Posts with the tag truth

In closing....2009

Josh Lelah "TRUTH" — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 23:13:23 EST

This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Farewell; my blessing season this in thee!

"I will be what I will to be"
"Love thy neighbor as thy self"
KEEP IT REAL

Dedicated to my Grandma Rosie.....

She said Joshie, "Red, white and blue your father is a Jew"

The Creator Wise and Kind" is "against all cunning or trickery." A simple statement really, referring to genetics as man's creator. The ancient square Hebrew characters wrote the Torah. The Torah is a genetic map of the human genome and its many translations throughout time. So these characters align with the 64 base combinations and the four letter genetic language.

Though Hebrew is written right to left and each letter left to right, if you note the two parallel lines in the center and the letters to the left you see a lateral inversion of those letters. Here in this two sets of three........and in the second set containing the letter Daled, or the number 4, it also is the word that means THE DOOR. If these letters are applied to the base sets of our genetic alphabet it defines the letter g for guanine that was replaced by a t for thymine marking the area of our genetic frameshift. If conceived within the circuitry of Earth's grid or template it indicates the break where the lines of electromagnetic fields have broken communication between energy and mass to transmit the message for the language of one. It also indicates that there are four inversions required to copy or replicate our gene transfer not six. (Bl. Mclanahan)

PART 2

George Washington's
Farewell AddressTo the People of the United StatesFRIENDS AND FELLOW-CITIZENS:
1 The period for a new election of a citizen, to administer the executive government of the United States, being not far distant, and the time actually arrived, when your thoughts must be employed designating the person, who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public voice, that I should now apprize you of the resolution I have formed, to decline being considered among the number of those out of whom a choice is to be made.

2 I beg you at the same time to do me the justice to be assured that this resolution has not been taken without a strict regard to all the considerations appertaining to the relation which binds a dutiful citizen to his country; and that in withdrawing the tender of service, which silence in my situation might imply, I am influenced by no diminutionof zeal for your future interest, no deficiency of grateful respect for your past kindness, but am supported by a full conviction that the step is compatible with both.

3 The acceptance of, and continuance hitherto in, the office to which your suffrages have twice called me, have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the opinion of duty, and to a deference for what appeared to be your desire. I constantly hoped, that it would have been much earlier in my power, consistently with motives, which I was not at liberty to disregard, to return to that retirement, from which I had been reluctantly drawn. The strength of my inclination to do this, previous to the last election, had even led to the preparation of an address to declare it to you; but mature reflection on the then perplexed and critical posture of our affairs with foreign nations, and the unanimous advice of persons entitled to my confidence impelled me to abandon the idea.

4 I rejoice, that the state of your concerns, external as well as internal, no longer renders the pursuit of inclination incompatible with the sentiment of duty, or propriety; and am persuaded, whatever partiality may be retained for my services, that, in the present circumstances of our country, you will not disapprove my determination to retire.

5 The impressions, with which I first undertook the arduous trust, were explained on the proper occasion. In the discharge of this trust, I will only say, that I have, with good intentions, contributed towards the organization and administration of the government the best exertions of which a very fallible judgment was capable. Not unconscious, in the outset, of the inferiority of my qualifications, experience in my own eyes, perhaps still more in the eyes of others, has strengthened the motives to diffidence of myself; and every day the increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more, that the shade of retirement is as necessary to me as it will be welcome. Satisfied, that, if any circumstances have given peculiar value to my services, they were temporary, I have the consolation to believe, that, while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it.

6 In looking forward to the moment, which is intended to terminate the career of my public life, my feelings do not permit me to suspend the deep acknowledgment of that debt of gratitude, which I owe to my beloved country for the many honors it has conferred upon me; still more for the steadfast confidence with which it has supported me; and for the opportunities I have thence enjoyed of manifesting my inviolable attachment, by services faithful and persevering, though in usefulness unequal to my zeal. If benefits have resulted to our country from these services, let it always be remembered to your praise, and as an instructive example in our annals, that under circumstances in which the passions, agitated in every direction, were liable to mislead, amidst appearances sometimes dubious, vicissitudes of fortune often discouraging, in situations in which not unfrequently want of success has countenanced the spirit of criticism, the constancy of your support was the essential prop of the efforts, and a guarantee of the plans by which they were effected. Profoundly penetrated with this idea, I shall carry it with me to my grave, as a strong incitement to unceasing vows that Heaven may continue to you the choicest tokens of its beneficence; that your union and brotherly affection may be perpetual; that the free constitution, which is the work of your hands, may be sacredly maintained; that its administration in every department may be stamped with wisdom and virtue; than, in fine, the happiness of the people of these States, under the auspices of liberty, may be made complete, by so careful a preservation and so prudent a use of this blessing, as will acquire to them the glory of recommending it to the applause, the affection, and adoption of every nation, which is yet a stranger to it.

7 Here, perhaps I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare which cannot end but with my life, and the apprehension of danger, natural to that solicitude, urge me, on an occasion like the present, to offer to your solemn contemplation, and to recommend to your frequent review, some sentiments which are the result of much reflection, of no inconsiderable observation, and which appear to me all-important to the permanency of your felicity as a people. These will be offered to you with the more freedom, as you can only see in them the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly have no personal motive to bias his counsel. Nor can I forget, as an encouragement to it, your indulgent reception of my sentiments on a former and not dissimilar occasion.

8 Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm the attachment.

9 The unity of Government, which constitutes you one people, is also now dear to you. It is justly so; for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquillity at home, your peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very Liberty, which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that, from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment, that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national Union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the Palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion, that it can in any event be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts.

10 For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens, by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of american, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have in a common cause fought and triumphed together; the Independence and Liberty you possess are the work of joint counsels, and joint efforts, of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.

11 But these considerations, however powerfully they address themselves to your sensibility, are greatly outweighed by those, which apply more immediately to your interest. Here every portion of our country finds the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and preserving the Union of the whole.

12 The North, in an unrestrained intercourse with the South, protected by the equal laws of a common government, finds, in the productions of the latter, great additional resources of maritime and commercial enterprise and precious materials of manufacturing industry. The South, in the same intercourse, benefiting by the agency of the North, sees its agriculture grow and its commerce expand. Turning partly into its own channels the seamen of the North, it finds its particular navigation invigorated; and, while it contributes, in different ways, to nourish and increase the general mass of the national navigation, it looks forward to the protection of a maritime strength, to which itself is unequally adapted. The East, in a like intercourse with the West, already finds, and in the progressive improvement of interior communications by land and water, will more and more find, a valuable vent for the commodities which it brings from abroad, or manufactures at home. The West derives from the East supplies requisite to its growth and comfort, and, what is perhaps of still greater consequence, it must of necessity owe the secure enjoyment of indispensable outlets for its own productions to the weight, influence, and the future maritime strength of the Atlantic side of the Union, directed by an indissoluble community of interest as one nation. Any other tenure by which the West can hold this essential advantage, whether derived from its own separate strength, or from an apostate and unnatural connexion with any foreign power, must be intrinsically precarious.

13 While, then, every part of our country thus feels an immediate and particular interest in Union, all the parts combined cannot fail to find in the united mass of means and efforts greater strength, greater resource, proportionably greater security from external danger, a less frequent interruption of their peace by foreign nations; and, what is of inestimable value, they must derive from Union an exemption from those broils and wars between themselves, which so frequently afflict neighbouring countries not tied together by the same governments, which their own rivalships alone would be sufficient to produce, but which opposite foreign alliances, attachments, and intrigues would stimulate and embitter. Hence, likewise, they will avoid the necessity of those overgrown military establishments, which, under any form of government, are inauspicious to liberty, and which are to be regarded as particularly hostile to Republican Liberty. In this sense it is, that your Union ought to be considered as a main prop of your liberty, and that the love of the one ought to endear to you the preservation of the other.

14 These considerations speak a persuasive language to every reflecting and virtuous mind, and exhibit the continuance of the union as a primary object of Patriotic desire. Is there a doubt, whether a common government can embrace so large a sphere? Let experience solve it. To listen to mere speculation in such a case were criminal. We are authorized to hope, that a proper organization of the whole, with the auxiliary agency of governments for the respective subdivisions, will afford a happy issue to the experiment. It is well worth a fair and full experiment. With such powerful and obvious motives to Union, affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those, who in any quarter may endeavour to weaken its bands.

15 In contemplating the causes, which may disturb our Union, it occurs as matter of serious concern, that any ground should have been furnished for characterizing parties by Geographical discriminations, Northern and Southern, Atlantic and Western; whence designing men may endeavour to excite a belief, that there is a real difference of local interests and views. One of the expedients of party to acquire influence, within particular districts, is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districts. You cannot shield yourselves too much against the jealousies and heart-burnings, which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend to render alien to each other those, who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection. The inhabitants of our western country have lately had a useful lesson on this head; they have seen, in the negotiation by the Executive, and in the unanimous ratification by the Senate, of the treaty with Spain, and in the universal satisfaction at that event, throughout the United States, a decisive proof how unfounded were the suspicions propagated among them of a policy in the General Government and in the Atlantic States unfriendly to their interests in regard to the mississippi; they have been witnesses to the formation of two treaties, that with Great Britain, and that with Spain, which secure to them every thing they could desire, in respect to our foreign relations, towards confirming their prosperity. Will it not be their wisdom to rely for the preservation of these advantages on the union by which they were procured? Will they not henceforth be deaf to those advisers, if such there are, who would sever them from their brethren, and connect them with aliens?

16 To the efficacy and permanency of your Union, a Government for the whole is indispensable. No alliances, however strict, between the parts can be an adequate substitute; they must inevitably experience the infractions and interruptions, which all alliances in all times have experienced. Sensible of this momentous truth, you have improved upon your first essay, by the adoption of a Constitution of Government better calculated than your former for an intimate Union, and for the efficacious management of your common concerns. This Government, the offspring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed, adopted upon full investigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its principles, in the distribution of its powers, uniting security with energy, and containing within itself a provision for its own amendment, has a just claim to your confidence and your support. Respect for its authority, compliance with its laws, acquiescence in its measures, are duties enjoined by the fundamental maxims of true Liberty. The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their Constitutions of Government. But the Constitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish Government presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established Government.

17 All obstructions to the execution of the Laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels, and modified by mutual interests.

18 However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people, and to usurp for themselves the reins of government; destroying afterwards the very engines, which have lifted them to unjust dominion.

19 Towards the preservation of your government, and the permanency of your present happy state, it is requisite, not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority, but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be to effect, in the forms of the constitution, alterations, which will impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be invited, remember that time and habit are at least as necessary to fix the true character of governments, as of other human institutions; that experience is the surest standard, by which to test the real tendency of the existing constitution of a country; that facility in changes, upon the credit of mere hypothesis and opinion, exposes to perpetual change, from the endless variety of hypothesis and opinion; and remember, especially, that, for the efficient management of our common interests, in a country so extensive as ours, a government of as much vigor as is consistent with the perfect security of liberty is indispensable. Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian. It is, indeed, little else than a name, where the government is too feeble to withstand the enterprises of faction, to confine each member of the society within the limits prescribed by the laws, and to maintain all in the secure and tranquil enjoyment of the rights of person and property.

20 I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the state, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party, generally.

21 This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.

22 The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries, which result, gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of Public Liberty.

23 Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind, (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight,) the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.

24 It serves always to distract the Public Councils, and enfeeble the Public Administration. It agitates the Community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms; kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another.

25 There is an opinion, that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the Government, and serve to keep alive the spirit of Liberty. This within certain limits is probably true; and in Governments of a Monarchical cast, Patriotism may look with indulgence, if not with favor, upon the spirit of party. But in those of the popular character, in Governments purely elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And, there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be, by force of public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, it should consume.

26 It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution, in those intrusted with its administration, to confine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predominates in the human heart, is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositories, and constituting each the Guardian of the Public Weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern; some of them in our country and under our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them. If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way, which the constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for, though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit, which the use can at any time yield.

27 Of all the dispositions and habits, which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and Citizens. The mere Politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connexions with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in Courts of Justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect, that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

28 It is substantially true, that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who, that is a sincere friend to it, can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric ?

29 Promote, then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened.

30 As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public credit. One method of preserving it is, to use it as sparingly as possible; avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace, but remembering also that timely disbursements to prepare for danger frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it; avoiding likewise the accumulation of debt, not only by shunning occasions of expense, but by vigorous exertions in time of peace to discharge the debts, which unavoidable wars may have occasioned, not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burthen, which we ourselves ought to bear. The execution of these maxims belongs to your representatives, but it is necessary that public opinion should cooperate. To facilitate to them the performance of their duty, it is essential that you should practically bear in mind, that towards the payment of debts there must be Revenue; that to have Revenue there must be taxes; that no taxes can be devised, which are not more or less inconvenient and unpleasant; that the intrinsic embarrassment, inseparable from the selection of the proper objects (which is always a choice of difficulties), ought to be a decisive motive for a candid construction of the conduct of the government in making it, and for a spirit of acquiescence in the measures for obtaining revenue, which the public exigencies may at any time dictate.

31 Observe good faith and justice towards all Nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and Morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and, at no distant period, a great Nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt, that, in the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages, which might be lost by a steady adherence to it ? Can it be, that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a Nation with its Virtue? The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices ?

32 In the execution of such a plan, nothing is more essential, than that permanent, inveterate antipathies against particular Nations, and passionate attachments for others, should be excluded; and that, in place of them, just and amicable feelings towards all should be cultivated. The Nation, which indulges towards another an habitual hatred, or an habitual fondness, is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one nation against another disposes each more readily to offer insult and injury, to lay hold of slight causes of umbrage, and to be haughty and intractable, when accidental or trifling occasions of dispute occur. Hence frequent collisions, obstinate, envenomed, and bloody contests. The Nation, prompted by ill-will and resentment, sometimes impels to war the Government, contrary to the best calculations of policy. The Government sometimes participates in the national propensity, and adopts through passion what reason would reject; at other times, it makes the animosity of the nation subservient to projects of hostility instigated by pride, ambition, and other sinister and pernicious motives. The peace often, sometimes perhaps the liberty, of Nations has been the victim.

33 So likewise, a passionate attachment of one Nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite Nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest, in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter, without adequate inducement or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite Nation of privileges denied to others, which is apt doubly to injure the Nation making the concessions; by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained; and by exciting jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld. And it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens, (who devote themselves to the favorite nation,) facility to betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with popularity; gilding, with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for public good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or infatuation.

34 As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments are particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent Patriot. How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practise the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, to influence or awe the Public Councils! Such an attachment of a small or weak, towards a great and powerful nation, dooms the former to be the satellite of the latter.

35 Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens,) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake; since history and experience prove, that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of Republican Government. But that jealousy, to be useful, must be impartial; else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of a defence against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation, and excessive dislike of another, cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other. Real patriots, who may resist the intrigues of the favorite, are liable to become suspected and odious; while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests.

36 The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connexion as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop.

37 Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none, or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.

38 Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people, under an efficient government, the period is not far off, when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality, we may at any time resolve upon, to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel.

39 Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice?

40 It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world; so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best policy. I repeat it, therefore, let those engagements be observed in their genuine sense. But, in my opinion, it is unnecessary and would be unwise to extend them.

41 Taking care always to keep ourselves, by suitable establishments, on a respectable defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies.

42 Harmony, liberal intercourse with all nations, are recommended by policy, humanity, and interest. But even our commercial policy should hold an equal and impartial hand; neither seeking nor granting exclusive favors or preferences; consulting the natural course of things; diffusing and diversifying by gentle means the streams of commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing, with powers so disposed, in order to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our merchants, and to enable the government to support them, conventional rules of intercourse, the best that present circumstances and mutual opinion will permit, but temporary, and liable to be from time to time abandoned or varied, as experience and circumstances shall dictate; constantly keeping in view, that it is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors from another; that it must pay with a portion of its independence for whatever it may accept under that character; that, by such acceptance, it may place itself in the condition of having given equivalents for nominal favors, and yet of being reproached with ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion, which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.

43 In offering to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friend, I dare not hope they will make the strong and lasting impression I could wish; that they will control the usual current of the passions, or prevent our nation from running the course, which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations. But, if I may even flatter myself, that they may be productive of some partial benefit, some occasional good; that they may now and then recur to moderate the fury of party spirit, to warn against the mischiefs of foreign intrigue, to guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism; this hope will be a full recompense for the solicitude for your welfare, by which they have been dictated.

44 How far in the discharge of my official duties, I have been guided by the principles which have been delineated, the public records and other evidences of my conduct must witness to you and to the world. To myself, the assurance of my own conscience is, that I have at least believed myself to be guided by them.

45 In relation to the still subsisting war in Europe, my Proclamation of the 22d of April 1793, is the index to my Plan. Sanctioned by your approving voice, and by that of your Representatives in both Houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it.

46 After deliberate examination, with the aid of the best lights I could obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the case, had a right to take, and was bound in duty and interest to take, a neutral position. Having taken it, I determined, as far as should depend upon me, to maintain it, with moderation, perseverance, and firmness.

47 The considerations, which respect the right to hold this conduct, it is not necessary on this occasion to detail. I will only observe, that, according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the Belligerent Powers, has been virtually admitted by all.

48 The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be inferred, without any thing more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the relations of peace and amity towards other nations.

49 The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be referred to your own reflections and experience. With me, a predominant motive has been to endeavour to gain time to our country to settle and mature its yet recent institutions, and to progress without interruption to that degree of strength and consistency, which is necessary to give it, humanly speaking, the command of its own fortunes.

50 Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am unconscious of intentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope, that my Country will never cease to view them with indulgence; and that, after forty-five years of my life dedicated to its service with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.

51 Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it, which is so natural to a man, who views it in the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations; I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat, in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free government, the ever favorite object of my heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers

Christmas True Meaning and Traditions

James Everitt — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 17:55:10 EST

Christmas True Meaning and Traditions

Christmas has had a long and varied history. It has been celebrated for centuries by different people, at different times, in different places, and in many different ways. Here you will find links to information about the different ways that the holiday we know as Christmas has been celebrated, or not celebrated, over the years.
»Watch video about the history and origins of Christmas

An Ancient Holiday
Some of our modern Christmas traditions have much older roots, going back to pagan European traditions.
»See how people celebrated the winter solstice

Saturnalia
Saturnalia was a Roman celebration in honor of the god Saturn.
»Discover what the Ancient Romans celebrated on December 25th

An Outlaw Christmas
The Puritans didn't believe in the jovial Christmas holiday, so they banned it.
»Find out the penalty for celebrating Christmas

Christmas Reinvented
Americans embraced Christmas in the 19th Century, even inventing some of their own Christmas traditions.
»See how Americans created their own vision of Christmas

A Christmas Carol
Charles Dickens' classic tale reflected and influenced changing ideas about the nature of Christmas.
»Learn how Scrooge and Tiny Tim changed Christmas

Enjoy Christmas with Santa Claus at the North pole, an award-winning Christmas web site. Send a letter to Santa Clause or a Christmas card to a friend.
»Santa Claus and Christmas at the Northpole

The True Meaning of Christmas

"The Real Truth About Santa Claus"

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus!

A famous letter from Virgina O'Hanlon to the editorial of The New York Sun, first printed in 1897.

We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of The Sun:

Dear Editor---

I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, "If you see it in The Sun, it's so." Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?

Virginia O'Hanlon

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!

Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?

True, trew, and troo

Jai from Tucson, AZ — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 18:11:45 EDT

'Just cuz it's true, don't make it a fact.' Has anyone ever said that to you? I began with that because it seems that we've lost sight of the difference between truth and fact. It is true that most people want a government run health care system no matter what the cost. It is a fact that a government run health care system cannot sustain itself while never raising taxes or increasing the deficit. One can be left up to interpretation, meaning it can't be unequivocally proven and is subject to the beliefs of the individual. The other is supported by calculations, documentation, and undeniable truths.
You have to know the difference between your truths and pragmatic truths or facts. I'm a believer, it is my belief (though many may share it), it is my personal truth, I will not argue my beliefs as they are based on my faith rather than empirical evidence. The fact that our government has systematically proven that the more power it is given, the larger it grows, the less capable it is of submitting itself to the will of the people as it is intended to do is a fact. Documents supporting it's original purpose, as well as it's subsequent and gradual demise support that fact. Before you go toe to toe with someone, step back, place your feelings and beliefs on the shelf, make sure you are informed and prepared and then enter into the ring of mental sparring. Do this equipped with knowledge, facts, and an open mind for these are your greatest assets in a discussion. I credit my mother with showing me how to separate the two and have a debate without being personally hurt. How to learn as well as teach and have fun while engaged in a battle of thoughts and ideas.
As I've said before and will say again, one's views are strengthened through the acquisition of knowledge and balanced/reinforced by the views of one's peers. I meant for this to be short lol but it has grown. All I'm saying is do not confuse the two (truth/fact), know the difference and optimize your opportunity to learn and grow.
Or don't lol maybe it's all subject to interpretation...

Abortion in the Health Care Reform Bill?

Rob Heidemann — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 17:05:11 EDT

Abortion in the Health Care Reform Bill: Who is telling the truth?

Healthcare Reform Now!

Med Pro grl CO 2009 — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 03:20:20 EDT

Give me bankruptcy or give me death?

The Status Quo- Insurance Scam.

I work in the medical field and healthcare reform is a great idea. It's about time.

I've sat by powerless, while many people have died in my care waiting for insurance companies to authorize non-formulary medications or treatments. Most people are healthy and don't realize how small the list of authorized formulary items is, until it's too late. Bankruptcy or Death is not what Americans should have to choose between. Health Security should be a right.

Even greedy self-loathing hypocrites whom don't like being GUARANTEED protection will someday need more than they can afford, so then, its illness or bankruptcy or DEATH for themselves or a loved one. Anyone who has tried calling an insurance company knows the truth. There is almost no regulation and mostly people just dance in circles with the insurance companies until it is too late. Time is on the insurance companies’ side. For them, time is money and for us or our families it may be a matter of health or death.

Afraid of the light

Debra — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 18:09:58 EDT

'We understand why children are afraid of darkness but why are people afraid of light?' ~Plato

Since our president's blog has transcended from being a campaign vehicle to a mouthpiece for promoting his agenda to and through the public, then it should be presumed (as he has constantly reminded us) that he wants all points of views and all parties "at the table" to put together reform. The current agenda, as seen on this homepage, is health care reform.

Unfortunately, strategy meetings at the white house have not included all parties but, rather, those individuals from organizations such as Planned Parenthood who have helped him form his personal views and political policies. In the latest of these meetings, attendees were told to remind them (that would be you and me) why we needed his reform package. This doesn't sound like bringing all parties to the table. It is definitely not collaboration in the democratic sense, which Princeton University's Wordnet defines as coaction or acting jointly ( http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=collaboration&sub=Search+WordNet&o2=&o0=1&o7=&o5=&o1=1&o6=&o4=&o3=&h= ) . However, the second definition given of collaboration perhaps is more fitting: "act of cooperating traitorously with an enemy that is occupying your country" . From that view, we can then understand his private strategy sessions with those who have helped form his reform package, and then public appearances before audiences of those with opposing views (identified by the media as conservatives, and by Janet Napolitano as terrorists). This, however, is not collaboration but, rather, the same old politics we have always had in this country. It is simply

INDEPENDENCE DAY ARRIVES

Kelly from Menomonie, WI — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 09:13:38 EDT

What Independence day looks like...

Isaiah 65:17 “For here I am creating new heavens and a new earth; and the former things will not be called to mind, neither will they come up into the heart. 18 But exult,YOU people, and be joyful forever in what I am creating. For here I am creating Jerusalem a cause for joyfulness and her people a cause for exultation. 19 And I will be joyful in Jerusalem and exult in my people; and no more will there be heard in her the sound of weeping or the sound of a plaintive cry.” 20 “No more will there come to be a suckling a few days old from that place, neither an old man that does not fulfill his days; for one will die as a mere boy, although a hundred years of age; and as for the sinner, although a hundred years of age he will have evil called down upon him.

21 And they will certainly build houses and have occupancy; and they will certainly plant vineyards and eat [their] fruitage.

22 They will not build and someone else have occupancy; they will not plant and someone else do the eating. For like the days of a tree will the days of my people be; and the work of their own hands my chosen ones will use to the full.

23 They will not toil for nothing, nor will they bring to birth for disturbance; because they are the offspring made up of the blessed ones of Jehovah, and their descendants with them.

24 And it will actually occur that before they call out I myself shall answer; while they are yet speaking, I myself shall hear. "

Yes the Holy Bible of Jehovah God has promised that the true God will promise what you want and he will not dissappoint. When you vote, why vote for a human just like you? Can you do what you ask President Obama to do? Then do not expect him to do it. Put your trust, instead, in the Almighty God who created you and all the things you see and experience.

Is War the Right Answer?

Maya — Sun, 17 May 2009 20:36:08 EDT

Is it not the time to stop war?

Do we need to fight in the name of national security?

Are we paying attention to every innocent and precious soul in the land attacked?

Have'nt innocent people died in war?

Do we really care?

War needs to be fought with wisdom and love in the heart

Anything attempted with ego will lead to more seperation between humanity

Any action done in fear will not create peace

The leaders need to acknowledge they are also humans trying to have mastery over their ego

The leaders need to acknowledge they have not always acted in truth

The leaders need to acknowledge they are students of life, mastering virtues through life challenges

When we are students, open to being wrong and willing to be taught by everyone

Humanity will have more peace

There is war in Wall street

There is war in Hospitals

There is war at home

There is war in our schools

Have we paid attention to the real problems instead of the symptoms?

We have lost our way from truth

We have lost compassion for our fears, our unconscious negative shadows

Hence we have no compassion for the same reflected in others

Maybe there needs to be the same force, the same passion and the same devotion to love

That was earlier given to war

Maybe our priorities are not right

If we create our reality, dont we have the power to change it?

www.PowerofIllusion.com

Author The Power of Illusion

Ponsjau

Unknown user — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 02:49:21 EDT

Poenau

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To President Barak and Michelle Obama.

JohnB — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 01:04:45 EDT

To President Barak and Michelle Obama.

50+ years of coverup of the sexual abuse of children by Catholic clergy across the globe. 7 years since the global acknowledgement of a coverup in a number of countries. In those 7 years the problem has been found to extend to every country on the planet where the church exists. The numbers of abused is estimated to be in the millions.

What happens to a country and a world which has been deceived for more than 50 years by those who supposedly lead the way. The country suffers from the problems which come from and continue to come from the activities undertaken during those past 50 years by the church in its covering up of the abuses.

The response of our government appears to have been to increase its involvements and workings with this socially dysfunctional church and appears to wish to continue in that way without seeking from the church a definitive point in time for the church to respond in an appropriate manner or to give the people of Australia their democratic right to sayif they wish to continue to trade with a broken Catholic church.

Without proper intervention each American becomes disadvantaged as there is no policy set down as to how our country should deal with the fact that the Church is unable to provide a policy itself while we all understand that is the most basic of things we need from this church so that every American child will not have to find a path through the hypocritical life we provide to them whilst this matter remains unaddressed in our society.

When both Church and State fail us on this scale it is the children who suffer first and suffer the most.

The Church and the Government must take positive and appropriate action. Itis both inappropriate and dysfunctional for Governments right across the world to continue to trade with this church until we have a clear understanding of how both your Government and the Catholic Church make it clear to us all just how they are going to resolve the matter of the sexual abuse of our children by so many priests of the worlds' leading Christian Church.

We obviously see both Church and State repeatedly fail to act in the light of this understanding and in the knowledge of the harm this causes our world and the lives of each of us living it.

Set aside September 1st 2009 as the last day we get to hear any leader inthe world utter the words "This is a matter for the Church" when he speaks of the children sexually abused by clergy.

Set aside September 1st 2009 as the day your Government and the Catholic Church provide us all with a clear and appropriate set of policies making it clear to us how we can live our lives without these aberrant behaviours from both Church and Government.

Barak, as the President of The United States we simply take your support for granted.

rgds

John Brown

NIHILISM, WILL WORDS ALWAYS BRING YOU TO

caring_independent — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 14:17:06 EDT

does fear of flying or death take us there
to know life older than any witness
and now past, may have eyes forseen our dare
to greedily seek for our uniqueness
once tearing free from our primitive root
more fragile than the tree, to think and will
could humanity take us from dispute
or will violence feed us our fatal pill?

concern not for another's attendance
who keeps to assuage intellectual pride
as captains map amoral contrivance
of right, but confess a just course abide
they'll speak with no doubt of true direction
while more, appeasing perceived mutinies
than terms imbibed in common religion
could we know truth from man's hypotheses?

coroners will define life from its death
and vision life's divination by line
like rings of trees never reveal its breath
will Horus' eye remain bounded in trine
fingers and symbols just point back at you
like breath is not caught in your reflection
Nihilism, will words always bring you to
why, do we accept nothing over One?

Written 3/17/2009, Copyright ME Wilson

For those who cannot find local OFA Listening Tour

Truthdancer — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 18:23:56 EDT

The Austin event is full. The next are too far for most of us, especially the elderly, or those who cannot drive at night. My home is large and about 5 minutes N of Austin. If we can set-up remote, or, otherwise, make arrangements, I'd like to offer my space. Since there may be fewer attendees due to our disabilities, I believe we may have adequate and comfortable space. Should anyone else find themselves in similar positions to mine, I'd like to hear from you. I'd also need to hear from the "OFA" on how to accomplish this effort. Our community is small and not so likely to get an equal voice. Please help us if you can. You may reach me at m_11@att.net, or 512-251-9091.

Also, I notice there are several mistakes on my "dashboard", but cannot figure out how to correct them. Anyone?

One last and crucial matter. I've received several calls this week from "Right to Lifers". They are beside themselves with pain and worry. It is being passed around that our President may be the strongest abortionist of all time. This is tragic and I certainly can't accept it. However, there is one point I'd like to make. IF we care for women, their health and rights, we must do as much as is right to help them. At the same time, IF we care for the most vulnerable and helpless of our people, we owe them rights, care and compassion. I have carried enough children to know that the excuse for the word "fetus" is false and an attempt to shed our guilt and lack of knowledge. I carried children. Each child was as different as you, or I. We have learned more and more that their awareness is greater, by far, than many want to believe. Rights for women and for children must not include "partial birth abortion". Compromise we must, but murder, we must not! How many of you have seen the baby fight dreadfully to avoid the needle (or by whatever barbaric assault is now popular)? Of course, he cannot. His life is over. Bleeding to death may not be so painful, but how many of you have fought for your own survival? Then, the carving begins. If at all possible, the mother will escape the scene of slaughter, but somewhere in her being, she will never escape. The deepest harm may be hers. I've been told so by several mothers who carry persistent emotional pain.—physical, as well. Before any paper is written, nor any pen raised, be a witness. Don't turn your back and vote. Look straight ahead; watch each moment, help dispose of "the parts". Do not let "med-speak" shelter you from the truth. I beg you. We must help all we can, but this devastating murder must not be a part of it. Let's work hard to do what is as good and right as it can be for every parent and every child.

Good Friday- Easter Sunday?

C.O.P.S. Communities Opposing Political Slavery — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 04:17:07 EDT

How many leaders of Churches told their members that Jesus Christ dyed on Friday and was resurrected on Sunday? The prophecy that Christ would remain in the grave for three days and three nights makes the theory of Easter Sunday Jesus rising with the sun mathematically impossible. What do we know? 1) We know that he was to remain in the grave for three days and three nights. 2) They were in a hurry to put him in the grave because the next day (night fall) was quickly approaching when all work was to be finished. No work was to be done because it was the holy day of the Passover. 3) The grave was discovered empty early on the first day of the week (Sunday). 4) Christ observed the Passover super early and this was allowed by Jewish custom if one was going to not be present for the Passover Feast. The Festival of Unleavened Bread lasted for seven days the first day there was to be no work and on the seventh day they were to observe a day of rest. Exodus 12:1-6 1"And the LORD spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt saying, 2This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you. 3Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, in the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for a house: 4And if the household be too little for the lamb let him and his neighbour next unto his house take it according to the number of the souls; every man according to his eating shall make your count for the lamb. 5Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year: ye shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats: 6And ye shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening." God gave Moses, Aaron and anyone who reads and understands the exact day and time we are to annually celebrate Passover. The correct translation for part of verse six is very interesting “Israel shall kill it in the evening” this actually means, between the two evenings between 3 P.M. and 6 p.m. this means that Christ was crucified on the exact day and exact time that God the Father said he would and the Jewish people had observe from the time of Moses. When I understood the poetry and beauty of that truth it gave me a new respect for the god of my forefathers and Mosses. I hope it helps those that search for truth.

If We Don't Fix Today, There Will Be No Future Generations

Herb Anthony — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 06:11:06 EST

Everyone seems so concerned of leaving a whopping debt to future generations. If we don't fix things in time,,,, WHAT FUTURE GENERATIONS? We are here NOW. Fix our economy, fix our ecological mess and maybe, perhaps MAYBE,,,, the generations to come will have a CHANCE to pay back whatever debt we leave them, if we fix it in a thoughtful and systematic manner.

If there IS a God,,,,,, he gave us the intellect (well some of us!!!) and dexterity to follow in "His" footsteps. "In his image and likeness." Doesn't likeness mean with the same potential?

If there is NO GOD,,,, we better get off our duffs and dig in to do the job ourselves anyway.

To me it is fairly irrelevant if there is or isn't a "God."

God gave us the tools and we used them to create this mess. Therefore,,,, isn't it up to us to fix it?

As far as enough time,,,,, well, time and space are relative, right? So if not "this time," then next.

The diversity of time line scenarios converge and intersect at intervals. Lets merge the convergence into a smooth future time line of peace and harmony rather than splitting the avenues of our future into tiny bits of fragmented DUST that will travel no longer into realms of time and space.

Thanks,,,,, for the opportunity to chime in. Irp Snerple The Rabble Rousing Pleiadian Dragon/Lion

www.jamwave.com/IrpSnerple

THE TRUTH HURTS...reply

Citizens for Change in America! — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 22:37:56 EST

The Truth HURTS…
This economic problem has always been about choice…what you decided to do with your money in the past and in the future is your choice that you have everyday of your life…AMERICA faces these choices and ALL of the AMERICAN PEOPLE will have to decide…
FACT: you paid off your house
FACT: you paid off your car
FACT: you paid off you credit cards
FACT: you paid off your investments
FACT: you paid off your bills
FACT: you paid off your expenses
FACT: you paid off your children’s educational expenses
FACT: you paid off you children’s college bills
FACT: you paid off your taxes
FACT: you paid off everything
FACT: DID YOU REALLY PAY and then some…so everyone can do WHAT EVER they desire…even for WRONG THINGS…for other peoples houses, cars, sunroofs, tinted glass windows, gas, tires, trucks, options, investments, summer homes, time shares, tips, trips, vacations, heat, electricity, clothing, food, college, medical, insurance, stocks, interest, bank loans, credit card bills, EVEN WRONG business CHOICES…did you…make these choices…take these risks…live this lie of fake prosperity.
The banks, brokerage houses, insurance companies and government offices…
all are having fun making choices with other peoples money…
yes everyone…especially those that might be considered too big to fail?
REMEMBER the BASICS (part of the costs of doing business is loss in theft, shrink and bad accounts…this is in all business models as experts are taught by experts…PROFESSORS teaching MBA’s and CPA’s for CEO’s and Presidents)
All the experts…
take their pay for whatever good or bad decisions and answers they tell you…
TALK IS CHEAP…but YOU PAY for all the CHOICES
YOURS…THEIRS…and everyone else in between…
every person not living by the Facts…
but by the MYTH…
Is sold on the idea to fill up every living Mystical Fantasy and Desire…
that is the Prophecy of EXPERTS…
fed to the people on both ends of AMERICA
Economic and Political
FACE the MUSIC…
BROKE is BROKE…
Do not hand me your meal ticket…I did not eat your lunch!
I did not own your business, bank, brokerage company, bakery, battery company, best shop or basket case…
do not give me your bills…
I didn’t get any of your pleasures, profits or perks…
I didn’t benefit from any of your lavish life style…
I didn’t get any thing before…
I don’t want anything now…especially, not any of your bills!
YOU went broke…not me…
You didn’t pay any of my bills…
You didn’t worry about feeding my children or sending them to school…
YOU KEEP YOUR OWN choices to yourself this time too…
IT'S YOUR CHOICE to keep the TRUTH...
PAIN FREE!

There must be a Truth Commission...

The Texican — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 06:33:58 EST

As much as I love our new President, there is one thing I disagree vehmently with him on, and that's about investigating the criminals that have been wrecking our country for the past 8 years.

Mr. President believes that we should be looking forward, not backwards. OK. Lets look at an American President 20 or 30 years from now who, not thinks, but knows that he can get away with the kinds of crimes that were a hallmark of the Bush years and go Bush even one better (ie worse). And then we can see, in hindsight, that perhaps it wasn't such a good idea to let BushCo offthe hook. Just like now we see that it wasn't such a great idea for Ford to pardon Nixon - because Bush did everything that Nixon did, but worse and he practically bragged about it & waved it in our faces.

The people are demanding it, Mr. President. We are a nation of laws and to say that a Truth Commission is looking backwards is to also say that any investigation of any rapist, thief, murderer, etc. should be dropped because, HEY!, it's in the past! Also, the crimes that were committed were against US, those three little words at the top of the US Constitution. We are the victims of those crimes, and victims have rights as well.

So, please, Mr. President, soften your stance against an investigation into the crimes of the previous 8 years. It will help the nations heal from these injuries a lot better and faster.

V is for Vision

coralights — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 03:41:34 EST

I have always thought of myself as a visionary. Often future events I've anticipated but didn't share with others have come to pass.

But at age 63 - I can look back and see that my vision was obstructed.

We all live with these obstructions. What we are taught, what we hear, feel and see - and most of all what we don't learn about ourselves and others until it's too late

This blog is dedicated to me, you, our President, and truth, hope, and justice for all.

Truth and Reconciliaton

Gib Robinson — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 12:55:42 EST

While I understand the President Elect's call to focus on the present and the future rather than dwell on the past I believe it is crucial to the future health of our nation to come to terms with what has happened during the two terms of the Bush administration.

Many of us experienced the shame and humiliation that comes from watching the ideals, values, and laws of this country trashed by the outgoing administration and although I have no need to see offenders sent to prison, I have a deep desire to see Congress and the in-coming administration unearth the facts of the last eight years so that we can face the truth of all that was done by the Bush Administration in the name of patriotism and security. I want to know what laws were broken and by whom; I want to know how the mission of agencies such as the EPA, Interior, the FDA and the Office of the Attorney General were distorted or thwarted by those appointed to lead them; I want to know how the “inconvenient truths” of good science and solid evidence was turned aside to prevent good decision-making; in short, I want to know how politics and idiology undermined competence and good government in the past eight years. How can we move forward with confidence if we are not willing to face where we have been? It is often said that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Let’s not miss our opportunity to learn from the past even while we move forward.

THE AUTO INDUSTRY, A FEW OF MY PERSONAL EXPERIENCES (INDUSTRIAL GREED):

Alex Karoub — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 21:14:47 EST

Contact: Alex.Karoub@gmail.com

This post is a brief overview of the Automotive Industry which describes some of the fundamental problems that are rarely spoken of. In addition, you will learn of a few of my personal experiences growing up, an environment where I was surrounded by the industry; you will learn of a few perspectives that are shocking and that even only a few within the industry know of. At the end of the post, you will better understand what happened to American Manufacturing and where it stands.

The Auto Industry is at the heart of all of American Manufacturing. It is an industry that laid the groundwork for many other types of industries to follow, deemed at one point in history to be the highest of successes. But now, it sheds light on what can become warning signs for other businesses that mistakenly try to imitate it.

This months hot topic is whether to bailout/rescue the regressing American Auto Industry. The original owners and their successors abandoned that industry long ago. The auto industry was ravaged and plundered by the wealthiest Americans a half century ago and has been in decline ever since. Shortsighted greed from one generation to the next has been the culprit. Since autos were first mass-produced and America monopolized the world, it was only natural that the American percentage/share of the market would eventually be reduced. However, total growth was enormous and total size of the market continues to grow even through today. Therefore, American growth of exports should have continued to grow, but does not significantly due to pillage and poorly planted roots. In simpler terms, we originally owned the entire pie. The pie was split up. Since the entire pie has grown dramatically, our piece should have grown too. However, the Big 4, 3, 2, … have been loosing market dominance and lead since the end of World War Two. Here we are years later in crisis, and the real question remains whether or not to rescue the real victims of the auto industry, the workers. People were not retrained or re-educated; most were never afforded real education's to start. People are now in despair and hopelessness. From my vantage point now living in Colorado for the last two decades, I have seen the high tech industry follow the auto industry, but at a learned and accelerated rate. Other industries are also copying the auto industry and are laying similar foundations also headed for disaster. Going back to a brief history, the misguided roots show how the decay started and why it spread.

Although I did not grow-up during the inception of the Auto Industry, its roots surrounded me. I spoke with a few who were there in the earliest days, and spoke with many who were of the following generation. I absorbed its history by studying it while attending school in Motown (Motor Town), by natural osmosis, and in my earliest career dealing with the car makers.

Growing up as a kid I lived less than a mile from Henry Ford's first moving assembly line factory, with GM’s World Headquarters’ just three miles away, and with Chryslers World Headquarters at the end of our street. The first Ford plant (in Highland Park, a city now surrounded by Detroit) and the first of GM's plants were built on the importation of the next generation of former black slaves and white share crop workers from the south (whites similar to former slaves whose white necks were red from working in the sunny fields, hence the mean spirited term 'Redneck'). The joke that Henry Ford must have laughed at and that went around town was "each worker would get paid enough to buy a Ford" (Of course using infamous 'Ford Credit' which was a primary direct withdrawal from their pay checks.) Henry manipulated a built-in guaranteed customer base and tapped double profits, being profits on the cars and the profitable bonded interest. Those were scams that he copied from sharecropping. The remains of their wages were so low that they had to live in shacks; but after all Henry felt, they came from shacks near the fields in the south. So much bigotry and repeated methods from sharecrop economic slavery. Instead of updating and rebuilding the original plants and without regard for the people who were the workers, the emerging auto giants left to go further to the suburbs.

So, as they moved and grew they imported shipload after shipload of immigrant economic slaves from Poland (to Hamtramck, MI) and more economic slaves from the Middle East (to Dearborn, MI). There were other minorities imported as well, also imported for economic servitude to supporting industries such as mining, iron works, steel fabrication, glass works, textile, …. Astonishing how easily the game of 'divide and conquer' worked upon the variety of minorities; a game of keeping the workers pitted against each other using race and ethnicity; all to hold back the power of the people from truly uniting. WW2 caused the Automakers not only to retool but also to reevaluate their future directions.

Soon, after the victory of WW2, came the Auto Giants grand visions for economically conquering the world via expansion outside the U.S. They quietly boasted that that would leave mainly world headquarters executives, designers, and engineers in the U.S. with the prestigious white-collar jobs. It was felt then (and these are not my bigoted opinions, not from me, yikes) that after all even 'the weaker sex' could do factory labor jobs as seen during WW2 (i.e. Rosie the Riveter). So why not have the 'stupid foreign workers' do the labor outside the U.S. What also gave way to the idea that manufacturing could succeed outside the U.S. was Mexico; since Mexican workers were also imported, but only temporarily during WW2. (By the way, the temporary Mexican workers were never fully paid back as promised during WW2.) A tremendous wave of pride about white-collar jobs became very popular in Detroit and in other automotive communities during the 50's. That vision sat poised on the back burner, but a pre-planted seed was already in place, which was Canada (Windsor) just across the Detroit River.

Canada was a much-desired orchestrated precedence for the automakers; it set the stage for grace given by the government as an easily set up protocol for off-shoring jobs. Soon after, the automakers made a migration south to other states, then further south to Mexico, and finally overseas and on to economic slavery in China.

Today we see the results of the destructive path the industry has taken. Layoffs, instead of being temporary situations reserved for pauses during new model changeovers, eventually became the mark of permanent labor plant closures. Obvious abandonment of people soon became the name of the automakers game. Along the swathed trail are - Highland Park, Detroit, Pontiac, Flint, Marquette, Gary Indiana, Pittsburgh, Toledo, Cleveland, …, which became known in the early 80’s as 'The Rust Bowl’. Sort of a rape, pillage, and burn mentality, which continues to today.

Amazing how well the reasoning of "that's the way it's always been" persists and grows from one generation to the next. Excuse after excuse gave temporary reasoning to incremental geographic movements for global conquer. Temporary excuses ranged from the need to originally amass large workforces, to the hindrance of union pressures, to American workers are lazy, to 'over' government regulation, to …, all straw obstacles as to why the auto industry needed to move as it did.

No! Greed is not good. We see how those at the top of the industry have each come in, grabbed with their greed, and left. Now today, we see how greed has caused "what once was, no longer is". So in short, now we see the results of greed, poorly planted roots, and disregard, taking its toll on America. Equally, is the toll on the myriad of unrelated businesses, old and new, that have adopted the auto industries infectious habits of having little to no regard for individual people that make up the American workforce. People.

While being raised in the center of Detroit, I experienced many situations involving the Auto Industry; the following although early was not my earliest, and is an actual example.

Around 1963, when I was 11 years old, I remember George Romney visiting our house to exchange political favors. Our 23-room house was a rundown relic of a past era, but it cleaned up well as a phony front for wealth and pretentious power. I remember we kids had to pretend that we were Christian Protestants for the visiting Governor (former Chairman of AMC) who was doing his Christian Mormon tradition of visiting the homes of his new legislators. How ostentatious they both were with fraudulent humility of how they rose from their humble beginnings. But more to the point, I remember Romney sitting at our dinning room table and saying "The Big Four Automakers don't have to worry about giving the Unions what they want, as long as the benefits will not be due for decades. By that time the labor plants will be outside the U.S." That shocked my brother Jimmy and I, as we listened playing in the sunroom just off the dinning room. Later we were once again physically punished (beaten-up), this time for listening to adult talk. Jimmy a year older than I, and intellectually gifted, soon became a Page at the State Capital. The accounts he returned with were shocking as well. Growing up as we did would make your head spin and open your eyes to disgust. We continued living in those surroundings until we grew out of our teens. Then we moved on to make our own adult lives, creating better environments much different from what we were born and raised in.

Recalling back to my teens, I realized back then the Detroit riots were not only about race, but was also about economic oppression. It was the minorities who were oppressed the worst, most especially African-Americans. Bad however you measure it is bad. (For a better understanding of the decline of Detroit and to better understand the riots, take a look at my other post: “DETROIT RIOTS OF 1967, A RECOLLECTION OF THE TRUTH.” You will also better understand how very close we came to seeing a nationwide repeat of the riots in the coming Spring of 2009.)

Unions, workers, man-hours, laborers, …, are not people, they are burdens to be minimized and eliminated. While watching Lee Iacocca being interviewed on Charley Rose last year, I noticed Iacocca admit that he new all the way back during negotiations with the unions, in the early 80’s, that Chrysler would never have to pay off in full on long term commitments to the unions. As Iacocca danced around the issue he said "now the unions will have to face reality". And, as Rose went on to discuss it more, Iacocca was getting more uncomfortable, and eventually managed to change the subject away from discussing past union negotiations. Iacocca was a bit slicker than George Romney was, since Iacocca was on national TV. It made me ashamed that Chrysler World Headquarters was at the end of our street when I was a kid. And, that as a young adult I had so proudly in my early career returned while working for a couple of electronics companies to Chrysler's World Headquarters R&D operations. I thought it an honor to have paid Iacocca's in-house barbershop to cut my hair, even his same barber. Some honor.

Following Chrysler, I moved up to deal with GM, and was puzzled. I listened to upper executives at GM complain that they constantly had to bribe Mexican government officials and border guards for GM plants. I guess they also assumed I already new and accepted that the plants in the late 70's had already begun their exodus to Mexico and other countries. I have always looked at bribery as disgusting and wrong, it was not for me or those who I dealt with, that's among the many good things that a mentor named Jack Bazzy taught me as a young kid. By becoming acquainted with other mentors as an adult, I learned to seek out highly reputable employers and quality knowledgeable friends. I learned how to educate myself, and moved up very high in the scientific and technical industries, all of which I enjoyed.

Although I grew up in Highland Park / Detroit, that was not anywhere near my top focus in choosing Obama. But, it is a simple history for me to recall, amazing how many more details I can give, but the main points have been brought forward. In addition, from being a mutt of sorts myself, to being a self made man, be that what it may, I have no illusions of being great. What I do mean here is that I quickly recognize many of Obama's unique insights, although mine are different but a bit similar in nature. Like many Obama supporters, I have personal experiences on most issues Obama has raised. So, above is just one of many examples that I can personally give.

To better understand manufacturing in America, you can read my other blog:
WHAT SCREWED UP MANUFACTURING FOR AMERICA

Blog members can reply here, anyone is welcome to email me at: Alex.Karoub@gmail.com

What Obama's inauguration means to me!

mrcsmitty — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 00:40:31 EST

This inauguration to me means that we have hope for an Honest Government ! That ideas and Facts will be real and not just based on what the highest bidder wants to be fact. That trampling our "lesser" citizens to fill certain pockets with wealth by lies and greed will stop! That ruining our great planet with petroleum products and chemicals only because of bias studies and greed will come to an end! That thousands of Law Enforcement and Border Guards can stop losing their lives over lies and greed! That thousands of Innocent-Honest-Hard Working Americans won't have their Lives and Families ruined by unfair laws funded by lies and greed! That America will be what our Founding Fathers intended it to be, FREE! That our Economy can Flourish with Savings from our bias War on our own people if it were to stop! That Millions of Jobs can be created and sick could have natural relief! That we can end our current failed wars on our people and stop the injustice! That prohibition on our rights will end! That prohibition will end! I know we can do it! YES WE CAN!!! We can be back to an America that's government is OF the people, BY the people, FOR the people and not OVER the people! YES WE CAN!!!

Obama is not eligible to be President

TimeToTellTheTruth.net from Monroe, LA — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 12:07:28 EST

Obama's father was not a U.S. Citizen, therefore Obama is not a "natural born Citizen" as required by the constitution. Congress needs to contest the Electoral Votes and name a President as the 20th Amendment allows. The U.S. Supreme Court should get involved if on January 8, 2009 Congress does not uphold their oath to defend the constitution.

ALTERNATIVE ENERGY

WEBMASTER — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 02:26:14 EST

The Pickens Plan: For those who would like to become an active participant in a solution for our nations energy needs I urge you to join with T.Boone Pickens in his quest for a cleaner planet through alternative energy.

Also see Green Wave Energy: Green Wave was founded by Mark Holmes and was formulated for viable alternative energy solutions. Green Wave Energy is promoting state-of-the-art energy-saving products and services throughout the country.

Green Wave Energy understands alternative energy technology will become “main stream” when

individuals and organizations understand that alternative energy technology exists and
when people see the economic benefits of using alternative energy technologies

Call 949.645.1701 for information on how Green Wave Energy can help you save the planet.

Alternative Energy
Source: David Apperson

url: http://veterans.barackobama.com/page/community/tag/alternative-energy

Dear President Elect,

Mike — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 21:04:23 EST

I think that it is important that I declare a few truths that cannot be denied, so that all who read this can be enlightened about the correct path to true stability. In order to live forever, there needs to be a circle, where the distance between itself (the center) to the ends in which it is established (outer point). To be central, legislation that is necessary and proper, must be equally in effect and obligations to all members. No member should be favored over others.

(Say What?)

The laws of Government should affect the members of that Government equally, and only for the purpose of establishment. If a Government is to Govern conduct between it's members, and uphold the laws equally upon each, as well as those rights that exist in the absence of government. It is the duty of the United States to govern the Conduct between the states, provide for their common defense, and maintain Justice between each. All of which can only be enforced upon members by way of law to acheive the intended end, as long as such an act does not exceed the means to the end.

The Government of the States (The United States) has blurred the perception of the Constitution, which is in effect the "Creator" of that government. It is blurred to take powers never granted during its own establishment from the Government of the People (The State) which has it's own "Creator" it is obliged to observe, and restrict its laws for the purpose in which the existance is necessary. The "God" of one, is not the "God" of the other. They both have members in which they are established to govern, but the governed are exclusively so governed and cannot be within the jurisdiction of the other. A sovereign state must exist before it can be a part of the United States. The sovereignty of the United States relies on the sovereignty found in the state in a related proportion, as is the case with a state.

The political body must always protect the constitution so the principles are maintained and not altered. As the Constitution fixes the Principles, and amendments should only fix any deviations that might come into existance and harmful to liberty, and more. (See Preamble)

How a person thinks, believes, or conducts himself away from the public cannot be the objects of state legislation, but how a person conducts himself with all other persons equally, as long as they contain some form of retribution that is necessary for those acts, should they be found guilty.

How a state enacts policies related to the Government of the People cannot be the objects of Federal Legislative Powers. States are direct members of the Union, and the intended target to be governed. Those conducting business with another state (or modernized, persons in another state other than their own) are bound to respect laws relating to conduct as well as State laws in personal or indvidual affairs.

Those who have attained the age in which they have a right of suffrage, are bound by the laws of the state. Those who have not reached that age cannot be the target of legislation by a state, because it is an obligation of the parent to raise their children so that when they reach the appropriate age, they possess the necessary knowledge required to make a responsible choice. Children are the objects of their parents legislation, which is meant to be tyrannical in nature so that they will recognize freedom and appreciate the benefits found in a democratic form. Members to a Government should seek justice through the government in which they share, and grievances addressed to the same for any inequalities that exist due to the laws they are governed by.

Those laws that are passed must be passed by the two interests affected by the legislation. (Laws relating to race have historically targetted the difference between "white" and "black". If there is no legislative bodies that represents these two groups seperately, then such laws are Unconstitutional, as they do not have their own house under the legislative branch that must have the ability to veto any proposal. There are benefits to an existance of gay persons in the world, because their taxes pay help pay for a part of the education your kids will receive. In order for tax to be Constitutional, the use of such a tax must support the purpose of the Government, as well as result in equal propotions to all states, whose members benefit from Justice maintained between each state.

The word of "God" is Supreme over all others, as is the same with the Constitution that establishes a government. In order to evolve into a better species of Government (People as a whole), they must first treat the space that divides them equally to all, regardless to how small or large, good or bad, respectful or otherwise... The only conduct that should be punishable by law is conduct that infringes on the rights of another. The laws relating to restricting conduct based upon distinct qualities shared by any number less than all should have no place in legislation originating from a government based on the principles of liberty.

Slavery is found in a number of ways, and economic slavery is one of the worst kind to every find a place in this government. The great pyramids in Eqypt being the oldest man made structures in existance gives strength to the concept that exists in nature, and if a global existance is to prevail, it must be based upon the same principles behind fractal art. (geometry) Day should be respected equally to night. Summer to Winter, Spring to Fall. Regardless of preferences that exists, seasons exists, so there is no use in making laws enforcing temperate climates, as they will not likely have an effect.

It seems as if all of what I keep trying to explain is complicated, but there is no simpler truth that exists in nature. Rather than ignore the word of God (that which exists in nature, not claimed by religeous establishements) embrace it, and let those principles guide your judgement, and the judgement of those who will Constitute your administration. My thoughts tend to work much faster than I can ever hope to type, so my apologies if this post has a few grammatical errors.

Thank You for taking the time to associate the circle of life in relation to any existance that should be everlasting.

End Now the Failed Drug War

Robert from Davenport, IA — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 11:10:43 EST

The drug war has failed. It’s Victims come from all walks of life with one thing in common: the drugs they chose to use are illegal. We need to shift our "attack" from Persecution to Education & Treatment.

There has been NO Significant Decrease in drug use since this miserable program was enacted in 1971. And the cost… $50 billion a year (Prevention + Enforcement + Legal Adjudication + Correctional Facilities) For 36 year we have been punishing our citizens, sending them away from their loved ones; their families, their support groups. I ask to what end?

Law Enforcement’s View = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LayaGk0TMDc

We need to start an honest discussion with ourselves and most importantly the young people in this country. “If you do this drug, this will happen” “If you get behind the wheel when drunk/high, this will happen” “If you take too many prescription pills, this will happen” “If you drink too much, this will happen” and most importantly “Yes, marijuana is a drug, but it’s effect is much less that other

Is full decriminalization the answer? I’m not sure, but lumping marijuana in with Heroin and other harder drugs doesn’t make sense to me. Also, Mandatory Minimum sentencing has proved to be a bad policy… go ask any Judge.

Here is one idea of mine: Take the Hard drugs off the street and make them available at drug stores. In order to purchase you will have to take a course to educate yourself on the dangers of drug use. Once you have completed the course you will get a stamp on your driver license’s permitting you to purchase drugs. The license will only be valid for a set number of years at which time you must take a refresher course…. (Politicians; think of the Tax money you can make)

I ask you to please give this issue a new Fresh, Honest, Look.

I CHANGE MY MIND

L. Dampeer — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 04:04:27 EST

I've been online reading blogs for years, yet this is my first. I am so inspired by President Obama and Family that I can't keep quiet any longer. I've honestly been given hope, inspiration and change. THANK YOU!

To Whom It May Concern:

For years i've been on my way back to school to futher my career. I've had plenty to say that was meaningful and from the bottom of my heart. Afraid to walk in the shoes of the person I truely want to be... the person I am. Haven't embraced the extremely artistic portion of myself... my passion. Its crazy how i've taken so much from myself, and pretended not to be as intellectual, and beautiful as I am inside and out. I thought to myself that I didnt want to be intimidating. Didn't say it if I thought it would hurt your feelings. It's fine... I am ok with who and where I am.

What the ____! What really have I been thinking...

Thank You, We the People

Marc from Marina del Rey, CA — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 16:01:25 EST

It has been a long road since the country veered off the constitutional course in the election of 2000 by not counting all the votes. Since that time we have seen and been part of what historians might call the most un-American time in our proud republic. When the founding fathers fought for freedom and declared their independence from tyranny there was a battle cry raised from the army of General George Washington. It was "A call to heaven". Their call was answered, their fight was won, and this unlikeliest of places united under the banner of freedom was born. This brave new world for the first time ever, said that all people are created equal and have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Our United States have grown up a lot since then, but at our core all of us still hold those truths to be self evident. We do come from different backgrounds, with different stories, and different thoughts of what is to protect and grow our fantastic democracy. That’s ok though. We can even disagree on very important issues and how to handle them, but what this election showed was that when the American democratic process involves all of us (about 137 million voted) we are a most powerful force. The world was watching with bated breath hoping that we could lift ourselves up and be the beacon of light again.

On one historic Tuesday we showed what democracy is all about. It doesn’t matter who you voted for or if your person or proposition lost, what matters is that you participated.

You are America; You are why we are free.

I know this stuff might sound corny to some of you, but on election night I was working the phones in a get out the vote effort for my candidate PRESIDENT ELECT BARACK OBAMA at a local bar and restaurant in Venice, CA. named Danny’s Deli. After we were done a few of us stayed to watch the returns. Venice is a pretty big spot for tourists and after a while some folks started joining us to watch history. I soon realized that a few of these people we not from around here, we had Germans, Canadians, and a girl from Scotland. They all were holding their breath along with us while we were waiting for the results. We heard stories about how so many people in their home countries were watching every move that this campaign made. All of them said how important this was to them, how important America is to them. We Americans are the leaders in the world as my new friend from Canada said.

It was still early, a few states for McCain, a few for Obama, nothing concrete yet. Then they called Pennsylvania for Barack, This was a big one, and I told that to my new international election night buddies. The excitement was building and the momentum we starting to go our way, then Ohio. I knew that this could be it but I didn’t say, you never know and of course there was still Florida. We were talking about how the world wanted Obama, how my new friends have been disappointed and scared by Bush. They thought, as did %52 of Americans did, that McCain was going to be just like Bush. And then just like that they called it "We can now project that Barack Obama has won and will be the next president of the United States".

We were all cheering jumping up and down giving each other big hugs, what a long and hard fight, what a moment, what history. My fellow phone bankers were crying my beautiful wife was so happy she couldn’t stop smiling, crying, and clapping for joy. I was still a little stunned. Did this just happen, did we do this, did America just elect the first Professor to be President of the United States? OK I wasn’t actually thinking about his professorship, but hopefully in a time not to long in our future, we will only be thinking about who someone is rather then what they look like.

First McCain came out to give his speech, and I turned to my wife and said that John McCain, the old McCain, can really help our country come back together, I hope he does. My Canadian friend disappeared for a minute and then came back with champagne for all of us. He turned to me and said thank you for saving the world. Saving the world, that’s what people thought was at stake here. Did I just save the world? No I just made some phone calls to remind Americans that the world was in our hands. I was just playing my part, a small one, in this dramatic American story. You all played one too, that’s the point of this post, you and I and all of us played a part, in this new beginning.

Then it was time for PRESIDENT ELECT BARACK OBAMA to take the stage. He was pitch perfect as usual. I was floored, but turning around to look at this new mix of people gathering around the TV to watch a profound moment in history, I noticed something, they were crying, all of them. I knew the folks who were working for Obama would be emotional, but there was not a dry eye in the house. From Scotland, to Germany, to Canada, to Venice Beach CA, his presence, his message of hope, and his strength made a believer of me and of all of them as well.

His message in victory came with the humility of knowing that what lies ahead is no easy task and that it will take all of us, our fellow Americans, and our friends around the world. I think we are ready for the challenge, I think we have been for a long time now but have been waiting for someone to lead. We now have a leader. So it is again time to gather our strength and like the great founders of this country do the hard work, even when we disagree in order to from a more perfect union.

When I got home later that night I was standing outside and looking at the stars, I held my wife real close and she whispered we did it! And just then a brisk wind started blowing, I turned to her and said a line from a Led Zeppelin song, in the light – "well the winds of change will blow around you but you are never alone."

Thank you, my friends, fellow Americans, and citizens around the world. On a transformational Tuesday night in November WE THE PEOPLE SAID YES WE CAN!

I’ll end with this; just think of the Great Ray Charles singing one of my favorite songs about the great country I’m so very proud to call home.

America, America,

God shed his grace on thee,

And crown thy good, with brother hood,

From sea to shining sea.

A mirror reflects the one who is looking at it

Unknown user — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 20:08:42 EST

I am from Turkiye but a man who belongs to this world.

I am an independant film-maker and my passion is telling stories with images. That's why I am not going to prolong my blog. Here is why I support Obama, with a short movie I've made two years ago. The African child in the movie would be Obama's daughter If she wasn't born in America or Obama was still living in Africa. And I believe that he would be the only person who would handle with this truth...

The truth, that is not only in my film,

The truth, that is all "in front of our eyes".

Here it is, the film:

http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=42734492

My Obama Book is Titled: The Audacity of Integrity

Marjani — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 10:56:31 EST

Why Obama will win this election:

America is thirsting and starving for integrity and truth and justice and to restore theoretical American values.

Every time the Republicans do something dumb his numbers go through the roof because people are getting sick of the BS. As an attorney working in the United States of America, Barack Obama knows that if someone accuses him of something, the burden of proof is on them to prove it out. He doesn't have to do anything or say a word. So, he sat back and watched those Republican piranha eat themselves alive. It's classic textbook legal courtroom know-how and savvy, true American-style.

I wish I had enough money to pay him to represent me in my own court case. I'd pay him a million-dollar retainer just from having watched him work in real life. Classic. Helluva lawyer.

He's even got trained volunteers all over the country (including Florida) positioned to watch the polls on Tuesday, along with the sheriff's, cops and lawyers in each polling precinct that were already assigned there. He was Ready on Day One.
If that's not a man who would have been prepared to go into Afghanistan and kick bin Laden's asz and get the hell out without very much loss of life, I don't know who is.

Preparedness always matters -- and so does an exit plan.

He had this campaign mapped out when he threw his hat in the ring. I can tell it by the way he's run it and kept people inspired through two whole LONG years of one hellacious battle after another. He already knew what was coming, he prepared himself, his family, and his supporters, and argued his case before the people like a true American lawyer, betting on the fact that there are more people out here with a little money than the few who have a ton of money. He was right. Even that Andy Martin nutcase backwoods lawyer who challenged him on his Hawaiian birth certificate has GOT to know my now that Obama would knock him cold out in a courtroom, if he ever had the privilege. I mean McCain wasn't even born on US soil and not once has Obama asked for his LONG FORM birth certificate with a raised seal on it.

They've thrown everything at Obama's character and integrity BUT the kitchen sink and he's not even feeling it, at least not in public. He doesn't even have smoke billowing from the coals they tried to burn him with. Looks like America has finally gotten the message that racism doesn't work for ANY OF US, but our thanks go out to McCain, Palin, and especially to Hillary Clinton, for trying it out this election year, and to Obama for addressing it before it went too far with the only people who count. Those who are voting for him.

While the Rethuglicans were busy acting the asz over petty personal crap just because they could find no fault with him politically, he stayed fresh, low-key, focused and on-target...and he didn't let anyone or anything slip out of his razor-sharp aim while he was at it.

He's got the same staff he started off with--nearly zero fallouts, if any. He told people to vote early and vote absentee (basically, because they can choose where they want to vote AND because sheriff's, lawyers, law students, and policeman watch the count on the absentee ballots and "vote counters" are sequestered like jurors on an OJ Simpson trial during the entire process -- LOL!!! Theoretically, I could guess any number of reasons Obama told us to vote early and vote absentee, but that's another book for another time.)

In the meantime, McCain has had to start over with a new staff every 2-3 months. Nobody trusts him and his own people don't like him -OR- Sarah Palin. The people on McCain's OWN campaign call him a nutcase and called her a moose-killing "diva."

The man Obama did not go to law school for nothing and he's been as cool as a cucumber in spite of all the attacks. Whoever paid for his law degree, it was obviously worth every dime.

He just smiles and keeps rolling because he knows he's above reproach and has nothing to hide. What he is "hiding" someone made up just like those people who threw tainted evidence in OJ's trial in California and ended up killing their own case just for trying to be sneaky about it.

If Obama was hiding something, like Sarah Palin did with those governmental Yahoo emails, no one would be able to find it so easily. Yet, his record is right out there for anyone who has internet access and a newspaper or even an old dialer radio to see. That's why he doesn't respond to the attacks unless he has no choice: His whole attitude is 'check the record for your damn self, I've got a campaign to run'.

Funny how people use christianity to manipulate people, then don't act like christians after they get what they want form the idiots who are being played. That's proof positive that America wasn't a christian nation from Day One. However, getting back to my point here:

Not once did Mr. Obama ask to see John-boy's birth certificate, though McCain wasn't even born on American soil, period. Obama has worked in America all of his adult life, and has always paid his taxes here as a citizen, as well. He had to have his birth certificate and social security card to get a driver's license and do anything and everything else he has done as a US citizen, but that wasn't enough for them. He passed their OWN system of checks and balances; then just because he did, they had the audacity to challenge the crap THEY invented. His integrity in attacking McCain on issues ONLY speaks volumes.

The fact that he never once attacked McCain's personal character or his integrity as a man and a citizen of the USA has sent a long and wide viable and visible message to the people who support him, as well as those who weren't supporting him before who have now bailed on McCain.

It says a lot about a man's character when he can stay focused and on point and on message, with a few minor adjustments here or there--because Obama is 'finally' starting to sound like a broken record--which means he is at the closing stages of his argument that not only can America get back on track and fix this Republican-made mess; but yes, we can get past our racial and ethnic and religious differences and be the One America that we should always have been from the start. It's a good thing he sounds like a broken record these days: It means he never lost sight and never lost track of his original goals and intentions. In two years, he never once allowed himself to be side-tracked by the BS. True textbook application of legal theory. Argue your case directly to the jury and to hell with the judges--in the end, the people, the jury of peers, are the ones who get to decide. If OJ WAS guilty, Obama is the man who could have put him behind bars for life.

McCain on the other hand, changes his message depending on who he is talking to and what mood they are in at the moment. Obama stays on message and on point no matter who's yelling "terrorist" and McCain shifts his message depending ON who's yelling "terrorist."

Now, let's see McCain and Palin keep themselves above reproach like that at least until Tuesday: (my guess is, they can't. They started a hailstorm of racist activity by not addressing it from Day One and they have to stay with it or risk some more troublesome news in the next two days).

From what I, Ye Olde American Citizen, have seen so far and for the past two years, the only way they were GOING to take Obama down was if they had managed to rattle enough skeleton bones, dunk enough Klan-type boogey men, slam enough Netherworld coffin lids, and roll out enough short-sheeted ghosts to scare the hell out of everybody. Apparently, they didn't have enough money to buy all of their costumes, props and equipment for the season because they were too busy spending it on Sarah Palin's clothes.

Halloween's over.
It's been real.

Time to move on and get down to the REAL business of electing a president.

Obama 08

Smarter than a 5th Grader

Ken from Long Beach, CA — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 01:45:26 EDT

"TRICK OR TREAT?!!!".....Ohhh, what a cute costume. Hey I see you've worked hard all evening collecting candy,and I see you have plenty. Well Obama says you need to give some of that candy to little Joey next door. You see he stayed home and played video games while you were out collecting candy. Knowing you have to give up some of yours, he's at home expecting you. Thank you, now don't you feel unselfish and patriotic?

Fear and Liars

Mickiboop (P.O.B.) Be the Change — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:35:05 EDT

If you repeat a lie long enough, people will begin to believe it. This is what has happened with the people against Barack Obama. They have been lied to by democrats and republicans for two long years. Since they were pre-determined to believe the worst and vote against Barack, it was easy for them to buy into the lies and fear his presidency. This is what we (Obama supporters) are up against and must fight. McOldness and his cronies have preached hate, fear and division long enough for some people to believe the lies even when you prove the truth to them and serve it on a silver platter.

It is a waste of time to argue any more, but when ever I'm confronted with lies against Barack, I make it my business to prove the truth by showing people where to find it. Please help in directing the trolls and anyone else who needs to know the truth, to our Fight the Smears site, FactCheck.com, Snoopes.org, PolitiFact.com, Truthorfiction.com, or any other reputable sites, blogs and video you know of. Once Barack Obama is the president, we will need all of the people in America to work together and this can only happen if we can change their hearts and minds and win them over with the truth!

Obama - Biden '08, Can't Wait!!!

For Biden, let's clear this one up too...TAXES

Sin City Scott — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 02:51:38 EDT

Joe Biden was correct in his statement that folks making $150,000 would get a tax cut. The oversimplification of the Obama tax policy and the 'taking one phrase out of context' is again mccain/palin sleaze tactics.

Here it is; study it and learn it and make repulsivecants look bushesque!

Per the Tax Policy Center, here is how Barack Obama's tax plan breaks down for individuals:

$0-$18,891 = $567 tax cut
$18,982-$37,595 = $892 tax cut
$37,596-$66,354 = $1,118 tax cut
$66,355-$111,645 = $1,264 tax cut
$111,646-$160,972 = $2,135 tax cut
$160,973-$226,918 = $2,796 tax cut
$226,919-$603,402 = $121 tax increase
$603,403-$2.87 million = $93,709 tax increase
$2.87 million-plus = $542,882 tax increase

How to cut taxes for real

M from Westminster, CA — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 16:43:24 EDT

Here is what a Man named Jim had to say in the sent in comment section of an AOL political website, http://news.aol.com/political-machine/2008/10/24/gop-navigates-deperation-straits/#comments

Jim10:43AMOct 24th 2008

Obama promises a tax cut for 95% of Americans. What a lie and the American electorate is eating it right up like the fools they are. Anyone who is confident Obama will follow through on his 95 percent promise is letting naivety triumph over common senseObama has a major plan to go after corporations and incease the corporate income taxes.. But funny thing is -- If you ask a typical family about taxes they pay they'll focus on America's biggest and visible taxes: property taxes on a home, sales taxes at the store, and income and payroll taxes deducted from their paychecks.

One tax that people are likely to ignore is corporate income tax. And the reason is simple: most who pay corporate income taxes aren't even aware that they exist..Most people think that corporate taxes are paid by the wealthy, anonymous companies. But as economist have been teaching for centuries the people bear the burden of corporate taxes, and not the companies.

Now lets look at who pays some of the large share of this tax burden.. One of the surprising findings done by Tax foundation is that the lowest income households bear large share of the corporate tax burden.

In total, the poorest of households pay more in corporate income taxes each year then they pay in individual income taxes to the IRS.. Here's an example...House holds earning $ 23,700 paid $271 in corporate taxes compared to just $171 in individual taxes.

Most people never even knew you paid it.

As a share of the burden, corporate taxes were 6.3 percent of the low income households tax bills campared to just 4 percent for individual taxes..The only tax that hits low income familes harder is the federal payroll tax which is designed to pay Social Security, and Medicare.

What this means is that cutting corporate tax rates is not about handing out money to US companies. It's about providing relief to American familes, much of which will provide enormous benefits to the nations lowest income wage earners..Obama doesn't understand the US Economic system and how it actually works.

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton took part in a debate several monthsago hosted by Charlie Gibson. Gibson asked Obama about his plan toraise the capital gains tax. Then Gibson pointed out that studies haveshown that lowering the capital gains tax increases government revenues and is good for the economy. Obama began stammering and stuttering and in one of the most revealing moments of the election, Obamas lack of understanding of the economy and taxes was made clear. Obama was unable to rely on a canned teleprompter response.Corporations are primarily taxed three ways. Once on the corporate income, next on dividends and then on the sale of stock. If you are a retiree and own stock, you will have less money because the corporation will have less profit and if you sell the stock you will pay more tax on the sale.The US corporate business tax system is an anachronism that discourages growth and undermines job creations.

High tax rates drive jobs and investments abroad.Government is extremely inefficient. $ 1,000 taken from a business will remove money that drives the economy, creates more jobs and ultimately brings more revenue for the government. That $ 1,000 will be wasted in government bureacracy and overhead.Obama is using this old lie to appeal to his core support that is promised everything by politicians that use them to win elections.Obama says 98 percent of all US small business make under 250k a year.

The following data comes from the IRS for the year 2003 and reveals the number of businesses with revenue over $ 250,000 in 2003.From IRS statistics in 2003:Revenue Range Number of businesses
$250,000 - $500,000 1,331,692
$500,000 - $1,000,000 932,914
$1,000,000 - $2,500,000 686,257
$2,500,000 - $5,000,000 263,211
$5,000,000 - $10,000,000 143,693
$10,000,000 - $50,000,000 124,568
$50,000,000 - Above 32,040

Many of you work for a company that falls into one of those categories. Plus this doesn't include the mid size corporation that would be effected by Obama tax incease..We won't even get into that matter .

Doesn't Obama realized that a company is considered a small business if it has one employee to five hundred employees.. Voters need to get an understand of the effects that raising taxes on business..Obama plans for a massive corporate business tax incease.

In theory that sounds great doesn't it -- but in reality it's a living nightmare..The US business tax rate stands at 40 percent in the us today. Obama plans to jump this number to somewhere in the 65 percent range.

HERE'S WHAT THE RESULT OF THAT WILL DO TO AMERICA...
Business taxes affect business decisions, job creation and retention, plant location, competitiveness, the transparency of the tax system, and the long-term health of a countries economy. Most importantly, taxes diminish profits. If taxes take a larger portion of profits, that cost is passed along to either consumers (through higher prices), workers (through lower wages or fewer jobs), or shareholders through lower dividends or share value).

Thus a country with lower tax costs will be more attractive to business investment, and more likely to experience economic growth.According to the KPMG report, 23 countries have lowered their corporate tax rates this year, and no nation has raised its rate since last year.

Awhile ago, for instance, Sweden announced a series of proposals to improve its business climate , including a plan to cut its corporate tax rate from 28 percent to 26.3 percent. A September 17, 2008 Industry Week article, "Sweden Announces Income Tax Cuts to Boost Jobs," explains, "Since coming to power in the autumn of 2006, the Swedish government has launched a series of measures aimed at inciting Swedes to return to the job market instead of living off of state subsidies.""The U.S. rate was higher than all other global regions in 1999 and the difference is even more dramatic today," . "If the Swedes now recognize that taxes matter to a country's business climate andincentives to work, then when will America's political class?"In Tax Foundation Fiscal Fact No. 145, "KPMG Study Finds U.S. Corporate Tax Rate Higher Than Every Global Region," Tax Foundation President Scott Hodge explains that America's stagnant business tax system is potentially harmful to America's economic competitiveness in the global marketplace.This KPMG survey comes on the heels of the Tax Foundation's CompeteUSA project, a campaign to raise public awareness of America's high business taxes and how our business tax system might be affecting our competitiveness, wages and living standards.

Recent OECD studies show U.S. corporate income taxes are 50 percent higher than the average among our counterparts in the industrialized world, and that corporate taxes are the single most harmful tax to GDP growth, more so than personal income taxes or consumption taxes.Last month, the Tax Foundation released a revised summary showing that the U.S. federal corporate income tax quietly taps family pocketbooks for nearly $370 billion per year in the form of higher prices, lower wages and poorer return on investment.If Obamas economic plan is the way to go.

How come every European nation has done "JUST THE OPPOSITE OF WHAT OBAMA SUGGEST"??Almost every European nation has lowered it's corporate tax rates..Obama has plans to raise the US corporate tax rate.

WHAT DO THE EUROPEAN NATIONS KNOW THAT OBAMA DOES NOT?? http://www.cato.org/pubs/tbb/tbb_0707_48.pdf

To learn more about the CompeteUSA project, go to
http://www.taxfoundation.org/competeusa.

The KPMG survey can be found at
http://www.kpmg.com/SiteCollectionDocuments/Corporate-Tax-Rates-Survey-2008b.pdf.

Fiscal Fact No. 145 can be found at http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/23621.html.

The Industry Week article can be found at
http://www.industryweek.com/ReadArticle.aspx?ArticleID=17335.http://citizenwells.wordpress.com/

Obama is just another modern day snake oil salesman. If you let him steal this election, Obama and the out of control Democrat congress, will ruin this economy and this country.WAKE UP PEOPLE.. Pass this information on around the web.. Lets get this information to the voters..

I love the internet!!!

WaltO4 — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:02:19 EDT

The internet is awesome. I say that because it is a reliable avenue to receive news. I especially love it during this campaign. I give it credit for the smears just flying off of Obama's skin and flying right back into the GOP's face. Not every member in the GOP is spewing this silliness, but I feel sorry for the ones who are. I love the internet because everytime someone tells another lie, we can go jump on the net and find the truth. Pat Buchanan told Chris Matthews that Powell's endorsement was based on race. Limbaugh said the same thing, as a matter of fact, Limbaugh, is an expert on African American issues now. People can no longer deny their statements easily, as in the past.

Cheers to the internet, the new truth verifier!!!

Don't believe Obama

M from Westminster, CA — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 10:55:05 EDT

Don't believe the liberal press
The liberal press wants to decide the election. It chooses what stories to run; it keeps blasting its left wing views and biased portrayals of the presidential candidates on the airways and television screens. This onslaught of misinformation is bombarding our consciousness. The liberal press clearly has a double standard given to Obama. Obama can attack and badmouth McCain at will and this is encouraged by the press, cheered by liberals who are ever more way out there on the left, and rehashed by self-proclaimed pundits. Any slightly negative statement by the McCain camp is jumped on by the talking-heads and they want to turn it into a negative. The liberal press repeat it enough times and the public may start believing it. The silent majority needs to speak up and let their views be heard. It is time to band together and to move the conservative base to let opinion count on Election Day. This blog's aim is to spur honest conversations about the unfair portrayals by the left wingers.

Promised changes by Obama that we will not be duped into believing.
Obama’s bold claim to not raise taxes on those that made less than $200,000 mysteriously increased to less than $250,000 and this significant shift was not even noticed and discussed by the press. Oh yes, I know exactly why Obama’s cronies suggested this flip-flop. The liberal democrats were worried that the previous $200,000 ceiling would anger those of the middle class that makes just above $200,000. So the greedy liberals figure they can make the even more outrageous $250,000 promise that they will not keep. Where are the extra tax revenues going to come from when the uncontrolled spending democrats hope to take over? They will not keep their promise and for sure will increase taxes on the middle class.
But imagine if this outrageous promise can just convince a few undecided voters to vote for Obama! That's all the Obama handlers are hoping for. Beware of wolves wearing sheep clothings. Obama is nothing more than a very left wing Democrat dressed-up to be more middle of the road--a total imagery created by socialistic Democrat handlers.

The Acorn doesn't fall far from the tree
I was naive enough to think that "one person one vote" is the Fairness precept in America. But fraudulant voters registration undermine our democracy. Absentee balloting are been used to push thru fraudulant votes filled out and mailed in by perpetrators or surrogates who don't need to show up at polling places with identifications. The deep pocketed Obama campain alledgedly contributes millions of dollars to Acorn which is now being investigated by the FBI in multiple battleground states. Will the election be bought by fraudulent voting? Every legitimate votes count even more now. Full scale investigation of any shady registration entities shoud be sped up to insure fairness.

Collin Powell endorsing Obama is no surprise and therefore doesn't help Obama one bit
About 90-95% of blacks plans to vote for Obama. So when Collin Powell, a black man, endorsed Obama, it should not surprise anybody. It probably will not help Obama gain any vote, once the public realize this simple fact. Now, the fact that Obama is leading in the polls indicates that whites are willing to vote for him. There would be a racism outcry if only a small portion of whites would vote for him. There is a double standard in America. Oh, but the other way around is definitely not 'permitted'.

Campaign Donation Reforms are needed. Those $200 internet donations can be given under your dog's name, your 2 years old daughter's name, your goldfish, etc...There is no oversight of multiple donations...Through this loophole, Obama has gotten over $200 Millions in internet donation. I want to know the paper trails from credit card paper trails, paypal, electronic money transfer, etc... I suspect plenty of violations here...

The real Truth from Brooklyn

Lisbeth Applefield — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 22:43:32 EDT

It appears our Truth from Brooklyn blogger is a pedophile into little boys. I found his site and discovered the real truth. Now I've reported him to the authorities.

The Fierce Urgeny of NOW...Mother Wit ... Just Plain Common Sense

One of Those Women — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 17:07:07 EDT

THE FIERCE URGENCY OF NOW*

Mother Wit... Just Plain Common Sense

By Cynthia A. Williams

Don't let the title of this message deceive you. This article is about the state of our country and the upcoming election. The title implies that this article will appeal to your intellect, your mother wit, and your common sense.

Some might ask what gives me the authority and right to write an article of this nature. I am writing this article under the auspices that the world through the American and International biographical associations recognizes me as one of the Great Minds of the 21st Century, 2000 Outstanding Intellectuals, and selected as 2007 Woman of the Year (Globally) in the Field of Theology (The study of God) and Spiritual Healing. It is on that note, spiritual healing, that I am writing this article.

I am almost certain when I say no one likes to be lied to. Anyone who lies is a liar, and one not to be trusted. That is a common sense statement, and requires no explanation. The Word of God says satan is the father of lies and the author of confusion and there is no good in him. Consequently, by deduction those who lie are servants of satan, evil, bad, and there is no good in them. Their only intent is to cause confusion, bring division and ultimately destroy whatever is in the midst or making.

With all that said, let’s take a look at the Presidential campaign. With no many days left, this message is crucial to appeal to your sense of good-will, truth, integrity, and unity.

This is about making a decision to believe a lie or the truth, life or death, hope or despair, ignorance or intelligence. You choose because we all have the God given right to choose what we believe and I pray it is based on the truth.

We have twelve qualified candidates running for the office of President /Vice President. They are competing for the highest office in this country. The office of President represents the United States as a people. This office should reflect excellence; the highest morals and values, the ultimate sense of honesty and integrity, and intelligence and wisdom. In this office decisions reflect how we as a people will live and survive for their term and maybe longer depending how much good or bad was done. We can see from the state of this country right now, somewhere, we failed in our judgment of character. It is assured we cannot do this again and survive the ramifications of a bad decision.

So let’s look at what we have in front of us. The way I see it the decision is too easy. We have the Republican candidates who have campaigned negatively from the inception of the race. Now we are at the end and their tone has changed only it has changed to outright lies, causing confusion and division. If this were a regular dispute, the things that are happening would be short of slander and libel. They have blatantly lied to the people, in speeches, on their website, in the debates, in their advertisements, all lies. The media which has twisted the news quite a bit doesn't have to do that for them because they make up their own mayhem. I can say they are lies because if you take the time to research what is being said the evidence is there, and it is clear. They know they are lying and think its okay to lie to the American people.

My thoughts are this, if they lie to you now, blatant and in your face, what makes you think they are going to do anything less when they get in office. You cannot trust a liar, and why should a person have to lie unless they have nothing to stand on to win. They really think the American people are stupid. For instance, Governor Palin get the results of her investigation which finds her guilty of unethical practices and she swears over and over again the report does not say that when the press shows you the written report... are we the people stupid?

Now let's look at the Democratic Party candidates. Senator Obama and Senator Biden, have only had one negative ad in their entire campaign, an ad, which Senator Obama apologized for and never ran another. They dispute the difference in the Republican Party’s platform and ideas but never attack the person and definitely no lies. They speak on what they plan to do versus what their opponents have done that have nothing to do with the campaign or the race for President. They spend much of their resources answering the lies that are being told and proving the other party to be exactly what I described in the beginning of this article.

As for the other eight candidates, they are soft spoken and almost unheard of. That’s just something to throw the numbers off. There are two other women of the Presidential ballot, so Palin is not the only making history.

If this was a game, the Republican Party candidates would have been thrown out of the game for unsportsmanlike conduct. If it was school they would have been expelled. If this was a family, they would have been punished. If this was a job they would have been fired. If this was court they would have been found guilty of perjury and sentenced to confinement.

ATTENTION… ATTENTION… This is neither, this is the Presidency of the United States and if we allow such conduct then whatever we get we deserve.

What are we looking at if we elect a liar? We are looking at more years of what we already have with escalated confusion, poverty, unemployment, the rich getting richer and more families on the streets. Are you ready for that? We can't afford more of what we have endured up to the present.

So let me deal with a few issues that I have had to explain to many that have been confused by those who are telling lies.

Pro-Choice vs. Pro-Life: The Pro-Life suggested by the Republicans is Pro-Death. It is going back to butchers in the back yard. However, both democratic candidates are against abortion but they more so against the government taking away an individual’s right to choose who they do with their own body. Freedom of choice is a God given and a constitutional right. When an individual makes the wrong choice they have to live with it. And no one knows the circumstances that might present in this evil world.

Gay Rights: Neither party upholds same sex marriage, and again the democrats uphold an individual right to choose what who they live with and ultimately who they share their personal property with in the legal sense of the matter.

Gun Rights: Both parties basically believe the same thing. They both defend the 2nd Amendment with the right to bear arms, only the Democratic Party has stressed the need for more patrolling on illegal, unregistered assault weapons especially in the hands of criminal, gangs etc.

Military Issues: If the Republican Party had its way our children would be overseas in a useless occupation (we are not in a war), spending money we don’t have, having soldiers come home wounded and without proper treatment and rehabilitation and families are being shattered by long deployments and PTSD. Whereas, the democrats want the troops to be downsized and brought home responsibly to realign them in places where our presence is necessary. To spend appropriately and support those coming home and the veterans who need rehabilitating. They intend to beef up military spending to ensure the equipment is in the highest state of readiness as well as the troops.

Health Care: The Republican party want to give people Money but not enough to cover the whole amount needed to maintain their insurance, and in turn tax the companies they work for so they drop coverage and leave the people hanging with nothing. Note getting health insurance with pre-existing illness is almost impossible and if so it will be much more than $5000. However, the Democrats look to subsidize those who have insurance and those who don’t ensure they get in a plan much like the ones the Senate has. It’s not social medicine but it is health care for everyone.

Taxes: You should all read the Intelligence Report. It breaks down what each party proposes and although it is not said McCain can’t so what he says without taxing the poor people oops the middle class heavy, while still giving taxes break to his class of people, the 5%. Obama plan, though many think it is impossible, will give tax break to those making less than $250,000 and spread the tax burden proportionately amongst those who have more to give. We all must remember before you start griping, to whom much is given much is required and we are the United States, all for one and one for all. Then we must not forget that when the monies are aligned properly, much like working a budget, some expenses will take care of itself.

Last but not least, and this is my opinion. I think the Bail out was more of the rich taking care of their own at the tax payers expense. While the Executives and CEO still have their Golden Parachutes and Million dollar salaries, many people are still unemployed, homeless and hungry. It was a smack in the face for the execs of AIG to go on a vacation after taking the taxpayers money. I think the taxpayers ought to get some dividends or stock in these companies, or at least a say in the adjustment of those balloon salaries.

My thought was if they were going to give up money they should have bailed the people out. They all knew who was down (in foreclosure, pending bankruptcy) on their books and cleared them of their outstanding debt, attached that debt onto their mortgages, refinanced them at 30 year fixed, and they would be in their homes, the businesses would have the money to stay afloat, and we wouldn’t be deepen than ever in history in a hole while the rich are laughing going to the bank.

* Excerpt from Martin Luther King Jr. speech 40 years ago

“One of Those Women” by Cynthia Williams

Buy the book at www.amazon.com

NEW FACE Model for Model Productions

2007 WOMAN OF THE YEAR & 2007 AMBASSADOR OF POETRY

About The Author: Mother, Grandmother, Ambassador, Prophetess, Ordained Minister, Advocate, Author, Mentor, Nurse, Retired Army War Veteran, Businesswoman, President- It’s A New Day Productions, Founder- Free-Will Fellowship Ministry, Distributor Millennium Plus GPS, Independent Owner NSE, Notary Public, Life Fellow Biographical Association, Deputy Director General of America, Life Fellow American Biographical Institute, Host of the One of Those Women BLOG Talk Show, 2008 Outstanding People, Great Women of the 21st Century, Marquis Who’s Who of American Women, of America, of Health Care Professionals, of Business and Finance; International Biographical Centre: Order of Excellence, One Thousand Great Americans, 21st Century Award for Achievement in Theology and Spiritual Healing, 21st Century 2000 Outstanding Intellectuals, Cambridge Blue Book; American Biographical Institute 2004 Female Executive Award for Theology and Spiritual Healing, Great Minds of the 21st Century, Universal Award of Achievement. Ministry Partner, Most of ALL Ambassador for Christ, and Child of the Most High God. BLESSED!

Barack Obama, Marilyn Monroe, The United States Of America & The American Dream

Mark from Los Angeles, CA — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 19:39:01 EDT

Barack Obama & Marilyn Monroe, The United States Of America & The American Dream By Mark from Los Angeles, CA - Sep 5th, 2008 at 9:17 pm EDT

To view this blog post with music and Barack Obama messages taped on his podcast in the past access this link

                                                            By Mark Bellinghaus


We at 'Our Marilyn' Blogcast & MARILYN MONROE PRODUCTIONS, LLC, WE SUPPORT Barack Obama, the truly gifted speaker and the most charismatic politician, since John F. Kennedy.

We encourage you to please consider to also cast your vote for Mr. Barack Obama.

Ladies & Gentlemen, the next, the 44th President of The United States:

Barack Hussein Obama II

Barack Obama Speech - 2008 DNC Denver: 8-28-08 Part 1

google.y={first:[]};window.setTimeout(function(){var xjs=document.createElement('script');xjs.src='/extern_js/f/CgJlbhICdXMrMAc4AiwrMBg4Aiw/tOvl6yWhIRk.js';document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(xjs)},0)Barack Obama Speech - 2008 DNC Denver: 8-28-08 Part 2



Marilyn Monroe & Barack Obama ©2008 by Mark Bellinghaus

Because you know, that Marilyn Monroe would vote for Barack Obama if she was still alive.
Marilyn Monroe was fighting racism, and she was supporting the Democratic Party, she was fighting for women's rights, and she opened her own company. Since Mary Pickford, she was the first actress who would take her faith into her own hands.
She was considering to adopt a baby, in 1962, shortly before her untimely death and decades before it became almost 'fashionable' for Hollywood actresses to adopt kids.
Marilyn Monroe was her time ahead, always.

The close friendship between black & white in 1950's racist America!


Ella Fitzgerald & Marilyn Monroe, in 1955 (above) and in 1962, (below), the year Marilyn Monroe passed away. In 1955, when racism was still a big issue in the United States of America, Ella Fitzgerald became the first African-American to perform at the Mocambo, after Marilyn Monroe had lobbied the owner for the booking. The booking was instrumental in Fitzgerald's career. Marilyn would promise the owner that she would appear every night (and be on time), and this way also fill the house--and she did, she was there every night, and she filled the house and: she was always on time! Their close friendship lasted for many years and Ella would sing Marilyn Monroe's famous 'My Heart Belongs To Daddy'in honor of her wonderful friend Marilyn Monroe, who died almost 34 years before she passed on in 1996, at age 79.

       Marilyn & Ella
Please vote for Barack Obama!

Show the world that racism in the United States Of America is now a defeated chapter from the dark past of this country, where an organization such as the KKK is still existing.

Show the world that change is possible, that the future is here.
The future is now, and the future is in your own hands.

Vote for the right candidate and make your voice heard and be counted.

On November 4, 2008, please give your vote to the only person who can turn this sinking ship that is covered by greed and stupidity, by a President who is still denying GLOBAL WARMING, while the Asthma cases for children in the USA are on the sharp rise...this person has arrived. And he was making a sensational entrance four years ago, when he spoke at the Democratic Convention, where hopes were high for John Kerry. Barack Obama stands for the American dream, more than any politician, more than anyone who has been running for President.

PLEASE VOTE FOR BARACK OBAMA, the President of Change, Hope, Progress and Charisma.


h1 = document.getElementById("title").getElementsByTagName("h1")[0];h1.innerHTML = widont(h1.innerHTML); Funny Quotes from Democratic Presidential Candidate Barack Obama

By Daniel Kurtzman, About.com

"They say I need to be seasoned; they say I need to be stewed. They say, 'We need to boil all the hope out of him -- like us -- and then he'll be ready.'" (Watch video

********************************

"I have nothing to hide, I enjoy being myself. I'm not going to change who I am just because it's Halloween." –appearing as himself on Saturday Night Live as part of a skit that featured Hillary Clinton dressed as a witch at a Halloween party

                         *********************************

"It's like I was shot out of a cannon. I'm so overexposed that I make Paris Hilton look like a recluse."

                 ****************************

"Hillary is not the first politician in Washington to declare 'Mission Accomplished' a little too soon."

                  ****************************

On his Democratic Convention speech, in which he said that "we coach Little League in the blue states and we have some gay friends in the red states": "Well, here's an update. Since the election, that gay couple I knew in the red states? They've moved back to the blue states."

                *****************************

On excitement in his father's native Kenya that his election would mean the building of billions of dollars in new roads, bridges, hospitals, and schools in their country: "I've tried to explain how it works these days. First comes the invasion, and then billions in aid."

                    ***********************************

"It's been a great ride. But I know how quickly these fads can pass. You all remember the pet rock, the mood ring, Howard Dean."

                     ***********************************

"You notice that people who've been in Washington too long, they don't talk like ordinary folks,. We had this debate in Las Vegas, and somebody asked me, What are your weaknesses?' So I said, Well, you know, I don't keep track of paper that well, I'm always losing paper, my desk is a mess.' And then they asked the next two candidates. And one candidate says, Well, my biggest weakness is I'm just so passionate about helping poor people.' And then the other one says, I'm just so impatient to help the American people solve their problems.' So then I realize well, I wish I'd gone last and then I would have known.. I'm stupid that way, I thought that when they asked what your biggest weakness was, they asked what your biggest weakness was. And now I know that my biggest weakness is I like to help old ladies across the street."

                    ************************************

"That's what he talked about yesterday, 'I want to drill here. I want to drill now.' I don't know where he was standing. I think he was in a building somewhere." --on John McCain's energy plan

                    ************************************

It is finally time for the 'White House,' to turn black. With pride, unity, happiness and.....hope.

Please support, please vote for Barack Obama on November 4, 2008.

Thank you and blessings to all of you.

Mark Bellinghaus, Ernest W. Cunningham & Jennifer J. Dickinson

Los Angeles, CA, USA, August 31, 2008



                Marilyn would vote for Barack!

YES, WE CAN! - SI, SE PEUDE! JA, WIR KÖNNEN!

MARILYN MONROE PRODUCTIONS, LLC, left to right:
Ernest W. Cunningham, author of The Ultimate Marilyn & plaintiff of the Queen Mary Marilyn Monroe fraud class action lawsuit 2006 / 2007--pointing out and ultimately stopping the biggest exhibition fraud / hoax in history which would have traveled the world for the following twelve years.
Jennifer J. Dickinson, journalist & mother of two who for the past two years has fought for justice and against corruption and criminals who fabricated fake Marilyn Monroe and other entertainment memorabilia.
Mark Bellinghaus, actor, activist, collector, debunker, entrepreneur & expert witness in the Queen Mary Marilyn Monroe fraud class action lawsuit 2006 / 2007 - the case against the biggest exhibition fraud in history: 'Marilyn Monroe: the exhibit,' which could have created a minimum of $100 million within the twelve years this exhibition was scheduled to travel around the globe.

We contested many different criminal frauds and deceptions which would have damaged the public--you, some way or another, we were able to expose and ultimately close down exhibitions, based on fraudulent memorabilia on display or for sale.
We contested hoaxes frauds and criminal pranks, which after our exposure were ultimately shut down, due to our proof based exposure.
We never wrongly accused anyone of being a criminal fraud, if the people were actually innocent.
We never failed - our accuracy is still at 100% for three years now.
WE SUPPORT BARACK OBAMA
Marilyn Monroe definitely would have voted for Barack Obama.
Please support Mr. Obama in his run for President.
Please support Barack to become the 44th President of The United States of America.

Credit for the 'YES WE CAN' Video:
Song & video, featuring a star cast, by will.i.am of The Black Eyed Peas. Inspired by Barack Obama's 'Yes We Can' speech.

----------------------------------------
08/28/08 Note: Congratulations to the the official Democratic Party nominee and the next President of the United States, Barack Obama!!

Official song site:
http://www.yeswecansong.com

Obama Campaign Site:
http://www.barackobama.com/

Yes we can what?:
http://www.barackobama.com/issues/

Is it true that he....?:
http://factcheck.barackobama.com/

Be a part of the video at:
http://www.hopeactchange.com

-Lyrics-

It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation.

Yes we can.

It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail toward freedom.

Yes we can.
It was sung by immigrants as they struck out from distant shores and pioneers who pushed westward against an unforgiving wilderness.

Yes we can.

It was the call of workers who organized; women who reached for the ballots; a President who chose the moon as our new frontier; and a King who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the Promised Land.

Yes we can to justice and equality.

Yes we can to opportunity and prosperity.

Yes we can heal this nation.

Yes we can repair this world.

Yes we can.

We know the battle ahead will be long, but always remember that no matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change.

We have been told we cannot do this by a chorus of cynics...they will only grow louder and more dissonant ........... We've been asked to pause for a reality check. We've been warned against offering the people of this nation false hope.

But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope.
Now the hopes of the little girl who goes to a crumbling school in Dillon are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the streets of LA; we will remember that there is something happening in America; that we are not as divided as our politics suggests; that we are one people; we are one nation; and together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story with three words that will ring from coast to coast; from sea to shining sea --

Yes. We. Can.
Celebrities featured include: Jesse Dylan, Will.i.am, Common, Scarlett Johansson, Tatyana Ali, John Legend, Herbie Hancock, Kate Walsh, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Adam Rodriquez, Kelly Hu, Amber Valetta, Eric Balfour, Aisha Tyler, Nicole Scherzinger and Nick Cannon

Also check out this other great song and video inspired by Barack:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyJ72i...

Life is all about signs...seeing the signs....understanding the signs...acting upon the signs

--Mark Bellinghaus

About:
'OUR MARILYN' BLOGCAST
&
MARILYN MONROE PRODUCTIONS, LLC The Mark Bellinghaus Marilyn Monroe CollectionAbout me
Mark Bellinghaus, CEO, MARILYN MONROE PRODUCTIONS, LLCLos Angeles, California, United StatesMark Bellinghaus owns the biggest, most comprehensive, and 100% authentic Marilyn Monroe memorabilia collection in existence. Part of his collection is an original copy of Marilyn Monroe’s last will and testament, including many important documents, which he shared in 2006 with the lawyers of three famous Marilyn Monroe photographers estates which were suing Anna Strasberg and CMG Worldwide (Mark Roesler) for several years. The documents that Mark Bellinghaus delivered served literally as the key to this groundbreaking success for the defense and the savior of the legacy of Marilyn Monroe. In 2006, Mark Bellinghaus closed down the biggest exhibition fraud in history: a $100 million project was exposed with his first blog on ‘blogcritics,’ and he also stopped a $15 million movie project, exposed Mary Jane Popp and June Alpino aka “DiMaggio’s” book as nonsense. He also exposed Dolores Hope Masi, Bebe Goddard, Robert Otto, Jeanne Carmen, etc. The list goes on and on.
In Oct. 2007, he successfully exposed, together with journalist Jennifer J. Dickinson another exhibit, this time in Great Britain (the ‘lost’ Marilyn Monroe William Travilla costume collection) as a complete hoax. Mark Bellinghaus owns a real & authentic Monroe worn Travilla costume.

Marilyn Monroe William Travilla Costume 'Prototypes' Hoax in ... May 26, 2008 ... MARILYN MONROE NEWS ENTERTAINMENT FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Marilyn Monroe William Travilla...
www.pr-inside.com/marilyn-monroe-william-travilla-costume-r607845.htm - 23k - Cached - Similar pages - Note this Costume 'Prototypes' Hoax in Bexleyheath,

Trademark ™ and Copyright © 2005 - 2008 by Mark Bellinghaus & MARILYN MONROE PRODUCTIONS, LLC All rights reserved. Do not copy or redistribute in any form.

Barack Obama For President!

MARILYN MONROE NEWS ENTERTAINMENT FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Marilyn Monroe would have voted for Barack Obama

Marilyn Monroe and Senator Barack Obama Photo compilation ©2008 by Mark Bellinghaus 2008-10-07 00:00:19 - By Mark Bellinghaus, CEO, MARILYN MONROE PRODUCTIONS, LLC

Opinion & Support

Because you know, that Marilyn Monroe would vote for Barack Obama if she was still alive.
Marilyn Monroe was fighting racism, and she was supporting the Democratic Party, she was fighting for women's rights, and she opened her own company. Since Mary Pickford, she was the first actress who would take her faith into her own hands.
She was considering to adopt a baby, in 1962, shortly before her untimely death and decades before it became almost 'fashionable' for Hollywood actresses to adopt kids.
Marilyn Monroe was her time ahead, always.

The close friendship between black & white (Ella Fitzgerald & Marilyn Monroe) in 1950's racist America!

Extract & Photo caption/description posted on OUR MARILYN BLOG - you can find the entire blog article here:
blog.ourmarilyn.com/2008/08/31/marilyn-monroe-would-have-voted-f ..
and also here:
my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/markbellinghaus/gG5W75
Ella Fitzgerald & Marilyn Monroe, in 1955 (above) and in 1962, (below), the year Marilyn Monroe passed away. In 1955, when racism was still a big issue in the United States of America, Ella Fitzgerald became the first African-American to perform at the Mocambo, after Marilyn Monroe had lobbied the owner for the booking. The booking was instrumental in Fitzgerald's career. Marilyn would promise the owner that she would appear every night (and be on time), and this way also fill the house--and she did, she was there every night, and she filled the house and: she was always on time! Their close friendship lasted for many years and Ella would sing Marilyn Monroe's famous 'My Heart Belongs To Daddy' in honor of her wonderful friend Marilyn Monroe, who died almost 34 years before she passed on in 1996, at age 79.

Barack Obama Quotes:

'They say I need to be seasoned; they say I need to be stewed. They say, 'We need to boil all the hope out of him -- like us -- and then he'll be ready.'

'I have nothing to hide, I enjoy being myself. I'm not going to change who I am just because it's Halloween." -appearing as himself on Saturday Night Live as part of a skit that featured Hillary Clinton dressed as a witch at a Halloween party

*

'It's like I was shot out of a cannon. I'm so overexposed that I make Paris Hilton look like a recluse.'

'Hillary is not the first politician in Washington to declare 'Mission Accomplished' a little too soon.'

Marilyn Monroe singing Happy Birthday to President John F. Kennedy, who was a Democrat

CBS NEWS: McCain's False Claims On Bill Ayers Misleading

Jeremy Smith — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 17:24:02 EDT

As the lies continue flowing the the McCain Campaign and RNC, CBS News has looked in to a recent McCain Web Ad and found out that the the Ad is misleading.

OCT 13, 2008(CBS)

A recent web advertisement from Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain makes two false claims about a connection between Bill Ayers and Senator Barack Obama.

1. “Ayers and Obama ran a radical education foundation, together.”

The foundation they are referring to is the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC), set up in the early 1990’s with funding from the Annenberg Foundation to reform public schools. Walter Annenberg is a well-known philanthropist and conservative Republican.

“This was not the Bill Ayers and Barack Obama show,” says Ken Rolling who was the Executive Director of the CAC and ran the organization, “It was not created by two people, it was created by a hundred people.”

Was it radical? Rolling says that’s in the eyes of the beholder, but he confirms that the CAC funded programs with the following purpose: teacher training, music education, support for new school council candidates, afterschool programs, education research, improvements for literacy and arts programs and initiatives to strengthen parental involvement in public schools.

“The idea that the Annenberg Challenge was somehow the extension of the Weather Underground of the 1960’s, that is just one of the most lunatic contentions I can imagine,” says Mike Flannery, political editor at the CBS Chicago affiliate WBBM who has covered Chicago politics for 35 years.

Flannery says the other people on involved in the CAC with Obama and Ayers were "business types and Republicans."

Obama chaired the board of the CAC but he did not serve on the board with Ayers. Ayers served on a separate advisory board.

2. “They wrote the foundation’s bylaws together.”

“They didn’t sit over a coffee table somewhere and say ‘let’s do it this way,’ they were involved with a large group of people,” Rolling says, “They did not actually write them.”

Rolling says Ayers served on a voluntary advisory board that hired a lawyer to write the bylaws that were eventually approved by the entire board of directors - one of the votes for the bylaws came from Obama.

Flannery says the negative attention that is being paid to the CAC is mystifying to Chicago reporters, "Those of us who have covered politics in Chicago the way I have for 35 years simply don't recognize the caricatures and the ridiculous descriptions of this group."

CBS NEWS: McCain's False Claims On Bill Ayers Misleading

Jeremy Smith — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 17:23:44 EDT

As the lies continue flowing the the McCain Campaign and RNC, CBS News has looked in to a recent McCain Web Ad and found out that the the Ad is misleading.

OCT 13, 2008(CBS)

A recent web advertisement from Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain makes two false claims about a connection between Bill Ayers and Senator Barack Obama.

The Source of the Obama Lies

Nia "Hussein" J. — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 01:56:49 EDT

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/13/us/politics/13martin.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&pagewanted=print

October 13, 2008The Man Behind the Whispers About Obama By JIM RUTENBERG

The most persistent falsehood about Senator Barack Obama’s background first hit in 2004 just two weeks after the Democratic convention speech that helped set him on the path to his presidential candidacy: “Obama is a Muslim who has concealed his religion.”

That statement, contained in a press release, spun a complex tale about the ancestry of Mr. Obama, who is Christian.

The press release was picked up by a conservative Web site, FreeRepublic.com, and spread steadily as others elaborated on its claims over the years in e-mail messages, Web sites and books. It continues to drive other false rumors about Mr. Obama’s background.

Just last Friday, a woman told Senator John McCain at a town-hall-style meeting, “I have read about him,” and “he’s an Arab.” Mr. McCain corrected her.

Until this month, the man who is widely credited with starting the cyberwhisper campaign that still dogs Mr. Obama was a secondary character in news reports, with deep explorations of his background largely confined to liberal blogs.

But an appearance in a documentary-style program on the Fox News Channel watched by three million people last week thrust the man, Andy Martin, and his past into the foreground. The program allowed Mr. Martin to assert falsely and without challenge that Mr. Obama had once trained to overthrow the government.

An examination of legal documents and election filings, along with interviews with his acquaintances, revealed Mr. Martin, 62, to be a man with a history of scintillating if not always factual claims. He has left a trail of animosity — some of it provoked by anti-Jewish comments — among political leaders, lawyers and judges in three states over more than 30 years.

He is a law school graduate, but his admission to the Illinois bar was blocked in the 1970s after a psychiatric finding of “moderately severe character defect manifested by well-documented ideation with a paranoid flavor and a grandiose character.”

Though he is not a lawyer, Mr. Martin went on to become a prodigious filer of lawsuits, and he made unsuccessful attempts to win public office for both parties in three states, as well as for president at least twice, in 1988 and 2000. Based in Chicago, he now identifies himself as a writer who focuses on his anti-Obama Web site and press releases.

Mr. Martin, in a series of interviews, did not dispute his influence in Obama rumors.

“Everybody uses my research as a takeoff point,” Mr. Martin said, adding, however, that some take his writings “and exaggerate them to suit their own fantasies.”

As for his background, he said: “I’m a colorful person. There’s always somebody who has a legitimate cause in their mind to be angry with me.”

When questions were raised last week about Mr. Martin’s appearance and claims on “Hannity’s America” on Fox News, the program’s producer said Mr. Martin was clearly expressing his opinion and not necessarily fact.

It was not Mr. Martin’s first turn on national television. The CBS News program “48 Hours” in 1993 devoted an hourlong program to what it called his prolific filing of frivolous lawsuits. He has filed so many lawsuits that a judge barred him from doing so in any federal court without preliminary approval.

He prepared to run as a Democrat for Congress in Connecticut, where paperwork for one of his campaign committees listed as one purpose “to exterminate Jew power.” He ran as a Republican for the Florida State Senate and the United States Senate in Illinois. When running for president in 1999, he aired a television advertisement in New Hampshire that accused George W. Bush of using cocaine.

In the 1990s, Mr. Martin was jailed in a case in Florida involving a physical altercation.

His newfound prominence, and the persistence of his line of political attack — updated regularly on his Web site and through press releases — amazes those from his past.

“Well, that’s just a bookend for me,” said Tom Slade, a former chairman of the Florida Republican Party, whom Mr. Martin sued for refusing to support him. Mr. Slade said Mr. Martin was driven like “a run-over dog, but he’s fearless.”

Given Mr. Obama’s unusual background, which was the focus of his first book, it was perhaps bound to become fodder for some opposed to his candidacy.

Mr. Obama was raised mostly by his white mother, an atheist, and his grandparents, who were Protestant, in Hawaii. He hardly knew his father, a Kenyan from a Muslim family who variously considered himself atheist or agnostic, Mr. Obama wrote. For a few childhood years, Mr. Obama lived in Indonesia with a stepfather he described as loosely following a liberal Islam.

Theories about Mr. Obama’s background have taken on a life of their own. But independent analysts seeking the origins of the cyberspace attacks wind up at Mr. Martin’s first press release, posted on the Free Republic Web site in August 2004.

Its general outlines have turned up in a host of works that have expounded falsely on Mr. Obama’s heritage or supposed attempts to conceal it, including “Obama Nation,” the widely discredited best seller about Mr. Obama by Jerome R. Corsi. Mr. Corsi opens the book with a quote from Mr. Martin.

“What he’s generating gets picked up in other places,” said Danielle Allen, a professor at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton University who has investigated the e-mail campaign’s circulation and origins, “and it’s an example of how the Internet has given power to sources we would have never taken seriously at another point in time.”

Ms. Allen said Mr. Martin’s original work found amplification in 2006, when a man named Ted Sampley wrote an article painting Mr. Obama as a secret practitioner of Islam. Quoting liberally from Mr. Martin, the article circulated on the Internet, and its contents eventually found their way into various e-mail messages, particularly an added claim that Mr. Obama had attended “Jakarta’s Muslim Wahhabi schools. Wahhabism is the radical teaching that created the Muslim terrorists who are now waging jihad on the rest of the world.”

Mr. Obama for two years attended a Catholic school in Indonesia, where he was taught about the Bible, he wrote in “Dreams From My Father,” and for two years went to an Indonesian public school open to all religions, where he was taught about the Koran.

Mr. Sampley, coincidentally, is a Vietnam veteran and longtime opponent of Mr. McCain and Senator John Kerry, both of whom he accused of ignoring his claims that American prisoners were left behind in Vietnam. He previously portrayed Mr. McCain as a “Manchurian candidate.” Speaking of Mr. Martin’s influence on his Obama writings, Mr. Sampley said, “I keyed off of his work.”

Mr. Martin’s depictions of Mr. Obama as a secret Muslim have found resonance among some Jewish voters who have received e-mail messages containing various versions of his initial theory, often by new authors and with new twists.

In his original press release, Mr. Martin wrote that he was personally “a strong supporter of the Muslim community.” But, he wrote of Mr. Obama, “it may well be that his concealment is meant to endanger Israel.” He added, “His Muslim religion would obviously raise serious questions in many Jewish circles.”

Yet in various court papers, Mr. Martin had impugned Jews.

A motion he filed in a 1983 bankruptcy case called the judge “a crooked, slimy Jew who has a history of lying and thieving common to members of his race.”

In another motion, filed in 1983, Mr. Martin wrote, “I am able to understand how the Holocaust took place, and with every passing day feel less and less sorry that it did.”

In an interview, Mr. Martin denied some statements against Jews attributed to him in court papers, blaming malicious judges for inserting them.

But in his “48 Hours” interview in 1993, he affirmed a different anti-Semitic part of the affidavit that included the line about the Holocaust, saying, “The record speaks for itself.”

When asked Friday about an assertion in his court papers that “Jews, historically and in daily living, act through clans and in wolf pack syndrome,” he said, “That one sort of rings a bell.”

He said he was not anti-Semitic. “I was trying to show that everybody in the bankruptcy court was Jewish and I was not Jewish,” he said, “and I was being victimized by religious bias.”

In discussing the denial of his admission to the Illinois bar, Mr. Martin said the psychiatric exam listing him as having a “moderately severe personality defect” was spitefully written by an evaluator he had clashed with.

Mr. Martin, who says he is from a well-off banking and farming family, is clearly pleased with his newfound attention. But, he said, others have added to his work in “scary” ways.

“They Google ‘Islam’ and ‘Obama’ and my stuff comes up and they take that and kind of use that — like a Christmas tree, and they decorate it,” he said. For instance, he said, he did not necessarily ascribe to a widely circulated e-mail message from the Israeli right-wing activist Ruth Matar, which includes the false assertion, “If Obama were elected, he would be the first Arab-American president.”

He said he had at least come to “accept” Mr. Obama’s word that he had found Jesus Christ. His intent, he said, was only to educate.

Kitty Bennett contributed reporting.

The Truth about Drilling to Prosperity - an open letter

Mark Daniel Merritt — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 13:27:35 EDT

An open letter to Senators Obama and Biden:

First, let me commend both Senator Obama and Senator Biden on the terrific campaign that they are running and their successful debates. They both are behaving in a way that is polished, tasteful and above board. This is the kind of campaign EVERYONE should be running, rather than attacking people for what their middle name is, or with whom they may have served on the board of a charity. I serve on several boards of non-profit groups, and I have never once asked the other board members what they were doing in 1969 while I was 8 years old. Good for Senators Obama and Biden for not bowing to use those kinds of tactics!

Secondly, I am a former Republican who is now 100% in favor of Barack Obama. I have donated to his campaign and have volunteered when I have been able. One issue that has popped up a couple of times in the debates makes my blood boil. The Republican candidates have raised the issue of drilling for oil now in the US as if it is some kind of magic bullet that will fix things overnight. We all know that is not the case and they know it too. This drilling to prosperity idea is a lie.

I want to make it clear that I have no associations whatsoever to the energy industry or to Mr. Pickens. I am a concerned citizen and I have common sense. Who says that the government lifting bans on drilling will cause any actual drilling? The oil companies are only going to drill if it is in their best interests to do it. It costs millions of dollars to drill for oil. The oil companies aren't going to do that unless they are convinced that the oil is there. Anything else would be stupid. I have yet to see any conclusive proof of significant, US reserves of oil that can be tapped which will change the status quo now or in the future.

The politicizing of the cost of gasoline is just that—politics as usual. No one wants to pay more for anything than we used to pay for it. Especially something we use a lot of. But consider this--gasoline costs about three times what it did in the early 1990's per gallon. Ironically, milk has had a comparable increase in price per gallon. Both used to be about $1.30 per gallon back then, and they are at or near $4.00 per gallon now. So why is there no outcry over the cost of Milk? Why is there no chant for farmers to beat their cows over the head for that one more drop of milk that could (at least theoretically) lower the price? This is all politics, and mindless politics at that. McCain and Palin are pandering to people who have jumped on a bandwagon that is on the "road to nowhere."

The only concrete, long-term solution to the US energy problem is to change completely over time from oil-based fuel to alternative fuels. I endorse real solutions over bandwagon solutions that really do not get to the bottom of anything but make a group of uninformed citizens feel better. I think it is time that the Obama campaign unmasks this kind of pandering for what it is. At the same time, I would encourage Senators Obama and Biden to think through the proposals of T. Boone Pickens. The propositions offered by Mr. Pickens possess the potential to put our country on the road to an enduring oil-free solution, while at the same time offering a significant interim overhaul to our energy problems by converting significant portions of our current oil-based energy uses over to other types of energy such as wind, solar and clean natural gas—all of which we have an abundance of here in the US.

So, the next time Senator McCain or Governor Palin raise this issue of "drill baby drill," why not unveil this for what it is--pandering to a group of people who have not taken the time to examine the facts that “drill here, drill now” incontrovertibly solves nothing; and then offer a tangible solution. I genuinely maintain that the “Pickens Plan” can furnish this solution. I do not know Mr. Pickens, or what his motives might be for having presented his plan. But I have studied his plan and I believe it will work. I am convinced that Senator Obama and Senator Biden are mindful individuals, and I am positive they can discern that the plan is a much better solution than the phony baloney offered by their opponents.

Again, I thank Senators Obama and Biden for the extraordinary campaign that they are running. I am so enthusiastic about real change. And I honestly trust in their candidacy to bring that kind of change. I just detest seeing this one issue go unanswered or partially answered since I think it is on the forefront to the future of our nation. We don’t just need change for change’ sake, we need changes that are real solutions to real problems facing our country. We need Barack Obama and Joe Biden in the White House!

Very Sincerely, your friend and avid devotee,

Mark Daniel Merritt

Mount Airy, NC

Barack Obama and working peoples.

chicago ca-by — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 00:14:02 EDT

Why I support Barack Obama: why my support Obama.1 he is Genoas he was poor like aim .i know him personally one time he sit my cab 2001.he talk to me how you are sir to day.he ask me so nice way .cause as a 25 cab driver i did not see well drees good looking well educated person talk me real.2 then i told him some problem all cab drivers have from city of chicago.then he give to me has business card that still i have it.that's why i love him like him pry for him.he will be my president.

The Real McCain

Gennel from Sacramento, CA — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 04:52:55 EDT

The Real McCain 10.6.8McCain may have been and still receiving “A Pass” card by the press, but he does not have to receive it from us. The link below is an example of the True McCain entitled the two faces of John McCain. Credit to the creator and producer is the video. Be in the know: Pass it on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEtZlR3zp4c

Gloves Off!! Fight Truth to Power!!

Nia "Hussein" J. — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 02:55:33 EDT

I've gathered some information that should help us fight back the smears and the lies. I agree that Obama needs to stay above the fray and keep the message on the economy. It's surrogates and supporters like us who have to fight back. We have come to far and worked to hard canvassing, phone calling, registering voters, convincing and informing undecideds, etc. for it to all go the way side like Kerry in 2004. We cannot afford another 4 years of the last eight. time is drawing close and we need this win. Fight back with truth. mccain and palin have allot of political skeletons that need to be forced out of the MSM closet. I've gathered some info, if you have more please share.

CNN truth report On Obama and Ayers:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMRON2GPXUA

Obama gives the go ahead to surrogates, to bring up Keating five and other associations:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/10/5/19317/4480/333/621072

The Obama campaign already has an ad related to it - make it viral

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHW-RO1_WN0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsI_0bV2CZo

Also bring Up Mccains lobbyist:http://www.mccainslobbyist.com

Donald Diamond:

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/04/23/it-goes-well-beyond-the-keating-five/

Richard Quinn:

http://politicalconsultantmisconduct.blogspot.com/2008/01/richard-quinn-associates-employee-of.html

George Gordon Liddy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6F3biK1Mb0&feature=related

Mccain Voted to protect Domestic Terrorist

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/10/06/mccain-abotion-bombers/

Lets also include the GOP's newest talent, Palin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xmt0rLtgmK0

Truth and Being the Change

Nanci — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 00:00:01 EDT

I've been thinking lots about Truth this campaign. Some very important people have asked "What is Truth?" and I am sure that I don't have that answer. But Truth seems to be the one factor that goes out the window when campaigns begin. With Truth goes Trust. Without Trust enters Cynicism, and with Cynicism comes Apathy. With Apathy comes Greed, Graft, and Irresponsibility in the place of Accountability, Patriotism, and Social Conscience.

It seems to me that this is the path America has gone down. Americans have been lied to by politicians for so many years, in so many important ways that Cynicism and Apathy have entered the American consciousness and Conviction, Conscience, Social Responsibility and true Patriotism have been harder and harder to find. We were lied to by Nixon. We were lied to by politicians during the Savings and Loan scandal, we were lied to by a number of politicians now cooling their heels in prison (some pardoned), we were lied to by more than one President and some cabinet members as well.

Why should the American people believe anymore? I guess the answer is that if we don't learn how to trust again, the country will not survive as it was formed. Democracy will suffer, and with it the common citizen will suffer, and when that happens to America, it happens to the world. I do not subscribe to the sentiment that the USA is the center of the world, and the ruler of the world, but I do know that everything that happens in America has a ripple effect in the world (in fact, that is true for every country and every one of us). If we fail, democracy fails.

Why should we hope and dream and trust? Because we have no choice, we must find a star to grab hold of, and we must work to make our beliefs come true. In a way, we must help to create hope by being willing to examine each statement for truth. Once proven, we must then put our hearts into the work that needs done to spread that Truth and Hope all around us to the best of our abillity. We must hold each of our elected officials accountable to Truth to rebuild Trust and Hope in our country, to move forward to claim our birthright and the birthright of our children and our children's children.

Barack Obama has asked us to Hope and to Believe. Not just in him, but in our OWN ability to bring about change in Washington and in the world. It is a call I have not heard for some 48 years, and I think it is a call the young people of this nation have been waiting for. If you are part of the younger generation, I am putting my hopes on you. Think about the future, about your friends and family, and about your country and your place in it. Then act.

This blog tonight isn't about partisan politics, and it really isn't even about Senator Obama. It is about our country and our values and our survival as a democratic Republic, about the values of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. It is the most wonderful country in the world, and has created and achieved amazing things in the short time it has existed as a government. Let us not be too cynical and apathetic to demand Truth, and to hold our government accountable. Stand up and be counted. Be the change!!

VOTE FOR TRUTH! VOTE FOR HOPE!! VOTE FOR CHANGE!! VOTE FOR OBAMA!!!

Economic Mess and the CRA's impact

ChuckT — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 17:11:52 EDT

Some of my acquaintances have been adamant in blaming the Democrats for the current economic mess and they point to the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977 as revised in the mid-90s during the Clinton Administration. Per these folks the CRA "invented" the sub-prime mortgage securities. This subject comes up in converstations and is making the rounds via e-mail, showing clips posted to YouTube, etc. There are many who are swayed by this argument and I would like to hear from others who are familiar with this subject.

I'm under the impression that aprox 20% of the sub-prime mortgages can be connected to the CRA, not a trivial amount of money but certainly not the only reason nor even the largest reason for the sub-prime mortgage crisis. The revisions to the CRA which took effect 1/01/1995 may well have contributed to lenders feeling that they were bound by law to lend to individuals and families who were at risk of default. The question is, how much of the current problem is related to the CRA?

I would also think that it would behoove Democrats (or the candidate) to address this allegation, nip it before it sways voters who are on the fence.

Your insights are welcome.

What I Know Now

Jc from Altadena, CA — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 12:32:54 EDT

A Letter To My Friends dated September 29, 2008

As you know, I am not an economist. I am a homeowner, a business owner and a small-time investor. For those reasons I have spent the last 11 months following and researching the twists and turns of this prolonged collapse. This is my country and my home and my livelihood and I need to know what is going on. Too many days since last November have I logged on to my trading account only to watch another 3,000, 4,000, 5,000 dollars evaporate out of previously sound investments for no particular reason.

I am not in some personal panic over uncertain times - I am still invested in stocks and commodities and intend to make money doing just that. I just closed escrow this week on a new home purchase in Altadena, CA and I intend to make money there as well. The fact is, like most Americans, I live here and work here and I don't consider there to be any better option in the near term.

So, what are we to do? There have been plenty of published (but too often ignored) reports that highlighted the crisis before it came to pass. I have posted links to some of these reports below. Read them with caution - you may be happier not knowing what is really going on.

Let me start by saying that this is a much bigger problem than anyone in Washington or Wall Street is letting on. It is much, much bigger than a few million U.S. home loan defaults (though that is tragic enough). It is bigger than Democratic egos fighting Republican egos . . .

Please See Congress' Denial of the Bailout For What It Is

Professorredbag — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 01:53:13 EDT

Dear Mr. Obama,

I hope that you can see that in the decision made today, the people in both major parties of the US ARE listening to you; and through their representatives in Congress have sent a loud and clear message of support for all the policies and practice that you espouse. Please do not stand with those who see the actions of the people as a failure. They simply do not want to be lied to and fooled by their government again. There are other ways, I'm sure, that can be found to alleviate the suffering of those who have been hurt the most by the misdeeds and failed policies of the past eight years. The people look to you now to find those creative ways, to present or support reasonable and honest strategies that avoid any hint of further lining the pockets of the Wall Street Gurus who got us (the world) into this economic mess in the first place.

As an educator I know that telling my students the truth and giving them a clear picture of the realities of the world they will one day face as mature citizens is not easy. We want things to be bright and rosy for all. We want to paint a picture of the world as full of nothing but hope and possibilities. However, I KNOW from experience that not to do so belittles them, shows a lack of faith in their abilities, does not adequately prepare them to make the hard choices they must as adults fully participating in the growth and direction of their lives, their countries and ultimately the future of mankind.

I have not yet faltered in my hope that you are for real, your message sincere. Please do not give me cause to do so now. I urge you on behalf of millions of voters and many more non voters, citizens of other countries who make up the 'family of mankind' around the globe, who may still one day look to America for just, honest, and enlightened leadership, I beg you to demonstrate now the courage we believe you have to face down the lobbyists, to challenge those who are clearly motivated by greed and selfishness, to be truthful in guiding America on the road to greater security and prosperity. Have the courage of Kennedy and King. It’s the right thing to do.

The color of money

Nanci — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 23:57:02 EDT

I guess now we know why the color of money is green--for cowardice. The Republican House cares less about the future of the country, and indeed the world, than about their personal political image. True, the vote for the Bailout (or whatever buzz name you want to use) was a no-win proposition for any politician. There was no guarantee of success, sort of like the stock market (interesting, eh?), and could easily come back to haunt the Representatives in the future. The problem being it could figure negatively in a vote in as near future as this election. None of them were willing to risk that for the good of the country. It's called something that is the opposite of courage--it is called cowardice.

I am so proud to support Barack Obama, a man who has principles and will stand by them and stand for them. A man who does less to manipulate the truth for his gain than most politicians. You can tell in the debates and as he speaks that his vision for American politics is one of collaboration and not partisan politics. Obama puts the health and future of the nation ahead of his personal gain. Rare, and if America passes up the chance for that vision, how long will it be until we see it again? I have more faith in Americans, and I think we will have that visionary as our next President. I see him standing behind the Presidential seal and in front of the US flag leading the country to a new era of respect, compassion, educational excellence, and prosperity. Oh, it won't come all at once, and it will take quite a bit of work to undo the damage of the last eight years, but that is so much better than the alternative.

Those who did not understand the bill placed before Congress should read all they can to understand it. They should ask their congressman to explain their vote (or non-vote, since many just refused to put their name on the record) and to tell them why they felt the consequences would not be felt by the average American. Remember these were Republicans boycotting a Republican Administration. Who lead them? McCain was in Washington when the deal fell apart. Most of this is political posturing, and we will have to have some sort of monetary support for Wall Street. It may not come in time to prevent much pain as it stands defeated today. We will see. The Republicans have gone home to campaign and tell more lies. I'd only say, again, find the truth for yourself about what has occurred today before casting your vote.

Aside from the short view of this election, I have some trepidation for the direction in which the Nation is headed. As more and more banks and financial institutions are swallowed by the few, I wonder what happens when the financial welfare of the country is controlled by a few, say three, major corporations. Is that a free market? Is that even capitalism? Is that the kind of power we are willing to give to a few men? People for years have been afraid of communism and socialism. What about fascism? Are we willing to see it emerge, ever so slowly, and to remain silent? Are we willing to let the man who supports division and exclusion win over the man who supports inclusion and collaboration?

All I am saying is educate yourself about the facts, then take a stand, and let your Congressman know that you hold him accountable to the truth and to some sort of integrity. The fate of democracy is threatened, I believe, as never before in our history and not by outside forces, but from within. Only a vigilant populace will keep democracy free. Stand up and be heard.

VOTE FOR A CHANGE IN THE DIRECTION OF OUR PRECIOUS GOVERNMENT! VOTE FOR OBAMA!!!

Can I get a strict Republican to vote Democrat?

Jaclyn from Ballwin, MO — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 18:51:19 EDT

Last Sunday, my father and I drove down to Union, MO, to go fishing. Since I had been thinking about the Friday night presidential debate all weekend, a political discussion in the car was inevitable.

I informed my dad that his thoughts on Barack Obama were, in fact, false. I told him that Obama is not Muslim and several of the quotes my dad received in emails about Obama were twisted, mutilated, and taken completely out of context.

My dad is an insurance agent and basically talks to senior citizens day after day about their health care, their children, and occasionally their personal lives (if they're willing to share any information, my dad is not, in any way, invasive).

Most of the senior citizens he has talked to are very strict, conservative Republicans. Unfortunately, I believe that their opinions have affected my father's vote. My dad didn't see the presidential debate on Friday night, so he still supports McCain. He hasn't really done any research whatsoever on either of the candidates, he's just seen several commercials and has obviously accepted the propaganda thrown at him by senior citizens.

Anyway, before we went fishing, my dad had a brief discussion about Obama with Shirley, the lake owner. Shirley told my father that Obama was going to take guns away from hunters, whether they had a license or not. I didn't want to interrupt the conversation, but I couldn't believe my ears.

Luckily, today I sent my dad the interview between Barack Obama and Field & Stream. Hopefully Obama's views on gun control will sway my dad's opinion on the upcoming election.

The News

Greg Oliver Sr — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 16:08:19 EDT

Has the news media and media in general become a moving force in American and World social opinion?

:::: MISINFORMATION & FACT SOURCES ::::

Christopher from Phoenix, AZ — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 23:13:18 EDT

Obama should make a connection between McCain's lies and distortions of the truth (about Obama) with all of the problems brought on by the Bush Administration.

For example, Bush's lies about Iraq's role in 9/11 only led to war. His lies about WMD's in Iraq only led to war. Bush's lies about the promise of deregulation only led to financial collapse. Now, McCain is lying or distorting the truth with regard to Obama. When will it end? This tactic only leads to poor results - it is proof of bad judgement.

Obama consistently works with the truth; the results of being truly "straight" should be pointed out. The prerequisite to international diplomacy should be the capacity to not distort your counterpart's record; the results of this are written in young American soldiers' blood.

From Wall St. to Baghdad let Obama break down the walls that Bush Built

Richard in Toronto - Still American After All These Years — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 11:37:31 EDT

As a kid growing up in Bethlehem PA and Sparta NJ I, as many Americans probably did, thought the world was a better place because of the United States, and that my country wanted everyone in the world to have what I had, and designed its foreign policy to care for the world and lend a helping hand.

At age 11 I left Bethlehem and moved overseas - Ethiopia to be exact - with my parents, my sister, our three dogs and a cat; we would leave no member of our family behind.

My first suspicion that the world was not entirely as I was taught at Rosemont Elementary came when I learned that Ethiopia, our ally, was a feudal society with an all-powerful dictator. Benevolent though he appeared to much of the world to be, Haile Selassie's first and foremost need for the American guns and other weapons of mass destruction Ethiopia obtained aplenty, was the suppression of his people and the retaining of his power.

Nonetheless I enjoyed the distinction and honor of being an American abroad, and I was both amazed and somewhat humbled that in a country where the average annual income was then about $50 I could meet meet a young boy tending a flock of goats in an area with no TVs and only one national radio station who was excited to meet a boy his own age from "Amereeka!!" and show he could recite the story of George Washington and the apple tree, and knew that Abraham Lincoln abolished slavery. Such was the legend of America the Brave in the world at large in 1970.

What has gone wrong? Why do we not win the hearts and minds of the world today? I believe it's because we try to solve problems by pointing fingers and guns, and we build walls between ourselves and between ourselves and the world.

On a day when the most encouraging man with the most uplifting ideas that we have seen in our great country in many years has come out strongly against rewarding the negligent guardians of our trust and engineers of our once strong nation's near collapse for their self-serving crimes against We the People and the once admiring people of the world we share, I want my fellow Americans to see and hear, from their own lips, the results of our attempts to "liberate" the Iraqi people using bombs, war and walls.

Tell me it's a lie to my face, I double dog dare ya!

SINGLE MAMA VOTING FOR OBAMA! — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 23:34:55 EDT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Al_y3g77ZsA

Are You Ready to Put the GOP Crap to Rest and Obama in the White House? Now?

Danielle — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 22:03:02 EDT

Hi Everyone,

The following information, that I am about to share with you, is dark, upsetting, somewhat graphic and will make every single one of you very angry. I know that is how I felt when I watched it; the first, second and third time. I have been researching the contents of this movie/documentary for the past 6 weeks, to try to disprove it...any of it, before sharing it with all of you. Unfortunately, I have not only been unable to find facts that prove otherwise, I've found more facts to verify its accuracy.

Policy of twisting the truth?

Christine C — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 14:39:48 EDT

I've been an Obama supporter since the state Senate election, and have excitedly been looking forward to being led by President Obama. And I've admired and looked up to Senator Biden for even longer.

But it's getting really hard to look people in the face and talk about how our party has the kind of integrity that others in Washington lack when I go to FactCheck.org every day and find a new example of another ad that distorts McCain's words or record. Or when I go to Politifact.org and see Obama's now got more "False" ratings and even a "Liar, Liar"!!

Come on - don't stoop to these games! We're better than that. There's so much truth out there to use 'against' that ticket, why even go there?

Please keep it clean so we don't have to hear "they all lie - you can't believe anything any of them say", and then have nothing with which to dispute it!

THE ECONOMY IS STRONG so said McCain and Palin

Mary — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 10:15:34 EDT

Two weeks ago John McCain was saying our economy was strong. Well of course a man who owns 13 CARS and 7 HOUSES would believe and say something that out of touch! I have a full time job earning $900.00 to $1000.00 a month, a very small one bedroom apartment and one used car. Because I am a woman I earn 77 cents to every dollar a man earns (Thanks to votes like McCains against women earning equal pay). In January I was laid off from my job and I went job hunting and it took until May to find a job. In all my years it has NEVER taken that long to secure a job for myself. Unlike McCain, I can tell you that the economy isn't strong and that the average person is really suffering.

What gets me is this, why should the average person bail out these large corporations? They all have savings accounts that they could pull from if they are so in trouble. If it was any small owned business the irs would demand their payment or foreclose on that small business owner. If it was any one of us the government would refuse to bail us out of our financial problems, thumb their nose at us and blame us. So why do they give favors once again to those large WEALTHY businesses and put the weight of the financial burden on our already burdened backs????

McCain say's that it's "Washingtons" fault, well Washington IS John McCain. John McCain voted to de-regulate those large businesses that he claims that "Washington" voted to de-regulate! Basically, the Republican party has from day one voted against ANY regulation of large corporate wealthy Americans and allowed them TAX cuts even though they could afford to pay those taxes. If a woman who cannot earn equal pay to a man is expected to pay her income taxes then you cannot tell me that any large corporation can't afford to pay taxes. I thought this was America where EVERYONE is responsible to the country but apparently America is not a democracy and some people are above the constitution and laws.

The Republican party and John McCain/Sarah Palin's of America don't live in the heart of America, don't concern themselves with the daily struggles of America, don't expect equality in America when it comes to home, finance, and business. ANY little businessman would be crushed and lose their business if they were in the same situation as those large financial companies are and the Republican's would NOT bail them out! I see Republican supporters cheering McCain on in his recent proclaimations concerning all the financial crisis and somehow neglecting to notice that two weeks ago they were cheering him on when he said that the economy is strong. Which is it, hmm?

I can only tell you what I observe from my small little corner of the world being a working widow working an average labor job every day of my life. Every day in Tampa people are begging for jobs where I am employed. Every day people are making payments for things where I work with pennies, nickles, dimes and quarters and apologizing to me saying, "Hard times, you know..." Can you imagine daily seeing people who live in a housing development that has been considered the middle class neighborhood apologizing to me because they are pulling out their pocket change just to get by at the end of their paychecks?

Yeah a man who owns 13 CARS and 7 HOUSES will never know the pain, the humiliation, the fear, the suffering that most of us every day American's are seeing and dealing with. He will never know what it is like to fear losing his one and only home that he worked HARD for or his one and only car repossessed. He will NEVER understand, he has NEVER understood and if anyone thinks that if John McCain gets into the office of the President that he will have any amount of compassion, understanding or will help out the average working middle class or laboring american then they need to go back and look at his voting history on those issues. He has ALWAYS voted in favor of wealthy america. He voted for those same companies that he is now flaming. He lies, lies, lies and has no intention in changing his true nature in the long run. Why should he, since he is one of them and own's more houses and cars than any of us AVERAGE AMERICAN'S ever will own!

Obama Daily Fact 09/22/2008 - Spread Truth!

Tanya Mitchell Graham — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 23:55:17 EDT

Today, I sent this Obama Fact to undecided voters in my address book:

Obama Daily Fact: As an Illinois State Senator, Barack Obama supported a bill to require that all potential capital punishment interrogations be videotaped. He also passed 150 laws to toughen penalties for violent crime. Spread Truth.

Even though Sen. Obama is up in the polls, I hope each of us stays viligant in our support for our next President of the United States, Barack Obama! Please spread the word!

A Lesson in Truth

Liadona — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 10:32:11 EDT

When I stated this blog I decided my main audience would be my son who is now 2 years old. I think that if he reads abou tmy proces and how I came to be where I am politically this election year he may learn some lessons for his future. I had really good intentions when I began this blog - but then life and its disasters got in the way. We learned the second mortgage we thought we had was incorrect; we started some turmoil in my husband's job; we found out that my job may not be around past October 1 (still don't know). With all of that going on I just didn't have time to even think about a blog let alone write one.

Yet, my family is luckier than most. We have our home, we have two jobs , we have money for food, I do not have to choose between my meds and diapers, we haven't been in the path of a natural disaster recently. All of these things plus a husband who is a pretty good economist makes it so we are much better than most. I know that - I acknoledge it. Having money is not a bad thing - especially when my husband and I worked for every scrap of earnings. I know what it is like to be laid off - believe me, if time #6 didn't teach me then #7 did. I may not know exactly how you are feeling or how you have chosen to deal with the situation you find yourlsef in, but I have been there and know it is not easy to come out.

So - what does this have to do with truth? Well, a lot if you think about it. I have had to face a lot of truths in my life from how much food do I really need to survive to not buying clothes for years unless I had to for some reason. During this time, I kept hearing about different politicians who would say "We can fix the economy." Hmmmm - not so much. I know they would like to fix the economy - they are working on a $700B bailout right now. But remember - these are the same people who spun off the Office ofthe Post OFfice and made it into a Quasi Governmental Agency - none of the perks and all of the problems. On top of that I keep hearing how Sarah Palin was anti-government earmarks yet she has the bridge to nowhere and didn't seem to fight hard from having it arrive on her doorstep. Of course - I don't know, I wasn't there.

Someone once told me that there are three sides to every issue - person #1's, person #2's and the truth. It doesn't matter who said what or who did want - in most cases memory is playing tricks on everyone and causing people to interpret as they wish. Only someone who wasn't there and can ask the right questions can strive for the truth.

However, there are some cases where truth is somewhat obvious. Sarah Palin is for abstinence only training in schools. It is her wish that children never leran about the birds & the bees from school. OK, that works if they get the sex education they need at home - something which rarely happens even if you have "The Talk." My question here is "Why didn't Palin take a second look at two of her policies and beliefs as soon as her 17 year old daughter walked up to her and said something like "I'm pregnant and I have chosen to keep the baby."

First and foremost - she is unwed, 17 and pregnant. If she went through abstinence training and it worked as her mom would have wished for her then she should not be the last thing on the list! (And yes - I would be saying this if Palin were Steve Palin and not Sarah Palin.)

Second - let's take a look at what her daughter presumably talked with her and her husband about - her choice to kepp the baby. Look at that sentance again if you don't see it...wait for it....yep - the word CHOICE was in that sentance. Choice - as in right to choose.

I truly believe that most people who profess a Right to Life attitude probably don't understand the fact that we are fighting over the same side of the coin. Those who are Right to Life wish to bring down the number of abortion and give people alternatives (meaning choices) to consider once the baby is born. Choice, on the other hand, gives women the choices they need to make the correct decision between havng an abortion to the alternatives that are available for a woman in this country who has a baby she feels she cannot protect nor raise. If these two groups came together a bit more they may find that the truth they have all been fighting for lies in the dialoge that meeting calmly will present.

OK - enough for tonight.

Lisa

Obama Daily Fact 09/21/08 - Spread Truth!

Tanya Mitchell Graham — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 23:02:26 EDT

Here's what I sent out today to people who have not made up their mind about who to vote for, along with Sen. Obama's video on the economy.

Obama Daily Fact: Sen. Obama has proposed 7 points that are necessary to deal with our immediate economic crisis and which respond to the $700 billion proposed to bail out Wall Street, which are as follows:1. There must be no blank check when American taxpayers are on the hook for this much money. 2. Taxpayers shouldn't be spending a dime to reward CEOs on Wall Street. 3. Taxpayers should be protected and should be able to recoup this investment. 4. This plan has to help homeowners stay in their homes. 5. This is a global crisis, and the United States must insist that other nations join us in helping secure the financial markets. 6. We need to start putting in place regular that Sen. Obama has been calling for for years to prevent this from ever happening again. 7. This plan can't just be a plan for Wall Street, it has to be a plan for Main Street. We have to come together, as Democrats and Republicans, to pass a stimulus plan that will put money in the pockets of working families, save jobs, and prevent painful budget cuts and tax hikes in our states.

Not Ready To Make Nice

Michael Corbett — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 16:22:38 EDT

That's the new theme I think the campaign should adopt. All the negativity from McPalin must be conuntered. I am not at all saying Senators Obama and Biden should go negative (well, maybe a little), BUT YOU HAVE TO CALL THESE PEOPLE OUT! A recent article on the political rhetoric of both campaigns said that while Obama/Biden has offered mostly truths while leaving some things out of the discussion, McCain/Palin has FLAT OUT LIED about pretty much EVERYTHING! It is time to call out these liars and expose them for what they are: FOUR MORE YEARS OF THE SAME FAILED BUSH POLICIES!

Truthiness Stages a Comeback

Nia "Hussein" J. — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 05:08:05 EDT

Truthiness Stages a Comeback

By FRANK RICH

Published: September 20, 2008

NOT until 2004 could the 9/11 commission at last reveal the title of the intelligence briefing President Bush ignored on Aug. 6, 2001, in Crawford: “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.” No wonder John McCain called for a new “9/11 commission” to “get to the bottom” of 9/14, when the collapse of Lehman Brothers set off another kind of blood bath in Lower Manhattan. Put a slo-mo Beltway panel in charge, and Election Day will be ancient history before we get to the bottom of just how little he and the president did to defend America against a devastating new threat on their watch.

For better or worse, the candidacy of Barack Obama, a senator-come-lately, must be evaluated on his judgment, ideas and potential to lead. McCain, by contrast, has been chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, where he claims to have overseen “every part of our economy.” He didn’t, thank heavens, but he does have a long and relevant economic record that begins with the Keating Five scandal of 1989 and extends to this campaign, where his fiscal policies bear the fingerprints of Phil Gramm and Carly Fiorina. It’s not the résumé that a presidential candidate wants to advertise as America faces its worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. That’s why the main thrust of the McCain campaign has been to cover up his history of economic malpractice.

McCain has largely pulled it off so far, under the guidance of Steve Schmidt, a Karl Rove protégé. A Rovian political strategy by definition means all slime, all the time. But the more crucial Rove game plan is to envelop the entire presidential race in a thick fog of truthiness. All campaigns, Obama’s included, engage in false attacks. But McCain, Sarah Palin and their surrogates keep repeating the same lies over and over not just to smear their opponents and not just to mask their own record. Their larger aim is to construct a bogus alternative reality so relentless it can overwhelm any haphazard journalistic stabs at puncturing it.

When a McCain spokesman told Politico a week ago that “we’re not too concerned about what the media filter tries to say” about the campaign’s incessant fictions, he was channeling a famous Bush dictum of 2003: “Somehow you just got to go over the heads of the filter.” In Bush’s case, the lies lobbed over the heads of the press were to sell the war in Iraq. That propaganda blitz, devised by a secret White House Iraq Group that included Rove, was a triumph. In mere months, Americans came to believe that Saddam Hussein had aided the 9/11 attacks and even that Iraqis were among the hijackers. A largely cowed press failed to set the record straight.

Just as the Bushies once flogged uranium from Africa, so Palin ceaselessly repeats her discredited claim that she said “no thanks” to the Bridge to Nowhere. Nothing is too small or sacred for the McCain campaign to lie about. It was even caught (by The Christian Science Monitor) peddling an imaginary encounter between Cindy McCain and Mother Teresa when McCain was adopting her daughter in Bangladesh.

If you doubt that the big lies are sticking, look at the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll. Half of voters now believe in the daily McCain refrain that Obama will raise their taxes. In fact, Obama proposes raising taxes only on the 1.9 percent of households that make more than $250,000 a year and cutting them for nearly everyone else.

You know the press is impotent at unmasking this truthiness when the hardest-hitting interrogation McCain has yet faced on television came on “The View.” Barbara Walters and Joy Behar called him on several falsehoods, including his endlessly repeated fantasy that Palin opposed earmarks for Alaska. Behar used the word “lies” to his face. The McCains are so used to deference from “the filter” that Cindy McCain later complained that “The View” picked “our bones clean.” In our news culture, Behar, a stand-up comic by profession, looms as the new Edward R. Murrow.

Network news, with its dwindling handful of investigative reporters, has barely mentioned, let alone advanced, major new print revelations about Cindy McCain’s drug-addiction history (in The Washington Post) and the rampant cronyism and secrecy in Palin’s governance of Alaska (in last Sunday’s New York Times). At least the networks repeatedly fact-check the low-hanging fruit among the countless Palin lies, but John McCain’s past usually remains off limits.

That’s strange since the indisputable historical antecedent for our current crisis is the Lincoln Savings and Loan scandal of the go-go 1980s. When Charles Keating’s bank went belly up because of risky, unregulated investments, it wiped out its depositors’ savings and cost taxpayers more than $3 billion. More than 1,000 other S.&L. institutions capsized nationwide.

It was ugly for the McCains. He had received more than $100,000 in Keating campaign contributions, and both McCains had repeatedly hopped on Keating’s corporate jet. Cindy McCain and her beer-magnate father had invested nearly $360,000 in a Keating shopping center a year before her husband joined four senators in inappropriate meetings with regulators charged with S.&L. oversight.

After Congressional hearings, McCain was reprimanded for “poor judgment.” He had committed no crime and had not intervened to protect Keating from ruin. Yet he, like many deregulators in his party, was guilty of bankrupt policy-making before disaster struck. He was among the sponsors of a House resolution calling for the delay of regulations intended to deter risky investments just like those that brought down Lincoln and its ilk.

Ever since, McCain has publicly thrashed himself for his mistakes back then — and boasted of the lessons he learned. He embraced campaign finance reform to rebrand himself as a “maverick.” But whatever lessons he learned are now forgotten.

For all his fiery calls last week for a Wall Street crackdown, McCain opposed the very regulations that might have helped avert the current catastrophe. In 1999, he supported a law co-authored by Gramm (and ultimately signed by Bill Clinton) that revoked the New Deal reforms intended to prevent commercial banks, insurance companies and investment banks from mingling their businesses. Equally laughable is the McCain-Palin ticket’s born-again outrage over the greed of Wall Street C.E.O.’s. When McCain’s chief financial surrogate, Fiorina, was fired as Hewlett-Packard’s chief executive after a 50 percent drop in shareholders’ value and 20,000 pink slips, she took home a package worth $42 million.

The McCain campaign canceled Fiorina’s television appearances last week after she inadvertently admitted that Palin was unqualified to run a corporation. But that doesn’t mean Fiorina is gone. Gramm, too, was ostentatiously exiled after he blamed the economic meltdown on our “nation of whiners” and “mental recession,” but he remains in the McCain loop.

The corporate jets, lobbyists and sleazes that gravitated around McCain in the Keating era have also reappeared in new incarnations. The Nation’s Web site recently unearthed a photo of the resolutely anticelebrity McCain being greeted by the con man Raffaello Follieri and his then girlfriend, the Hollywood actress Anne Hathaway, as McCain celebrated his 70th birthday on Follieri’s rented yacht in Montenegro in August 2006. It’s the perfect bookend to the old pictures of McCain in a funny hat partying with Keating in the Bahamas.

Whatever blanks are yet to be filled in on Obama, we at least know his economic plans and the known quantities who are shaping them (Lawrence Summers, Robert Rubin, Paul Volcker). McCain has reversed himself on every single economic issue this year, often within a 24-hour period, whether he’s judging the strength of the economy’s fundamentals or the wisdom of the government bailout of A.I.G. He once promised that he’d run every decision past Alan Greenspan — and even have him write a new tax code — but Greenspan has jumped ship rather than support McCain’s biggest flip-flop, his expansion of the Bush tax cuts. McCain’s official chief economic adviser is now Douglas Holtz-Eakin, who last week declared that McCain had “helped create” the BlackBerry.

But Holtz-Eakin’s most telling statement was about McCain’s economic plans — namely, that the details are irrelevant. “I don’t think it’s imperative at this moment to write down what the plan should be,” he said. “The real issue here is a leadership issue.” This, too, is a Rove-Bush replay. We want a tough guy who will “fix” things with his own two hands — let’s take out the S.E.C. chairman! — instead of wimpy Frenchified Democrats who just “talk.” The fine print of policy is superfluous if there’s a quick-draw decider in the White House.

The twin-pronged strategy of truculence and propaganda that sold Bush and his war could yet work for McCain. Even now his campaign has kept the “filter” from learning the very basics about his fitness to serve as president — his finances and his health. The McCain multihousehold’s multimillion-dollar mother lode is buried in Cindy McCain’s still-unreleased complete tax returns. John McCain’s full medical records, our sole index to the odds of an imminent Palin presidency, also remain locked away. The McCain campaign instead invited 20 chosen reporters to speed-read through 1,173 pages of medical history for a mere three hours on the Friday before Memorial Day weekend. No photocopying was permitted.

This is the same tactic of selective document release that the Bush White House used to bamboozle Congress and the press about Saddam’s nonexistent W.M.D. As truthiness repeats itself, so may history, and not as farce.

A Rose By Any Other Name

Reynaldo A. Macias — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 02:30:20 EDT

Don’t call it the War in Iraq. Call it what it is . . . an invasion. An occupation. When you call it a war, you give George Bush and John McCain credit they don’t deserve. When you call it a war, you lose because like it or not, a war has two sides, and Americans don’t want to be losing. But we aren’t fighting a war. The United States, under false pretenses, invaded Iraq, and is currently occupying it. Adam Kokesh, Iraq veteran and anti-invasion activist, asked the question best at the Republican National Convention: How do you win an occupation?

Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with the terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2008. The invasion of Iraq, because they violated a United Nations resolution, was wrong. And as Senator McCain says, in the “twenty-first century, nations don’t invade other nations.”

John McCain’s thought process (I’m being generous by calling it that), is a knee-jerk, pick up your guns and go shoot someone reaction, which incidentally also explains his choice of Sarah Palin. But both decisions leave not only his detractors, but his supporters wondering: what is he thinking? He’s not. And that’s not the person that I want running the country. As early as September 12th, 2001, John McCain was on record for invading Iraq in retaliation for the terrorist attacks. September 12th. 24 hours after the planes crashed into the building, John McCain was already pointing his guns at people without any evidence to support it.

John McCain also likes to claim that “the surge is working.” What does that mean? Lindsey Graham at the RNC kept yelling “Victory!” How do you win an occupation?

We’re not winning a war in Iraq. Osama Bin Laden, the actual architect of the attack, is still at large; Al Qaeda, his terrorist organization, is stronger than it was when they attacked us; Afghanistan, where they were training and the first country invaded by the United States, has fallen back into lawlessness; Saudi Arabia, where 15 of the 19 hijackers originated, is still a leading US ally thanks to President Bush; the United States military, the strongest in the world, is spread thin and staggering (not to mention ill-equipped, but I digress).

John McCain deserves credit for what he has done: voted to authorize military force in Iraq; vocally supported a surge in troops, putting more American service-people in danger; failing to realize the importance of the war against terrorists in Afghanistan; understanding the difference between Sunni and Shia and their allies, since those are the people we’re working with and fighting against in the region; supported deregulation for twenty-six years in Congress and then changed his mind when the banks crashed; toured with cameras for Hurricane Gustav and ignored Hurricane Ike; let his friends, surrogates, & campaign workers lie about Barack Obama while saying, “I’m John McCain, and I approve this message.”

You can call him an honorable man, who is qualified to be president. You can call his ideas “change,” and his running mate a “crack in the glass ceiling.” You can call him a maverick, who’s “even bucked his own party to do what is right.” You can call him knowledgeable about the economy, and in touch with average Americans.

You can call shit Shinola. But you can’t use it to shine your shoes.

Crossposted at Will Rhodes Portmanteau and Spreading the Word on September 19, 2008.

Fighting Untruths

Nancy — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 00:43:32 EDT

The Internet is a funny thing...it has so much information, and yet so much misinformation! Case in point...at my school, we can sit around having great discussions about all kinds of things. The other day I was saying I only go back to visit Texas (I moved east three years ago) about once a year to see my accountant. A colleague said - wow...must be a great accountant. So I mentioned that I own a little land where they have drilled for natural gas and am part-owner of an oil well - so the accountant in TX knows how to deal with that on our taxes. (I waited for the question of if I rode a horse to work when I lived there - LOL).

So - this led to a discussion of drilling off-shore for oil and what I thought about it - and I said it was a terrible idea! I brought up Gore's Challenge to America for 100% clean energy in ten years... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAnQ1cFA_zM

Wind and solar are the way to go...did you hear about Bloomburg's idea to put wind turbines on the skyscrapers of NYC? What a great idea! How about solar panels on the roofs of all the townhouses and apartments that are being built for affordable housing in NJ? I wish I had solar panels on roof of MY townhome - but it goes against the covenants.

So - most of the people were listening and agreeing. Then one guy said "yeah - but it takes years to recoup solar panels....and while we're fighting about drilling off-shore, the Chinese are already doing slant drilling off the coast of Florida, taking OUR oil and selling it back to us". HUNH?? So I searched - and sure enough - found that rhetoric on a bunch of right-wing websites - none with hard data to back it up. But that's the scary thing...so many people don't need the hard data - they believe what they want to believe. How do we fight the untruths?

Obama Daily Fact 09/19/08 - Spread Truth!

Tanya Mitchell Graham — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 23:45:09 EDT

I know Senator Obama is up in teh poll of polls, but I still continue to spread the truth about him and his record. Here's what I sent out today:

09/19/08 E-Mail: Obama Daily Fact: Sen. Obama proposes to establish new laws that protect consumers with a Credit Card Bill of Rights. He voted against limiting credit interest rates to 30% because 30% too high. Spread Truth.

Text: Obama Daily Fact: Sen. Obama proposes to establish new laws that protect consumers with a Credit Card Bill of Rights. Spread Truth.

Issues vs Personalities

Susan from Cranston, RI — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 23:09:33 EDT

I found the article below on Jim Wallis's God's Politics Blog (www.sojo.net). I think it makes a good point about why it is so important to look at our motives for choosing a particular candidate and to exam the candidate's approach to the issues as distinct from how we relate to or identify with his or her personality.

I also think that we need to be as clever as foxes in our efforts to weed out the lies from the truth as fed to and interpreted for us by various media including emails. It's important that we don't accept or pass on as truth what we hear in the news or read in emails without first vetting the information, finding out the source and researching it ourselves. No one is served by passing on misleading information and outright lies.

Something About Morality

Mary — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 21:40:48 EDT

Yes, I've been gone for some time and working so many hours in order to live. Having listened to some family and other people who pose the issues of morality and republican party vs. morality and democratic party I wanted to just mention a few thoughts. I often hear that the Republican's represent the "moral" group, but how is it moral to vote against women earning the same income as men? I worked eight day's this week and two of those day's I worked for 12 hour shifts. Now I don't mind working, and since I'm a widow I must work in order to pay my bills. I earn about $900.00 to $1,000.00 a month, my work is honest hard work and when it's all said and done I'll pay the same taxes that any man would pay to the government. The difference is that Republican's voted every bill down that would give women the right to earn the same pay as a man. How is that moral? I hear people say that Republican's protect against abortions. Well, how will these mother's who have no husband's and work for less pay afford to take care of the unaborted children when the Republican party doesn't support them earning equal pay? How is that moral and does it cause any woman who is alone to believe that she has the income to take care of that unborn child? What about women who's husband's abandon them and their children for another woman? How does that abandoned wife and mother support her children if the father is delinquent in paying for the children and helping her out? It happens, it's not moral, and that mother rely's upon government and law to secure some kind of monitary way to continue to live.

I see two key issues that morality groups always pick as support for the Republican party. Gay marriage and anti-abortion. And yet! The Republican party has protected the rights of the wealthy giving them the largest tax breaks. They support selfish gain and inequality in paying some people and women what they are due and yet they expect to get their income tax from everyone. They have allowed insurances companies and home mortgage companies rob people blind. People are losing their life long dream, their homes and the republican party hasn't stopped this greedy trend. Everyone is paying more for gasoline than ever before and the republican party has defended the large oil corporations and given them tax breaks. McCain's latest visit to Tampa had people shouting "Drill baby drill" and hoping for oil wells off our coast. Forget for a moment the environmental problems and just ask yourself "Who will gain from those Oil rigs?". Believe me it won't be the state of Florida and it's residents. Gasoline prices won't drop for us as the oil companies will find yet another reason for raising the prices. The only way Florida could gain is if they forced the Oil corporations that drill off the coast to make the State of Florida shareholders and demand 10% of all monitary gains from that likely 8 to 10 billion a year those oil company owners will make.

The one thing I note is that the Republican always illudes to the most obvious of moral issues and yet they are NO MORE MORAL than the democratic party. They are humans, "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.", they lie, they have stollen from poor eldery people and deprived them of their right to have full benefits, they lie to veterans of war and have denied them benefits, they deny women the right to be paid as thought their work was as valuable as any man, they take from the poor and give to the rich, they do not give to those in need. All those things fall in the realm of immorality. They are no more moral than anyone and they dupe most people who wish to be moral with two issues. To support them is to support another kind of immorality, the kind that the pharasees had. Religiousity doesn't equate with morality at all. They may appear religious, they may claim to support religious issues, but they are neither moral or right. When I see how many wrongs they have supported and continue to support vs. the two things that the Democratic party support then I wonder how it is that people who claim to be moral can continue to support the Republican party.

I guess you could if you can agree that greed is okay, that denying widows and orphans is right, that taking food and medicine from war veterans, eldery people and single mothers/fathers is right, that not paying the laborer what is due them and taxing them the same as the laborer who earns much more is right. I guess you could agree that they are moral if you can accept that taking programs that support mothers with infants and children away is okay. You see, in the end they will lure you in with promises of keeping gay's from marrying and women from aborting children. Gay people will still live together regardless and women will get secret abortions just like they've done for generations. How do people who claim to be moral support a party that deny's women the mean's to live and support themselves and their children? Is that moral?

Apologies to everyone for not being around so much but people such as myself don't get the luxury like the McCain's or Sarah Palin who has a husband. I am neither wealthy or come from a wealthy family. What I am though is an honest hard working woman who does indeed live an ethical moral life and it disgust me that people can be led by the nose to the slaughterhouse by liars who claim to live moral lives while in truth the Republican party do nothing of the kind. They just learned that all they have to do is bring up those two issues and church people jump hook, line and sinker while overlooking the immorality that the Republican's continue to generate. Nuff said and I have to go to bed since tomorrow is yet another day that this old woman will pull herself up early and stand for 8+ hours at work but get paid less then the men and be taxed the same. So how is that moral?

WHATS REALLY GOING ON. THE FACTS

Obama Supporter — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 19:00:42 EDT

This blog is for those of you that dont know what Bush has been up to for the past 8 years. I warn you, it is vary scary!!!

If Biden thinks Mccain is such a great guy then why shouldn't I vote for him?

Barbara from Queen Creek, AZ — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 13:19:44 EDT

I hate to repeat myself again but Biden and Obama need to quit reminding the nation what a great guy McCain is. If I hear Biden tell me one more time that McCain is a friend and a nice guy I may have to vote for the slimy Republican. I do trust Joe Biden's opinion.

This campaign needs to hit harder on the fact that McCain wanted to privatize social security and give another windfall to Wall Street. They need to bring out McCain's voting record and the Keating Five scenario. They should not squander this opportunity. They need to start naming names on his staff. They need to bring up Phil Gramm more often......maybe everyday!!

This campaign needs to bring McCain's voting record regarding veterans .minimum wage, equal pay for equal work and deregulation of the corporate criminals.

Let's get this show on the road. Tell the truth and tell it often. All the opposition can do is tell a lie and tell it often but we know that works too. If truth prevails then its time to scream it from the rooftops before it is too late.

Women's Suffrage

Nanci — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 01:27:53 EDT

I just came home from a viewing of the HBO production "Iron Jawed Women" about women's suffrage in the 1900's (1920, to be exact). The star was the other Hilary, Hilary Swank. What these women endured, the dedication and total commitment they gave to their cause, against all odds and at great personal sacrifice moved me deeply. If you are older than 88 years, you were alive in the time that women did not have the right to vote. For me, that is only a generation away. Incredible!

Today, we must be committed to reminding women of the preciousness of that right, and the responsibility, in particular to our childre, in particular our daughters. It is not about having a woman on the ticket. That would be to say that women were still chattels and mindless extensions of men. It is not about the second time in history that a woman has campaigned as a Vice Presidential candidate. That would be to say that woman do not understand the issues, much less care about the future of our country and what it holds for our daughters and our children.

Women know that Barack Obama and Joe Biden stand for the issues that women stand for: equal rights under the Constitution, fair wages and the right to strike, education for our children that is not only granted to the rich, jobs so Americans (male and female) can make a living wage and not see their jobs outsourced overseas so corporate greed-pots can line their pockets while workers scrape to make ends meet, and the right of a woman to decide what happens to her own body. This is not a pro-abortion stance, this is the right to decide, and not be told our values. The right not to be told whether or not we are "Christian" enough, the right not to be lied to by those we entrust with leadership, the right not to be told that the economy is strong while we see it sliding away, and not to be told we are not Patriots and not supportive of our own sons and daughters who are fighting in the wrong war. The right to be compassionate, and not judgmental. If we give up these rights, we give up what America stands for.

Barack Obama and Joe Biden echo the values that I have forged in my life as a citizen of America, as a woman and as a patriot. That is why I am passionate about this election. That is why, for the first time in my life, I am volunteering to see Barack Obama elected. That is why I urge you to stand up and be counted. Make your position known. Listen to what the candidates have to say, watch their body language, believe first the words you hear for yourself and not the spin put on the words. Think for yourself, judge Obama's values against your own. I think if you do, you will find that you can support this candidate as well.

Be certain you are registered to vote. If you have married or moved since voting the last time, go to a political headquarters, call the Democratic party in your area, call your congressman and find out how & where to change your name and address. If you are not registered, know that in Washington State the deadline is October 4. After that, the election will be decided without you. If you turn 18 years of age before November 4 you can register to vote in THIS election NOW. Don't wait.

Don't wait for change to happen. As John Mayer says "Waiting for the World to Change" never works. If you and I do nothing, how can we have change? If we re-elect the same party, how can we have change? Don't let the Republicans continue to assume you are too dumb to see through their political lies and strategies. Don't let them continue to talk down to you. Demand answers. Demand truth. Demand accountability. Demand to hear what the woman on their ticket knows about national and international politics. Demand your rights as a citizen and a woman in the glorious country of America.

VOTE OBAMA!! OBAMA FOR CHANGE!! OBAMA FOR HOPE!! OBAMA FOR PRESIDENT!!

Obama Daily Fact 09/17/2008 - Spread Truth!

Tanya Mitchell Graham — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 23:09:40 EDT

Here is what I sent out today:

E-mail:

Obama Daily Fact: Senator Obama co-sponsored the Combat Meth Act, which provides more money for fighting methamphetamine (meth), tightens controls on the sale of meth ingredients, and provides assistance to the children of meth abusers. The legislation would limit access to cold medicines containing pseudoephedrine, the primary ingredient used to make methamphetamine. This bill passed the Senate and became law in the 109th Congress. Spread Truth.

Text:

Obama Daily Fact: Sen. Obama co-sponsored the Combat Meth Act which provides more money for fighting methamphetamine. The bill became law in 2005. Spread Truth.

Does Truth Matter?

CW — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 22:47:17 EDT

Recently I saw a commentary in our local newspaper that ask the readers "Does Truth Matter?". Referring to the election, it brought to mind the many fabrications put forth as fact by the McCain/Palin campaign. It asked the reader to ponder the fact that even when all of the ads Senator McCain has endorsed included outright lies people still chose to believe them. Information proven false still is being spread by McCain/Palin. The media, which here, by the way seems to me as being pro-republican, has come out and said that the stories he has spread are false. I even saw an article from a well known and respected news source call "John McCain...from Maverick to Liar". So I wonder, does the truth matter in this election?

My Letter to the Editor

Obama Donna — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 11:06:23 EDT

When I hear one of the candidates for President say, "The fundamentals of our economy are strong," I have to speak out. It is so important in this campaign for Americans, whether Democrat, Republican, or Independent, to think long and hard about the state our country is in. Regardless of party, we should study the issues, and when we go into the booth to vote on November 4th, make our decision based on a good knowledge of the real facts and not campaign rhetoric. Too often, voters stubbornly vote along party lines instead of what is the best for America. This year has to be different. We must be informed and vote our conscience. We must check out facts presented for the truth. There are non-partisan websites like Snopes.com or Truthorfiction.com, that will tell you what is the truth and what is a rumor, lie, or misinformation. I researched the following information and it can be verified at the sites noted:The unemployment rate is up to 6.1%, a five-year high, this quarter and more than 10 percent of Americans are unemployed or underemployed, a nearly 25-percent increase from one year earlier (Wall Street Journal). More than a half million Americans (530,000) have been subject to mass layoffs in the last year. Real estate foreclosures in the U.S. were up 75 percent in 2007. The overall rate in the U.S. was 10.3 per 1,000 households. Eight states ended the year with foreclosure rates of more than 15 per 1,000 households (CBS News), yet Exxon-Mobil smashed the record for highest profits ever made by a public U.S. company by posting a net profit of $40.6 billion in 2007. To put these figures in perspective, Exxon made $77,245 per minute in 2007—that’s more money generated per minute than 70 percent of Americans earned all year according to the Census Bureau (Center for American Progress).Over the past nine months, global food prices have soared 40 percent, while food reserves are at 30-year lows (CNN Money). Energy prices were up 6.6% in the month, led by a 10.1% jump in gas prices. That left gasoline prices up nearly a third from a year earlier.Many people, tired of politics as usual, think nothing will be done any differently when one of our candidates becomes President in 2008. I urge all of you to think carefully about how the past eight years have affected 95% of the American population, and that John McCain has the same economic policies that President Bush has had. McCain thinks multimillionaires are members of the middle class, homeowners are to blame for the housing crisis, and Big Oil needs more tax breaks. Barack Obama will put the middle class first. He’ll pass a middle class tax cut that gives 95% of working Americans a tax cut of up to $1,000—and he’ll give families an emergency energy rebate to help folks cope with rising gas prices. For example, in the $38 to $66 thousand salary bracket, McCain's plan gives a tax break of $31. Obama's plan gives a break of $1042. In the $603 thousand to 2.8 million brackets, McCain's plan gives a tax break of $45,361 while Obama's plan will tax them $119,574 more (Tax Policy Center.org)! He will tax the big oil companies on their record profits, and put that money to use for the middle class. He’ll offer students a $4,000 tax break to pay for tuition in exchange for doing 100 hours of community service. And he’ll raise the minimum wage and index it to inflation. He will eliminate income tax for seniors making less than $50,000 per year. He will eliminate oil and gas loopholes. And there is so much more. Check out the Major Tax Revisions Chart at Tax Policy Center.org ( a non-partison research firm that reports factual, proven, information to the American consumer) where there is a comparison chart showing the two candidates economic policies.Barack Obama is the clear choice for American families. Barack Obama has been working for the poor and the middle class all of his adult life, and I hope that Americans will reach deep inside their conscience and have a spirit of love for ALL the people in our great country when they vote on November 4th. When this candidate spoke on Labor Day, I heard and will forever remember these words, “If there’s a poor child out there that’s my child; If there’s a man out there who lost his job, that’s my brother. If there’s a senior out there in trouble, that’s my grandparent; If there’s a woman out there without health care, that’s my sister.” Vote your conscience for the largest majority of the American people. You really can make a difference!

Change Requires Truth, Doesn't It?

Mac from McHenry, IL — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 00:20:48 EDT

When someone says something like "well, that's the way politics are played" today, it makes me cringe. I do try to look at this campaign objectively. As difficult as it is sometimes... it's important, and keeping with the democratic philosophy, I believe. However, democracy isn't served when the decisions citizens make are based on pure marketing. What I get stuck on recently, and hope others are considering as well, is the desire to ignore the details.

Details are what are used, with enormous effort, to manipulate us into thinking one way or another. Campaign managers know most of us won't make the effort necessary to understand the truth, so it's all about how they can craft their message. And craft it they do.

Obama Daily Fact 09/16/2008 - Spread Truth!

Tanya Mitchell Graham — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 23:04:43 EDT

Here's what I sent out today:

E-mail:

Obama Daily Fact: Senators Barack Obama and Joe Biden will provide tax relief for small businesses and start up companies by eliminating all capital gains taxes to encourage innovation and job creation. Obama and Biden will also support small business owners by providing a $500 “Making Work Pay” tax credit to almost every worker in America. Self-employed small business owners pay both the employee and the employer side of the payroll tax, and this measure will reduce the burdens of this double taxation. Spread Truth.

Text:

Obama Daily Fact: Sen. Obama will provide tax relief for small businesses by eliminating all capital gains taxes, encouraging job creation. Spread Truth.

"A time comes when silence is betrayal." VOTE OBAMA/BIDEN 11/4/08

Hope4Unity — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 06:03:40 EDT

"The truth of these words is beyond doubt, but the mission to which they call us is a most difficult one. Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government's policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world. Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexing as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict, we are always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty. But we must move on."

"Some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony, but we must speak. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak... And we must rejoice as well, for surely this is the first time in our nation's history that a significant number...have chosen to move beyond the prophesying of smooth patriotism to the high grounds of a firm dissent based upon the mandates of conscience and the reading of history. Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. If it is, let us trace its movement, and pray that our own inner being may be sensitive to its guidance. For we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us."

There is at the outset a very obvious and almost facile connection between the war in Vietnam (Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan) and the struggle I and others have been waging in America...Then came the buildup in Vietnam (Invasion of Iraq), and I watched this program broken and eviscerated as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war. And I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor (and the middle class) so long as adventures like Vietnam (Iraq)continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic, destructive suction tube. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor (and working-class) and to attack it as such."

Obama Daily Fact 09/14/2008 - Spread Truth!

Tanya Mitchell Graham — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 22:51:29 EDT

Here's what I sent to everyone in my e-mail address book and via text from my cell phone.

Obama Daily Fact 091408E-mail:Obama Daily Fact: Starting in 1993 and throughout his Illinois state senate career, Senator Obama taught Constitutional Law part-time at the University of Chicago Law School, as a Lecturer from 1992 to 1996 and as a Senior Lecturer from 1996-2004.

Text:

Obama Daily Fact: Sen. Obama taught Constitutional Law at the University of Chicago Law School 1992 to 2004.

Republicans fault both campaigns for negative ads, By HOPE YEN Associated Press Writer

Change O'8 — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:54:03 EDT

This article is a publicity stunt, by Karl Rove, to accomplish at least three things:

1. Make it look like the GOP really is at odds with McCain, and therefore McCain really will bring change to Washington.

2. Truly warn McCain to tone down the negativity of his adds because they are making him look bad.

3. Scare Obama away from being more aggressive, which he actually needs to be.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/C/CAMPAIGNS_NEGATIVITY?SITE=CARIE&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Less than 50 days to get things done!

Kyle Keleher — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 16:58:02 EDT

With all the lies coming from the McCain-Palin camp this week, I look forward to another week of the national news media exposing their true colors.

Palin dropped the "Bridge to Nowhere" line in her speeches in Alaska this week, but in Reno NV yesterday, she's trying the ol' "hook, line, and sinker" on all of us again. She dropped it in Alaska because all of her friends and foes know it to be a false statement. Let me tell you, she's not going to hood wink us this time!

Seems like "Troopergate" is just one of Palins many personal firings. Seems like other city employees felt her swift hand of rash firings also. She fired the city's librarian because she would not remove some books off the shelf. Just because she never directly ordered the books to be removed, the firing justified her motives. After the city was up in arms about this issue, she was voted by the residents to regain her job as librarian.

And just this week, she had to correct her statements on a so called visit to Iraq, liar! Truth be told, she only went to the Kuwait and Iraq border (on the Kuwait side). Oops, yet one more lie the McCain-Palin camp has told to the American people to boost her foreign policy.

How we can make a difference

Corey — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 09:47:10 EDT

Below is the letter to the editor I just sent to the AJC in response to Jim Wooten's article in Sunday's paper:

"Jim,

I have a simple request. Instead of writing an article every week talking about how Obama is going to lose, why don't you write an article illustrating the differences between McCain and Bush. If McCain is everything you think he is, you should have no trouble filling your editorial space in the Sunday paper with those differences. Any space you can't use should go to an extra Luckovich cartoon. Deal? Let's make the election about the issues, not about personality. The American people will be better for it!"

Article link is:

http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/shared-blogs/ajc/thinkingright/entries/2008/09/12/panic_sets_in_for_obama_democr.html

We need to do more of this. Make the election about the issues. Then we win!

Pass it on, make people think.

Obama Daily Fact 09/13/2008 - Spread Truth!

Tanya Mitchell Graham — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 21:18:53 EDT

Here's what I sent out today to spread the word!

E-mail: Obama Daily Fact: Sen. Obama’s New Energy Plan for America will help create 5 million new green collar jobs for Americans by strategically investing $150 billion over the next ten years to build a clean energy future and stop America’s dependence on foreign oil. Spread Truth. Text:

Obama Daily Fact: Sen. Obama’s Energy Plan will help create 5 million new green collar jobs for Americans and stop our dependence on foreign oil. Spread Truth.

FACT CHECK: Sen. John McCain's Acceptance Speech (09-05-08)

Stephanie Williams — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 11:56:46 EDT

FACTCHECKING JOHN McCAIN

He made some flubs in accepting the nomination

by Brooks Jackson, with Viveca Novak, Lori Robertson, Joe Miller, & Emi Kolawole

My Free Ad for the Obama Campaign

Chris Orcutt, Deputy Field Organizer — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 11:35:15 EDT

I will be voting for Barack Obama on November 4, but not because I think he has all the answers. I'm voting for him because he's shown a willingness to TRY something. I fear that with the Republican ticket, we're going to end up with four more years of policies that have gone nowhere.

So, with this in mind, I wrote a lengthy note to the Obama camp and emailed said note to the campaign offices, Senate offices, and several Democratic blogs. The gist of my message is that they need to shift the message away from one of personalities back to the question of vision. The following is an excerpt from what I wrote:

Dear Guys & Gals of the Obama Campaign:

[...]

Anytime the media attempts to drag you into a debate about personalities, shift the question back to McCain's TOTAL LACK OF VISION. Hammer away at the idea that it takes more than adding a buzzword to a campaign to make that party about "change." Redefine the playing field. What about this approach: since the McCain camp isn't detailing the kind of so-called change they're talking about, since they're offering no VISION, why not go ahead and do it for them?

Create an ad in which you say something like this:

[Narrated by James Earl Jones]

"Now that the campaign is getting tough, John McCain is suddenly about CHANGE. But if that's the case, why hasn't he offered any specifics?

[Insert video clips of McCain saying "I don't know" or similar vague comments]

Since McCain won't, or simply can't, offer Americans a vision of what Republican change will be, we thought we'd give him a hand:

THE MCCAIN BRAND OF CHANGE:

- Even HIGHER unemployment rates than the recent historic high under Bush.

- Increased reliance on fossil fuels and new drilling that is harmful to our environment.

- At least seven Washington lobbyists operating in the White House.

- An expanded war in Iraq.

- More government bailouts that benefit Republican fat-cats.

- Increased alienation from the rest of the world.

- MORE and more of the same failed Bush policies.

With McCain, things will CHANGE in Washington all right--for the worse. Barack Obama, on the other hand, is for the RIGHT kind of change in Washington and America. He has a real vision for America, and he's been up-front about it from day one.

[Insert bullets on major issues]

Barack Obama...Change you can believe in.

John McCain...changing what he believes."

If you're a Democrat or Independent, make sure you're registered to vote, and MAKE SURE YOU VOTE on November 4.

If you're a Republican, feel free to stay home and complain.

Barack's Message of TRUTH

Rick from Washington, DC — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 10:58:49 EDT

What is this election really about? It's CHANGE of course, but now that has been appropriated by the McCain Pallin crowd. Barak should keep on the "Change we need" message but I believe he needs to emphasize the importance of

TRUTH in politics.

McCain has given up credibility on this point. He now accepts the advise of his Bush era campaign staff to distort the truth to win. THAT IS NOT THE CHANGE WE NEED.

TRUTH form our politicians is esssential. We need to be moving away from the TALK RADIO reality and move back to what is factual.

TRUTH is as important to me now in this election as CHANGE, (but it will be a change from the Bush years of course.)

Rick

Who Lies More? (It's Chain emails, McCain in distant second.)

Jesse Radin — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 07:37:59 EDT

Obama, McCain, Palin, Biden.

Obama:

True 39 (39) 34.2%
Mostly True 24 (24) 21.1%
Half True 21 (21) 18.4%
Barely True 12 (12) 10.5%
False 18 (18) 15.8%
Pants on Fire

114 total claims. Note this includes the primaries.

I haven't gone through all of these, but I might do something in a few days.

Basically, Obama is VERY honest for a politican. I will call True/Mostly True/Half True Truth, and Barely True/False/Pants on Fire a lie.

So Obama
True: 73.7%
False: 26.3%

This looks good, so I will now do McCain.

True 25 (25) 22.1%
Mostly True 20 (20) 17.7%
Half True 19 (19) 16.8%
Barely True 21 (21) 18.6%
False 22 (22) 19.5%
Pants on Fire 6 0.5%

113 Claims.

Pants on Fire, are of course, the worst. It means a complete lie intentionally done. False may not be as intentional.

McCain:

True: 56.7%
Lie: 43.3%

So, the old adage about Politicians lying all the time is false, but Obama is significantly more honest than McCain.

Let me put it this way. It may not be that big of a difference, but theoretically, the odd of two Obama statements being true is 54.3% (73.3% squared), that is two statements. Almost as much as McCain's 1 true. Two McCain statements being true is a lot less. Only 32.1%.

The difference is less than 20% but in the long run it matters.

Now I will do the VP, but this is unfair to Biden because it includes anything he said over the entire primary season and Palin JUST entered the race.

Palin so far cannot be analyzed. They keep the woman silent for good reason. I mean she is a woman. Just kidding. There are female Republican senators. It's because she's a dumb hockey mom who doesn't know shit.

She's only made 8 statements and all of them are in the True range. That is not enough to measure. I will admit I am biased, but I'd say you'd need close to 100 to get a good idea.

She has flopped on Global Warming (or McCain told her, you're for fixing it or GTFO the Gay talk Express.") And on the bridge to nowhere.

Get it, Gay opposite of straight? :-P

Now Biden.

Actually, Biden has not had enough statements, but from what I saw he leaned toward the True side.

But Obama is more honest than McCain, and that gap will widen as McCain continues to let his campaign write his ads and put his "I approve that message" on them when he may not actually approve them himself, but decided to just let the Dark Lords take over and go against his old ways of being a good person and honest man.

In a monthi I will post an update to this and see who is being more honest.

And one more.

Chain emails.

True 2 (2) 5.1%
Mostly True 5 (5) 12.8%
Half True 2 (2) 5.1%
Barely True 3 (3) 7.6%
False 16 (16) 41%
Pants on Fire 11 28.2%

39 total.Yup.

True: 23%
False: 77%

So question for you. McCain and Obama each say three things, and a chain email says one. Who do you trust.

Obama: 40%
McCain: 18.2%

As you can see, Obama's gap becomes more important. If Obama tells you 3 things, there is a 40% chance that ALL THREE are true. it's late, so I won't do binomial probability here, but I will do a bit more.

Even at 4 statements, Obama is more likely to be true ALL FOUR TIMES than one chain email!

And at 5 statements, he's at 21.7%, just barely below one chain email.

This is important to people who care. All these claims are documented and graded.

Obama also has never had a Pants on Fire moment, meaning he doesn't make obvious horrible lies like McCain does. The Palin chain emails do, but that is not related to Obama. Blaming Obama for MoveOn is like blaming McCain for FreeRepublic.

Sorry for the blogs. I love Obama and people need to realize he really is different. Think about it. If I were to bet on 4 things being true said by Obama (all four) vs one chain email being true, it'd be wise to bet on Obama.

The straight talk express derailed. McCain is a bitter old man who realized that he couldn't be a moderate sane person and win the election. It's sad.

Labels:

Fight for Change with Information

crewt — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 23:42:43 EDT

For some reason a majority of American voters don't take their voting right responsibly. They accept lies as truth; they vote for candidates because their family tells them to; they vote for candidates for no other reason than they are the same sex, skin color, or religion. My hope is that with information, we can open these individual's eyes to the truth and get the right man in office for a change (pardon the pun). Please visit my blog "A Stream of Conscientiousness" at http://crewt.blogspot.com to read daily posts concerning national, international, and election issues. I know that if we can open people's eyes to the truth, the decision to elect Barack Obama president will the their own logical choice.

OWN THE TRUTH

Edwardo — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 21:32:26 EDT

Every "contrast ad" put up by the Obama campaign should have indisputable facts that can be easiy proven and they need to emphasize the "If you don't believe me, go here and find out the truth?" thing

Shine a big light on the third party players that support you're rebukes. Idependents need reassurring from non-politicians.

A Small Conversation For Two

Edwardo — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 20:20:14 EDT

Hey Barack, I love ya, but come on! . . . You must have some fantastic young writers on staff that can "Sloganize" you're change ideas into something soundbite-sized?

You need to talk directly to the couch dweller on the other end of the glass - Stop talking in the abstract "The American People This - The American People that" Enough! Stop talking in great big concepts that don't translate to the medium well. We know what you're saying - now say it to the independents in there own language.

And stop talking to the masses - rememeber, in the US of A, there is usually only one or two people watching their televisions at any given time... scale back the rhetoric, it's one on one time!!

Beyond Change. Revolution.

Q Manning — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 19:55:34 EDT

John McCain and his campaign have decided to wrestle the mantle of Change from the Obama campaign.

So the question is - what do we do? What do we, those of us who pushed change for months, who made the concept of change strong, and powerful, and so very clearly inevitable, do to grab our fire back?

It's simple. We differentiate. Because if what McCain is offering change, do we really want to be associated with that? Do we want our movement to really be swirled in with the muck and gunk of the Republican party platform that's lead us to be hated around the world? Despised by our allies and enemies alike. The party that's destroyed our economy, who has stretched our military so thin, made our dollar and strength dissipate so far that we can no longer stand up to countries like Bolivia or Venezuela.

McCain augmented the concept of change with a word - a word that had some cache associated with it - and was a great marketing ploy: reform

But reform just means to change things slightly. To keep things the same, but make a few modifications. Is that what we want? Is that what we want our agent, our ambassador Barack Obama, to bring to Washington? That sort of mindset? No, we want more. And the words change and reform are too weak.

What we want, what we need, what we desire is something more powerful. Something that's been coming a long time. Something that is necessary for America to turn the corner into the future, and turn back the tide of the massive the wealth transfer to China, Russia and the Middle East, leaving our own workers and our own country in the gutter.

We demand REVOLUTION.

Let that sink in for a second, let it grow on you. I'll wait.

Done? Good. Because we don't have a lot of time to waste. There's more to this whole thing than just some election, some "silly" game as Barack Obama has called it. What's going on here is the absolute fate of our great nation, and we're facing a ruling class that doesn't care about the people. No longer is America a country "For the People and By the People" as it was originally established. Instead it's a country where the people work to make the corporations stronger, even as they take our jobs away, remove our manufacturing, squash ingenuity in the small business sector, and stifle the innovation that's always made America that shining beacon just over the horizon.

We need REVOLUTION.

Not the kind where we raise up arms against our brothers. Our country is stable, strong, and though recent information may be hinting at fraudulent voter practices rearing their ugly heads once again, our peaceful nation can enact a revolution using nothing more than a chad pushed all the way through a piece of paper. Because if enough of us want it, if enough of us push and strive for it, if enough of us hit the pavement and demand it, no amount of voter fraud or slanderous ads full of lies and deceit will be able to stop the the coming maelstrom.

Our upcoming election is larger than one issue. Or two issues. Or even a dozen issues. It's about every issue, every facet of our lives, every person in our country, and the roads we're going down. We have an American spirit, a love for freedom that goes beyond anything the world can imagine. We rose against the British when it seemed impossible. We fought our own brothers over land and slavery when it was necessary for true change to take place.

Revolution is nothing new for America. Revolution is America. Barack Obama, I ask you to take on this mantle of Revolution. To send a message to the cheap seats, the high dollar seats, the valleys, the mountains, the suburbs, the urban areas, and the farms of America.

If you're unhappy with your lot in life, you must embrace someone who will act on your behalf. Who will work to be your agent of change. Who will be your Ambassador of Revolution.

Taking a Stand

Marielle — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 16:24:48 EDT

I'm glad to read today that the Obama campaign has registered its supporters' concerns about the need to turn up the intensity on criticisms of the McCain/Palin campaign. I trust that they will be careful not to stoop to the deceitful, dishonorable tactics of the Republicans, but rather will strongly present the truth that is on their side with the decency and dignity that has characterized the campaign thus far. Obama need not "attack" his opponents, but rather challenge their lies and their record on improving the lives of ordinary citizens, invoking reason with passion.

Bible verses about lying

Benjamin Vos, Nashville — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 10:44:02 EDT

Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.

So I tell you this, and insist upon it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more.

You, however, did not come to know Christ that way. Surely you heard of him and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body.

- Ephesians 4:14-25

You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is not truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

- John 8:44

But what if someone leads one of these little ones who believe in me to sin? If he does, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and be drowned at the bottom of the sea. How terrible it will be for the world because of the things that lead people to sin! Things like that must come. But how terrible for those who cause them!

- Matthew 18:6-7

Then you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.

- John 8:32

If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of a raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.

- Hebrews 10:26-27

This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

- I John 1:4-8

Eyes on the Prize

Amy — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 09:23:35 EDT

Senator Obama has been truthful throughout his efforts to serve us as President Obama. The campaign has been different, from the beginning. The movement around Senator Obama has grown as all of us yearning for honesty in government recognized someone we can trust. Senator Biden is another strong voice for positive open change, and no nonsense. This morning a radio news reporter concluded that even though the people on the other ticket are indeed misrepresenting themselves and others, they 'want to win' and (paraphrasing) whether it's pretty or ugly how they get there, they want to get into the White House, so they're doing what they have to do.

This is not about pretty or ugly. This is about lying. Lying like intentionally misrepresenting your opponents' positions and biographies. Lying like claiming you departed with your party much of the time when you voted with your party's leader over 90 percent of the time. (By the way, if your main charge against your opponent is that you differed with your party more than he differed with his - maybe that means he showed better judgement in choosing his party!) Claiming you "said 'thanks but no thanks' " to an earmark when you supported it and then took the money for other projects... that's lying. We have had enough experience with an executive branch who thinks it's ok to lie to acomplish your private vision of what you think is 'right' for this country. We have had enough of deceptions justified as necessary to 'the mission.' If they win the election by lying, what will motivate them to tell the truth as they govern?

I wish all the candidates could see their way clear to respect Americans enough to run a serious election in these profoundly serious times. Tell the truth about where you stand, then stand by your own positions and let the people decide. Our democracy and our world need leaders who value integrity in the means as well as the ends. We need Barack Obama and Joe Biden in the White House, for all of our sakes. And they need all of us to help them get there. Let's keep our eyes on the prize.

Thank You, Keith Olbermann, For Stating The Truth

Robin Z — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 00:26:18 EDT

A great Special Comment by MSNBC's Keith Olbermann this evening on the Republican Party's disrespectful misuse of Sept 11 as a campaign tactic, and John McCain's so-called promise that he knows how to get Bin Laden.

Go to MSNBC.COM to hear it, if you haven't done so already.

And thank you, Keith, for using your air time to state the TRUTH.

Truth and Reason Under Siege

ernie — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 23:23:59 EDT

"In recent years as fear has become a more powerful political tool than trust, public consumption of entertainment has dramatically surpassed that of serious news, and blind faith has proven more potent than truth.

"We are at a pivotal moment in American democracy. The persistent and sustained reliance on falsehoods as the basis of policy, even in the face of evidence to the contrary, has reached levels that were previously unimaginable. It's too easy and too partisan to simply place the blame on the policies of President George W. Bush. We are all responsible for the decisions our country makes.

"Reasoned, focused discourse is vital to our democracy to ensure a well-informed citizenry. But this is difficult in an environment in which we are experiencing a new pattern of serial obsessions that periodically take over the airwaves for weeks at a time--from the O.J. Simpson and Michael Jackson trials to Paris Hilton and Anna Nicole Smith.

"Never has it been more vital for us to face the reality of our long-term challenges, from the climate crisis to the war in Iraq to the deficits and health and social welfare. Today, reason is under assault by forces using sophisticated techniques such as propaganda, psychology, and electronic mass media.''

Al Gore made those disturbing observations in his book, "The Assault on Reason,'' and never before have the words rung so true as they do today. Can't win on the issues, lost the battle on your hapless performance as a government leader? Time to get a buzz working, manufacture lies about your record and the change you will bring, and maybe even launch a cult of personality around an instant "celebrity.''

Never before as a nation have we faced such monumental, fundamental challenges, to our national security, to our economy, to the environment, to the education of the young, and the care of the ailing. Yet now we have a vice presidential candidate who clearly is not allowed, or perhaps trusted, to speak independently. Instead she is programmed like a Chatty Cathy doll. Her running mate stands behind her, pulls the string, and she spouts a programmed sound bite, duplicity and doubletalk. They dare not have an open discourse on the issues. But as Al Gore warned, the astonishing danger may be that it might not matter to far too many voters. Idolatry of celebrity runs rampant: "Who cares about the record deficit, what have you heard about the pregnant daughter?''

The clear challenge in the remaining days is to fight against this manipulation of message, and the attempted hijacking of the political process. Maybe next time we need to have all the candidates sign a code of ethics. . .

Hello everyone, my soap box as follows!

Stopping the Republican's hijacking of Christianity — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 23:00:15 EDT

I admit I was duped for a long time, but now I'm fired up and very angry; now I want to make up for it. I always knew that it is wrong to shun homosexuals and deny them the right to be in a real relationship with someone that is recognized by the govt. I always knew that the poor, especially single mothers and their children, are to be loved and supported, fed and clothed, and treated with respect and dignity. I always knew that one shouldn't judge and try to convert someone; that is not my job it is God's. I am always available when inquiries are made, but we are to live by example and no wonder people have the wrong impression about Christians. They look like mean, hypocritical, hateful, divisive, judgmental people because Republicans have muddied up the name Christian by using the issue of abortion to dupe people into believing they are Christian. Well guess what they are NOT! I realize that I have no right to tell a woman she cannot choose what to do with her own body. It is between her doctor and herself. I do think we should reduce the number of abortions and that it shouldn't be used as a form of contraception. I say this because I know what it can potentially do to your body. We need to lift women up and teach young girls what men will say to them to get in their pants. We need to take the false ideas of beauty off the pages of magazines and teach our women to be strong, capable, educated, lovely women who can do anything they set their minds to! Then if they do end up with a child they have a hard time raising, support them if we are to choose life in a way that will give that child a chance to succeed and thrive in any situation. One child at a time, all the time! We can do so much together whether we are Christian or Atheist, Hindu or Muslim, Agnostic or Wiccan we need to band together as good, honest decent people who care about each other because we are brothers and sisters who really did come from some organism whether human or otherwise of common ancestry. We owe it to each other to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.

On Patriotism and the Issues

KG in Milwaukee, WI — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 21:55:10 EDT

Issues. Remember those? Do the they matter? Of course they do! Though you wouldn't know it if you listen to the Republicans. They're far more worried about lipstick, livestock, and phony outrage than about discussing the real issues.

But here's the thing: a lot of people fought and died for our right to choose our government. A lot of people toiled, marched, and suffered for our right to decide who represents us and how our government is run. We have a patriotic duty to understand the real issues that matter to each of us. We have a patriotic duty to look past the lies, rumors, and just plain empty rhetoric of those who would distract us.

Enough! This election is NOT about Obama!

Margotb822 — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 18:31:10 EDT

This election is not about Obama. It needs to be a referendum on the business of the past eight years.

Enough!

Using Social Networking sites and blogs to create a strong network for Obama/McCain fact checking, voter outreach and accurate information positioning about Obama's message

Johnathan Waters | Advocacy4change — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 16:53:52 EDT

I am working on using social networking sites such as Faithbase.com, BlackPlanet, Facebook and others (as many as I realistic have time) to promote Obama message and to throw water on the lies and deceitful tactics that McCain is putting out there each and everyday. We can further flood out the information that McCain is putting out there, at least from a electronic vehicle point of view, if more people would sign up and use these social networking venues and blogs solely for this purpose. I believe this election is going to be decided by voter outreach and by making sure voters and undecided voters have "trustworthy" information to make an informed decision. McCain is hoping that people only see one side of the equation. We know there is always two sides of an argument, thus Obama's side needs to get out there more, especially with McCain strategic alliance to promote a one-sided information overload to the White House . Visit http://www.faithbase.com/voiceofswords for an example of what I am doing. This kind of networking can increase the young vote;target marketing of Obama message is crucial. If voters can get the truth, I will have to scratch my head very hard if Obama loses in November.

We need a president who strives for the principles of trustworthiness and integrity in the White House come January. Barack stated, since the beginning of his campaign that he will govern the same way he campaigns. He continue to uphold this promise. However, McCain is showing us how he wants to campaign for president, we need to show how that reflects his character judgment if elected in November. We need to be strong on the ground as well as through the network cables and servers that have helped join all of us together for one purpose, elect Barack Obama! :)

Obama faithful,

Johnathan

New Videos - Fascism Comes To America & BarackRoll'd

Jarrett in Florida — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 16:09:44 EDT

Many Americans have become unsettled by the recent tactics of Right Wing Republicans to intimidate and manipulate voters and supporters. This video highlights some things that are clearly unamerican about today's Republican party:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrLG1vMoFKE

But if something cute and funny is more your style, please enjoy this clip that is making big waves on YouTube - It's called BarackRoll'd:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TiQCJXpbKg

BIDEN "S BITE

dharmas — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 09:10:49 EDT

what happened to our VP ? where is his energetic response. The polite Obama's attack dog.

What are we waiting for? drowning in the alaskan frigid waters.