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Democrats are rebuking President Bush for saying in his speech to the Knesset, here, that to “negotiate with terrorists and radicals” is “appeasement.” The Democrats took it as a slap at Barack Obama. What bothers me is the continual reference to Hitler and his National Socialists, particularly the British and French accommodation at the Munich Conference of 1938. The narrative we're given about Munich is entirely in hindsight. We know what kind of man Hitler was, and that he started World War II in Europe. From the view of 1938, what Hitler was demanding at Munich was not unreasonable, according...

WASHINGTON - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama accused President Bush on Thursday of launching a "false political attack" with a comment about appeasing terrorists and radicals. The Illinois senator interpreted the remark as a slam against him but the White House denied that Bush's words were in any way directed at Obama, who has said as president he would be willing to personally meet with Iran's leaders and those of other regimes the United States has deemed rogue. In a speech to Israel's Knesset, Bush said: "Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as...

Barack Obama can fully accept Hillary Rodham Clinton’s terms on Michigan and Florida and still win a majority of pledged Democratic delegates on June 1, allowing him to lay claim to the nomination under the New York senator’s own rules. A Politico analysis of the delegate numbers after Tuesday’s primaries in North Carolina and Indiana shows Obama can concede to Clinton’s position on Michigan and Florida and still claim victory — potentially forestalling the Democratic nightmare scenario of a floor fight at the Denver convention. The Clinton campaign rejected the premise of Politico’s analysis, dismissing it as “artificial metrics” that...

What began as a night that could have delivered a devastating psychological blow to the Barack Obama campaign has ended with an extraordinary win for Obama, leaving him comfortably poised to ascend to the nomination. Barack Obama defeated Hillary Clinton easily in North Carolina and, in a true squeaker, lost narrowly in Indiana, a result the Clinton campaign will be unable to overcome. Expectations had cratered for Obama approaching the evening, shifting the likelihood of a large victory in North Carolina to merely the hope for a small one. In Indiana, what began as a potential victory for Obama ended...

Video here.

(CNN) — The core of Hillary Clinton’s argument to superdelegates has been her electability – that she is the candidate most likely to beat presumptive Republican nominee John McCain in November. But according to exit polls, voters don’t share that view. In Indiana, Democratic primary voters were equally split over who was most likely to beat McCain, with both drawing 48 percent. And in North Carolina, voters gave the edge to Barack Obama: 54 percent thought he was more likely to win in November, while 40 percent [...]

As Barack Obama emerged in front of an estimated crowd of 22,000 in front of Old Main on the Penn State University campus, Ashley Sims shouted the kind of welcome usually reserved for pop stars. "Oh, my God! Oh, my God! I love you, Barack! Look at me! Hi!" This from a 24-year-old graduate student who customized her cell phone's ring tone as the Obama Girl tune, "I've Got a Crush on Obama." When speaking about Obama, she has a dreamy look in her eyes, clasps her hands to her chest, and pauses in the middle of sentences as if...

FARGO, N.D. (AP) - North Dakota State University is investigating complaints about a campus skit in which a white student in blackface portrayed Barack Obama receiving a lap dance. The same skit, part of a charity fundraiser held at a campus theater, also featured a depiction of cowboys having sex with each other, witnesses told The Forum newspaper, which first reported the backlash Friday. "We're trying to find out the right approaches for accountability, but at the same time try to heal wounds that have occurred and allow the campus to move ahead," Janna Stoskopf, NDSU's dean of students, told...

Can Barack Obama, who campaigns as an icon of peace, actually be more bellicose than Bush? Yes, he can. President Obama would be a warmonger. He would be a wide-eyed, zealous interventionist who would not think twice about using America’s “military muscle” (his words) to overthrow “rogue states” and to suppress America’s enemies, real and imagined. He would go farther even than President Bush in transforming the globe into America’s backyard and staffing it with spies and soldiers. He would relish the “American mission” to police the world and topple tyrannical regimes. Iraq is the Obamabots’ favorite faultline in the...

Michael Goldfarb observes that the Obama "dipdive" videos are unhealthy, creepy and deeply disturbing. The Dipdive videos were the creepy culmination of the Obama campaign's messianic rhetoric. And they even seemed to make the campaign's most fanatical supporters a bit queasy. Obama's rhetoric was always empty, but coming from the man himself, eloquent as he is, everyone seemed willing to overlook how silly it all was. Once you get Jessica Alba and Scarlett Johanson repeating the same phrases and chanting his name as though he were some kind of political immortal--well, it all became far more transparent. What is even...

I'd had a neat idea for a bumber sticker or maybe just a nice net graphic for the coming post-convention campaign season. It would be "Obama 2008" and a play on his current bumper sticker. The difference is that the rainbow in the "O" would be replaced with a red circle with the islamic crescent and star. All of the lettering would be red on a white background so it would be inexpensive to produce (red ink on white vinyl). Any graphic artists in the house want to give this a whirl? Also, I'd have posted this in Vanity but...

I've been volunteering for Hillary Clinton across America, knocking on doors and handing out flyers, giving little speeches and putting stickers on jumpers. But everywhere I've been, from Iowa to South Carolina to Nevada to Texas, the toughest constituency for us Hillary volunteers has been young people. A few weeks ago, covered in Hillary badges, I approached a young couple in California and, as I was about to offer up my pearls of electoral wisdom, they just began singing at me. And they were singing Yes We Can, the song by Black Eyed Peas' Will.I.Am, whose video has become a...

I've been closely watching the struggle for the democratic presidential nomination between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. It has struck me that Clinton seems to be powerless against "Obamamania." There are many factors — mostly negative ones against Clinton as opposed to positive reasons for Obama — but I think there is something more fundamental happening as well.Much of the Obama phenomenon has been described as "Obama messianism." The overall effect of his trend is well-documented by the weblog http://www.obamamessiah.blogspot.com/. It is this secular messianism which is really what Clinton cannot beat. The antidote to the secular messianism of Obama...

NELSONVILLE, Ohio (BP)--Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama defended his belief in same-sex civil unions March 2 by referencing Jesus' Sermon on the Mount and then implicitly criticizing those who view Romans as a binding teaching on homosexuality. Obama made the comments during a question-and-answer session with voters in Nelsonville, Ohio. A local pastor asked Obama how he plans to win the votes of evangelical voters when they disagree with him on moral issues. "I believe in civil unions that allow a same-sex couple to visit each other in a hospital or transfer property to each other," he said, referring to...

Barack Hussein Obama finally pulls off the necessary action to pull ahead of Hilliary for the Democrat nomination for President of The United States. The crowds cheered and he is swept to victory!

Like most Maryland Democrats, I voted for Sen. Barack Obama in the recent Potomac Primary. By doing so, according to the leaders of my church, I put my soul at risk. That's right, says the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops -- tap the touch screen for a pro-abortion-rights candidate, and you're probably punching your ticket to Hell. For a church that "thinks in centuries," things sure are moving quickly. Back in 2004, as Washington correspondent for the independent National Catholic Reporter, I covered what Comedy Central's Jon Stewart dubbed the "wafer wars." A handful of conservative bishops warned Democratic presidential...

WASHINGTON -- Much has been made of the religious tenor of Barack Obama's presidential campaign. Reports of women weeping and swooning -- even of an audience applauding when The One cleared his proboscis (blew his nose for you mortals) -- have become frequent events in the heavenly realm of Obi-Wan Obama. His rhetoric, meanwhile, drips with hints of resurrection, redemption and second comings. "We are the ones we've been waiting for," he said on Super Tuesday night. And his people were glad. Actually, they were hysterical, the word that best describes what surrounds this young savior and that may be...

WASHINGTON -- Much has been made of the religious tenor of Barack Obama's presidential campaign. Reports of women weeping and swooning -- even of an audience applauding when The One cleared his proboscis (blew his nose for you mortals) -- have become frequent events in the heavenly realm of Obi-Wan Obama. His rhetoric, meanwhile, drips with hints of resurrection, redemption and second comings. "We are the ones we've been waiting for," he said on Super Tuesday night. And his people were glad. Actually, they were hysterical, the word that best describes what surrounds this young savior and that may be...

Try to guess(the candidate). Left-wing, cult of personality — you’ve got a 50/50 shot. Video Link

IT was early 1994 when Nelson Mandela gave a speech in a slum outside Cape Town and spoke in grand terms of a new beginning and how when he was elected president every household would have a washing machine. People took him literally. A few months later he became South Africa's first black president. That's when clerks in department stores in Cape Town had to turn people away demanding their free washer and dryer. Having spent some time as a reporter in South Africa watching the Mandela presidency I was reminded of that story this week when I travelled with...