LATimes - Peter Nicholas wrote:
[...] For the last year and a half I've covered the presidentialrace, focusing first on Hillary Clinton, then moving over to Obama.
AfterClinton's defeat in the Iowa caucuses, she decided she needed anemergency reinvention. She began mixing with reporters, sipping a glassof wine late at night in the aisle of her campaign plane andunburdening herself about the state of the race. As her prospectsdimmed, her accessibility grew. Sometimes she was off the record, butyou can't say she wasn't fun.
Not so with Obama. One of thestriking ironies is that a man who draws tens of thousands of people tohis rallies, whose charisma is likened to that of John F. Kennedy, canbe sort of a bore.
Discipline is essential for candidates whowant to drive home a consistent message, or avoid the self-sabotagethat comes with a careless answer. A steely perseverance helps explainwhy Obama at this point stands a better than even chance of becomingthe 44th president. But when you're exposed to the guy 18 hours a day,it's a bit maddening. You want him to loosen up.
I've watchedObama demonstrate a soccer kick to his daughter in Chicago; devour acheesesteak in Philly; navigate a roller rink in Indiana; drive abumper car; and catapult 125 feet in the air on an amusement-park ridecalled "Big Ben." He's done it all with dogged professionalism, butwith little show of spontaneity. After all this time with him, I stillcan't say with certainty who he is.
A couple of images from the long campaign stay with me.
Onewas watching Obama enter an apartment building near his Chicago homefor a morning workout. He wore dark sweats, a gray T-shirt and abaseball cap pulled low over his forehead. In those few seconds it tookhim to walk from the car to the building, with his head down, thin andsolitary, he looked nothing like the adored politician presiding overrallies. It was a reminder that behind the hype and the TV ads is thisone rather vulnerable-looking guy. And in that moment came thequestion: Is he really ready to take over the toughest job on theplanet?
The other was a hot summer afternoon in Iowa. Obamawas flipping burgers at a backyard barbecue, in what the campaign hopedwould be an exquisite photo opportunity. A fly began circling his head.Then more flies. Pretty soon flies were swarming him, the burgers --everything. It was awful to watch. But in rhythmic fashion he beganwaving them off with his hand. He scooped up the burgers and headedback to the picnic table, as if nothing had gone wrong. That smallepisode told me something about Obama's temperament. I would havewanted to fling the grill over the fence in frustration.
Both impressions came from a distance. A cordon of aides ensures nothing more intimate is available to the traveling press. [...]
First Clinton, then John McCain made the argument that Obama is someonewe don't really know. Obama's supporters counter that we have hisrecord in the U.S. and Illinois senates, two memoirs that reveal hisinner thinking and a vast trove of public speaking. Ironically, thoseof us who were sent out to take his measure in person can't offer muchhelp in answering who he is, or if he is ready. The barriers set inplace between us and him were just too great.
[...] For the last year and a half I've covered the presidentialrace, focusing first on Hillary Clinton, then moving over to Obama.
AfterClinton's defeat in the Iowa caucuses, she decided she needed anemergency reinvention. She began mixing with reporters, sipping a glassof wine late at night in the aisle of her campaign plane andunburdening herself about the state of the race. As her prospectsdimmed, her accessibility grew. Sometimes she was off the record, butyou can't say she wasn't fun.
Not so with Obama. One of thestriking ironies is that a man who draws tens of thousands of people tohis rallies, whose charisma is likened to that of John F. Kennedy, canbe sort of a bore.
Discipline is essential for candidates whowant to drive home a consistent message, or avoid the self-sabotagethat comes with a careless answer. A steely perseverance helps explainwhy Obama at this point stands a better than even chance of becomingthe 44th president. But when you're exposed to the guy 18 hours a day,it's a bit maddening. You want him to loosen up.
I've watchedObama demonstrate a soccer kick to his daughter in Chicago; devour acheesesteak in Philly; navigate a roller rink in Indiana; drive abumper car; and catapult 125 feet in the air on an amusement-park ridecalled "Big Ben." He's done it all with dogged professionalism, butwith little show of spontaneity. After all this time with him, I stillcan't say with certainty who he is.
A couple of images from the long campaign stay with me.
Onewas watching Obama enter an apartment building near his Chicago homefor a morning workout. He wore dark sweats, a gray T-shirt and abaseball cap pulled low over his forehead. In those few seconds it tookhim to walk from the car to the building, with his head down, thin andsolitary, he looked nothing like the adored politician presiding overrallies. It was a reminder that behind the hype and the TV ads is thisone rather vulnerable-looking guy. And in that moment came thequestion: Is he really ready to take over the toughest job on theplanet?
The other was a hot summer afternoon in Iowa. Obamawas flipping burgers at a backyard barbecue, in what the campaign hopedwould be an exquisite photo opportunity. A fly began circling his head.Then more flies. Pretty soon flies were swarming him, the burgers --everything. It was awful to watch. But in rhythmic fashion he beganwaving them off with his hand. He scooped up the burgers and headedback to the picnic table, as if nothing had gone wrong. That smallepisode told me something about Obama's temperament. I would havewanted to fling the grill over the fence in frustration.
Both impressions came from a distance. A cordon of aides ensures nothing more intimate is available to the traveling press. [...]
First Clinton, then John McCain made the argument that Obama is someonewe don't really know. Obama's supporters counter that we have hisrecord in the U.S. and Illinois senates, two memoirs that reveal hisinner thinking and a vast trove of public speaking. Ironically, thoseof us who were sent out to take his measure in person can't offer muchhelp in answering who he is, or if he is ready. The barriers set inplace between us and him were just too great.
"Obama - who is he?"
ReplyDeleteFor some very good answers see http://www.theobamafile.com/
The Obama File
Barack Hussein Obama
(Intro):
"A privileged African-American, who has not shared the black American experience. By birth, blood and training, a Muslim, who has been a member of a Black-African church for 20 years. A socialist whose politics are rooted in Marx and whose tactics were conceived by Alinsky. A master at shaping his own mythology and completely unqualified to be Commander in Chief."
See and read as many of the links to sections, very informative.
See this one:
http://www.theobamafile.com/BarackObama.htm
"Who is this guy?
I've read everything I could get my hands on about this guy in the last 18 months and I know less about him now than I did at the beginning.
Is he a Muslim? -- I don't think so.
But, I don't think he's a Christian, either.
He's a Socialist -- and worse he's an Alinsky socialist.
His "thing" is getting people "pissed off." That's what Alinsky-style "community organizers" do. Community organizers, in Alinsky's words, "rub raw the sores of discontent." They don't go off on Jihad.
Yet, there is a part of Obama that is Muslim. There's the prepubescent youngster who lived in a Muslim household, in a Muslim country, attended a Muslim school, undoubtedly eager to please his peers and teachers, and doing his best to be a good little Muslim boy to please his new step-father.
The Jesuits would say, "Give me the child, and I will mould the man."
But then -- Shazaaaam! -- young Obama is in Hawaii -- abandoned by his father, and now, his mother.
During the day, he's going to school with the children of the Islands' elites, telling his classmates that his father was an African prince, the leader of a proud and successful people.
During the evening, he's tutored by Frank Marshall Davis, grampa Stanley's drinkin' buddy. Under Frank's tutelage, Marx replaced Muhammad.
There's still some Muslim in there somewhere -- some influence -- some sensitivity -- some empathy -- but, he's not a Muslim.
Davis, a radical black communist, fed the impressionable Obama a constant diet of "pissed off" and "blackness" all through his high school years. Davis's parting words to Obama on his leaving for Occidental College were, "college is an advanced degree in compromise" and he warned Obama not to forget his "people" and not to "start believing what they tell you about equal opportunity and the American way and all that shit."
Obama, who grew up in a comfortable white household, has struggled to find an identity as a righteous black men ever since. Obama resisted "the pure and heady breeze of privilege" to which he was exposed as a child, and rejected his "white skin privilege" or at least tried to.
At Occidental, Obama sought out the more politically active black students. The foreign students. The Chicanos. The Marxist professors and structural feminists. But, even though Obama had a full-boat scholarship, Occidental wasn't black enough for him and after two years he headed east to Columbia University -- on the edge of Harlem.
Obama's Columbia experience is a complete mystery. No one, absolutely no one, remembers Obama from Columbia -- Fox News asked 400 ex-students and all Fox got was shrugs. There is no picture of him in the yearbook. The only thing we really know about this period is that Obama spent a lot of time at the Marxist-Socialist conferences at Cooper Union and African cultural fairs in Brooklyn.
Obama stopped drugging sometime during the Columbia period. He started abusing marijuana and cocaine at Punahou. "Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow when you could afford it. Not smack, though," he wrote.
After a brief flirtation with New York, Obama was hired as a community organizer for the Developing Communities Project (DCP) of the Calumet Community Religious Conference (CCRC) in Chicago. The "Project" was funded by Bill Ayers' Woods Fund.
Obama was 24 years old, unmarried, and according to his memoir, searching for a genuine African-American community.
Both the CCRC and the DCP were built on the Alinsky model of community agitation, wherein paid organizers learned how to, in Alinsky's words, "rub raw the sores of discontent."
Alinsky viewed as supremely important the role of the organizer, or master manipulator, whose guidance was responsible for setting the agendas of the People’s Organization. "The organizer," Alinsky wrote, "is in a true sense reaching for the highest level for which man can reach -- to create, to be a 'great creator,' to play God."
Alinsky wrote, "Rules for Radicals," a book he dedicated to Lucifer, whom he called the "first radical'" For Alinsky, "Change" was his mantra. By "Change," Alinsky meant a quiet, Marxist revolution achieved by slow, incremental, Machiavellian means that turned society inside out. This had to be done through systematic deception, winning the trust of the naively idealistic middle class, and by using the language of morality to conceal an agenda designed to destroy it. And the way to do this, he said, was through "people’s organizations'"
One of Obama's early mentors in the Alinsky method was Mike Kruglik, who had this to say to an interviewer of The New Republic, about Obama:
"He was a natural, the undisputed master of agitation, who could engage a room full of recruiting targets in a rapid-fire Socratic dialogue, nudging them to admit that they were not living up to their own standards. As with the panhandler, he could be aggressive and confrontational. With probing, sometimes personal questions, he would pinpoint the source of pain in their lives, tearing down their egos just enough before dangling a carrot of hope that they could make things better."
Watch Obama work a crowd at a town hall meeting. He comes out, says a few words in greeting and then begins his laundry list of all the stuff that's wrong with America, getting the audience all revved up. When the crowd is engaged and sufficiently "pissed off," Obama presents a solution to the all the things that are "pissing them off" -- the chosen one, the anointed one, the Obama -- as president.
Alinsky's goal was to slowly turn the United States into a Communist dictatorship; to this end he tried to convince various groups of poor people and labor unions to push for legislation in that direction; he did this by appealing to their self-interest -- whether valid or not -- instead of using charismatic leadership -- but now we have Obama, who is skilled in the Alinsky method and charismatic.
The unrepentant terrorist, Bill Ayers, was a constant during Obama's "Alinsky" period. Alinsky supplied the method but Bill Ayers supplied the money and the connections to the Chicago Left that allowed Obama to grow his activism into political office. When Obama wasn't agitating, he was elbow to elbow with Bill Ayers on one project or another.
One of Ayers' and Obama's schemes, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, spent $150 million to radicalize Chicago schoolchildren.
When Obama undertook his agitating work in Chicago's South Side poor neighborhoods, he was un-churched. Yet his office was in a Church and most of the folks he needed to agitate and organize were Church people -- pastors and congregants, who took their churches and their church-going very seriously. Again and again, he was asked by pastors and church ladies, "Where do you go to Church, young man?"
In the paperback version of "The Audacity of Hope," in the chapter entitled "Faith," beginning on page 195, and ending on page 208, Obama is telling us that he doesn’t really have any profound religious belief, but that in his early Chicago days he felt he needed to acquire some spiritual "street cred."
So, at 28, Obama finally joined a church, in part to deepen what one friend called "a whole web of relationships" in the community. It also gave him a strong political base and a well-connected mentor.
Obama didn't join just any church, but a huge black nationalist church, the Trinity United Church of Christ (UCC). Its pastor, Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright, a former Muslim and racist black nationalist, unabashedly preached a "black" gospel" and the Marxist "Black Liberation Theology."
Membership in this congregation gives Obama the political cover he needed. He now introduces himself as a Christian, although he has never been baptized.
Swearing allegiance to the "Black Value System" of a church whose foundation is "Black Liberation Theology" does not a Christian make. But it is good politics on the South Side.
Harvard Law School changed everything. Being the first affirmative-action president of the Harvard Law Review netted Obama a book deal -- which he booted -- he spent the money but didn't produce a book -- but he got a second advance and headed off to Bali, Indonesia, to finish his fable, "Dreams From My Father," the source of almost everything we know about Obama.
In the early 90's, Obama married and practiced civil rights law for a couple of years and then, with the publication of "the book," Obama started blossoming out. He cut back on his law practice. He began teaching at the University of Chicago. He chaired the Chicago Annenberg Challenge.
And, finally, Obama saw the chance to run for the state senate in a district that included Hyde Park, the home of the University of Chicago and some of the poorest ghettos on the South Side.
Obama challenged hundreds of signatures on his rivals' nominating petitions and kept challenging petitions until every one of Obama's four Democratic primary rivals was forced off the ballot and won unopposed.
The man now running for president on a message of giving a voice to the voiceless first entered public office not by leveling the playing field, but by clearing it.
During his run for the Illinois state senate seat, Obama received the endorsement of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). Obama was/is an associate of the Chicago branch of the DSA, and a member of the "New Party," and signed documents seeking their support.
Obama has spent his entire political career trying to win the next step up. Every three years, he has aspired to a more powerful political position.
When Obama was considering a run for the US Senate in 2003, he paid an intriguing visit to Emil Jones, Jr., the Illinois Senate Majority Leader.
"You have the power to elect a U. S. senator," Obama told Jones, a former Chicago sewers inspector, who had risen to become one of the most influential African-American politicians in Illinois.
Jones looked at the ambitious young man smiling before him and asked, teasingly: "Do you know anybody I could make a U. S. senator?"
According to Jones, Obama replied: "Me." It was an audacious step in his spectacular rise from the murky political backwaters of Springfield, the Illinois capital.
Jones had served in the Illinois Legislature for three decades. He represented a district on the Chicago South Side not far from Obama's. He became Obama's kingmaker.
Several months before Obama announced his U.S. Senate bid, Jones called his old friend Cliff Kelley, a former Chicago alderman who now hosts the city's most popular black call-in radio program.
I called Kelley last week and he recollected the private conversation as follows:
"He said, 'Cliff, I'm gonna make me a U.S. senator.'"
"Oh, you are? Who might that be?"
"Barack Obama."
Jones appointed Obama sponsor of virtually every high-profile piece of legislation in the senate, angering many rank-and-file state legislators who had more seniority than Obama and had spent years championing the bills.
"I took all the beatings and insults and endured all the racist comments over the years from nasty Republican committee chairmen," state senator Rickey Hendon, the original sponsor of landmark racial profiling and videotaped confession legislation, yanked away by Jones and given to Obama, complained to me at the time. "Barack didn't have to endure any of it, yet, in the end, he got all the credit."
"I don't consider it bill jacking," Hendon told me. "But no one wants to carry the ball 99 yards all the way to the one-yard line, and then give it to the halfback who gets all the credit and the stats in the record book."
Every bill Obama passed as a state senator was passed his last year. During his seventh and final year in the state senate, Obama's stats soared. He sponsored a whopping 26 bills passed into law -- including many he now cites in his presidential campaign when attacked as inexperienced.
It was a stunning achievement that started him on the path of national politics -- and he couldn't have done it without Jones.
When Obama decided to run for the U. S. Senate he was virtually unknown in his own state. Polls showed fewer than 20 percent of Illinois voters had ever heard of Barack Obama.
But he got a boost, when, on June 2004, the billionaire, George Soros threw a big fund-raiser at his New York home for Obama’s Illinois Senate campaign. Soros and family personally chipped in $60,000. No telling what Soros' buddies chipped in.
Then the Democratic Party introduced Barack Obama to the nation on July 27th, 2004, when Obama delivered his now-famous speech before the Democratic National Convention.
During the 2004 senate campaign, Obama ridiculed as "a silly question" whether he would run for president or vice president before his term ends in 2011. "I’ve never worked in Washington," he said. "I can unequivocally say I will not be running for national office in four years, and my entire focus is making sure that I’m the best possible senator on behalf of the people of Illinois."
In November, 2004, Obama was elected to the United States Senate, mostly through the self-destruction of his top opponents in both the primary and general elections.
Almost immediately after his swearing-in Obama's beatification began when Time magazine named Obama one of "The World's Most Influential People." He was listed among other leaders and revolutionaries. The British journal, New Statesman, named Obama one of "10 People Who Could Change the World."
In the first 18 months of his first Senate term Obama was also writing his second book, "The Audacity of Hope." Immediately after finishing it, he built up support for his forthcoming Presidential campaign by campaigning for other Democrats in 2006, took part in a book tour, made a few appearances on entertainment shows, and began his campaign for the presidency. Not much time for doing what he was elected to do -- represent the people of Illinois.
On Tuesday, January 16th, 2007, less than two years after his swearing-in, Obama, who has been repeatedly identified as the most liberal member of the U. S. Senate, took the first step toward running for president by filing papers to create a presidential exploratory committee.
Pretty much, everybody that cares, has watched what has gone on since. The elevation of Obama to cult status as the Obamamessiah. The "we can change the world" slogans and mass crowds. The Alinsky-inspired challenges about "the world as it is, and the world as it should be."
But, there was a downside to the campaign. The Rev. Wright's hateful, racist and anti-American sermons become public and, after 20 years, Obama swore he didn't know anything about it, saying, "I wasn't in church that day."
The names Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn bubbled up and Obama went, "Who?"
His pal and money-man Rezko was found guilty and Obama said, "What?"
The Annenberg Challenge? The only executive experience Obama has, is missing from his resume.
ACORN? Nuts!
Obama doesn't know anybody or anything.
Have you noticed? Obama doesn't have any close friends. Obama doesn't have a "best friend," a pal or a buddy, who goes back to Punahou, or Occidental, or Columbia, or Harvard, or the projects -- no one.
But, the people that are around Obama all have one thing in common -- they all hate America.
His wife (Michelle), his mentor (Davis), his druggy buddy (Rafik), his pastor (Wright), his other pastors (Pfleger, Meeks, Watts), his associates (Ayers, Dohrn, Klonsky) or his supporters at the Daily Kos and Code Pink all have one thing in common -- they all hate America -- and they all say so, all the time -- and Obama feigns surprised that anyone would question his patriotism, even as he disrespects his country's symbols.
Obama and all his friends have clearly stated their goals. America, as it is and has been, needs to change and the change they have in mind is socialism -- at best.
I know this is true, because these people have repeatedly and clearly said so. They're all up to their ears in the "quiet revolution," first described by the Italian Marxist, Antonio Gramsci, and they feel it is at hand. They can taste victory and it all hinges on Barack Hussein Obama.
The mainstream media provides cover for Obama. It has completely abrogated its role and responsibility to vet him.
On the Internet, there is an organized, systematic cleansing of Obama-related content.
Every couple of days I get an email telling me this link, or that link, connects to a "Page not found -- 404 error." The extensive body of Obama web-knowledge, that has evolved over the last 20 years, is shrinking. Stuff that's considered an Obama smear or unflattering is sent to the Obama '08 cyber shredding machine. And the campaign is getting help from some really big web service providers.
A good example is Kristof's famous New York Times article, in which Kristof quotes Obama saying that the Muslim call to prayer is "one of the prettiest sounds on Earth" and in which Obama recited the Muslim call to prayer, the Adhan, "with a first-class [Arabic] accent" -- that's gone -- from The New York Times (I have it cached, though).
And, the Trinity UCC website has completely changed. Now, it's all sweetness and light. Gone are all those great Rev. Wright "God damn America" videos and anti-Israeli Trumpet magazine excerpts.
Obama has lived for 48 years without leaving any footprints -- none! There is no Obama documentation -- no paper trail -- none.
Original birth certificate -- Not released
Obama/Dunham marriage license -- Not released
Soetoro/Dunham marriage license -- Not released
Soetoro adoption records -- Not released
Besuki School application -- Released
Punahou School records -- Not released
Selective Service Registration -- Released
Occidental College records -- Not released
Passport (Pakistan) -- Not released
Columbia College records -- Not released
Columbia thesis -- Not released
Harvard College records -- Not released
Harvard Law Review articles -- None (maybe 1, unsigned?)
Baptism certificate -- None
Medical records -- Not released
Illinois State Senate records -- None
Illinois State Senate schedule -- Lost
Law practice client list -- Not released
University of Chicago scholarly articles -- None
The Illinois State Archives told Judicial Watch that they never received any request from Senator Obama to archive any records in his possession. In 2007, Obama told Tim Russert that his records were "not kept."
And there's less on the web every day. In time, the entire Obama body of knowledge will consist of 3 documents -- "Dreams From My Father" -- "The Audacity of Hope" -- and the latest -- "Change We Can Believe In" -- all written by Barack Hussein Obama or his "ghost-writers."
Obama is an immensely talented man whose talents have been largely devoted to crafting, and chronicling, his own life. Not things. Not ideas. Not institutions. But himself.
So, you can understand why I say, I know less about Obama now than I did at the beginning. The critical stuff is disappearing and all we have left is Obama's idealized version of events.
This undocumented stranger, who has repeatedly been rewarded for the work of others, could be our next president?
And, this stranger already is building a cadre to lead his own "people’s organization" -- and he's got a ton of money -- more than $75 million.
Obama has, through his nonprofit group, "Public Allies," a pun on Alinsky's "people’s organizations," has been organizing and training a political cadre since 1993. There are fifteen fully-staffed and populated chapters, operating under the watchful eye of Michelle Obama.
The Obama Campaign is also conducting, at the state level, a "national program for social change," called "Camp Obama," and there's no marshmallows at Camp Obama. Here's their sign-up page -- you too can be a "Deputy Field Organizer."
Obama Campaign's website promises that "you'll get the kind of experience that Barack got as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago," and "Camp Obama is your chance to step up and become a leader in this movement."
Movement? What movement?
Public Allies and Camp Obama are Alinsky training programs designed to build a core group of "community organizers" dedicated to "social change" in their communities.
Their charter will be to bring about "Change." They'll do this through threats, pressure, tension and confrontation -- getting people "pissed off" -- the tactics of Alinsky.
Obama is cloning thousands of baby Obamas -- a "people’s organization" -- and on our dime.
A "movement" -- dedicated to social change by getting people "pissed off" -- and there will be thousands of them.
If Obama should sit in the Oval Office, just what do you think he has planned for these guys?
And -- if Obama shouldn't sit in the Oval Office, just what do you think he has planned for these guys?
Remember this?
On July 2nd, 2008, Obama spoke in Colorado Springs and hit themes of national service, foreign policy, and national security. In that vein, Obama proposed a rather extraordinary idea -- that the US should spend as much money on a civilian national security force as it does on the military. (video)
"We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded."
And what color shirts will they wear?
Lenin said this about socialism: "The goal of socialism is communism."
None of this is good."
About Obama's temperament,the journalist Mark Steyn hit it on the head when he said for an egalitarian candidate it is strange that he has to manner himself like a foreign dignitary when visiting such places as a bowling alley.
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