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November 28, 2008
Exclusive: Oval Office Watch – Friday, November 28
Obama’s Birth Certificate Challenger Keeps Going
Forbes.com
You've got to hand it to Philip J. Berg: he doesn't give up easily. You might recall that Philadelphia attorney Berg tried, and failed, to halt the presidential election of Barack Obama on the grounds that he is not a native-born citizen. Game over, right? Wrong.
Berg filed a writ of certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court in late October, asking that the highest court review the decision of the U.S. District Court in Pennsylvania. The latter court dismissed Berg's claims because he lacked standing to bring them. Standing requires plaintiffs to prove they are directly affected by the issue at hand, with evidence of injury that is concrete and particular. In its decision the district court said Berg "does not, and we believe cannot, establish injury in fact." It also dismissed his claims as frivolous.
Berg takes this in stride. His writ, he says, requires Obama and the Democratic National Council to respond by December 1. Also, he has another arrow in his quiver. He's filed in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., under the False Claims Act, which is often used in Medicaid fraud. "I am basing this on the fact that as a U.S. senator [Obama] is collecting money illegally because he is not a citizen of this country," he says. Read article.
Georgia congressman warns of Obama dictatorship
Ben Evans, Breitbart.com
A Republican congressman from Georgia said Monday he fears that President-elect Obama will establish a Gestapo-like security force to impose a Marxist dictatorship.
"It may sound a bit crazy and off base, but the thing is, he's the one who proposed this national security force," Rep. Paul Broun said of Obama in an interview Monday with The Associated Press. "I'm just trying to bring attention to the fact that we may—may not, I hope not—but we may have a problem with that type of philosophy of radical socialism or Marxism."
Obama's comments about a national security force came during a speech in Colorado in which he called for expanding the nation's foreign service.
"We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set," Obama said in July. "We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded." Read article.
Obama Will Get Stimulus Bill First Day, Democrats Say
Daniel Whitten, Bloomberg.com
Congress will send President-elect Barack Obama an economic stimulus package the day he takes office Jan. 20, two Democratic lawmakers said today.
Senator Charles Schumer of New York said on ABC’s “This Week” program that the package will be between $500 billion and $700 billion. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, of Maryland, said on “Fox News Sunday” that he believed the Inauguration Day goal would be met, but he declined to put a price tag on the bill.
“I think Congress will work with the president elect starting now and will have a major stimulus package on his desk by Inauguration Day,” Schumer said. “I think it has to be deep. My view it has to be between five and $700 billion.”
Obama said yesterday he aims to save or create 2.5 million jobs in his two-year plan to stimulate an economy facing a “crisis of historic proportions.”
The U.S. economic slowdown has been exacerbated by the worst credit crisis in seven decades. More firings will weigh on the economy and consumer spending will pressure Obama and Congress to agree on legislation that will stimulate growth, economists say. Read article.
I Beg Your Pardon: Hillary and Holder?
Lisa Richards, Human Events.com
There can be only one reason Barry Obama would consider Hillary Clinton for Secretary of the State: kowtowing to feminists he snubbed by not picking Hillary as his VP choice. The fact Hillary is set to accept the nomination says two things: either she feels she has no chance of being president in 2012 or she intends to run against Obama with Secretary of the State added to her resume.
Hillary Clinton is not qualified to head the State Department; Hillary has the Clinton name, which gives her political clout and rock star fame, but she has no actual political experience despite the fact she co-ruled America for eight years. Being Senator for the past eight years does not meet the criteria for handing out autographed basketballs to Kim Jung IL.
Obama, the man who claims he wants “change” for America and Washington, is simply bringing back Clintonian politics by choosing Hillary as Secretary of the State. Mr. “change” has no intention of changing Washington at all, rather rehiring Democrat cronies responsible for the crumbling economy and pardoning criminals. Read article.
The Sidwell Choice - The Obama family leads by example.
Review & Outlook, Online WSJ.com
Michelle and Barack Obama have settled on a Washington, D.C., school for their daughters, and you will not be surprised to learn it is not a public institution. Malia, age 10, and seven-year-old Sasha will attend the Sidwell Friends School, the private academy that educates the children of much of Washington's elite.
Vice President-elect Joe Biden's grandchildren attend Sidwell -- as did Chelsea Clinton -- where tuition is close to $30,000 a year. The Obama girls have been students at the private University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, where tuition runs above $21,000. "A number of great schools were considered," said Katie McCormick Lelyveld, a spokeswoman for Mrs. Obama. "In the end, the Obamas selected the school that was the best fit for what their daughters need right now."
Note the word "selected," as in made a choice. The Obamas are fortunate to have the means to send their daughters to private school, and no one begrudges them that choice given that Washington's public schools are among the worst in America.
Most D.C. parents would also love to be able to choose a better school for their child, but they lack the financial means to do so. The Washington Opportunity Scholarship Program each year offers up to $7,500 to some 1,900 kids to attend private schools, but Democrats in Congress want to kill it. Average family income for kids in the voucher program is about $22,000. Read article.
Obama's Most Telling Appointment
Dan Proft, Human Events.com
The most telling appointment Barack Obama has made since becoming President-elect has nothing to do with his Cabinet or senior advisors.
It was the appointment of Sidwell Friends School, a private grammar school in Washington D.C. to which the Obamas have reportedly decided to send their two daughters.
I applaud Obama’s commitment to the education of his daughters, choosing to send them to the best schools.
It is just too bad that Obama opposes extending that choice to families whose children are relegated by geography and by income to schools he knows and everyone knows will fail them.
And Obama does indeed know something of this problem. While an Illinois State Senator, Obama represented a district with more than 12,000 students in failing elementary schools (according to NCLB standards, 2004).
During that time, while Obama’s daughters matriculated at the prestigious -- and private -- University of Chicago Lab School, thousands of other children Obama was elected to represent were inventoried at Chicago Public School (CPS) warehouses where most are stored for 8-12 years until they are mature enough to either enter the penal system or go off into the real world having mastered the phrase, “Would you like to try one of our combo meals today?” Read article.
Hillary plays hardball
Loenoard Doyle, Independent.co.uk
Before Hillary Clinton has been formally offered the job as Secretary of State, a purge of Barack Obama's top foreign policy team has begun.
The advisers who helped trash the former First Lady's foreign policy credentials on the campaign trail are being brutally shunted aside, as the price of her accepting the job of being the public face of America to the world. In negotiations with Mr. Obama this week before agreeing to take the job, she demanded and received assurances that she alone should appoint staff to the State Department. She also got assurances that she will have direct access to the President and will not have to go through his foreign policy advisers on the National Security Council, which is where many of her critics in the Obama team are expected to end up.
The first victims of Mrs Clinton's anticipated appointment will be those who defended Mr Obama's flanks on the campaign trail. By mocking Mrs Clinton's claims to have landed under sniper fire in Bosnia or pouring scorn on her much-ballyhooed claim to have visited 80 countries as First Lady they successfully deflected the damaging charge that he is a lightweight on international issues. Read article.
Not so smart after all
Jack Kelly, JWR.com
Liberals think of themselves as being a good deal smarter than conservatives are. An example is this e-mail I received after last week's column:
"Mass support behind the conservative movement in America comes mostly from lower middle class voters, many of whom are poorly educated and inarticulate. The perfect example is feelings about Sarah Palin. The base of the Republican Party loves her, precisely because she mispronounces words, speaks ungrammatically, displays poor grasp of complex ideas ... and has a spotty, undistinguished educational background. In other words, she reflects the Republican Party's base ... as a mass movement it reflects stupidity and ignorance."
A Zogby poll released last week casts doubt on the notion it's conservatives who reflect stupidity and ignorance. Mr. Zogby asked a dozen questions of 512 Obama supporters, 55 percent of whom have college degrees.
Apart from the appallingly low percentage of Obama supporters who could answer the basic civics question of which party controls Congress, the results reflect more what the news media chose to emphasize in their reporting than the awareness of respondents. Read article.
Buchanan to Obama
Patrick J. Buchanan, snopes.com
''Life's tough .... it's even tougher if you're stupid.'' - John Wayne
Barack says we need to have a conversation about race in America .
Fair enough. But this time, it has to be a two-way conversation. White America needs to be heard from, not just lectured to.
This time, the Silent Majority needs to have its convictions, grievances and demands heard. And among them are these:
First, America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known. Wright ought to go down on his knees and thank God he is an American.
Second, no people anywhere has done more to lift up blacks than white Americans. Untold trillions have been spent since the '60s on welfare, food stamps, rent supplements, Section 8 housing, Pell grants, student loans, legal services, Medicaid, Earned Income Tax Credits and poverty programs designed to bring the African-American community into the mainstream.
Sorry, Barack, some of us have heard it all before, about 40 years and 40 trillion tax dollars ago. Read article.
Progressives and Obama's Acceptable Blackness
Miguel A. Guanipa, Capitol Hill Coffee House.com
On the eve of Clarence Thomas’ Supreme Court nomination, a cry went out throughout the land. It was that of fire breathing liberals who could not believe that a conservative president would dare appoint a conservative judge to the highest court in the nation…
Although the president had picked someone of African-American descent, who was also more than qualified to fulfill the role of Supreme Court Justice, such considerations were swiftly trumped by the fact that Mr. Thomas was not pledged to walk in lockstep with the abiding progressive weltanschauung; in other words, he was not viewed by liberals as the “right” kind of black man.
Likewise, many from the left frowned disappointingly at President George W. Bush’s choice of General Colin Powell for the office of Secretary of State. Some even referred to Mr. Powell as a modern day Uncle Tom, congenially submissive and overly accommodating to the erratic whims of his war hungry superiors. The same Colin Powell was not long ago lauded by the mainstream media for his ringing endorsement of now president elect Barack Obama. Read article.
Fear of Obama's "Civilian National Security Force"
Selwyn Duke, Chronwatch.com
In all my life I have never seen an American politician who could make so many Americans' blood run cold. Some may mention the left's feelings regarding Reagan or President Bush, but there is no equivalency. For all of leftists' bluster and melodrama, they weren't afraid of those men as much as they, well, just hated them. Sure, leftist ideologues said those two Republicans were scary, but the same people also said that each one was both dumb and Machiavellian. Hatred is an emotion, and emotion isn't logical; it just conjures up whatever feels right at the moment.
In Obama's case, however, I sense a real, palpable, go-white-in-the-face fear akin to what might be evident in someone who has a gun put to his head or believes he has seen a demon. I know for instance, a stout-hearted man of rough-hewn breeding and my political persuasion who has said about the impending changing of the guard, "I'm afraid."
However, he is a right-winger like me, and just as with the leftist ideologues who "feared" Reagan and Bush, we aren't exactly a representative sample of America.
But this is what is truly, well, scary. I have seen this fear not just in rightist politics wonks but also in people who are not in the habit of troubling much over politics at all. Read article.
Clinton campaign continued after backing Obama: $6.4 million transfer focus of FEC filing
Jim McElhatton, WashingtonTimes.com
Precisely when Mrs. Clinton, who is expected to be Mr. Obama's secretary of state nominee, dropped out of the Democratic presidential primaries is emerging as an important legal question for FEC regulators examining the transfer of funds. Such transfers are legal if donors give their permission, and the Clinton campaign has said donors indeed authorized the move.
Still, such transfers also must take place within 60 days of when a candidate withdraws from the race, according to FEC rules. The Aug. 28 transfer date fell more than 80 days after her June 7 concession to Mr. Obama, in which she told supporters in Washington that "we must elect Barack Obama our president. I endorse him and throw my full support behind him."
Given Mrs. Clinton's concession speech in early June, the FEC has raised questions about the timing of the Aug. 28 transfer, sending a letter to the Clinton campaign last month asking for more details. Read article.
Our party failed, our principles didn't
Mark Hillman, Townhall.com
After being routed at the polls for two consecutive election cycles, Republicans are turning introspective, asking how the party fell out of favor so suddenly and how to correct course.
That introspection includes the inevitable catharsis that exacerbates tensions within the existing right-center political coalition.
Conservatives say moderates were too squishy, especially on spending matters. Moderates say conservatives were too rigid, particularly on social issues. Libertarians say both conservatives and moderates are correct in their diagnoses but wrong in their prescriptions. The reality again harkens to Lord Acton's admonition about the corrupting influence of power. Read article.
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