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Obama says he's never witnessed or heard Rev. Wright's racist and anti-American rants.
 

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1995 In his memoir, Obama writes of one of the watershed moments of his racial awareness -- time and again in remarkable detail.  It is a story about a Life magazine article that influenced him.  The report was about a black man who tried to bleach his skin white.  When Obama was told no such article could be found in Life, he says "it might have been Ebony."

He is 9 years old, living in Indonesia, where he and his mother moved with her new husband, Lolo Soetoro, a few years earlier.  One day while visiting his mother, who was working at the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, Obama passed time by looking through several issues of Life magazine.  He came across an article that he later would describe as feeling like an "ambush attack."

The article included photos of a black man who had destroyed his skin with powerful chemical lighteners that promised to make him white.  Instead, the chemicals had peeled off much of his skin, leaving him sad and scarred, Obama recalled.

"I imagine other black children, then and now, undergoing similar moments of revelation," Obama wrote of the magazine photos in "Dreams."

Yet no such photo exists, according to historians at the magazine.  No such photos, no such article.  When asked about the discrepancy, Obama said in a recent interview, "It might have been an Ebony or it might have been ... who knows what it was?"  (At the request of the Tribune, archivists at Ebony searched their catalogue of past articles, none of which matched what Obama recalled.)

In fact, it is surprising, based on interviews with more than two dozen people who knew Obama during his nearly four years in Indonesia, that it would take a photograph in a magazine to make him conscious of the fact that some people might treat him differently in part because of the color of his skin.
2003 Barack Obama in 2003, talking to the AFL/CIO:

“I happen to be a proponent of single-payer universal healthcare coverage.  That’s what I’d like to see.”

In January, 2008, Obama claimed in a nationally televised debate:

"I never said that we should try to go ahead and get single-payer."

2004

In Obama's famous DNC Convention speech, Obama says, "My father was a foreign student, born and raised in a small village in Kenya.  He grew up herding goats, went to school in a tin-roof shack.  His father -- my grandfather -- was a cook, a domestic servant to the British."

Kezia, Obama Sr.'s first wife tells a story that puts Obama's account to lie.


Kezia said: In 1955 Obama Sr. was 18 and working in an office in Nairobi, when he took Kezia from her family at the age of 16.  Her father was furious.

"He did not like Obama.  My father and brothers came to Nairobi to bring me back.  They said I had to go back to school.

"When I wouldn't, they said they would never speak to me again.

"Barack was also worried about what his father would think because I was so young, but he gave us his approval.  Obama's father (often described as poor) sent my mother and father 14 cows for my dowry.

 

Just how can a cook, a domestic servant to the British, provide a dowry of 14 cattle for Senior's first wife?  Also, Obama's father had been working in a Nairobi office since the age 16, not herding goats.

As an aside, can you imagine if a Republican was running for president and it came out that his father had bought his first wife for 14 cows???!!!Just wow!!

2004 Responding to questions about his intent to serve out the six year senate term, Obama says, in this video, (link removed), that he will not run for the presidency in four years.

Notice:  The video has disappeared. Using WayBackMachine, I found two links -- both played empty videos -- a lot of stuff is being scrubbed from the web.

Here is what he said in the video:

"I think I've been very clear.  Ah-ah-mumble-mumble, there's a presidential election in four years.  I'm not running for president in four years."

Here is a backup story -- during a meeting with reporters at his Illinois campaign headquarters after his election to the U.S. Senate, he ridiculed as "a silly question" whether he would run for president or vice president before his term ends in 2011.  "I’ve never worked in Washington," he said. "I can unequivocally say I will not be running for national office in four years, and my entire focus is making sure that I’m the best possible senator on behalf of the people of Illinois."
7/28/04 The day after his speech at the Democratic convention catapulted him into the national spotlight, Barack Obama told a group of reporters in Boston that the United States had an "absolute obligation" to remain in Iraq long enough to make it a success.

"The failure of the Iraqi state would be a disaster," he said at a lunch sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor, according to an audiotape of the session.  "It would dishonor the 900-plus men and women who have already died. . . .  It would be a betrayal of the promise that we made to the Iraqi people, and it would be hugely destabilizing from a national security perspective."

 

In late winter, 2008, on the campaign trail, Obama says he wants to bring the troops home yesterday -- you decide -- was he lying then or is he lying now?

1/22/06 On "Meet the Press," Tim Russert and Obama had the following exchange:

Russert: "When we talked back in November of '04 after your election, I said, 'There's been enormous speculation about your political future.  Will you serve your six-year term as United States senator from Illinois?'"

Obama: "I will serve out my full six-year term.  You know, Tim, if you get asked enough, sooner or later you get weary and you start looking for new ways of saying things.  But my thinking has not changed."

Russert: "So you will not run for president or vice president in 2008?"

Obama: "I will not."
1/24/07 On January 24, the Obama campaign released a statement, saying, "To be clear, Senator Obama has never been a Muslim, was not raised a Muslim, and is a committed Christian who attends the United Church of Christ in Chicago.

On March 14th, in a statement to The Times, the Obama campaign offered this statement to correct their previous statement, that appears to be a bold-faced lie:

"Obama has never been a practicing Muslim. The statement added that as a child, Obama had spent time in the neighborhood's Islamic center."

And, the original statement began, "To be clear ..."

So, in three months, Barrack's campaign has gone from describing the U.S. presidential hopeful as never having been a Muslim and never having been raised as a Muslim to now never having been a practicing Muslim.

What's with the semantics?  Statements from Obama's campaign appear to have evolved, to say the least.
3/25/07 On March 25th, the Chicago Tribune reports that an extensive search found no basis for an episode Obama recounts about a picture he ran across in Life magazine of a "black man who had tried to peel off his skin" in a failed effort to use chemicals to lighten it. Obama writes that "seeing that article was violent for me, an ambush attack."

The Tribune continued: "Yet no such Life issue exists, according to historians at the magazine.  No such photos, no such article.  When asked about the discrepancy, Obama said in a recent interview, "It might have been an Ebony or it might have been ... who knows what it was?"

At the request of the Tribune, archivists at Ebony searched their catalogue of past articles, none of which matched what Obama recalled."
3/26/07 As another example, consider Obama's stirring tale for the Selma audience about how he had been conceived by his parents, Barack Obama Sr. and Ann Dunham, because they had been inspired by the fervor following the "Bloody Sunday" voting rights demonstration that was commemorated March 4.  "There was something stirring across the country because of what happened in Selma, Alabama," he said, "because some folks are willing to march across a bridge.  So they got together and Barack Obama Jr. was born.  So don't tell me I don't have a claim on Selma, Alabama.  Don't tell me I'm not coming home to Selma, Alabama"

Obama was born in 1961, and the Selma march occurred four years later, in 1965.  The New York Times reported that when the senator was asked about the discrepancy later that day, he clarified: "I meant the whole civil rights movement."
3/26/07 Obama went on to tell his audience that the Kennedys -- Jack and Bobby -- decided to do an airlift.  They would bring some young Africans over so that they could be educated and learn all about America.  His grandfather heard that call and sent his son, Barack Obama, Sr., to America.

The problem with that scenario is that, having been born in August 1961, the future senator was not conceived until sometime in November 1960.  So, if his African grandfather heard words that "sent a shout across oceans," inspiring him to send his goat-herder son to America, it was not Democrat Jack Kennedy he heard, or his brother Bobby, it was Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Actually, Senior was awarded an American sponsored scholarship in economics to the University of Hawaii at Manoa.  He was selected by a former Kenyan cabinet minister, the late Tom Mboya, who was earmarked as the successor to Jomo Kenyatta, Kenya's first prime minister.

The presumption was that Senior would return to Africa and use his "Western-honed skills in a new Kenya."
3/27/07 Obama, tells the crowd at fundraiser , "I was a constitutional law professor, which means unlike the current president I actually respect the Constitution."

For the record, Obama is a "Senior Lecturer (on leave of absence)" at the University of Chicago Law School.  He has taught Constitutional Law III: Equal Protection and Substantive Due Process, Current Issues in Racism & the Law, and Voting Rights & the Democratic Process.
5/8/07 Obama, caught up in the fervor of a campaign speech Tuesday, drastically overstated the Kansas tornadoes death toll, saying 10,000 had died.

"In case you missed it, this week, there was a tragedy in Kansas. Ten thousand people died -- an entire town destroyed," the Democratic presidential candidate said in a speech to 500 people packed into a sweltering Richmond art studio for a fundraiser.

The death toll was 12.
5/10/07 Obama botched his facts in a speech criticizing the U.S. auto industry for "investing in bigger and faster cars while foreign competitors invested in more fuel-efficient technology."

Obama stated that "while our fuel standards haven't moved from 27.5 miles per gallon in two decades, both China and Japan have surpassed us, with Japanese cars now getting an average of 45 miles to the gallon."  But Toyota, which should know, has responded, "No carmaker gets 45 mpg; ours is closer to 30 mpg."

Well, we're glad to see Obama's shifting the blame from the consumer to the automakers.  That must explain why the Illinois Senator and Presidential candidate owns a HEMI-powered V8 Chrysler 300C

Obviously it's Chrysler's fault Obama bought a big 5.7-liter engine from them -- he just didn't have a choice.
6/15/07 During his 12 years in politics, Sen. Barack Obama has received nearly three times more campaign cash from indicted businessman, Tony Rezko and his associates, than he has publicly acknowledged, the Chicago Sun-Times has found.

Seven months ago, Obama told the Sun-Times his "best estimate" was that Rezko raised "between $50,000 and $60,000" during Obama's political career.

However, Obama has collected at least $168,308 from Rezko and his circle.  Additionally, Obama also has taken in an unknown amount of money from people who attended fund-raising events hosted by Rezko since the mid-1990s.

Everything you ever wanted to know about Obama and Rezko.
9/17/07 Responding to criticism of his disrespect of the flag of the United States during the National Anthem, Obama defended himself by saying "My grandfather taught me how to say the Pledge of Allegiance when I was 2."
 

He didn't even remember what he was doing on September 17th, when Obama, Hillary and Bill Richardson attended the Steak Fry of Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) in Indianola, IA.

How can he possibly remember what happened when he was two years old?

10/6/07 Obama accused his fellow American citizens of the indiscriminate murder of Iraqi civilians, saying, "And these private (Blackwater USA) contractors, they go out and they're spraying bullets and hitting civilians and that makes it more dangerous for our troops."

Obama lies with the same ease as the Clintons and proves that he will say anything to win the nomination and election.
11/11/07 Last fall during a nationally televised presidential debate,  Obama hesitantly raised his hand and joined with most of his Democratic rivals to declare that he opposed decriminalizing marijuana. (first video).

But as a candidate for the U.S. Senate four years ago, Mr. Obama told Illinois college students that he supported eliminating criminal penalties for marijuana use or possession, according to a videotape of a little noticed debate that was obtained by The Washington Times.

"I think we need to rethink and decriminalize our marijuana laws," Mr. Obama told an audience during a debate at Northwestern University in 2004. "But I'm not somebody who believes in legalization of marijuana." (second video).

Asked about the two different answers, Mr. Obama's presidential campaign said he in fact has "always" supported decriminalizing marijuana as he answered in 2004, meaning the candidate mistakenly raised his hand during the presidential debate last fall.
12/1/07 Obama said, "I'm not running because I'm trying to fulfill some long-held plan."

Oh, really?

Iis Darmawan, 63, Obama's teacher in 1970, remembers him as an exceptionally tall and curly haired child who quickly picked up the local language and had sharp math skills. "He wrote an essay  titled, 'I Want To Become President,'" the teacher said.

In 1971, Obama's sister Maya, has also said, "There was always a joke between my mom and Barack that he would be the first black president."

In 1991, David B. Wilkins , the Kirkland and Ellis professor of law, said he advised Obama to become a Supreme Court Clerk.  "Obama recognized the honor in pursuing that post," Wilkins said, but quickly added that he wasn’t interested.

“He said that he wanted to write a book about his life and his father, go back to Chicago, get back into the community, and run for office there.  He knew exactly what he wanted and went about getting it done,” Wilkins said.

In 1992,
Obama's brother-in-law, Craig Robinson pulled him aside and asked about his plans.  "He said, 'I think I’d like to teach at some point in time, and maybe run for public office,'" recalls Robinson, who assumed Senator Obama meant he’d like to run for city alderman.  "He said no -- at some point he’d like to run for the U.S. Senate.  And then he said, 'Possibly even run for President at some point.'  And I was like, 'Okay, but don’t say that to my Aunt Gracie.'  I was protecting him from saying something that might embarrass him."

In 1993, Obama began teaching at the University of Chicago Law School, where he declined to pursue a tenure-track post, hoping to save time for politics.

The one thread, that remains consistent, throughout Obama's life, is his teacher's, mentor's and friend's recollection of Obama's single-minded pursuit of high political office.
12/22/07 In a small-town café in Pleasantville, Omaha, Obama was asked a question that typically only circulates on the Internet.
 

As he sat down to have a slice of pie with a small group of potential voters and an elderly woman asked him about being Muslim.
 

"I've always been a Christian," the Illinois Democrat responded. "I have never practiced [Islam]."

Note: The newspaper editors had to add the word, "Islam."

In his autobiography, "Dreams From My Father," Obama mentions studying the Quran.   He was enrolled in two Jakarta schools as a Muslim.  His teacher Tine Hahiyary said that she remembered that he had studied "mengaji" (recitation of the Quran)."  Classmate Rony Amiris described Obama as being a very devout Muslim, saying, "Barry was previously quite religious in Islam."  Another classmate, Emirsyah Satar, now the CEO of Garuda Indonesia, was quoted as saying, "He (Obama) was often in the prayer room wearing a 'sarong.'"  (See Obama's Education.)

Yet, on his official campaign website, Obama has posted this statement, "Barack has never been a Muslim or practiced any other faith besides Christianity."

Obama's grandfather was a Muslim.  Obama's father was a Muslim.  Obama's stepfather was a Muslim.  His African relatives are Muslims.  What was he for the 27 years before his alleged conversion if he wasn't a Muslim?
 

If Obama has always been a Christian, why was he enrolled in two Jakarta schools as a Muslim, and why did he study the Quran?

 

And note his Clintonesque defense, "I have never practiced."

But that's not what Obama's sister says -- in an interview with the New York Times, published on April 30th, Maya Soetoro-Ng, Obama’s younger half sister, told the Times, "My whole family was Muslim, and most of the people I knew were Muslim."  (Alternate link)

I assume Maya thinks of her brother, Obama, as a member of her family?

And, the Jerusalem Post reports that Barack Obama's half brother Malik said, if elected, his brother will be a good president for the Jewish people, despite his Muslim background.

 

This is Obama's biggest problem -- his dissimulation.

Saying, "I've always been a Christian," is a bold-faced lie.  Especially since he's never been baptized.

1/22/08 The Hillary Clinton Campaign releases a video that proves that Obama lied about his position on "single-payer healthcare."

The video compares statements Obama made during the January 21st Democratic debate with those he made to an AFL-CIO conference in June 2003 while campaigning for the Senate.  Contradicting what Obama said at the debate, the old footage shows the senator saying, "I happen to be a proponent of single-payer universal healthcare coverage.  That’s what I’d like to see."

At the debate, Obama stated: “I never said that we should try to go ahead and get single-payer (healthcare)."

Single-payer healthcare is an euphemism for socialized medicine.
2008 February -- As Sen. McCain has pointed out, Obama promised to use public funding in the general election if the Republican candidate would do so also.  Well, McCain has agreed to it, but now Obama wants to back out of the deal.  After all, when he made the promise, he didn't have a chance of raising more than the public's $85 million stipend.  But now that he can raise $300 million, well, what's a little untruth between the waited-for one and his people?  Yes, he can.
2/29/08 The Obama campaign told Canadian Television (CTV) that no message was passed to the Canadian government suggesting that Obama does not mean what he says about opting out of NAFTA if it is not renegotiated.

However, the Obama camp did not respond to repeated questions from CTV on reports that a conversation on this matter was held between Obama’s senior economic adviser, Austan Goolsbee, and the Canadian Consulate General in Chicago.

Earlier Thursday, the Obama campaign insisted that no conversations have taken place with any of its senior ranks and representatives of the Canadian government on the NAFTA issue. On Thursday night, CTV spoke with Goolsbee, but he refused to say whether he had such a conversation with the Canadian government office in Chicago. He also said he has been told to direct any questions to the campaign headquarters.

CTV didn’t stop there. They announced that their sources, at the highest levels of the Canadian government," reconfirmed the story to CTV and one of their primary sources provided a timeline of the discussion to CTV.
3/2/08 Obama told another whopper while criticizing Hillary Clinton.

Obama said that Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a fellow Democrat from neighboring West Virginia, had read the intelligence estimate as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee and after a brief pause said the then-chairman had voted against the war resolution.

However, Rockefeller was not the chair at the time and voted in favor of the war authorization.  Sen. Bob Graham of Florida was the intelligence committee chair in 2002 and voted against the resolution.  Obama did not mention Graham’s name in the passage.

His exact words are, "She didn’t read the National Intelligence Estimates.  Jay Rockefeller read it.  But she didn’t read it.  I don’t know what all that experience got her because I have enough experience to know that if you have a National Intelligence Estimate and the chairman of the national, um, Senate Intelligence Committee says you should read this, this is why I’m voting against the war, that you should probably read it.  I don’t know how much experience you need for that."
3/7/08 Obama's courage: Contrary to a recent hyperbolic campaign ad, it wasn’t "courageous" to give his 2002 anti-war speech, primarily because he delivered it at an anti-Iraq war rally.

At the last debate, America’s former co-president claimed that it was easy to give that speech, and it wasn’t a gamble for him because he wasn’t in the US Senate and therefore wasn’t in a position of responsibility.  Obama’s impassioned reply was, "I was in the midst of a U.S. Senate campaign.  It was a high-stakes campaign."

Wrong. In reality, Obama did not announce his intentions to run for the US Senate until January 2003.
3/7/08 Obama say he doesn't take money from DC lobbyists and special interest PACS.  This is the type of double-talk "politics of the past" rhetoric Obama rails against.

While his claim is technically true, what he does do is take money from state lobbyists and other big money contributors who have substantial lobbyist machines in DC, like law firms and corporations.

In April 2007, the LA Times quoted the Campaign Finance Institute’s Stephen Weissman as pointing out that the distinction Obama makes on lobbyist money is meaningless: "He gets an asterisk that says he is trying to be different.  … But overall, the same wealthy interests are funding his campaign as are funding other candidates, whether or not they are lobbyists."

The Capital Eye reported that "[a]ccording to the Center for Responsive Politics, 14 of Obama’s top 20 contributors employed lobbyists this year, spending a total of $16.2 million to influence the federal government in the first six months of 2007."

Obama’s no stranger to being influenced by those campaign donations, either.
3/14/08 In one of the biggest lies he ever told -- Obama says he "vehemently condemns" the words of his pastor and mentor, Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright, an official member of Obama's campaign, as a member of Obama's African American Religious Leadership Committee.

 

What an absolute pile of crap!

 

Obama says he's never witnessed or heard these statement before.

 


Double click arrow on tool bar to view. (01:30)

 

Another load of crap!  Obama has!  Later, in a cover-his-ass speech, Obama even admits he heard "the REv's" despicable words.

 

Obama and his wife Michelle have been listening to this man for 20 years.

Obama is a bold-faced liar to now claim he had no idea the "the Rev" was such an anti-American, racist,  hate-monger!

Why hasn't Obama denounced "the Rev" at any time in the past 20 years?

The answer, of course, is because Obama wasn't running for national office before -- that's one reason.

 

Another?

Obama and Wright are of the same mind -- now and then!

3/14/08 OK, OK!  Maybe he didn't hear those words.  But what about Reverend White's words that appear in Obama's very own book, "Dreams of My Father."

"It is this world, a world where cruise ships throw away more food in a day than most residents of Port-au-Prince see in a year, where white folks’ greed runs a world in need, apartheid in one hemisphere, apathy in another hemisphere…  That’s the world!  On which hope sits!"

Reverend Wright spoke of Sharpsville and Hiroshima, the callousness of policy makers in the White House and in the State House.

That was 13 years ago, in 1995.
3/14/08 March 14th -- Barack may not have heard Wright's rants, but did he read them?

In the Trinity United Church of Christ Bulletin, January 21, 2007, on pages 9 and 10, "The Pastor's Page," are these words:

"We have lost over 3,000 boys and girls in an illegal and unjust war, and the media is on a feeding frenzy about Barack Obama’s church.  Where is the outrage about the 3,000 dead American military personnel and the 600,000 dead Iraqi civilians who are dead for no reason other than greed and ego?  What’s goin’ on?"

"I use his words today on the third Sunday of a New Year to keep before you the painful truth of who we are and where it is we are in this racist United States of America!  What’s goin’ on?"

"The reality, however, is that the entire war in Iraq and the larger “war on terror” have been based on lies, half-truths and distortions to serve the agenda of the United States imperialism.  Where is the public outcry? Where is the outrage?  What’s goin’ on?"

He may never have heard Wright actually say the U. S. was racist or some aspiring empire.  But he never read it in his bulletin?  Ever?
3/14/08 Presidential candidate Barack Obama  repudiated what he called "inflammatory and appalling remarks" made by his Chicago pastor.

Obama said he had not been present during the sermons in question.

Obama told MSNBC, "Had I heard them in church I would have expressed that concern directly to Rev. Wright."

Please note, he says that he would have expressed concern, not repudiate, the words

Yet, in this video, "the Rev" places Obama in the congregation, by saying, "There is a man here, who can take this country in a new direction" and he points at him.

In the next clip, during Wright's 2007 Christmas services, Wright rails, "Barack knows what it means to be a black man living in a country and a process that is controlled by rich white men, Hillary can never know that, Hillary ain't ever been called a nigger!"

While Wright rails, "Bill did us like he did Monica Lewinsky," Wright's successor, Otis Moss III, jumps into the picture frame, attempting to high-five "the Rev."

Barack was in Chicago for Christmas 2007 and Wright is addressing him from the pulpit.  Will Barack say me didn't attend Christmas services? 

When Obama said, "Had I heard them in church ..." Obama lied.  He listened to Wright's sermons for 20 years. 

These two men, Obama and Wright, are two peas in the same pod.


And, please notice the congregation in that video.  They are going nuts during Wright's preaching.  All of them believe this "evil white man" crap and eat it up.

The whole bunch of them are the worst kinds of hateful racists -- and remember, Wright's congregation is composed of successful, educated African-Americans.

3/14/08 And on the same day, he admits to another whopper!

Obama now says Rezko played a bigger fundraising role.

Indicted Chicago businessman Antoin "Tony" Rezko was a more significant fundraiser for presidential candidate Barack Obama's earlier political campaigns than Obama has previously admitted.  Rezko raised as much as $250,000 for the first three offices Obama sought, the senator told the Tribune on Friday.

Obama also said for the first time that his private real estate transactions with Rezko involved repeated lapses of judgment.  The mistake, Obama said, was not simply that Rezko was under grand jury investigation at the time of their 2005 and 2006 dealings.  "The mistake was he had been a contributor and somebody involved in politics," he said.

And this from a guy who is running for office based upon his judgment.
3/15/08 Will Obama deny he was in attendance at the controversial Chicago church when the pastor referred to "white arrogance" and "the United States of White America"  on July 22, 2007, accompanied by his Secret Service detail.

Wright laced into America's establishment, blaming the "white arrogance" of America's Caucasian majority for the woes of the world, especially the oppression suffered by blacks.  To underscore the point he refers to the country as the "United States of White America."  Many in the congregation, including Obama, nodded in apparent agreement as these statements were made.
3/30/08 The University of Chicago released a statement Thursday saying Sen. Barack Obama "served as a professor" in the law school -- but that is a title Obama, who taught courses there part-time, never held, a spokesman for the school confirmed on Friday.

"He did not hold the title of professor of law," said Marsha Ferziger Nagorsky, an assistant dean for communications and lecturer in law at the school.

Another university spokesman, Josh Schonwald, said the Obama campaign did not request that the statement be issued and that it was posted because reporters were calling the school with questions about Obama's status.

The university statement said, "From 1992 until his election to the U.S. Senate in 2004, Barack Obama served as a professor in the Law School."

The school probably did not mean to imply that Obama became a University of Chicago professor a year out of law school.  But the word "served" is key -- Nagorsky said Obama carried out, or served, a function of a professor -- teaching a core curriculum course -- while at the same time not holding down that rank.

At issue in a Clinton memo was Obama's claims -- most specifically on several direct mail pieces produced for his 2004 U.S. Senate race -- that said he was a law professor at the university.

Obama graduated from Harvard Law School in 1991.  He was a lecturer at the U. of C. law school between 1992 and 1996.  During that time, he was an attorney at the law firm of Miner, Barnhill & Galland.  In his first years of teaching, he had only one course.

He was promoted to senior lecturer in 1996, and his teaching load eventually increased to three courses a year, less than the load of a professor.

Obama won a state Senate seat in 1996.  He maintained his senior lecturer post from 1996 to 2004, when he took a leave to run for the U.S. Senate.

Nagorsky said there is a major distinction between a lecturer and senior lecturer, though neither is a full-time position.  She said the status of a senior lecturer is "similar" to the status of a professor and that Obama did teach core courses usually handled only by professors.  Obama's appointment was not part of an academic search process, and he did not have any scholarly research obligations.
3/31/08 The Obama campaign has made political points over Hillary Clinton’s dishonest comments about coming under "sniper fire" in Bosnia, but Obama also has some opportunistic lies for which to account.  The Washington Post calls it "overstating," but make no mistake; this is a flat-out lie: Obama Overstates Kennedys’ Role in Helping His Father.

Addressing civil rights activists in Selma, Ala., a year ago, Sen. Barack Obama traced his "very existence" to the generosity of the Kennedy family, which he said paid for his Kenyan father to travel to America on a student scholarship and thus meet his Kansan mother.

The Camelot connection has become part of the mythology surrounding Obama’s bid for the Democratic presidential nomination.  After Caroline Kennedy endorsed his candidacy in January, Newsweek commentator Jonathan Alter reported that she had been struck by the extraordinary way in which "history replays itself" and by how "two generations of two families -- separated by distance, culture and wealth -- can intersect in strange and wonderful ways."

It is a touching story -- but the key details are either untrue or grossly oversimplified.

Contrary to Obama’s claims in speeches in January at American University and in Selma last year, the Kennedy family did not provide the funding for a September 1959 airlift of 81 Kenyan students to the United States that included Obama’s father.  According to historical records and interviews with participants, the Kennedys were first approached for support for the program nearly a year later, in July 1960.  The family responded with a $100,000 donation, most of which went to pay for a second airlift in September 1960.

Obama spokesman Bill Burton acknowledged yesterday that the senator from Illinois had erred in crediting the Kennedy family with a role in his father’s arrival in the United States.  He said the Kennedy involvement in the Kenya student program apparently "started 48 years ago, not 49 years ago as Obama has mistakenly suggested in the past."
3/31/08 Obama distorts McCain’s "100 years in Iraq" comment again

Shocking!  Not that he’d distort it; that’s politics.  What’s shocking is the fact that the reporter presses him on it and clarifies what McCain meant (which Obama already knows, natch), backing him into the very stupid assertion that Maverick wants a Germany/Japan-type occupation of Iraq that’s somehow going to cost us $150 billion a year for decades and decades and decades.  "It’s seldom that you see such a dirty lie," said Krauthammer of this subject not long ago.  Prepare yourselves to see it again and again and again.


 

Exit question: He wants to know how Bush and McCain define victory.  How does he define it?

4/1/08 Last week, Obama aired a television ad in Pennsylvania called "Nothing's Changed" that outlines his energy proposals while declaring, "I don't take money from oil companies or Washington lobbyists, and I won't let them block change anymore."

The Clinton campaign last week accused Obama of "false advertising."

"Senator Obama says he doesn't take campaign contributions from oil companies but the reality is that Exxon, Shell, and others are among his donors," Clinton spokesman Phil Singer said.

THE FACTS: True enough, Obama does not take money from oil companies.  No candidate does.  It is illegal for corporations to give money to politicians.  Corporations, however, do have political action committees that collect voluntary donations from employees and then donate them to candidates.  Obama doesn't take money from PACs.  He also doesn't take money from lobbyists.

But he does accept money from executives and other employees of oil companies and two of his fundraisers are oil company executives.  As of Feb. 29, Obama's presidential campaign had received nearly $214,000 from oil and gas industry employees and their families, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.  Clinton had received nearly $307,000 from industry workers and their families and Republican Sen. John McCain, the likely GOP presidential nominee, received nearly $394,000, according to the center's totals.

Two of Obama's fundraisers are Robert Cavnar, the chairman and chief executive of Houston-based Mission Resources Corp., and George Kaiser, the president and CEO of Tulsa-based Kaiser-Francis Oil Co.

In January and February alone, Obama received nearly $18,000 from Exxon Mobil workers, according to Federal Election Commission records.  Most of the donations were of $250 or less; the money came from workers ranging from executives to engineers to geologists to shift supervisors.  Overall, he has raised about $34,000 from Exxon Mobil workers since the beginning of his campaign.  Exxon Mobil employees have given Clinton about $16,000 since the beginning of last year.
4/8/08 Despite his previous pledge to enter into the public financing system should he be the Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., has recently been reluctant to re-commit to entering the system.

This reluctance has coincided with his primary, caucus, and fundraising successes. For that reluctance, Obama has been hammered as hypocritical by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., not to mention impartial observers.

Tonight at a fundraiser in Washington, D.C., at the National Museum of Women in the Arts -- at a $2,300-per-person event for 200 people held before a $1,000-per-person reception for 350 people -- Obama previewed his argument to justify this possible future discarding of a principle.

"We have created a parallel public financing system where the American people decide if they want to support a campaign they can get on the Internet and finance it, and they will have as much access and influence over the course and direction of our campaign that has traditionally been reserved for the wealthy and the powerful," Obama said.

Do you buy it?
4/11/08 Obama? -- Shake the illusion, this guy’s a snake.

In Levittown, Penn., today, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, was asked about his church’s magazine giving an award to Rev. Louis Farrakhan.  "This was done by a magazine that was connected to the church," Obama explained.  "I would have never done it.  It was primary focused on the rehabilitation work that they do for ex-offenders in Chicago.  That doesn’t excuse it, that just explains it."

The first time Obama said this, I could believe he was misinformed [update: indeed, the first time he said this, he only said he "assumed" this was the reason].  The second time, perhaps that he was caught off guard and didn’t have his story straight.  Now, I can only conclude that he is intentionally choosing to blatantly lie about this, hoping that no one will notice and call him on it.

Let’s recall the facts: The magazine explicitly explained in the video it prepared for the banquet at which Farrakhan was honored that it was honoring Farrakhan for his purported dedication to "truth, education, and leadership."  [Surprise, surprise, the video seems to have been pulled from YouTube.]  Obama's spiritual mentor Rev. Wright, meanwhile praised Farrakhan in the magazine for his "astounding and eye-opening" analysis of the "racial ills of this nation," a "perspective" that is "helpful and honest."  I even got hold of the interview the magazine did with Farrakhan.  No mention was made in any of these sources of "rehabilitation work for ex-offenders."
4/14/08 April 14th -- Obama has pledged to end the influence of lobbyists, but that doesn’t keep him from fundraising at the offices of one of the most notoriously corrupt lobbyists in years.

Newsday reported over the weekend that Obama took about $125,000 from Greenberg Traurig employees at their Miami offices last October.  The firm made headlines when its biggest lobbyist, Jack Abramoff, admitted to several counts of corruption and was sentenced to prison.
4/17/08 Both the McCain and Clinton campaigns are accusing Obama of giving a misleading answer to Charlie Gibson about whether his handwriting was on a questionnaire that reported him as favoring a complete ban on handguns.  The Obama campaign has said that a staffer "mischaracterized" the senator's views while filling up answers to the questionnaire without Obama's input.  You can see the questionnaire here.  Obama's handwriting is on the first page, but tonight he said flatly, "no, my writing was not on that particular questionnaire."

There were, in fact, two versions of the questionnaire, filed under Obama's name in 1996 when he was running for the Illinois State Senate.  One version has Obama's handwriting on it, one does not.  Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor subsequently told Politico that the senator scribbled a few notes on the first page of the questionnaire, but did not read the response to the question about banning handguns, on a subsequent page.

Either way, it seems a rather lame explanation.
4/17/08 Following Obama's recent dumb comment about small town Americans clinging to guns and religion, he defended himself by claiming that the notion of elitist is absurd because of his poor upbringing.  He said that his mother was on food stamps, so how could he be an elitist in his upbringing?

Here is the Time article written by Joe Klein in 2006, long before Obama decided to run for president.  Back then, he was seen as the rising star within Democratic Party, and he didn't worry about critics breathing down his neck.

Here is the key excerpt from the article:

"For example, I was going to a fancy prep school, and my mother was on food stamps while she was getting her Ph.D."

That is what Obama said.  He went to a fancy private school that today costs $15,000 per -- and his mother was studying for a Ph.D.

Students often receive food stamps as part of the educational-financial-government-money package -- doesn't mean "they are poor."

Re-reading the above, it occurred to me that a double-divorcee and her son, in these circumstances, were doing quite well -- doing some dancin' -- but doing well -- they certainly had futures.
4/18/08 Lies within lies.

In the last post from yesterday, Obama defended himself of charges that he was an elitist by saying, "For example, I was going to a fancy prep school, and my mother was on food stamps while she was getting her Ph.D." as a defense.

I got curious to know when Anna received her Ph.D.
  Here is the Wikipedia entry:

In 1992 she earned a Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Hawai'i with a dissertation titled Peasant blacksmithing in Indonesia: Surviving and Thriving Against All Odds.

That was thirteen years after Obama graduated from his "fancy prep school."

Obama consciously conflated these two events to produce a defense he knows to be untrue.
4/20/08 An e-mail from a reader said that, while Hillary Clinton tells lies, Barack Obama is himself a lie.

That is becoming painfully apparent with each new revelation of how drastically his carefully crafted image this election year contrasts with what he has actually been saying and doing for many years.

Obama's election year image is that of a man who can bring the country together, overcoming differences of party or race, as well as solving our international problems by talking with Iran and other countries with which we are at odds, and performing other miscellaneous miracles as needed.

There is, of course, not a speck of evidence that Obama has ever transcended party differences in the United States Senate.  Voting records analyzed by the National Journal show him to be the furthest left of anyone in the Senate.  Nor has he sponsored any significant bipartisan legislation -- nor any other significant legislation, for that matter.

Sen. Obama is all talk -- glib talk, exciting talk, confident talk, but still just talk.
4/26/08 At a town hall meeting in Kokomo, IN, Obama, responding to a question, referred to the time last October, when a Cedar Rapids, Iowa, TV reporter asked him why he didn’t wear a flag pin.

"Then I was asked about this in Iowa," Obama said.  "And somebody said 'Why don’t you wear a flag pin?'  I said, well, sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.  I said, although I will say that sometimes I notice that they’re people who wear flag pins but they don’t always act patriotic.  And I was specifically referring to politicians, not individuals who wear flag pins, but politicians who you see wearing flag pins and then vote against funding for veterans, saying we can’t afford it."

Obama then proceeds, in a magnificent example of hypocritical chutzpah, to call bloggers who accurately reported his words liars.

"So I make this comment.  Suddenly a bunch of these, you know, TV commentators and bloggers (say) 'Obama is disrespecting people who wear flag pins.'  Well, that’s just not true. Also, another way of saying it is, it’s a lie."

Obama’s two radically different versions of his reasons for not wearing the pin are there for you to read. You decide who’s telling the truth.
4/29/08 PROOF POSITIVE THAT REZKO AND OBAMA ARE BUSINESS PARTNERS.

Examine the Cook County land records:

The deed for the house that the Obama’s purchased for $300k less than the asking price is from Frederic Wondisford and his wife, Sally Radovic, to the Obama’s Northern Trust Company Land Trust #10209 (established as such for "confidentiality") is dated 15 June 2005 and is recorded 21 June 2005 as Document #0517233010.  Declared value is $1,650,000.00.

The deed for the vacant lot is from Wondisford/Radovic to Rita M. Rezko.  This deed is dated 15 June 2005 and recorded a day earlier, on 20 June 2005 as Document #0517133004. Declared value is $625,000.00.

Examination of the Cook County records very clearly indicates that Rita M. Rezko conveyed the entire lot to Obama’s Northern Trust Company Land Trust #10209 on 11 January 2006 and recorded 16 February 2006 as Document #0604733162.  Declared value is $104,500.00.

VERY IMPORTANTLY, thorough and careful examination of all Cook County land records fails to locate a deed back to Rita M. Rezko from the Obama’s Northern Trust Company Land Trust #10209.

There is a "wild deed" indicated from Rita M. Rezko to "5050 S. Greenwood LLC."  This is an Illinois limited liability corporation with the same address as Rezmar Corporation that is registered to the indicted Tony Rezko.  (This deed is considered "wild" because it is not supported by any ownership deed from the Obama’s Land Trust.)

Furthermore, Tony Rezko’s registered corporation, 5050 S. Greenwood LLC, then pledges the entire vacant lot in favor of a mortgage THAT IS STILL OPEN with Fifth Third Bank for the amount of $375,000.00.  This is Document #0703357023 recorded 2 February 2007.

THUS, THE ENTIRE VACANT LOT IS TITLED TO SEN. BARACK AND MICHELLE OBAMA (IN THEIR LAND TRUST FOR CONFIDENTIALITY) AND ALLOWED BY SENATOR BARACK AND MICHELLE OBAMA TO BE PLEDGED BY A TONY REZKO CORPORATION TO SECURE A LOAN.

This is contrary to what has been stated by Senator Obama; contrary to what has been stated by Senator Obama’s campaign staff: and contrary to what has been reported.

It must be noted that a seemingly intelligent Harvard educated attorney does not make such unknowing errors as stated above.  The above is obvious intent not "oversight".
4/29/08 Obama indicated that he could indeed disown his long standing Uncle Wright...even though just a few weeks ago he said he could never do that.
 

Even though it stretches credibility to think that after 20+ years and so much close history together...after all, it was Obama who called Wright his mentor and spiritual advisor...that Obama could not have really "known" the real Jeremiah Wright, let's take him at his word that he did not.
 

My questions then are simple.
 

If, after 20+ years of a close relationship where it was clear to everyone else who Jeremiah Wright was, if after that long you so terribly misjudged the man...then please tell me Mr. Obama, who else have you misjudged so completely?
 

Who on your campaign staff?  Who of your contributors?  Who amongst your other close associates and friends?
 

More telling yet, Mr. Obama, Who will you so wholly misjudge in the future?
 

What leaders of nations?  What members of your cabinet?  What Judges you nominate?
 

The list could go on and on -- AND, he STILL remains committed to the church.
 

In an interview that aired Friday on PBS's "Bill Moyers' Journal," Wright used similar terms to explain why Obama, who has been a member of his church for two decades, felt compelled to denounce some of Wright's statements.

"It went down very simply," Wright told Moyers.  "He's a politician, I'm a pastor.  We speak to different audiences.  And he (Obama) says what he has to say as a politician.  I say what I have to as a pastor.  Those are two different worlds."

"I do what I do.  He does what politicians do" -- and that's why Obama's words don't change anything and this item is archived in "Obama's Lies."

5/12/08 Obama's Inability to Hire Good Help Rears Its Head … Again.

Jake Tapper started covering Sen. Barack Obama's inability to hire good staffers in June 2007, when he blamed staffers for some opposition research trying to link Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, to outsourcing in India; for injecting some venom in the David Geffen/Hillary Clinton fight; and for missing an event with firefighters in New Hampshire.

In December, we noted again that Obama was blaming the answers on a 1996 questionnaire on a staffer; and was blaming his touring with "cured" ex-gay gospel singer Donnie McClurkin (which antagonized gays and lesbians) on bad vetting by his staff.

Those five buck-passing incidents were apparently not enough.

All-in-all, Tapper identifies 14 instances of Obama buck-passing.
5/27/08 LAS CRUCES, N.M -- Despite not having served in the military himself, Barack Obama used his Memorial Day remarks to speak about his family’s service.  "My grandfather marched in Patton’s army, but I cannot know what it is to walk into battle like so many of you," he told a small group of veterans here. 

And speaking of his typical white grandmother, he said -- "My grandmother worked on a bomber assembly line, but I cannot know what it is for a family to sacrifice like so many of yours have."  

Obama also spoke about his typical white uncle, who was part of the American brigade that helped to liberate Auschwitz.  He said the family legend is that, upon returning from war, his uncle spent six months in an attic.

First lie! -- Wow!  Very dramatic! The problem is that Auschwitz of course is in Poland.  It was liberated by the Red Army on January 27th, 1945.  Poland, on most maps is usually placed to the east of Germany, although we may need to investigate the geography textbooks the Obamessiah used as a child.

The Allies were wrapping up the battle of the bulge in late January of 1945 -- the Rhine crossings were still well into the future when Auschwitz was liberated.

Either Obama’s uncle served in the Red Army, or he’s spinning Clintonesque lies about Auschwitz to sell his government programs. Hey, it’s for a good cause…but it’s not enough for him. It has to be personal. It has to be all about him.

Second lie! -- Obama has no uncles.  His mother Anna was an only child, and Obama Sr. had two sisters.

Oh, it's not a lie, his campaign says he made a mistake -- he just made another gaffe in the growing collection of documented Obama's gaffes -- it was his great-uncle and it was a sub-camp of Buchenwald, but who cares about these little details, right?

AGAIN? -- well, it turns out that he's
told this tale before, in 2002 -- except he identifies his typical white grandfather as the liberator.

"My grandfather signed up for a war the day after Pearl Harbor was bombed, fought in Patton’s army.  He saw the dead and dying across the fields of Europe; he heard the stories of fellow troops who first entered Auschwitz and Treblinka.  He fought in the name of a larger freedom, part of that arsenal of democracy that triumphed over evil, and he did not fight in vain."

 

Third lie! -- Obama's grandfather enlisted on June 18, 1942.

Fourth lie!
-- In his autobiography, "Dreams of My Father," Obama states his grandfather never engaged in combat.  "Gramps returned from the war never having seen real combat, and the family moved to California, where he enrolled at Berkeley under the GI bill."  -- Berkeley??????

6/4/08 Responding to the Rezko verdict: Guilty on four of first five counts; guilty on 16 of 24 counts involving mail/wire fraud, money laundering, and corrupt solicitation charges, Obama said, "This isn’t the Tony Rezko I knew."



"I know nothing!


Obama has known Rezko since his Harvard days -- about the same time he began his close relationships with the Revs. Wright and Pfleger -- and he denies he knew who they are and what they do -- Obama is a bold-faced liar.

6/5/08 But why tell one lie when you can tell more?

Earlier this year, three-fourths of the Senate voted in favor of the Kyl-Lieberman Amendment,  designating the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization.  Among those who voted for the resolution were Hillary Clinton, Richard Durbin, Harry Reid, and Chuck Schumer.

Obama voted against it, effectively standing with the IRGC.

Yesterday at the AIPAC conference, however, Obama expressly stated that the IRGC was a terrorist organization.  His campaign explained his opposition to the resolution naming the IRGC a terrorist entity by claiming that the resolution contained language about military action -- but Joe Lieberman, the bill's author, said bluntly, "It has none of that."

Obama's claim is
just another lie.
6/5/08 Don't call Barack Obama an appeaser -- call him what he is -- a liar.

In his speech Wednesday before the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee, Obama said the military option is "on the table" for dealing with Iran's nuclear program in stark contrast to his earlier statements.

During a debate last summer, he said he would be willing to meet with Iranian leaders and other American adversaries "without preconditions" during the first year of his presidency.

Now, he says, "[A]s president of the United States, I would be willing to lead tough and principled diplomacy with the appropriate Iranian leaders at a time and place of my choosing, if and only if it can advance the interest of the United States.  That is my position.  I want to be absolutely clear."

Yo, Obama, "...if and only if it can advance the interest of the United States," is a PRECONDITION.

Obama campaign officials, believing the electorate is stupid and knowing the press won't question Obama, insisted the presumptive Democratic nominee has not changed his position.
6/12/08


"I don’t want a timetable for withdrawal"  (00:28)


From Obama's official campaign website:

"Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq.  He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months.  Obama will make it clear that we will not build any permanent bases in Iraq.  He will keep some troops in Iraq to protect our embassy and diplomats; if al Qaeda attempts to build a base within Iraq, he will keep troops in Iraq or elsewhere in the region to carry out targeted strikes on al Qaeda."

Yo, Obama, removing one to two combat brigades each month, and ... all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months, is a timetable.

6/13/08 Barack Obama repeatedly attacks his opponents for taking lobbyists money or having lobbyists on their campaign staff.

What he doesn't tell you is that he has raised $264,492,301 from 358 bundlers and 14 lobbyist bundlers, himself.

Go here to see the detailed list.
6/14/08 Barack Obama announced last Thursday that he has begun a web site to fight 'rumors,'"  Andy Martin states.  "To be sure, some of what is said about Obama is exaggerated or untrue.  I refuse to publish a great deal of anti-Obama material that crosses my desk.  But much of what Obama characterizes as 'rumor' is true.  Obama has been lying about his family and his religious past his entire life.  This time he will not get away with his lies."

"Obama says in large print and underlines 'Senator Obama has never been a Muslim, was not raised a Muslim, and is a committed Christian," Martin states.  "Two thirds of that claim are bald-faced lies.  The last third, about Obama's Christianity, has never been adequately documented.  Most people who are baptized have a Baptismal Certificate.  I call on Obama to release his Baptismal Certificate or record.  Many Americans do not believe that sitting in the pews, listening to Reverend Jeremiah Wright's racist jeremiads for two decades qualifies anyone to be a 'committed Christian.'"  Committed racist and America-hater, maybe.

I have corresponded with three Chicago-area journalists, inquiring about a baptism.  There is NO record, anywhere, of Barack Hussein Obama ever having been baptized.  He is only a Christian because he says so -- although I don't believe the Trinity UCC church is a Christian Church -- it is a Black African church and their website is very clear about that.  From the Trinity UCC website:

The vision statement of Trinity United Church of Christ is based upon the systematized liberation theology that started in 1969 with the publication of Dr. James Cone’s book, Black Power and Black Theology.

Black theology is one of the many theologies in the Americas that became popular during the liberation theology movement. They include Hispanic theology, Native American theology, Asian theology and Womanist theology.

That stuff isn't theology -- it's politics!.
6/16/08 When reading this article, please keep in mind that Obama received the following presidential contributions -- Exelon employees $236,211 (Source: OpenSecrets -- The Center for Responsive Politics):  note, Exelon employees also gave over $270,000 to Obama's State Senate campaign, total over $500,000.

Obama scolded Exelon and federal regulators for inaction and introduced a bill to require all plant owners to notify state and local authorities immediately of even small leaks.  He has boasted of it on the campaign trail, telling a crowd in Iowa in December (2007) that it was, "the only nuclear legislation that I've passed.  I just did that last year," he said, to murmurs of approval.

But, contrary to Obama's comments in Iowa, the bill died amid parliamentary wrangling in the full Senate.

The history of the bill shows Obama navigating a home-state controversy that pitted two important constituencies against each other and tested his skills as a legislative infighter.  On one side were neighbors of several nuclear plants upset that low-level radioactive leaks had gone unreported for years; on the other was Exelon, the country's largest nuclear plant operator and one of Obama's largest sources of campaign money.

IN TRUTH, Mr. Obama told the Iowan's that he PASSED nuclear legislation, "just last year (2007)."

IN TRUTH, Mr. Obama LIED -- his nuclear legislation bill NEVER PASSED!

This was a KEY Issue that swayed the Iowa Caucus in his favor, as the folks of Iowa were facing similar issues regarding nuclear power plants, and they mistakenly were "hoodwinked and  boondoggled" by a slick Chicago politician, who was willing to tell them anything to get their votes, even lying about his legislative record.

Mr. Obama in his 3+ years in the US Senate has sponsored ONLY TWO pieces of legislation that have become law:

1.  A bill to promote democracy in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
 
2.  A bill to name a post office.
6/18/08


"Country I Love" TV Ad (01:02)
 

JCM directs us to this video, in which Obama says, "That's why I passed laws moving people from welfare to work(1), cut taxes for working families(2) and extended health care for wounded troops who'd been neglected(3)."

 
(1) State of Illinois, Public Act 90-0017, as HB0204 6 sponsors (of which Obama was one) and 16 co-sponsors.  

First, the law in question wasn't dreamed up out of thin air by its sponsors, is was to comply with the new Federal law that had already passed.  It was the follow-up to the FEDERAL welfare reform act, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, that President Clinton signed on Aug. 26, 1996.  That law gave states the ability to design their own welfare programs as long as they met certain federal requirements, including limits on how long recipients could get benefits. 

Second, Obama was against the 1996 federal legislation which precipitated the caseload reduction. "I am not a defender of the status quo with respect to welfare," Obama said on the floor of the Illinois state Senate on May 31, 1997.  "Having said that, I probably would not have supported the federal legislation, because I think it had some problems."  The bill that Obama cosponsored was Illinois' version.
 
(2) State of Illinois, Public Act 91-0700, as HB3939 7 sponsors and 41 co-sponsors (of which Obama was one).
 
(3)United States, H.R. 4986, which became public law 110-181

Fact: Obama did not sponsor/co-sponsor this law, and was "not present" when it passed, 91-3.
6/19/08 In an interview with Fortune to be featured in the magazine's upcoming issue, the presumptive Democratic nominee backed off his harshest attacks on the free trade agreement and indicated he didn't want to unilaterally reopen negotiations on NAFTA.

"Sometimes during campaigns the rhetoric gets overheated and amplified," he conceded, after I reminded him that he had called NAFTA "devastating" and "a big mistake," despite nonpartisan studies concluding that the trade zone has had a mild, positive effect on the U.S. economy.

Does that mean his rhetoric was overheated and amplified?  "Politicians are always guilty of that, and I don't exempt myself," he answered.

I suppose it's a positive step when Obama moves past his denials and admits he lied, but I wouldn't expect him to stop.
6/19/08 The flip -- On Wednesday, June 4th, Obama, appearing in front of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, said Jerusalem should be Israel's undivided capital, saying, "Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided."

The flop -- Well, on Thursday, the 5th, Palestinian leaders reacted with anger and dismay to this statement, so Obama immediately flip-flopped on his support for Israel's stance on Jerusalem, saying Palestinians and Israelis had to negotiate the future of the holy city.

The flip -- Yesterday, June 18th, Obama said he would want to bring Osama ben Laden to justice "in a way that allows the entire world to understand the murderous acts that he's engaged in and not to make him into a martyr."

The flop -- Today, Obama implied that he would kill bin Laden without a trial, saying, "First of all, I think there is an executive order out on Osama bin Laden's head.  And if I'm president, and we have the opportunity to capture him, we may not be able to capture him alive."

Of course, there is no known Presidential Executive Order "out on Osama bin Laden's head."

If Obama is unwilling to say kill Osama bin Laden, he cannot hide behind an Executive Order that does not exist, mumbo jumbo about how he never threatens, or the need for diplomacy.

And, watch Obama flip-flop his way around free trade and the FISA bill.  He makes John Kerry look like the Rock of Gibraltar.

 


Obama has no position on anything he'll flip-flop all day long -- hell, he even makes stuff up as he goes along.  This guy will say absolutely anything he thinks people want to hear.

6/20/08 Is it just one more flip-flop, or one more lie?  Either way, it is more proof that Obama's word isn't worth squat, and he and the truth are complete strangers.

When the Obamamessiah campaign started 17 months ago, Obama said he'd pursue public financing "aggressively."  He committed to it in a written questionnaire.  He even said, repeatedly, that he would meet personally with Senator John McCain to discuss a deal.

On February 8th, 2007, MSNBC reported that, ""Senator Obama has long been a proponent of public financing of campaigns and we are asking the FEC to take a step that could preserve the public financing option for the party's nominees," said Obama spokesman Bill Burton.

Yesterday, Obama abandoned his pledges to accept public financing for his presidential campaign.

This flip-flop, or lie, makes Obama the first presidential candidate to opt out of the current system since it was put in place after the Watergate scandal and a complete hypocrite.



Don't tell me words don't matter.  (00:48)


This is obviously "change we can believe in."

Obama is proving that he will say and do anything that will get him elected to office -- he makes the Clintons look positively trustworthy by comparison.

Here's a question to ponder -- how many of Obama's contributions, pouring in to his website, are coming in from outside of the country, in violation of the law?

6/21/08 Mark Shields didn’t mince words on PBS about Barack Obama’s decision to opt out of public financing.  Appearing as the progressive balance with David Brooks on Judy Woodruff’s show, Shields ripped into Obama, calling him unprincipled and suggesting that his latest video message painted him as a "hostage" who couldn’t pass a polygraph.
6/23/08 Barack Obama released his first general election ad on Friday, which seems aimed above all to answer some early concerns about his biography and experience.  It's a well made ad, but it also offers an example of the kind of brazen padding of the resume that Obama will inevitably need to engage in, and which will carry serious risks for him.

About 46 seconds into the ad, we are told that Obama passed laws that extended healthcare for wounded troops who'd been neglected, and in the usual manner of these political commercials we are given a little citation at the bottom.  The citation reads Public Law 110-181 1/28/08.  That law is the only federal legislation cited in the ad the other two items mentioned were from the Illinois legislature and referred to other issues raised in the ad.

Public Law 110-181 was the 2008 defense authorization bill.  It passed the Senate by 91 to 3 in January, with six Senators not voting.  Among those six absentees was Barack Obama.  So he cites a bill he didn't even vote for.  Did he contribute to it in some way that might be reasonably referred to as extending healthcare for wounded troops who'd been neglected?  It certainly doesn't seem that way, as even Obama supporters at the Daily Kos discovered when they tried to answer some of the bloggers who pointed to Obama's citation of the bill.  They found that Obama had tried to insert an amendment that had to do with screenings for service members returning from deployments, and one that would ease the discharge of service members found to have personality disorders, but neither amendment passed.  Another part of the bill, calling for inspector general reports about hospital facilities, had come from a different bill Obama had sponsored.

Even under the most generous reading imaginable could any of that count as passing legislation that extended health care for wounded troops?  The Chicago Tribune noted the problem on its blog last week but defended Obama by pointing out that John McCain didn't vote for the bill either.  That would be an interesting piece of information if John McCain had cited this bill as among his chief legislative accomplishments.

The Obama teams desire to pad the resume is understandable its awfully slim after all.  But this kind of dishonesty will catch up with them, or at least it should.
6/24/08 "JCM" also pointed us to this article, "All Obama Promises Expire."  It's Just a Question of When.

Obama spokesman Bill Burton on October 24, 2007: To be clear: Barack will support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies.

Barack Obama, June 20, 2008: Given the legitimate threats we face, providing effective intelligence collection tools with appropriate safeguards is too important to delay.  So I support the compromise, but do so with a firm pledge that as president, I will carefully monitor the program.

All Barack Obama statements come with an expiration date.  All of them.
6/25/08 Reader, "JCM," suggests reading this article (requires login), and please keep in mind that Obama received the following Presidential contributions -- Exelon employees $236,211 (Source: OpenSecrets, The Center for responsive Politics) :note, Exelon employees also gave over $270,000 to Obama's State Senate campaign, total over $500,000.

Mr. Obama scolded Exelon and federal regulators for inaction and introduced a bill to require all plant owners to notify state and local authorities immediately of even small leaks.  He has boasted of it on the campaign trail, telling a crowd in Iowa in December (30, 2007) that it was the only nuclear legislation that I've passed.

"I just did that last year," he said, to murmurs of approval.

But, contrary to Mr. Obama's comments in Iowa, it ultimately died amid parliamentary wrangling in the full Senate.

The history of the bill shows Mr. Obama navigating a home-state controversy that pitted two important constituencies against each other and tested his skills as a legislative infighter.  On one side were neighbors of several nuclear plants upset that low-level radioactive leaks had gone unreported for years; on the other was Exelon, the country's largest nuclear plant operator and one of Mr. Obama's largest sources of campaign money.


IN TRUTH, Mr. Obama told the Iowan's that he PASSED nuclear legislation, "just last year (2007)."

IN TRUTH, Mr. Obama LIED, LIED, LIED-his nuclear legislation bill NEVER PASSED!!!

This was a KEY Issue that swayed the Iowa Caucus in his favor, as the folks of Iowa were facing similar issues in regards to nuclear power plants, and they mistakenly were "hoodwinked and  boondoggled" by a slick Chicago politician, who was willing to tell them anything to get there votes, even lying about his legislative record.

Mr. Obama in his 3+ years in the US Senate has sponsored ONLY TWO pieces of legislation that have become law:

A bill to promote democracy in the Democratic Republic of Congo
A bill to name a post office
6/25/08 Terrific set of videos documenting Obama's "all over the place" positions on public financing!!!

Talk about opponents who become masters at gaming this (broken) system.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0608/11212.html

Excellent "walk back" over last two years.  "Change you can('t) believe in."

 

This guy is way, way, way beyond flip-flop.  He'll just say anything, at anytime, to anybody.  He knows the media will jus ignore his mendacity.

6/26/08


"One of my favorite tasks of being a senator is hosting town hall meetings." (00:50)


Obama knows he would have his head handed to him if he were to share the stage with John McCain.  Without his teleprompter and 4 X 5 cards, Obama is clueless -- check out the video below.


 
The affirmative action candidate on the hustings -- without the teleprompter  (00:40)

6/26/08 Another Obama statement reaches its expiration date, this one on guns.

The Heller decision came down today from the Supreme Court, striking down the Washington, D.C. gun ban.

With the Supreme Court ruling, the Obama campaign is disavowing what it calls an "inartful" statement -- Obamese for lie -- to the Chicago Tribune last year, and are blaming an "unnamed aide" characterized Obama as believing that the D. C. ban was constitutional.

"That statement was obviously an inartful attempt to explain the Senator’s consistent position," Obama spokesman Bill Burton tells ABC News.

Obama took a question about the constitutionality of the gun ban from WJLA's Leon Harris during the Potomac Primary, and didn't dispute the characterization that he believes the ban is constitutional.

Here's the exchange:

LH: "One other issue that is of great importance to the people of the district here, is gun control.  You said in Idaho here, recently, that "I have no intention of taking away folks’ guns."  But you support the D.C. handgun ban, and you’ve said that it’s constitutional.  How do you reconcile those two positions?"

BO: "Because I think we have two conflicting traditions in this country.  I think it’s important for us to recognize that we’ve got a tradition of handgun ownership and gun ownership generally.  And a lot of people -- law-abiding citizens use if for hunting, for sportsmanship, and for protecting their families."

"We also have a violence on the streets that is the result of illegal handgun usage.  And so I think there is nothing wrong with a community saying we are going to take those illegal handguns off the streets, we are going to trace more effectively, how these guns are ending up on the streets, to unscrupulous gun dealers, who often times are selling to straw purchasers.  And cracking down on the various loopholes that exist in terms of background checks for children, the mentally ill.  Those are all approaches that I think the average gun owner would actually support.  The problem is, that we’ve got a position, often times by the NRA that says any regulation whatsoever is the camel’s nose under the tent.  And that, I think, is not where the American people are at.  We can have reasonable, thoughtful gun control measure that I think respect the Second Amendment and people’s traditions."

"When Obama says, "we are going to take those illegal handguns off the streets," I wonder if it ever occurred to him to "take the damned criminals off the streets?"


Also, how can Obama claim "I have always believed that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to bear arms" when, as a director of the Joyce Foundation, he steered $15 million to the self-described "most aggressive group in the gun control movement?"  That group published a book entitled, "Every Handgun is Aimed at You: The Case for Banning Handguns."

And, remember, on April 3rd, in the run-up to a Democratic presidential debate scheduled on the one-year anniversary of the Virginia Tech shootings, Obama said:

"I am not in favor of concealed weapons," Obama told the Pittsburgh Tribune. "I think that creates a potential atmosphere where more innocent people could (get shot during) altercations."

Barack Obama’s record is clear on guns.  He not only supported gun bans, but he supported prosecuting acts of self-defense.

Obama is about as anti-gun as you would expect from a Chicago politician. He voted for assault weapons bans, voted to limit the number of handguns a person could buy, voted against lawsuit protections for gun manufacturers, supported a national ban on concealed carry, and worst of all voted against a bill protecting homeowners from being sued by burglars they shoot in their own homes.

7/2/08 Obama's new TV ad says he "worked his way" through college and law school.  His campaign says he had two summer jobs.

Obama’s latest ad repeats an often-stated claim, saying he "worked his way through college and Harvard Law."  We know Obama took out loans to get himself through school.  But the campaign provided information on just two jobs Obama had in those years, and they were both in the summer.

The ad begins with the announcer telling us that Obama "worked his way through college and Harvard Law."  Actually, Obama took out loans to get himself through college, as we heard in a 60-second ad his campaign began running last month.  We don't know how much assistance his family provided.

But "worked his way" through college and law school?  The only back-up the campaign provided for this claim was a quote from Obama's book "Dreams from My Father" having to do with a construction job he had one summer while he was in college, and an article mentioning his job as a summer associate one year at a big Chicago law firm (where he first met Bernadine Dohrn, the terrorist).  We asked campaign spokesman Tommy Vietor if Obama held jobs during the school year, or other summer jobs, but he said only, "He had the two jobs I told you about." 

Unless Obama had a good bit more employment than his spokesman was able to describe for us, it's a real stretch to claim he "worked his way" through school.
7/2/08 Obama traveled Monday to Independence, Missouri, to proclaim his patriotism in an appearance linked to the Fourth of July holiday.  He said: "I will never question the patriotism of others in this campaign, and I will not stand idly by when I hear others question mine."



The patriot, Obama, does the crotch salute during the National Anthem. (video)


Obama is a damned, sneaky bastard.  He knows he doesn't have to question the patriotism of others, meaning John McCain, of course, because he has a core group of surrogates that have been performing this nasty "artful" work for some time.

On July 8th, George McGovern argued that John McCain's war experience was not a qualification for the White House, saying, "But I don't recall ever saying that experience as a bomber pilot equipped me to be very strong on how to run a war, how to command the armed forces.  Of course, John McCain never said it was either.

In June, Wesley Clark dismissed the import of McCain’s military background in the current race. "I don’t think getting in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to become president," Clark sniffed.  The real issue, according to Clark, was that McCain was "untested and untried."  Again, John McCain never said it was.

But CNN's, John Roberts, pointed out the most glaring contradiction in Clark's theory of military experience: his enthusiastic endorsement of the treacherous John Kerry, whose strategic command experience was nowhere near McCain's.

Jim Webb didn't have any problem using his military service to run against George Allen, but now he says, "Let's get the politics out of the military, take care of our military people, or have our political arguments in other areas."

Rand Beers, a former Clinton White House aide, was appearing at the McCain University, a day-long symposia attacking Senator McCain hosted by John Podesta's Center for American Progress, and he, too, went after Senator McCain for his service with an equally outrageous statement.

Beers attacked Senator McCain, saying that he was isolated during the Vietnam years, causing him to miss all the social revolutions going on in the 1960s.  Yes, he was isolated.  He was in a prison cell in North Vietnam.  And he said because he was captured,