Obama Uses Prosecutors to stiffle free speech

John at Powerline alerts us to some of the abuses coming from the Obama camp.

If Barack Obama becomes President and takes over command of the Justice Department, it is reasonable to expect an assault on the First Amendment the like of which we haven't seen since the Jefferson administration. Here's the latest: in Missouri, Obama has enlisted his allies in public office, including St. Louis County Circuit Attorney Bob McCulloch, to threaten criminal prosecution of any Missouri television station that runs ads about Obama that are untrue. Since every politician sincerely believes that all ads run by his opponents are untrue, the field of potential criminal exposure is broad indeed.

Today, Missouri's Governor Matt Blunt responded strongly to Obama's attempted flouting of the Constitution:

St. Louis County Circuit Attorney Bob McCulloch, St. Louis City Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce, Jefferson County Sheriff Glenn Boyer, and Obama and the leader of his Missouri campaign Senator Claire McCaskill have attached the stench of police state tactics to the Obama-Biden campaign.

What Senator Obama and his helpers are doing is scandalous beyond words, the party that claims to be the party of Thomas Jefferson is abusing the justice system and offices of public trust to silence political criticism with threats of prosecution and criminal punishment.

This abuse of the law for intimidation insults the most sacred principles and ideals of Jefferson. I can think of nothing more offensive to Jefferson’s thinking than using the power of the state to deprive Americans of their civil rights. The only conceivable purpose of Messrs. McCulloch, Obama and the others is to frighten people away from expressing themselves, to chill free and open debate, to suppress support and donations to conservative organizations targeted by this anti-civil rights, to strangle criticism of Mr. Obama, to suppress ads about his support of higher taxes, and to choke out criticism on television, radio, the Internet, blogs, e-mail and daily conversation about the election.

Barack Obama needs to grow up. Leftist blogs and others in the press constantly say false things about me and my family. Usually, we ignore false and scurrilous accusations because the purveyors have no credibility. When necessary, we refute them. Enlisting Missouri law enforcement to intimidate people and kill free debate is reminiscent of the Sedition Acts - not a free society.

"Barack Obama needs to grow up?" Well, maybe. Either that or, as President, he can carry out his threats to have his critics arrested. Say what you will about other celebrities who have grown up in the public eye, like Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears: at least they never tried to have you thrown in jail.

And this before he is even elected president. Like I tell Larry over at noleftturnz

See you in the camps.

Inside Obama's OODA loop

In the late 1950s Colonel John Boyd, one of the great military tacticians and strategists of the Twentieth Century devised the OODA loop applying it to one on one battles in Jet fighters (commonly known as dog fights). The idea is that every battle is fought by observing orienting deciding and acting over and over in a loop. To win the battle a warrior either performs his OODA faster than his opponent or ideally get inside your opponents OODA loop breaking it up. John McCain being a fighter pilot is iam sure familar with the concept and yesterday he was so far inside his oponents OODA loop he had Senator Obama chasing his political tail as well as telling political tales. MCCain Observes the nation in crises, a crises I might add that is eroding his position in the poles. The need for action is obvious to save the markets and possably the economy but action is stalled by what appeares to be a partisan imopasse. McCain Orients this is a job for a bipartisan healer a maverick, someone like John McCain. McCain decides and acts Suddenly McCain announces he is suspending his campaign to return to washington to help America in crises he invites Obama to follow his lead. What is a Dmocratic presidential candidate and part time U.S> Senator, to do. If he follows McCains lead he looks weak, if he doesn't the Good Senator is perceived as putting campaign over Country. What to do what to do I know if your a politician when in doubt LIE . I called McCain this morning. Sure you did. Well it sells among Obama hard core supporters. McCain looks like McCain, Obama looks like Obama and that is not good news for Senator Obama.

Lies Continued

Powerline points out a new lie which Senator Obama is using to scare seniors on Social Security.

Like many Democrats, Obama engages in the politics of fear. He tries, especially, to scare senior citizens. In one ad, he asserts that the "Bush-McCain privatization plan" would "cut Social Security benefits in half." That this crude lie is absurd on its face does not mean that no fearful seniors will fall for it. FactCheck.org writes:

This is a falsehood sure to frighten seniors who rely on their Social Security checks. In truth, McCain does not propose to cut those checks at all.

Every election season the Democrats try to scare seniors into believing that their Social Security checks will be cut if the Republicans get into office. Of course no one in America can change the Social Security system. President Bush spent much of his early second term and a large amount of political capitol trying to get a little sanity into Social Security. The reward for this effort? Zero zip, Nada, a day of reckoning with Social Security is coming and the Democrats who love making Social Security a political football will almost certainly try to blame Republicans when that day comes.

Lies

Every Campaign Ad that McCain runs (that i know of) is factually true and every time he runs an Ad it seems the Obama campaign accuses the McCain campaign of lying. For example McCain indicated that Senator Obama was in favor of comprehensive sex education for kindergartners. Obama says that is a lie because he only meant to protect the Children from sexual predators. Regardless of Obama's intent the bill he supported called for comprehensive K-12 sex ed. This was demonstrated by Byron York at National Review Online.

Today Obama is caught fudging on his claims at an ad dezigned to Scare Seniors.

dragonfly gets it right in the powerhouse forum

dragonfly posted this at the powerhouse forum (spelling errors have been corrected):

"Bill Katz is right, and I am sure that Sarah Palin, a bred-in-the-bone, unabashed "flyover" American knows exactly who she is appealing to, and will continue to win votes because of it. McCain is going to let Sarah be Sarah because she is not rattled by either the MSM or Obama's slimy tactics. She knows that middle America knows slimy big city politics when they see them.

Which speaks to a cultural dimension that the GOP is not playing - the socialist, big city, crooked party machine, which Obama truly epitomizes. Obama, emotionally attracted to the radical socialism of his parents from adolescence through his college years, went to Chicago to SEEK a radical leftist climate, found it, was embraced by it, financed by it. He is,TOTALLY, the poster boy of the big city corrupt political machine. He never organized or operated out outside a geographic area of about 200 square miles. He worked 95% with an African American community.

Obama has absolutely no knowledge of, understanding of, or interest in "real" Americans. His claim to Kansas roots are beyond absurd - his socialist leaning parents fled stuffy mid-America before his mother was in high school. He has calculatedly immersed himself, since adulthood, in the narrow academic socialist clubiness of Hyde Park - as its name implies, a snobby professorial town, owned by a university, that permits no low-income residents, except servants, and places strict limits on business, including food stores. Wasilla is a capitalist paradise compared to his home town.

He can't hide from these truths. Hounding him on this key aspect of his character cannot be attacked as "smearing". He has no fall back position. Claiming he represent all Illinois gets him nowhere: he was made a state senator and is a U.S. Senator solely through the Daley city machine. He is, 100%, A BIG CITY BOY.

If it is OK for him to go after Wasilla and small town America, it is OK for McCain to go after Chicago
Most Americans, whose rating approval of Congress is under 10%, do not want a President who is in the pocket of Big City Political hoods. And they don't like socialists.

AD: "Do you really want a puppet of the Chicago political machine running our country? Oh, and by the way, have you noticed - he's a SOCIALIST?"

McCain should go after the cultural disconnect, full press . It will win him a lot more votes than his Foreign Policy."

People like dragonfly are why McCain -Sarah will be relocating to Washington. D.C. in January. Todd you are going to love the Washington summers.

Sarah Palin- America Wants to know

Today Michelle Malkin pretty much sums up the anti-Sarah hysteria in the media.

Next up: Us Weekly and company investigate the Sarah Palin’s eyebrow waxing appointments, Todd Palin’s beard grooming preferences, and the children’s dental hygiene habits.

America must know the truth!

The New York Times sent at least 30 truth seekers up to Alaska to find dirt on Sarah Pallin and then they filled their pages with inuendo from enemies that Sarah made while cleaning up the forty ninth State.

One of the great things that Sarah has done for this political season is to rip the mask off the the media. Obama can undermine US foreign policy in Iraq and no one in the DemSM investigates. Senator Obama protects the Chicago political machine from an obvious scandal in truck leasing and the DemSM doesn't investigate. Senator Obama buys his house with help from a person who turns out to be a politically corrupt felon Tony Resco (who was under indictment when Obama got the help) and the DemSM doesn't investigate. Sarah Paline has a hair out of place and the DemSM goes crazy investigating. Fortunately the American people are not dumb, despite what the Demsm believe and Sarah only becomes more popular.

Are babies born alive after botched abortions left to die?

Senator Obama has defended his indefensible opposition to the infant born alive act proposed in the Illinois Senate when he was at the head of the committee overseeing that legislation. This legislation protected babies who are born alive after a botched abortion.This act was in response to the reality that babies born as a result of a botched aabortion had been left to die in Illinois hospitals. While Senator Obama, was fighting this legislation similar legislation passed unanimously in the Senate of the United States.

It seems the good Senator believed that the defense of Roe v. Wade was neccesary even though the bill had nothing to do with babies inside the womb (the only kind that Roe addresses). He seems to believe that defending Roe v. Wade is more important than defending babies that are born alive. .

Also Senator Obama claims that the language in the U.S. Senate bill was different than language in the Illinois Bill. He even called pro lifers and Bill Bennet liars over the issue. This despite the fact that he voted to change the language in a proposed bill to make that bill identical to the United States Senate bill and then oppossed the bill as amended.

Now we have a new defense for Senator Obama. The assertion that there are no babies born alive after abortions. In fact there are as was clearly shown in testimony which Mona Charon presents at the corner at national review online.

Senator Obama is as radical on abortion as it is possible to be in America.

Regarding Sarah and the Bush Doctrine

Cliff May at the corner National Review online demonstrates how a real policy expert would have answered Charlie Gibson's Question to Sarah on "the Bush Doctrine".

"But ask yourself: How would a real foreign policy sophisticate have replied to Gibson’s question?

Well, Anne-Marie Slaughter is the dean of the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton. She was interviewed by Alan Johnson, for a book titled: "Global Politics After 9/11: The Democratiya Interviews."

Here's how the exchange begins:

Johnson: What are the central differences, and what are the elements of continuity, if any exist, between 'the Bush doctrine' and the 'grand strategy of forging a world of liberty under law'?

Slaughter: Tell me what you mean by 'The Bush Doctrine'.

In other words, Dean Slaughter gave the same answer as did Palin."

She doesn't even know what the "Bush Doctrine" is

...... and apparently neither does Charles Gibson. Just ask the guy who invented the phrase.

Senator Obama his new politics and getting tough

Senator Obama has signaled that he is getting tough. With his new politics of hope you would expect the good Senator to come out with a an ad attacking John McCain on the issues. Wrong, the Obama campaign has come out with an ad attacking John McCain because he is old (he came to the Senate in the eighties when they had clunky cell phones) and because he does not use e-mail.

I doubt John McCain, a person who flew fighter jets off of aircraft carriers was chairman of the Senate subcommittee on telecommunication and is regarded as one of the most technologically savvy senators in the Senate by other senators, is computer illiterate. The ad also insults everyone over 50. Not only a large segment of the population but one that routinely votes. And the older a person is the more likely she is to vote. Senator Obama has replaced Hope with mean. But of course Obama insists that he just wants to be looked at in terms of the issues (the issues he wants to talk about) not his record, not his experience, not his associates, just the issues.

The reason John McCain doesn't answer his own e-mails is that he can't use a keyboard thanks to the wounds inflicted upon him by the North Vietnamese during his captivity, otherwise his computer skills are quite adequate. Good job Senator Obama, attacking someone for their disability. Also from a political standpoint Obama already has the votes of people who are not voting for John McCain just because he's old. Attacking old people and people who are disabled because of injuries collected while they are prisoners of war fighting for this country doesn't seem to be the brightest move in this campaign season.

Equal pay for Equal work Obama and the twisting of reality

In Toledo Senator O'bama complained that Sarah was against equal pay for Women, suuuure, that is like Jesse Jackson being against integrated housing. It doesn't make sense and it isn't true. What Obama was talking about was Senator McCain not supporting extending the Statute of limitations under the equal pay act. McCain and Sarah are both for equal pay for Women . Deroy Murdock at National Review online shows that Obama only pays the women in his Senate office 83 cents for every dollar he pays men. John McCain pays women $1.04 for every dollar he pays men. Why the discrepancy? Obama's higher ups are men McCain's top people are women. Obama believes (with good reason) he can get away with these distortions because they will be reported in the Dem Media who will provide him cover.

Palin the Feminist

The article dad had me read is exactly why I love Palin so much. Why, when my sisters called and asked me what I thought I of Sarah Palin I exclaimed, "Vote for her? I want to be her!" I am a feminist. I am excited about the possibility of a woman in the white house, and was excited even as I cringed at the idea of it being Hillary Clinton. I thought it would take much longer than this. My nieces will not remember a time when this glass ceiling did not have a million cracks in it. I am excited by the kind of woman Palin is; the kind of feminist Palin is. She is strong and confident. She does what needs to she needs to do in order to complete the tasks at hand. Like the pioneer women, the women who went to work in the factories during war time, my grandmother who told off doctors as a labor and delivery nurse when they weren't doing right by their patience, or the woman down the hall from me who as a single mother put her self through college and now teaches ninth grade that is so feared by the entire community even the bus drivers respect her name Palin is good at her job. She has children she loves deeply and a husband that is "her guy" and has been since high school. That does not mean that she isn't a feminist. It means the traditional life worked in a lot of ways for her. Why shouldn't it? Why can't she have a family and a career? So many women in this life do now. They have a career and a family, get promotions as they join the PTA, or like my Grammy tell of doctors and then come home and cook dinner. Why are we afraid of this in the white house?

Competent women make up the majority of the people educating American children, manning hospitals as nurses, and as of last year graduating from law school. There is no reason one cannot also run the country. But the double standard comes out so obviously in the press. Bristol is not the only white house kid who didn't live up to the expectations of her parents. But because it is her mother running, it is an issue. There were suggestions that her political success will lead to her failing as a mother to a special needs child. She is a feminist, and she is fighting for the cause with everything she has.

Palin believes in the sanctity of the life of an unborn child. That does not make her anti-woman. It makes her against abortion. There are thousands of ways that women are being kept down every single day. The most blatant of which is the sexual abuse statistics in this country. One in four college women is sexually abused during their college careers, nearly a third of the women returning from Iraq have been raped. My male students think it is okay to refer to a classmate as a ho, or cat call them in the hallway. Almost everyone teen I know uses "girl" or a derogatory word for the vagina as an insult. I am adamantly opposed to all of this and am fighting for things to change. I make feminism a priority in my classroom. And I believe that a fetus is a life and needs to be protected. This does not disqualify me from being a feminist. It just makes me a different kind; a Sarah Palin kind of feminist.

Intrade is a betting parlor for politics, in 2004 as tradesport it predicted the winner of the presidential race and 49 of the 50 States. Since the race became clearly Obama v. McCain Intrade favored Obama. It was about Obama 70 McCain 30 for quite a while but the numbers closed dramatically after the conventions. Since they are using real money intade normally reflects reality. Today for the first time intrade favors John McCain 51 to Obama 47. You can check it and track it at Real Clear Politics. This swing is remarkable and if you bought McCain early you can sell right now and almost double your money. If he wins you get paid $100. It is a relief that the market now believes (narrowly) McCain will win but anything can happen. We have to work, work work.

An article for Thea D.

Camilla Paglia writes an article in Salon on Sarah which I think Thea D. would agree with once she gets by the nasty remarks aimed ar McCain. Paglia is what I call a reasonable leftist (a dying breed). I am sure she will take heat for this article and maybe that is why she heaps derision on Senator McCain calling the mention of his 5 year imprisonment Sadomasochistic and the Senator himself a beady eyed Vampire. I doubt it will protect her from the left because it is Sarah who is threatening their lust for power not McCain. Check out this paragraph.

"Conservative though she may be, I felt that Palin represented an explosion of a brand new style of muscular American feminism. At her startling debut on that day, she was combining male and female qualities in ways that I have never seen before. And she was somehow able to seem simultaneously reassuringly traditional and gung-ho futurist. In terms of redefining the persona for female authority and leadership, Palin has made the biggest step forward in feminism since Madonna channeled the dominatrix persona of high-glam Marlene Dietrich and rammed pro-sex, pro-beauty feminism down the throats of the prissy, victim-mongering, philistine feminist establishment." The article continues in this vein.

Sarah and anorher Special child

I heard Rush, who I don't listen to often, talking to a man with a little down syndrome girl about his family meeting Sarah and John McCain on a campaign stop. The dialogue had me choking up. The picture posted at Limbaugh's website needs to go in a McCain ad. At The corner National review on line Kathyrn Jean Lopez puts the dialogue and picture together like so.

Meeting Chloe Nolan Kathyrn Jean Lopez

This exchange is from today's Rush Limbaugh Show:

CALLER: And I wanted to share a story with you. A week ago last Saturday we went to the Palin-McCain rally in Washington, Pennsylvania, was the day after he announced her, and we have a five-year-old daughter with Down syndrome, and we made a sign that said: "We Love Kids with Down Syndrome." So when they pulled in their bus the sign did catch their, McCain and Palin and the rest of their family, it caught their eye, we could tell, they gave us a thumbs-up from the bus, so we were all excited just by that —

...

So then we moved around as the bus was getting ready to pull out, we kind of positioned ourselves so we could just wave them on and a Secret Service agent came up to us and said, "Hey, can you come with us?" I was like, "Do we have a choice?" RUSH: (laughing) You shouldn't have worried. It's not the Clinton administration.

CALLER: Right. So we accompanied them up the hill, we went right to the bus, where it was, and Governor Palin, Senator McCain, Cindy, Todd Palin, they're all standing there. We're in this inner circle with just us and them, and the Secret Service agent, and they came right up to us and thanked us for coming out, said they loved our sign, and Governor Palin immediately said, "May I hold your daughter?" and our daughter Chloe, who's five, went right to her, and I have some pictures I'd love to send you maybe when I'm done here, but Governor Palin was hugging Chloe, and then her little daughter brought their baby Trig who has Down syndrome from the bus, he was napping, and Chloe went right over and kissed him on the cheek, and my son Nolan who's nine, he thanked her.

Interesting Weather

According to my google weather in Toledo the Wind is blowing from the Southwest at 0 miles per hour. The sound of one hand clapping.

Obama Critizes Sarah on earmarks are you kidding me.?

This from the Politico. ,

“Obama said at a town hall here (in Terre Haute Indiana). “But when you [have] been taking all these earmarks when it is convenient and then suddenly you are the champion anti-earmark person. That is not change, come on. I mean, words mean something. You can’t just make stuff up.”"Obama said at a town hall here (in Terre Haute Indiana). “But when you [have] been taking all these earmarks when it is convenient and then suddenly you are the champion anti-earmark person. That is not change, come on. I mean, words mean something. You can’t just make stuff up.”

Are you kidding me. Who the heck is advising the good Senator or is he doing this on his own.
Does the man from Chicago as usual politics want to take on the Governor who stopped the bridge to nowhere and trade earmark records with her or for that matter John McCain? Didn’t his advisers tell him don’t ever say earmarks on the campaign trail.

This from the New York times in May:

“Senator Barack Obama on Thursday released a list of $740 million in earmarked spending requests that he had made over the last three years, and his campaign challenged Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to do the same....

The list included $1 million for a hospital where Mr. Obama’s wife works, money for several projects linked to campaign donors and support for more than 200 towns, civic institutions and universities in Illinois”.

Has the man got a political death wish. Now the big story could be how much Presidential Candidate Barrack Obama is in the political earmark tank tank vis a vis Veep choice Sarah Palin.

I doubt if Sarah received 740 Million dollars as Mayor or 220 million dollars which is what Obama secured for his friends in Illinois. It is more interesting when a closer examination of wh got Obamas earmarks occurs.

And what of the earmarks sought by John McCain the guy Barack is supposed to be running against. Zip, Zip, Zip. McCain is was and is always against earmarks.

Keep growling girl!

No one has asked Obama how the move would effect his children, how his daughters would feel if they had to have their first dates with the secret service tagging along.

No one has asked Joe Biden why he didn't give up his political career when his family went into crisis.

No one has asked if Obama wants any more children, or what he would do if his wife got pregnant while he was in office.

My mother was able to have a career, a working household and at least 2 flourishing girl scout troops all at the same time. With my father working. My college speech coach had a baby, nursed during all the meetings and the coaching sessions, taught her classes, and coached the team to a national championship in our division. My grandmother had five children, went back to get her certification and taught the third grade.

Women all over the country can and do manage a career and a family beautifully. Why wouldn't Palin be able to do it on a national scale, especially with such a supportive husband?

Lies and the lying liars that tell them.

"Hey teacher, I watched that convention like you told me to. Did you know that there are a lot of Caucasians there? I had no idea that white people were democrats!"



In my students world, everything is black and white. If you like black people you vote for Barrack Obama. If you vote for John McCain it is because you don't care about black people.



It has been a very confusing time for my students as I wear a McCain button on my bag, but also care deeply about them. It is even more confusing when I explain to them why I am voting for McCain.



An old student came to see me Friday and discuss the voting choice I was making she so deeply disapproved of. How could I vote for him? I explained to her that Obama supported abortion she understood. But it made me aware of how misinformed everyone is. And how easy it is to manipulate people with lies.

But it isn't just my kids who are misinformed. I have friends who won't vote for Obama because they believe he is a terrorist, still. Or they won't vote for him because he will "only make decisions for black people" as though a white guy is the only one capable of considering what is best for all Americans.

Satan is the father of lies. He thrives in confusion and hate. The more lies that get told the more hate there seems to be in the political world. The more hate and confusion the harder it is to get anything done. The more hate speak, on either side, and lies, from either side the more people are manipulated.

Even if McCain lost the election, which would break my heart, but there was no manipulation, no lies, no hate, then this election year would be beautiful.

It will be close

I just posted this at the Powerline forum.

JOHN adds: There really is no case to be made for the go along/get along careerist, Barack Obama. McCain will win, and it won’t be particularly close.

I agree there is no case to be made for O’bama the Organizer being President, but I don’t think McCain-Sarah supporters should even be thinking “McCain will win, and it won’t be particularly close” McCain will win and it will be close. This ain’t over Democrats MSM Academia and George Soro’s want to win baaadly. You think they hate our President because of Iraq? They hate him because he has power and they don’t and they have to hate him and get the country to hate him to get the power back. All this change stuff, real change that will hurt their power (not just the Dems) and more importantly their pocket book is going to scare the hell out of them. We need to work, work, work, work to make that happen. And Pray! Neither of those things will happen if we start thinking McCain will win, and it won’t be particularly close. It will be close Florida a 250 vote shift and Al would have been President, Ohio a 50,000 vote swing and John Kerry would have been president. It shouldn’t be close but it will be. And only work will make it happen.

Sarah hits Home Run

Sarah knocked it out of the park a hat trick in the Seventh game of the Stanley Cup. Sarah struck just the right tone and there is no question she is a pit bill with lipstick and she ripped the left wing establishment a new one, all with smile, grace and charm. First she got the special needs family's votes, then Harry Truman small town America, then the blue collar vote. Then everyone who doesn't like Harry Reid and the Washington establishment.

I love the line "servant's heart" when she describes her view of public service. Evangelicals understand this phrase is code for, well, servant's heart and the left can't understand the phrase at all. This is the second speech she has used it in and it really does describe John McCain and I believe Sarah as well. It is her phrase I have never heard McCain or any other politician use it before. The phrase is common in evangelical circles and connotes the best of what evangelical Christianity is and what public service from the school board member to the President should be.

The left was right to try to destroy her before the country gets to know her. It is too late now. She is every bit the rhetorical equal of Obama and she is real. Joe Biden, Michael Moore, Barrack Obama, and yes the Clintons be afraid, be very afraid. A new sun is rising on conservatism, family values, the Republican party and Women in politics and that sun is named Sarah.

I"ve had this feeling before

It was about two maybe three years ago I was listening on the radio to our local high school Football team playing in the second or third round of the State play offs. In Ohio where football is king this was rarefied air that I was unacostomed to breathing. The game, which was being played on the other side of the State in the shadow of the football hall of fame, was close and our team was doing well when in the third and fourth quarters the referees started making outrageous calls and non calls helping the other side to win, we were being homered big time. The unfairness of it all was breath taking but what could you do other than go home as the other team advanced.

The same feeling came over me watching the networks covering the Republican convention. The networks are supposed to be the referees just reporting what is happening but of course they are not. They are Democrats covering a Republican convention and they are going to do everything they can to blunt the Rebublican message. Will this homering cause the Democrats to prevail. We will see but now I remember where I have had this feeling.

Watching The 3 Networks covering the convention

I do not have cable television so I am stuck watching the convention on The National Barak, American Barak or Columbia Barak networks. You have to keep shifting the channel to watch the speakers because the networks would rather you watch them belittling the proceedings or the last speaker or trying to minimize the proceedings so you get as negative and dismissive a view as possible. With sufficient surfing you can watch most of the speeches but the bias from the press is amazing.

Sarah and the Youth

I know this is just an anecdote but I have a very smart eighth grade nephew who follows politics closely. I happened to see him this weekend and He said "McCain has it(the election) in the bag with the Palin pick". He is a big Hillary supporter and is not fond of Obama but I was really surprised to hear this from a youth who sends me e-mail on Global warming and dessertification.

Victor Davis Hanson on Iraq

Victor Davis Hanson is one of my favirite commentators. I read him at National Review Online and pajamas media. Here he gives some perspective to Iraq and the Presidents future place in history.