2012 Presidential Election

[Valin]

 

 

Yes, good answer.

 

This is something McCain never understood...and I have doubts he understands today.

 

I would dearly love for politics to be like Firing Line was..reasoned, civil...etc, unfortunately it's more like The Mclaughlin Group. Loud and nasty.

[Valin]

New York: President Obama Can’t Be in the Same Room As Forks Anymore?

Dan Amira

6/22/12

 

 

Kelly O'Donnell

@KellyO

 

"There's a reason why there are no knives at your table & the forks WILL be collected..I'm not joking" says NALEO host re: Secret Service

 

 

Smooooth Move!

 

 

[Valin]

And the latest Dem not attending Obama’s party is…

Jazz Shaw

6/23/12

 

The DNC convention this year is going to turn out to be a serious opportunity… for ticket scalpers. The list of folks who won’t be coming from the Left side of the aisle continues to grow. We already saw US Senator Joe Manchin, Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin and U.S. Rep. Nick Rahall taking a pass. We later reported that Mark Critz had … err.. scheduling conflicts. And now, long time friend of Hot Air the Lady Logician checks in from Utah and finds that the state’s only prominent, national level Democrat is otherwise occupied on the date of the big shindig.

 

(Snip)

 

So what prompted this? A family emergency? The upcoming marriage of a family member? Apparently not.

 

(Snip)

 

At this point, it’s honestly surprising that Matheson is willing to publicly admit he’ll be voting for Obama, but I suppose there are some rivers one simply can not cross. There’s something to be said for a guy who can win on a ticket in that part of Utah with a “D” behind their name, but it’s never a sure thing. And clearly he doesn’t want to be associated with the big party in September if he plans on keeping his seat.

 

What could possibly be going on here? Its a mystery.

 

[nickydog]

New York: President Obama Can’t Be in the Same Room As Forks Anymore?

Dan Amira

6/22/12

 

 

Kelly O'Donnell

@KellyO

 

"There's a reason why there are no knives at your table & the forks WILL be collected..I'm not joking" says NALEO host re: Secret Service

 

 

Smooooth Move!

 

He doesn't want people to eat while he talks. They must listen with rapt attention. Plus the noise of forks on plates is distracting.

[clearvision]

4 Pinocchios for Obama’s newest anti-Romney ad

 

From the Washington Post....

[Draggingtree]

Published: June 22, 2012 Updated: June 23, 2012 7:58 a.m.

Text: Next Article »

Mark Steyn: Obama the first Invented-American president

By MARK STEYN

 

Syndicated columnist

letters@ocregister.com

 

Courtesy of David Maraniss' new book, we now know that yet another key prop of Barack Obama's identity is false: His Kenyan grandfather was not brutally tortured or even non-brutally detained by his British colonial masters. The composite gram'pa joins an ever-swelling cast of characters from Barack's "memoir" who, to put it discreetly, differ somewhat in reality from their bit parts in the grand Obama narrative. The best friend at school portrayed in Obama's autobiography as "a symbol of young blackness" was, in fact, half Japanese, and not a close friend. The white girlfriend he took to an off-Broadway play that prompted an angry post-show exchange about race never saw the play, dated Obama in an entirely different time zone, and had no such world-historically significant conversation with him. His Indonesian step-grandfather, supposedly killed by Dutch soldiers during his people's valiant struggle against colonialism, met his actual demise when he "fell off a chair at his home while trying to hang drapes."

David Maraniss is no right-winger, and can't understand why boorish nonliterary types have seized on his book as evidence that the president of the United States is a Grade A phony. "It is a legitimate question about where the line is in memoir," he told Soledad O'Brien on CNN. My Oxford dictionary defines "memoir" as "an historical account or biography written from personal knowledge." And if Obama doesn't have "personal knowledge" of his tortured grandfather, war-hero step-grandfather and racially obsessed theater-buff girlfriend, who does? But (snip) Read More http://www.ocregister.com/opinion/memoir-360243-obama-fake.html

[Draggingtree]

Joy Behar: Gay Conservatives Only Think with Their Penises

by Mary Chastain23 Jun 2012, 8:23 AM PDT

Both Ms. Behar and her guests imply that conservative gay men only think of sex and reduce them to nothing but a penis. But, then again, this is the party that reduced women to vaginas just last week, so I’m not too shocked.

First Dan Savage insults the conservative gay group GOProud by calling them “House F*ggots” because they support Mitt Romney. Now Joy Behar has jumped in on the left's latest conservative gay bash. Not only did she insult their intelligence, but she crossed the line concerning Governor Romney’s children.

 

Noel Sheppard at NewsBusters reports that Ms. Behar asked her gay guests if GOProud supports Governor Romney just because they find his sons attractive. Not only that, but her guests joined in on the bashing!

JOY BEHAR, HOST: Do you think Romney will ever get the gay vote? I don't think he’s going to get it any way.

HOWARD BRAGMAN, REPUTATION.COM: No, I don’t, unless his sons do a spread in GQ shirtless, and then I think it’ll be fine. (snip) Read More

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Hollywood/2012/06/23/Joy-Behar-Reduces-GOProud-to-Sex-Organs

[Draggingtree]

BETWEEN THE LINES

 

Obama: Accessory to murder?

 

Exclusive: Joseph Farah shows how executive-privilege move actually implicates BHO

 

When Barack Obama claimed executive privilege today in an effort to protect Attorney General Eric Holder from a contempt-of-Congress charge in the Fast and Furious gunrunning scandal, he may have inadvertently exposed himself as an accessory to murder.

For eight months, Holder has been stonewalling congressional investigators looking into the Justice Department scandal responsible for the deaths of at least two U.S. law enforcement officers and untold numbers of civilians on either side of the border with Mexico.

Holder has repeatedly lied to Congress, besides withholding the documents investigators have subpoenaed.

• When asked earlier this year when he first learned about Fast and Furious, Holder claimed about two weeks earlier. Later, congressional investigators found documents proving he had known about it for at least a year and a half longer.
  
• Holder also claimed the Bush administration started the program and that his predecessor knew all about it. When pressed on that point by Sen. Charles Grassley, Holder and the Justice Department retracted the claim.
  

Holder then offered the House Judiciary Committee, headed by Rep. Darrell Issa, a deal. Holder would provide all the documents the committee demanded for a pledge to close the investigation.

Issa, of course, reacted incredulously. What would be the point of an investigation if the results were predetermined by the target of the investigation? What investigator in his right mind would accept such a deal?

Then Obama stepped in and claimed executive privilege.

Now understand what this means. Obama cannot claim executive privilege for any member of his administration. He can only do so for himself and his inner circle of advisers, and should never do so unless it’s a matter of national security.

What Obama did, in apparent desperation, was to expose his own personal complicity in this scandal, making him, quite possibly, an accessory to murder.

Can you imagine how Read More

 

http://www.wnd.com/2012/06/obama-accessory-to-murder/

[Valin]

BETWEEN THE LINES

 

Obama: Accessory to murder?

 

Exclusive: Joseph Farah shows how executive-privilege move actually implicates BHO

 

When Barack Obama claimed executive privilege today in an effort to protect Attorney General Eric Holder from a contempt-of-Congress charge in the Fast and Furious gunrunning scandal, he may have inadvertently exposed himself as an accessory to murder.

 

This was a boneheaded move on the part of the 4th best President. By inserting himself in he has taken a low level scandal and made a big story of it. He would have been better off throwing Holder under the bus. This opinion is of course based on a couple of assumptions (and we all know what happens when you assume) A. The WH had nothing or very little to do with this, B. Holder could be trusted to keep his mouth shut.

Now it's going to be part of the 2012 campaign..this is bad news for Obama, because now Joe/Jane six pack will start scratching their collective heads and asking is there something too this.

[Valin]

Power Line: Mocking the Obama Campaign: A Game Anyone Can Play!

John Hinderaker

6/23/12

 

As the Obama campaign continues to sputter, mockery is starting to come from unexpected directions. Like the Chicago comedy troupe Second City. You may have seen some of the Obama campaign videos starring Deputy Campaign Manager Stephanie Cutter. Here is one, in which she attacks Mitt Romney for being an international businessman. Don’t feel obliged to watch it to the end; it’s like fingernails on a chalk board:

 

 

And here is Second City’s parody of the Stephanie Cutter videos, which ridicules the Obama camp’s increasingly desperate pleas for money.....(Snip)

 

 

 

I would like to note we at the American Society of Steve's in no way condone mocking the greatest President to come out of Occidental College, or his campaign, and we find it in very bad taste...no arugula for you!

[Draggingtree]

June 24, 2012

Obama and the Kingdom of the Concrete Skull

 

By Clarice Feldman

My friend Jane Woodworth looked over her newspaper, put down her coffee mug, and said , " Imagine being so down and out that you have to deter people from talking about the economy with the news that you are an accessory to murder." Nothing better summed up a week where the economy continued its tumble, the presidential approval rate continued its downward slide, and the President invoked executive privilege with respect to the government gun running operation which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of people including our own border agent, Brian Terry, and perhaps an ICE agent

of ours as well.

There was only one thing left for the failing president to do. Make a claim of executive privilege, make it late in the game, after months of his Attorney General Eric Holder's dissembling before Congress under oath, after repeated retractions of Holder statements which were proven false, a claim so weak that all it did was distract attention from the financial news and suggest to even the dimmest wit that the president himself was an accessory to murder. (Every respectable legal observer has announced the claim cannot be sustained. See, this, this and this.) Read More http://www.americant...rete_skull.html

[Geee]

Cash Rules at Romney Retreat While Condoleezza Rice Steals the Show

 

PARK CITY, Utah - If the majority of donors who attend this weekend's gathering of hundreds of high dollar fundraisers go back home as fired up as Rodger Young, the Romney campaign will be in quite strong a financial position and the investment in time and effort for the event will be paid back many times over.

"I am going to bundle every penny I can bundle," said Young, a donor at this weekend's mixer for Romney donors, GOP stars, and Republican leaders.

Until this weekend, Young was merely a donor not a bundler, but that has now changed.

"I came here with the idea that we were all going to take on more financial responsibility and I am certainly prepared to do that for Gov. Romney and I think we can get this done," Young told ABC News.

Hundreds of high dollar fundraisers turned out this weekend for a mixer for Romney campaign donors, GOP stars and Republican leaders, but among the faces at the retreat were other attendees who have the same goals of defeating Barack Obama, but whose roles in Republican politics lie in super PACs.

A man in a dark suit and purple pocket square was camped out in the lobby of the Chateaux at Silver Lake talking to what appeared to be lanyard-wearing donors. The man was Charlie Spies, the founder of the Mitt Romney-backing super PAC Restore Our Future.

He wasn't attending any of the panels or discussions and didn't even want to go into get a cup of coffee, but the lobby is really the place to be, with attendees walking to and from meetings or gathering to talk.

Reporters were asked to leave the lobby after being spotted chatting with Sen. John Thune and his wife about Friday's reception at Olympic Park, as well as with Florida Rep. Connie Mack.

It's legal for Spies to be there, but "coordination" with the candidate is not, a rule that's hard to enforce and explain.

He pleasantly wouldn't answer questions about the propriety of him hobnobbing at the Romney Victory Leadership Retreat, but he said, "Romney supporters are energized."

"People here understand that the private sector is not doing fine and we need a president who understands how to create jobs and turn the economy around," Spies told ABC News.

The Romney campaign did not immediately respond to an evening request for comment about ROF staff being at the retreat.

But Spies wasn't the only person affiliated with a GOP superPAC attending the confab.

Karl Rove, founder of American Crossroads and a former Bush strategist, was also on hand. He spoke on a "media insight" panel, and on another one examining Romney's path to victory. Rove, dressed in a blue blazer, told reporters his panel was "damn good," before whizzing away on a golf cart.

Attendees said the panel was engaging and humorous, with Rove swearing up a storm and regaling the crowd with funny stories.

Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz told reporters both Rove and GOP strategist Mary Matalin were making the crowd howl, telling them about when Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot a friend with bird-shot pellets on a hunting trip.

"He was on full display," Chaffetz said of Rove.

It wasn't all joking, though. According to Young and his wife, Rove said, "We had to focus on some particular groups, such as some Republicans that didn't vote in the last election," including focusing on women. It's unclear whether Rove was also soliciting donations as he mingled with attendees over the weekend.

 

http://news.yahoo.com/cash-rules-romney-retreat-while-condoleezza-rice-steals-044000279--abc-news-politics.html

[Valin]

Cash Rules at Romney Retreat While Condoleezza Rice Steals the Show

 

 

OH Ick! Rich People!

[Valin]

 

 

 

H/T Leagal Insurrection

[Draggingtree]

June 24, 2012

 

White House Congratulates Egypt's Morsi

 

@ikhwan aka Freedom & Justice Party

 

 

Our hard earned tax dollars well spent, eh Obama, even though you *bypassed Congress to do so.

The White House congratulated Egypt's president-elect Mohamed Morsi on his victory in that country's presidential election,

calling it a "milestone" in the country's transition to democracy

.[insert laugh here...ed]

Read More

http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/

 

*Obama Bypasses Congress, Gives $1.5 Billion to Muslim Brotherhood

By Stable Hand at 04:20 PM | Comments (1)

[Valin]

Obama on Clearance in New York

William A. Jacobson

June 25, 2012

 

This is a GUEST POST from friend of the blog SGLawrence, who is vacationing in upstate New York this summer:

 

I was driving on Route 209 through Ellenville, New York in the Catskills on Saturday, June 23, 2012, when I noticed a gentleman sitting all alone in an empty parking lot selling Obama stickers and buttons.

 

I decided to stop and chat with the man to find out how the Obama 2012 campaign was doing in the heart of Democratic Blue New York State.

 

(Snip)

 

 

 

 

Remember

[Pepper]

@Draggingtree

 

I watched that clip a few times just now. It may be one of those cases where any viewer is immediately biased at the outset. As in you will NOT think of pink elephants.

 

 

Although eyes and body behavior tell a lot, don't you think six or so other syllables might have been said?

[nickydog]

Obama on Clearance in New York

William A. Jacobson

June 25, 2012

 

This is a GUEST POST from friend of the blog SGLawrence, who is vacationing in upstate New York this summer:

 

I was driving on Route 209 through Ellenville, New York in the Catskills on Saturday, June 23, 2012, when I noticed a gentleman sitting all alone in an empty parking lot selling Obama stickers and buttons.

 

I decided to stop and chat with the man to find out how the Obama 2012 campaign was doing in the heart of Democratic Blue New York State.

 

(Snip)

 

 

 

 

Remember

 

A guy like that may not vote at all. He is just trying to make a few bucks.

[Draggingtree]

TRR: Michelle Obama: “All This Just For a Flag”

By James S. Robbins

September 13, 2011, 08:39PM

 

The internet was buzzing this week with

of First Lady Michelle Obama apparently showing extreme disrespect to the American flag at a ceremony in honor of the victims of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. As police and firefighters fold the flag to the sound of marching bagpipers, a skeptical looking Mrs. Obama leans to her husband and appears to say, “all this just for a flag.” She then purses her lips and shakes her head slightly as Mr. Obama nods.

Just for a flag? If that is what she said it is regrettable. Even with all her years being around those who hold high public office Mrs. Obama does not seem to understand the purpose and importance of ceremonies. They Read More http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/robbins-report/2011/sep/13/michelle-obama-all-just-flag/

[Valin]

 

 

A guy like that may not vote at all. He is just trying to make a few bucks.

 

 

wish mine all the luck in the world....looks like here's gonna need it.

[Draggingtree]

Guy Sorman

Paul Krugman’s Follies

The Nobel-winning economist embraces fantasy.

24 June 2012

End This Depression Now!, by Paul Krugman (Norton, 272 pp., $24.95)

Paul Krugman’s new book should come with a disclaimer: there is no relation whatsoever between the ideological assertions of the New York Times columnist and bestselling author and the other Paul Krugman, who received a well-deserved Nobel Prize in 2008 for his scholarly research on international trade. Winning a Nobel Prize in economics doesn’t grant legitimacy to everything an economist writes, and Krugman’s book, like most of his newspaper columns, shows little connection with his past academic work.

To be fair, Krugman acknowledges that he has become a “pundit,” an implicit admission that his book is informed by his liberal views as much as by his economic knowledge. End This Depression Now! is essentially a pamphlet pretending to offer scientific answers to the U.S. economic slump. Its argument is easy to summarize: we have the knowledge and tools to revive the economy and provide jobs to millions of unemployed Americans. Consequently, those in positions of power who refuse to put Krugman’s advice into practice, themselves motivated by ideology, are the enemies of the unemployed. They want Americans to suffer for their past sins of excessive borrowing and spending. As if to emphasize that he sees the economic debate as a morality play, Krugman dedicates his book to the unemployed.

“Ending the depression should be incredibly easy,” Krugman asserts. The government must simply spend more, (snip) Read More http://www.city-journal.org/2012/bc0624gs.html

[Draggingtree]

Pull my finger

 

 

June 23, 2012 | Filed under Courage | Posted by Baron Von Ottomatic

It’s easy to sympathize, I suppose, because if I were ever left unsupervised in the White House the shocking photos would be me urinating on the portrait of LBJ wrenched from the wall and hurled to the floor. So in that respect a couple of Obama supporters invited to the White House in commemoration of gay pride month photographed flipping off a portrait of Reagan isn’t all that disrespectful. Of course, I figure that’s why slobs like me don’t get invited to the White House and left unsupervised.

Geez, I thought Reagan was a good Republican. One that wouldn’t even be nominated for President by today’s extremist, TEA-bagging, racist Republican Party. There’s just no pleasing some people. Naturally, the White House has issued a rebuke.

Photographer Zoe Strauss and Matty Hart, national director for public engagement at the group Solutions for Progress, had posted the images of themselves to Facebook.

Hart, under his, wrote simply: “F— Reagan.”

He later posted a link on his Facebook page to the Philadelphia Magazine piece about their gesture.

Neither Strauss nor Hart have responded to FoxNews.com for comment.

Hart, though, defended his gesture in the Philadelphia Magazine article. “Ronald Reagan has blood on his hands,” he said. “The man was in the White House as AIDS exploded.”

If there’s one thing that Barack Obama has taught us it’s that a president cannot be held responsible for any misery that occurs while in the Oval Office. Forty some-odd months of 8%+ unemployment? Not Obama’s fault. Increasing the national debt more in three-and-a-half years than his free-spending predecessor did in eight? Not Obama’s fault. Squandering Read More

http://wizbangblog.com/2012/06/23/pull-my-finger/

[Draggingtree]

An Anonymous Warning to the President & His Allies

 

 

Posted by Ben Howe (Diary)

Monday, June 25th at 3:45PM EDT

No Comments

This is an open letter to the Obama campaign that I wanted to pass along. I will not disclose the author, except to say that it is somebody who is in a position to know many of these things. It is not somebody who has any association with American Crossroads with whom the writer speaks about in the email.

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE OBAMA CAMP

Dear Obama campaign (and his allies),

Yes, I am writing this anonymously. If you have any objections to my anonymous speech, please address them here. I’ll even give you directions.

Recently, you filed a complaint with the New York Times — er, I mean the FEC — demanding that Crossroads GPS be forced to disclose its donors. You did not argue that Crossroads GPS does not engage in issue advocacy. You simply claimed that their issue advocacy was “not in the national interest” and that their “purpose” was to elect Republicans.

That’s an interesting play, but I don’t think you’ve thought this all the way through. Let me spell out some things for you.

Read More →

http://www.redstate.com/aglanon/2012/06/25/an-anonymous-warning-to-the-president-his-allies/

[Valin]

This May be a Metaphor

Rob Long

6/25/12

 

The recent winner of the "Win Dinner with Barack Obama" contest, which the Obama campaign has been running for the past year or so, was an actual Obama staffer. From Politico:

 

One of President Obama's own campaign staffers was chosen for the popular win-a-dinner contest with the president.

 

Toby Fallsgraff, apparently a member of the campaign's technical team, a wrote in a fundraising pitch that his name was drawn for the contest while he was testing the campaign's computer systems.

(Snip)

 

(Snip)

 

Which suggests the following: the only people who are entering these contests already work for Barack Obama. In November, he's clearly going to sweep that particular segment of the population.

 

The other segments are up for grabs.

[Valin]

Pinning Romney Down on Arizona

W. James Antle, III

6.25.12

 

Mitt Romney's campaign has been trying very hard to criticizing the Supreme Court's Arizona decision without taking a firm position on the substantive results. Romney spokesman Rick Gorka had a painful exchange with reporters on the subject.

 

(Snip)

 

I noted Romney's immigration caution on the main site this morning.

 

UPDATE: Romney himself says: "I would have preferred to see the Supreme Court give more latitude to the states, not less. And there are states now under this decision have less authority, less latitude to enforce immigration laws."