Do you think he will keep them?

Here are some of what he has said about taxes.

It’s time for change. And let me tell you exactly what that change will look like. Change means a tax code that doesn’t reward the lobbyists who wrote it, but the American workers and seniors and small businesses who deserve it. Take a close look at the tax cuts I’m proposing and the special interest giveaways that my opponent is proposing, because that will tell you everything you need to know about who we’re going to put first as President.

I will cut taxes - cut taxes - for 95 percent of all working Americans.

I will reward work through a “Making Work Pay” tax credit of $500 for American workers and $1,000 for working families. Because when I’m President, we’ll rewrite the tax code to work for the middle class - not Washington lobbyists. That’s change.

I will ease the burden on struggling homeowners through a universal homeowner’s tax credit. This will add up to a 10 percent break off the mortgage interest rate for 10 million households. That’s another $500 each year for most middle class families. That’s change.

I will make sure our seniors can afford to retire with the dignity and security they have earned. That’s why I will eliminate income taxes for seniors making less than $50,000. This will end income taxes for 7 million Americans, at a savings of roughly $1,400 each year. That’s change.

I will make college affordable for every single American who has the talent and drive to go with an annual $4000 tax credit for anyone who commits to 100 hours of public service. You invest in America, and America invests in you - that’s how we’ll make college affordable for every American. That’s change.

I think we need to encourage growth. Senator McCain thinks we need to give $200 billion a year in tax breaks for corporations, but not a single new tax break for small businesses - even though small businesses are the source of 80 percent of the new jobs in our economy. I will eliminate capital gains taxes for the small businesses and start-ups that will create the high-tech, high-wage jobs of tomorrow, and help them afford health insurance for their employees. That’s how America is going to compete. That’s how we’re going to build the middle class. That’s change.

We need a tax code that creates American jobs instead of shipping them overseas. You know, just this week we learned that if an American company creates jobs in the United States, they pay more than twice as much in taxes than if that same company creates jobs in China. So you pay more than twice as much to create jobs in Dover than Shanghai. That’s a direct result of what we’ve gotten from Washington year after year after year, and it’s time for that to change.

My opponent has voted for those tax breaks, and he’ll continue them as President. I will end tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas, and start investing in American jobs and workers.

To pay for these tax cuts, I’ll stand up to special interest carve-outs, close corporate loopholes and offshore tax havens, and ask the wealthiest Americans to give back a portion of the Bush tax cuts. It’s time for folks like me who make over $250,000 to pay our fair share to keep the American promise alive for our children and grandchildren.

When you’re running for four more years of George Bush’s policies, it’s hard to run on your plans. So you make stuff up. You twist facts, and you don’t tell the truth - that’s what John McCain has done when it comes to my tax plan. So let’s be clear about what we are proposing.

My plan - all together - is a net tax cut. My plan will cut taxes to a smaller share of the economy than they were under President Reagan. Under my plan, income taxes for typical American families will be the lowest that they’ve been in more than a half century. Everyone in America - everyone - will pay lower taxes than they would under the rates Bill Clinton had in the 1990s.

Sound good? Yeah, its not bad. But will he keep them? He just promised not to raise taxes, but to actually CUT them for 95% of working people.  (he also wants to increase spending, but that is another story.)

Do you think he will keep his promises to the American people and to the rest of world? If so, we want to know what you think. And if you don’t think he will keep his promises, then we want to know what you think too. Please comment below.  You can also vote in the poll on the sidebar.

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By Pamela Meister 

From American Thinker:

Smokers could soon have a reason to rejoice: President-elect Obama is a smoker who has tried hard to quit the habit but just can’t seem to do it. His addiction could go a long way toward making smoking a fashionable pastime once again. Hey, reliable liberal and Time magazine columnist Michael Kinsley is just fine with The One’s habit. Not only does Obama’s need for nicotine show “he’s not a superman,” but quitting could affect one of his greatest assets: his “steely nerve.”

For decades, smoking has been under attack. While always somewhat of a dirty habit due to the smell and mess (not to mention the health risks that became known back in the 1960s), smoking used to be considered a rite of passage. Even women got in on the act in their quest for equality and while they may continue to carp about “equal pay,” they are certainly closing the gap with men in smoking-related diseases such as heart attack and stroke.
You’ve come a long way, baby.
Those who continue to smoke despite the well-known health risks have gained near pariah status in many places in the United States. In 24 states, smoking is banned in the workplace, including restaurants and bars. Other states have partial bans, a few have no ban at all. In some states, like California, smoking is even banned within 20 feet of any window, door or air intake of government buildings or buildings leased by government agencies. Individual counties and towns have also taken it upon themselves to ban smoking in parks, on beaches, and in apartment and condo buildings.
It’s hard to be a smoker in the 21st century. Full disclosure: I am a former smoker. I’m generally okay with bans in public buildings, but balk a bit at the bans in public outdoor spaces and apartments. Pretty soon, it seems as though while cigarettes themselves will be legal, smoking them will not. Why not go all the way and get it over with?
For years I’ve been calling Obama’s particular brand of confidence chutzpah. My bad. Besides, I thought Obama was the Messiah, not a superman. I guess even modern saviors must be allowed to have their vices. Jesus enjoyed wine; Obama enjoys tobacco. Same diff, right?
You know, Bill Clinton enjoyed cigars. Unfortunately for smokers, that didn’t do much for their cause. But Obama’s cult status could be a boon to not only smokers but to tobacco companies in general.
In Britain, they have a Royal Warrant system wherein the warrants “are a mark of recognition to individuals or companies who have supplied goods or services for at least five years to HM The Queen, HRH The Duke of Edinburgh or HRH The Prince of Wales.” Those products are marked with a royal seal which, one would assume, is a positive marketing tool.
Maybe the new agent of Hope and Change could come up with a similar system. Products that he and the First Family use exclusively could receive The One’s seal - possibly the stylized “O” used during the campaign. Imagine the cigarette brand lucky enough to receive an “O” on its packaging, right next to the Surgeon General’s warning that “Cigarette Smoke Contains Carbon Monoxide.” Since it’s common knowledge these days that Obama can do no wrong, Obama supporters may well rush to the local smoke shop to stock up on Camels, Marlboros, Kool, Benson & Hedges, or whatever brand Obama prefers.
For those who can’t wait to find out, since the press was so efficient at ferreting out all of Sarah Palin’s dirty laundry and airing it during the campaign, finding out which brand Obama smokes should be a cinch.
And all those parents who were proud to have their children sing odes to Obama that were posted on YouTube will just have to suck it up when they discover that their children have taken up the habit of smoking. “Obama does it!” will be their snarky retort. And who can argue with that?
In the meantime, perhaps the government should consider lifting the ban on smoking in federal buildings. After all, the White House is a federal building. You wouldn’t want for our leader to have to suffer the indignity of sneaking out the back door just to grab a quick smoke, would you?

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Well, the next four years will be interesting. We will be keeping this site going for the next four years, and we will see who wins next. With a democratic congress and senate, and president, people will be sick of them by the next election. Though the damage done will be hard to turn around, America is strong, and will rebuild itself, starting as soon as Obama is out of office.

http://www.youvotedforhim.com/

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American Thinker: 

By William Tate 

I have learned how Barack Obama plans to cut taxes for 95% of the public, even though only 60% of people pay income taxes.  The explanation came from a young man calling from an Obama phone bank, one of millions of such calls being made these days.

Before we discussed the tax proposals, the college-age caller informed me that:
-Sarah Palin belongs to a church whose pastor believes in witchcraft, and that she is anti-Semitic.
-Obama will give me government-run health care and will pay for it, and all his other programs, by taxing the rich and corporations. When I pointed out that the wealthy already pay the majority of income taxes, and that corporations don’t really pay taxes, that they — for the most part — simply pass those taxes on to consumers, he sounded confused, as though they were concepts he had never heard before.
-Under Obama’s health plan I will be able to go to any doctor, including the most expensive specialists I can find, and the government will pay for it and all my other medical expenses, no matter how high the cost. Again, paid for by increased taxes only on the rich and corporations.
-After my questions about Obama’s connection to ACORN, and the numerous investigations into widespread ACORN voter fraud, that John McCain was trying to prevent students from voting. His evidence? He had heard that nugget on one Air America talk show. He sincerely believed it to be the moral equivalent to the numerous investigations into ACORN voter fraud.
-McCain’s economic policies would be devastating. When asked if he knew anything about McCain’s proposals, he admitted he did not.
-Obama will hire people to drive down “high” unemployment, although he was unaware of where unemployment current stands (6.1% in September) or that it is low by historical standards.
-Obama will increase employment by giving tax breaks for corporations to bring jobs back to America. When I said my understanding was that the tax break would be $3,000 per job  and asked how many people he thought would be willing to work for $3,000 a year, he said he would. He apparently had no concept of how little money that would be.
-The stock market will tank further if McCain is elected. When I pointed out that the stock market is a forward-looking mechanism, and that at least some of the market’s recent fall has been the result of pricing in an expected Obama victory, he simply continued to maintain the market would fall if McCain is elected.
Finally, I asked the troubling question about how Obama will ensure a tax break for 95% of people–despite the fact that about 40% don’t pay income taxes.  He struggled with that one for a while. Again, it seemed to be a foreign concept to him, like no one had ever raised the subject before.
He stumbled through a series of answers. Obama would “give” the unemployed jobs so that they could pay taxes and get a tax break. When I reminded him that would only account for 6%, he–in a tribute to the American education system–said that Obama was really talking about the 55% difference between 95 and 40. I reminded him that Obama had specified 95%, not 55%. He replied that “Obama didn’t really mean that.” I asked if he, the caller, was really supporting a candidate who lied about something so important?
He told me to wait while he talked to his supervisor. I could overhear bits of a conversation in which he referred to me, rather politely, as “a difficult one.” (At least he didn’t call me THAT one.)
When he returned to the phone, he informed me that Obama would reach the 95% figure by initiating taxes on the 40% who don’t pay income taxes now, so that he could later give them their promised tax break.
Out of the mouths of babes.
I don’t know which is scarier: that the young man knew so little about the policies of the candidate for whom he had volunteered to work, that the young man’s supervisor apparently knew little more, or that the talking heads say that young people like him could determine this election.
The Obama caller was polite and sincere … and utterly clueless.
I thanked him for his sincerity and for a civil discourse on the subject. He thanked me for the same. Then we hung up.
And then he made his next call.
William Tate is an award-winning journalist and author.

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Chicago - My Obama number is one. I know him through our association at the University of Chicago Law School and through mutual friends in the neighborhood. We have had one or two serious substantive discussions, and when I sent him e-mails from time to time in the early days of his Senate term, he always answered in a sensible and thoughtful fashion. And yet, for assessing the course of his likely presidency, I don’t know him at all.

It should come as no surprise that the traditionally liberal Hyde Park community is a veritable hotbed of support for Obama. So my manifest reluctance on his candidacy raises more than a single eyebrow: Loyalty for the home team counts.

The odd point is how his many learned and thoughtful supporters couch their endorsement. Almost without exception, they praise the man, not the program. Their claim is that Obama has proved himself to be a consummate politician who understands that the first principle of holding high office is to get reelected. His natural moderation in tone and demeanor, therefore, translate into getting advisers who know their substantive areas, and listening to them before making any rash moves. The dominant trope is that he will be a pragmatic president who will move in small increments toward the center, not in bold steps toward the left.

But is it all true? The short answer is that nobody knows. Virtually everyone who knows him recognizes that he plays his cards close to the vest, so that you can make your case to him without knowing whether it has registered. At this point, my fear is that the change in office will not lead to a change in his liberal voting record, as reinforced by a hyperactive Democratic platform. My great fear is that a landslide victory will give him solid majorities in both Houses of Congress, so that no stalling tactics by Republicans can slow down his legislative victory procession. At that point his innate pragmatism will line up with his strong left-of-center beliefs on issues that have thus far been muted during the campaign.

Put otherwise, Obama’s vague calls for change that “you can believe in” are, to my thinking, wholly retrograde in their implications. At heart, he is an unreconstructed New Dealer who can see, and articulate, both sides on every question–but only as a prelude to championing the old corporatist agenda with a vengeance.

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It’s no longer an issue about Obama’s tax plan and its effect on a foolish “Average Joe” afflicted with the American Dream disease.  Nope, the issue is the credibility of the one asking The One an uncomfortable question that demonstrated his fragility while temporarily un-cocooned.  After all, it was The One who descended upon Joe the Plumber’s neighborhood, unannounced.

I’d like to think there are tens of millions of Joe the Plumbers out there — men and women — dreaming about working their tails off, of working for themselves.  Obama’s life story illustrates the machinations of a man working his tail off to control the outcome of everyone’s American Dream — and place a target on the back of those that achieve their American Dream. 

Say, Joe the plumber does buy the plumbing business and is successful — $250,000+ per year successful.  Consequently, Joe must be compelled to exhibit his “neighborliness” and “patriotism” by “redistributing” a few thousand dollars more of his income to his next-door neighbors, Sam the slug and Sam’s wife and two children.   After all, Sam deserves a chance to get ahead. 

See, Sam inherited his parent’s modest house and works just enough to hit the sweet spot of the Earned Income Credit — currently a $4,716 “refund” check for 2007 — and then Sam spends the rest of the year drinking beer and watching Jerry Springer while sitting on his couch in his underwear.  Joe the plumber “owes” Sam the slug a few more thousand dollars.  Don’t believe me?  Just ask Obama.

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