Young Republicans pose as Obama supporters to misrepresent Obama

Are Republicans supposed to be the party of “Christian family values?”  Are they supposed to be the party of “small town America” with “small town values?”  Isn’t this the party that James Dobson and evangilicals align with?  If so, then how are they tolerating such dishonest tactics to win an election?  On top of the smear ads that John McCain has been running (ads so dishonest that even Karl Rove and Fox News acknowledged they were misleading), young Republicans appear to join the Obama team and make FALSE calls to voters on behalf of Barack Obama.

From their facebook group, Clandestine Young Republican Obama Neighbor to Neighbor Infiltration Club!, they write:

Folks, thanks to Obama’s web 2.0 platform, anyone can play the CONTACT AN OBAMA VOTER in PA game!

Here’s what you Republicans need to do:
1. Go to BarackObama.com and register (it takes about 30sec.)
2. Sign up for Neighbor to Neighbor with your Obama-identity
3. Google a random city in PA (Not Pittsburgh or Philly), get the address and phone number for a local pizzeria or business.
4. START MAKING CALLS FOR BARACK!

Keep in mind when making these calls, that you’re not trying to persuade people to vote for John McCain. You’re also not trying to lie to them either.

Your goal should be to present the clear facts about Obama’s ultra-liberal record – everything from his 500% tax increase on firearms he proposed in Illinois to his plan of redistribution of wealth from the rich down to those who are poor. Find the talking points (I will soon post some of my own) and smilingly deliver the great message that make up Obama’s policies!

It also doesn’t hurt to make fun of John McCain while you’re at it. Here’s a good one:
“Have you seen Obama’s new commercial about John McCain? …ha… It’s so funny! John McCain can’t even use a computer – what an idiot. I mean he can’t even type on a keyboard… He says it’s because he lost control of his fine motor skills when he was beaten as a POW! Isn’t that ridiculous! I think it’s funny.”

Remember, this is serious. You don’t want to ever lie about Obama. His liberal policies are enough to scare away Independents. Also, while you want to keep it authentic by sounding like an elitist snob or hippie college student, you must realize that real people are on the other end and you must treat them with respect.

Good luck and SHHH!!! We want this to remain a secret. Clandestine operations such as these shouldn’t get out!

How sad.  I guess Obama was right.  Republicans really can’t run on the issues this year, so they are resorting to smears, deceptions, and out right lying.  Some “values” huh?

White Privilege

White Privilege
By Tim Wise

For those who still can’t grasp the concept of white privilege, or who are constantly looking for some easy-to-understand examples of it, perhaps this list will help.

White privilege is when you can get pregnant at seventeen like Bristol Palin and everyone is quick to insist that your life and that of your family is a personal matter, and that no one has a right to judge you or your parents, because “every family has challenges,” even as black and Latino families with similar “challenges” are regularly typified as irresponsible, pathological and arbiters of social decay.

White privilege is when you can call yourself a “fuckin’ redneck,” like Bristol Palin’s boyfriend does, and talk about how if anyone messes with you, you’ll “kick their fuckin’ ass,” and talk about how you like to “shoot shit” for fun, and still be viewed as a responsible, all-American boy (and a great son-in-law to be) rather than a thug.

White privilege is when you can attend four different colleges in six years like Sarah Palin did (one of which you basically failed out of, then returned to after making up some coursework at a community college), and no one questions your intelligence or commitment to achievement, whereas a person of color who did this would be viewed as unfit for college, and probably someone who only got in in the first place because of affirmative action.

White privilege is when you can claim that being mayor of a town smaller than most medium-sized colleges, and then Governor of a state with about the same number of people as the lower fifth of the island of Manhattan, makes you ready to potentially be president, and people don’t all piss on themselves with laughter, while being a black U.S. Senator, two-term state Senator, and constitutional law scholar, means you’re “untested.”

White privilege is being able to say that you support the words “under God” in the pledge of allegiance because “if it was good enough for the founding fathers, it’s good enough for me,” and not be immediately disqualified from holding office–since, after all, the pledge was written in the late 1800s and the “under God” part wasn’t added until the 1950s–while believing that reading accused criminals and terrorists their rights (because, ya know, the Constitution, which you used to teach at a prestigious law school requires it), is a dangerous and silly idea only supported by mushy liberals.

White privilege is being able to be a gun enthusiast and not make people immediately scared of you. White privilege is being able to have a husband who was a member of an extremist political party that wants your state to secede from the Union, and whose motto was “Alaska first,” and no one questions your patriotism or that of your family, while if you’re black and your spouse merely fails to come to a 9/11 memorial so she can be home with her kids on the first day of school, people immediately think she’s being disrespectful.

White privilege is being able to make fun of community organizers and the work they do–like, among other things, fight for the right of women to vote, or for civil rights, or the 8-hour workday, or an end to child labor–and people think you’re being pithy and tough, but if you merely question the experience of a small town mayor and 18-month governor with no foreign policy expertise beyond a class she took in college–you’re somehow being mean, or even sexist.

White privilege is being able to convince white women who don’t even agree with you on any substantive issue to vote for you and your running mate anyway, because all of a sudden your presence on the ticket has inspired confidence in these same white women, and made them give your party a “second look.”

White privilege is being able to fire people who didn’t support your political campaigns and not be accused of abusing your power or being a typical politician who engages in favoritism, while being black and merely knowing some folks from the old-line political machines in Chicago means you must be corrupt.

White privilege is being able to attend churches over the years whose pastors say that people who voted for John Kerry or merely criticize George W. Bush are going to hell, and that the U.S. is an explicitly Christian nation and the job of Christians is to bring Christian theological principles into government, and who bring in speakers who say the conflict in the Middle East is God’s punishment on Jews for rejecting Jesus, and everyone can still think you’re just a good church-going Christian, but if you’re black and friends with a black pastor who has noted (as have Colin Powell and the U.S. Department of Defense) that terrorist attacks are often the result of U.S. foreign policy and who talks about the history of racism and its effect on black people, you’re an extremist who probably hates America.

White privilege is not knowing what the Bush Doctrine is when asked by a reporter, and then people get angry at the reporter for asking you such a “trick question,” while being black and merely refusing to give one-word answers to the queries of Bill O’Reilly means you’re dodging the question, or trying to seem overly intellectual and nuanced.

White privilege is being able to claim your experience as a POW has anything at all to do with your fitness for president, while being black and experiencing racism is, as Sarah Palin has referred to it, a “light” burden.

And finally, white privilege is the only thing that could possibly allow someone to become president when he has voted with George W. Bush 90 percent of the time, even as unemployment is skyrocketing, people are losing their homes, inflation is rising, and the U.S. is increasingly isolated from world opinion, just because white voters aren’t sure about that whole “change” thing. Ya know, it’s just too vague and ill-defined, unlike, say, four more years of the same, which is very concrete and certain.

White privilege is, in short, the problem.

John McCain gets BarackRoll’d (video)

America’s disgusting double-standard

* If you grow up in Hawaii, raised by your grandparents, you’re “exotic, different.”
* If you grow up in Alaska eating moose burgers, you’re a quintessential American story.

* If your name is Barack, you’re a radical, unpatriotic Muslim.
* If you name your kids Bristol, Trig, and Track, you’re a maverick.

* If you graduate from Harvard law School, you are unstable.
* If you attend 5 different small colleges before graduating, you’re well grounded.

* If you spend 3 years as a brilliant community organizer, become the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a voter registration drive that registers 150,000 new voters, spend 12 years as a Constitutional Law professor, spend 8 years as a State Senator representing a district with over 750,000 people, become chairman of the state Senate’s Health and Human Services committee, spend 4 years in the United States Senate representing a state of 13 million people while sponsoring 131 bills and serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public Works and Veteran’s Affairs committees, you don’t have any real leadership experience.
* If your total resume is: local weather girl, 4 years on the city council and 6 years as the mayor of a town with less than 7,000 people, 20 months as the governor of a state with only 650,000 people, then you’re qualified to become the country’s second highest ranking executive.

* If you have been married to the same woman for 19 years while raising 2 beautiful daughters, all within Protestant churches, you’re not a real Christian.
* If you cheated on your first wife with a rich heiress, and left your disfigured wife and married the heiress the next month, you’re a Christian.

* If you teach responsible, age appropriate sex education, including the proper use of birth control, you are eroding the fiber of society.
* If, while governor, you staunchly advocate abstinence only, with no other option in sex education in your state’s school system, while your unwed teen daughter ends up pregnant , you’re very responsible.

* If your wife is a Harvard graduate lawyer who gave up a position in a prestigious law firm to work for the betterment of her inner city community, then gave that up to raise a family, your family’s values don’t represent America’s.
* If you’re husband is nicknamed “First Dude”, with at least one DWI conviction and no college education, who didn’t register to vote until age 25 and once was a member of a group that advocated the secession of Alaska from the USA, your family is extremely admirable.

OK, *much* clearer now.

(I didn’t write this, just so you know.)

Iraqi War Veteran shamefully politicizes his service

Upon first watching this video, it is easy to get caught up in raw emotion.  A young US ‘Iraq war’ veteran speaks passionately about his service, the service of our troops, and the importance of sacrifice for freedom.  He lectures Senator Barack Obama for saying our invasion of Iraq was a mistake, claiming that the sacrifices made by our troops has brought the Iraqis freedom that they haven’t had before.  He says Obama’s criticism dishonors the service of our troops, and that Obama doesn’t understand that freedom comes with a price.  Because of all this, the soldier says he’s backing John McCain, who has served our country and understands what it means to sacrifice for country.

Near the end of the video, the solider walks away from the camera to reveal what we can assume to be his wounds acquired from battle.  The man has lost a leg, and he has had it replaced with an artificial one.  As walks in the distance, the music “I’m proud to be an American” beings to play.  Then an image of John McCain comes up with the text “The day we lose our will to fight is the day we lose our freedom.”

I would first like to state that any criticism of this video is not intended in any way to demean or dishonor the service and sacrifice of this soldier or any of our troops.  We can honor their service without supporting this political video.  So I hope no one takes what I am about to say as an attack on our brave men and women in uniform.

Having said that, I can honestly say that this video is absolutely disgusting.  There is a reason that politicians are not supposed to use our troops for political gain.  Regardless of who wins, democrat or republican, our troops must serve in a non-partisan fashion under the Commander in Chief to protect our nation.  Senator Obama could very well be our next Commander in Chief, and it is dangerously harmful to our nation for those in our military to believe he dishonors or disrespects the troops.  Those sentiments are divisive and leave our troops weaker and more vulnerable.

The argument made in the video is really pretty silly.  There is a big difference between the decision a President makes to go to war, and the service and sacrifice our troops make when they are deployed to war.  It is like saying someone is disrespecting engineers and construction workers when they are critical of the “bridge to no where”.  It makes no sense.  This soldier might very well see some “thankful” Iraqi citizens who appreciate their new “freedoms” we’ve brought them in Iraq (at the expense of 4000+ American lives and who knows how many Iraqi and Iraqi citizens lives).  But that doesn’t mean the decision to go into Iraq following 9/11 was a good one.  We all know that Osama Bin Laden and al Qaeda are still on the loose and have actually grown stronger since the US has been fighting in Iraq.  In a recent interview with FOX News, right wing news anchor Bill O’reilly told Obama that he was right in his judgment in 2002 that going into Iraq was a mistake.  So will this soldier also make a video bashing O’reilly?

There are a few fundamental American traits that the right wing has tried to hi-jack as strictly and exclusively belonging to their party.  Attributes like honor, patriotism, love of country, integrity, morality and family values.  By making these false claims of exclusive ownership, they indirectly paint their opponents (the democrats) as dishonorable, unpatriotic, not loving America, lacking integrity, immoral and lacking family values.  It appears this political spin (aka falsehood and propaganda) has affected the mind of this young soldier.

I wonder if he did he research and learned that, despite his opposition to the war, Obama voted consistently to fund the troops so they could have the equipment they needed in battle.  I wonder if he learned that Obama supported the new GI Bill that George Bush reluctantly passed and John McCain opposed.  I wonder if he took time to learn about the plans Obama has to reduce homelessness amongst veterans, and provide health care for those with PTSD.  I wonder if he learned that Obama’s grandfather (who helped raise him) was a WWII veteran, and his uncle was in the service as well (so he knows the value of service in his own family).  I wonder if that young soldier read a newspaper overseas, and saw how unpopular this war is even amongst our allies, and how it has dropped George Bush’s reputation both here in the US and around the world.  I wonder if that soldier learned of how popular Barack Obama is in America and overseas and how a strong part of why he is the nominee over Hillary is because of his judgment on Iraq.

I wonder if that soldier has been paying attention to the leadership in Iraq, which along with the Bush administration is now following Obama’s advice to set a timetable in Iraq to withdraw our troops.  I wonder if that soldier realized how arrogant and ridiculous he sounded to accuse Barack Obama of dishonoring our troops when even our troops are donating to the Obama campaign 6-to-1 over John McCain because they recognize Obama has better leadership ability and judgment than even this former POW.

In conclusion, this soldier dishonored his own servive by politicizing it to help John McCain.  Service is service, not a campaign ad.  I hope that young soldier realized that he wasn’t fighting for the Republican party, he was fighting for the United States.  Barack Obama is just as much a part of the United States as John McCain is.  And while you might disagree with him on his policies, it’s way below the belt to accuse him of dishonoring our troops because of that.  These baseless, insulting, false, and disgusting attacks have no place in our politics.  That US soldier should be ashamed of his political video.

Temper Temper anti McCain t-shirts

John MCCain t-shirts

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Anti Sarah Palin t-shirts

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#1. Sarah Palin “JOKE” t shirt

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Other Anti-Sarah Palin T shirts

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Oprah is being FAIR by refusing to book Sarah Palin

Once again, the media lies to build up a controversy that shouldn’t be there.  Oprah has said she will not have Sarah Palin on her show UNTIL the elections are over.  Was this a knock against Sarah Palin?  Was Sarah Palin snubbed because Oprah supports Obama?  NO!  Oprah hasn’t had ANY candidate on during this election.  She didn’t have Obama on, nor McCain, nor Hillary, nor Rudy, nor Mitt, nor John Edwards, nor Joe Biden, nor Chris Dodd, nor Huckabee, nor Thompson, nor Richardson, nor any other Presidential candidate during this election.  To put Sarah Palin on would be to snub all of the rest of these candidates.  Therefore Oprahs decision NOT to put Sarah Palin on her show until after the elections are over is a FAIR decision.

Now someone will say that Barack Obama has been on the Oprah show before.  However, both appearances, in January 2005 and October 2006, were before he announced his candidacy for President of the United States.  In the past, like the 2000 election, Oprah has had on Presidential candidates.  Everyone should remember that kiss she received from George W. Bush.  But this election, she’s decided against doing that, and she’s held to that position from the start of it.

The media should report the truth on this matter, that having Sarah Palin on at this time, less than 2 months away from the elections, would be bias and unfair and a slap to all of the other candidates in this race.  Joe Biden also has a compelling story, but he hasn’t been invited on either.

As for Oprah supporting Obama, that’s a personal decision, not a business decision connected to her show.  Everyone has a job, but that doesn’t mean every decision you make is related to your job or on behalf of your job.  Oprah is a human being too, and people should respect her right as an individual American citizen to make her own choices in her personal life.  But as for the show, Oprah is being FAIR in NOT having Sarah Palin on during the elections.

Former POW Says McCain Is “Not Cut Out to be President”

John McCain has been exploiting his POW experience every chance he gets. He has used this story to justify everything from not knowing how many homes he has to his healthcare plan to his taste in music. But now a veteran who was a prisoner with McCain in Vietnam is explaining loud and clear that being a POW does not qualify McCain to lead.

read more | digg story

If Obama loses, it will NOT be because of racism…

I think consistently bringing up racism in this electon is too simplistic of an answer. Yes, some of it exists, but I think there are much larger social issues that Obama would have to deal with. There is a large segment of the population that seems to think in extremes. They are the ones that keep FOX News as the #1 viewed station (if it really is that). They’re scared (very scared, easily scared), they’re paranoid, they can be close minded, they’re cynical and pessimistic, they’re hot tempered & easily angered, they passionately believe talking points, they practice labeling (ie: labeling people “liberals” or “radical leftists”) and they don’t seem to embrace complexity. Just take a look at this:

For them, political debates become battles between good and evil, life and death, God and Satan, freedom and slavery. These are the people that say Obama is a fascist, Obama is a terrorist, Obama supports Osama, Obama wants to enslave us, Obama is the anti Christ, Obama will bring this nation to hell, etc.

They dismiss any and all positive or sound minded messages of hope, unity and change as “empty rhetoric”, while embracing smear SPAM emails and out-of-context remarks or photos as 100% credible.

Their greatest joy is to be against something or against someone, at least that’s where the majority of their focus is. They are controlled by fear, and like a cornered cat fighting for its life, they lash out against all who aren’t like them.

Appealing to such people is very very challenging, and would be so for just about anyone who isn’t a carbon copy of them. They seem loyal to the few that do appeal to them, even if that group exploits them.

I think this is the real challenge that keeps this race close. It is dealing with adults who aren’t adults, at least when it comes to politics. They might be the passionate Hillary supporters who just want someone with a vagina in office, regardless of what she believes.  They might be a single-issue conservative, who is blind to the faults in their own party because they’ve believed all evil comes from the Democrats.

This is the real challenge for Obama, or any cool headed, intelligent, rational, objective person. Getting his message out to these voters requires patience.  This goes beyond issues of race, and into issues of maturity.  This culture is easy to exploit by feeding them the fear they desire, but it’s really hard to reason with.

EDIT: I know racism exists and it’s an issue in this election.  The title of this thread is intended to be provocative because all too often things are oversimplified as “racist” when I think a larger cultural issue is at work.  Fear is the greatest tool for manipulation, and those who exercise it regularly know exactly what they are doing (because fear mongering is an incredibly lucrative career in this country).