5-18-13 - LONG DREAM - This dream had several parts to it, all with the
same male characters, but something different was happening in each room.
It started out that I was babysitting a small, thin boy who wasn't wearing a
shirt. He got very cold and I wanted him to have a shirt on, and the other
men in the dream tried to prevent that from happening.
In the other room, the telephone rang, and there were several extensions on
the same line, but not all of them picked up the line itself for some reason,
and that was being interfered with by the same adult men.
When I didn't get the message on the phone, despite the fact that the phone
lines didn't all work, they picked on me for not getting the message.
In the last scene, again it was about clothing, and again they were all
interfering in one way or another to not letting me have the clothing I needed.
I'm sure this refers to the previous dream of this morning and my needing to
clothe a little boy I was taking care of who had no shirt on, and he was cold
and the men in the dream apparently didn't want him to have a shirt to wear.
(He was unprotected)
5-18-13 - NAP DREAM - I was in a very large house, and the landlady
came to see me. She noticed that not all the digital connections were made
in the house, so she said we needed that, and she said she would make sure that
got done.
So the man who was going to do the installation, ran back into the warehouse
area, and I clumsily followed him, because I had to walk on top of things in the
aisles, but he found the digital connection gadget and holding it high in the
air with one hand, he ran back to the living room to install it for us, and I
ran back after him, all excited, because we were finally going to be able to SEE
everything that was happening at the same time.
It's being installed as we speak. :-)
Thu Dec 23, 2010 at 02:18 AM PST/p>
byTroubadour
"Yeah, but..." This is such a common, almost reflexively-used phrase
in response to good news by some commentators on the left that it might
as well be a single word - perhaps even a single syllable. "Yeabut."
It's a perfectly legitimate qualifier when the comment that follows is
actually relevant to the news being discussed - "Yeah, but the bill
contained an amendment that limits its effectiveness." But when it's
used as a means to change the subject completely - "Yeah, DADT repeal is
great and all, but what about mountaintop removal mining, huh? Talk
about that, hotshot!" - in other words, when the only caveat to a
celebrated achievement is that something else exists that
hasn't been accomplished, what you have on your hands is laundry list
politics: The obnoxious pursuit of outrage at the cost of never
capitalizing on victory.
This is not to say that all or even most people afflicted with
laundry list syndrome are just rage-addicted perpetual victims who see
winning as a kind of death - they're a sizable minority, but hardly the
bulk of the phenomenon. Rather, the problem as I see it appears to stem
from two perspectives that (as I explain later) stem from the same
conceptual failure. The first:
- Sub-dimensional thinking. This is
my overly cerebral way of saying "oversimplification," but the
distinction is not gratuitous - there are very specific consequences
to ignoring applicable political dimensions. Though the perspective
may be simpler, the resulting picture often paradoxically appears
more complex than it is because otherwise logical relationships are
obscured or seem chaotic. Consider the following series of visual
illustrations.
Suppose the above is a two-dimensional representation of a set of
agenda items one is hoping to accomplish, with each node denoting a
particular objective. Now, it is a very shallow, cross-sectional plane,
so you cannot see anything in the foreground or background relative to
these nodes, all you can see is that which exists in the plane
- like in a microscope slide. Based on this visualization, what would
you deduce about the relative priority of these items?
Naturally, you might assume the largest and most obtrusive is the
most important, and focus more on those closest to it than those further
away. But your attempts to address these issues based on this
perspective are frustratingly ineffective - you find that the
relationships you deduce are generally not quite as you think, and you
have to keep reinvesting the same energy over, and over to protect gains
already made and address new issues. This is the laundry-list view of
politics - nothing is connected, so every issue has its own costly
political overhead rather than being addressed in a holistic way. One
can deal with this fact by looking deeper, or by inventing
self-rationalizing betrayal mythologies that do nothing to improve your
effectiveness. Let's look deeper.
Now suppose we extend our shallow 2D plane to a much greater depth -
it's still two-dimensional, but objects in the foreground and background
are projected on to the plane, as illustrated above. We now have more
information, and can begin to discern clearer and more useful
relationships. What deductions can we make based on this fuller
picture? It appears that one of the nodes is far more important than
the others based on the number of direct connections it has. Perhaps
the largest is still important, given its enormous comparative size, but
there is also this hub node that may deserve a great deal of focus as
well.
When utilizing this deep-focus 2D perspective, one finds that the
effectiveness of the agenda increases somewhat, but there are still a
lot of puzzling failures and disappointments. We are beginning to
distance ourselves from the laundry-list mentality, but there is still
some of that going on because the systemic relationships between the
issue objectives are still not clear. Once again, we can engage in
self-justifying CTs and pathological betrayal theologies, or we can look
deeper. Let's look deeper.
You'll have to forgive the relative crudity of this next model, I'm
not using any kind of professional program to generate the dimensional
geometries, I'm just drawing in MS Paint to give a rough idea of the
concept. Basically, it contains all the same information as the above,
only we see what's causing that information - we see its
origins. Just realize that relationships are radically different when
the perspective adds a new dimension:
From this perspective, the "central node" is seen to be almost
totally irrelevant, and the largest node isn't connected to anything
else - if you were to pour all of your resources to conquering it, you
could not capitalize on that energy for any subsequent victories. So,
as could be said of anything, it's important to understand the
connections - the systemics - in order to achieve lasting, sustainable
political progress. To make your efforts count, they must be calculated
to address root causes of both problems and solutions, and efficiently
deploy resources to have maximum impact.
In the visual metaphor above, this would mean focusing on the second
largest node, which is much smaller than the largest and has far fewer
connections than the apparent "hub" node, but would in the larger
perspective be key to accessing the rest of the system. Were you to
focus on the largest node, even if you were to succeed you would end up
isolated; and if you were to focus on the apparent hub, you would
discover it was an optical illusion and you had just wasted your energy.
So that is one type of laundry-list politics - failing to appreciate
the dimensionality and systemics of the issue. Now for the second type:
- Inability or refusal to prioritize.
For some on the left, politics is not about achievement, but about
expression. In particular, expression of judgments and reactions.
They regard activism as a series of conditional but nonetheless
one-dimensional statements: If x, then y - this is the definition of
morality for them, and if you follow the program, then you are a
"true progressive." They find the addition of new variables
disquieting, confusing, and corrupting - it smacks of
"triangulation" or "capitulation" to them. "If x AND z, then NOT y"
simply doesn't compute for them because x is present, so the core
statement "If x, then y" must apply or else one will be deemed to
have violated it. There is no recognition that "x AND z" is
fundamentally different from x - no recognition that one number is
different from another that is a factor of it.
For these people, prioritizing would be an abhorrent act of
amorality, like choosing between one's children. They do not understand
the roots of their own values, and how those roots ultimately converge
on fundamental principles that not only tolerate, but frankly demand
casuist ethics: If "standing up" for your issues is more important than
actually advancing them, then you don't actually care about them - you
simply worship them as ideal objects, and wish to preserve them in your
mind far more than you give a damn whether they are represented in
practice.
If one asks such a person what they stand for, they will not tell you
their values - i.e., what moral postulates they apply in determining
actions. Instead, they will recite a...you guessed it...laundry list of
specific agenda items, legislative positions, and - if they're assholes
- reel off a litany of grievances, perceived betrayals, and individuals
whom they deem to be insufficiently committed to these items, whose
motives they suspect, or whom they consider to be actively treacherous.
They're not actually telling you anything by this, let alone engaging
in productive thought - what they're doing is regurgitating the contents
of their brains so that you can bask in the awesomeness that is them,
and perhaps pay them the compliment of imitation. Basically religious
proselytizing.
In reference to the illustrations above, a person who cannot
prioritize either does not know or does not care that they can win two
or more victories for the price of one - they would consider it
"cynical" or a form of "cheating" to address the roots of issues rather
than individually focusing on every single twig and leaf. Because
activism for them is an expression rather than a constructive activity,
victory is just another form of defeat - it temporarily dampens the
emotional potency of their cause, and thereby deprives them of what may
be a central motivator.
In such cases one might as well dismiss them, because they are quite
happy to be inconsequential - merely expressing themselves fulfills
them, and they couldn't care less whether anyone else benefits from what
they're doing. It's the expression that matters to them. But at the
same time, there are people who simply aren't aware that laundry-lists
are not how things are accomplished - that politics in reality does not
consist of discrete, non-negotiable items that you obtain by shouting
louder, stomping your feet, and waving around signs more vigorously.
The first step to transcending the laundry list mentality is to know
what it is you actually want. You can start with the litany of issue
positions if you must, but start looking for commonalities between them
- the connective tissue that reveals where it is your interest comes
from. Do this repeatedly until you begin to recognize the nature of
your own motives: Is it that you feel inadequate, and thus want to
change the world around you in the hopes that it will change you in
turn? Do you hate someone or something, and attack ideas and policies
that benefit them or remind you of them? Are you afraid, and trying to
defray your fear through a lot of pointless noise and self-distraction?
Or do you actually see something larger than yourself? Do you see what
fills the spaces between you and others? Do you understand its fluidity
and living nature?
Once you know what you're about, then you can begin rationally
designing your political program. If you are afraid, what is the root
of your fear? If you hate, what is the root of your hatred? Not the
object at which it is directed - it's never that simple. We never hate
the objects of hatred or fear that which frightens us - it's things
about them, things they do, reactions they cause in us. The deeper you
examine, the more mutability you discover - principles of connection
that reveal that that which we assumed to be absolute was fluid, that
which we thought permanent, temporary. And vice-versa! And it's not a
bad or depressing realization at all, because it creates far more
possibilities than it limits.
But leaving aside the philosophy of it, you also come to understand
the reality of what already exists and how others achieved it. Real
historical accomplishments that most people gloss over with puerile
fantasies of an angelic crusade against evil become understandable,
manageable, and what's most important, replicable within
suitable contexts.
I, for instance, stand for Liberty, Equality, and Opportunity
- my signature line. Those three words encompass everything I stand
for: Countless specific positions, countless potential legislative
items, and innumerable opinions of political figures past and present.
I don't have to memorize a laundry list, and I don't have to randomly
select some cherry-picked example out of the ocean - I can just say
Liberty, Equality, and Opportunity, and know exactly what I'm talking
about. In fact, I wrote a diary about it a while back, so feel free to
check it out. You can ask me to elaborate on the meaning, and I can
- easily - because I'm beginning with the root principles of my
politics and expanding outward rather than stumbling around trying to
synthesize a million different agendas into a pithy statement.
So let's generate a small example of someone's political laundry list
(real ones can run to hundreds of items):
- Guaranteed healthcare.
- Free college education.
- Save endangered species.
- Gay marriage.
- End capital punishment.
- Rebuild New Orleans.
- Net neutrality.
- Teaching evolution.
- Higher minimum wage.
- The DREAM Act.
If you were to hear someone advocate these issues, you would know
their politics lean to the left, but you probably will not see any kind
of coherent mission behind the litany of subjects. As a result, more
often than not, they cannot prioritize them - they are struggling to
express a unified agenda and failing to do so, ending up instead spewing
out huge litanies of specific positions that are only loosely related at
first glance. But look deeper.
- Guaranteed healthcare - Equality,
Opportunity.
- Free college education - Equality,
Opportunity.
- Save endangered species - Opportunity.
- Gay marriage - Liberty, Equality.
- End capital punishment - Liberty,
Equality.
- Rebuild New Orleans - Opportunity.
- Net neutrality - Liberty, Equality.
- Teaching evolution - Opportunity.
- Higher minimum wage - Opportunity.
- The DREAM Act - Opportunity.
Judging by the deeper interpretation of this person's laundry list -
and please, let's not quibble with the interpretation, it's just an
example - they appear to value Opportunity most highly, then Equality,
then Liberty. Perhaps this reflects their personal circumstances, where
they feel the greatest inadequacy to be lack of opportunity, or perhaps
it is just a reflection of their character to be more interested in that
side of things. Others may be more interested in addressing Equality,
and still others Liberty. Some may find them of equal interest, and
possibly some who discover their interests to be imbalanced will decide
that the three are equally important and deserve a conscious effort to
address them all with equal vigor.
Whatever the case, it becomes obvious that the three are intertwined,
and reflect an even higher principle - albeit one so abstract it's
virtually meaningless to assert it beyond recognizing that it exists.
We can just call it "freedom" for want of an equally universal,
all-encompassing term - one that has gradually diverged from "liberty"
over the course of American history and become a generalized term for
democratic political virtue. This apex value is different in different
societies - in some Asian cultures, for instance, the apex value might
be "harmony," and in others (pick your usual suspects) it could be
beauty, while still others are rooted in the ideal of happiness - but
there is no mistaking ours. In this country, everything is defined in
reference to freedom, even where it has been ruthlessly extirpated:
Liberals fight to preserve and cultivate it, conservatives seek to
pervert and co-opt it, and everyone, sincere or otherwise, wraps
themselves in its iconography because freedom is our national postulate.
Now, one realizes there is a strangely Trinitarian relationship in
that "freedom" as we've defined it cannot exist in the absence of the
three stated principles, and yet the three cannot exist in isolation
either - they naturally form a gestalten whole requiring a separate
definition from its components and representing the essence of a living
democracy in homeostasis.
There is not one progressive agenda item that is not derived
ultimately from at least one of the three - liberty, equality, or
opportunity. So feel free to use it if you find it helpful, or (perhaps
more fun) go on your own exploratory adventures and discover the roots
of what you do and why you do it for yourself. Now, that isn't to say
I'm fundamentally motivated by support for liberty, equality,
and opportunity - those are just the moral/philosophical derivations
of my actual motives. In truth, I'm a little more human than that: I
just fucking hate liars and bullies. Analyzing deeper than that becomes
a trivial exercise, because beneath instinct there is only more
instinct.
Whatever the origins of one's philosophy and politics, what matters
is what you do with it. If politics is just another form of
masturbation for you, there are far less selfish and socially corrosive
ways to go about it than adding your voice to the Noise that pollutes
our society, deforms our debates, and drains public energy from reform.
Whatever you do, at least let it be the result of a conscious decision
on your part, and not the default result of unexamined reactions.
Originally posted to
Troubadour on Thu Dec 23, 2010 at 02:18 AM PST.
Tags
Liberty, Equality, and Opportunity: We Can Have All Three, or None - No
Multiple-Choice.
In 2010, I had an epiphany about my personal philosophy that, in my
view, reveals all of progressive, liberal, and humanist politics at its
most basic and unified essence:
Liberty, Equality, Opportunity - a trinity of moral
ends-in-themselves that can neither be subdivided nor sustained in
practice unless all three are protected and promoted. The conceptual
power of "LEO" is that it unifies principles we all generally share, but
which we are often at odds to optimally balance, let alone articulate in
a way that doesn't simply trap us into dead-ends by the limitations of
language. By looking at it this way, we can understand our politics as
a three-dimensional system with the "ideal good" being at the
intersection of these three qualities, and realize the fact that unless
all three are balanced, what results will be both unstable and
unsustainable.
Try to imagine a circumstance where any of the three is lacking.
What you get is a dystopia where even the values that are promoted in
theory are degenerate in practice. For instance...
1. Consider anarchy: Liberty and Equality are technically
present, but only in their basest and least constructive forms. When no
institution is effective enough to control individual behavior, people
are theoretically just as free to do good things as well as bad, but in
practice all you get is the latter.
Moreover, people are theoretically equal, but only because
insecurity and desperation are universal, with even the predators
fighting over transient scraps of illusory power. And both perversions
are the result of one of the three legs of the LEO tripod being totally
nonexistent - Opportunity. No idea, no matter how clever; and no amount
of work, no matter how diligent, can be rewarded so long as anarchy
persists.
2. Consider fascism: Opportunity is strongly present in a
fascist state, at least at first - those with the Will to rule and excel
in some profession just smash their way to their objectives, and align
themselves with unscrupulous powers who will reward their competence in
exchange for obedience. However, it's unstable: Sooner or later the
people who smash and murder their way to the top simply become a
stifling aristocracy who do everything they can to suppress the same
kind of revolutions from toppling them. And in a monstrous, diabolical
way, even Equality is present in a fascist state in the form of the
"right of conquest" tautology: Everyone is equally entitled to murder
and enslave everyone else, and those who do so successfully are
"justified" by definition. But Liberty is not permitted on any level:
You may not choose to coexist peacefully, or dissent, or take moral
positions - fascism forces all parties to a zero-sum test of strength,
and you will either join, be conquered, or conquer in turn.
3. Consider communism (or other form of authoritarian
egalitarian state): Equality is the single overwhelming value in a
communist state, but it is both in a degenerative sense and unstable.
The vast majority of people are equally oppressed, deprived, and
exploited, but even the benefits of that Faustian bargain are ephemeral
because the cunning and unscrupulous learn how to cheat the system,
forming black markets and mafias around the bits and pieces of inequity
that crop up in a bureaucracy. And, of course, neither Liberty nor
Opportunity are present - everything is strictly regimented from the
top, and monolithic Leviathan states determine who is worthy of reward
rather than any sort of natural, democratic, or fluid process, assuring
that ultimately only the people who control the rewards are rewarded and
nothing is permitted to change.
These are just the most extreme examples, but you can have any number
of intermediate versions, e.g.: The social Darwinian capitalist
kleptocracy, where you have Liberty in theory but not practice (because
few can afford to do anything other than barely survive), and
Opportunity only in the sense of being unrestrained from preying on
others, much like fascism; the petty monarchy, where there is no
Equality or Opportunity, but a kind of Liberty in the fact that the
rulers mostly don't care what you do and won't exert themselves to
control it except where their own interests are concerned; and the
primitive tribal state, where there is general Equality because social
control is extremely simple, but neither Liberty nor Opportunity have
meaning because there's little structure against which to either dissent
or build upon.
As these examples demonstrate, if you shortchange any of the three,
the other two become a sick joke and/or radically short-lived. This is
why we find such technically bewildering alliances as the partnership
between libertarianism and fascism: Not because they agree on anything
specifically, but because they have a mutual enmity toward LEO as a
unified system - both oppose the practical, politically-enforced
maintenance of Liberty and Equality, preferring that people not be given
a choice about participating in zero-sum competitions for power and
privilege. The only significant difference is that libertarians prefer
that the ruthless wield power through corruption of explicit governments
rather than directly wielding them, but this preference is idle at best.
In practice, the two blend smoothly into each other, with
libertarianism rapidly degenerating into some other crippled state -
anarchy, kleptocracy, monarchy, fascism, or if a radical
counter-reaction occurs, an authoritarian egalitarian state like the
French revolutionary government or the 20th century Communist
dictatorships and oligarchies.
You need Liberty for people to access and exploit Opportunity, and to
demand and maintain Equality; you need Equality to maintain Liberty and
effectively, robustly distribute Opportunity; and you need Opportunity
for Equality and Liberty to efficiently benefit society. These are
three words, but in practice they are one, deeply interconnected dynamic
system, and trying to turn any one or two of them into the slave of the
other(s) creates disfigured, sickly, or stillborn governments and
cultures.
This realization was codified into the very fabric of the US
government, in the three-branch structure of checks and balances, but as
often happens the success of it merely created more advanced
opportunities for failure. As a result, the state that was the most
robust in modern times at embodying LEO (and second only to the 400-year
Roman Republic in all of human history) - mitigating and forestalling
the violent revolutions and stagnant vulnerabilities that have destroyed
most other governments or left them defenseless against external events
- has fallen prey to its own hyper-evolved economy, with financial
systems that operate with such speed and complexity that the corporate
institutions of the rich constantly outwit and outflank the political
system that makes them possible.
The solution to this is not to retreat to greater simplicity, which
would be to simply pretend that history never happened or that we don't
know what we know: That would be little more rational or constructive
than dealing with a personal crisis in adulthood by reverting to
adolescence. Nor is the answer to cultishly mimic societies with an
equal and opposite imbalance to our own current problems, since - for
instance - it obviously hasn't helped more socially-inclined states like
those of Europe to avoid the predations of austerity that are wracking
most of the continent. The answer is to take the profound
understandings embodied in the US Constitution to the next level - to a
more evolved, more rapid set of mechanisms that we can rely upon in
daily life to regulate and control the otherwise unchecked corporate
anarchy/monarchy that rules over us, and stop it from corrupting and
obstructing our ability to appeal to slower, more distant political
institutions.
The Occupy movement had the right idea in this respect, at least
initially, in that it tried to envision what LEO might look like on a
granular level that people could interact with in their daily lives, but
it lost momentum when it became more concerned with its own treatment by
authorities than in creating, communicating, and implementing ideas.
Part of it was that a lot of the people at its core were themselves
impatient with the reality of a democratic mass-movement whose larger
community didn't necessarily care about the laundry-list politics of its
most active constituents, and some of whom felt hindered or "co-opted"
by mainstream involvement. But nothing stops any of us from building on
the foundations of Occupy's early successes and trying to implement a
more rigorous, more robust set of democratic mechanisms in everyday life
and in our local communities. At the nexus of Liberty, Equality, and
Opportunity is a free, humane, and limitless society, if we are smart
enough, courageous enough, and yet humble enough to pursue it.
ALSO SEE MY PAGE ON: ANARCHY VS CAPITALISM
&
http://www.greatdreams.com/blog-2013-2/dee-blog493.html
The answer should not surprise you. On the day after
seven people, including a one-year old, had been shot in Oakland,
it took at least twenty police, the City Attorney and his aide,
a bunch of private security, vast numbers of press and a Running
Wolf no longer in a tree before everyone stood down and allowed
a teepee to be erected on Frank Ogawa Plaza / Oscar Grant Park.
How much is twenty police? It represents somewhere around 10%
of the entire Oakland Police force on duty at that time
(assuming three shifts and about 600 on the entire force). How
many people, not counting all those listed above, were on the
Plaza? Maybe fifty, assuming you were counting downhill with the
wind at your back. How many exhibited any signs of violence?
Zero. What is the population of Oakland? 400,000. You do the
math; I'll tell the story. Read on, and check out the pictures.
I headed down to Oakland in the cold Berkeley fog, prepared,
literally, to chill out. I emerged from the 12th Street BART a
mere three miles away to a cloudless, warm day, a few minutes
before the
24-hour vigil to reclaim the Plaza was scheduled to begin.
But if there was a significant event planned you wouldn't have
known it just by looking around.
A half hour later some seventy people had gathered in the
amphitheatre to commence the vigil. Running Wolf, who has been
#occupying a tree in the plaza for the last seventeen days/a>,,
explained the significance of the teepee and the vigil, and how
the teepee was not to be used for camping, but as a symbol of
#occupation and #decolonization. A table was set up for people
to inscribe messages to be hung on the teepee, further
emphasizing it's messaging aspect.
Then a policeman informed Running Wolf and the vigil
committee attorneys that they would need a permit to erect the
teepee. And so it began.
(For background on the vigil and some of the legal issues
involved, check out
Occupy Oakland: P-Q4. The Vigil Gambit Begins/a>))
All of what I tell you here is true to the extent that I saw
it and heard it, but much of what happened and much of what was
discussed betwixt the police, city officials, Running Wolf and
the vigil committee remains obscure.
After some time milling about, Running Wolf and supporters
headed off to the North side of the plaza to erect the teepee
where they were blocked from proceeding further by the police.
More police seemed to arrive every minute.
A tense standoff ensued, with a small crowd of attendees
surrounding Running Wolf, a lot of police surrounding them, and
press scattered amongst everyone. Runnning Wolf was of a mind to
attempt to start erecting the teepee, stating that he was
willing to go to jail. But he kept his cool while the lawyers
talked things over.
The tenseness was defused somewhat by an announcement that
the City Attorney, Arturo Sanchez, would come down from
Barad-dur City Hall tower in five minutes to sort things
out. He eventually did come down, although it took far more than
five minutes.
As is befitting any negotiation, once he did arrive the
lawyers kept telling the crowd "five more minutes." The police
and the crowd kept a watchful eye on each other as all this
played out, but there were no incidents other than typical shout
out to the police to "Go chase down criminals" and the like.
Some thirty minutes into the negotiations, the City Attorney
presented the City's offer to the vigil attorneys:
#OccupyOakland could erect the teepee and maintain a 24-hour
vigil, but the teepee itself had to come down between the hours
of 10:00 PM and 6:00 AM. There was no explanation that I noted
as to why those hours were chosen as the park itself seems to
be, legally, open twenty-four hours.
The vigil legal team and Running Wolf (facing)
The vigil attorneys huddled as you see above and eventually
decided that they would "conform" to the City's restrictions.
They stated that they disagreed with the City's right to impose
such conditions on the vigil, and reserved the right to file a
lawsuit against the curfew. I talked with one of the attorneys
immediately after the fact, and asked him if a lawsuit would
indeed be filed. He replied that he intended to file a lawsuit
in Federal court as soon as possible. (They have the lawsuit all
prepared, as they had stated previously, so this should not take
long, should it actually come to pass).
Note: A tweet I've recently seen says that the agreement or
permit is only good for three days. But this was not stated as a
condition by the vigil lawyers when they announced to the crowd
the situation and said that the teepee should be erected. The
exact situation remains unclear to me.
At this point the teepee began being erected, the excitement
wound down, and I decided to head off.
Running Wolf supervising the teepee going up,
facing the camera.
But that's not all. While all this was happening, an entire
side-story was playing out just a few feet away. This is the
Interfaith Tent, which has been #occupying the Plaza for a week
or so now. Notice the artillery emplacements:
This tent is visible from City Hall (that's the lower floors
of City Hall in the background). It's not like no one noticed it
until today. I'm told the Mayor, Jean Quan, even paid it a visit
some days ago. But, oddly enough, today during the standoff, was
the day the police decided to inform the Interfaith group that
they would need a permit or the tent would have to be removed.
Can you say "selective enforcement?" I knew you could.
Apparently the deadline for removal is 10:00 PM, as allie123
tweets
alyssa011968 Alyssa
I am going to take a nap & go to #OccupyOakland at 9:30pm--
OPD threatened to take down interfaith tent& Running Wolf
requested support
and
BootsRiley Boots Riley
RT @FaezaMoghul 10PM is deadline for taking interfaith tent
& teepee down. Running Wolf requests your support. #OO
#Occupyoakland #OWS
You can be assured that there will be plenty of police about
the Plaza at that point, zealously guarding the right of the
people to peacefully assemble be shot at in liquor stores
while the police are elsewhere.
Stay tuned as the City of Oakland decides whether to commit
police, attorney and monetary resources in a single-minded
effort to derail #OccupyOakland, or to stop little kids from
getting shot. In a bet on which direction they'll take, I know
which choice my money's on.
Credits: Alyssa, aka our own allie123, aka
alyssa011958 on
Twitter, took these pictures. I just uploaded them. My story is
my own.
7:44 PM PT:
AP is reporting that the permit is for seven days.
Police say officers and private security will be on hand to
make sure no tents, sleeping bags or camping equipment are
set up at the site, but they will allow a seven-day vigil at
Frank Ogawa Plaza.
7:48 PM PT: A video of
the teepee going up, wherein I am, briefly, visible way in the
background
8:28 PM PT:
Interview with one of the vigil's lawyers (the one with his back
toward the camera in the picture)
Originally posted to
jpmassar on Tue Nov
29, 2011 at 07:39 PM PST.
FROM:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/29/1040965/-Occupy-Oakland-How-many-Oakland-Police-Does-it-Take-to-Erect-a-Teepee
PROMISES ON JOBS DURING THE CAMPAIGN:
June 14, 2012
Speaking to skeptical voters nationwide from the pivotal battleground of
Ohio, President Barack Obama defiantly defended his record on the economy
Thursday and painted Mitt Romney as the standard-bearer for those who would
bring back George W. Bush's policies.
"I want to speak to everybody who is watching who may not be a supporter,
may be undecided, or thinking about voting the other way," Obama said. "If
you want to give the policies of the last decade another try, then you
should vote for Mr. Romney."
That line drew a chorus of boos from a rowdy crowd of about 1,500 people
assembled to hear Obama try to reframe what some Democrats have described as
his wobbly election message.
Romney, speaking to supporters at an aluminum plant in Cincinnati moments
before Obama's remarks,
offered his own version of the choice voters face on Nov. 6.
"If you think things are going swimmingly, if you think the president's
right when he said the private sector is doing fine, well, then he's the guy
to vote for," he said.
Obama opened his remarks with a direct reference to his much-mocked claim
last Friday that the "private sector is doing fine" compared to
cash-strapped state and local governments. Republicans including Mitt Romney
have seized on that comment to suggest the president is out of touch.
"So, Ohio, over the next five months, this election will take many twists
and many turns, polls will go up and polls will go down, there will be no
shortage of gaffes and controversies that keep both campaigns busy and give
the press something to write about," he said.
"You may have heard I recently made my own unique contribution to that
process. It wasn't the first time. It won't be the last," the president said
in the verbal equivalent of a dismissive shrug.
"Of course the economy isn't where it needs to be. Of course we have a
lot more work to do. Everybody knows that," Obama said from behind a lectern
emblazoned with his campaign slogan, "Forward," in front of eight American
flags.
Aides had suggested the president's 53-minute speech from Cuyahoga
Community College in Cleveland would serve to recast the debate between him
and Romney on the sour economy, the top issue on voters' minds. The remarks
at times seemed like a blend of the soaring oratory that carried the
Democrat to his historic victory in 2008 along with the ponderous,
laundry-list politics of unsuccessful "State of the Union" addresses.Obama
worked to cast Nov. 6 as "a choice between two fundamentally different
visions" about the best path out of the rubble left by the 2007-2008 global
economic meltdown—not a referendum on an embattled incumbent at a time of
8.2 percent unemployment.
"The economic vision of Mr. Romney and his allies in Congress was tested
just a few years ago," Obama said. "We tried this. Their policies did not
grow the economy. They did not grow the middle class. They did not reduce
our debt."
"Why would we think that they would work better this time?" said the
president, who has used variations on that theme in scores of campaign
events all over the country over the past few months.
"We can't afford to jeopardize our future by repeating the mistakes of
the past. Not now. Not when there's so much at stake," he said.
In a preemptive rhetorical strike, Romney anticipated Obama's words:
"He's going to be a person of eloquence as he describes his plans for making
the economy better," Romney said. "But don't forget, he's been president for
three and a half years. And talk is cheap. Action speaks very loud."
But the president emphasized the timeline of events. "Our economy started
growing again six months after I took office and it has continued to grow
for the last three years," Obama said.
The president also pleaded for patience—"not only are we digging out of a
hole that is 9 million jobs deep, we're digging out from an entire
decade"—and he blamed Republicans in Congress for stalling his efforts to
revive the economy.
"What's holding us back is a stalemate in Washington between two
fundamentally different views of which direction America should take," he
said. "And this election is your chance to break that stalemate."
"If they win the election, their agenda will be simple and
straightforward; they have spelled it out. They promise to roll back
regulations on banks and polluters, on insurance companies and oil
companies. They'll roll back regulations designed to protect consumers and
workers while cutting taxes on the very wealthy," Obama said.
The president said he would boost investments in education, scientific
research and refurbishing the country's crumbling infrastructure.
Before Obama left Washington, the Department of Labor released official
data showing that
weekly unemployment benefit applications rose 6,000 to a seasonally
adjusted 386,000—the latest sign of anemic hiring and sluggish growth.
And the Gallup polling organization released a survey showing that
more than two-thirds of Americans—including half of Republicans—still pin
the country's economic ills on former President Bush.
What one might call the blame gap has narrowed considerably: When Gallup
first asked Americans in July 2009 whom they faulted for the poor economy,
80 percent laid a great deal or a moderate amount of blame on Bush, and only
32 percent held Obama responsible.
The current numbers show 68 percent of the public blames the former
president while 52 percent say Obama deserves the criticism. (The numbers
total more than 100 percent because the question was not "which one do you
blame more," but how much blame each president deserves individually.)
And on Wednesday, an ABC News/ Washington Post poll showed that only
38 percent of independent swing voters viewed Obama's economic plans
favorably, with a majority (54 percent) disapproving. But independent
voters judge Romney's economic ideas just as harshly: 47 percent gave his
economic approach an unfavorable rating, with just 35 percent finding it
favorable.
The Democratic president has crisscrossed the country in recent months
pleading for patience from voters still struggling in the anemic recovery
and grappling with a stubbornly high unemployment rate above 8 percent. In
his speeches, Obama makes a point of charging Bush and Republicans in
general with the 2007-2008 meltdown and warns that Mitt Romney's economic
program resembles the Bush approach "on steroids."
Among independents, who often play a role in deciding elections, 51
percent assign Obama a great deal or a moderate amount of blame, while 47
percent say he deserves not much or no blame at all. Meanwhile, 67 percent
of independents say Bush bears a great deal or a moderate amount of the
fault. Only 32 percent exonerate him in whole or in part.
After the speech, Obama headed to New York to make a Flag Day pilgrimage
to ground zero and attend a pair of fundraisers aimed at scooping up $4.5
million for his campaign. One of the events will be hosted by actress Sarah
Jessica Parker and Vogue editor Anna Wintour. Fifty guests there are due to
pay $40,000 each.
"Running for president is an expensive proposition," White House press
secretary Jay Carney told reporters aboard Air Force One.
LIST OF OBAMA LIES 2012 - UPDATED - OBAMA
LAUNDRY LIST OF LIES
Source:NationalReview
SO IT BEGINS: OBAMA LIES, CLAIMS ROMNEY-RYAN WILL RAISE YOUR
TAXES
Source: Breitbart.com,
August 12, 2012
Barack Obama has been proven by more than one fact checking
organization to be a habitual liar.
“I am told that Governor Romney’s new running mate, Paul Ryan,
might be around Iowa the next few days,” he said while in Council Bluffs,
Iowa. “He is one of the leaders of Congress standing in the way. So if you
happen to see Congressman Ryan, tell him how important this farm bill is to
Iowa and our rural communities.”
House passed bill on August 2, 2012 (Paul Ryan voted yes)
The American automobile industry has come roaring back…So now I
want to say what we did with the auto industry, we can do it in
manufacturing across America. Let’s make sure advanced, high-tech
manufacturing jobs take root here, not in China. And that means supporting
investment here. Governor Romney … invested in companies that were called
‘pioneers’ of outsourcing. I don’t want to outsource. I want to insource.
Forbes- Outsourcer-In-Chief: Obama Of General Motors
“You Didn’t Build that”
A few examples
While writing the previous
piece where Washington Post’s The
Fact Checker gave Barack Obama four Pinocchios on a statement
he made on April 30, 2012, I clicked over to PolitiFact and took a look at
the Obama File they keep where they have three pages of statements made by
Barack Obama that were rated false
statements.
Obama- If
the Supreme Court throws out the federal health care law, it “would be an
unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a
strong majority of a democratically elected Congress.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact- Slim majority, not unprecedented)
Obama- “For the first time since 1990,
American manufacturers are creating new jobs.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
Obama- “Preventive care … saves money,
for families, for businesses, for government, for everybody.”
Truth-O-Meter
rating: False
(PolitiFact- Wrong in 2009, and wrong today)
Obama- “Thirty million Americans,
including a lot of people in Florida, are going to be able to get healthcare
next year because of that law.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
Obama- “I made a bunch of these promises
during the campaign. … We’ve got about 60 percent done in three years.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact- “In the Works” does not equal “done”)
Obama Admin.- Under President Barack
Obama, the United States has “doubled our exports.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
Obama Admin.- The president’s proposed
budget “will help reduce the deficit by $400 billion over the next decade to
the lowest level since Dwight Eisenhower was president.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-A mangled reference to a prior talking point)
Obama- Under the White House’s budget
proposal, “we will not be adding more to the national debt” by the middle of
the decade.
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-Revenue would equal outlays, but he ignores growing
interest on the debt)
Obama- Twelve judges have thrown out
legal challenges to the health care law because they rejected “the notion
that the health care law was unconstitutional.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-Score two to two on judges’ decisions on constitionality)
Obama- “I didn’t raise taxes once.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-We’ve tracked a few increases)
Obama- When President Franklin D.
Roosevelt started Social Security, “it only affected widows and orphans,”
and when Medicare began, “it was a small program.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-A grain of truth in the big picture, far off on the
details)
Obama- The Bush administration had been
“giving (auto companies) billions of dollars and just asking nothing in
return.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
Obama- “The vast majority of the money I
got was from small donors all across the country.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-Big donors bankrolled much of Obama’s campaign)
Obama- “We’ve excluded lobbyists
from policymaking jobs.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-We found at least four)
Obama- When Obama was interviewed by
American reporters in Asia, “Not one of them asked me about Asia. Not one of
them asked me about the economy.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-More than one did)
Obama- Insurers delayed an Illinois man’s
treatment, “and he died because of it.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(Insurer’s decision was reversed and man lived three more years)
Obama- Health reform will “give every
American the same opportunity” to buy health insurance the way members of
Congress do.
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
Obama- Preventive care “saves money.”
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
(PolitiFact-Covering preventive care for everyone is a net cost)
Obama- (No earmarks in spending bill)
Truth-O-Meter rating: False
That was only from page one of Obama’s false statement
PolitiFact files.
(Note- Skipped one from page one because
while PolitiFact rated it as false it was because Obama misspoke and quoted
the wrong time frame, so I don’t count that as an outright lie to the
American people, just sloppy.)
Page two is here and page
three is here.
Noteworthy- Those three pages do not include the five
instances where Obama was ruled worse than “false” but were called
“pants on fire” false.
The another
three pages of statements that are listed as “mostly false” on the
Truth-O-Meter.
Mostly false statements by Obama or his administration- Page
one here, page
two here and page
three here.
All those listed above are from one fact checking organization,
PolitiFact, which leaves one to wonder how many lies Obama has told in total
since organizations often fact check different statements.
Barack Obama has been proven by more than one fact checking
organization to be a habitual liar.
Lies During Third Year
I will walk on that picket line with you, if workers are denied
the right to bargain.
Youtube
In his 2012 State of the Union Address, President Obama said that
American oil production is the highest that it’s been in eight years.
www.breitbart.com
I’ve done more for Israel’s security than any President ever
Obama aided Islamic Extremists take over of Egypt/ Libya – Weapons
pour into Gaza
Virtually every Senate Republican voted against the tax cut last
week
Examiner
“Every idea that we’ve put forward are ones that traditionally
have been supported by Democrats and Republicans alike.”
Like Raising taxes?
Obama met highly qualified out of work teacher Robert Baroz
He wasn’t out of work and Obama never met him.
GOP Responsible for Obama Jobs Bill Not Passing
Dems Rejected Jobs Bill
You have 80 percent of the American people who support a balanced
approach. Eighty percent of the American people support an approach that
includes revenues and includes cuts. So the notion that somehow the American
people aren’t sold is not the problem
Gallup Poll: Only 69%
These are obligations that the United States has taken on in the
past. Congress has run up the credit card, and we now have an obligation to
pay our bills.
Looks like it’s been incurred mostly in the years of Obama
Jobs Bill Paid for
Seems not so much Paid for
Then you’ve got their(GOP)which is dirtier air, dirtier water,
less people with health insurance
Barack Obama, campaiging in Asheville, NC, 10/17/11
I cannot guarantee that those checks go out on August 3rd if we
haven’t resolved this issue. Because there may simply not be the money in
the coffers to do it.
American.com
USA producing more oil than ever before
Petroleum Insights
Fence between US and Mexico is “Practically Complete”
Department of Homeland Security says 5%
Rich doesn’t pay their fair share.
National Taxpayers Union
Mitt Romney would deny gay people the right to adopt children.
Cnn Interview
Lies During Second Year
Obama claimed the SCOTUS decision in Citizens United v. FEC,
“open[ed] the floodgates for special interests — including foreign
corporations — to spend without limit in our elections.
nationalreview.com
No signing statements to nullify or undermine congressional
instructions as enacted into law
Obama Lies to Keep Czars
No “boots” on the ground Libya
Anyone that has worked with the AC-130 gunship can tell you, you need
spotters to let aircraft know where the targets are. Usually it is Special
Forces, Rangers etc trained for this mission. It’s CIA
Agents in Libya on the ground
Reform will also rein in the abuse and excess that nearly brought
down our financial system. It will finally bring transparency to the kinds
of complex, risky transactions that helped trigger the financial crisis.
Obama Lies About Financial Reform Bill
All Americans WILL BE were, “surprised, disappointed and angry”
about lockerbie bomber
Obama Memo
I will not rest until the BP Oil Spill stops
Obama’s Schedule
The health care bill will not increase the deficit by one dime.
Campaign and Presidency
If you like the health care plan you have you can keep it
TownHall
“Under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund
abortions, and federal conscience laws will remain in place.”
U.S. Capitol, Washington, D.C., September 9, 2009.
ObamaCare Fee is not a new tax
Obama denies healthcare is a new tax on all Americans
We have run out of places in the US to drill for oil.
Obama’s oval office speech in June 2010
Now suddenly if you don’t have your papers and you took your kid
out to get ice cream, you can be harassed, that’s something that could
potentially happen.
Arizona Immigration Law
Doctors choose amputation because they get better compensation.
Greedy Doctors taking out tonsils for more money.
Claims never documented
The Health Care Package will pay for itself
Time
Republicans don’t have a single idea that’s different from George
Bush’s ideas — not one.
Hmm Immigration?
We shouldn’t Mandate the purchase of health care
Democratic Debate Lies
Obama says he’ll save average family $8,000 in gas
Video Proof
I am immediately instituting PayGo “Pay as you go”
Said during a speech immediately after the Trillion Dollar “Shovel Ready”
bill.
I got the Message from Massachusetts
Daily Bail
Lies During First Year
We began by passing a Recovery Act that has already saved or
created over 150,000 jobs.” – caught cooking the books and now changed to
‘jobs supported’ versus ‘created/saved’
AP fact Checker
Number one, we inherited a $1.3 trillion deficit. … That wasn’t
me.” – Congress, under Democratic control in 2007 and 2008, controlled the
purse strings that led to the deficit Obama inherited.Obama supported the
emergency bailout package in Bush’s final months — a package Democratic
leaders wanted to make bigger.
AP fact Checker
Collective salvation
Obama calls himself a Christian
I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute
the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my
ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.
Obama Inauguration. 20 Jan 2009
Cut Deficit in Half by end of first term
Associated Press Video
Health Care deals will be covered on C-span
Obama Lies
As President I will recognize the Armenian Genocide
ABC
Recovery Act will save or create jobs
ABC News
Unemployment rate will be 8.5% without stimulus.
Obama Lies
No Earmarks in the $787 Billion Stimulus
CNN
I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health
care plan
Specator.Org
We have launched a housing plan that will help responsible
families facing the threat of foreclosure lower their monthly payments and
refinance their mortgages.
Obama Lies
I am not somebody who promotes same-sex marriage.
NPR
Guantanamo bay to be closed within a year
Council on Foreign Relations.
Won’t Raise taxes on those making less than 250,000 per year.
Businessweek: Obama Agnostic on taxes
List of Tax Promise Violations
2008 Campaign Lies
I will walk the picket line with you, if workers are denied the
right to bargain
Youtube
No more wiretapping of citizens
Youtube
Mr. Ayers as “a guy who lives in my neighborhood,” but “not
somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis.
News Busters
I had a uncle who was one of the, who was part of the first
American troops to go into Auschwitz and liberate the concentration camps
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Obama campaign would accept public funding
ABC
Minimum Wage will increase to $9.50/hr
A Socialist
Ann Dunham spent the months before her death in 1995 fighting
with insurance companies that sought to deny her the coverage she needed to
pay for treatment.
Mounting Heath Care Lies
Didn’t know Jeremiah Wright was Radical
Dreams of My Father – A radical Socialist.
Would have the most transparent administration in History
Cato Institute
We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by
line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we
do operate in a sensible cost-effective way.
Boston Globe
I have visited all 57 states.
Snopes
I’ll get rid of earmarks
Source: Any bill passed during presidency
When a bill lands on my Desk, The American people will have 5
days to review it before I sign it.
Campaign Speech
My father served in World War II.
The Videos and the Facts
Have troops out of Iraq by March 31, 2009
News Video
Seniors Making less than 50,000 will not have to pay taxes
YouTube
Would not vote for any bill supporting troop funding without a
firm withdrawal commitment from the Bush Administration.
He has done nothing but continue the Bush admins strategy and to explain how
the “surges total failure” has now become his greatest achievement.
Present Votes Are Common In Illinois
NPR
I Won Michigan
Huffington Post
I won Nevada
The Nation
I don’t Have Lobbyists
US News
My Campaign Had Nothing To Do With The 1984 Ad
Crooks and Liars
I Have Always Been Against Iraq
Washington Post
My Wife Didn’t Mean What She Said About Pride In Country
CNN
Barack was never an ACORN trainer and never worked for ACORN in
any other capacity.
Obama Campaign Video
I Barely Know Rezko
Sun Times
My Church Is Like Any Other Christian Church
ABC News
|
year
|
event
|
| 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.”
|
| 2004 |
On July 28th, 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?
|
| 2006 |
On the January 22nd edition of “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.”
|
| 2007 |
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.”
|
| 2007 |
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.”
|
| 2007 |
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.
|
| 2007 |
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.”
|
| 2007 |
On March 27th, 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.
|
| 2007 |
On May 8th, 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.
|
| 2007 |
On May 10th, 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.
|
| 2007 |
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.
|
| 2007 |
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?
|
| 2007 |
On
October 6th, 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.
|
| 2007 |
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.
|
| 2007 |
On the 1st of December,
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.
|
| 2007 |
On
December 22nd, 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.”This is Obama’s biggest problem —
his dissimulation.Saying, “I’ve always been a Christian,” is a
bold-faced lie.
|
| 2008 |
On
January 22nd, 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.
|
| 2008 |
On February 29th, 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.
|
| 2008 |
On March 2nd, 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.”
|
| 2008 |
March 7th — 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.
|
| 2008 |
March 7th — 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.
|
| 2008 |
March 14th — 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.
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!
|
| 2008 |
March 14th — 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.
|
| 2008 |
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?
|
| 2008 |
On Friday, the 14th, 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 wordsYet, 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 before I get feedback from the
loony libs, remember, it was Obama, himself, that wrote these words
in “‘Dreams of My Father,” — “I found solace in nursing a pervasive
sense of grievance and animosity against my mother’s race.”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.
|
| 2008 |
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.
|
| 2008 |
March 15th — 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.
|
http://www.freedomsenemies.com/_Obama/ObamaLies.htm
OBAMA LAUNDRY LIST OF LIES as of April 16,
2008 (76 lies and counting)
76) “I am the only candidate who isn’t taking a dime from
Washington lobbyist” - LIAR-
The record shows quite the opposite. According to USA Today, Obama’s
campaign fundraising team includes 38 members of law firms that were paid
$138 million last year to lobby the federal government, records show. Those
lawyers, including 10 former federal lobbyists, have pledged to raise at
least $3.5 million for the Illinois senator’s presidential race. Employees
of their firms have given Obama’s campaign $2.26 million, a USA TODAY
analysis of campaign finance data shows.
Source:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-04-15-obama_N.htm
75) “I did not take money from oil companies” -LIAR- It
is against the law to take money from oil companies. None of your opponents
take money from oil companies either. 74)
“I did not recall meeting Nadhmi Auchi at any time or on any
occasion” - LIAR -
But a government witness said on Monday, during Antoin Rezko’s
corruption trial, that he recalled seeing Sen. Barack Obama at a party that
Rezko held in 2004 to honor Nadhmi Auchi, an Iraqi-born tycoon.
Two
other guests at the party declared the Obamas were present at the event,
which took place one week before Obama won his U.S. Senate seat.
Source:
http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/rezko/894559,CST-NWS-rezko15.article
according to the Chicago
Tribune.
73) Here is what Obama now said he meant about comment
he made about Small town PA - “So I said, ‘Well, you know, when you’re
bitter you turn to what you can count on,’ ” he continued. “So people they
vote about guns, or they take comfort from their faith and their family and
their community. And they get mad about illegal immigrants who are coming
over to this country or they get frustrated about, you know, how things are
changing. That’s a natural response.” - LIAR
- See what Obama really meant in red. It does not take high
school student to understand what Obama meant - “You go into these small
towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the
jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them…And they
fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and
each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are
gonna regenerate and they have not. And it’s not surprising then they
get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or
antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or
anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
72) Obama on Guns - when Obama ran for the Illinois state senate
the political group, Independent Voters of Illinois (IVI), asked him if he
supported a “ban [on] the manufacture, sale and possession of handguns” and
he responded “yes.” - LIAR-
But in what will probably be the most improbable change, the Politico
reported on Saturday that Barack Obama was making a big play for gun votes
in Pennsylvania. In 1998, another questionnaire administered by IL
State Legislative National Political Awareness Test didn’t ask about banning
all handguns, but it did find that Obama wanted to “ban the sale or transfer
of all forms of semi-automatic weapons.” Source:
Fox News and Politico.com
71) Obama distort (aka “Lie”) about McCain saying, “McCain (he)
is willing to send our troops too another war of 100 years in Iraq”.
Obama also denied what he said on the video -
LIAR - The video proves him absolutely untruthful (”a
liar”).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-cXV4Z2Hrg
70) I did not campaign in Florida, (so Florida vote
shouldn’t count) - LIAR
-According to Boston Globe, HeraldTribune and other sites,
Obama airs “ads” on Cable stations in Florida. Even with the Florida
cable ads, Obama still lost.
See the Video here
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2008/01/obama_airs_nati.html
69) “I stopped smoking. I stopped smoking. I haven’t had a
cigarette since I quit - LIAR
- But in his own words, here is what Obama said.
Except….last night on MSNBC’s Hardball, Obama admitted that his
attempt to wean himself from the vile tobacco weed had not been entirely
successful. I fell off the wagon a couple times during the course of it, and
then was able to get back on,” he said. “But it is a struggle like
everything else.” Source ABC News:
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/04/obama-is-smokin.html
68) Look at my education record in Illinois -
LIAR - In reality, Obama never
really championed the local councils. He supported them behind the scenes
and only eventually came out publicly on their behalf. When he did weigh in,
he came down on the wrong side of the debate—against protecting principals
from unwarranted dismissals and in favor of keeping councils independent, no
matter what. In the end, the resolution of the conflict between the two
sides didn’t alleviate anyone’s concerns. Instead, it prolonged a turf
battle that seems to have dragged down academic progress in the years since.
Read more here
http://www.slate.com/id/2188010?wpisrc=newsletter Source:
slate.com
Source: ABC News:
Buried
in Eloquence, Obama Contradictions About Pastor
67) “I don’t think my church is actually particularly controversial,”
Obama said at a community meeting in Nelsonville, Ohio, earlier this month.
- LIAR - But yesterday, he
told a different story. “Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be
considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes,” he said in his speech
yesterday in Philadelphia.
66) I did not take money from oil companies: -
LIAR - [03/31/2008] 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. Source:
Associated press via Yahoo News
65) I did NOT play the race card: -
LIAR - [03/31/2008] Obama was the first to play the race
card. According to Phialdelphia Inquirer, Quietly, the storm over the
hateful views expressed by Sen. Barack Obama’s pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah
Wright, has blown away the most insidious myth of the Democratic primary
campaign. Obama and his surrogates have charged that Sen. Hillary Rodham
Clinton has deliberately and cleverly played the race card in order to label
Obama the “black” candidate.
Read more here
64) I played greater role in crafting liberal stands on gun control, the
death penalty and abortion - LIAR
- [03/31/2008] It was found that Obama — the day after sitting for
the interview — filed an
amended version of the questionnaire, which appears to contain Obama’s
own handwritten notes added to one answer. Read
Obama had
greater role on liberal survey
63.) I have the best plan to cure the Mortgage Crisis - LIAR.
[03/30/2008] You and your campaign buddy Penny SubPrime Bank Collapse
Prizker have had your little fingers full of subprime cash - Obama has taken
$1,180,103 from the top issuers of subprime loans: Obama received $266,907
from Lehman, $5395 from GMAC, $150,850 from Credit Suisse First Boston,
$11,250 from Countrywide, $9052 from Washington Mutual, $161,850 from
Citigroup, $4600 from CBASS, $170,050 from Morgan Stanley, $1150 from
Centex, and last but certainly NOT LEAST - Obama received $351,900 from
Goldman Sachs. I am sure that cash all came from folks who knew the subprime
loan they had was a dream, eh?
Scroll down for more 1 - 62 (We are
working on updating the source of the stories)
1.) Selma Got Me Born - LIAR,
your parents felt safe enough to have you in 1961 - Selma had no effect on
your birth, as Selma was in 1965. Source:
hotair.com
2.) Father Was A Goat Herder - LIAR,
he was a privileged, well educated youth, who went on to work with the
Kenyan Government. Source:
http://www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message504435/pg1
3.) Father Was A Proud Freedom Fighter - LIAR, he was part of one of the
most corrupt and violent governments Kenya has ever had
Source:http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2008/01/obamas-oginga-o.html
4.) My Family Has Strong Ties To African Freedom - LIAR, your
cousin Raila Odinga has created mass violence in attempting to overturn a
legitimate election in 2007, in Kenya. It is the first widespread violence
in decades. Source:http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2008/01/obamas-oginga-o.html
5.) My Grandmother Has Always Been A Christian -
LIAR, she does her daily Salat prayers
at 5am according to her own interviews. Not to mention, Christianity
wouldn’t allow her to have been one of 14 wives to 1 man. Source:
According to NYTimes story of April of last year,
Sarah Hussein Obama
told the New York Times she is a devout Muslim.
6.) My Name is African Swahili - LIAR, your name is Arabic and ‘Baraka’
(from which Barack came) means ‘blessed’ in that language. Hussein is also
Arabic and so is Obama.
7.) I Never Practiced Islam - LIAR, you practiced it daily at school,
where you were registered as a Muslim and kept that faith for 31 years,until
your wife made you change, so you could run for office.
8.) My School In Indonesia Was Christian - LIAR, you were registered as
Muslim there and got in trouble in Koranic Studies for making faces (check
your own book).
9.) I Was Fluent In Indonesian - LIAR, not one teacher says you could
speak the language.
10.) Because I Lived In Indonesia, I Have More Foreign Experience - LIAR,
you were there from the ages of 6 to 10, and couldn’t even speak the
language. What did you learn, how to study the Koran and watch cartoons.
11.) I Am Stronger On Foreign Affairs - LIAR, except for Africa
(surprise) and the Middle East (bigger surprise), you have never been
anywhere else on the planet and thus have NO experience with our closest
allies.
12.) I Blame My Early Drug Use On Ethnic Confusion - LIAR, you were quite
content in high school to be Barry Obama, no mention of Kenya and no mention
of struggle to identify - your classmates said you were just fine.
13.)An Ebony Article Moved Me To Run For Office - LIAR, Ebony has yet to
find the article you mention in your book. It doesn’t, and never did, exist.
14.) A Life Magazine Article Changed My Outlook On Life - LIAR,
Life has yet to find the article you mention in your book. It doesn’t, and
never did, exist.
15.) I Won’t Run On A National Ticket In ‘08 - LIAR, here you are,
despite saying, live on TV, that you would not have enough experience by
then, and you are all about having experience first.
16.) Present Votes Are Common In Illinois - LIAR, they are common for
YOU, but not many others have 130 NO VOTES.
17.) Oops, I Misvoted - LIAR, only when caught by church groups and
democrats, did you beg to change your misvote.
18.) I Was A Professor Of Law - LIAR, you were a senior lecturer ON
LEAVE.
19.) I Was A Constitutional Lawyer - LIAR, you were a senior lecturer ON
LEAVE.
20.) Without Me, There Would Be No Ethics Bill - LIAR, you didn’t
write it,introduce it, change it, or create it. <!–noadsense–>
21.) The Ethics Bill Was Hard To Pass - LIAR, it took just 14 days from
start to finish.
22.) I Wrote A Tough Nuclear Bill - LIAR, your bill was rejected by your
own party for its pandering and lack of all regulation - mainly because of
your Nuclear Donor, Exelon, from which David Axelrod came.
23.) I Have Released My State Records - LIAR, as of March, 2008, state
bills you sponsored or voted for have yet to be released, exposing all the
special interests pork hidden within.
24.) I Took On The Asbestos Altgeld Gardens Mess - LIAR, you were part of
a large group of people who remedied Altgeld Gardens. You failed to mention
anyone else but yourself, in your books.
25.) My Economics Bill Will Help America - LIAR, your 111 economic
policies were just combined into a proposal which lost 99-0, and even YOU
voted against your own bill
26.) I Have Been A Bold Leader In Illinois - LIAR, even your own
supporters claim to have not seen BOLD action on your part. 27.) I Passed 26
Of My Own Bills In One Year - LIAR, they were not YOUR bills, but rather
handed to you, after their creation by a fellow Senator, to assist you in a
future bid for higher office.
28.) No One Contacted Canada About NAFTA - LIAR, the Candian
Government issued the names and a memo of the conversation your campaign had
with them.
29.) I Am Tough On Terrorism - LIAR, you missed the Iran Resolution vote
on terrorism and your good friend Ali Abunimah supports the destruction of
Israel.
30.) I Am Not Acting As President Yet - LIAR, after the NAFTA Memo, a
dead terrorist in the FARC, in Colombia, was found with a letter stating how
you and he were working together on getting FARC recognized officially.
31.) I Didn’t Run Ads In Florida - LIAR, you allowed national ads to run
8-12 times per day for two weeks - and you still lost.
32.) I Won Michigan - LIAR, no you didn’t.
33.) I won Nevada - LIAR, no you did not.
34.) I Want All Votes To Count - LIAR, you said let the delegates decide.
35.) I Want Americans To Decide - LIAR, you prefer caucuses that limit
the vote, confuse the voters, force a public vote, and only operate during
small windows of time.
36.) I passed 900 Bills in the State Senate - LIAR, you passed 26, most
of which you didn’t write yourself.
37.) My Campaign Was Extorted By A Friend - LIAR, that friend is
threatening to sue if you do not stop saying this. Obama has stopped saying
this.
38.) I Believe In Fairness, Not Tactics - LIAR, you used tactics to
eliminate Alice Palmer from running against you.
39.) I Don’t Take PAC Money - LIAR, you take loads of it.
40.) I don’t Have Lobbysists - LIAR, you have over 47 lobbyists, and
counting.
41.) My Campaign Had Nothing To Do With The 1984 Ad - LIAR, your
own campaign worker made the ad on his Apple in one afternoon.
42.) My Campaign Never Took Over MySpace - LIAR, Tom, who started
MySpace issued a warning about this advertising to MySpace clients.
43.) I Inspire People With My Words - LIAR, you inspire people with other
people’s words.
44.) I Have Passed Bills In The U.S. Senate - LIAR, you have passed A
BILL in the U.S. Senate - for Africa, which shows YOUR priorities.
45.) I Have Always Been Against Iraq - LIAR, you weren’t in office
to vote against it AND you have voted to fund it every single time, unlike
Kucinich, who seems to be out gutting you Obama. You also seem to be
stepping back from your departure date - AGAIN.
46.) I Have Always Supported Universal Health Care - LIAR, your plan
leaves us all to pay the 15,000,000 who don’t have to buy it.
47.) I Only Found Out About My Investment Conflicts Via Mail - LIAR, both
companies you site as having sent you letters about this conflict have no
record of any such letter ever being created or sent.
48.) I Am As Patriotic As Anyone - LIAR, you won’t wear a flag pin and
you don’t put your hand over your heart during the Anthem.
49.) My Wife Didn’t Mean What She Said About Pride In Country - LIAR,
your wife’s words follow lock-step in the vein of Wright and Farrahkan, in
relation to their contempt and hatred of America.
50.) Wal-Mart Is A Company I Wouldn’t Support - LIAR, your wife has
received nearly a quater of a million dollars through Treehouse, which is
connected to Wal-Mart.
51.) Treehouse Is A Small Company - LIAR, the CEO of Treehouse last year,
made more than the CEO of Wal-Mart, according to public records.
52.) University Of Chicago Hospital Pay Is Fair - LIAR, your wife’s pay
raise was nearly 150% her already bloated rate and the hospital is a
Non-Profit Hospital, which made $100,000,000 in the last 3 years. They
overcharge blacks VS whites for services, and overcharge everyone in general
by 538%!
53.)I Barely Know Rezko - Only 5 Billed Hours - LIAR, you have known him
for 17 years, and decided to do a real estate deal with him during a time
when he was proven to be under investigation. Despite this, you divided your
property and had them take off $300K before the mortgage problems started.
Then Rezko’s wife buys the lot beside it that you can’t afford, saving you
$625,000.
54.) My Donations Have Been Checked Thoroughly - LIAR, you only gave back
Hsu ($72K) and Rezko (first $66K, then when caught lying $86K, then when
caught lying again $150K and now caught lying YET AGAIN OBAMA, it’s $250k)
their money when publically called on their involvement in your campaigns.
55.) My Church Is Like Any Other Christian Church - LIAR, your church is
so extreme, the pastor who married you, Rev. Wright, just got done blaming
the US for 9/11 and named Louis Farrahkan their person of the year.
56.) I Disagree With My Church All The Time - LIAR, you still have yet to
repudiate Wright, who married you and your wife, and you still donate large
sums of money to assist the church in furthering its message - hatred and
revenge. You donated in 2006 alone, $22,500 to the church that you so
terribly disagree with. That is nearly $500 PER WEEK - that sure is
disagreement, Senator Obama.
57.) I Have Clean Connections Despite Rezko - LIAR, you are not only
connected to Exelon and Rezko, you are also connected to Hillary PAC
supporter Mr. Hsu, AND an Iraqi Billionaire of ill repute, Nadhmi Auchi, who
ripped off people in the Food For Oil, Iraqi deal. Seems Mr. Auchi may have
helped Obama buy his million dollar property long before Obama had millions
of dollars. Wonder what favors Mr. Auchi expects, when Obama leaves Iraq
free to be taken over by special interests such as him.
58.) I never heard sermons like Rev. Wright’s, that have been in videos
all day, You Tube - LIAR! 3 days later during your Mea Culpa BS speech you
said “Did I hear controversial statements while I sat in that church? Yes I
did.”
59.) The Passport Invasion is a conspiracy to find dirt on me! - LIAR.
Your own Campaign Foreign Policy Advisor is the CEO of the company that
looked into your records. PS - You had them look into yours to hide the fact
you looked into Clinton’s and McCain’s more than a year before!
60.) Rev. Meeks has nothing to do with my campaigning - LIAR. Rev. Meeks
appeared in ads for your Senate Campaign, donated to you, and helped raise
money, then AND NOW. PS - He also seems to despise America.
61.) My wife didn’t mean America is ignorant, she was just using a phrase
- LIAR. Again, MicHELLe’s comments perfectly sync with Wright’s, Meeks’, and
Farrakhans, both in language, anger, and direction.
62.) I am very Anti-Terror - LIAR. [03/30/2008] One of your good pals is
long time radical and terrorist William Ayers, with whom you have been seen
in the last 12 months and who has helped the now jailed khalidi, Professor
at Columbia who invited Ahmadinejad to the University, to raise money for
Palestinian terrorism attacks against Israel.
PS - Your church published a pro Hamas Manifesto - guess you weren’t
there on THAT Sunday either? How lucky for you.
This is the LAUNDRY LIST OF LIES. Updated to reflect new
dishonesties.
FROM:
http://www.audacityofhypocrisy.com/fashion-shows/
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