Posted on 06/12/2008 12:05:42 PM PDT by jazusamo
A week later it's still baffling. In fact, it's one of the more baffling lines ever uttered by a candidate laying claim to his party's presidential nomination. It came last week on the night Barack Obama clinched the Democratic nomination over Hillary Clinton.
"In just a few short months, the Republican Party will arrive in St. Paul with a very different agenda," he told the multitude before him. "They will come here to nominate John McCain, a man who has served this country heroically. I honor that service, and I respect his many accomplishments, even if he chooses to deny mine."
"Even if he chooses to deny mine." What's that all about? Obama stands at the hour of his great triumph. He's locked up the Democratic nomination, becoming the first African American to win a major party's presidential nomination. He's defeated the once-mighty house of Clinton. And he engages in a bit of narcissistic self-pity worthy of a teenager.
Obama, it seems, has come to believe his own gushy media notices. And he's in something of a snit that Republicans aren't so smitten.
Now, Obama's a charming man with an impressive resume -- Columbia graduate, Harvard Law, former Illinois state senator, first-term U.S. senator, best-selling author. He doubtless gives a good set speech. But elections are about comparisons, and it's a tad presumptuous of Obama to grouse about not getting equal treatment when it comes to his public service and accomplishments.
McCain has spent 25 years in Congress doing the kinds of things Obama has only talked about in speeches. That includes pushing bipartisan legislation (campaign-finance reform, climate change, terrorist interrogation techniques, immigrations reform), forging compromises (the Gang of 14 deal on judicial nominations) and breaking with his own party (all the aforementioned and his early criticism of the Iraq war's execution).
Now, I don't find much of this heart-warming. It's too bipartisan for me. But there it is. Obama, by contrast, has spent seven years in the Illinois senate before heading to the U.S. Senate in 2005. Almost immediately, he started running for president. Does his slim record reflect the post-partisan cooperation he talks up on the hustings? No. He was, for example, nowhere to be found when McCain was putting together the Gang of 14.
Does it suggest he has the experience to be president, much less be compared favorably to McCain? "Absolutely not," former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney said last Friday in Portland. "[I] think he's a very well-spoken, articulate, intelligent person, but I don't think he has the experience in the private sector and the public sector to be as effective a leader as John McCain. You see that in the number of times he says things which are troubling" -- Obama's comments about bombing Pakistan, for instance.
Yes, Romney's a partisan; he's even mentioned as a possible McCain running mate. So let's reach across the aisle for an assessment of Obama and McCain's comparative public service. "Senator McCain will bring a lifetime of experience to the campaign . . ." Hillary Clinton said during her campaign. "Senator Obama will bring a speech that he gave."
Even if Obama were a modern-day Henry Clay or Sam Rayburn and his legislative record matched his turn-back-the-tides rhetoric, it would still probably not be wise for him to mention McCain's denying his public accomplishments.
Why? Because McCain's service includes - 51/2 years as a prisoner of war in Hanoi -- complete with the poor medical care for the broken leg and broken arms he had upon capture, the beatings and torture, the breaking of his ribs and arm (again) and solitary confinement. A captivity that could have been shorter if McCain, the son of an admiral, had accepted Vietnamese offers to go home before the other POWs who'd been there longer.
It's unclear if McCain's experience in Vietnam and Washington, D.C., will matter this November. Voters may decide that all that has little to do with being president. They might choose Obama's pretty speeches. Fair enough. But, please, let's not pretend -- let's not let Barack Obama himself pretend -- that the two candidates' public service and accomplishments merit inclusion in the same sentence.
BUMP for NOBAMANATION 2008!
Hey jeff, is there a list anywhere of Obama’s statements.
< Watch the site. The first smples of the top one come in tomorrow afternoon.
On the site linked above in my post, there is a link to OBAMA IN HIS OWN WORDS. It is mainly youtube videos, but I am going to be adding just quotes tonight.
Other than whatever he said to dispatch the succubus, I wish someone would tell me one smart thing Obama ever said.
Obama in his own words.
From Audacity of Hope: I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.
Below are a few lines from Obamas books in his own words:
From Dreams of My Father: I ceased to advertise my mothers race at the age of 12 or 13, when I began to suspect that by doing so I was ingratiating myself to whites.
From Dreams of My Father: I found a solace in nursing a pervasive sense of grievance and animosity against my mothers race.
From Dreams of My Father: There was something about him that made me wary, a little too sure of himself, maybe. And white.
From Dreams of My Father: It remained necessary to prove which side you were on, to show your loyalty to the black masses, to strike out and name names.
From Dreams of My Father: I never emulate white men and brown men whose fates didnt speak to my own. It was into my fathers image, the black man, son of Africa , that Id packed all the attributes I sought in myself, the attributes of Martin and Malcolm, DuBois and Mandela.
Bump
Very telling, it seems he puts our country last.
Thanks.
HATRED OF WHITES:
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From Dreams of My Father, “ I FOUND A SOLACE IN NURSING A PERVASIVE SENSE OF GRIEVANCE AND ANIMOSITY AGAINST MY MOTHER’S RACE”.
From ‘Dreams of my Father’, “THE EMOTION BETWEEN THE RACES COULD NEVER BE PURE...THE OTHER RACE WOULD ALWAYS REMAIN JUST THAT; MENACING, ALIEN AND APART.”
From ‘Dreams of My Father’,
“I CEASED TO ADVERTISE MY MOTHER’S RACE AT THE AGE OF 12 OR 13, WHEN I BEGAN TO SUSPECT THAT BY DOING SO I WAS INGRATIATING MYSELF TO WHITES.”
From Dreams Of My Father, “NEVER EMULATE THE WHITE MEN and brown men whose fates didn’t speak to my own. IT WAS INTO MY FATHER’S IMAGE, THE BLACK MAN, SON OF AFRICA, THAT I’D PACKED ALL THE ATTRIBUTES I SOUGHT IN MYSELF”.
From Dreams Of My Father:
“THAT HATE HADN’T GONE AWAY,” he wrote, BLAMING “WHITE PEOPLE some cruel, some IGNORANT, sometimes a single face, sometimes just a faceless image of a system claiming power over our lives.”
From Dreams Of My Father;
“There were enough of us on campus to constitute a tribe, and when it came to hanging out many of us chose to function like a tribe, staying close together, traveling in packs,” he wrote. “IT REMAINED NECESSARY TO PROVE WHICH SIDE YOU WERE ON, TO SHOW YOUR LOYALTY TO THE BLACK MASSES, TO STRIKE OUT, AND NAME NAMES. “
From Dreams Of My Father, “I HAD GROWN ACCUSTOMED , everywhere, TO SUSPICIONS BETWEEN THE RACES.”
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LOVE OF ISLAM:
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Quote from Barack Obama’s book, Dreams Of My Father:
“THE PERSON WHO MADE ME PROUDEST OF ALL, though, was [HALF BROTHER ] ROY .. HE CONVERTED TO ISLAM” .
From ‘Dreams of my Father’, “IN INDONESIA, I HAD SPENT TWO YEARS AT A MUSLIM SCHOOL.”
“I STUDIED THE KORAN.”
From ‘Audacity of Hope: “LOLO (Obama’s step father) FOLLOWED .. ISLAM...” “I LOOKED TO LOLO FOR GUIDANCE”.
From ‘The Audacity Of Hope, “I WILL STAND WITH THE MUSLIMS SHOULD THE POLITICAL WINDS SHIFT IN AN UGLY DIRECTION.”
From The Audacity Of Hope, “WE ARE NO LONGER just A CHRISTIAN NATION..We ARE also a Jewish nation, A MUSLIM NATION, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.”
http://www.examiner.com/a-534540~Can_a_past_of_Islam_change_the_path_to_president_for_Obama_.html?cid=dc-article-obama
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http://www.examiner.com/a-536474~_Trapped_between_two_worlds_.html
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All of them are good.
I like the NoBama one requires minimal thinking.
I’m going to put both, one on either side of the back window, on my pickup.
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