4 years ago
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Liberal Left Learning Lesson
In Barack we trust?
Obama campaigned on his personality and judgment and won. Now, like it or not, he isn't beholden to anyone.
By David Sirota
Nov. 29, 2008 Judging by the proliferation of capital letters in the e-mail correspondence I receive, many seem worried that Barack Obama may not deliver the promised "change we can believe in."
After voters rejected the mantra of free trade and deregulation, some of those contacting me say they are upset that Obama is hiring so many free-trading deregulators who birthed today's economic mess.
With the president-elect having touted his opposition to the Iraq war, some are bothered "that Obama's national security team will be dominated by appointees who favored the Iraq invasion and hold hawkish views," as the Los Angeles Times reports.
Others recall Obama's insistence that "change doesn't come from Washington; change comes to Washington," and say they are dismayed that his government will be run by Washington insiders. And still others are confused that Obama championed a progressive platform but, as the Nation's Chris Hayes notes, "not a single, solitary, actual dyed-in-the-wool progressive" has been floated for a major Cabinet position.
To my fearful letter writers, I offer three responses.
First, I counsel not fretting too much yet. Although there is truth to the notion that "personnel is policy," crises can make radicals out of former establishmentarians, and the president-elect's initial declarations imply a boldly progressive agenda. "Remember, Franklin Roosevelt gave no evidence in his prior career that he would lead the dramatic sea change in American politics that he led," says historian Eric Rauchway.
Second, I tell e-mailers they are right to be somewhat distressed, right to ignore Obama loyalists who want them to shut up, and right to speak out. When President Bill Clinton rammed George H.W. Bush's NAFTA through Congress after candidate Clinton pledged not to, he provided ample reason to recollect the saying "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me." And voicing concern is critical. As Frederick Douglass said, "Power concedes nothing without demand."
Finally, I ask my pen pals if they really are shocked.
Despite the election's progressive mandate, Obama is not what Ronald Reagan was to conservatives -- he is not as much the product of a movement as he is a movement unto himself. He figured out that because many "progressive" institutions are merely Democratic Party appendages and not ideological movement forces, he could build his own movement. He succeeded in that endeavor thanks to the nation's Bush-inspired desire for change, his own skills and a celebrity-obsessed culture.
Though many Obama supporters feel strongly about particular issues, and though polling shows the country moving left, the Obama movement undeniably revolves around the president-elect's individual stardom -- and specifically, the faith that he will make good decisions, whatever those decisions are. With that kind of following, Obama likely feels little obligation to hire staff intimately involved in non-Obama movements -- especially those who might challenge a Washington ruling class he may not want to antagonize.
This is the mythic "independence" we're supposed to crave -- a czar who doesn't owe anyone. It is the foreseeable result of the Dear Leader-ism prevalent in foreign autocracies but never paramount in America until now -- and it will have its benefits and drawbacks.
Wielding his campaign's massive e-mail list, the new president could mobilize supporters to press Congress for a new New Deal. Or, he could mobilize that army to blunt pressure on his government for a new New Deal. The point is that Obama alone gets to choose -- that for all the talk of "bottom-up" politics, his movement's structure grants him a top-down power that no previous president had.
For better or worse, that leaves us relying more than ever on our Dear Leader's impulses. Sure, we should be thankful when Dear Leader's whims serve the people -- but also unsurprised when they don't.
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/11/29/obama_choices/index.html?source=newsletter
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Nov. 29, 2008 Judging by the proliferation of capital letters in the e-mail correspondence I receive, many seem worried that Barack Obama may not deliver the promised "change we can believe in."
After voters rejected the mantra of free trade and deregulation, some of those contacting me say they are upset that Obama is hiring so many free-trading deregulators who birthed today's economic mess.
With the president-elect having touted his opposition to the Iraq war, some are bothered "that Obama's national security team will be dominated by appointees who favored the Iraq invasion and hold hawkish views," as the Los Angeles Times reports.
Others recall Obama's insistence that "change doesn't come from Washington; change comes to Washington," and say they are dismayed that his government will be run by Washington insiders. And still others are confused that Obama championed a progressive platform but, as the Nation's Chris Hayes notes, "not a single, solitary, actual dyed-in-the-wool progressive" has been floated for a major Cabinet position.
To my fearful letter writers, I offer three responses.
First, I counsel not fretting too much yet. Although there is truth to the notion that "personnel is policy," crises can make radicals out of former establishmentarians, and the president-elect's initial declarations imply a boldly progressive agenda. "Remember, Franklin Roosevelt gave no evidence in his prior career that he would lead the dramatic sea change in American politics that he led," says historian Eric Rauchway.
Second, I tell e-mailers they are right to be somewhat distressed, right to ignore Obama loyalists who want them to shut up, and right to speak out. When President Bill Clinton rammed George H.W. Bush's NAFTA through Congress after candidate Clinton pledged not to, he provided ample reason to recollect the saying "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me." And voicing concern is critical. As Frederick Douglass said, "Power concedes nothing without demand."
Finally, I ask my pen pals if they really are shocked.
Despite the election's progressive mandate, Obama is not what Ronald Reagan was to conservatives -- he is not as much the product of a movement as he is a movement unto himself. He figured out that because many "progressive" institutions are merely Democratic Party appendages and not ideological movement forces, he could build his own movement. He succeeded in that endeavor thanks to the nation's Bush-inspired desire for change, his own skills and a celebrity-obsessed culture.
Though many Obama supporters feel strongly about particular issues, and though polling shows the country moving left, the Obama movement undeniably revolves around the president-elect's individual stardom -- and specifically, the faith that he will make good decisions, whatever those decisions are. With that kind of following, Obama likely feels little obligation to hire staff intimately involved in non-Obama movements -- especially those who might challenge a Washington ruling class he may not want to antagonize.
This is the mythic "independence" we're supposed to crave -- a czar who doesn't owe anyone. It is the foreseeable result of the Dear Leader-ism prevalent in foreign autocracies but never paramount in America until now -- and it will have its benefits and drawbacks.
Wielding his campaign's massive e-mail list, the new president could mobilize supporters to press Congress for a new New Deal. Or, he could mobilize that army to blunt pressure on his government for a new New Deal. The point is that Obama alone gets to choose -- that for all the talk of "bottom-up" politics, his movement's structure grants him a top-down power that no previous president had.
For better or worse, that leaves us relying more than ever on our Dear Leader's impulses. Sure, we should be thankful when Dear Leader's whims serve the people -- but also unsurprised when they don't.
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/11/29/obama_choices/index.html?source=newsletter
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Obama Will Deliver Weekly YouTube Fireside Chats
Obama is officially the first YouTube president—you know, if you doubted it for some reason with 1800 videos uploaded and over 110 million views. He will be the first president to post videos of his weekly fireside coffee talks on YouTube in addition to the traditional radio format, which goes back to FDR, who used the medium to directly address the nation as he steered it through the Depression and WWII. Indeed, some pundits are calling the Obama administration's use of the web the "internet-era" version of FDR's fireside chats.
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Bring Palin back in 2012, poll says
By Alex Leary, Times staff writer
In print: Sunday, November 30, 2008
No sooner had Barack Obama won the presidential election than pundits started looking to 2012 and possible Republican challengers. A Gallup Poll asked people to rank the top 10 candidates they would like to run. Topping the list: Sarah Palin (67 percent), Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee. Second to last: Gov. Charlie Crist (23 percent), one below former Gov. Jeb Bush (31 percent). The telephone poll was taken Nov. 5-16 and included 799 Republicans and GOP-leaning independents, with a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Alaska: Home of Sarah Palin
Now that the elections are (almost) behind us, I plan to learn more about Alaska, it's geography and history.
I found this interesting article today:
.....on a whim, I decided to look at the Alaska Travel Industry Association, and sure enough — there she was. Granted, Sarah Palin is the governor of the state, but she and her family are mentioned more than once (apparently her husband, Todd, is a four-time winner of the snowmachining race “Iron Dog.”) She also graces the cover of the state’s tourism brochures which are now in wide distribution. Although they were printed before she was selected to be John McCain’s running mate, a spokeswoman for the association said, the group decided not to send the majority out until after the election to “be safe” and not affect voting.
Cont. here:
http://industry.bnet.com/travel/1000399/hawaiian-tourism-banks-on-obama-and-sarah-palin-helps-alaska-too/
In this November Travel News Bulletin you will find:
1. Volunteers get a taste of the Iditarod without driving a sled
2. Speed demons get their fix at Alaska’s snowmachine races
3. Nome musk ox tour offers new snow-cat alternative
4. Countdown to Alaska’s 50th birthday: Celebrate with Cruise West
1. Volunteers get a taste of the Iditarod without driving a sled Last month, Alaska’s Last Great Race went prime time with the premier of the Discovery Channel’s newest extreme reality series, “Toughest Race on Earth: Iditarod.” Now the same fans riveted by the likes of Captain Sig Hansen of the Deadliest Catch can follow Alaska legends like Lance Mackey and DeeDee Jonrowe along the 1,150-mile sled dog race to Nome. Those not content to sit on the sidelines can join the action by volunteering with the Iditarod Trail Committee with assignments as diverse as answering phones, dog handling, sorting food and supplies, race communications and more. With so much activity surrounding the race — from media conferences, race starts in both Anchorage and Wasilla, the musher’s banquet, food drops and more — volunteers are sure to find an option to suit their skills and interests.
(snipped)
2. Speed demons get their fix at Alaska’s snowmachine races Drawn to harrowing speeds, snowmachine racers brave Alaska’s harsh elements and test both machine and human stamina during the Tesoro Iron Dog and Alcan 200 races each winter. Nationally, more Americans than ever are aware of Alaska’s long-distance snowmachining races (as well as the fact that we call them snowmachines, not snowmobiles) thanks to the sudden notoriety of Todd Palin, husband of Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin and four-time Iron Dog champion. Beginning its legacy in 1984 as the “Iron Dog Iditarod,” the Tesoro Iron Dog travels from Wasilla to Nome, then on to Fairbanks through 1,971 miles of some of the most remote and rugged terrain in Alaska. Teams of two battle for a hefty purse upwards of $165,000 and crown of the world’s longest, toughest snowmachine competition. Fans not able to attend the race can follow the action through GPS tracking or the DOG BLOG,
Cont. here:
http://www.travelalaska.com/Media/WhatsNew.aspx
Storm to bring up to a foot of snow
Six inches to a foot of snow is expected to settle on Anchorage today and tomorrow, the National Weather Service reported Saturday.
http://bellalu0.wordpress.com/2008/09/15/governor-sarah-palins-alaska-what-do-we-know-about-it/
http://sarah-palin-2008.blogspot.com/2008/10/i-can-see-clearly-now.html
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
I found this interesting article today:
.....on a whim, I decided to look at the Alaska Travel Industry Association, and sure enough — there she was. Granted, Sarah Palin is the governor of the state, but she and her family are mentioned more than once (apparently her husband, Todd, is a four-time winner of the snowmachining race “Iron Dog.”) She also graces the cover of the state’s tourism brochures which are now in wide distribution. Although they were printed before she was selected to be John McCain’s running mate, a spokeswoman for the association said, the group decided not to send the majority out until after the election to “be safe” and not affect voting.
Cont. here:
http://industry.bnet.com/travel/1000399/hawaiian-tourism-banks-on-obama-and-sarah-palin-helps-alaska-too/
In this November Travel News Bulletin you will find:
1. Volunteers get a taste of the Iditarod without driving a sled
2. Speed demons get their fix at Alaska’s snowmachine races
3. Nome musk ox tour offers new snow-cat alternative
4. Countdown to Alaska’s 50th birthday: Celebrate with Cruise West
1. Volunteers get a taste of the Iditarod without driving a sled Last month, Alaska’s Last Great Race went prime time with the premier of the Discovery Channel’s newest extreme reality series, “Toughest Race on Earth: Iditarod.” Now the same fans riveted by the likes of Captain Sig Hansen of the Deadliest Catch can follow Alaska legends like Lance Mackey and DeeDee Jonrowe along the 1,150-mile sled dog race to Nome. Those not content to sit on the sidelines can join the action by volunteering with the Iditarod Trail Committee with assignments as diverse as answering phones, dog handling, sorting food and supplies, race communications and more. With so much activity surrounding the race — from media conferences, race starts in both Anchorage and Wasilla, the musher’s banquet, food drops and more — volunteers are sure to find an option to suit their skills and interests.
(snipped)
2. Speed demons get their fix at Alaska’s snowmachine races Drawn to harrowing speeds, snowmachine racers brave Alaska’s harsh elements and test both machine and human stamina during the Tesoro Iron Dog and Alcan 200 races each winter. Nationally, more Americans than ever are aware of Alaska’s long-distance snowmachining races (as well as the fact that we call them snowmachines, not snowmobiles) thanks to the sudden notoriety of Todd Palin, husband of Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin and four-time Iron Dog champion. Beginning its legacy in 1984 as the “Iron Dog Iditarod,” the Tesoro Iron Dog travels from Wasilla to Nome, then on to Fairbanks through 1,971 miles of some of the most remote and rugged terrain in Alaska. Teams of two battle for a hefty purse upwards of $165,000 and crown of the world’s longest, toughest snowmachine competition. Fans not able to attend the race can follow the action through GPS tracking or the DOG BLOG,
Cont. here:
http://www.travelalaska.com/Media/WhatsNew.aspx
|
Six inches to a foot of snow is expected to settle on Anchorage today and tomorrow, the National Weather Service reported Saturday.
http://bellalu0.wordpress.com/2008/09/15/governor-sarah-palins-alaska-what-do-we-know-about-it/
http://sarah-palin-2008.blogspot.com/2008/10/i-can-see-clearly-now.html
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Sarah Palin: A digital superstar
“People are projecting their values onto Sarah Palin, and in some sense, she reflects them back,” said Mark Corallo, a Republican media strategist. “She’s a conservative, she’s young, and she’s attractive. She speaks to something that’s been missing from the Republican Party.”
By CHARLES MAHTESIAN 11/29/08 6:51 AM EST
Three weeks after the Republican ticket suffered a sweeping defeat at the polls, Sarah Palin continues to dominate search engine queries, cable news and online video sites. The only American politician who generates comparable interest is President-elect Barack Obama. No one else is close. Palin was the most popular Lycos search from the week she joined the ticket continuously through last Sunday, some two weeks after the election, when she was dethroned by Paris Hilton, the celebutante whom John McCain famously compared to Barack Obama. The Alaska governor now ranks fourth, just one spot below Obama, on the weekly Lycos 50 list.
“People are still searching for her in record numbers,” said Kathy O’Reilly, a spokeswoman for Lycos. “How bizarre is that? Obama is the president-elect after the most historic election of all time and you’d think he would be dominating search activity and he only now is going ahead of her.”
By CHARLES MAHTESIAN 11/29/08 6:51 AM EST
Three weeks after the Republican ticket suffered a sweeping defeat at the polls, Sarah Palin continues to dominate search engine queries, cable news and online video sites. The only American politician who generates comparable interest is President-elect Barack Obama. No one else is close. Palin was the most popular Lycos search from the week she joined the ticket continuously through last Sunday, some two weeks after the election, when she was dethroned by Paris Hilton, the celebutante whom John McCain famously compared to Barack Obama. The Alaska governor now ranks fourth, just one spot below Obama, on the weekly Lycos 50 list.
“People are still searching for her in record numbers,” said Kathy O’Reilly, a spokeswoman for Lycos. “How bizarre is that? Obama is the president-elect after the most historic election of all time and you’d think he would be dominating search activity and he only now is going ahead of her.”
Palin has been the subject of intense online fascination since her introduction as the Republican nominee on August 29. In September, the Anchorage Daily News reported a 928 percent spike in traffic, according to Nielsen Online. Her mid-October Saturday Night Live appearance drove the show’s highest rating in 14 years, and her Oct. 2 debate with Joe Biden was the most watched vice-presidential debate ever — drawing more viewers than any of the three presidential debates between McCain and Obama.
The scope of the GOP ticket’s loss — and the role her critics assigned to her in that defeat — hasn't cooled interest in Palin. She ranked as the number two top news search at Ask.com this week, number two (after Obama) among newsmakers on the AOL 2008 year-end hottest searches list, and she occupied two slots on Politico’s list of the site's 10 most searched terms. Palin also ranked fourth among Yahoo searches, behind “Black Friday,” a famous Czech model and a contestant on the hit television show "Dancing with the Stars." She was the only politician on the Yahoo top 20 list.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1108/16047.html
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1108/16047.html
Friday, November 28, 2008
Baby it's Cold Out There: Scientists urge caution on global warming
by Erika Lovley
November 25, 2008 01:22 PM EST
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
November 25, 2008 01:22 PM EST
Climate change skeptics on Capitol Hill are quietly watching a growing accumulation of global cooling science and other findings that could signal that the science behind global warming may still be too shaky to warrant cap-and-trade legislation.
While the new Obama administration promises aggressive, forward-thinking environmental policies, Weather Channel co-founder Joseph D’Aleo and other scientists are organizing lobbying efforts to take aim at the cap-and-trade bill that Democrats plan to unveil in January.
So far, members of Congress have not been keen to publicly back the global cooling theory. But both senators from Oklahoma, Republicans Tom Coburn and Jim Inhofe, have often expressed doubts about how much of a role man-made emissions play.
“We want the debate to be about science, not fear and hypocrisy. We hope next year’s wave of new politics means a return to science,” said Coburn aide John Hart. “It’s the old kind of politics that doesn’t consider any dissenting opinions.”
The global cooling lobby’s challenge is enormous. Next year could be the unfriendliest yet for climate skeptics. Already, House Energy and Commerce Chairman John Dingell (D-Mich.) has lost his gavel, in part because his peers felt he was less than serious about tackling global warming.
The National Academy of Sciences and most major scientific bodies agree that global warming is caused by man-made carbon emissions. But a small, growing number of scientists, including D’Aleo, are questioning how quickly the warming is happening and whether humans are actually the leading cause.
Armed with statistics from the Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Climate Data Center, D’Aleo reported in the 2009 Old Farmer’s Almanac that the U.S. annual mean temperature has fluctuated for decades and has only risen 0.21 degrees since 1930 — which he says is caused by fluctuating solar activity levels and ocean temperatures, not carbon emissions.
Data from the same source shows that during five of the past seven decades, including this one, average U.S. temperatures have gone down. And the almanac predicted that the next year will see a period of cooling.
“We’re worried that people are too focused on carbon dioxide as the culprit,” D’Aleo said. “Recent warming has stopped since 1998, and we want to stop draconian measures that will hurt already spiraling downward economics. We’re environmentalists and conservationists at heart, but we don’t think that carbon is responsible for hurricanes.”
D’Aleo’s organization, the International Climate and Environmental Change Assessment Project, is collaborating on the campaign with the Cooler Heads Coalition, a subgroup of the National Consumer Coalition with members including Americans for Tax Reform, the National Center for Policy Analysis and Citizens for a Sound Economy.
More than 31,000 scientists across the world have signed the Global Warming Petition Project, a declaration started by a group of American scientists that states man’s impact on climate change can’t be reasonably proven.
If the project gains traction, it might give skeptical lawmakers an additional weapon to fight cap-and-trade legislation to curtail greenhouse gases — a move they worry could damage the already fragile economy. At the least, congressional aides say, it could caution additional lawmakers from rushing into a hasty piece of legislation.
Many Hill skeptics have varying opinions on whether the earth’s temperature is warming more slowly than some environmentalists predict and how much man is actually contributing to it.
Inhofe’s staff has been steadily compiling a list of global cooling findings. And aides report that they have received countless e-mails from scientists worldwide supporting the theory. While Inhofe hasn’t indicated that he will move forward with the information anytime soon, his aides continue to compile it.
Republicans aren’t the only ones who are wary of hastily passing a greenhouse gas bill. Ten Democrats wrote to Senate leaders earlier this year, citing economic concerns as a key reason why they didn’t vote for the Senate’s cap-and-trade bill.
And despite Democrats’ pickups in the Senate this fall, several of the new Democrats are from conservative, energy-producing states and may not be supportive, either.
But congressional aides say it could be a long wait before lawmakers are comfortable pushing science that contradicts the global warming theory. And until the lobby gains traction, skeptics plan to continue pushing their ideas by arguing for protection of the economy, where they hope to meet middle ground with global warming supporters.
“Never underestimate the ability of Congress to offer non-solutions to problems that do not exist,” said Marc Morano, communications director for the Republicans on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. “We could spend weeks arguing the mounting scientific evidence refuting man-made warming fears,” he added, “but it’s the economic arguments that have the most immediate impact.”
At the Cato Institute, senior fellow Patrick Michaels, a contributing author of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said most of Washington is already too deeply entrenched in the global warming mantra to turn back.
“You can’t expect the scientific community to now come to Washington and say this isn’t a problem. Once the apocalypse begins to deliver research dollars, you don’t want to reverse it,” said Michaels. “Washington works by lurching from crisis to crisis.”
Despite the growing science, the world’s leading crusader on climate change, Al Gore, is unconcerned.
“Climate deniers fall into the same camp as people who still don’t believe we landed on the moon,” said the former vice president’s spokeswoman, Kalee Kreider. “We don’t think this should distract us from the reality.”
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Vote in our poll: should kindergarten kids wear Thanksgiving costumes?
Some say having students dress up as pilgrims and Native Americans is 'demeaning.' Their opponents say they are elitists injecting politics into a simple children's celebration.
For decades, Claremont kindergartners have celebrated Thanksgiving by dressing up as pilgrims and Native Americans and sharing a feast. But on Tuesday, when the youngsters meet for their turkey and songs, they won't be wearing their hand-made bonnets, headdresses and fringed vests.
Parents in this quiet university town are sharply divided over what these construction-paper symbols represent: A simple child's depiction of the traditional (if not wholly accurate) tale of two factions setting aside their differences to give thanks over a shared meal? Or a cartoonish stereotype that would never be allowed of other racial, ethnic or religious groups?
What do you think?
Vote in our poll at right>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Ask President Bush to Pardon Ramos and Campean
Petition President Bush Today!
National Petition And Media Campaign To Pardon Agents
Ramos And Compean!
Total signers: 325,573
Your Sponsor: Grassfire.org
The Issue:
Two former U.S. Border Patrol agents -- Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean -- are serving 11- and 12-year prison terms for attempting to apprehend an illegal alien drug smuggler. The smuggler, who was transporting 743 pounds of marijuana (about $1 million worth), was given full immunity to testify against our agents and is suing our government for $5 million.
Now, reports indicate that the Mexican government was instrumental in this case even being launched. Plus, our own government has been lying about key details in the case. Meanwhile, the agents sit in jail (Ramos was severely beaten by Mexican nationals in jail who shouted “death to the border agent”), the drug smuggler may get rich and our President has not taken action!
Ask President Bush to pardon these men and reunite them with their families by Christmas.
Sign the Petition
Read the letter from Senators Cornyn and Feinstein:
Read the letter from the New Mexico Legislature:
Click here to sign the petition:
http://www.pardontheagents.com/petition.asp
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
National Petition And Media Campaign To Pardon Agents
Ramos And Compean!
Total signers: 325,573
Your Sponsor: Grassfire.org
The Issue:
Two former U.S. Border Patrol agents -- Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean -- are serving 11- and 12-year prison terms for attempting to apprehend an illegal alien drug smuggler. The smuggler, who was transporting 743 pounds of marijuana (about $1 million worth), was given full immunity to testify against our agents and is suing our government for $5 million.
Now, reports indicate that the Mexican government was instrumental in this case even being launched. Plus, our own government has been lying about key details in the case. Meanwhile, the agents sit in jail (Ramos was severely beaten by Mexican nationals in jail who shouted “death to the border agent”), the drug smuggler may get rich and our President has not taken action!
Ask President Bush to pardon these men and reunite them with their families by Christmas.
Sign the Petition
Read the letter from Senators Cornyn and Feinstein:
Read the letter from the New Mexico Legislature:
Click here to sign the petition:
http://www.pardontheagents.com/petition.asp
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Sarah Palin to Campaign for Chambliss in Ga.
 |
|
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Children's Defense Fund Will Not be Defending Children
http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/checker.aspx?v=e4qGeuQuZu
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
The Foxes are in Charge of Guarding the Hen House Now!!!
by Janet Crain
I remember my parents telling me about the Depression. They always said; "But that will never happen again. Regulations were put in place to prevent the stockmarket from ever falling again." And it just makes me furious that these so called brilliant geniuses removed those regulations.
The Times editorial writers deftly avoid criticising Barack “Mr Change” Obama, slamming Larry Summers while not missing a parting shot at the Bush administration and giving the Clinton administration a deregulatory pass.
Mr. Obama’s Economic Advisers
As treasury secretary in 2000, Mr. Summers championed the law that deregulated derivatives, the financial instruments — a k a toxic assets — that have spread the financial losses from reckless lending around the globe. He refused to heed the critics who warned of dangers to come.
That law, still on the books, reinforced the false belief that markets would self-regulate. And it gave the Bush administration cover to ignore the ever-spiraling risks posed by derivatives and inadequate supervision. Read More
Imus speaking with Lou Dobbs had this to say..
When Larry Summers was Treasury Secretary he was the guy for deregulating derivatives and wouldn’t take any advice from anybody. A bunch of people were jumping up and down saying this would be a nightmare bundling up all these mortgages and selling ‘em to each other.
To which Lou Dobbs responded..
The New York Times is funny as heck editorializing against deregulation while supporting the Clinton administration all the way through.
Of course we are talking about Lawrence Summers former Harvard University President, who hypothesised innate differences between men and women might be one reason fewer women succeed in science and math careers. Which from the NYT’s PC point of view makes him expendable or at least criticisable.
Imus with Lou Dobbs
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/25/opinion/25tue1.html?_r=1&ref=opinion
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
What hath Obama Wrought?
As for myself, I note that all new cabinet members are either:
1. From Chicago
2. A former Clinton Administration member or
3. A Saul Alinsky pupil
Obama himself is 1 and 3.
Somewhere, Mr. Alinsky is grinning from ear to ear.
Stephanopoulos: Obama Cabinet Unparalleled in 'Brain Power'
Good Morning America's news team on Monday gushed at the sheer brilliance of Barack Obama's incoming cabinet, including his "team of economic gladiators." Former top Bill Clinton aide-turned journalist George Stephanopoulos rhapsodized: "We have not seen this kind of combination of star power and brain power and political muscle this early in a cabinet in our lifetimes." (What does that say about Stephanopoulos' friends in the Clinton administration?) Co-host Robin Roberts was equally enthusiastic. Speaking with Stephanopoulos, she cooed: "Some would say it's a team of rivals, a la President Lincoln, or is a better comparison a team of geniuses as FDR did?" Continuing the fawning, Stephanopoulos readily agreed: "Well, one Obama advisor told me what they like is a combination of team of rivals and 'the Best and the Brightest,' which was the David Halberstam book about the incoming Kennedy administration. I think there are parallels to all three."
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Monday, November 24, 2008
Repubs in the Cabinet may be hard to find.......
By JONATHAN MARTIN 11/23/08 7:12 AM EST
Appearing on CBS’ “60 Minutes” last Sunday, Barack Obama reiterated a campaign-trail promise.“Yes,” the president-elect told Steve Kroft, he would include Republicans in his Cabinet.
Pressed if there would be more than one, Obama declined to elaborate. As the top tier of his Cabinet begins to come into focus, however, it looks increasingly unlikely that Obama will break new ground when it comes to fashioning a bipartisan government.
Appearing on CBS’ “60 Minutes” last Sunday, Barack Obama reiterated a campaign-trail promise.“Yes,” the president-elect told Steve Kroft, he would include Republicans in his Cabinet.
Pressed if there would be more than one, Obama declined to elaborate. As the top tier of his Cabinet begins to come into focus, however, it looks increasingly unlikely that Obama will break new ground when it comes to fashioning a bipartisan government.
Instead, he appears to be taking a check-the-box approach that would differ little from the pattern set by predecessors Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. They both made a nod to the opposition party in their Cabinet selections but in the main did not depart from Washington’s to-the-victor-goes-the-spoils tradition in their personnel choices or the policies that flowed from them.
The most likely Republican for a top Obama post, based on published speculation and reporting within his transition team this weekend, is Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who might keep his job in at least the opening phase of the new administration. Obama has said foreign policy is the area most in need of more bipartisanship, and the likely appointment of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) leaves few other openings.
A Gates reappointment would send a message of caution and continuity within national security circles — not exactly the message that Obama’s most ardent anti-Iraq war supporters are yearning for.
It's Hannity Without Colmes in the New Year
It will be H only after Jan.1st. JCOn a sad note, or perhaps happy depending your political pedigree, Alan Colmes, the oracle of left-wing blather on Fox News every night at 9pm for the last 12 years has called it quits:
FOX News Channel’s (FNC) Alan Colmes will relinquish his role as co-host of Hannity & Colmes at the end of the year.
In announcing his decision, Colmes said, “I approached Bill Shine (FNC’s Senior Vice President of Programming) earlier this year about wanting to move on after 12 years to develop new and challenging ways to contribute to the growth of the network. Although it’s bittersweet to leave one of the longest marriages on cable news, I’m proud that both Sean (Hannity) and I remained unharmed after sitting side by side, night after night for so many years.”
http://carlosechevarria.blogspot.com/2008/11/palin-props-colmes-quits.html
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
Must Irony take a Hike?
I just received a comment that demonstrates perfectly how sensitive Obama supporters are. Kids, get used to it. He is going to be criticized.The media has to write about something and the novelty is wearing off their star player already. It's been three weeks and nothing's any better!!! The sea hasn't fallen one centimeter. JC
PITY poor irony. Declared dead after 9/11, it staged a strong rally beneath a “Mission Accomplished” banner, only to find itself in mortal danger once again
Peter Foley
Its ill health was noted by, among others, no less an ironist than Joan Didion, the nation’s poet laureate of disillusion. The week after the election, in a talk at the New York Public Library, Ms. Didion lamented that the United States in the era of Barack Obama had become an “irony-free zone,” a vast Kool-Aid tank where “naïveté, translated into ‘hope,’ was now in” and where “innocence, even when it looked like ignorance, was now prized.”
Who’d want to live in a world like that?
But are ironic sensibilities like Ms. Didion’s — the detachment of mind, the appreciation of the folly of taking things at face value — really disappearing?
Not according to the conservative humorist P. J. O’Rourke, who reported from his New Hampshire office on Wednesday that he was finishing a piece for The Weekly Standard with the working title, “Is It Too Soon to Start Talking About the Failed Obama Presidency Just Because He Isn’t President Yet?”
Not according to the thin black novelist Colson Whitehead, who wrote an Op-Ed in The New York Times under the headline, “Finally, a Thin President.”
Dildon’s comment is ironic in and of itself. Newman also cites none other then P.J. O’Rourke commenting on President Elect Obama to prove irony is not dead…
Mr. O’Rourke, for his part, said that Mr. Change himself, with his choices of usual suspects and Beltway insiders to help him run the country, was proving no slouch in the irony department.
“Mr. Change” the irony of this statement is too obvious, is it not? Do comments by O’Rourke indicate the “Obama Embargo” is showing cracks? One can only hope.
http://imustimes.wordpress.com/2008/11/24/imus-obama-comedy-embargo/
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
Barack Obama, honeymoon killer?
The Clintonites in his Cabinet, forgiveness for Lieberman, the creeping signs of centrism -- progressives aren't ready to panic, yet.
By Mike Madden
Nov. 24, 2008 | WASHINGTON -- One of the first things Barack Obama did after winning the election two weeks ago was put an old-school political brawler in charge of his White House. Next, he saved Joe Lieberman. Then, he met with John McCain, and asked Hillary Clinton to run his State Department. For good measure, he's also apparently weighing whether to keep George W. Bush's Defense secretary, Robert Gates, on at the Pentagon.
This is the guy Republicans called a socialist, maybe a Marxist, and National Journal said was the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate? McCain aides were saying on Election Night that their own polling showed 60 percent of the country thought Obama was a liberal (and many voted for him anyway). Barely two weeks into the transition, that number might already be dropping fast.
In fact, in his appointments, and in what can be divined of his foreign policy, there are loud echoes of the last Democratic administration, and also of that lady he beat in the primaries, the one the netroots didn't like very much. Certainly, some of Obama's supporters are getting a little nervous about what this all presages about an Obama White House. "The list [of disappointments] is getting awfully long," wrote the blogger bmaz at Firedoglake. "Almost as long as Barack Obama's arm that he used to take our money and efforts to get himself elected. All we have seen is the short arm he has used to punch us in the face and collect street cred with villagers for having done so." Open Left's Chris Bowers wrote on Friday that he felt "incredibly frustrated ... [W]hy isn't there a single member of Obama's cabinet who will be advising him from the left?" Even Pat Buchanan -- not exactly the world's most liberal guy -- apparently thinks Obama needs to throw a bone to progressives after the start the transition is off to.http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/11/24/obama?source=newsletter
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
Are They Moving Chicago to DC?
It would seem that the way to a new president's heart is to have hosted a highly successful fundraiser for him. JC
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
Desiree Rogers, a prominent Chicago businesswoman and Harvard MBA, will be named the first African American White House social secretary, sources in the presidential transition office said yesterday.
Rogers, 49, is a friend of Michelle and President-elect Barack Obama’s, and a leader in Chicago corporate and civic circles; her appointment signals that the first couple consider the job crucial to how they introduce themselves to the country and the globe. She was a major fundraiser for Obama.
Last week, Desiree Rogers hosted Valerie Jarrett’s birthday party that included the president-elect and Michelle Obama. ‘She has extraordinary flair and exquisite taste,’ Jarrett said. ‘My party was perfect — she had my favorite food, my favorite flowers.’
‘The president-elect and Mrs. Obama wanted a social secretary with extraordinary accomplishment who would bring vision and a fresh approach to the White House,’ said Stephanie Cutter, spokeswoman for the presidential transition.
In January, Desiree hosted a $1,000-a-person fundraiser for Obama that attracted 600 people. “Welcome Back Barry” See: http://chicagoist.com/2008/01/09/welcome_back_ba.php
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
'Disgusting' Bias for Obama, Time Writer Admits
Sunday, November 23, 2008 5:40 PM
The mainstream media's support for Barack Obama's presidential campaign was so biased that even major insiders are now admitting they were shocked by its depth and depravity.
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
The mainstream media's support for Barack Obama's presidential campaign was so biased that even major insiders are now admitting they were shocked by its depth and depravity.
Last week, Time magazine's Mark Halperin called the media's performance during the campaign simply "disgusting."
Halperin told a panel of media analysts at the Politico/USC conference on the 2008 election, "It's the most disgusting failure of people in our business since the Iraq war."
He added, "It was extreme bias, extreme pro-Obama coverage."
According to the Web site Politico, Halperin, who edits Time's political site "The Page," zeroed in on two New York Times articles near the end of the campaign that profiled both Cindy McCain and Michelle Obama.
"The story about Cindy McCain was vicious," Halperin said. "It looked for every negative thing they could find about her and it cast her in an extraordinarily negative light. It didn't talk about her work, for instance, as a mother for her children, and they cherry-picked every negative thing that's ever been written about her."
But the Times gave Michelle Obama red carpet treatment, "like a front-page endorsement of what a great person Michelle Obama is."
Halperin, a former ABC News political director, allowed that some of the press coverage simply reflected the extreme efficiency of Obama's presidential campaign.
"You do have to take into account the fact that this was a remarkable candidacy," Halperin said. "There were a lot of good stories. He was new."
Obama also had a lot of money and outspent Republican John McCain by more than 2 to 1.
The press never bothered to hold Obama accountable for reneging on his promise to use public financing. McCain kept his promise to do so.
During the campaign, conservatives criticized the pro-Obama coverage, but it had little effect.
Columnist David Limbaugh noted: "Never has that been clearer than in the 2008 presidential election, during which they are covering up rather than covering Barack Obama's shady past and alliances, his knee-deep involvement in corrupt practices threatening the very core of our democratic system, and his many policy misrepresentations."
http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/media_bias_halperin/2008/11/23/154417.html?s=al&promo_code=71E0-1Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
Sorry to ruin the fun, but an ice age cometh
by Janet Crain
We are about to be ripped off by our own government to an extent never before heard of in a free country. This is due to the over hyped Global Warming hysteria created by Al Gore, a non-scientist who made mediocre grades in his required college science classes, aided and abetted by a liberal media and a bunch of Hollywood celebrities and, yes it must be said, elected leaders from both parties who have not taken the time to educate themselves.
Let one person dissent and they are ridiculed as bad selfish uncaring people. Children have been made to feel guilty for eating a hamburger! And it is all nonsense.
Al Gore makes a living from promoting these theories. He even got a Nobel prize. Meanwhile he jets around the country telling people to conserve fuel, while his utility bills at his home are more than a lot of people's annual income. I have managed to mostly ignore him and his adherents, to each his own and all that, but now we have a president about to take office who believes all this foolishness and intends to break this country with a cap and trade system which will bankrupt coal plants and send utility bills skyrocketing. (his own words)
Additionally cap and trade will add from 35 cents to $1. to the cost of a gallon of gasoline. They don't call this a tax, but it is. And it hits everyone at the same rate, rich and poor alike.
If the earth is actually getting cooler and it sure seems like the agencies listed in the article below would be trustworthy, then all these draconian measures are not only unnecessary, they are downright stupid.
The Australian
The Australian
Phil Chapman | April 23, 2008
THE scariest photo I have seen on the internet is www.spaceweather.com, where you will find a real-time image of the sun from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, located in deep space at the equilibrium point between solar and terrestrial gravity.
What is scary about the picture is that there is only one tiny sunspot.
Disconcerting as it may be to true believers in global warming, the average temperature on Earth has remained steady or slowly declined during the past decade, despite the continued increase in the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide, and now the global temperature is falling precipitously.
All four agencies that track Earth's temperature (the Hadley Climate Research Unit in Britain, the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, the Christy group at the University of Alabama, and Remote Sensing Systems Inc in California) report that it cooled by about 0.7C in 2007. This is the fastest temperature change in the instrumental record and it puts us back where we were in 1930. If the temperature does not soon recover, we will have to conclude that global warming is over.
There is also plenty of anecdotal evidence that 2007 was exceptionally cold. It snowed in Baghdad for the first time in centuries, the winter in China was simply terrible and the extent of Antarctic sea ice in the austral winter was the greatest on record since James Cook discovered the place in 1770.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23583376-7583,00.html
Excellent article a must read:Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
Sunday, November 23, 2008
We're Gonna Need a Little Global Warming this Winter
We're Getting Colder, Not Warmer
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
If necessary, right click and choose "open in a new window"
If only global warming were real. Unfortunately temperatures are determined not by Al Gore's ideology, nor by the authoritarian bureauweenies who seek to exploit it, but by the Sun. Like the climate, the Sun's output naturally fluctuates — and it appears to be on the wane:
All four major global temperature tracking outlets (Hadley, NASA's GISS, UAH, RSS) have released updated data. All show that over the past year, global temperatures have dropped precipitously.
A compiled list of all the sources can be seen here. The total amount of cooling ranges from 0.65C up to 0.75C — a value large enough to wipe out most of the warming recorded over the past 100 years. All in one year's time. For all four sources, it's the single fastest temperature change ever recorded, either up or down.
In stark contrast to warming, cooling really is a problem:
Cold is more damaging than heat. The mean temperature of the planet is about 54 degrees. Humans — and most of the crops and animals we depend on — prefer a temperature closer to 70.
Historically, the warm periods such as the Medieval Climate Optimum were beneficial for civilization. Corresponding cooling events such as the Little Ice Age, though, were uniformly bad news.
A drop in temperatures would have only one benefit: in light of all the hysterical lies we've been told about global warming, at least a few people might learn better than to believe anything they're told by the media, the government, Al Gore or the United Nations.
World temperatures per the Hadley Center for Climate Prediction. Note the steep drop on the right.
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
If necessary, right click and choose "open in a new window"
Kenyan Ambassidor confirms Obama was born in Kenya
Kenyan Ambassador to the United States, His Excellency Peter Ogego, admitted in this radio interview that Barack Obama was born in Kenya!
When WRIF “Mike In The Morning” Mike Clark (Michigan Radio Talk Show) Co-Host asked if there was going to be a marker where Barack Obama was born in Kenya, the Kenya Ambassador Ogego said his birthplace in Kenya “is already an attraction.”
Next question to Ambassador Ogego was: Will they put up a marker at Obama’s birthplace there? Ogego affirmed: “it’s already well known!”
His Excellency Peter Ogego, Kenyan Ambassador to the United States admitted in this radio interview that Barack Obama was born in Kenya!
Interview “LISTEN TO OUR CALLS TO THE KENYAN EMBASSY ABOUT BARACK OBAMA!:”
LISTEN HERE See minute: 12:39
CONTACT INFO:
Contact Mike Clark, WRIF Michigan Radio Talk Show Host: mim@wrif.com
Contact Your Congressional Representatives with quick phone call and ask
- 1) that Obama be investigated to insure he is a natural born citizen eligible to be President
2) ask for Congressional Hearings on this immediately.
Senate switchboard: 202-224-3121. Contact your Representative by e-mail. House switchboard: 202-225-3121 … White House switchboard: 202-456-1414 …
FREE NUMBERS TO CALL 1-800-828-0498 or
1-866-220-0044
http://www.israpundit.com/2008
Click here to view all recent Sarah Palin in 2012 posts
View All Recent Meet the Real Sarah Palin Blog Posts:
Firefox users, right click and choose "open in a new window"
“I apologize for the Jewish vote for Obama”
November 19, 2008
“I apologize for the Jewish vote for Obama”
The Jewish Journal
Dear Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin:
This is my public apology to John McCain, Sarah Palin, Republican voters, Christian evangelicals, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Mike Gallagher and everyone else in the non-Jewish universe who stands four-square behind the State of Israel.
While you have written, spoken and, yes, even prayed in strong opposition to any retrofitting of American policy on behalf of the Jewish state, nearly eight out of every 10 American Jews failed to demonstrate similar resolve on Election Day.
Those dancing along with the Democratic faithful in Grant Park included Jews from almost all sectors of American life: young and old, Reconstructionist and Orthodox, wealthy and poor. So enamored were the revelers of the symbolism of electing a man of color to the Oval Office that they fatefully overlooked what he stands for and,worse, what he will not stand against.Who would have ever imagined that it would fall to our non-Jewish neighbors to take up the cause of Israel’s survival and the necessity to be ever vigilant against the gathering clouds of Holocaust II?
In the wake of such Jewish philistinism, how am I to respond to my non-Jewish friends who wonder, with increasingly vocal and justifiable irritation, why Protestants and Catholics and Mormons recognize the threat that electing Barack Obama poses to Israel’s existence, yet the vast majority of American Jews won’t?
All that I can say, really, is “I am profoundly sorry.”
And, please, let me be very clear for what sin I beg forgiveness.
For generations, the Jewish people craved legitimacy and community. Only in America, since the establishment of the State of Israel, have the Jews found a country and a vast portion of its non-Jewish populace to stand side by side with us as true friends and allies.
And how do we repay this miracle? By leaving those who stand with us standing alone.
It is not that I wish my non-Jewish friends to be understanding of the 78 percent of American Jewish voters who cast their ballots for Obama, even when they were well aware of his proclivities to associate with anti-Jewish, anti-Israel friends and preachers. I do not forgive such willful callowness.
Nor do I make apologies for those American Jewish leaders, such as Marc Stanley of the National Democratic Jewish Council, who sought to minimize Obama’s close personal ties to Jew haters, such as Rashid Khalidi, by touting all the good Hamas has provided to downtrodden Palestinians. Indeed, on Election Day, Stanley actually told conservative talk show host Gallagher that in Gaza, Hamas “is the United Way.” (If I were the United Way, I’d sue for slander.)
I wish no forgiveness and make no apologies for the Marc Stanleys of our community. For them, I must draw deep upon my Jewish neshamah (breath) to feel anything but scorn.
No, it is on behalf of the 22 percent of American Jewry — including myself — who had the reasoned sense and maturity not to vote for the feel-good candidate, that I offer my humblest apologies to our non-Jewish countrymen.
We have not been good shepherds of our brothers and sisters. We have forgotten both our biblical and modern history — wherein a minority of Jews has always been required to exercise true leadership. We failed to act soon enough and forcefully enough to prevent nearly four out of every five of our kin from wandering off in the political desert.
While the political pundits speak of this being the first post-baby boom American election, we should have measured the significance for Jewish people differently.
The Jews in the world today are in a transitional period. We are the conduit generations — bridging the pre-Israel, pre-Holocaust world of our people with a future that will not be ours. Our role, the responsibility of our lifetimes, is to always act and behave on behalf of all who perished at the hands of evil and to be guardians for those still unborn who will inherit the fortune and folly of our deeds.
To our past and our future, I also apologize for our insufficient leadership.
For now, we must leave the Lost Tribes of Obama on their own. If their ears could not hear and their eyes could not see all the pre-election warnings that a President Obama may cost Israel its very survival, and in a domino effect destabilize the Western world and America, I have yet to discover the magic words that would wake them from their trance.
Instead, I believe the immediate focus and the tasks ahead must fall to those of us in the politically incorrect minority — just 22 out of every 100 American Jewish voters.
What do we do now?
I don’t yet know the answer. I do know that we can no longer count on sensibility to save the day. I do know that the people, countries and way of life we hold most dear are under serious assault, and we are summoned to disrupt the calmness of our pre-election lives to acknowledge as much. And I do know that we can’t count on non-Jewish allegiance to have eternal patience.
This is no simple lost election where we lick our wounds and pledge to fight on for another day. On Nov. 4, the world, especially the Jewish world, was set on a new, frightening course, and we must soberly acknowledge as much.
A month before the election, Anne Bayefsky, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, warned that not since Hitler’s time has civilization teetered so perilously on the brink of catastrophe.
“So when you cast your ballot this election, make no mistake: You are voting for or against a nuclear holocaust,” she wrote.
Nuclear holocaust won.
Dean Rotbart, a former columnist and news editor at The Wall Street Journal, is a Los Angeles-based publisher of media-related Internet sites. He can be reached at dr@deanrotbart.com.
“I apologize for the Jewish vote for Obama”
The Jewish Journal
Dear Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin:
This is my public apology to John McCain, Sarah Palin, Republican voters, Christian evangelicals, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Mike Gallagher and everyone else in the non-Jewish universe who stands four-square behind the State of Israel.
While you have written, spoken and, yes, even prayed in strong opposition to any retrofitting of American policy on behalf of the Jewish state, nearly eight out of every 10 American Jews failed to demonstrate similar resolve on Election Day.
Those dancing along with the Democratic faithful in Grant Park included Jews from almost all sectors of American life: young and old, Reconstructionist and Orthodox, wealthy and poor. So enamored were the revelers of the symbolism of electing a man of color to the Oval Office that they fatefully overlooked what he stands for and,worse, what he will not stand against.Who would have ever imagined that it would fall to our non-Jewish neighbors to take up the cause of Israel’s survival and the necessity to be ever vigilant against the gathering clouds of Holocaust II?
In the wake of such Jewish philistinism, how am I to respond to my non-Jewish friends who wonder, with increasingly vocal and justifiable irritation, why Protestants and Catholics and Mormons recognize the threat that electing Barack Obama poses to Israel’s existence, yet the vast majority of American Jews won’t?
All that I can say, really, is “I am profoundly sorry.”
And, please, let me be very clear for what sin I beg forgiveness.
For generations, the Jewish people craved legitimacy and community. Only in America, since the establishment of the State of Israel, have the Jews found a country and a vast portion of its non-Jewish populace to stand side by side with us as true friends and allies.
And how do we repay this miracle? By leaving those who stand with us standing alone.
It is not that I wish my non-Jewish friends to be understanding of the 78 percent of American Jewish voters who cast their ballots for Obama, even when they were well aware of his proclivities to associate with anti-Jewish, anti-Israel friends and preachers. I do not forgive such willful callowness.
Nor do I make apologies for those American Jewish leaders, such as Marc Stanley of the National Democratic Jewish Council, who sought to minimize Obama’s close personal ties to Jew haters, such as Rashid Khalidi, by touting all the good Hamas has provided to downtrodden Palestinians. Indeed, on Election Day, Stanley actually told conservative talk show host Gallagher that in Gaza, Hamas “is the United Way.” (If I were the United Way, I’d sue for slander.)
I wish no forgiveness and make no apologies for the Marc Stanleys of our community. For them, I must draw deep upon my Jewish neshamah (breath) to feel anything but scorn.
No, it is on behalf of the 22 percent of American Jewry — including myself — who had the reasoned sense and maturity not to vote for the feel-good candidate, that I offer my humblest apologies to our non-Jewish countrymen.
We have not been good shepherds of our brothers and sisters. We have forgotten both our biblical and modern history — wherein a minority of Jews has always been required to exercise true leadership. We failed to act soon enough and forcefully enough to prevent nearly four out of every five of our kin from wandering off in the political desert.
While the political pundits speak of this being the first post-baby boom American election, we should have measured the significance for Jewish people differently.
The Jews in the world today are in a transitional period. We are the conduit generations — bridging the pre-Israel, pre-Holocaust world of our people with a future that will not be ours. Our role, the responsibility of our lifetimes, is to always act and behave on behalf of all who perished at the hands of evil and to be guardians for those still unborn who will inherit the fortune and folly of our deeds.
To our past and our future, I also apologize for our insufficient leadership.
For now, we must leave the Lost Tribes of Obama on their own. If their ears could not hear and their eyes could not see all the pre-election warnings that a President Obama may cost Israel its very survival, and in a domino effect destabilize the Western world and America, I have yet to discover the magic words that would wake them from their trance.
Instead, I believe the immediate focus and the tasks ahead must fall to those of us in the politically incorrect minority — just 22 out of every 100 American Jewish voters.
What do we do now?
I don’t yet know the answer. I do know that we can no longer count on sensibility to save the day. I do know that the people, countries and way of life we hold most dear are under serious assault, and we are summoned to disrupt the calmness of our pre-election lives to acknowledge as much. And I do know that we can’t count on non-Jewish allegiance to have eternal patience.
This is no simple lost election where we lick our wounds and pledge to fight on for another day. On Nov. 4, the world, especially the Jewish world, was set on a new, frightening course, and we must soberly acknowledge as much.
A month before the election, Anne Bayefsky, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, warned that not since Hitler’s time has civilization teetered so perilously on the brink of catastrophe.
“So when you cast your ballot this election, make no mistake: You are voting for or against a nuclear holocaust,” she wrote.
Nuclear holocaust won.
Dean Rotbart, a former columnist and news editor at The Wall Street Journal, is a Los Angeles-based publisher of media-related Internet sites. He can be reached at dr@deanrotbart.com.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
