JohnKJR's Blog

For one short week, the city of Denver will have the best-coiffed homeless population in America: Denver’s homeless get free haircuts to look good for Obama and his Democrats.

According to Rick Sallinger of the CBS TV station, Denver Human Services has been handing out coupons for free homeless haircuts.

The idea was to make the homeless feel better about themselves. And maybe then they’d get jobs or something.

Rusty Johnson told Rick he hadn’t had a haircut in three or four months and, frankly, didn’t much care about the Democrats caring about his appearance. “I just want to look good and feel good for myself,” he said.

Imagine the mental anguish suffered by Sasquatch devotees worldwide, as the latest Bigfoot carcass turns out to be a cheap rubber gorilla suit.

(AP) Turns out Bigfoot was just a rubber suit.

Two researchers on a quest to prove the existence of Bigfoot say that the carcass encased in a block of ice - handed over to them for an undisclosed sum by two men who claimed to have found it - was slowly thawed out, and discovered to be a rubber gorilla outfit.

The revelation comes just days after a much ballyhooed news conference was held in California to proclaim that the remains of the creature found in the North Georgia mountains was the legendary man-ape.

Steve Kulls, executive director of squatchdetective.com and host of Squatchdetective Radio, says in a posting on a Web site run by Bigfoot researcher Tom Biscardi that as the “evidence” was thawed, the claim began to unravel as a giant hoax.

First, the hair sample was burned and “melted into a ball uncharacteristic of hair,” Kulls said in the posting. The thawing process was sped up and the exposed head was found to be “unusually hollow in one small section.” An hour of thawing later and the feet were exposed - and they were found to be made of rubber.

A dead giveaway.

by Mike S. Adams
Townhall.com

So this lesbian goes walking into a counselor’s office to get help with her same-sexed relationship. Actually, it sounds like the start of a really bad joke but it isn’t. The counselor’s name is Marcia Walden. In addition to being a counselor she is a devout Christian who believes it is immoral to engage in same-sex relationships. So she faced a tough decision when Jane, her prospective client, sought help resolving problems in her lesbian relationship.

Rather than misleading her, Marcia decided to tell Jane about her religious conflict, indicating that it would be unfair for her (Jane) if she were to serve as her counselor. But she remained helpful and offered to refer Jane to another counselor named Ken Cook.

Jane met with Mr. Cook just ten minutes later and even acknowledged that her counseling experience was “exemplary.” Mr. Cook told Marcia she had done the “right thing” by making the referral. For awhile everyone seemed happy, if not gay.

But later in the day Jane was feeling angry. So she called Ms. Walden’s supervisor Mr. Hughes and complained that she refused to counsel her due to “homophobia.” Hughes contacted Ms. Walden to tell her of the complaint about which he was “very concerned.”

Later, Ms. Walden was subjected to an interrogation about her religious beliefs. There were several supervisors there including Mr. Hughes who told her that if she ever found herself in a similar situation she should simply make up an excuse (read: lie) instead of telling the truth about her religious beliefs. Of course, Ms. Walden also stated that lying was against her religious beliefs.

After Mr. Hughes was unable to convince Ms. Walden to lie to prospective clients an employee relations specialist named Jacqueline Byrum implied that Walden should not discuss her religious objections to homosexuality. Instead, she should just tell the prospective homosexual client that she was not experienced with relationship counseling. Walden again reiterated her religious objections to intentionally misleading prospective clients.

On August 30, 2007, Christie Zerbe, a Center for Disease Control employee, sent an email demanding Ms. Walden’s removal solely because she referred Jane to another counselor. Without the benefit of any effort to accommodate her religious beliefs and practices, Walden’s employment was terminated.

----- SCHOOL -- 195
7 vs.. 2007

Scenario: 
Jack goes quail hunting before school, pulls into school parking lot with shotgun in gun rack.
1957 
- Vice Principal comes over, looks at Jack's shotgun, goes to his car and gets his shotgun to show Jack.
2007 
- School goes into lock down, FBI called, Jack hauled off to 
jail and never sees his truck or gun again. Counselors called in for 
traumatized students and teachers.  

Scenario: 
 Johnny and Mark get into a fistfight after school.
1957 
- Crowd gathers. Mark wins. Johnny and Mark shake hands and end up buddies.
2007 - Police called, SWAT team arrives, arrests Johnny and Mark. Charge them with assault, both expelled even though Johnny started it. 
 

Scenario: 
 Jeffrey won't be still in class, disrupts other students.
1957 
- Jeffrey sent to office and given a good paddling by the Principal. Returns to class, sits still and does not disrupt class again.
2007 - Jeffrey given huge doses of Ritalin. Becomes a zombie. Tested for ADD. School gets extra money from state because Jeffrey has a disability. 
 

Scenario: 
Billy breaks a window in his neighbor's car and his Dad gives him a whipping with his belt.
1957 - Billy is more careful next time, grows up normal, goes to college, and becomes a successful businessman.
2007 - Billy's dad is arrested for child abuse.  Billy removed to foster care and joins a gang.  State psychologist tells Billy's sister that she remembers being abused herself and their dad goes to prison.  Billy's mom has affair with psychologist. 
 

Scenario: 
Mark gets a headache and takes some aspirin to school.
1957 - Mark shares aspirin with Principal out on the smoking dock.
2007 - Police called, Mark expelled from school for drug violations. Car searched for drugs and weapons.  

Scenario:
Pedro fails high school English.
1957 - Pedro goes to summer school, passes English, goes to college.
2007 - Pedro's cause is taken up by state. Newspaper articles appear nationally explaining that teaching English as a requirement for graduation is racist. ACLU files class action lawsuit against state school system and Pedro's English teacher.   English banned from core curriculum.  Pedro given diploma anyway but ends up mowing lawns for a living because he cannot speak English..  

Scenario: 
Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from 4th of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle, blows up a red ant bed.
1957 - Ants die.
2007- BATF, Homeland Security, FBI calle d. Johnny charged with  domestic terrorism, FBI investigates parents, siblings removed from home, computers confiscated, Johnny's Dad goes on a terror watch list and is never allowed to fly again. 

Scenario: 
Johnny falls while running during recess and scrapes his knee. He is found crying by his teacher, Mary.  Mary hugs him to comfort him.
1957 - In a short time, Johnny feels better and goes on playing.
2007 - Mary is accused of being a sexual predator and loses her job. She faces 3 years in State Prison.  Johnny undergoes 5 years of therapy. 

  

By Pamela Geller
American Thinker

I have been researching, documenting and studying thousands upon thousands of Obama's campaign donations for the past month. Egregious abuse was immediately evident and I published the results of my ongoing investigation. Each subsequent post built a more damning case against Obama's illegal contribution activity.

The media took little notice of what I was substantiating. I went so far as to upload the documents so that anyone could do their own research. I asked readers to download the documents and a number of folks pitched in.


Despite dropping the groundbreaking bombshell story of "Palestinian" brothers from the Rafah refugee camp in Gaza who donated $33,000 to Obama's campaign, no big media picked up the story. Jihadis donating to Obama from Gaza? Could there be a bigger story? Foreign donations are illegal, but this story was all that and so much more. The "Palestinian" brothers were proud and vocal of their "love" for Obama. Their vocal support on behalf of "Palestinians" spoke volumes to Obama's campaign.

And yet still no media.


But Obama pricked up his ears. He smelled trouble and while no media asked, he answered anyway. Sen. Obama's campaign immediately scrambled and contended they had returned the $33,500 in illegal contributions from Palestinians in Hamas-controlled Gaza, despite the fact that records do not show that it was returned and the brothers said they have not received any money. Having gone through all of Obama's refunds redesignations etc, no refund was made to Osama, Hossam, or Edwan Monir in the Rafah refugee camp. And still no media.


One of the Gazan brothers, Monir Edwan (identified here), claimed he bought "Obama for President" T-shirts off Obama's website and then sold the T-shirts in Gaza for a profit. All purchases on the Barack Obama website are considered contributions.


The Palestinians allegedly claimed "they were American citizens", so said Obama's people. They listed their address -- zip code 972 (ironically the area code for Israel) and they input "GA"the state abbreviation for Georgia (screen shot here) They actually lived in a Hamas controlled refugee camp. So if Obama's people thought it was "Georgia" why did they ship the tee shirts to the correct address in Gaza? Shipping overseas to a Gaza refugee camp is vastly different than the state next door.

Still no media.


"Some young men even bought the T-shirts for 60 shekel ($17.29), which is a lot to spend in Gaza on a T-shirt, but that is how much Gazans like Obama," Edwan claimed in a follow up article in the conservative websiet WorldNetDaily. And Hamas has publicly endorsed Obama.

And still no media.


Obama's campaign said the Palestinian brothers in the Middle East made $33,000 in illegal donations to the campaign via the internet.


The donations came in between Sept. 20 and Dec. 6 and virtually all of the money, about $33,500, was returned by December 6. But the refunds weren't reported to the Federal Election Commission due to a technical error, campaign officials said.


If McCain had been involved with something so dark and nefarious, taking money from Islamic jihad, his candidacy would never withstand the media blowback.


But it was the son of hope, the agent of change, the one we have been waiting for , so the media yawned.


The jihad donations were hardly the only bloody red flags. The first in my series of posts ran July 19th. The documents were so unwieldy, readers like John, Doc, and Cathy (who discovered Rafah) were working furiously to cross check our findings at the FEC site and then mine the data.

The Communist Party USA says that Barack Obama may not be the perfect Stalinist they’ve been hoping for, but he is a stepping stone to the new socialist utopia: CPUSA Online - Editorial: Eye on the Prize.

Barack Obama is not a left candidate. This fact has seemingly surprised a number of progressive people who are bemoaning Obama’s “shift to the center.” (Right-wingers are happy to join them, suggesting Obama is a “flip-flopper.”) It’s sad that some who seek progressive change are missing the forest for the trees. But they will not dampen the wide and deep enthusiasm for blocking a third Bush term represented by John McCain, or for bringing Obama by a landslide into the White House with a large Democratic congressional majority.

A broad multiclass, multiracial movement is converging around Obama’s “Hope, change and unity” campaign because they see in it the thrilling opportunity to end 30 years of ultra-right rule and move our nation forward with a broadly progressive agenda.

This diverse movement combines a variety of political currents and aims in a working coalition that is crucial to social progress at this point. At the core are America’s working families, of all hues and ethnicities, whose determination to move forward does not depend on, and will not be diverted by, the daily twists and turns of this watershed presidential campaign. They are taking the long view. ...

If Obama’s candidacy represented nothing more than the spark for this profound initiative to unite the working class and defeat the pernicious influence of racism, it would be a transformative candidacy that would advance progressive politics for the long term.

The struggle to defeat the ultra-right and turn our country on a positive path will not end with Obama’s election. But that step will shift the ground for successful struggles going forward.

One thing is clear. None of the people’s struggles — from peace to universal health care to an economy that puts Main Street before Wall Street — will advance if McCain wins in November.

Let’s keep our eyes on the prize.

Also, at Barack Obama’s official campaign blog site: Barack Obama | The Socialist Party. With a nice picture of Leon Trotsky.

The following is a list of beliefs that I hold. Nearly every one of them was a liberal position until the late 1960s. Not one of them is now.

Such a list is vitally important in order to clarify exactly what positions divide left from right, blue from red, liberal from conservative.

I believe in American exceptionalism, meaning that (a) America has done more than any international organization or institution, and more than any other country, to improve this world; and (b) that American values (specifically, the unique American blending of Enlightenment and Judeo-Christian values) form the finest value system any society has ever devised and lived by.

I believe that the bigger government gets and the more powerful the state becomes, the greater the threat to individual liberty and the greater the likelihood that evil will ensue. In the 20th century, the powerful state, not religion, was the greatest purveyor of evil in the world.

I believe that the levels of taxation advocated by liberals render those taxes a veiled form of theft. "Give me more than half of your honestly earned money or you will be arrested" is legalized thievery.

I believe that government funding of those who can help themselves (e.g., the able-bodied who collect welfare) or who can be helped by non-governmental institutions (such as private charities, family, and friends) hurts them and hurts society.

I believe that the United States of America, from its inception, has been based on the Judeo-Christian value system, not secular Enlightenment values alone, and therefore the secularization of American society will lead to the collapse of America as a great country.

I believe that some murderers should be put death; that allowing all murderers to live does not elevate the value of human life, but mocks it, and that keeping all murderers alive trivializes the evil of murder.

I believe that the American military has done more to preserve and foster goodness and liberty on Earth than all the artists and professors in America put together.

I believe that lowering standards to admit minorities mocks the real achievements of members of those minorities.

I believe that when schools give teenagers condoms, it is understood by most teenagers as tacit approval of their engaging in sexual intercourse.

I believe that the assertions that manmade carbon emissions will lead to a global warming that will in turn bring on worldwide disaster are a function of hysteria, just as was the widespread liberal belief that heterosexual AIDS will ravage America.

I believe that marriage must remain what has been in every recorded civilization -- between the two sexes.

I believe that, whatever the reasons for entering Iraq, the American-led removal of Saddam Hussein from power will decrease the sum total of cruelty on Earth.

I believe that the trial lawyers associations and teachers unions, the greatest donors to the Democratic Party, have done great harm to American life -- far more than, let us say, oil companies and pharmaceutical companies, the targets of liberal opprobrium.

I believe that nuclear power, clean coal, and drilling in a tiny and remote frozen part of Alaska and offshore -- along with exploration of other energy alternatives such as wind and solar power -- are immediately necessary.

I believe that school vouchers are more effective than increased spending on public schools in enabling many poorer Americans to give their children better educations.

I believe that while there are racists in America, America is no longer a racist society, and that blaming disproportionate rates of black violence and out-of-wedlock births on white racism is a lie and the greatest single impediment to African-American progress.

I believe that America, which accepts and assimilates foreigners better than any other country in the world, is the least racist, least xenophobic country in the world.

I believe the leftist takeover of the liberal arts departments in nearly every American university has been an intellectual and moral calamity.

I believe that a good man and a good marriage are more important to most women's happiness and personal fulfillment than a good career.

I believe that males and females are inherently different. For example, girls naturally prefer dolls and tea sets to trucks and toy guns -- if you give a girl trucks, she is likely to give them names and take care of them, and if you give a boy trucks, he is likely to crash them into one another.

I believe that when it comes to combating the greatest evils on Earth, such as the genocide in Rwanda, the United Nations has either been useless or an obstacle.

I believe that, generally speaking, Western Europe provides social and moral models to be avoided, not emulated.

I believe that America's children were positively affected by hearing a non-denominational prayer each morning in school, and adversely affected by the removal of all prayer from school.

I believe that liberal educators' removal of school uniforms and/or dress codes has had a terrible impact on students and their education.

I believe that bilingual education does not work, that for the sake of immigrant children and for the sake of the larger society, immersion in the language of the country, meaning English in America, is mandatory.

I believe that English should be declared the national language, and that ballots should not be printed in any language other than English. If one cannot understand English, one is probably not sufficiently knowledgeable to vote intelligently in an English-speaking country.

Finally, I believe that there are millions of Americans who share most of these beliefs who still call themselves "liberal" or "progressive" and who therefore vote Democrat. They do so because they still identify liberalism with pre-1970 liberalism or because they are emotionally attached to the word "liberal."

I share that emotion. But one should vote based on values, not emotions.

One of the participants at an “interfaith service” at the upcoming Democratic Convention is Ingrid Mattson—a deceptive shill for the Islamic Society of North America, one of the groups listed as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation Hamas funding trial: Radical Islamist to Appear at Democrat Convention ‘Interfaith Service’.

Hamas co-conspirators at an “interfaith service.” Welcome to the modern Democratic Party.  Sounds like a "Hate America" fest brewing at this years Dem convention!

Thats sure to win the election; right?

OkeydokeObamalama Dingdong

By... DANEgerusDANEgerusQuotes via Patriot Post Via Chris, Ali had the rope-a-dope and Barack Hussein Obama is the "okey-doke". Every sermon is tailored to the audience and the shallowness of his rhetoric is disguised by the grandiosity, which is the hallmark of narcissim.

Ace notes Americans grow weary of hearing about Obama Close to half (48%) of Pew's interviewees went on to say that they have been hearing too much about Obama lately. I'm sure that would be 100% of the readers of this blog...

Byron York notes the same report Repeat: Obama Did Not Grow Up In Kansas When asked about specific commercials, those tested for each candidate registered about similar recall levels - 41% of Pew's respondents said they have seen McCain's commercial that compares Barack Obama to Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. Almost the same number - (43%) report seeing Barack Obama's commercial where he talks about his background growing up in Kansas. As mentioned here yesterday, the Kansas part just didn't happen. But sometimes repeating the little-white-lies isn't enough. Amanda Carpenter notes that WaPo indulged a fraud with a front-page smear: Who are these Donors the WaPo Found? I can't find three out of these four donors on opensecrets.com, the online clearinghouse for donor information.
...
...it could be, this is just simply not true. And if that's the case they should apologize to the McCain campaign and promptly post a correction online and in tomorrow's paper. Ed Morrissey WaPo research on display on Page 1 The Norman Hsu case, in contrast, built on odd donation patterns but didn’t get reported until actual wrongdoing was apparent, with Democratic bundler Hsu being a fugitive with a penchant for Ponzi schemes.

Now, however, a correction rides above the web version of the article that renders Mosk and his editors as risible examples of a media salivating for dirt on McCain.
...
Excuse me, but doesn’t that gut the entire premise for the article in its entirety? The only “odd” donor left is the mechanic, and no pattern exists any longer.

This would not have come to light had it not been for Amanda Carpenter, who did what the Post’s layers of fact-checkers and editors apparently couldn’t be bothered to do: their jobs. Ace Hey Amateurs, Stand Back and We'll Show You How the Professionals Do It ...this was clearly supposed to be a hit-piece directed at McCain...
...
How could they have blown this? I think you'll only need one guess. Soren Dayton WaPo's Matt Mosk doesn't fact check Obama oppo dump Note that this was a front-page story with names and dates and a picture of John McCain. And all of the operative facts were completely false. This is inexcusable.
...
Matthew Mosk writes a front page story in the Washington Post based on demonstrably false facts. This is a firing offense.
...
These aren't journalists. These aren't even advocates. They are just liars. Ed Morrissey notes Barack Hussein Obama is running from the debates: Obama really doesn’t like a debate Barack Obama got stung by a challenge from a Las Vegas reporter on his energy policy, and specifically on his efforts to paint John McCain as a lackey of Dick Cheney. Jon Ralston asked Obama about the contradiction inherent in this strategy — the fact that Obama voted for Cheney’s energy bill in 2005 while McCain voted against it. Obama stammered out an accusation that Ralston was a proxy for McCain...
...
Time was, reporters were paid to ask candidates tough questions. Ralston’s question is entirely legitimate, especially since Obama and the Democrats made Cheney’s energy policy a campaign issue in the first place. If Obama dislikes it so much, why did he vote for it — and why blame it on the one candidate in the race that actually voted against it? Clearly the reporter is a racist. The symbolism of the contrast between ‘oil’, which is black, and McCain, who is a “white-devil” is designed to accentuate the fact that Barack Hussein Obama is Hawaiian.

Instapundit says OOPS Democratic candidate Barack Obama criticized Republican John McCain on Tuesday for taking a page out of "the Cheney playbook" on energy, overlooking his own support of oil-friendly policies that the unpopular vice president helped to craft.

Vice President Dick Cheney, a former oilman, early in the Bush administration helped draft an energy policy that Obama asserted is biased in favor of tax breaks and favorable treatment for big oil. Obama's remarks were an attempt to capitalize on Cheney's unpopularity. . . .

However, Obama himself voted for a 2005 energy bill backed by Bush that included billions in subsidies for oil and natural gas production, a measure Cheney played a major role in developing. McCain opposed the bill on grounds it included billions in unnecessary tax breaks for the oil industry. Sweetness & Light Obama Slams ‘Cheney’ Bill He Voted For ...to think our current crop of comedians rib McCain for his senility. Shannen Coffin Obama in Knots over Cheney So which is it Senator? Is Obama's complaint about the NEPDG merely grousing about process (a process complaint that led to wasteful federal litigation in which the Vice President ultimately prevailed)? Or is Obama-wan Kenobi playing gutter political games, trying to tar McCain with guilt by association with Cheney? (An association that isn't particularly supported by the record and with which, by the way, I would be more than happy to be "tarred.") Either way, it doesn't jibe with his "the One" narrative. Hillary is suffering from premature insertion Hillary: Hey, how about we place my name in nomination? Update: Obama, Hillary do damage control Not for her own ego gratification, mind you, but to make the people happy. Ed Morrissey on how Barack Hussein Obama really sees bipartisanship Another stealth ad from Obama: “Original” For the second time in a week, the Barack Obama campaign has published an ad without releasing it to the media. “Original” goes negative yet again, attacking John McCain for being … well, Republican...
...
...it attempts to paint McCain as a Bush lackey on energy when Obama was the only one of the two to vote in favor of the administration’s energy policy in 2005. Stanley Kurtz documents Barack Obama's Lost Years The senator's tenure as a state legislator reveals him to be an old-fashioned, big government, race-conscious liberal.
...
...Obama himself, as a state senator, wrote more than 40 columns for the Herald, under the title "Springfield Report," between 1996 and 2004. Read in isolation, Obama's columns from the state capital tell us little. Placed in the context of political and policy battles then raging in Illinois, however, the young legislator's dispatches powerfully illuminate his political beliefs. Even more revealing are hundreds of articles chronicling Obama's early political and legislative activities ...
...
Any rounded treatment of Obama's early political career has got to give prominence to the issue of race. Obama has recently made efforts to preemptively blunt discussion of the race issue, warning that his critics will highlight the fact that he is African American. Yet the question of race plays so large a role in Obama's own thought and action that it is all but impossible to discuss his political trajectory without acknowledging the extent to which it engrosses him.
...
When it comes to issues like affirmative action and set-asides, Obama is anything but the post-racial politician he's sometimes made out to be.
...
On race-related issues Obama has stood shoulder to shoulder with Chicago's African-American politicians for years.

When the 2000 census revealed dramatic growth in Chicago's Hispanic and Asian populations alongside a decline in the number of African Americans, the Illinois black caucus was alarmed at the prospect that the number of blacks in the Illinois General Assembly might decline. At that point, Obama stepped to the forefront of the effort to preserve as many black seats as possible. The Defender quotes Obama as saying that, "while everyone agrees that the Hispanic population has grown, they cannot expand by taking African-American seats." So... representative government as long as African-American's get to keep the representatives? Fundamentally, he is a big-government redistributionist who wants above all to aid the poor, particularly the African-American poor.
...
Important though it is to Obama, the crime issue runs a distant second to his deepest passion: social welfare legislation. "Big government liberal," "redistributionist"-call him what you like, Obama's fondest hope is to lead America into another war on poverty.
...
He repeatedly proposed a state constitutional amendment mandating universal health care.
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Bipartisanship for thee, but not for me: That's how Obama ended up with the most liberal voting record in the U.S. Senate.
...
...Obama's economic experience is largely limited to social welfare spending. Indeed, precisely because of his penchant for spending, Obama's fingerprints are all over Illinois's burgeoning fiscal crisis.
...
When, just a year later, Democrats added control of the governorship and state senate to their existing control of the house, they revealed that the state deficit had reached $5 billion-far larger than most had feared. Since then it's been a swift downhill tumble toward fiscal implosion for Illinois. Now ruling, the Democrats have continued their profligate ways, pushing the state's budget woes to new heights.
...
Illinois's fate may foreshadow the nation's. As long as it's your money and the "poor" are... identifiable?

Allahpundit New McCain ad: Biggest celebrity in the world actually a tax and spend liberal ...until just a few minutes ago Drudge had a headline up noting that Paris’s “ad” mocked McCain, which implied that Maverick was the one who suffered the most damage from it. Really? Compare the reactions of the McCain camp and the Obama camp to her spot last night. Speaking of his "LibRule" roots: Obama Finds An ACORN The man who includes being a community organizer on his short resume has a long association with a far-left group that would organize our communities into socialist gulags.
...
In 1995, Illinois Gov. Jim Edgar balked at implementing the federal motor voter law out of concern that letting people register via postcard and blocking the state from pruning voter rolls might invite vote fraud.

A young lawyer, a community organizer himself, sued on behalf of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (Acorn) and won. The young lawyer was Barack Obama. Acorn later invited Obama to train its staff.

When Obama served on the board of the Woods Fund for Chicago with Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers, the Woods Fund frequently gave Acorn grants to fund its agenda and voter registration activities.
...
Obama also opposes voter ID laws.
...
Acorn opposed welfare reform and opposes securing American borders to stem the flow of illegal immigrants.
...
Acorn also has been in the lead supporting the "living wage" and opposing efforts by big-box retailers such as Wal-Mart to bring the bounty and benefits of free-market capitalism to inner cities.
...
How can they oppose "low" wages for Wal-Mart employees while in effect supporting higher prices for Wal-Mart customers? They can because they believe the socialist orthodoxy that capitalism is bad, government is good and that the solution to poverty is to make everyone equally poor.
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Advocates of the so-called living wage see their efforts as putting money directly into workers' pockets. But it merely transfers money from one person's pocket to another person's pocket. This is classic socialist income redistribution — not economic justice, but economic extortion. Which is really no surprise given that Barack Hussein Obama had a Marxist "mentor" long before his "Black Liberation Theology " Mentor. Young Obama's Red Mentor ...the seeds of Obama's far-left ideology were planted in his formative years as a teenager growing up in Hawaii — and they were far more radical than any biography or media profile has portrayed.
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...the late communist Frank Marshall Davis, who fled Chicago after the FBI and Congress opened investigations into his "subversive," "un-American activities."
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Davis was a member of the Moscow-controlled Communist Party USA, according to the 1953 report of the Commission on Subversive Activities of the Territory of Hawaii, which labeled him "a bitter opponent of capitalism."
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In the eyes of white America, Davis warned Obama: "You may be a well-trained, well-paid n*****, but you're a n***** just the same." He also nurtured anti-white hatred in his young mulatto subject, telling him, "Black people have a reason to hate."
...
Obama followed in Davis' footsteps after college, working as a "community organizer" for the same socialist network in Chicago. He even considered a career in journalism like Davis.
...
Obama attended socialist conferences, and took a shine to other black Marxist revolutionists. Not long after Davis died in 1987, Obama came under the spell of another black nationalist-socialist, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who, like Davis, wore a dashiki and became a father figure.

If the relationship with Davis was as blase as the Associated Press makes it sound, why is Obama mum about it? And why did he try to hide Davis' identity in his first memoir, published in 1995?

"With the exception of my family and a handful of public figures," he wrote in the preface, "the names of most characters have been changed for the sake of privacy." But there was no need to protect Davis' privacy. He had long been dead. But lets lighten it up for a minute with Peter Kirsanow 25 Reasons You May be a Racist apologies to Jeff Foxworthy... But not as funny as the unreal Barack Hussein Obama, via Taranto What Would the Fonz Make of This? Yesterday we noted that Slate's Timothy Noah believes it is racist to call Barack Obama "skinny," because any reference to a black man's physical characteristics is code for calling him black.
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It is therefore at risk of being tagged insensitive by Noah that we observe that Obama is thin-skinned. NRO tears up the other race-baiter, Bob Herbert: Victor Davis Hanson What was stunning about the NY Times' Bob Herbert's charge that the McCain campaign, in its satire on Obama's messianic sense of self, had deliberately inserted clips of the phallic Leaning Tower of Pisa and Washington Monument to drive home a racist trope about black men and white women was not just his embarrassing ignorance of architecture, or his infantile pop-Freudianism, or even his preemptory efforts to tie all criticism of Obama to racism and thereby stifle dissent. It was the sheer arrogance in the manner in which he persisted in his false points: "An image right there... of the Leaning Tower of Pisa and ... the Washington Monument.... You tell me why those two phallic symbols are placed there...".

If one listens to the clip, he asks rhetorical questions, and then in condescending fashion chides his bewildered panelists about their inability to fathom his own pseudo-charges: "You remember that! Alright!...Look at the beginning of that ad again! You tell me!...Pow! ...I really wish someone would answer the question!...Run the ad again and take a look at it!" Yes... Barack Hussein Obama cluelessly selected Germany's "Victory Column", "the 19th-century monument to Prussian militarism and conquest over its neighbors" and the blind hatred of Bob Herbert transformed such a tasteless choice into a Leaning Tower of Penis. Andy McCarthy on The Leaning Phallus of Pisa ...did Herbert say which one of the 57 states that's in? Byron York Obama, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and the Washington Monument, Plus Britney and Paris ...this exchange from MSNBC's "Morning Joe" is quite striking. Gateway Pundit has a funny video White Jewish Rapper Disses Ludacris & Obamanabull Obama! MOVE OVER LUDACRIS... Now seriously... I don't think Barack Hussein is anymore a Muslim, then he is a Christian, but Muslims think he is a Muslim, making this newest scandal even funnier, via Sweetness & Light Obama’s Muslim Outreach Adviser Quits In 2000, Mr. Asbahi briefly served on the board of Allied Assets Advisors Fund, a Delaware-registered trust. Its other board members at the time included Jamal Said, the imam at a fundamentalist-controlled mosque in Illinois…

The eight-year-old connection between Mr. Asbahi and Mr. Said was raised last week by the Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report, which is published by a Washington think tank and chronicles the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood, a world-wide fundamentalist group based in Egypt. Other Web sites, some pro-Republican and others critical of fundamentalist Islam, also have reported on the background of Mr. Asbahi. He is a frequent speaker before several groups in the U.S. that scholars have associated with the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Justice Department named Mr. Said an unindicted co-conspirator in the racketeering trial last year of several alleged Hamas fund-raisers, which ended in a mistrial. He has also been identified as a leading member of the group in news reports going back to 1993.

Mr. Said is the imam at the Bridgeview Mosque in Bridgeview, Ill., outside Chicago. You can bet there is a heck of a lot more to Mr. Asbahi’s associations than the Wall Street Journal has found. Taranto More Muslim Problems for Obama It's odd that a candidate so Islamophobic that he thinks "Muslim" is a "smear" and won't even be photographed with Muslims would hire a "Muslim outreach" coordinator, much less one with connections like Asbahi's. We are seeing a prefect illustration of Barack Hussein Obama's Marxist outlook: “The ‘windfall profits’ tax is back, with Barack Obama stumping again to apply it to a handful of big oil companies. Which raises a few questions: What is a ‘windfall’ profit anyway? How does it differ from your everyday, run of the mill profit? Is it some absolute number, a matter of return on equity or sales—or does it merely depend on who earns it? Enquiring entrepreneurs want to know. Unfortunately, Mr. Obama’s ‘emergency’ plan, announced on Friday, doesn’t offer any clarity. To pay for ‘stimulus’ checks of $1,000 for families and $500 for individuals, the Senator says government would take ‘a reasonable share’ of oil company profits. Mr. Obama didn’t bother to define ‘reasonable’... This extraordinary redefinition of free-market success could use some parsing. Take Exxon Mobil, which on Thursday reported the highest quarterly profit ever and is the main target of any ‘windfall’ tax surcharge. Yet if its profits are at record highs, its tax bills are already at record highs too. Between 2003 and 2007, Exxon paid $64.7 billion in U.S. taxes, exceeding its after-tax U.S. earnings by more than $19 billion. That sounds like a government windfall to us, but perhaps we’re missing some... business subtlety. Maybe [Obama has] in mind profit margins as a percentage of sales. Yet by that standard Exxon’s profits don’t seem so large. Exxon’s profit margin stood at 10% for 2007, which is hardly out of line with the oil and gas industry average of 8.3%, or the 8.9% for U.S. manufacturing (excluding the sputtering auto makers). If that’s what constitutes windfall profits, most of corporate America would qualify... The fun part about this game is anyone can play. Jim Johnson, formerly of Fannie Mae and formerly a political fixer for Mr. Obama, reaped a windfall before Fannie’s multibillion-dollar accounting scandal. Bill Clinton took down as much as $15 million working as a rainmaker for billionaire financier Ron Burkle’s Yucaipa Companies. This may be the very definition of ‘windfall.’... The point is that what constitutes an abnormal profit is entirely arbitrary. It is in the eye of the political beholder, who is usually looking to soak some unpopular business. In other words, a windfall is nothing more than a profit earned by a business that some politician dislikes. And a tax on that profit is merely a form of politically motivated expropriation. It’s what politicians do in Venezuela, not in a free country.” -- The Wall Street Journal

“It doesn’t seem to occur to Obama that the oil companies would pass the ”windfall profits tax“ on to consumers. What a great plan: You get relief from $4-a-gallon gas, and the only downside is $5- or $6-a-gallon gas!” -- James Taranto Gateway Pundit Unreal... Obama Doubles Down on Tire Pressure Energy Plan Power Line did the math and found that it would take approximately 11,308 years of tire inflation to equal the energy we can obtain by developing our own petroleum resources. Ace McCain: I Was Wrong to Compare Barack Obama to Paris Hilton; Paris Hilton is Actually More Sensible and Less Goofball Enviroleftist Paris Hilton cut a Funny or Die clip, announcing her bid for presidency. She proposed both expanded drilling (with environmental safeguards) and tax incentives for alternate energy development.

She pitched this (or rather her writers pitched this) as a sensible "All of the Above" alternative to Obama's and McCain's plans.

Trouble is, it's not an alternative to McCain's plan; it's actually McCain's plan... 

What I want to know is, how did Hans Christian Andersen know about Barack Obama more than a century ago? Because Obama is straight out of Andersen's classic fairly tale, The Emperor's New Clothes. Old Hans Christian, who lived in Denmark from 1805 to 1875, had Obama's number down pat. All he needed was a good grasp of human nature.

Nothing has changed. Pretentious frauds still parade down the boulevards of Copenhagen and Washington, D.C., and only little kids notice their nakedness. Nobody dares to snicker, for fear of being called a bad name. (You know the bad name everybody is afraid of being called today.)

But there's no there there. Not a single, solitary rag of clothing. Barack Obama has the least amount of relevant experience of any major party candidate in the last hundred years. He just makes it up as he goes along, with sublime arrogance. If he wanted to be interviewed for President of General Electric they wouldn't give him the time of day; but President of the United States? No problem! Obama is a total stage prop, a media fiction, a complete unknown, a rolling stone.

The Emperor is seduced by his own grandiosity; whenever he blows another elementary fact about the world, his staff just gives him a quick heads-up to tell him what to say next. He's like a bad actor who flubs his lines every single time, just expecting the others to give him his cues. And the ink-stained wretches of the media always give him a pass. Their editors would give them hell if they said anything bad.

Just one little example. On May 19 Senator Obama proclaimed Iran to be just "a tiny country." That's a tiny country with seventy million people, half of it covered with mountains that you can tunnel under for your nuclear hidey holes. A half-million men in the army plus the fanatical martyrs of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, a domestic terror apparatus to keep the people down, a growing nuclear and missile program, enough oil to finance it all, a strategic position at the head and the tiny choke-point of the Persian Gulf, a long, long imperial tradition, and an Islamofascist suicide ideology, thanks to Jimmy Carter's good friend Ayatollah Khomeini. The regime of this tiny country had a habit of sending hundreds of young boys to blow up mine fields with their bodies, wearing green plastic "Keys to Paradise" around their necks. It controls the "Shiite Crescent" from Lebanon to the Gulf using its powerful alliance with Syria and Hezb'allah, supplied by our good friends the Russians and Chinese. The regime has a habit of blowing up American soldiers in Iraq with state-of-the-art shaped-charge explosives. Iran has performed high-altitude missile tests that could only be used to set off a nuclear EMP explosion, designed to cripple any modern nation by zapping its electrical and communication grids. It's just a "tiny threat," said Obama --- until his staff told him that wasn't quite right, and he quickly changed his tune.

If George W. Bush had ever been this blind, the media would have torn him into bloody shreds by now. We've seen them trying for eight years.

But the Emperor is protected from hard questions; when he blunders into them he just "uhs," "ahs," and stammers and stumbles. The media give him two or three guesses before he has to settle on his firm convictions -- for that day -- and then he flips again as soon as he feels like it.

This is sheer, open incompetence. Even Bill Clinton is saying it. He's right. Hell, half of the Democratic Party apparatus knows it. They aren't fooled. They're just hoping the rest of us stay fooled.

Obama's millions of immature O'bots are utterly self-deluded, but then they're not mental heavyweights anyway. The O'bots have their eyes shut tight, because looking at the reality of their idol is just too scary.

O'bots live in Hope and Hype; reality is not their strong suit. They just yearn to see His Imperial Majesty's royal crown, his purple robes, his golden sceptre, his bejeweled throne. But it's all self-hypnosis. Scratch the Obama thin veneer of hype for a second and it peels off before your very eyes.

A U.S. Border Patrol agent was held at gunpoint Sunday night by members of the Mexican military who had crossed the border into Arizona, but the soldiers returned to Mexico without incident when backup agents responded to assist.

Agents assigned to the Border Patrol station at Ajo, Ariz., said the Mexican soldiers crossed the international border in an isolated area about 100 miles southwest of Tucson and pointed rifles at the agent, who was not identified.

It was unclear what the soldiers were doing in the United States, but U.S. law enforcement authorities have long said that current and former Mexican military personnel have been hired to protect drug and migrant smugglers.

"Unfortunately, this sort of behavior by Mexican military personnel has been going on for years," union Local 2544 of the National Border Patrol Council (NBPC) said on its Web page. "They are never held accountable, and the United States government will undoubtedly brush this off as another case of 'Oh well, they didn't know they were in the United States.'

"It is fortunate that this incident didn't end in a very ugly gunfight," said the local's posting.

The NBPC represents all nonsupervisory personnel among the agency's 16,000 agents.

Border Patrol spokesman Michael Friel did not return calls for comment Tuesday.

State Department spokeswoman Nicole Thompson said Tuesday that the department had no information on the incident, and referred further questions to the Border Patrol. "It is not an incident that we are aware of," she said.

Ricardo Alday, spokesman at the Mexican Embassy in Washington, said Tuesday that Mexico and the United States are engaged in "an all-out struggle to deter criminal organizations from operating on both sides of our common border."

"Law enforcement operations have led, from time to time, to innocent incursions by both U.S. and Mexican law enforcement personnel and military units into the territory of both nations, and in particular along non-demarcated areas of our border," he said.

Workers at the Tyson Foods poultry processing plant in Shelbyville will no longer have a paid day off on Labor Day but will instead be granted the Muslim holiday Eid al-Fitr.

 

According to a news release from the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, a new five-year contract at the plant included the change to accommodate Muslim workers at the plant.

 

Tyson's director of media relations Gary Mickelson said the contract includes eight paid holidays -- the same number as the old contract.

 

Eid al-Fitr -- which falls on Oct. 1 this year -- marks the end of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting.

 

Union leaders said implementing the holiday was important for the nearly 700 Muslims, many of them Somalis, who work at the plant that employs a total of 1,200 people.

 

Nineteen-year plant veteran William Pentecost doesn’t agree with the decision.

 

"I don’t think it's right. I really don't think it's right," he said.

 

Tyson company spokeswoman Libby Lawson said by phone that, "This isn't a religious accommodation, this is a contractual agreement. The majority asked for it."

 

The change didn’t bother some workers.

 

"I think it's fine. I don’t have any problem with it. There's a whole bunch of them here, so they've got to do something for them," said worker John Smith.

 

"It shouldn't happen. I mean, I think, we're in America, you're in America, I think that they should go with our holidays," Pentecost said.

 

Channel 4's Cynthia Williams could not reach any of the plant’s Muslim workers, because Channel 4 News' crew was not permitted on the property.

 

Former employee and Shelbyville resident Anthony Proctor said he thinks what's happening is wrong.

 

He said he helped build a special Muslim prayer room that's located inside the plant and that no other Tyson facility has been that accommodating for any other religion.

 

"If we want to go pray, we don’t have one for Christians," he said.

 

Tyson is headquartered in Arkansas.

 

Lawson said they consider religious accommodations on a case-by-case basis. She said that so far, no one has asked for any other type of religious prayer room.

 

No one at the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union’s regional office answered phone calls placed by Williams on Friday.

 

A representative in New York said that no one there knew specifics about the new contract with the workers, but a person in research told Williams that holidays aren't usually replaced and are more likely to be added on.

 

The decision will only apply to workers at the plant who are union members. All other employees at the plant will still have their normal Labor Day holiday.

Want to know what Barack Obama believes? Check out what he taught his students: Inside Professor Obama’s Classroom - The Caucus - Politics - New York Times Blog.

  The War on Words   By Deborah Weiss

During the past year, several federal agencies – including the Department of Homeland Security, the State Department, and the National Counter Terrorism Center – have declared a war on words. Specifically, these agencies have issued memoranda discouraging their employees from naming the enemy in the War on Terror. The prohibition included words such as “jihad,” “Islamist,” “Islamofascism,” and “caliphate,” among others.

 

It’s not that the terms are inaccurate. Quite the contrary, as the agencies conceded, they often are used by the terrorists themselves. But they urged censorship all the same. Calling jihadists “holy warriors,” as they call themselves, is accurate, but it risks glorifying them. Moreover, even when used accurately, words like “Islamist” might be misinterpreted by moderate Muslims – who are henceforth to be known as “mainstream Muslims” – and should therefore be avoided so as not to offend anyone in the Muslim community. The phrase “Muslim community” should also be avoided.

 

To be sure, all the memos featured disclaimers stating that they were “not official policy.” But the fact that they were distributed on agency letterhead suggested at least a tacit endorsement of their content. Taken together, the memos marked a victory for government-imposed political correctness over clarity in the War on Terror.

 

That’s certainly how Michigan Congressman Pete Hoekstra saw it. On May 8, 2008, Hoekstra introduced an amendment to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence that would prohibit government agencies from using any intelligence funding to enforce their new speech code. The amendment states: “None of the funds authorized to be appropriated by this Act my be used to prohibit or discourage the use of the words or phrases ‘jihadist’, ‘jihad’, ‘Islamofascism’, ‘caliphate’, ‘Islamist’ or ‘Islamic terrorist’ by or within the intelligence community or the Federal Government.”

 

At first the amendment failed to make it out of committee. Consequently, 900 people signed a petition in protest. As a result, on July 16, 2008, the Intelligence Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2009, which included Hoekstra’s amendment, was presented to the full House of Representatives. This time the amendment passed in a 249-180 vote. All 180 opposing votes came from Democrats. Despite this opposition from their party’s leadership, 55 Democratic Congressmen voted in favor of the amendment.

 

During the floor debate, Rep. Hoekstra made a case for the critical importance of words in the conflict with Islamic terrorists. “Al Qaeda itself uses these terms to describe its fight against America, our allies, and moderate Muslims around the world,” Hoekstra noted. “Why then would we prohibit our intelligence professionals from using the same words to accurately describe Al Qaeda’s stated goals?”

 

Hoekstra also noted that the agencies’ memos suppress free speech. Citing death threats that jihadists routinely make to authors, cartoonists and journalists, he insisted that government agencies must not stifle free speech. Yet another danger of mandating political correctness, he observed, it that it would contribute to the politicalization of America’s national intelligence community.

 

On each of these counts, Hoekstra is correct. But more is at stake than free speech. The government’s memos preclude an honest and open discussion about the nature of our enemy. Terrorism in a tactic, but we are fighting those who subscribe to a dangerous ideology – radical Islam – that we ignore at our peril. It was not a coincidence that the Council on American Islamic Relations, a group with longstanding ties to Islamic terrorist organizations and an unindicted co-conspirator in a criminal conspiracy to support Hamas, was one of the groups to applaud the government’s new terminology for terror.

 

Another problem with the unofficial speech codes is that, even as they will inhibit debate in the U.S., they will have no influence on the debate in the Middle East. Government officials can ban all the words they like, but jihadists will continue using them. What’s more, their Muslim audience will continue to look to religious leaders for the “proper interpretation” of Islam. Neither United States government officials, nor Westerners more broadly, will be considered authoritative on these matters.

 

Rep. Hoekstra’s amendment will not alter this reality. Nor is it likely to change the climate of political correctness that exists in our government agencies. Still, it is important symbolically. It demonstrates that at least some officials understand the nature of our enemy, as well as the strategic importance of naming the threat that America faces. When a similar bill comes to a vote in the Senate, let us hope its members evince the same kind of courage.

Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad.
- Euripides

He has a seat on his campaign aircraft marked "president". He has taken a shot at creating his own presidential seal, complete with Latin motto. He has laid claim to personal control over the world's oceans and seas. He has repeatedly attempted to dictate how and on what level he, his ideas, and his activities may be discussed. He has encouraged a portrayal of himself as a messianic figure, including a portrait of himself as Christ, complete with halo. He is even now completing a triumphant grand tour of the old world, during which he attempted to shanghai an ancient monument for personal use without consulting the host government.

The operative term here is "hubris". A word of Attic Greek origin, hubris was a major concept animating classical Greek thought. Hubris is overweening pride, an arrogance so profound and so visible as to affront the gods themselves. Hubris was a quality often identified with Greek tragic heroes. The hero allowed simple human pride in his accomplishments and station to burgeon to offensive proportions, at which point the wheels of fate began rolling. The ending was never good -- the valiant Ajax stabs himself to death at a lonely spot, the kingly Oedipus is transformed into a howling, self-blinded wreck.

Barack Obama embodies hubris in chemically pure form. Not that he's a tragic hero, or a hero of any sort, to anyone apart from his deluded legions of college freshmen. Beyond cleaning Hillary's clock, he has no accomplishments to speak of, and as for his station... A glance at Trent Lott, Robert Byrd, and Ted Kennedy clearly reveals that "U.S. senator" is not a position of particular pride.

But even if he hasn't founded cities, destroyed monsters, or led men into battle, Obama does share one quality with the heroes of the ancient world: an absolute conviction that he is superior to the ordinary run of humanity. Like them, Obama believes himself a man of destiny, and like them, Obama will go over the edge.

The only question is whether he gets to take the country with him.

He's nearly blown himself up several times previously. In the case of Jeremiah Wright, he felt himself so far above the controversy that he failed to so much as acknowledge it until it had already boiled over, leaving him no choice but to repudiate his longtime mentor. More recently he went so far as to accuse one of the oldest and most liberal publications in the country of impiety. There is no other word for it -- the entire case against The New Yorker was based on the premise that Barack Obama, of all living individuals, is beyond the reach of satire due to the sacredness of his person, a claim never, to my knowledge, made in a previous American election.

Over the past week, he has thrust himself into negotiations with a crucial American client, a client even now involved in the final stages of a lengthy and debilitating war, for the sole purpose of bolstering his campaign. Again, it's impossible to think of a previous candidate who ever behaved in this fashion.

All these incidents -- and plenty of others that could be mentioned -- mark the steps taken toward catastrophe. Obama is edging closer and closer to his climactic moment.