Exclusive: Saturday, July 19

by PRESIDENTIAL WATCH July 19, 2008

Poll: Obama behind Democratic predecessors - CLICK HERE.

Who Obama Should See in Iraq

Dan Senor, Online WSJ.com

Barack Obama is headed to Baghdad, probably within days. It's a shame he chose to pre-empt the visit with a big speech and an op-ed on the subject. He just might learn a thing or two while he's there.

I helped plan these congressional delegations (or CODELS) to Iraq for over 250 congressmen and senators when I worked for the Coalition Provisional Authority. I know that congressmen find them illuminating despite the obvious limitations imposed by time and security concerns. Here are some individuals and groups Mr. Obama should make it a priority to see: Read article.

Why the Race is Tied

Dick Morris, Vote.com

After almost six weeks of a constant Obama lead, generally in the five to seven-point range, Scott Rasmussen's daily tracking poll records two consecutive days of a tie race (July 12-13) and a one-point Obama lead on July 14. What happened to the Democrat's lead?

Part of the slippage is Obama's fault and part is McCain's gain.

Obama has carried flip-flopping to new heights. In the space of a month and a half, this candidate - who we don't really yet know very well - reversed or sharply modified his positions on at least eight key issues:

Obama's breathtaking flips and flops are materially different from McCain's. While McCain had opposed offshore oil drilling and now supports it, the facts have obviously changed. Obama's shifts have nothing to do with altered circumstances, just a change in the political calendar.

As a candidate who was nominated to be a different kind of politician, Obama has set the bar pretty high. And, with his flipping and flopping, he is falling short, to the disillusionment of his more naïve supporters. One wag even called him the "black Bill Clinton," a turnaround of the "first black president" moniker that had been pinned on Bill. Read article.

What Part of "Drill Now" Do They Not Understand?

Col. Bob Pappas, USMC Ret, Gulf1.com

Anyone who contemplates the vast amount of money in circulation cannot help but marvel that the economy can turn downward, but it does. It did during the closing months of the Clinton bubble spilling over to the Bush years. Now, at the end of the Bush Administration given the amount of negative economic hype being put forth by the leftist media for the past two years combined with the concerted efforts of some of America's so-called "friends" an economic downturn has finally come to a measure of fruition.

When a large enough number of people stop buying because they are repeatedly told that "bad times" are just around the corner or these are "bad times," retailers stop selling, distributors stop distributing, orders for goods are not made and ultimately factories stop responding because there are no orders, and so GM closes 14 plants. It has nothing to do with reality, and everything to do with perception. Get it? So, who says that the media doesn't play a role? How the hell do you think that the Republican's got McCain and the Democrats got Obama if the media didn't play a role?

In the two years that Democrats have controlled the Congress, and given its single digit approval rating, they have earned it, how anyone with more than an ounce of brains would vote for one of those anachronistic dinosaurs is stupefying. Aside from beating up on oil industry executives and threatening to "nationalize" the industry, they have done nothing, zilch, squat, zip, and zero to help those who depend on transportation in connection with their livelihood!

Drilling may not be the solution but there are hundreds of proven wells that are not producing because the Democrats in Congress are standing in the way. Read article.

Embarrassed American

J.D. Pendry, JD Pendry.com

Harry Reid tells us that oil and coal makes us sick. It makes the planet sick. We also hear that we are addicted to oil and use more than our share of the world's supply of it. It is no great wonder that only 9 percent of Americans believe the Congress that Harry Reid leads is doing a good job. That is not even to mention the brilliance and effectiveness of the Nancy Pelosi led half of it.

The Speaker promised us a plan that would reduce the outrageously high $2.91 per gallon gasoline prices. We see how well that worked. Harry and Nan's genius, I fear, is just the beginning for our country. The beginning of the end of it if we are not careful.

We are told that we take so much from the world.

We are told instead to feel bad about the vehicles we drive, the temperatures at which we set our thermostats and what we eat. Somehow, we need the rest of the world to agree that it is okay for us to prosper as a people and we need to feel bad if we do while their failed states regress. That is quite pathetic especially coming from those who hope to lead us - unfortunately in the direction of those failed nations that would be better served to copy our model rather than despise it.

Read article.

Obama's "Flexible" Value System

Paul R. Hollrah, NMJ.us

In his book, Hitler's Jewish Soldiers: The Untold Story of Nazi Racial Laws and Men of Jewish Descent in the German Military (University Press of Kansas, 2002) , author Bryan Mark Rigg, tells us that as many as 150,000 Jews and "partial-Jews" served in Hitler's Wehrmacht.

Rigg tells us that "exemptions" were made in order to allow a soldier to stay in the military or to spare a soldier's parent, spouse, or other relative from incarceration and the gas chambers. But as the war dragged on, politics soon trumped military necessity and it became all but impossible for a soldier to escape the fate of millions of other Jews.

From the perspective of the 21st century, and knowing what we do about what went on behind the walls of Auschwitz, Dachau, and Bergen-Belzen, it is no less difficult to understand the fidelity of the Jewish soldier to the Wehrmacht than it is to understand the half century-long fidelity of African Americans to the Democratic Party.

Much is known about the century of brutality that American blacks suffered at the hands of the night riders of the Ku Klux Klan, the paramilitary arm of the Democratic Party.

Political assassination at the hands of Democrats and their Klan "enforcers" was commonplace. For example, in a single day of brutality, Easter Sunday, April 13, 1873, 150 black Republicans were rounded up and murdered by Democrats at Colfax, Louisiana. 50 of those men were killed under a white flag of truce.

In a March 2005 fundraising appeal to the radical group MoveOn.org, Obama said, "Senator Robert Byrd was one of the first senators I met with when I came to the Senate three months ago. Senator Byrd understands the history, the importance, and the role the Senate plays in our government."

Reeling off a long list of charges against the Bush Administration and Senate Republicans, all of which were either untrue or totally misleading, Obama concluded by saying, "Above all, Robert Byrd understands just how sacred the Constitution of our country truly is and fights every day to protect it."

This is the same Robert Byrd who wrote in a 1944 letter to a Mississippi senator, "I shall never fight in the armed forces with a Negro by my side." Read article.

Obama, the national security neophyte

Mark Alexander, Patriot Post.us

Seems like this is as good a week as any to pause and ponder, "Who should be our next commander in chief?"

The most important constitutional role of our president is that of commander in chief -- which is why every Patriot, every American, every human on the planet, should be deeply concerned about the prospect of a "President Obama."

If Barack Hussein Obama, the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate, persuades voters that he is a "centrist candidate" and parlays that deception into defeating John McCain, there will be plenty of "change" in the coming years -- unpleasant at best and catastrophic at worst.

Arguably, since our nation's founding, no candidate has been less qualified than Obama to be his political party's nominee for president of the United States. And nowhere is Obama more ill prepared than in matters of national security.

Obama responded to Iran's missile tests this week, saying, "Now is the time to work with our friends and allies, and to pursue direct and aggressive diplomacy with the Iranian regime backed by tougher unilateral and multilateral sanctions. It's time to offer the Iranians a clear choice between increased costs for continuing their troubling behavior, and concrete incentives that would come if they change course."

"Incentives"? Mahmud Ahmadi-Nejad has vowed to destroy Israel and create another Holocaust. How about this incentive -- a paraphrase from JFK during the Cuban missile debacle: "It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any missile launched from Iran against any ally of the United States as an attack by Iran on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon Iran." Read article.

The War We're In: Obama's disturbing op-ed.

Thomas Donnelly, Weekly Standard.com

It's reassuring to hear Sen. Barack Obama, a man who based his presidential bid on the supposed inevitability of defeat in Iraq, recognize the success of the surge, which he also predicted was bound to fail. But his New York Times op-ed today betrays a strategic understanding that is more deeply disturbing; it's not just his "Plan for Iraq" that's worrisome, but his plan for America in the world.

In Obama's view of international politics and power, Iraq is not simply "the greatest strategic blunder in the recent history of American foreign policy," but a diversion, a strategic sideshow. He claims "Iraq is not the central front in the war on terrorism, and never has been," and offers "broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan."

Obama needs to look at a map and a history book. Iraq long has been and today remains one of the two naturally dominant powers in the Persian Gulf region, home to the second-largest proven oil reserves on the planet and a front-line bulwark against revolutionary Iran. That's where this story began: with Saddam's Hussein's ambitions for hegemony and his long and bloody war with Iran. It was a pity, as Henry Kissinger famously quipped, that both sides in that conflict couldn't lose. But neither the United States nor the rest of the world could be oblivious to the outcome; the strategic stakes were too great. Read article.

Iraq and the Surrounding Region, As Obama Wanted It

Patrick J. Casey, American Thinker.com

Had Obama had his way, there's a good chance that Iran would have fully taken over the Shia region in southern Iraq both directly and via its proxy Muqtada al-Sadr, separating it from the rest of Iraq and fulfilling its desire for a larger Shia Islamic State. That would have meant that Iran would have not only controlled its own oil, but also a significant part of Iraqi oil as well. The Mullahs and Ahmadinejad might well be running Basra, the oil platforms in the Persian Gulf, the al Faw peninsula and the port of Umm Qsar -- making it uncomfortably easy for Iran to shut off the flow of Middle East oil and shipping to the rest of the world.

In the north, there would be a separate war going on, potentially involving several different countries -- a conflict much worse that the current occasional border skirmish between the Kurds and Turks. As Northern Iraq could have broken off from Baghdad in the face of other disintegration, there's a good chance that Turkey would either be contemplating or have already commenced a full scale invasion of the breakaway Kurdish region -- since the expressed goal of many of the Northern Iraqi Kurds is to eventually unite all of historical Kurdistan in one large independent country, something Turkey has vowed to prevent militarily. Since the territory of Kurdistan includes not only land currently located in Iraq and Turkey, but also territory in Iran and Syria, the situation wouldn't have been pretty.

That would leave the traditional Sunni territory surrounding Baghdad alone, and with little or no natural resources. The capital city itself would probably look a lot like Beirut right now, with Al Qaeda in control, and would remain under terrorist control for the foreseeable future.

As all of this would have been taking place, one or two brigades of combat troops a month would have been leaving Iraq under orders from Obama, putting increased pressure on the remaining US troops. Both Al Qaeda and Iran would be justifiably claiming victory over America, handing them the greatest recruitment tool for terrorist groups ever seen. Read article.

Has Barack Obama Peaked Too Soon?

Bonnie Erbe, US News.com

This weekend's RasmussenReports.com presidential tracking poll results are not good news for the Obama camp, despite the following caveats:

1. National daily presidential tracking polls are lousy predictors of electoral college results. They offer little insight into how key swing states will vote. In tight races, the White House is won in swing states. 2. Three-and-a-half months out from what we know is going to be a tight race, it is still way too early to give much credence to any poll.

Caveats aside, starting this past weekend, there has been a sizable shift in a poll that has pretty consistently shown Sen. Barack Obama beating Sen. John McCain in a two-way matchup since early June.

The Rasmussen Reports Daily Presidential Tracking poll shows Obama and McCain now tied in the presidential race, erasing the consistent 5-point lead Obama has maintained in that poll since early last month.

Two more caveats:

1. Rasmussen Reports uses telephone robo-polling, meaning respondents give their answers to a recording and the results are tallied (by real human beings) later on. Despite this, I have found Rasmussen's results to fairly represent the mood of the country during the past two presidential elections.

2. Even Rasmussen's website continues to show Obama winning the electoral college vote. Read article.

George's Advice for Barack & John

Richard Brookhiser, NY Post.com

John McCain and Barack Obama each want to be the 44th president. What could George Washington, the first president, tell them?

Washington would be worth listening to, not only as a predecessor in the job, but as a man who filled executive roles for most of his life - commander-in-chief, plantation owner.

Our candidates are both legislators; one was a squadron commander, the other a community organizer. Washington might look at these resumes and wonder whether modern America thought the presidency could run on automatic.

But, since Washington took his assignments seriously, he'd probably buckle down and say something like this.

On McCain: Every leader has to make an inventory of his character traits, flaws included. Washington and McCain share a flaw: temper.

Washington never banished his temper - some flaws are too ingrained - but he did learn to cool down. After both tantrums, he returned to the matter at hand - winning the battle, settling policy - without reference to his anger.

He would note the McCain campaign's latest staff shake-up and applaud McCain's ability to cut his losses.

Yet he'd also ask why McCain's campaign staff keeps needing shake-ups (there was another a year ago). A leader has to keep his eye on the details. Most of Washington's energy as commander-in-chief was consumed by organization and logistics, down to the level of latrine maintenance.

On Obama: Washington lacked Obama's skills as a writer and speaker. He was neither as lucid as Jefferson nor as eloquent as John Adams. But he had his own communication skill - his commanding presence - and he worked to perfect it, designing his own uniforms, projecting a dignified bearing.

He would tell Obama to keep playing to his strengths - but also warn him that communication isn't everything. Jefferson and Adams both had troubled presidencies. Words and appearances have to be backed by a consistent record of deeds.

Washington would also tell Obama not to be overawed by experts. Read article.

Spielberg, tear down this wall

Andrew Breitbart, Washington Times.com

The conventional wisdom is that Hollywood has never before been so gaga over any candidate as she is now for Democratic Sen. Barack Obama. In addition to raking in Oprah-level campaign cash, Mr. Obama is making Sen. John McCain, despite the Republican's comedic turns on "Saturday Night Live" and in "The Wedding Crashers," look like an out-of-it grandfather.

While it is true that the ratio of Obama-to-McCain bumper stickers in West L.A. is about 250-to-1, there are untold closet Republicans in the entertainment industry who dare not advertise their beliefs in movie studio parking lots. (Unfortunately, car keying is a tactic wielded liberally by the self-described "tolerant.")

But in this land of superficiality and augmented assets, the inconvenient truth is that, in Hollywood, absolute conformity to the Democratic Party is a well-constructed facade. The environment is not so much unfavorable to the Grand Old Party as it is utterly totalitarian. There's simply no lifestyle choice that receives a worse response at dinner parties.

Only proclaiming one's self a practicing Christian is met with greater disdain - making Christian Republicans the gold standard in Hollywood pariah status. Fortunately, their Savior - that dude from Mel Gibson's highest-grossing blockbuster that was shunned by the major studios - wrote the script on how to live with an unpopular point of view. Read article.