I dislike the idea of Bristol Palin offering generic advice — “Teenagers need to prevent pregnancy to begin with” — rather than acknowledging any personal responsibility for her own situation. Is the problem that teenagers in general are getting pregnant, or that you got pregnant? In point of fact, teen pregnancy is at an all-time low. Is it too much to expect something like a mea culpa?
It is finally nice to see a Neo-Conservative admit that Bristol Palin’s baby thing is about the most hypocritcal thing on the face of the planet. This is supposed to be the party of morals. But it seems that the party of morals has kinda left the morals behind, in favor of social liberalism.
Having a woman on the V.P. proved that, in my eyes at least.
The Dems say they will keep Burris from the floor, so says CNN:
Senate Democratic leaders think Roland Burris, Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s pick to fill President-elect Barack Obama’s vacant Senate seat, will likely show up on Capitol Hill Tuesday for the opening day of Congress, according to a Democratic aide familiar with Senate Democratic leaders’ plans.
They have prepared a contingency plan in case he does, the aide added.
Burris will not be allowed on the Senate floor, according to this aide and a Senate Democratic leadership aide.
The aide familiar with Senate Democratic leaders’ plans said if Burris tries to enter the Senate chamber, the Senate doorkeeper will stop Burris. If Burris were to persist, either trying to force his way onto the Senate floor or refusing to leave and causing a scene, U.S. Capitol Police would stop him, said the aide.
“They (police) probably won’t arrest him” but they would call the sergeant-at-arms,” the aide said.
When asked about what would happen if he shows up and tries to be seated, Burris told the Chicago Tribune that he’s, “not going to create a scene in Washington.” He added, “We hope it’s negotiated out prior to my going to Washington.”
Burris told CNN that, “We’re certainly going to make contacts with the leadership to let them know that the governor of Illinois has made a legal appointment. And that I am currently the junior senator for the State of Illinois. And we’re hoping and praying that, you know, they will see the reason in appointing me as a very qualified, capable, able and ready-to-serve individual.”
Yeah, Right. They don’t want to make a scene. You believe that and I got land to sell you in Texas, cheap! That’s what race-baiting Democrats do, make a scene. Because we all know, it’s all about “struggle” for them. (whatever that is….)
Way I see it, the so-called “struggle” ended when America elected that…. THING for President. So, Al Sharpton and his ilk should be out of a job.
Update 2: Even Pat Buchanan is thinking along the same lines: (H/T WND)
Here we have an African-American elder statesman of the Democratic Party, an honorable and distinguished man, appointed by the governor according to law and the Constitution, to fill a Senate seat. There has been no hint of illegal consideration asked or given by either the governor or Burris.
Yet Harry Reid, who presides over a Democratic caucus of some 60 senators, with not a single black member, is going to refuse this black man a seat to which the law entitles him?
One hopes Burris will stay firm and march up to that Senate, and, if nothing else, expose the hypocrisy.
Our president-elect is from a party that champions busing to integrate public schools but bypasses D.C. public schools to send his girls to exclusive private schools in far northwest Washington.
We have a Democratic Senate that champions affirmative action. Yet not one white Democratic senator, in a caucus that has not a single black member, has ever volunteered to step down and let the governor of their state replace him or her with an African-American.
Not one. That would be liberals leading by example, not exhortation.
If Democrats believe our institutions of power should look like America, why don’t they make their Senate caucus look like America? Why do not a dozen Democrat senators resign, to be replaced by 12 appointed black Democrats, giving one-fifth of all Democratic Senate seats to a minority that gave Barack 97 percent of its vote and Barack and Joe Biden one-fourth of all the votes they received?
Why does not Gov. Paterson follow Gov. Blagojevich’s lead and name an African-American of Burris’ stature to the U.S. Senate?
Fellas, let’s start practicing what we preach here.
There are times when I totally disagree with Pat, but he’s dead right here. If the Democrats have any sense, they will approve this guy. Pat says in this article that this Governor has not been convicted, and yet the Democrats are acting like the Governor is in Prison! Something stinks, and it’s not my body. 😀
Update 3: To expand this even further; what you are seeing here is two wings of the Democratic Party clashing. The Honorable Part of the Party that seeks to be above any sort of scandal, bumping up against the Identity Politics wing of the Democratic Party. It’s more than just “Racism” or whites vs blacks, it’s two independent Political ideologies under the same tent. It’s quite the thing to watch.
Wonderful. As if the gray lady did not have enough trouble. Some Ann Coulter wanna-be is filing a lawsuit for getting smeared by the New York Times:
Washington lobbyist Vicki L. Iseman has filed a $27 million defamation lawsuit against The New York Times for a February article about Iseman and her relationship with Sen. John McCain.
The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Richmond on Tuesday, alleges the article falsely communicated that Iseman and McCain had an illicit “romantic” relationship in 1999 when he was chair of the Senate Commerce Committee and she was a lobbyist representing clients before Congress.
The suit also names the executive editor of the Times, its Washington bureau chief and four reporters who wrote the story as defendants.
William Keller, the paper’s executive editor, did not respond to an e-mail requesting comment on the suit.
“We fully stand behind the article. We continue to believe it to be true and accurate, and that we will prevail. As we said at the time, it was an important piece that raised questions about a presidential contender and the perception that he had been engaged in conflicts of interest.”
I have no direct knowledge of the case or of Iseman, but if I were the Times, I would be afraid. I would be very afraid. They have a lot more to lose than the 27 million bucks in the suit. Their reputation is already tarnished and their bottom line diminishing. If Iseman can prove her case to the public’s satisfaction, it will constitute yet more bruising and a serious humiliation for the sometime “newspaper of record”. Those who have been accusing them of being nothing more than a scandal sheet – and a biased one at that, unlike the National Enquirer – will be vindicated. Indeed, if Ms. Iseman wins her case, the Times’ editors and publisher will be revealed to have been simultaneously boneheaded and despicable – an ugly combination indeed.
I just wonder, if she happens to win and takes over ownership of the paper, whom will she make the Editor? Ann Coulter? 🙄
Way I see it, if she wasn’t bobbing the knob. Then honestly, what is the problem?
Seriously. That was the first thing out of my mouth.
Already?
In other parts of the country one would say, “That Quick?”
Seems that way, because Richard Cohen has basically said of Obama, that the Party; with him and his lesbian sister, was over.
Quotable Quotes:
Not that he was planning to attend, but Barack Obama should know that my sister’s inauguration night party — the one for which she was preparing Obama Punch — has been canceled. The notice went out over the weekend, by e-mail and word of mouth, that Obama’s choice of Rick Warren to give the inaugural invocation had simply ruined the party. Warren is anti-gay, and my sister, not to put too fine a point on it, is not. She’s gay.
She is — or was — a committed Obama supporter. On the weekend before the presidential election, my sister and my mother drove from the Boston area, where they both live, to Obama’s New Hampshire headquarters in Manchester. There my mother made 76 phone calls for Obama, which is not bad for someone who is 96, and gives you an idea of the level of commitment to Obama in certain precincts of my family.
I should say right off that my mother feels less strongly about Warren than my sister does. But I should add immediately that my sister feels very strongly, indeed. She’s been in a relationship with another woman, the quite wonderful Nancy, for 19 years, and she resents the fact that Warren has likened same-sex marriage to incest, pederasty and polygamy.
Let me just say right here. What you are seeing, is a major let down by the far left. Many on the far left saw Barack Obama is some sort of Liberal Messiah that would make the world all better again, if he were elected. It had to do with much of his election stump speech, which was filled with bombast and platitudes. In reality, Barack Obama is nothing more than just another Chicago liberal politician who will say and do almost anything to get elected to the office in which he is running for.
Of Obama’s Preacher Problems, Cohen Adds:
The conventional thing to say is that Obama has a preacher problem — first the volcanic Jeremiah Wright and now the transparently anti-gay Warren. But the real problem has nothing to do with ministers and everything to do with Obama’s inability or unwillingness to be a moral leader. Sooner or later, he just might have to stand for something.
This was apparent to me almost a year ago when I reported that Obama’s church, the Trinity United Church of Christ, had given a major award to Louis Farrakhan, the anti-Semitic leader of the Nation of Islam. The award was presented in Wright’s name and featured in a cover story in the church’s magazine, Trumpet. When I asked the Obama campaign about this, I was told that Obama himself did not agree with Farrakhan. What a relief!
And what a joke. I never for a moment thought Obama viewed Farrakhan any differently from the way I do. But I also thought that as a U.S. senator, as a presidential candidate or even as a mere citizen, he had an obligation to denounce the award — maybe quit the church. Do something! He did nothing.
Wow! Isn’t that what Republicans and Independent Conservatives were saying, um, for the last 2 years about Obama, but were derided as racists? Man, talking about turning on your own! 😮
I knew this was coming, I just knew it. The Democratic Party elected someone based upon popularity and it is now coming back to haunt them. I said this way back in the primary, when I was still running this blog over on the old site on Blogger, that Obama was being set up as some sort of “Perfect Liberal” and that the Democrats were setting themselves up for a let down.
Somewhere today, John Edwards and the rest of the Democrats are smiling. Because they are seeing what I am seeing and thinking, “That’s what those assholes get for electing him!” Anytime you elected someone based upon popularity or in Bambi’s case, skin color; it almost always comes back to haunt you, and right now it is.
Something tells me, that this is going to be an interesting four years to come. I predict that by the time Obama’s four years are up, he will be the most hated President among the far left, ever.
Yes, I am awake. I was up 30 minutes before the alarm clock went off. Which I believe was amazing. To what extent I slept, I will know later. But I am awake and nursing a mug of coffee. 😀
Now about Rick Warren. He’s about as traditional Christianity or “Religious Right” as I am Roman Catholic. (See my “About Me” page to see what I am….)
Me and Paul Proctor, (See Here, Here, Here, and Here) and David Cloud all feel the same way; that Rick Warren is not a genuine representation of Christianity in the traditional sense of the word. In fact, warren scoffs at the idea of a traditional Christianity, in which the true Word of God is used; which is, in this writers opinion, The King James Bible, of course. Instead, he prefers a non-judgmental, feel good, version of Christianity, that uses any version of the Bible that one wants, or as Warren says, “You can read.” and also, he mingles human philosophy and the Word of God. Something which is extremely ignorant and very dangerous. He is in the ranks of Robert Schuller or as I like call him, Robert Schuller with a Hawaiian Shirt. 😉
So, in short, while Rick Warren might be the darling of the compromising Neo-Evangelical crowd, he is hardly what I could call a true believer; that is in the True Bible-Believing, Fundamentalist Christianity sense of the word.
I cannot say that I am shocked or even surprised for that matter.
Now, I am sure that you are expecting me to say something rather nasty or even Ann Coulter’ish sounding about this.
Well, Surprise… 😀
I have absolutely no issue with Obama being named person of the year. I will explain to you why…
Barack Obama came out of nowhere and defeated the Clinton Machine. Because you and I both know, that knocking Hillary out of the captain’s chair is a feat in itself. You see, unlikesomeof my fellow Conservatives, I saw what Obama was doing and I thought it was absolutely brilliant. I didn’t agree with some of the tactics that some of his surrogates were using, and still do not; however, I did admire the grace that Obama showed, especially under pressure from some of his worst and fiercest critics. One thing that I can say and any Conservative; of any stripe, would say, if they are being intellectually honest, that they never heard Obama make any sort of “Al Sharpton” sounding statement. I mean; yes, he did drop the occasional reminder that he was a black man. But there was never any of that, “I’m black and oppressed” nonsense that continually flows from the mouths of the race baiting ilk in New York.
Further, let it be known that it is not lost on me, that Obama has a far left progressive ideology. Although, I will say that judging from his cabinet selections so far, it may seem that Obama is going to try to run a White House from a centrist viewpoint and try and avoid some of the more far left politics of his campaign; much to the chagrin of those who are of that political mindset that voted for him. Personally, I think at the very least or at the very worst; Obama may want to raise taxes to pay for some of the debt that this Nation has incurred at the hands of a quasi-Conservative President. This could be more the case if both of the wars continue to drag on. Not to mention that if every Business in America gets a poorly named “Bail out.”
From a libertarian conservative viewpoint I simply say this; this election was not Obama’s to necessarily win, it was John McCain’s to lose. John McCain was having to follow and associate himself with a very unpopular President, who, in this writers opinion, was elected on the basis of pedigree. Further, John McCain just was not able to articulate Conservative positions without sounding like some old feeble grandfather who was telling a bedtime story. Not to mention, that the economy took a rather large nosedive in the middle of the election cycle. Adding to all this; McCain made some rather disastrous campaign decisions that in essence doomed his campaign to failure. I could sit here and list them all, but I believe anyone who has been following this election cycle as much as I have, knows what I am referring to.
So, in closing, this award, was one well deserved. I hope Obama enjoyes the romance with the media, because I have a sinking feeling it will not last forever.
I say obligatory, because I think this story has got about the traction of a damned bald Goodyear tire in the winter. But I digress.
The sensational media rolls on, I suppose. One day in the tank, next minute throwing Obama in the tank. 🙄
Anyhow… here we go! 😀
The Chicago Tribune’s Political Blog, “The Swamp” Reports:
Rahm Emanuel, President-elect Barack Obama’s pick to be White House chief of staff, had conversations with Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s administration about who would replace Obama in the U.S. Senate, the Chicago Tribune has learned.
The revelation does not suggest Obama’s new gatekeeper was involved in any talk of dealmaking involving the seat. But it does help fill in the gaps surrounding a question that Obama was unable or unwilling to answer this week: Did anyone on his staff have contact with Blagojevich about his choice for the Senate seat?
Blagojevich and John Harris, his former chief of staff, face federal charges in an alleged shakedown involving the vacant Senate seat, which Illinois law grants the governor sole authority to fill.
Obama said Thursday he had never spoken to Blagojevich about the Senate vacancy and was “confident that no representatives” of his had engaged in any dealmaking over the seat with the governor or his team. He also pledged Thursday that in the “next few days” he would explain what contacts his staff may have had with the governor’s office about the Senate vacancy.
Emanuel, who has long been close to both Blagojevich and Obama, has refused to respond to questions about any involvement he may have had with the Blagojevich camp over the Senate pick. A spokeswoman for Emanuel also declined to comment Friday.
One source confirmed that communications between Emanuel and the Blagojevich administration were captured on court-approved wiretaps.
Another source said that contact between the Obama camp and the governor’s administration regarding the Senate seat began the Saturday before the Nov. 4 election, when Emanuel made a call to the cell phone of Harris. The conversation took place around the same time press reports surfaced about Emanuel being approached about taking the high-level White House post should Obama win.
Emanuel delivered a list of candidates who would be “acceptable” to Obama, the source said. On the list were Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, Illinois Veterans Affairs director Tammy Duckworth, state Comptroller Dan Hynes and U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Chicago, the source said. All are Democrats.
One thing that stands out in this article, is this right here:
The revelation does not suggest Obama’s new gatekeeper was involved in any talk of dealmaking involving the seat. But it does help fill in the gaps surrounding a question that Obama was unable or unwilling to answer this week: Did anyone on his staff have contact with Blagojevich about his choice for the Senate seat?
However, to read some of the Republican/Conservative/Neo-Conservative Blogs, you would think that Obama offered to help finance the operation or something. Which I think is outright silly and blatantly asinine. There’s no proof of that at all, and I am inclined to believe the President-Elect, if he says he had no contact with the man. Sorry, you cannot count me amongst the group of people who believe he’s some sort of undercover Muslim or anything of that nature, I don’t run with that crowd at all. Most of that nonsense is of the Alex Jones flavor, and I deal with facts and reality, not conspiracy theories and lunacy. Oh, sure, I’ve written things on here, mostly in jest and trying to be snarky… and once, because I was pissed at the race baiting of the far lefty Liberals, during the election, but Obama is going to be the new President, and I’m fine with that. But I will write and speak out against what I feel to be wrong, and likewise, I will defend the man, when I feel that it is due.
Anyway, got way off track there! 😮
As for the current situation at hand here, my advice to the President-Elect is, dump Rahm Emanuel now. Because as long as Emanuel is on the Obama team, the Conservative/Neo-Conservative/Republican talking heads and some of the more main stream media are going to continue to hound you over this. I know, it is a bit silly, but that is what the Conservatives do, they did it Bill Clinton, almost to the point of lunacy and as long as this guy is on your staff, you will have to contend with the questions, and with the insinuation that you are connected with this scandal. In other words, Ann Coulter will have something to talk about for the next four years. God knows, we have heard enough of that feckless bitch for the last eight years.
I hope that the President-Elect figures this out and gives Rahm Emanuel the ol’ Heave Ho and gets someone else in there. Otherwise, it will be a circular firing squad on this Blog for the next four years.
So, I am giving you, the other side of the story, from the horses mouth; without commentary from me.
I did not ask that you agree, I simply ask that you listen and hear this man out. Now I am almost sure, that the Blogs, that I have linked to, will remove my trackback, like the Neo-Con Fascists that they are. I mean, it is all about controlling the message with those guys. 🙄
Here we go:
Part 1:
Part 2:
Media Q & A:
Media Q & A Part 2:
Media Q & A Part 3:
There you have it. The other side of the story. You decide.
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