via Brave New Films:
If this is any preview of what’s going to happen in the general election… It’s going to be tough of the G.O.P. and McCain.
Others: MyDD, Booman Tribune, The Real McCain, Daily Kos, Balloon Juice, Group News Blog and Attackerman
This is too damn funny….
The Article: White House takes swipe at NBC News (Via The Hill)
Steve Capus
President, NBC News
30 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, N.Y. 10112Mr. Capus:
This e-mail is to formally request that NBC Nightly News and The Today Show air for their viewers President Bush’s actual answer to correspondent Richard Engel’s question about Iran policy and "appeasement," rather than the deceptively edited version of the President’s answer that was aired last night on the Nightly News and this morning on The Today Show.
In the interview, Engel asked the President: "You said that negotiating with Iran is pointless, and then you went further. You said that it was appeasement. Were you referring to Senator Barack Obama?"The President responded: "You know, my policies haven’t changed, but evidently the political calendar has. People need to read the speech. You didn’t get it exactly right, either. What I said was is that we need to take the words of people seriously. And when, you know, a leader of Iran says that they want to destroy Israel, you’ve got to take those words seriously. And if you don’t take them seriously, then it harkens back to a day when we didn’t take other words seriously. It was fitting that I talked about not taking the words of Adolf Hitler seriously on the floor of the Knesset. But I also talked about the need to defend Israel, the need to not negotiate with the likes of al Qaeda, Hezbollah and Hamas. And the need to make sure Iran doesn’t get a nuclear weapon."
This answer makes clear: (1). The President’s remarks before the Knesset were not different from past policy statements, but are now being looked at through a political prism, (2). Corrects the inaccurate premise of Engel’s question by putting the "appeasement" line in the proper context of taking the words of leaders seriously, not "negotiating with Iran," (3). Restates the U.S.’s long-standing policy positions against negotiating with al Qaeda, Hezbollah and Hamas, and not allowing Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon.
Engel’s immediate follow-up question was, "Repeatedly you’ve talked about Iran and that you don’t want to see Iran develop a nuclear weapon. How far away do you think Iran is from developing a nuclear capability?"
The President replied, "You know, Richard, I don’t want to speculate – and there’s a lot of speculation. But one thing is for certain – we need to prevent them from learning how to enrich uranium. And I have made it clear to the Iranians that there is a seat at the table for them if they would verifiably suspend their enrichment. And if not, we’ll continue to rally the world to isolate them."
This response reiterates another long-standing policy, which is that if Iran verifiably suspends its uranium enrichment program the U.S. government would engage in talks with the Iranian government.
NBC’s selective editing of the President’s response is clearly intended to give viewers the impression that he agreed with Engel’s characterization of his remarks when he explicitly challenged it. Furthermore, it omitted the references to al Qaeda, Hezbollah and Hamas and ignored the clarifying point in the President’s follow-up response that U.S. policy is to require Iran to suspend its nuclear enrichment program before coming to the table, not that "negotiating with Iran is pointless" and amounts to "appeasement."
This deceitful editing to further a media-manufactured storyline is utterly misleading and irresponsible and I hereby request in the interest of fairness and accuracy that the network air the President’s responses to both initial questions in full on the two programs that used the excerpts.
As long as I am making this formal request, please allow me to take this opportunity to ask if your network has reconsidered its position that Iraq is in the midst of a civil war, especially in light of the fact that the unity government in Baghdad recently rooted out illegal, extremist groups in Basra and reclaimed the port there for the people of Iraq, among other significant signs of progress.On November 27, 2006, NBC News made a decision to no longer just cover the news in Iraq, but to make an analytical and editorial judgment that Iraq was in a civil war. As you know, both the United States government and the Government of Iraq disputed your account at that time. As Matt Lauer said that morning on The Today Show: "We should mention, we didn’t just wake up on a Monday morning and say, ‘Let’s call this a civil war.’ This took careful deliberation.’"
I noticed that around September of 2007, your network quietly stopped referring to conditions in Iraq as a "civil war." Is it still NBC News’s carefully deliberated opinion that Iraq is in the midst of a civil war? If not, will the network publicly declare that the civil war has ended, or that it was wrong to declare it in the first place?
Lastly, when the Commerce Department on April 30 released the GDP numbers for the first quarter of 2007, Brian Williams reported it this way: "If you go by the government number, the figure that came out today stops just short of the official declaration of a recession."
The GDP estimate was a positive 0.6% for the first quarter. Slow growth, but growth nonetheless. This followed a slow but growing fourth quarter in 2007. Consequently, even if the first quarter GDP estimate had been negative, it still would not have signaled a recession – neither by the unofficial rule-of-thumb of two consecutive quarters of negative growth, nor the more robust definition by the National Bureau of Economic Research (the group that officially marks the beginnings and ends of business cycles).
Furthermore, never in our nation’s history have we characterized economic conditions as a "recession" with unemployment so low – in fact, when this rate of unemployment was eventually reached in the 1990s, it was hailed as the sign of a strong economy. This rate of unemployment is lower than the average of the past three decades.
Are there numbers besides the "government number" to go by? Is there reason to believe "the government number" is suspect? How does the release of positive economic growth for two consecutive quarters, albeit limited, stop "just short of the official declaration of a recession"?
Mr. Capus, I’m sure you don’t want people to conclude that there is really no distinction between the "news" as reported on NBC and the "opinion" as reported on MSNBC, despite the increasing blurring of those lines. I welcome your response to this letter, and hope it is one that reassures your broadcast network’s viewers that blatantly partisan talk show hosts like Christopher Matthews and Keith Olbermann at MSNBC don’t hold editorial sway over the NBC network news division.
Sincerely,
Ed Gillespie
Counselor to the President
So, they cannot control the media, like they do over at Fox News and so, they write NBC whining about it. 
How immature, stupid, and terribly lame, can you be? 
November cannot come fast enough.
Others agree: JustOneMinute, Marc Ambinder, The Hill’s Blog Briefing Room and Gawker
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
The Article: Obama Warns GOP ‘Lay Off My Wife’ (Via ABCNEWS)
The Republicans seem to have come to the same conclusion and a GOP Internet campaign in Tennessee has an ad featuring Michelle Obama’s comments during the long Democratic campaign that "for the first time in my adult life, I am proud of my country."
Michelle Obama was asked about the ad on "GMA," but her husband said, "Let me just interject on this."
"The GOP, should I be the nominee, I think can say whatever they want to say about me, my track record," Obama said. "I’ve been in public life for 20 years. I expect them to pore through everything that I’ve said, every utterance, every statement. And to paint it in the most undesirable light possible. That’s what they do."
"But I do want to say this to the GOP. If they think that they’re going to try to make Michelle an issue in this campaign, they should be careful. Because that I find unacceptable," he said.
Obama praised his wife’s patriotism and said that for Republicans "to try to distort or to play snippets of her remarks in ways that are unflattering to her I think is just low class … and especially for people who purport to be promoters of family values, who claim that they are protectors of the values and ideals and the decency of the American people to start attacking my wife in a political campaign I think is detestable."
Here’s a wake up call for you, Barry.
You don’t like your BITCH being talked about, then keep your damn BITCH at home! 
When are people going to wake up and see what this Marxist tool for what he really is?
Seen over at Commentary Magazine online:
Is this man Serious? I mean Seriously….
My Reply…:
Like I said, It is to wonder…
Others agree: Click Here
Welcome to your new America.
Sometime in the next few years, if a memorandum signed by President Bush this month ever goes into effect, one government official talking to another about information on terrorists will have to begin by saying: "What I am about to tell you is controlled unclassified information enhanced with specified dissemination."
That would mean, according to the memo, that the information requires safeguarding because "the inadvertent or unauthorized disclosure would create risk of substantial harm."
Bush’s memorandum, signed on the eve of his daughter Jenna’s wedding, introduced "Controlled Unclassified Information" as a new government category that will replace "Sensitive but Unclassified."
Such information — though it does not merit the well-known national security classifications "confidential," "secret" or "top secret" — is nonetheless "pertinent" to U.S. "national interests" or to "important interests of entities outside the federal government," the memo says.
Hmmmm.. Whatever happened to open and transparent Government? 
If the United States wants to win the War in Iraq, this is NOT the way to do it.
The Story: U.S. General Apologizes for Desecration of Koran (Via New York Times)
BAGHDAD — The commander of United States troops in Baghdad asked local leaders and tribal sheiks this weekend for their forgiveness after the discovery that a soldier had used a Koran for target practice at a shooting range.
Responding to an episode ripe with the potential to stoke unrest, the commander, Maj. Gen. Jeffery Hammond, held a meeting Saturday with Iraqi leaders.
“I come before you here seeking your forgiveness,” General Hammond said at the meeting, in remarks carried by CNN. “In the most humble manner, I look in your eyes today and I say, please forgive me and my soldiers.”
General Hammond also read a letter of apology from the soldier, who was not identified. “I sincerely hope that my actions have not diminished the partnership that our two nations have developed together,” the general read from the letter.
Another American officer kissed a Koran and gave it to the tribal leaders, according to news agency reports.
A statement Sunday from the American military called the desecration of the Koran, in Radwaniya, just west of Baghdad, “serious and deeply troubling” and said the soldier had been disciplined and sent out of Iraq. Iraqi police officers had found the Koran on May 11 perforated with bullet holes after American forces withdrew from the area.
This is good way to inspire more terrorists. I mean, I would be willing to bet that this guy was some sort of Conservative or something. Regardless if the United States apologized or not, the damage has been done, and I look for some sort of retaliation in the future towards our troops.
The reason I say that this was not smart, is because President Bush has repeatedly said, that this war in Iraq and Afghanistan is NOT a war against Islam or Muslims, but a war against extremists who have hijacked a Religion. Now there are those that disagree with this, and I respect their position. I personally do not believe that Islam is a religion of peace, as my bookstore reflects. However, the President does have to keep the peace amongst various Religions, so, he does have to keep these people happy, especially in their homeland, and this shooting up of a copy of Koran, only undermines that. So, taking this action was quite necessary, in order to keep the peace between us and the Iraqi people.
Some say our apology was overblown, but at this point, I would be kissing some serious behind over there. I’m glad to see the US Army took action.
More reactions @ Memeorandum
I saw this Yesterday, but didn’t blog on it, because I ran out of time.
This comes via Politico:
Former Rep. Thomas G. Loeffler, a Texan who is among the McCain campaign’s most important advisers and fundraisers, has resigned as a national co-chair over lobbying entanglements, a Republican source told Politico on Sunday.
It’s at least the fifth lobbying-related departure from the campaign in a week.
The McCain campaign, already facing the prospect of being badly outgunned in the general election, now also must cope with the disruption of the lobbying shakeout.
The McCain campaign’s stringent approach to the issue is provoking a bit of grumbling from some of its Washington allies, who point out that a lobbyist’s function is enshrined in the Constitution.
“No one in real America cares,” said one key Republican. “But McCain cares.”
The senator, whose appeal to independent voters rests in part on his reformist image, recognizes that he will be held to a high standard in the coming campaign and wants to clean house before the general election formally kicks off, sources say.
The McCain campaign last week announced a restrictive “McCain Campaign Conflict Policy” that included a questionnaire to be returned to the campaign’s legal department as part of a re-vetting of all staff.
“No person working for the Campaign may be a registered lobbyist or foreign agent, or receive compensation for any such activity,” the policy says.
Officials say Loeffler’s resignation shows that McCain and his campaign is going to be serious about enforcing the policy, which was implemented following revelations about the lobbying ties of several campaign officials.
I hate to break it to John McCain, But this is nothing more than red meat for the Democrats, who will use this as a campaign strategy. I am sure that John McCain’s camp has some of their own, but it is going to be quite hard to convince people to ignore this sort of thing.
Also, the assumption that "No one in real America cares", is a real dangerous attitude to have. I believe Americans do care, not all, but a great of them do. I know I do, and I would be less inclined to vote for someone, who has had to fire staffers over lobbyist ties.
Also, John McCain is going to have quite the uphill battle, with economy like it is, fuel prices sky high, and the job market like it is. It is going to be tough for him, and I just believe people are smarter and much more well informed, then they were, say in Ronald Reagan’s era. Plus, times have changed as well. Things are much different than they were in Reagan’s era.
Hopefully McCain can shake this off, but I just don’t see it happening.
More via Memeorandum
That is, I must say, absolutely amazing.
Via MSNBC:
Per the Obama campaign, 75,000 people (60,000 in the gates and 15,000 outside of them) turned out in Portland to hear Obama speak there this afternoon — making it the largest Obama crowd to date.
Duane Bray, the battalion chief with Portland Fire and Rescue, validated that crowd estimate, the campaign says.
*** UPDATE *** Here’s the dispatch from NBC/NJ’s Athena Jones… Some 75,000 people flocked to Portland’s waterfront Sunday to watch Barack Obama speak, making it the biggest rally the campaign has held to date. Thousands stood on the lawn, dozens watched from boats and from the bridge stretching across the Willamette River. A few kayakers held their paddles and tried to keep their kayaks straight as they watched the candidate, who stood on a makeshift platform.
That’s amazing, and this is just the primary. Unbelievable. Here’s some pics:
There’s more pictures over at Flickr. Amazing stuff.
There’s just no way that John McCain can bring that sort of a crowd… It just cannot happen. I must admit, as much as I disagree with some, but not all, of his politics, I am quite impressed with his ability to draw a crowd.
I don’t think that I’ve seen anything like that, on the Conservative side since Ronald Reagan. I believe that people just want change, and they see Barack Obama as the last great hope for America. I just hope he can deliver.
If this is any indication of what the General election is going to be like, I suspect there’s going to be a handy defeat, and it is not going to be the Democrats.
Update: Crunchy Con says it’s the GOP’s fault.
More Thoughts at @ Memeornadum
Seen over at HuffPo:
and……
This above is what every political pundit worried about, when it was clear that the race was down to Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. However, at the time, they, being he pundits, thought that the race would be over, before anything like this could manifest itself.
Of course, this is the type of identity politics that Democrat Party is infamous for. Now that Hillary has basically lost, the feminist crowd is going to attempt paint Obama as some sort of sexist.
Ah, the joys of liberalism…. You see now, why I left?
More @ Memeorandum
and…. kicks Barry’s message of Hope, Change, Hope, Change, to the curb….
The Article: Moore: `Fahrenheit 9/11′ follow-up is not a sequel (Via Yahoo! News) (Via The New Editor – Seen at HotAir.com)
"It would be easier and safer to make a sequel, if that’s all it was, but this isn’t about Bush. We all know this. Regardless of who the president is come November, we have a big mess, a big, big mess to be cleaned up, and I don’t know whether it can be cleaned up," Moore said. "The toxicity of the spill may be so great that there’s nothing we can do about it. If that’s the case, where are we now as America and as Americans?"
I blogged about this fat, idiotic, liberal, blowhard before. I will be the first to admit, even back when I first came on the Blogging scene. I did not like Michael Moore, he is, as far as I am concerned, the male version of Ariana Huffington. He is nothing more than an opportunist, he see’s the liberal message as a simple way to make money. The only movie that he made, that he really honestly cared about, was "Roger and Me". That is because his father had gotten laid off from G.M. Truthfully, Michael’s dad got quite the handsome severance package from G.M. (Thanks to the U.A.W.) and moved out of Michigan. So, I really do not know what his problem was. For what it is worth, Roger Simon was the best thing that ever happened to G.M, if he had not come in and made the cuts that he did, General Motors would have went bankrupt. The problem was he did not go far enough and now G.M. is back in the same spot again, although, not quite as bad.
Now as to what Michael Moore said up there in the quote, the reason why Michael Moore has basically decided that "Hope Change" isn’t possible, because he was not able to realize his final goal. That is to turn America’s Healthcare system into a totally socialized healthcare plan. Even Hillary Clinton told the guy that he simply did not know what he was talking about. So, it is pretty obvious that Michael Moore is basically taking his Socialist, Liberal, ball and going home.
Let’s just hope he stays there.
