May 16, 2012
FSM HOT TOPICS
Exclusive: Thursday, August 28
by PRESIDENTIAL WATCH August 28, 2008
Coming soon - “That’s not the Bill Ayers I knew.” Read article.
Biden's Toughest Opponent: Himself
Cal Thomas, Townhall.com
In selecting Sen. Joseph Biden as his running mate, Barack Obama gains some needed foreign policy expertise, but loses some credibility. If Washington is as bad as these two say it is, was Biden a contributor or an enabler during his six Senate terms? If 36 years in the Senate doesn't make you an "insider" and part of the problem, what does?
Presidential candidates love to run against Washington and pretend they are outsiders, even when they have been insiders. The same applies to John McCain, who has been an insider for 26 years, 24 of them in the Senate. But while McCain has been critical of some Bush administration policies - notably the initial way the Iraq War was fought with too few troops - Biden has a litany of criticism of Obama, which the McCain campaign will use to undermine whatever enhancements Biden brings to the Democratic ticket. Read article.
Bill & Barack's Excellent Adventure
Thomas Lifson, American Thinker.com
William Ayers, unrepentant terrorist and education professor, is once again being tied to Barack Obama in the public mind. Controversy builds over the withholding of the archives of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, an expensive failed school reform effort headed by Obama and effectively run by Ayers, held by the library of the University of Illinois Chicago. Researchers who have gained access to a few documents recording the history of the project have found strong evidence of a very important working relationship between the two men on the project, Obama's sole claim to executive experience.
Oddly enough, even though the project produced no measurable improvement in student performance according to its own final report, educators and administrators -- participants and grantees of the CAC -- were reported by outside monitors to be often "ebullient" about the activities. For insiders, it was an excellent adventure. For the pupils stuck in the failing public schools of Chicago, an ongoing, unrelieved disaster.
Obama and his campaign long have gone out of their way to downplay, in fact distort, the long and evidently deep relationship between Ayers and Obama. In the Philadelphia Democratic debate last April, George Stephanopoulos asked Obama about his relationship with Ayers, and the candidate responded:
"This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who's a professor of English in Chicago, who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He's not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis."
Almost two months earlier, the "neighbor" talking point campaign manager David Axelrod introduced the notion that Obama and Ayers were mostly just neighbors, telling The Politico's Ben Smith,
"Bill Ayers lives in his neighborhood. Their kids attend the same school," he said. "They're certainly friendly, they know each other, as anyone whose kids go to school together."
Ayers and his wife are in their sixties, while the Obamas are in their mid-forties. Ayers' children are all adults, while Obama's children are currently 10 and 7. Axelrod's prevarication is telling, bespeaking confidence that nobody in the media will bother to dispute an obvious falsehood.
"Flimsy" turns out to be a completely misleading word when it comes to characterizing the Obama-Ayers relationship.
Notwithstanding the campaign's efforts to direct attention away from Ayers, a 527 group, American Issues Project, has just released the following ad tying Obama to Ayers, and says it is spending 2.8 million on television airtime in key states. Read article.
If voters find out Obama was lying about his past, will it kill his chances in November?
Clarice Feldman, Pajamas Media.com
Throughout the summer months, many voters supporting John McCain have been frustrated by his failure to respond forcefully to Obama’s charges against him. I felt his failure to swat about at each charge was because he was an old fighter pilot, taught to hold his fire and stay concealed as long as possible.
If circumstances permitted, he would not budge until his opponent had made a potentially fatal move from which it was going to be exceedingly hard to extricate himself. Whether my assessment was right or not, it appears that the moment to strike has arrived, and like the old fighter pilot descending from the cloud cover, McCain has taken full advantage of Obama’s errors to place him in a position from which I can see no way out for him.
I’m talking about Obama’s role in the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC), and his ill-conceived ad attacking McCain’s associations which opened the door for McCain to bring to public view something Obama has — with clear media connivance — lied about and tried to conceal: His close association with William Ayers in a program he botched. Read article.
Obama, unlike JFK, has not been tested
Judith A. Klinghoffer, Political Mavens.com
It is fashionable to compare Barack H. Obama’s inexperience with that of John F. Kennedy’s. Indeed, even Kennedy’s descendents are encouraging the comparison. However, let us not forget that though JFK was indeed inexperienced and awareness of that inexperience led to his being severely challenged by the Cuban Missile Crisis, the American people had reason to believe that when push came to shove, he would not buckle. The same cannot be said about BHO.Â
Why? Because unlike Obama, he has been tested, and like John McCain, had the scars to prove it.
Yes, when the going got tough Kennedy got going. Moreover, like McCain, he put his men and country first. Would Obama? Who knows? Let us not forget this is the man who did not hesitate to throw his grandmother under a bus in response to a much less demanding challenge. ("typical white woman" afraid of black people) Read article.
Voices for the Unborn on the Streets of Denver
Larrey Anderson, American Thinker.com
The most visible and vocal protestors demonstrating at the Democratic National Convention are the advocates for the unborn. Virtually ignored by the media, they are everywhere and in the faces of delegates. Undaunted by the heat, the ridicule, and the tight restrictions placed on them by the city (and ignored by the main stream media) these soldiers for life battle on.
Much to the chagrin of the main stream media, the far-left has failed to produce more than a peep of a protest here in Denver. Recreate 68 hasn't even managed to recreate a successful Tupperware house party.
But the pro-life forces are everywhere. Their exhibitions are carefully planned and their demonstrations are skillfully executed. Where is the liberal media? Read article.
Democrats Aim for a 60-Vote Senate
Kimberley A. Strassel, Online WSJ.com
Here's an intriguing thought: The John McCain-Barack Obama fight isn't this season's biggest political story. That honor should be reserved for the intense Democratic push to win a filibuster-proof Senate majority.
Democrats know this is a huge prize, and they are throwing at least as much money and sweat into that effort as they are into electing Mr. Obama. What isn't clear is that voters are as aware of the stakes. An unstoppable Democratic Senate has the potential to alter the balance of power in Washington in ways not yet seen.
A quick recap of the numbers: Republicans must defend 23 seats, compared to 12 for the Democrats. Of those GOP slots, 10 are at potential risk: Virginia, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Minnesota, Oregon, Colorado, Alaska, Mississippi, Maine and North Carolina. The Democrats claim only one vulnerable senator this year, Louisiana's Mary Landrieu. Depending on how big a day the party has in November, it is at least conceivable Democrats could get the nine seats they need to hit the magic 60. Read article.
Conventions Need a Believable Script
Karl Rove, Online WSJ.com
What must Barack Obama and John McCain achieve at their conventions? Conventions are the best, most controlled opportunities left for the candidates. Only the debates come close in impact, but they are unpredictable and not susceptible to the choreography available at the conventions.
Mr. McCain's handlers must achieve three things. First is a greater public awareness of the character that makes him worthy of the Oval Office. Mr. McCain's warrior ethic makes it difficult for him to share his interior life, though his conversation with Rick Warren did provide moving glimpses into it. To win, Mr. McCain will need to show more.
Mr. McCain's second goal is to persuade Americans he can tackle domestic challenges. Voters trust him as commander in chief. The doubts are whether he understands their concerns about their jobs, their family's health care, their children's education, the culture's coarseness, and their neighborhood's safety.
Third, Mr. McCain must show voters he remains a maverick who will, as president, work across party lines as he has as senator. Read article.
Back-to-back conventions: The great unknown
Dick Morris, The Hill.com
For the first time in memory, the two parties are holding their conventions right after one another. Within 72 hours of Obama’s acceptance speech on the night of Aug. 28, in front of 75,000 adoring fans outdoors at Invesco Field, the Republican convention’s opening gavel will come crashing down. How will it work? What will be the impact of these nearly simultaneous events? Nobody really knows, but the answer is critical. Usually, the post-convention polling sets a pattern that lasts at least until the candidates debate.
Will Obama’s magic and aura last for the ensuing week, casting a fog over the Republican convention, obscuring its proceedings and dulling its impact? Or will the winds of criticism against Obama, for four nights in a row in Minneapolis, dissipate the vapors and nullify his bounce?
At the moment, the scheduling of the conventions appears to make a prolonged deadlock between the two campaigns the most likely result.
Normally, when conventions are held several weeks apart, the party holding the later gathering has a huge advantage. It can absorb the worst the opposition has to dish out and then work for the ensuing weeks to reduce the size of its post-convention bounce. Then, when the party with the second convention meets, it can build on an even race and structure a bounce that lasts through the fall. Read article.
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