Actually, I was Thinking McCain's Secretary of Housing & Urban Development for Obama

I was just thinking earlier today that McCain's next campaign step should be to offer Barack Obama a Cabinet position in his Administration, since he stated that he wanted to include Democrats in his Administration. Apparently I am not the only person thinking along the same lines:

"Governor Schwarzenegger has made the service czar a cabinet-level appointment," Stengel said. "Would you, as president, do the same and would you name Senator Obama to your cabinet for National Service?" McCain paused for a beat before replying with a smile: "Yes!" Cue laughter and applause. - Telegraph, UK

No. No. NO! Certainly the best position for Senator Obama is as Secretary of Housing & Urban Development, also known as HUD.

HUD's mission is to increase homeownership, support community development and increase access to affordable housing free from discrimination. To fulfill this mission, HUD will embrace high standards of ethics, management and accountability and forge new partnerships--particularly with faith-based and community organizations--that leverage resources and improve HUD's ability to be effective on the community level. - HUD's Mission

Then again, maybe he might be better off offering Mr. Obama a diplomat position, somewhere. Who knows, if Obama blows this election I think he will disappear from the political area faster than John Kerry because his supporters will abandon him quicker than rats off a sinking ship...

Link:
John McCain offers Barack Obama a cabinet post - Telegraph, UK
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We Should Remember More Than Just 9/11

So here we are seven years after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and it seems that I am a bit angry this year.

Returning from sea. March '93, just after the first WTC attack.

We shouldn't just remember the attack. We should also understand the events that led up to this attack being a reality. No, I don't mean that somehow American's actions around the world brought this about. That is just liberal BS. I mean how our own Government's stupidity (Under President Clinton) failed to see the threat and stop it. President Bush has been unfairly blamed for being handed a country that already had terrorists operating inside it. The seeds of this attack were planted when Clinton was in office and his administration, pandering to liberals, enacted barriers to prevent proper investigation such as 'the wall'. But you don't hear about that. You only hear about the huge tax/budget surplus the Country had under Clinton and how wonderful the country was back then. Well maybe he should have spent some of that surplus to better protect the country. And maybe his administration should have let the CIA tell the FBI that terrorists were also enjoying the Clinton era good life.

Previous:
Life Goes on for Most of US - 2007
World Trade Center Tribute - 2006
Glenn J. Winuk - One of Many 9/11 Heros - 2005
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One Fact Not Mentioned About All Those Factory Jobs Moving Overseas

You keep hearing the Democrats complain that all the jobs in the US are moving overseas and that they should be elected to punish companies that send jobs offshore. But there is one thing that the Democrats are not telling you. The US is the world's number one manufacturer. (By dollar value)

BEIJING (XFN-ASIA) - China is set to overtake the US next year as the world's largest producer of manufactured goods, four years earlier than expected, as a result of the rapidly weakening US economy, the Financial Times reported, citing forecasts provided to it by consultancy Global Insight.

In 2009, China will account for 17 pct of manufacturing value-added output of 11,783 bln usd and the US will account for 16 pct, according to the estimates.

Just last year, the US was the clear leader with about 20 pct of the total, compared with China 's 13.2 pct, the newspaper said. - Forbes

Just think about that. Twenty percent of everything manufactured in the world, by value, was made in the US. Do you think that that might be part of the reason why the US consumes about 25 percent of the world's oil production!

With the US being number one in manufacturing, it is going to be pretty much impossible to prevent some jobs from moving overseas, seeing that the US has more than its fair share (using a Democrat term) of the world's manufacturing jobs. It might be that the US became a manufacturing powerhouse partly due to the third world being so underdeveloped, failing to undergo an industrial revolution of their own. But now, it is much easier to set up a factory pretty much anywhere and have it automated enough to limit the need to employees. And these factories in the US can also modernize and automate resulting in less manufacturing jobs anyway. The end result is that moving offshore or not, jobs go away. The trick is to provide people with valuable skills so that they are qualified for a much larger pool of jobs.

There is one other thing not mentioned about many of those manufacturing jobs that are disappearing. Many of them sucked and many of those jobs required very little of the employees other than repetitive motion. (NOTE: There are many, many very rewarding manufacturing jobs. Thankfully, many of those jobs are still here and are probably not going anywhere, anytime soon. Provided that Obama doesn't become President and raise Corporate taxes.)

The long-term goal was to retrain workers in order to restore manufacturing jobs in the area; Kellman took Obama by the rusted-out, closed-down Wisconsin Steel plant for a firsthand look. But the whole thing was a bit of a pipe dream, as the leaders soon discovered. “The idea was to interview these people and look at education, transferable skills, so that we could refer them to other industries,” Loretta Augustine-Herron told me as we drove by the site of the old factory, now completely torn down. “Well, they had no transferable skills. I remember interviewing one man who ran a steel-straightening machine. It straightened steel bars or something. I said, well, what did you do? And he told me he pushed a button, and the rods came in, and he pushed a button and it straightened them, and he pushed a button and it sent them somewhere else. That’s all he did. And he made big bucks doing it.”

That, of course, was one of the reasons the steel mill closed. And it became clear that neither Obama nor Kellman nor anyone else was going to change the direction of the steel industry and its unions in the United States. Somewhere along the line, everyone realized that those jobs wouldn’t be coming back. - National Review

Should we really spend lots of tax money to keep jobs like that? It is much better to try and retrain people to do something that is in demand. Provided that they are open-minded enough to be retrained. Unfortunately, most of them are not likely to earn the type of money that they were earning before. But then again, maybe it was a gift that they were earning big buck for as long as they did. They still can earn big bucks in the future, but they are going to have to work hard to learn the skills that the rest of have learned to get the jobs we have now.

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5 Miles Per Hour - Photo

Here is a photo I took in Oyster Bay Harbor on Long Island a couple weeks ago.  The harbor was empty of other boats.

*****

Total BS: Obama to Cut Taxes "for 95 percent of all working families"

Barack Obama's acceptance speech mentioned the following promise:

I will -- listen now -- I will cut taxes -- cut taxes -- for 95 percent of all working families, because, in an economy like this, the last thing we should do is raise taxes on the middle class. - NY Times

Are you kidding me? This is pure fantasy, especially considering that the bottom 40% of wage earners in the country already pay no taxes. So his statement could only be true if 40% of the country was not working at all. (He promised to lower taxes for most working families, not all families)

It turns out that about 41 percent of us have no income tax liability whatsoever, the highest percentage in modern history. Around 32 percent of all tax returns filed have no liability, so they get back everything they paid. An additional group of people don't even have to file.

Of the people who file income taxes, including the third that has no liability, the bottom half pays 3 percent of all taxes and the top half pays 97 percent of all taxes. Narrowing even further, the richest 1 percent of all taxpayers account for 40 percent of taxes paid. - Union Leader, New Hampshire

So how do you cut taxes for people who don't pay any now? Well, if your Barack Obama, you give them other people's tax money:

When Obama says that he will cut taxes for 95 percent of Americans, he is talking about his proposal for a $500 refundable income tax credit for all but the top 5 percent of income earners. For the bottom 40 percent of income earners, this will be just another check from the federal government rather than a reduction in tax liability. It is another sharp increase in government spending rather than any sort of tax cut. An arbitrary cash grant does not, moreover, do anything to improve the economy or incentivize productive business. That only comes from cutting tax rates. What Obama is proposing here is really quite similar to George McGovern's 1972 plan to send everyone a $1,000 check, which voters rightly saw as a crass vote-buying scheme rather than serious policy. - AEI

Giving people who already pay no taxes money is not a tax cut, its a handout and Obama's tax cut promise is little more than a gimmick and an expensive one at that if he gets elected.-------------------- --------------------

Maritime Monday 126 Posted at gCaptain

This week's edition of Maritime Monday has been posted at gCaptain on Monday.

Maritime Monday 126

You can find last week’s edition here.

You can find Maritime Monday 76 here. (Published 17 September 2007).

Previous Editions:

As linked below or click on the label ‘MaritimeMonday’:

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gCaptain editions: 99 - 100 - 101 - 102 - 103 - 104 - 105 - 106 - 107 - 108 - 109 - 110 - 111 - 112 - 113 - 114 - 115 - 116 - 117 - 118 - 119 - 120 - 121 - 122 - 123 - 123a - 124 - 125 - 126 - 127 - 128 - 129 - 130

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Moon Over Parador - North Korea Sequel

As if North Korea isn't screwed up enough already, comes this rumor:

Is Kim Jong-il for real? The question has baffled foreign intelligence agencies for years but now a veteran Japanese expert on North Korea says the “dear leader” is actually dead – and his role is played by a double.

The expert says Kim died of diabetes in 2003 and world leaders including Vladimir Putin of Russia and Hu Jintao of China have been negotiating with an impostor.

He believes that Kim, fearing assassination, had groomed up to four lookalikes to act as substitutes at public events. One underwent plastic surgery to make his appearance more convincing. Now, the expert claims, the actors are brought on stage whenever required to persuade the masses that Kim is alive. - Times Online

Well until Kim comes out of the shadows to dispute this rumor, I'm going to assume that it is true. For some reason it makes sense.  And the nice thing is that by having 3-4 doubles enables whoever is really running North Korea to avoid the Moon Over Parador prima donna  dilemma where you only have one double for the 'dear leader'.

Moon Over Parador: The film follows the exploits of Jack Noah (Dreyfuss), who is filming in the small, fictional South American country of Parador when the Paradorian president-for-life suddenly dies of a heart attack. Not wanting to lose his position in power, the president's right-hand man, Roberto Strausmann (Raul Julia) forces Jack to take the 'role of a lifetime' - that of the dead president, as the two men look so much alike. Jack accepts, eventually winning over the people and even the dead president's mistress, Madonna (Sonia Braga). However, when paradise proves to be too boring, Jack needs to find a way to get out while keeping Roberto out of the loop. - Wikipedia

If your one double gets out of line you can always replace him with a spare.  The question is (if this is true) how many spares do they have, and why haven't they replaced him by staging an appropriate death? Are the rulers afraid of revolt if news gets out of his death? There is this:

South Korean analysts who attended two summits with Kim (before and after his supposed death) reported that he had indeed changed appearance. But that was because he had lost weight, quit smoking, given up cognac in favour of red bordeaux and coaxed the rest of the politburo onto a health kick. - Times Online

Sadly, even if this is true, it will most likely result in no change in the criminal Government there other than there being one less maniac in charge. Unless news of the leaders death results in a complete breakdown of the Government there.  And that event cannot come too soon.

(Found via Drudge Report)

UPDATE: 9 Sept 08

Like I said, why don't they just engineer the double's demise for an orderly transition of Government.

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il has suffered serious health problems and is believed to have suffered a stroke within the past month, according to U.S. officials.

Mr. Kim didn't attend the country's 60th anniversary celebration Tuesday, according to news agencies with offices in Pyongyang, reinforcing speculation that he's in poor health after reports that he collapsed last month and has been visited by doctors from China. - Wall Street Journal

Only problem here is that the North Koreans made no announcement. Seems that something realy is going on. Maybe they ran out of body doubles! On a more serious note, the faster we can get the North Korean Government to collapse, the better. the progressives of the world have a problem with the US keeping prisoners in GITMO.  Well here is a whole country of prisoners. I guess the only way any of them will care (including the press) is if we get President Bush to be the next leader of North Korea.

Link:
North Korea ‘uses doubles to hide death of Kim’ - Times Online

Barack Obama - From Community Organizer to Out-Of-Touch Politician

Take this comment from Obama Campaign Manager David Plouffe:

Community organizing is how ordinary people respond to out-of-touch politicians and their failed policies. - National Review

We will ignore for the moment that for some reason many 'failed policies' tend to be in areas of the country controlled by Democrat politicians..

So, what does a community organizer do?



Here is a summary of what Barack Obama did as a Community Organizer:

After four years in New York City, Obama moved to Chicago to work as a community organizer for three years from June 1985 to May 1988 as director of the Developing Communities Project (DCP), a church-based community organization originally comprising eight Catholic parishes in Greater Roseland (Roseland, West Pullman, and Riverdale) on Chicago's far South Side. During his three years as the DCP's director, its staff grew from 1 to 13 and its annual budget grew from $70,000 to $400,000, with accomplishments including helping set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens. Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute. - Wikipedia

That sounds like a lot of money for what they got in return.  Oddly enough, one of his accomplishments just happened to be working as an instructor to train more community organizers.  That's not saying much. Reminds me of that old saying, those who cannot do, teach. But job training sounds like something a community organizer would organize if government policies failed to provide it.  Surely, that is the one activity most likely to get poor people a better chance of escaping poverty.  So surely, this is something Barack Obama fought for once becoming an Illinois State Legislator, right?

Here is a summary of what Barack did as an Illinois State Legislator:

Once elected, Obama gained bipartisan support for legislation reforming ethics and health care laws. He sponsored a law increasing tax credits for low-income workers, negotiated welfare reform, and promoted increased subsidies for childcare. In 2001, as co-chairman of the bipartisan Joint Committee on Administrative Rules, Obama supported Republican Governor Ryan's payday loan regulations and predatory mortgage lending regulations aimed at averting home foreclosures, and in 2003, Obama sponsored and led unanimous, bipartisan passage of legislation to monitor racial profiling by requiring police to record the race of drivers they detained and legislation making Illinois the first state to mandate videotaping of homicide interrogations. - Wikipedia

AND:

In January 2003, Obama became chairman of the Illinois Senate's Health and Human Services Committee when Democrats, after a decade in the minority, regained a majority. During his 2004 general election campaign for U.S. Senate, police representatives credited Obama for his active engagement with police organizations in enacting death penalty reforms. Obama resigned from the Illinois Senate in November 2004 following his election to the US Senate. - Wikipedia

If it was so important to set up job training in his community, then why didn't he try to enact job training for the whole state once he became a politician? Hell, there is nothing he did as a State Legislator (and even less as a US Senator, where he seems to mostly forget about the poor) that would help the poor find a path out of poverty. So if he couldn't do that at the state level, what makes anyone think he'll do it on a national level?

In Barack Obama's acceptance speech for the Democratic National Convention nomination for President, he derided the Republicans for telling people that it is up to themselves to work their way out of poverty:

For over two decades, he’s subscribed to that old, discredited Republican philosophy — give more and more to those with the most and hope that prosperity trickles down to everyone else. In Washington, they call this the Ownership Society, but what it really means is you’re on your own. Out of work? Tough luck. No health care? The market will fix it. Born into poverty? Pull yourself up by your own bootstraps — even if you don’t have boots. You’re on your own.

Well, it’s time for them to own their failure. It’s time for us to change America. - From Obama's acceptance Speech, posted at Politico

But nowhere in Obama's political history, other than as a community organizer, do I see him doing anything to help the poor get the tools (get the boots) to help themselves escape poverty. That is the main thing many of the poor need, along with a better work ethic and an increased mobility of this section of the workforce, in order to join the ranks of the middle class. As this recent study points out, people who earn more money, work harder. So telling people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps means making sacrifice, and working long hours. Most of the people who are doing well, are working lots of hours to get to where they are.

Since 1980, the number of men in the bottom fifth of the income ladder who work long hours (over 49 hours per week) has dropped by half, according to a study by the economists Peter Kuhn and Fernando Lozano. But among the top fifth of earners, long weeks have increased by 80 percent. - Outside the Beltway

Working is the best way to escape poverty.



Too bad Barack all too quickly forgot about his community organizer roots once he became a politician, quickly becoming out of touch until deciding to run for president.

Link:

Rich Work More than the ‘Working Class’ - Outside The Beltway



Previous:

What Happened To The Democrat Party? - 22 May 2008



Found at Last of the Few:











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Obama Responds to DNC Flag Desecration

Democrat Presidential Candidate Barack Obama commented earlier today in response to news that over ten thousand unused US Flags were thrown away by the DNC after their recent Convention in Denver.

This is just another example of how disaffected Republicans cling to their guns, flag and religion.

OK, maybe he didn't really say that. But his actions, and the actions of the DNC during their recent Convention (See Redstate's: 'New Game: Where's the Flag') speak louder than words. And yes, respect for the flag matters, especially for whoever is President.  They are supposed to be a role model for the rest of the country.  And what sort of role model has no respect for the traditions of this country or for the symbols of the US, starting with the US Flag.  Senator Obama is fully lacking in this area. Some people think that we should put the flag and pride in our country away. I am not one of those people.  Senator Obama claims that he wants to make America proud and great again as in the past. Well in the past, the flag and American traditions featured highly. So what is Obama's vision of a great America? My guess is no sort of America that we have ever seen before and no sort of America that most Americans will want to live in.

Previous post:
Beyond Stupid: Democrats Throw Away Over 10,000 US Flags

Beyond Stupid: Democrats Throw Away Over 10,000 US Flags

Drudge Report is linking to a story that part of the trash generated by the Democrat National convention in Denver is over 12,000 unused American Flags, which were saved from being tossed out as garbage by a worker.

This morning, Republicans tell me that a worker at Invesco Field in Denver saved thousands of unused flags from the Democratic National Convention that were headed for the garbage. Guerrilla campaigning. They will use these flags at their own event today in Colorado Springs with John McCain and Sarah Palin. - Denver Post

How sad that none of the Democrats thought of taking the flags to give away to delegates, or to all those people they got to fill Invesco Field to listen to Obama's speech or even take along to give away on the road. Even I would love to get a flag from the 'Great One'. Not only that but it really would have neutralized the whole Obama-flag pin issue.  At the very least a Democrat could have taken them and sold them on eBay. But I guess none of those Democrats have any sort of entrepreneurial spirit.

Instead the flags are going to be used at a McCain/Palin campaign event. Does that count as a campaign contribution?  Either way, thanks DNC! (And shame on you at the same time!) Guess lots of supports will be walking away with some nice new flags.

I'll take 17. Too bad I'm stuck in Virginia getting rained on.

UPDATE:

Seems that this is just the latest in an ongoing flag issue that REDSTATE has been following. See their posts: 'New Game: Where's the Flag' as they fail to find any US flags that the DNC might have put up for their convention. And then 'Mystery Solved' as they discover US Flags tossed in with regular convention garbage.

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Dear John McCain, I know Where You Can Find the First $1 Billion

Here is one passage from Republican Presidential Candidate John McCain's acceptance speech last night:

We are going to stop sending $700 billion a year to countries that don't like us very much. - Speech posted at Instapundit

The US currently gives Russia almost $1 billion a year in aid. And as I pointed out in this post "Why it's OK to Stop Paying $1 Billion a Year to Protect Russia's Nukes", we are just throwing this money away. So I nominate Russia to be first on President McCain's foreign aid hit-list.

After all, despite paying close to a billion a year, Russia has found what they seem to consider better partners. and what good does it do the US to 'Protect' Russia's nukes, when they just turn around and teach our enemies to build them:

Putin and Ahmadinejad - Each the other's most Useful Idiot

As for the rest of John McCain's speech, I liked what I heard. Sure, it was not awe inspiring, but then again, neither is the job that needs to be done. Tough and somewhat unpopular short-term changes will be needed to change the country for the better, and this is the only candidate who is not concerned about ruffling feathers to get it done!

Previous:

Why it's OK to Stop Paying $1 Billion a Year to Protect Russia's Nukes



-- Anchor Countries --



US Aid to Russia (2006) $949 Million

US Aid to Russia (2007) $913 Million



Norway and UK Pay Nuke Money as Russia Threatens West

US Assistance to Russia Funding Iranian Nukes







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Free Speech Thieves - RNC Edition

This was to be expected. The free speech thieves have interrupted both Republican VP Candidate Sarah Palin and Republican Presidential Candidate John McCain's acceptance speeches.

A protestor is seen as Republican presidential nominee John McCain speaks at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., Thursday, Sept. 4, 2008. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) - Yahoo News

That would be a Code Pink protester making an attack during John McCain's speech. She was one of at least three who rudely interrupted his speech.

This Code Pink clown attacked during Sarah Palin's speech:

A demonstrator is removed from convention hall during U.S. Republican vice presidential candidate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota September 3, 2008. REUTERS/Robert Galbraith (UNITED STATES) US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION CAMPAIGN 2008 (USA) - Yahoo News

'A Demonstrator'? Come on. Which Reuters photographer/editor does not know that this is the co-founder of Code Pink, Medea Benjamin. In fact, which Secret Service screener let her into the building, credentials or not to enter? No matter, she is a major free speech thief and should spend some time in jail for theft of all of our time. (Either that or can her husband do us all a favor and f..k her.)

A demonstrator is pulled away from stage during Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's nomination acceptance speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota, September 3, 2008. REUTERS/John Gress (UNITED STATES) US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION CAMPAIGN 2008 (USA) - Yahoo News

This 'demonstrator' just happens to be a big money collector for Barack Obama:

One of Barack Obama's top 500 bundlers who raised nearly $100,000 for the Democratic Candidate rushed the stage during the Sarah Palin speech tonight at the Xcel Center. The Secret Service dragged her away.

Democratic mega-donor Jodie Evans was nearly on the stage when the Secret Service stopped her. - Founding Bloggers

These people just hurt those whose cause they support.  If John McCain's message is so bad, then why not just shut up and let us hear it...

UPDATE: 9/5/08

It seems that Code Pink managed to get inside by way of identity theft.

See the following sites for more details and photos as well including one of one of the criminals with a badge in the stolen name. Maybe now at least one of them can be arrested.:
 - Update on Code Pink’s RNC Insurgency - this Ain't Hell
 - CODE PINK STOLE DELEGATE'S IDENTITY TO GET INTO RNC CONVENTION!!!! - Gateway Pundit

Of interest is also this tidbit:
 - Blogger: RNC Organizer Said Protesters Had MSNBC Badges - Newsbusters

Previous:
Return of the Free Speech Thieves - 10 Sept 07
Free Speech Thieves - 4 Aug 06



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Sarah Palin has Spoken...

Sarah Palin fully delivered in her speech!

Great speech today. Go ahead and point out that someone wrote it for her. All political speeches are products of speech writers but how funny is it that good speeches come are delivered by good politicians. And she delivered tonight. She owned her speech. So well that she even made me feel a bit excited for voting for John McCain. Tat he has earned the right to be the next President.  That is a strong distinction between McCain and Obama. Best of all it wasn't just talk. She pointed out the major differences between McCain's ticket and Obama's ticket.

And if that was not good enough, Rudy Giuliani probably delivered his best speech of the campaign tonight. And that's saying lots, especially since I like Rudy, but was no fan of him becoming President (Here and here).

Obama has a serious problem facing his election as President and that's good.

One more thing, this country has 100 Senators. Two for every state. But there are only 50 Governors in this country, one per state. Ultimately responsible for their state and responsible for most of your interaction with any Government.  State taxes, driver's licenses, etc... Some Governors run states that are bigger than other countries. And as she pointed out, they have actual responsibilities.

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Obama, McCain, Your Money and Theirs...

Obama raked in millions of your money and then spent most of it to win the Democratic Presidential Nomination, with having little concern of having to make hard choices on how to spend it, since there was plenty of money to go around.

McCain however was nearly broke at one point in this race before coming back to win the Republican Nomination against candidates with much bigger bankrolls

The presidential campaign of Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican who once seemed poised to be his party’s nominee in 2008, acknowledged yesterday that it was in a political and financial crisis as a drop in fund-raising forced it to dismiss dozens of workers and aides and retool its strategy on where to compete. - NY Times, July 3, 2007

For his whole campaign, John McCain has had to make many hard decisions on how to spend the campaign's hard earned money, especially considering that he did not have access to his wife's fortune to bankroll his campaign. However, for the General Election, he has accepted public financing to get him through to the election. Senator Obama initially agreed to take public funding as well, until he saw how willing his followers were willing to give to his campaign. However, despite being able to spend more than John McCain in the General Election, he will first have to get his followers to replace the $84 million he just gave up before he can take advantage of not having a spending limit to cap his advertising efforts:

When Mr. Obama decided in June to bypass the $84 million in public financing for the general election, campaign officials calculated that to make it worth the additional time he would need to devote off the campaign trail to fund-raising, they needed to raise two to three times the $84 million.

They set out a goal of raising $300 million for the campaign and $180 million for the Democratic Party, several fund-raisers said, or about $100 million a month. - NY Times

This does not seem to be an issue the media cares about, but I think this tells lots about Senator Obama's view about money. After all, he is willing to take money from donors where up to half of that money he could have received from the Government. While he claims to care about Americans suffering from stretched budgets, his actions in asking his supporters to stretch their budgets a little further to give him money, does not sound like someone who is really concerned about their economic situation.

And I wonder how many of his donors currently don't earn enough to pay taxes? If they can find money to donate to political campaigns, then perhaps they too can pay their 'fair share' of taxes...

Links:
Some Clinton Fund-Raisers Are Still Simmering - New York Times
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... I'VE HEARD NO DISCUSSION ABOUT REMOVING BARACK OBAMA FROM THE TICKET ...

I am somewhat amused at how John McCain's pick of Sarah Palin to be his running mate has made most of the professional media just go insane. I actually managed to have some free time last night to watch news and first turned into CNN. There was James Carville clearly freaking out. I think he is setting himself up for a heart attack come election day. The coverage was so bad, and mostly centered on news of the daughter's pregnancy, that I changed channels and then finally just shut the TV off.

Then turning to the Internet to read some news, I ran across this insanity:

" ... TOP GOP GOVERNOR: I'VE HEARD NO DISCUSSION ABOUT REMOVING MS. PALIN FROM THE TICKET ... "

Clearly this is in response to a question asked by a reporter. Surely the response is true. After all, why would there be any talk of removing a pick for VP that has instantly energized the entire Republican Party. Yet, by printing the comment as they did above gives the impression to their readers that the Republican ticket is in trouble.  I can't see how doing this is of any benefit to their readers. It just gives them a false impression of the chances of their candidate and is more likely to cause M.P.D.S. (McCain/Palin Derangement Syndrome) at election time when Obama fails to win the Presidency.

In line with their completely dishonest, hack style of journalism, comes the title of this post mocking their crude work:

 ... I'VE HEARD NO DISCUSSION ABOUT REMOVING BARACK OBAMA FROM THE TICKET ...

My statement is also 100% true.  However, I bet that not everyone can say that, especially anyone involved in halting the roll call vote at the Democrat National Convention to prevent Hillary supporters from throwing the convention into chaos by arranging a Hillary win. This brings to light a problem in attacking Mrs. Palin. Most every attack can be turned back onto the Democrats, in some cases in a more devastating fashion. Such as Obama having to state that he has more experience than the Republican VP Candidate. That kind of statement also makes a great headline and is more damaging to the candidate himself.

Every once in a while parts of the US Military will stand-down for a day to review what they have been doing whenever they run into a spate of mishaps.  The liberal-leaning US media is one big train wreck.  They really should take a step back and look at what they have become.  Otherwise another surprise come January will be a White House Press Corp packed with New Media.

As for the story behind the GOP Governor statement.  This is what was said:

Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina said that he had heard no discussion about removing Ms. Palin from the ticket. In fact, he said, he thought her daughter's pregnancy would not hurt her with voters.

"People are looking for real," he said in an interview. "Real means blemishes, real means warts, real means real. These family imperfections make people say, 'That family isn't so different from my family.'"

Early reaction among women at the Republican convention to the news about Bristol Palin's pregnancy was almost uniformly supportive. - HP

Sounds somewhat encouraging for the Republican side, doesn't it.



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