http://www.sefermpost.com/
Please see link above about fact checks on Obama's birth certificate, his home purchase and clarification of controversial issues in the presidential campaign. Good source to have to refer voters to who have distorted ideas about Obama. Factcheck.org is another source.
Women's Rights: Obama-Biden; Opposed: McCain-Palin
We must circulate information to as many former Hillary Supporters as possible that McCain-Palin do NOT support women's reproductive rights. Sarah Palin is far right in opposing women's reproductive rights. Let's not allow Hillary's former Supporters to be in the dark on this fact.
Also, Sarah Palin is attempting to ride on the wave of breakthroughs in the rise of presidential candidates in the Democratic Party, namely that of Geraldine Ferraro and Hillary Clinton. Just think, a Republican VP pick, with only 2 months of campaigning, expecting to lock up the vice presidency of the United States on the years' worth of hard-earned reputations of Ferraro and Clinton! We can't let this lady or the McCain campaign think Obama-Biden Supporters are pushovers and will stand by and let that happen!
Let's work hard to bring Hillary's former Supporters back into the fold. We need them to know Obama-Biden has the interests of Women's Rights among their top priorities! Many Hillary Supporters are already honoring her lengthy, hard-fought presidential campaign by casting their vote for Obama-Biden, whom Hillary, herself, is supporting. It's up to us to reach out and encourage all of Hillary's former Supporters to do so.
The Democratic Party paved the way for women presidential candidates. We must see to it that any breaking of glass ceilings in the White House will be only with the Democratic nomination and election of the First Woman President in 2016!
Barack Obama-Joseph Biden/President & Vice President of the United States of America, Jan '09
Here's a great video about Tim Wise on unity across racial lines, according to a practical perspective about solving the problems in New Orleans after Katrina. Please pass it along. Thanks.
http://www.redroom.com/video/tim-wise-creation-whiteness-clip
Monday, April 21st, 2008My Vote's for Obama (if I could vote) ...by Michael MooreFriends, I don't get to vote for President this primary season. I live in Michigan. The party leaders (both here and in D.C.) couldn't get their act together, and thus our votes will not be counted. So, if you live in Pennsylvania, can you do me a favor? Will you please cast my vote -- and yours -- on Tuesday for Senator Barack Obama? I haven't spoken publicly 'til now as to who I would vote for, primarily for two reasons: 1) Who cares?; and 2) I (and most people I know) don't give a rat's ass whose name is on the ballot in November, as long as there's a picture of JFK and FDR riding a donkey at the top of the ballot, and the word "Democratic" next to the candidate's name. Seriously, I know so many people who don't care if the name under the Big "D" is Dancer, Prancer, Clinton or Blitzen. It can be Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Barry Obama or the Dalai Lama. Well, that sounded good last year, but over the past two months, the actions and words of Hillary Clinton have gone from being merely disappointing to downright disgusting. I guess the debate last week was the final straw. I've watched Senator Clinton and her husband play this game of appealing to the worst side of white people, but last Wednesday, when she hurled the name "Farrakhan" out of nowhere, well that's when the silly season came to an early end for me. She said the "F" word to scare white people, pure and simple. Of course, Obama has no connection to Farrakhan. But, according to Senator Clinton, Obama's pastor does -- AND the "church bulletin" once included a Los Angeles Times op-ed from some guy with Hamas! No, not the church bulletin! This sleazy attempt to smear Obama was brilliantly explained the following night by Stephen Colbert. He pointed out that if Obama is supported by Ted Kennedy, who is Catholic, and the Catholic Church is led by a Pope who was in the Hitler Youth, that can mean only one thing: OBAMA LOVES HITLER! Yes, Senator Clinton, that's how you sounded. Like you were nuts. Like you were a bigot stoking the fires of stupidity. How sad that I would ever have to write those words about you. You have devoted your life to good causes and good deeds. And now to throw it all away for an office you can't win unless you smear the black man so much that the superdelegates cry "Uncle (Tom)" and give it all to you. But that can't happen. You cast your die when you voted to start this bloody war. When you did that you were like Moses who lost it for a moment and, because of that, was prohibited from entering the Promised Land. How sad for a country that wanted to see the first woman elected to the White House. That day will come -- but it won't be you. We'll have to wait for the current Democratic governor of Kansas to run in 2016 (you read it here first!). There are those who say Obama isn't ready, or he's voted wrong on this or that. But that's looking at the trees and not the forest. What we are witnessing is not just a candidate but a profound, massive public movement for change. My endorsement is more for Obama The Movement than it is for Obama the candidate. That is not to take anything away from this exceptional man. But what's going on is bigger than him at this point, and that's a good thing for the country. Because, when he wins in November, that Obama Movement is going to have to stay alert and active. Corporate America is not going to give up their hold on our government just because we say so. President Obama is going to need a nation of millions to stand behind him. I know some of you will say, 'Mike, what have the Democrats done to deserve our vote?' That's a damn good question. In November of '06, the country loudly sent a message that we wanted the war to end. Yet the Democrats have done nothing. So why should we be so eager to line up happily behind them? I'll tell you why. Because I can't stand one more friggin' minute of this administration and the permanent, irreversible damage it has done to our people and to this world. I'm almost at the point where I don't care if the Democrats don't have a backbone or a kneebone or a thought in their dizzy little heads. Just as long as their name ain't "Bush" and the word "Republican" is not beside theirs on the ballot, then that's good enough for me. I, like the majority of Americans, have been pummeled senseless for 8 long years. That's why I will join millions of citizens and stagger into the voting booth come November, like a boxer in the 12th round, all bloodied and bruised with one eye swollen shut, looking for the only thing that matters -- that big "D" on the ballot. Don't get me wrong. I lost my rose-colored glasses a long time ago. It's foolish to see the Democrats as anything but a nicer version of a party that exists to do the bidding of the corporate elite in this country. Any endorsement of a Democrat must be done with this acknowledgement and a hope that one day we will have a party that'll represent the people first, and laws that allow that party an equal voice. Finally, I want to say a word about the basic decency I have seen in Mr. Obama. Mrs. Clinton continues to throw the Rev. Wright up in his face as part of her mission to keep stoking the fears of White America. Every time she does this I shout at the TV, "Say it, Obama! Say that when she and her husband were having marital difficulties regarding Monica Lewinsky, who did she and Bill bring to the White House for 'spiritual counseling?' THE REVEREND JEREMIAH WRIGHT!" But no, Obama won't throw that at her. It wouldn't be right. It wouldn't be decent. She's been through enough hurt. And so he remains silent and takes the mud she throws in his face. That's why the crowds who come to see him are so large. That's why he'll take us down a more decent path. That's why I would vote for him if Michigan were allowed to have an election. But the question I keep hearing is... 'can he win? Can he win in November?' In the distance we hear the siren of the death train called the Straight Talk Express. We know it's possible to hear the words "President McCain" on January 20th. We know there are still many Americans who will never vote for a black man. Hillary knows it, too. She's counting on it. Pennsylvania, the state that gave birth to this great country, has a chance to set things right. It has not had a moment to shine like this since 1787 when our Constitution was written there. In that Constitution, they wrote that a black man or woman was only "three fifths" human. On Tuesday, the good people of Pennsylvania have a chance for redemption. Yours,Michael MooreMichaelMoore.comMMFlint@aol.com
Written by J. Bennett GuessApril 19, 2008
In what will be his first interview since snippets of his preaching became a central issue in the U.S. presidential campaign, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. will speak publicly to veteran journalist and fellow UCC member Bill Moyers.
The interview will be broadcast on Friday evening, April 25, on Bill Moyers Journal, a PBS news series that airs nationally. Check local listings at www.pbs.org/moyers.
Wright retired in March after 36 years as senior pastor of the 8,000-member Trinity UCC in Chicago, where U.S. Sen. Barack Obama has been a member for more than 20 years. Trinity UCC is the largest congregation among the UCC's 5,700 churches.
Moyers, a member of Riverside Church (UCC/American Baptist) in New York City, is a critically-acclaimed public affairs journalist who is known for his thoughtful attention to the intersection of politics, religion and the media. Last June, Moyers and Obama were among the presenters at the UCC's 50th anniversary General Synod in Hartford, Conn.
Following his appearance on Bill Moyers Journal, Wright is scheduled to be the keynote speaker at the NAACP Detroit Branch on Sunday, April 27. He is also slated to speak on Monday, April 28, to a breakfast gathering at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., followed by a teach-in at Howard University School of Divinity and Shiloh Baptist Church, which also will host an ecumenical prayer service.
"A sound bite cannot capture … a whole sermon,"
"We Are The Ones" Video:
http://www.dipdive.com/dip-politics/wato/
PLEASE CIRCULATE AS WIDELY AS POSSIBLE!! Pennsylvania: We Need You to Give Obama a VICTORY on Tuesday, April 22nd. Please, PA, we are counting on YOU!! Thank You!!
PLEASE CIRCULATE EVERYWHERE AND FAST!! THANK YOU!!
BY David Coleman From the Huffington Post
I Was There: What Obama Really Said About Pennsylvania
Posted April 14, 2008 | 11:54 AM (EST)
Clinton, McCain, and media pundits have parsed a blogger's audio tape of Obama's remarks and criticized a sentence or two characterizing some parts of Pennsylvania and the attitudes of some Pennsylvanians. In context and in person, Senator Obama's remarks about Pennsylvania voters left an impression diametrically opposed to that being trumpeted by his competitor's campaigns.
At the end of Obama's remarks standing between two rooms of guests -- the fourth appearance in California after traveling earlier in the day from Montana -- a questioner asked, "some of us are going to Pennsylvania to campaign for you. What should we be telling the voters we encounter?"
Obama's response to the questioner was that there are many, many different sections in Pennsylvania comprised of a range of racial, geographic, class, and economic groupings from Appalachia to Philadelphia. So there was not one thing to say to such diverse constituencies in Pennsylvania. But having said that, Obama went on say that his campaign staff in Pennsylvania could provide the questioner (an imminent Pennsylvania volunteer) with all the talking points he needed. But Obama cautioned that such talking points were really not what should be stressed with Pennsylvania voters.
Instead he urged the volunteer to tell Pennsylvania voters he encountered that Obama's campaign is about something more than programs and talking points. It was at this point that Obama began to talk about addressing the bitter feelings that many in some rural communities in Pennsylvania have about being brushed aside in the wake of the global economy. Senator Obama appeared to theorize, perhaps improvidently given the coverage this week, that some of the people in those communities take refuge in political concerns about guns, religion and immigration. But what has not so far been reported is that those statements preceded and were joined with additional observations that black youth in urban areas are told they are no longer "relevant" in the global economy and, feeling marginalized, they engage in destructive behavior. Unlike the week's commentators who have seized upon the remarks about "bitter feelings" in some depressed communities in Pennsylvania, I gleaned a different meaning from the entire answer.
First, I noted immediately how dismissive his answer had been about "talking points" and ten point programs and how he used the question to urge the future volunteer to put forward a larger message central to his campaign. That pivot, I thought, was remarkable and unique. Rather than his seizing the opportunity to recite stump-worn talking points at that time to the audience -- as I believe Senator Clinton, Senator McCain and most other more conventional (or more disciplined) politicians at such an appearance might do -- Senator Obama took a different political course in that moment, one that symbolizes important differences about his candidacy.
The response that followed sounded unscripted, in the moment, as if he were really trying to answer a question with intelligent conversation that explained more about what was going on in the Pennsylvania communities than what was germane to his political agenda. I had never heard him or any politician ever give such insightful, analytical responses. The statements were neither didactic nor contrived to convince. They were simply hypotheses (not unlike the kind made by de Tocqueville three centuries ago ) offered by an observer familiar with American communities. And that kind of thoughtfulness was quite unexpected in the middle of a political event. In my view, the way he answered the question was more important than the sociological accuracy or the cause and effect hypotheses contained in the answer. It was a moment of authenticity demonstrating informed intelligence, and the speaker's desire to have the audience join him in a deeper understanding of American politics.
There has been little or no reaction to the part of the answer that was addressed to the hopelessness of inner city youth who have been rendered "irrelevant" to the global economy. No one has seized upon those words as "talking down" to the inner city youth whose plight he was addressing. If extracted from an audio tape HuffPost Blogger Fowler, those remarks could (and may yet) be taken out of context as "Obama excuses alienation and violence by urban youth." But in context, Senator Obama's response sounded like empathetic conclusions and opinions of a keen observer: more like Margaret Mead than Machiavelli.
As the week's firestorm evolved over these remarks at which I was an accidental observer, I have reflected upon the regrettable irony that has emerged from Senator Obama's response to a friendly question: no good effort at intelligent analysis, candor -- and what I heard as an attempt to convey a profound understanding of both what people feel and why they feel it - goes unpunished. Such insights by a political candidate might otherwise be valued. In a national campaign subject to opposition research, his analytical musing has instead created an immense amount of political flak.
Now and "in this time," to invoke one of the candidate's favorite riffs, such observations and remarks shared among supporters are just a push of a record button on a tape recorder away from being spread across the internet to be dissected by political nabobs. What struck me immediately after the fundraiser as so refreshing turned out to be a moment Senator Obama is forced to regret. Today we marvel at de Tocqueville insights about American communities. Apparently, such commentary is valued as long as it is three centuries old and doesn't come from the mouth of a contemporary observer who might be elected president.
So much for the political ironies. But there is one more personal observation that was missed.
I happened to be on the balcony when Senator Obama's vehicles arrived and he emerged from the Secret Service SUV. Obama shouted the friendly greeting "How are you guys up there doing?" to the group of us looking down from the balcony and then said, "You have to excuse me, I need to call my kids in Chicago now." All of us stood and watched the leading candidate for the Democratic party nomination for president have a short conversation with his kids before he entered a fundraiser to make his remarks.
No tape of that conversation has emerged as yet. Who knows how casual remarks of a father to his children or his wife on a cell phone could be spun to support the argument that as a father speaking to his kids two time zones away before they go to bed, his comments sounded as if he "looked down" upon them. Given his relative height and the age of his kids, he probably does. But that would be precisely as relevant to his capacity to unite and lead this country as were the remarks at the fundraiser that have been so deconstructed over this past week.
After a tough six-week stretch of campaign gaffes, roaring controversies and heightened scrutiny, Barack Obama's presidential bid appears as strong as ever - and rival Hillary Clinton is running out of time to change the script.
Obama has expanded his lead on Clinton in many national polls and gained ground on her in the next battleground of Pennsylvania ahead of Tuesday's vote, despite furors over his remarks on small-town residents and inflammatory comments by his former pastor.
Clinton's image appeared to take a heavier hit after wrongly claiming she faced sniper fire in Bosnia in 1996. A Washington Post poll this week found more Americans have an unfavorable impression of her than at any time since she entered the national limelight in 1992.
"It hasn't been a bed of roses for Obama. He's had some problems. But she is the one whose negatives are going up," said Phil Noble, head of the South Carolina New Democrats group and an Obama supporter.
Obama has a nearly unassailable lead on the New York senator in delegates to the August nominating convention and in popular votes won in the first three months of the primary battle.
Clinton hopes a big Pennsylvania win ignites a strong run through the final nine contests, fundamentally reordering the race and giving her fresh evidence to argue she is the strongest candidate to face Republican John McCain in November's presidential election.
But polls show Obama has whittled her once substantial double-digit lead in Pennsylvania to single digits. A Zogby poll on Friday put her lead at 4 points, a Rasmussen poll showed it at 3 points and a Los Angeles Times poll earlier this week had it at 5 points.
A narrow Clinton win probably would be enough to keep her in the race, but would not stem another round of calls among Democrats for her to step aside and let Obama concentrate on the race with McCain.
OBAMA LEAD GROWS
Obama has expanded his national lead in several polls. A Reuters/Zogby poll released earlier this week put it at 13 points, and a daily Gallup tracking poll had it at 7 points, down from his high of 11 earlier in the week.
Obama continues to steadily win endorsements from superdelegates, the nearly 800 Democratic Party insiders who are free to back any candidate and who hold the key to winning the nomination.
"It doesn't seem like she has the power to alter the dynamic of the race anymore," said Simon Rosenberg, head of the Democratic advocacy group NDN.
Rosenberg said Clinton's scenario for winning the Democratic nomination was no longer believable.
"In every way you can measure it, he's won more delegates, he's won more states, he's raised more money, he has a better organization -- all the metrics one has of how to evaluate the race indicate he is winning and she is losing," he said.
Obama, an Illinois senator who would be the first black U.S. president, weathered a flap in March about the controversial comments of his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, by giving a widely praised speech on race.
He ignited another firestorm last weekend when his comments about small-town residents at a private San Francisco fundraiser became public. He said small-town residents were clinging to religion and guns out of bitterness about their economic struggles.
In the six-week lull between the last contest in Mississippi, which Obama won, and Tuesday's vote in Pennsylvania, those flaps and Clinton's Bosnia controversy dominated the campaign debate.
But so far, none of the controversies appears to have the strength to derail Obama.
"Voters in the end may not be that agitated about these kinds of things," said Linda Fowler, a political analyst at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. "They really are more concerned about the war and the economy and which candidate is more effective."
© 2008 Reuters. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters.
The mayor released the following statement:There are a lot of reasons that Americans are angry about Washington politics. And one more example is the way Senator Obama’s opponents are playing guilt-by-association, tarring him because he happens to know Bill Ayers.I also know Bill Ayers. He worked with me in shaping our now nationally-renowned school reform program. He is a nationally-recognized distinguished professor of education at the University of Illinois/Chicago and a valued member of the Chicago community.I don’t condone what he did 40 years ago but I remember that period well. It was a difficult time, but those days are long over. I believe we have too many challenges in Chicago and our country to keep re-fighting 40 year old battles.
The mayor released the following statement:
There are a lot of reasons that Americans are angry about Washington politics. And one more example is the way Senator Obama’s opponents are playing guilt-by-association, tarring him because he happens to know Bill Ayers.
I also know Bill Ayers. He worked with me in shaping our now nationally-renowned school reform program. He is a nationally-recognized distinguished professor of education at the University of Illinois/Chicago and a valued member of the Chicago community.
I don’t condone what he did 40 years ago but I remember that period well. It was a difficult time, but those days are long over. I believe we have too many challenges in Chicago and our country to keep re-fighting 40 year old battles.
But Hillary’s campaign just can’t let it go-
But the Clinton campaign was not about to drop Ayers connection to Obama. Ayers hosted a neighborhood coffee for Obama’s initial 1996 Illinois state Senate run and gave Obama a $200 donation for his state Senate re-election campaign in 2001.In a conference call with reporters today, Clinton spokesmen Howard Wolfson and Phil Singer sought to maintain that Obama’s political relationship with Ayers was more important than the decision by Clinton’s husband, President Bill Clinton, to commute the sentences of two of Ayers’ former Weather Underground members, Susan Rosenberg and Linda Evans on terrorist related weapons charges.
But the Clinton campaign was not about to drop Ayers connection to Obama. Ayers hosted a neighborhood coffee for Obama’s initial 1996 Illinois state Senate run and gave Obama a $200 donation for his state Senate re-election campaign in 2001.
In a conference call with reporters today, Clinton spokesmen Howard Wolfson and Phil Singer sought to maintain that Obama’s political relationship with Ayers was more important than the decision by Clinton’s husband, President Bill Clinton, to commute the sentences of two of Ayers’ former Weather Underground members, Susan Rosenberg and Linda Evans on terrorist related weapons charges.
A highly respected Catholic Priest, Father Michael Pleger of St. Sabina in Chicago, sets Fox News straight on the Reverend Wright issue. Finally, Fox News is left speechless.
Please circulate far and wide as we enter the "11th hour" before the PA primary. Go Obama!! PA we need YOU! to give Obama a BIG WIN on Tuesday, April 22nd!! We are counting on YOU! to help Obama and all America bring change in Washington!! GOTV for Obama!! YES WE CAN, WE WILL & WE MUST!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0wvQMqSzTM
(CNN) — Robert Reich, a former Clinton cabinet member and longtime friend of the former president, has formally endorsed Barack Obama's White House bid, saying Friday that "my conscience won't let me be silent any longer."
"Although Hillary Clinton has offered solid and sensible policy proposals, Obama's strike me as even more so," Reich wrote on his blog. He served as the Secretary of Labor from 1993-1997 and is currently a professor at UC Berkeley.
"His plans for reforming Social Security and health care have a better chance of succeeding," Reich continued. "His approaches to the housing crisis and the failures of our financial markets are sounder than hers. His ideas for improving our public schools and confronting the problems of poverty and inequality are more coherent and compelling. He has put forward the more enlightened foreign policy and the more thoughtful plan for controlling global warming."
Reich, whose relationship with the Clintons dates back to their law school days at Yale, has long been a critic of the New York senator's White House bid. Shortly before the Iowa caucuses in January, he wrote that voters would have a choice "between someone who talks the talk, and somebody who's walked the walk."
Read the rest of this entry »
From: CNN Ticker Producer Alexander Mooney, CNN's Peter HambyFiled under: Hillary Clinton • Robert Reich
By VC Today at 9:56 am EDT TO ALL VOTERS IN PENNSYLVANIA, INDIANA, AND NORTH CAROLINA. Remember we are trying to stop the media all out attacks on Barack. Remember when you go to the polls, and you are asked to complete exit poll questions, please don't answer any questions regarding your racial identity or any questions about Rev. Wright. They will try to use it to say Barack is not electable. if the pollster is asking and recording the answers for you, do not answer because they will complete race information for you. if you stop answering this question, they will stop asking the question, and they will have to stop talking about it. don't give Hillary or the media any more fuel for the fire.
--------------
Isn't this a great idea to control the race-bating in this election. Of course, pollsters will do it by judging voters' race on their own, but we don't have to help them. Besides, it takes away from their credibility if voters do not indicate their race themselves. Let's get beyond racial politics and change this country for the better!! Obama '08 YES WE CAN, WE WILL AND WE MUST!!
Tuesday: Barack Obama speaks at a town hall-style meeting with veterans at Washington Jefferson College in Washington, Pa. (AP Photo)
Barack Obama, under attack for his “condescending” remarks about small-town America, told Pennsylvania voters on Tuesday that it’s just “silly” to call someone who was raised by a single mother and who was on food stamps an elitist.
Both Hillary Clinton and John McCain have assailed Obama for saying that small-town voters are clinging to guns and religion because they are frustrated with Washington. Clinton, who has repeatedly broached the issue with voters, launched an ad in Pennsylvania Tuesday featuring five residents criticizing Obama’s remarks.
Asked about the flak he’s been taking, Obama said the charges make little sense to him.
“I am amused about this notion of elitist, given that when you’re raised by a single mom, when you’re on food stamps for a while when you were growing up, you went to school on scholarship….” he said, also talking about his wife Michelle’s money troubles.
“So when somebody makes that argument, particularly given that I spent my entire life working with workers, low-income communities to try to make people’s lives a little bit better, then that’s when you know we’re in political silly season,” he told a veterans forum in Washington, Pa.
“Hopefully it’ll come to an end fairly soon and we can start focusing on the issues that the people of Pennsylvania and the American people care about.”
The individual who asked about the comments suggested the charges of elitism had racial overtones.
“As a white person, this term, the way it is being used against you, it isn’t far from ‘uppity,’ OK?” the man told Obama angrily. “And I think the Clintons are getting away with something that they must be called on. They will continue to do it until somebody states, ‘Mrs Clinton, you’re really close to prejudice here. This is wrong.’”
Obama said it was “nice to say that,” but he didn’t think racial overtones were shading the debate.
“I think that, you know, it’s politics,” he said. “When we start getting behind in races, then we start going on the attack.”
In a counter to Clinton’s ad, Obama’s campaign release an ad Tuesday that showed footage of Clinton being jeered for bringing up Obama’s “bitter” comments at a Pittsburgh event the day before.
“There’s a reason people are rejecting Hillary Clinton’s attacks,” the narrator says. “Because the same old Washington politics won’t lower the price of gas or help our struggling economy. Barack Obama will represent all Americans. He offers a new approach”
Obama made the controversial remarks at a San Francisco fund-raiser a week ago, saying voters facing economic hard times in rural Pennsylvania and elsewhere “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.”
His opponents, and his opponents’ surrogates, say that Obama’s words showed his true disdain for small-town voters, expressed in an unguarded moment among friends.
But with just one week remaining until the April 22 Pennsylvania primary, and with little movement in the polls as a result of the flap, Obama has said that voters are justifiably angry over high gas prices, the loss of manufacturing jobs and other examples of economic insecurity, but can still appreciate a message of hope.
“Just because you’re mad, just because it seems like nobody is listening to ordinary Americans, that’s not a reason to give up hope,” Obama told the Building Trades National Legislative Conference.
“You get mad and then you decide you’re going to change it. If you’re not angry about something you’re going to sit back and let it happen to you. If you’re only angry, you don’t feel hopeful.”
FOX News’ Aaron Bruns contributed to this report.
Lea
Remember Lee Iacocca, the man who rescued Chrysler Corporation from it's death throes? He has a new book, 'Where Have All The Leaders Gone?' and here are some excerpts Lee Iacocca says: 'Am I the only guy in this country who's fed up with what's happening? Where the hell is our outrage? We should be screaming bloody murder. We've got a gang of clueless bozos steering our ship of state right over a cliff, we've got corporate gangsters stealing us blind, and we can't even clean up after a hurricane much less build a hybrid car. But instead of getting mad, everyone sits around and nods their heads when the politicians say, 'Stay the course' Stay the course? You've got to be kidding. This is America , not the damned 'Titanic'. I'll give you a sound bite: 'Throw all the bums out!' You might think I'm getting senile, that I've gone off my rocker, and maybe I have. But someone has to speak up. I hardly recognize this country anymore.
The most famous business leaders are not the innovators but the guys in handcuffs. While we're fiddling in Iraq , the Middle East is burning and nobody seems to know what to do. And the press is waving 'pom-poms' instead of asking hard questions. That's not the promise of the ' America ' my parents and yours traveled across the ocean for. I've had enough. How about you? I'll go a step further. You can't call yourself a patriot if you're not outraged. This is a fight I'm ready and willing to have. The Biggest 'C' is Crisis! Leaders are made, not born. Leadership is forged in times of crisis. It's easy to sit there with your feet up on the desk and talk theory or send someone else's kids off to war when you've never seen a battlefield yourself. It's another thing to lead when your world comes tumbling down. On September 11, 2001, we needed a strong leader more than any other time in our history. We needed a steady hand to guide us out of the ashes. A Hell of a Mess So here's where we stand. We're immersed in a bloody war with no plan for winning and no plan for leaving. We're running the biggest deficit in the history of the country. We're losing the manufacturing edge to Asia , while our once-great companies are getting slaughtered by health care costs. Gas prices are skyrocketing, and nobody in power has a coherent energy policy. Our schools are in trouble. Our borders are like sieves. The middle class is being squeezed every which way. These are times that cry out for leadership. But when you look around, you've got to ask: 'Where have all the leaders gone?' Where are the curious, creative communicators? Where are the people of character, courage, conviction, omnipotence, and common sense? I may be a sucker for alliteration, but I think you get the point. Name me a leader who has a better idea for homeland security than making us take off our shoes in airports and throw away our shampoo? We've spent billions of dollars building a huge new bureaucracy, and all we know how to do is react to things that have already happened Name me one leader who emerged from the crisis of Hurricane Katrina. Congress has yet to spend a single day evaluating the response to the hurricane, or demanding accountability for the decisions that were made in the crucial hours after the storm. Everyone's hunkering down, fingers crossed, hoping it doesn't happen again Now, that's just crazy. Storms happen. Deal with it. Make a plan. Figure out what you're going to do the next time. Name me an industry leader who is thinking creatively about how we can restore our competitive edge in manufacturing. Who would have believed that there could ever be a time when 'The Big Three' referred to Japanese car companies? How did this happen, and more important, what are we going to do about it? Name me a government leader who can articulate a plan for paying down the debt, or solving the energy crisis, or managing the health care problem. The silence is deafening. But these are the crises that are eating away at our country and milking the middle class dry. I have news for the gang in Congress. We didn't elect you to sit on your asses and do nothing and remain silent while our democracy is being hijacked and our greatness is being replaced with mediocrity. What is everybody so afraid of? That some bonehead on Fox News will call them a name? Give me a break. Why don't you guys show some spine for a change? Had Enough? Hey, I'm not trying to be the voice of gloom and doom here. I'm trying to light a fire. I'm speaking out because I have hope, I believe in America . I n my lifetime I've had the privilege of living through some of America 's greatest moments. I've also experienced some of our worst crises: the 'Great Depression', 'World War II', the 'Korean War', the 'Kennedy Assassination', the 'Vietnam War', the 1970s oil crisis, and the struggles of recent years culminating with 9/11. If I've learned one thing, it's this: 'You don't get anywhere by standing on the sidelines waiting for somebody else to take action. Whether it's building a better car or building a better future for our children, we all have a role to play. That's the challenge I'm r aising in this book. It's a call to 'Action' for people who, like me, believe in America . It's not too late, but it's getting pretty close. So let's shake off the crap and go to work.Let's tell 'em all we've had 'enough.' Excerpted from 'Where Have All the Leaders Gone?'. Copyright (c) 2007 by Lee Iacocca. All rights reserved.
OBAMA '08 YES WE CAN!! AND WE MUST!!
Check out video below from the movie, Network. Sound familiar?
http://youtube.com/watch?v=90ELleCQvew
http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/4/11/222036/551
Barack Obama continues to hold a significant lead over Hillary Clinton, 51% to 43%, in Democratic voters' presidential nomination preferences.
Received this "Letter to the Editor" in my personal email. Please circulate far and wide. Thanks.
As a 78 year old American of African descent, I feel compelled to respond to all this "much ado about nothing" when it comes to the statement that Michelle Obama made about the fact that this is the first time in her adult life that she has been proud to be an American. The country needs to hear this from the Black perspective. Long before I was born, my grandfather Joseph Burleson, owned a considerable amount of land in oil rich Texas. Because during that era, Blacks could not vote, nor could they contest anything in the courts of the United States...Do you think I am proud of that? ...In 1943 my parents attempted to buy the 2 flat at 5338 South Kenwood, in Hyde Park, Chicago, IL we were told that we could not buy it because there was a restrictive covenant that said that the property was never to be sold to "Negroes." Do you think I am PROUD OF THAT? ...My cousin's barbershop was bombed in Mississippi in the 50's because he was encouraging Black people to register to vote. ..Is that something I should be PROUD OF? Now we get to Rev. Jeremiah Wright,... Would any of the talking heads who are so alarmed by Rev. Wright's thoughts and speeches suggest that Catholics should abandon their faith or denounce and reject the Pope because so many priests have molested children? ... Should Governor Romney denounce and reject the Mormon Church because some of their members practice polygamy? ...Like, Michelle Obama, after living in this country all of my 78 years, loving my country and not understanding why my country has not loved me, I now for the first time in my adult life feel PROUD OF MY COUNTRY because I sense a maturing, a recognition of talent and character, and not color, and a field of candidates aspiring to l ead this nation coming from very diverse backgrounds of gender, religious beliefs, national origin, ethnicity, age and experiences. This to me is the HOPE that America is coming into her own and will begin to CHANGE and will embrace the philosophy upon which this country was founded, where all men are created equal and are entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Now I truly believe, YES WE CAN!
For further information: Contact: Helen L. Burleson, Doctor of Public Administration (708) 747-0919
