ACORN Bullsh*t

The Republican voter fraud hoax

Donald Duck and the Dallas Cowboys won't steal the election for Obama. Acorn's only crime is registering Democratic voters

Comments (171)

• 
• • Brad Friedman
  • guardian.co.uk,
  • Monday October 13 2008 20.30 BST
  • Article history

Barack Obama and the Democrats are stealing the election. Massive voter fraud is being carried out, even as we speak, by their henchmen, known by the innocuous sounding Association for Community Organisations for Reform Now, or Acorn. Clever bastards.

The only problem? Despite the screaming wall-to-wall coverage of "Democratic voter fraud in 11 swing states" as seen on Fox News and even the once-respectable CNN, none of it's true. None of it.

In just the last week, we've had a phoney stunt raid in swing state Nevada (where Acorn had been cooperating with officials for months, concerning problem canvassers they'd long ago fired); a Republican election official in swing state Missouri tell Fox News that she's being beseiged with fraudulent registration forms from Acorn (in a county where they've not done any registration work since August); a Republican sheriff in swing state Ohio, who, the very next day, suddenly requested the names and addresses of hundreds of early voters (with evidence of exactly zero wrong doing, but lots of Democratic-leaning college student in the particular county, and John McCain's state campaign chair as a partner in the investigation); and a screaming front page headline in Rupert Murdoch's New York Post about a guy who claims he was somehow tricked by Acorn into registering 72 times (but read the article closely to note he says he registered at the same address each time, which, even if true, would allow him - you guessed it - precisely one legal vote.)

It's an old Republican scam, but it's never been carried out with more zeal than this year. The Republicans have been putting so much time, money and resources into the propaganda leading up to this over the last four years, we should have expected no less.

As luck would have it, the Democrats have a man who, as an attorney years ago, actually had the temerity to join the US department of justice in representing Acorn in a successful lawsuit, forcing the state of Illinois to follow the law by allowing citizens to register to vote at the department of motor vehicles. What a scoundrel.

That, of course, was before the department of justice, under George Bush's corrupt command, would itself become politicised by the very Republicans so desperate to keep low-income voters from voting, that they were willing to fire their own US attorneys for failing to bring phoney charges of voter fraud in key swing states like Nevada and Missouri.

So what are the crimes that have caused all the Sturm und Drang on US television and talk radio, and in several otherwise respectable newspapers and even by the McCain campaign itself?

The only actual crime here is that Acorn managed to register some 1.3m low-income (read: Democratic-leaning) voters over the past two years. The rest is, pretty much, just made up.

But in the bloody and desperate trenches of the Republican war on democracy, that's more than enough to kick in a last minute surge of lies that may - with the help of a compliant and lazy corporate US media - wreak enough havoc, scare enough voters, confuse enough people and plant enough seeds to call an Obama victory into doubt on November 4.

If you can't win it, steal it. If you can't steal it, claim the other guy stole it. If you can't claim the other guy stole it (yet), say they're about to and then kick up smoke that maybe someone will believe you. (Heckuva job, CNN.)

Here are the facts. Acorn verifies the legitimacy of every registration its canvassers collect. If they can't authenticate the registration, or it's incomplete or questionable in other ways, they flag that form as problematic ("fraudulent", "incomplete", et cetera). They then hand in all registration forms, even the problematic ones, to elections officials, as they are required to do by law. In almost every case where you've heard about fraud by Acorn, it's because Acorn itself notified officials about the fraud that's been perpetrated on them by rogue canvassers. Most officials who run to the media screaming "Acorn is committing fraud" know all of the above but don't bother to share those facts with the media they've run to. None of this is about voter fraud. None of it. Where any fraud has occurred, it's voter registration fraud and has resulted in exactly zero fraudulent votes.

You'll hear that Donald Duck, Mary Poppins, Dick Tracy, Mickey Mouse and (new this year) the starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys football team have all had fraudulent registrations submitted in their names. That's true. And we know this, why? Because Acorn told officials about it when they followed the law and turned in those registrations, flagged as fraudulent.

What you won't hear is that federal law requires anybody who does not register to vote in person at the county office to show an ID when they go to vote the first time. So, unless Donald Duck shows up with his ID, he won't be voting this November. You needn't worry, no matter how much even John McCain himself cynically and dishonourably tries to mislead you.

If it quacks like a duck, in this case, it's likely another Republican Acorn voter fraud lie. They haul it out every two years.

Just days before the 2004 presidential election, rightwing whack job Michelle Malkin claimed that Acorn was registering terrorists to vote in swing state Ohio. Problem was, that was a lie.

In 2006, again just days before the election, the new US attorney in swing state Missouri (recently appointed, since the one before him refused to bring such charges), filed voter fraud indictments against Acorn workers in the state. Problem was, bringing election-related indictments that close to an election was a violation of the department of justice's own written policy. And Acorn had nothing to do with it, other than turning in the employees to officials.

Getting the picture? It's a hoax. All of it.

But it's been an effective one, as it's served to distract from very real concerns about tens of thousands of voters who have been illegally purged from the voting rolls in dozens of states, as the New York Times reported in a remarkable front page investigative story. That story followed a report the week before from CBS News detailing still more wholesale purges of voting rolls in some 20 states.

That will be the November surprise, when thousands, if not millions show up to vote only to find they are no longer welcome to do so and are forced to vote on a "provisional ballot" which may or may not be counted.

These real concerns of election fraud, such as voting roll purges, electronic voting machines that don't work and so much more that actually matters, have been obscured by the smoke and mirrors and sleight of hand of the Republican party's phoney Acorn voter fraud charade.

And where they can, they'll parlay it all into new photo ID restrictions at the polls (knowing full well that some 20m, largely Democratic-leaning voters don't own the type of ID they'd need to jump over that next Republican hurdle.)

Yet, with all of the unsubstantiated, wholly bogus claims of voter fraud being carried out by Democrats, there remains at least one case of absolutely ironclad, documented, yet still-unprosecuted case of voter fraud that, for some reason, Republicans don't much like to talk about.

We can only wonder why.

What if the roles were reversed?

This came along in my email box today, something interesting to ponder..

Obama/Biden vs McCain/Palin, what if things were switched around?.....think
about it. Would the country's collective point of view be different?
(10/8/08)

Ponder the following:

What if the Obamas had paraded five children across the stage, including
a three month old infant and an unwed, pregnant teenage daughter?

What if John McCain was a former president of the Harvard Law Review?
What if Barack Obama finished fifth from the bottom of his graduating
class?

What if McCain had only married once, and Obama was a divorcee?

What if Obama was the candidate who left his first wife after a severe
disfiguring car accident, when she no longer measured up to his standards?

What if Obama had met his second wife in a bar and had a long affair while
he was still married?

What if Michelle Obama was the wife who not only became addicted to pain
killers but also acquired them illegally through her charitable
organization?

What if Cindy McCain graduated from Harvard?

What if Obama had been a member of the Keating Five?
(The Keating Five were five United States Senators accused of corruption
in 1989, igniting a major political scandal as part of the larger Savings
and Loan crisis of the late 1980s and early 1990s.)

What if McCain was a charismatic, eloquent speaker?
What if Obama couldn't read from a teleprompter?

What if Obama was the one who had military experience that included
disc ipline problems and a record of crashing seven planes?

What if Obama was the one who was known to display publicly, on many
occasions, a serious anger management problem?

What if Michelle Obama's family had made their money from beer
distribution?

What if the Obamas had adopted a white child?

You could easily add to this list. If these questions reflected reality,
do you really believe the election numbers would be as close as they are?

This is what racism does. It covers up, rationalizes and minimizes
positive qualities in one candidate and emphasizes negative qualities in
another when there is a color difference.

Educational Background:

Barack Obama:
Columbia University - B.A. Political Science with a Specialization in
International Relations.
Harvard - Juris Doctor (J.D.) Magna Cu m Laude

Joseph Biden:
University of Delaware - B.A. in History and B.A. in Political Science.
Syracuse University College of Law - Juris Doctor (J.D.)

vs.

John McCain:
United States Naval Acade my - Class rank: 894 of 899

Sarah Palin:
Hawaii Pacific University - 1 semester
North Idaho College - 2 semesters - general study
University of Idaho - 2 semesters - journalism
Matanuska-Susitna College - 1 semester
University of Idaho - 3 semesters - B.A. in Journalism

Education isn't everything, but this is about the two highest offices in
the land as well as our standing in the world. You make the call.

Sarah Palin and the Apack of Lips

Can you believe this picture? 100,000 people showed up in St. Louis today to see Barack Obama speak. Wow. Shades of Lincoln.

meanwhile, Sarah Palin showed up on Saturday Night Live:

COLUMBUS, Ohio – After watching "Saturday Night Live" make fun of her from afar, Sarah Palin witnessed it first hand this week as Tina Fey engaged in fiction by depicting her at the news conference the Republican vice presidential nominee has yet to hold.

Later, Palin came on stage during the Weekend Update mock news segment and bobbed to the beat as cast member Amy Poehler performed a rap song the Alaska governor decided was too hardcore for her to perform personally.

"I'm Jeremiah Wright 'cuz I'm the preacher; I got a bookish look and you're all hot for teacher," Poehler rapped as actors dressed as Eskimos, Palin's husband, Todd, and a caribou pranced across the stage.

The appearance was anticipated since September, when Fey began portraying Palin just after GOP presidential nominee John McCain selected the little-known governor as his running mate. The two look alike, and Palin remarked that people often told her — before Fey started portraying her — that she resembled the actor.

In the show's opening, Fey's impersonation of Palin told a group of reporters, "First off, I just want to say how excited I am to be in front of both the liberal elite media as well as the liberal regular media. I am looking forward to a portion of your questions."

Moments later, the camera cut away to the real Palin watching a television monitor alongside the show's executive producer, Lorne Michaels.

"You know, Lorne, I just don't think it's a realistic depiction of the way my press conferences would have gone," Palin said. She said she wished he would have let her do a sketch about "30 Rock," the NBC program in which Fey now stars. That prompted Michaels to deadpan: "Honestly not enough people know that show."

Palin then stood mute as Fey's "30 Rock" co-star, Alec Baldwin came onto the stage, mistook Palin for Fey and pleaded with Michaels not to let the actor go onstage with the governor.

"This is the most important election in our nation's history and you want her, our Tina, to go out there and stand with that horrible woman?" Baldwin said.

When Michaels broke down and introduced him to Palin, Baldwin feigned embarrassment and replied, "I see. Forgive me. I feel I must say this: You are way hotter in person."

Palin got even by saying, "Thank you, and I must say, your brother Stephen is my favorite Baldwin brother."

The camera soon cut back to Fey who answered a question about the polls.

"I don't worry about the polls. Polls are just a fancy way of systematically predicting what's going to happen. The only poll I care about is the North Pole, and that ... is ... melting. It's not great."

The real Palin then walked onto the news conference set, sending Fey fleeing.

"Thank you, thank you," the governor said to applause from the studio audience. "No, I'm not going to take any of your questions, but I do wanted to take this opportunity to say, `Live from New York, it's Saturday Night.'"

It was not immediately clear if McCain, overnighting in Ohio, watched the show, but earlier in the day he told a crowd in Woodbridge, Va., that he thought Fey and Palin were "separated at birth."

Speaking of his running mate, he added, "I know she'll do a great job."

BUT THEN THEY RAN AN AD FOR OBAMA THAT QUOTED JOHN MCCAIN SAYING "I'VE VOTED OVER 90% OF THE TIME WITH GEORGE BUSH" - just devastating.

Look, I grew up in the 60's. As soon as you have a hero something bad happens to him (or her). I'm used to watching heroes disappear, and I'm not used to seeing them make it to the finish line. However, that being said, I'm hopeful that the country is going in the right direction. And just to make it seem all the more important and game changing than it already is, consider this;

If Gore hadn't lost the election (that he won) and if the Supreme Court hadn't handed Bush the election (which it did), then Obama would not be this close to being elected President. Only a sick economy and 8 years of an awful Presidency, could the country even consider voting for someone outside the paradigm. So consider for a moment thanking George Bush for being so awful, otherwise we'd be facing another four to 8 years of our national nightmare.

And the truth is, I enjoyed watching Sarah bop to the music on SNL - was she not aware of Amy P was singing, mocking her? Even if she was, she smiled gamely throughout, and remembered her chops as a weather lady. It just shows how adept she is at READING A SCRIPT, whether it's weather, or news, or what Karl Rove shoves under her nose. God bless her. I hope she stays on the national scene. But SNL was hilarious.. that rap song priceless. Good on ya Lorne.

My two cents

RepubliCORN Dirty Tricks

Voters say they were duped into registering as Republicans

Email Picture

Stephen Osman / Los Angeles Times

"I am not a Republican," insisted Karen Ashcraft, 47, a pet clinic manager from Ventura who said she was duped by a signature gatherer into joining the GOP. "I certainly . . . won't sign anything in front of a grocery store ever again."

YPM, a group hired by the GOP, allegedly deceived Californians who thought they were signing a petition. YPM denies any wrongdoing. Similar accusations have been leveled against the company elsewhere.

By Evan Halper and Michael Rothfeld, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
October 18, 2008

SACRAMENTO -- Dozens of newly minted Republican voters say they were duped into joining the party by a GOP contractor with a trail of fraud complaints stretching across the country.

Voters contacted by The Times said they were tricked into switching parties while signing what they believed were petitions for tougher penalties against child molesters. Some said they were told that they had to become Republicans to sign the petition, contrary to California initiative law. Others had no idea their registration was being changed.

"I am not a Republican," insisted Karen Ashcraft, 47, a pet-clinic manager and former Democrat from Ventura who said she was duped by a signature gatherer into joining the GOP. "I certainly . . . won't sign anything in front of a grocery store ever again."

It is a bait-and-switch scheme familiar to election experts. The firm hired by the California Republican Party -- a small company called Young Political Majors, or YPM, which operates in several states -- has been accused of using the tactic across the country.

Election officials and lawmakers have launched investigations into the activities of YPM workers in Florida and Massachusetts. In Arizona, the firm was recently a defendant in a civil rights lawsuit. Prosecutors in Los Angeles and Ventura counties say they are investigating complaints about the company.

The firm, which a Republican Party spokesman said is paid $7 to $12 for each registration it secures, has denied any wrongdoing and says it has never been charged with a crime.

The 70,000 voters YPM has registered for the Republican Party this year will help combat the public perception that it is struggling amid Democratic gains nationally, give a boost to fundraising efforts and bolster member support for party leaders, political strategists from both parties say.

Those who were formerly Democrats may stop receiving phone calls and literature from that party, perhaps affecting its get-out-the-vote efforts. They also will be given only a Republican ballot in the next primary election if they do not switch their registration back before then.

Some also report having their registration status changed to absentee without their permission; if they show up at the polls without a ballot they may be unable to vote.

The Times randomly interviewed 46 of the hundreds of voters whose election records show they were recently re-registered as Republicans by YPM, and 37 of them -- more than 80% -- said that they were misled into making the change or that it was done without their knowledge.

Lydia Laws, a Palm Springs retiree, said she was angry to find recently that her registration had been switched from Democrat to Republican.

Laws said the YPM staffer who instructed her to identify herself on a petition as a Republican assured her that it was a formality, and that her registration would not be changed. Later, a card showed up in the mail saying she had joined the GOP.

"I said, 'No, no, no. That's not right,' " Laws said.

It all sounds familiar to Beverly Hill, a Democrat and the former election supervisor in Florida's Alachua County. About 200 voters -- mostly college students -- were unwittingly registered as Republicans there in 2004 by YPM staffers using the same tactic, Hill said.

"It is just incredible that this can keep happening election after election," she said.

YPM and Republican Party officials said they were surprised by the complaints. The officials said the signature gatherers wear shirts bearing the Republican symbol, an elephant -- a contention disputed by some of the voters interviewed.

Every person registered signs an affidavit confirming they voluntarily joined the GOP, party leaders said.

"It does the state party no good to register people in a party they don't want to be in," said Hector Barajas, communications director for the California Republican Party.

The document that voters thought was an initiative petition has no legal implications at all. YPM founder Mark Jacoby said the petition was clearly labeled as a "plebiscite," which does nothing more than show public support.

He also said that plainclothes investigators for Secretary of State Debra Bowen, a Democrat, have conducted multiple spot checks and told his firm it is doing nothing improper....


Oh my! The Republicans cheating and committing voter fraud? I thought they were Americans! The true patriots! At least they weren't making up names and submitting them to ACORN reps. This is MORE INSIDIOUS. Creeps. All of 'em.

My two cents.

Wow. I wish the whole campaign had been like this...

McCain, Obama trade jokes, not jabs at NYC dinner

By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent 1 hour, 1 minute ago

NEW YORK - John McCain and Barack Obama swapped self-deprecating jokes instead of campaign jabs Thursday night, the Republican saying he had replaced his team of senior advisers with "Joe the Plumber" while the Democrat claimed his own "greatest strength would be my humility.

Said Obama: "Contrary to the rumors you have heard, I was not born in a manger. I was actually born on Krypton and sent here by my father, Jor-el, to save the planet Earth," a reference to Superman.

McCain joked that Democrats had already begun attacking Joe the Plumber, the Ohio man whom he referred to in Wednesday night's debate, and claimed "that this honest, hardworking small businessman could not possibly have enough income to face a tax increase under the Obama plan."

"What they don't know is that Joe the Plumber recently signed a very lucrative contract with a wealthy couple to handle all the work on all seven of their houses," McCain said, drawing laughter with the reference to his property holdings.

The two men spoke at the 63rd annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, a charity event organized by the Catholic Archdiocese of New York for the benefit of needy children. An estimated $4 million was raised.

The event often draws politicians as speakers and, by long tradition, presidential candidates appear as headliners every four years. In this case, the evening of humor came one night after an intense final debate of the presidential campaign.

McCain lampooned Obama's primary opponent, Hillary Rodham Clinton, as well as himself.

"Even in this room full of proud Manhattan Democrats, I can't shake the feeling that some people here are pulling for me," he said, before adding: "I'm delighted to see you here tonight, Hillary."

He also said Obama "is ready for any contingency, even the possibility of a sudden and dramatic market rebound. I'm told that at the first sign of a recovery, he will suspend his campaign and fly immediately to Washington to address the crisis," said the Republican, who drew criticism when he suspended his campaign a few weeks ago and flew to Washington during the crisis.

Obama also poked fun at his Democratic National Convention acceptance speech, which he delivered before a crowd of tens of thousands at an outdoor football stadium on an elaborately constructed stage.

"I was originally told we'd be able to move this outdoors to Yankee Stadium," he said of the dinner.

Then, pausing and looking around, he said, "Could somebody tell me what happened to the Greek columns that I requested?"

Both men closed with compliments.

McCain praised Obama for his "great skill, energy, and determination. It's not for nothing that he's inspired so many folks in his own party and beyond," he said of his rival, bidding to become the nation's first black president. "I can't wish my opponent luck but I do wish him well."

Obama said few Americans had served their country with "the same honor and distinction" as McCain, a former Navy pilot who was a prisoner of war for more than five years in Vietnam.

Filmmaking in Rome - Closer Look

Filmmaking in Rome - Closer Look

Ooh! they're raiding ACORN offices! Oh My!

I got an email from an old military vet today - drumming up support for McCain by claiming ACORN is robbing the election (you can listen to fathead Rush Limbaugh at it every day). Here's the text. Forgive the guy's spelling, I guess when you're mad, you don't spell so good:

FW: Exposure To True Informstion Does No Matter Anymore

Please click on the Homeland Security US link below,
obtained from the Northeast Intelligence Network and
E-mailed to me by an American Patriot and war hero.
Kindly watch the entire video and share it; you can
skip the follow on article on ACORN if you care to,
but kindly watch the first video, it has nothing to
do with the election.
Do you think the mainstream media would run
with a story like this just 20 days from a Presidential
election? Exposure to True Information Does Not
Matter Anymore. There is a non-profit organization
that has been found to be illegally
registering voters. Voters have come forward stating
that have filled out multiple registration cards by this organization.

1. Several offices of this organization have been raided and thousands
of fraudulent registration cards have been seized.
2. One of the Presidential candidates used to be an attorney for this
organization.
3. One of the Presidential candidates used to be a trainer for this
organization
4. One of the Presidential candidates campaign gave $832,000 to this
organization.
5. One of the Presidential candidates set on a board with a domestic
terrorist that gave this organization $200,000.

The answer to the question raised above would be YES if it was McCain, but
in this case it is Obama, so like everything else negative regarding Obama,
the mainstream media is silent.

Please click on this link to watch ACORN:
Please follow this link
to watch "ACORN."

AND HERE'S MY RESPONSE:

The site you mentioned in your email is .. well, let's put it this way; loopy. "Exposure to True Informstion Does No Matter" indeed.

The guy who runs this site, Hagmann, has been exposed as a fraud. He's been spewing nonsense about terrorists running around the US for years,. The concept that ACORN, a homeless advocacy group who pays people to register voters, is some kind of terrorist left wing org is nonsense. You can't vote based on registering. John McCain himself spoke at their conference last year. Here's a photograph of John with the ACORN people:
Let's stop bashing the people who register homeless people to vote. 23% of the homeless in our country are Veterans. What's to say they won't vote for a fellow Veteran? If the ACORN people turned their own registrars in because of fraud, then what's the problem? If you sign up to vote as Mickey Mouse, you still have to show your Mickey Mouse ID when you go to vote.

Shouldn't we be worried about how we're going to fix the economy? In the history of the world, there's never been a nation with a bad economy that has been able to wage wars. The economy goes into the ditch, so does the military. How patriotic do we have to be to realize that we need someone in Washington who can fix the economy? If that's going to be Senator McCain, then let's hear what he wants to do.
He may be the person to bring the country out of its tailspin. Palin may be the soldier on the white horse that's going to save us from the Depression. But nothing they've said so far gives me that confidence. Maybe tonight, Senator McCain will "Whip Obama's You-Know-What," although the image of him whipping a black man - even if he's only half black - and not an Arab, "but a decent family man" is unfortunate.

my two cents

Palin As President, Hilarious!

http://www.palinaspresident.com/

Don't forget to try the windows, the bridge to nowhere and turn up the sound.. hilarious.

Even anti-semites like Sean Hannity's Andy Martin admit Obama's Christian!

October 13, 2008

The Man Behind the Whispers About Obama

By JIM RUTENBERG NY TIMES

The most persistent falsehood about Senator Barack Obama’s background first hit in 2004 just two weeks after the Democratic convention speech that helped set him on the path to his presidential candidacy: “Obama is a Muslim who has concealed his religion.”

That statement, contained in a press release, spun a complex tale about the ancestry of Mr. Obama, who is Christian.The press release was picked up by a conservative Web site, FreeRepublic.com, and spread steadily as others elaborated on its claims over the years in e-mail messages, Web sites and books. It continues to drive other false rumors about Mr. Obama’s background. Just last Friday, a woman told Senator John McCain at a town-hall-style meeting, “I have read about him,” and “he’s an Arab.” Mr. McCain corrected her.

Until this month, the man who is widely credited with starting the cyberwhisper campaign that still dogs Mr. Obama was a secondary character in news reports, with deep explorations of his background largely confined to liberal blogs. But an appearance in a documentary-style program on the Fox News Channel watched by three million people last week thrust the man, Andy Martin, and his past into the foreground. The program allowed Mr. Martin to assert falsely and without challenge that Mr. Obama had once trained to overthrow the government. An examination of legal documents and election filings, along with interviews with his acquaintances, revealed Mr. Martin, 62, to be a man with a history of scintillating if not always factual claims. He has left a trail of animosity — some of it provoked by anti-Jewish comments — among political leaders, lawyers and judges in three states over more than 30 years.

He is a law school graduate, but his admission to the Illinois bar was blocked in the 1970s after a psychiatric finding of “moderately severe character defect manifested by well-documented ideation with a paranoid flavor and a grandiose character.” Though he is not a lawyer, Mr. Martin went on to become a prodigious filer of lawsuits, and he made unsuccessful attempts to win public office for both parties in three states, as well as for president at least twice, in 1988 and 2000. Based in Chicago, he now identifies himself as a writer who focuses on his anti-Obama Web site and press releases. Mr. Martin, in a series of interviews, did not dispute his influence in Obama rumors. “Everybody uses my research as a takeoff point,” Mr. Martin said, adding, however, that some take his writings “and exaggerate them to suit their own fantasies.”As for his background, he said: “I’m a colorful person. There’s always somebody who has a legitimate cause in their mind to be angry with me.”

When questions were raised last week about Mr. Martin’s appearance and claims on “Hannity’s America” on Fox News, the program’s producer said Mr. Martin was clearly expressing his opinion and not necessarily fact. It was not Mr. Martin's first turn on national television. The CBS News program "48 Hours" in 1993 devoted an hourlong program, "See You in Court; Civil War, Anthony Martin Clogs Legal System with Frivolous Lawsuits," to what it called his prolific filings. (Mr. Martin has also been known as Anthony Martin-Trigona.) He has filed so many lawsuits that a judge barred him from doing so in any federal court without preliminary approval.

He prepared to run as a Democrat for Congress in Connecticut, where paperwork for one of his campaign committees listed as one purpose “to exterminate Jew power.” He ran as a Republican for the Florida State Senate and the United States Senate in Illinois. When running for president in 1999, he aired a television advertisement in New Hampshire that accused George W. Bush of using cocaine. In the 1990s, Mr. Martin was jailed in a case in Florida involving a physical altercation. His newfound prominence, and the persistence of his line of political attack — updated regularly on his Web site and through press releases — amazes those from his past.

“Well, that’s just a bookend for me,” said Tom Slade, a former chairman of the Florida Republican Party, whom Mr. Martin sued for refusing to support him. Mr. Slade said Mr. Martin was driven like “a run-over dog, but he’s fearless.” Given Mr. Obama’s unusual background, which was the focus of his first book, it was perhaps bound to become fodder for some opposed to his candidacy.Mr. Obama was raised mostly by his white mother, an atheist, and his grandparents, who were Protestant, in Hawaii.

Theories about Mr. Obama’s background have taken on a life of their own. But independent analysts seeking the origins of the cyberspace attacks wind up at Mr. Martin’s first press release, posted on the Free Republic Web site in August 2004. Its general outlines have turned up in a host of works that have expounded falsely on Mr. Obama’s heritage or supposed attempts to conceal it, including “Obama Nation,” the widely discredited best seller about Mr. Obama by Jerome R. Corsi. Mr. Corsi opens the book with a quote from Mr. Martin.

“What he’s generating gets picked up in other places,” said Danielle Allen, a professor at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J., who has investigated the e-mail campaign’s circulation and origins, “and it’s an example of how the Internet has given power to sources we would have never taken seriously at another point in time.”Ms. Allen said Mr. Martin’s original work found amplification in 2006, when a man named Ted Sampley wrote an article painting Mr. Obama as a secret practitioner of Islam. Quoting liberally from Mr. Martin, the article circulated on the Internet, and its contents eventually found their way into various e-mail messages, particularly an added claim that Mr. Obama had attended “Jakarta’s Muslim Wahhabi schools. Wahhabism is the radical teaching that created the Muslim terrorists who are now waging jihad on the rest of the world.”

Mr. Obama for two years attended a Catholic school in Indonesia, where he was taught about the Bible, he wrote in “Dreams From My Father,” and for two years went to an Indonesian public school open to all religions, where he was taught about the Koran. Mr. Sampley, coincidentally, is a Vietnam veteran and longtime opponent of Mr. McCain and Senator John Kerry, both of whom he accused of ignoring his claims that American prisoners were left behind in Vietnam. He previously portrayed Mr. McCain as a “Manchurian candidate.” Speaking of Mr. Martin’s influence on his Obama writings, Mr. Sampley said, “I keyed off of his work.”

Mr. Martin’s depictions of Mr. Obama as a secret Muslim have found resonance among some Jewish voters who have received e-mail messages containing various versions of his initial theory, often by new authors and with new twists. In his original press release, Mr. Martin wrote that he was personally “a strong supporter of the Muslim community.” But, he wrote of Mr. Obama, “it may well be that his concealment is meant to endanger Israel.” He added, “His Muslim religion would obviously raise serious questions in many Jewish circles.”

Yet in various court papers, Mr. Martin had impugned Jews. A motion he filed in a 1983 bankruptcy case called the judge “a crooked, slimy Jew who has a history of lying and thieving common to members of his race.” In another motion, filed in 1983, Mr. Martin wrote, “I am able to understand how the Holocaust took place, and with every passing day feel less and less sorry that it did.”In an interview, Mr. Martin denied some statements against Jews attributed to him in court papers, blaming malicious judges for inserting them.But in his “48 Hours” interview in 1993, he affirmed a different anti-Semitic part of the affidavit that included the line about the Holocaust, saying, “The record speaks for itself.” When asked Friday about an assertion in his court papers that “Jews, historically and in daily living, act through clans and in wolf pack syndrome,” he said, “That one sort of rings a bell.”He said he was not anti-Semitic. “I was trying to show that everybody in the bankruptcy court was Jewish and I was not Jewish,” he said, “and I was being victimized by religious bias.”In discussing the denial of his admission to the Illinois bar, Mr. Martin said the psychiatric exam listing him as having a “moderately severe personality defect” was spitefully written by an evaluator he had clashed with.

For instance, he said, he did not necessarily ascribe to a widely circulated e-mail message from the Israeli right-wing activist Ruth Matar, which includes the false assertion, “If Obama were elected, he would be the first Arab-American president.”He said he had at least come to “accept” Mr. Obama’s word that he had found Jesus Christ. His intent, he said, was only to educate. Kitty Bennett contributed reporting.

Sean Hannity claims Senator Obama is guilty by association for being on a board with Chicago Citizen of 1997, the same year as the board, William Ayers. Gee, doesn't that make Sean Hannity an Anti Semite? The truth about Andy Martin reveals the truth about Sean Hannity - a blowhard full of innuendo and general creepiness, because his premise is based on racism and anti-semitism. Hannity defending having Andy Martin on his show for a half hour "HE ALLOWS ANYONE ON WITH A DIFFERENT POV," and used Al Sharpton's name as an example. Got news for you Sean; Sharptaon ain't no Andy Martin. Thanks for giving an anti-semite legitimacy on your show - who's next - the separationist from Alaska, Vogler? Oh, sorry, he's dead from fooling around with a bomb. Or maybe Sarah's Palin's husband, a card carrying member of that party for seven years? Hey, who's palling around with terrorists who want to bring down the nation?

Whatever. Honestly I think Obama should do what FDR did just prior to World War II; he made his opponent in the race his Secretary of the Navy. I say ask John McCain to work in your cabinet as Secretary of the Navy. It would do a lot to help heal the wounds that the right wing has inflicting on this nation, and if the Bill Clinton years were any example, will continue to do so while Obama serves in office, doing everything in their power to make his term fail. So much for patriots.

My two cents.

Obama is secretly a radical 60's leftist communist Muslim

I found this unusual missive out on the net...





"Not sure if you're aware of it, but John McCain was secretly born in Panama, but that doesn't make him a Panamanian. Yes, it's true that Bill Ayers and Tom Haydn did everything in their power to stop a war in Vietnam that was thousands of innocent lives, a war that even our old pal Bob McNamara now claims was wrong.

So is Ayers the terrorist? While Bill Ayers and Tom Haydn were running around trying to get our nation out of a good war, poor John McCain was busy crashing five, no six airplanes before being shot down and tortured in prison. And what was Obama doing? Being 8 years old is no excuse. He wasn't out there doing the hookilau, or the hula, or whatever kind of Hawaiian rap music he was probably doing. I have it on good authority, that secretly Obama (not Senator Obama, he doesn't deserve to be called a Senator because after all, he's only been there for two years!) is part of the black muslim underground, the PStone rangers from the South Side of Chicago, just posing as a half white man - that whole nonsense about his mother being white, did you know that in Puerto Rico if your mother is white and your father is black you're considered white? Thank God he's not from Puerto Rico as well!

This guy claims to be from Hawaii and raised in Oklahoma was really secretly born in Kenya where he was not only a Muslim, but a black P stone rangers Muslim, raised by Farrakhan and every afternoon he bows down to Mecca when not working in Congress. I know he claims he was raised a Christian, and it's in all his school books and public records that he's a Christian, but he sounds Muslim!

Oh, wait a second, are you saying that Islam and all the Muslims can be genetically traced back to Abraham the father of the Christian religion?Wait a second, are you saying that Jews and Christians and Muslims can trace all their religions back to the same person, Abraham, who had one line of his family go on to found the Hebrew religion, and another son who went on to found Islam? That's crazy! That would mean that it doesn't matter if someone is a Muslim or a Christian! That's like saying something crazy like we're all from Africa - that we can trace all our genetic history back to "dark continent" - because at some point in time our ancestors all came from Africa. That would be crazy.

That would be like saying it doesn't matter what the color of someone's skin is, or whether their skin has melanoma, or has too much melonin - or that it doesn't matter what happened back in the 1960's, because that war was wrong and its over, and there's no point beating that horse when the economy is falling around our ears on a daily basis and 90 year old women are shooting themselves to avoid being evicted. And now that communist Chief of Police of Cook County has taken the outrageous step to order his officers to stop evictions! Doesn't he respect the law? Or the banks law?

Doesn't he know its more important to get to the bottom of whether or not Bill Ayers, who was given the title Mr. Chicago by the city in 1997 for all his civic duties, is still running perverting black P stone nation muslims on the south side of Chicago? You mean the the Black P Stone nation, that now has members in Congress now, is secretly behind this rise to power of this .. half hawaiian, half kenyan, half harvard, half Cubs fan, half White Sox fan running for office?

I just don't get it. Why would the American people, after seeing the first two debates, and hearing Sarah Palin actually speak in an interview, suddenly start switching their votes to this guy who is not American, or at least not the kind of American that the founding fathers envision.. or that Thomas Jefferson envisioned - besides the fact that Jefferson fell in love with his slave Sally and had a bunch of kids by her - What was he thinking? Of a future America with his kids by Sally running for President?

Why are all these folks switching votes? Don't tell me they think we're going to go back to the failed economy of the Clinton era? God forbid! As our fearless leader Dick Cheney once put it "Deficits are meaningless!" Why doesn't Obama just go back to Hawaii or Harvard or wherever he came from? And while they're at it, just declare Martial Law and get this election over with???"

There's no accounting for wacky Republican vitriol.

My two cents.

Palin is a bully, oh my!

Alaska panel finds Palin abused power in firing

By MATT APUZZO, Associated Press Writer 7 minutes ago

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Sarah Palin unlawfully abused her power as governor by trying to have her former brother-in-law fired as a state trooper, the chief investigator of an Alaska legislative panel concluded Friday. The politically charged inquiry imperiled her reputation as a reformer on John McCain's Republican ticket.

Investigator Stephen Branchflower, in a report by a bipartisan panel that investigated the matter, found Palin in violation of a state ethics law that prohibits public officials from using their office for personal gain.

The inquiry looked into her dismissal of Public Safety Commissioner Walter Monegan, who said he lost his job because he resisted pressure to fire a state trooper involved in a bitter divorce with the governor's sister. Palin says Monegan was fired as part of a legitimate budget dispute.

The report found that Palin let the family grudge influence her decision-making even if it was not the sole reason Monegan was dismissed. "I feel vindicated," Monegan said. "It sounds like they've validated my belief and opinions. And that tells me I'm not totally out in left field."

Branchflower said Palin violated a statute of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act.

What a shock. They have ethics in Alaska. There's hope for Alaska yet. Even though the spawned this phenomena, and like my previous posts, I've noted I feel sorry for Sarah.. after all, she didn't ask to run for this office. But boy, it must stick in McCain's craw, to have Karl Rove shove someone down your throat.. and then this comes out. Whatever. They'll say it's the "liberal media bias" and ignore the bipartisan part of the message. I hate liars. Hate 'em. Just can't stand a pickle for 'em.

Meanwhile, I'd like to take a moment to let Sarah speak in her own words!

Say it ain't so, Joe, there you go again pointing backwards again. You preferenced [sic] your whole comment with the Bush administration. Now doggone it, let's look ahead and tell Americans what we have to plan to do for them in the future. You mentioned education, and I'm glad you did. I know education you are passionate about with your wife being a teacher for 30 years, and god bless her. Her reward is in heaven, right? ... My brother, who I think is the best schoolteacher in the year, and here's a shout-out to all those third graders at Gladys Wood Elementary School, you get extra credit for watching the debate.

Looks like she may need to get some schoolin' ya think?

Meanwhile I got a post from a Republican friend who was claiming that the dems are trying to sign up folks 77 times for voting (Oh, my! And ya think they'll vote 77 times? No! Really?) and today I got the opinion that the Stock Market is falling because traders fear an Obama Presidency. Repubs are running around screaming that ACORN, a homeless advocacy group, is signing up the homeless to vote! Gee, ya think they'll vote for McCain? why not, he's going to increase their rolls!

So far the rallies have got people shouting "Kill Him!" and "Traitor!" - sounds like they're priming us for a race riot. Only problem is - Obama is white. At least according to people who live in Puerto Rico. If you're born with a white mom there, you're considered white. No one considers this but me? Obama's a .. white guy?

So every time I see an article about him being "black" I think - "that's your point of view." Listen, I like the way the guy talks, I like his friends, I like his calm. I have no idea if he's going to be the best or worse President. But it can't get much worse. And the thought of having old grumpy pants and caribou Barbie (sorry, not my coinage, but tis clever) in the White House makes me.. hmm. Sounds kind of funny really. Would it be so bad to have them in their, carrying on their banner?

There's the Tom Bradley effect everyone's talking about in California.. that's the one where you answer a pollster that you'll vote for 'the black guy' but when you get in the booth, you get the willies (not willie horton) and pull .. the white lever. I wouldn't be surprised. Nothing surprises me these days.

Does anyone besides me get the "end of days" feeling about this Administration? That martial law can't be far off? The country is going to hell in a handbasket (what does that mean anyway?) and tra la, off we go on another adventure.

Can't wait for Nov. 5th!!

SNL

Ha!

Keith Olbermann Kicks Alaskan Booty

Wow. KO really summed it up well. Be careful when you go around calling people "UnAmerican" and a "terrorist" - people who live in thin igloos shouldn't throw stones. And McCain going after Obama's "association with Ayers." Obama didn't wait five seconds to counter punch with a Keating Five Scandal video detailing McCain's involvement in it. No Swiftboating will happen on this watch, thank you very much. Did you see that Doonesbury claims there's 144 lobbyists working in McCain's campaign? Did I read that right? And this "witch doctor" from Kenya who did an exorcism of Sarah Palin in church? This is the same minister who inspired a town in Kenya to attack a witch and her demon snake? And is this the same Palin whose husband belongs to the Vogler nutball group that wants Alaska to secede? Did John McCain really only meet this woman once before putting her on the ticket?

Some other news of note: LA Times today picked up the story about how McCain was a reckless pilot who crashed FIVE planes before being shot down in Vietnam. McCain - war hero? I'm not so sure. You crash your plane five times, it makes you seem like you're a bad pilot. I wouldn't go as far as the Republicans did with claiming that since John Kerry didn't get shot he wasn't a hero. But then neither did McCain. Arms broken.. oh, what a silly argument. I'm sorry I brought it up. But let's have some perspective. The guy crashes six planes in Vietnam. Should we have even been in Vietnam? No. Even Bob McNamara says so in the film "Fog of War." So, why is it such a big thing that the guy served in an unjust war? Oh, right. He was tortured. That is a bummer. But.. should we vote for the guy who suffered the most? Or who's going to get us out of this financial mess.

It's the economy, stupid. Like Joe Biden, I'll repeat myself. It's the economy, stupid. It's not complicated to see that deregulation makes really smart rich guys richer. That the bulk of money drifts to other rich guys. Same thing happened when banks were deregulated. Lot of banks sprang up, lot of guys got rich, including McCain, then the government bailed them out. Meaning "the people of the United States" bailed them out.

So.. the market is in freefall, people are shooting themselves, soon it's going to be jumping out of windows over Wall Street. And Mr. Bin Laden is chuckling in his villa (according to CNN's Christiane Amanpour on Bill Maher the other night) in Pakistan. Watching the Americans free fall, the way the Russians free fell. Of course he thought he was the one who brought the big Russian bear down - and everyone on this side of the pond thought it was Ronnie Reagan. It wasn't either. Just the economy, stupid, or the Russian equivalent of stupid.

Back to the subject at hand. Palin is embarrassing her family, her reputation, her career - for what? To be McCain's attack dog? What a waste. It's going to get uglier, and uglier, until someone throws up.. and hopefully it's not us.

Da Debate

OJ is guilty. Wow. I feel bad for Ron's dad. Can't OJ just go away? Oh, maybe he is.

On to more important things at hand. Like the Cubs down 2-0. Didn't this happen the year the Reds won it? Weren't they down like 3 games with just a few outs left, and they turned it around? One can only hope. I can only say I can't bear to watch the Cubs lose. I watched the debate instead of watching them lose (although my blackberry has the Cubs link on it, and I watched until they were down 5-0. Ouch! ) But I digress...

Oh yeah! There was a debate, wasn't there?

What's all this nonsense, "A tie is a win..."? Please. Senator Biden was clear, was concise, was passionate, was smart, was.. everything you want in a Vice President. Damn. And then, on the other side.. bless her heart, "why doncha, c'mon there, let's wink, wink, can I call ya Joe? Seriously, I'm mom six pack, I'm just like you, and you should vote for me, cause I'm just like you .. except that.. I'm not."

"Because I'm a liar. I stand up in front of you and say that I've hired diverse people in Alaska," when everyone knows she hired everyone from her grade school and high school class. She'll stand up there and lie about the bridge to nowhere, (not mentioned, thankfully) or lie about terrorists being in Iraq (weren't there until we invited them), lie about Obama's tax plan (taxing people who make 40 grand a year!) lie about Biden's record, about Obama's record.. just.. oh, it pain's me to say it - stop with the lying already!!!!

And these pundits who look for the lowest common denominator in our candidates. "Gee, I could drink a beer with Bush." I'll tell you, I'd rather drink a beer with Gore any day, Kerry too. They have their faults, they may not have been the best person in the country to spank George Bush, but a day has not gone by when W was in office, I didn't rue the day he stole the election. And if we're talking about Sarah, then she's a winner, if she didn't make an ass out of herself, she's a winner.. is the American public that retarded? I'm sorry, mentally challenged?

But past is past, and past is prologue. Let's move on. Sarah, I think you're in over your head. I think your between a rock (Iraq - or is it eye-rack?) and a hard place. You can't quit, the nation's made a laughing stock of you, and because of McCain's callous call to bring you onto the ticket, your life has been turned upside down. Everyone is Alaska is shocked at finding out who the real Sarah Palin is - with a million dollar net worth, and a long history of bullying, prevaricating and nonsense following you around. John McCain has not only ruined your reputation, he's ruined your career at future office. Didn't really think that one through when he went along with Karl Rove's suggestion, now did he?

So goodluck to you Ms. Palin, I'm sorry you had to have a bath by fire, but it's not fair for us either, to have to watch the nation go down in flames along with you. My take on elections; he or she with the best sense of humor wins. It's always been the case. As long as any President I remember; it's always the guy who stands there and says something clever, and pulls it off with grace and charm. JFK, LBJ, then Nixon over Humphrey (Hubert was not a funny guy, and Nixon, as much as I loathed him, was more 'interesting') Carter, Reagan, Bush, sorry to say Gore and Kerry looked way too serious all the time - something about being flippant that brings out the sympathy in all of us - and McCain has lost his sense of humor. And he's a funny guy. But it shows. He's tired and very uncool. And flappable. And Obama is not.. he's got an easy smile and a quick mind. Now if he could just add some laughs...

My two cents.

Steve Fossett's effects

Okay, I'm not a psychic. I don't claim to be a psychic, but I'm convinced that if you focus on something, and listen, you'll get the answer. I know this sounds new agey, and for a guy who's working in Hollywood, not so far off the track. But I want to add some info to the Steve Fossett disappearance.

A week or so after he disappeared, Google sponsored a search for him online. I, like many others, joined in the online search. I combed a certain area, and then looked for others. However, I've also had some success with something called "remote viewing." For those of you who know what it is, I don't have to repeat it here, but for those of you who don't, it's the ability to "see" images from afar, and if you can tune into an image, get something out of it that's tangible.

When the little Utah girl was missing, my wife and I tried an experiment in remote viewing. I came up with "Wasatch mts., a mine shaft, and an image of a woman with long gray hair and owl glasses taking care of Elizabeth Smart" - very much alive. Later on, it turned out to be true. There was an older gray haired woman with owl glasses who took care of her. I saw her in the post arrest, and recognized her immediately. (I wrote all this down and forwarded it to the authorities by the way, no response, but that's understandable.)

I've also had some success with connecting with my kids when I'm further away. There was a study done at the University of Virgian, Ian Stevenson's group, which showed that people could tune in to their loved ones over long distances. In my case, I've been able to see my daughter in various places - particularly Disney land - while I was in Paris. I didn't know she was going there, but later called my wife and said "So, you guys were eating french fries in a yellow restaurant in Disney land today." She asked how I knew. I said "I meditated on it, saw the yellow walls, and got a sense of you and our daughter together eating French Fries - and she said that you weren't too happy." My wife confirmed that the long bus ride and long lines had made her grumpy.

Okay, back to Mr. Fossett. So I sat back and meditated on Steve, and instantly got the message "Catastrophic heart attack" "Mono Lake" "Was dead before the plane crashed." I wrote to the people sponsoring the search, didn't mention Remote Viewing, but did mention that I knew someone who'd "seen and heard" these details (me, of course) wrote to Steve's company to let them know what I thought I saw or heard - understandably, they didn't respond, but I suggested that someone look in or near Mono Lake for his plane. (a few miles from the crash site). So when the news came that they found his plane near Mono Lake, needless to say, I felt like I already knew that - and now am predicting if they can figure out what killed him - it will be a massive heart attack.. although I doubt they'll be able to do that with what's left of his remains. Either way, I'm putting this out there, if only to help those who've lost loved ones, to encourage them to meditate on them, and the answers that you're seeking will come to you. You heard it here first.

Steve, you were quite the adventurer, and you lived your life at the edge at all times. More power to you, and thanks for being a beacon to others. Rest in peace.

My two cents

SNL Skewers the Guv from the Great White North

Why McCain Can't Look Obama in the Eye

"The eyes are the window of the soul."

Why couldn't John McCain look his opponent in the eye?

Is it because Sarah Palin took all his face time when she "didn't blink" when asked about becoming Vice President?

Why can't one guy look into the eyes of another when debating them? Fact is, John McCain has spoken about his ability to "look someone in the eye" before. Here's an article on the subject:

"Sen. John McCain issued the keeper of all campaign promises today. It's on the question of taxes, which he vows not to raise. It's not a "read my lips, no new taxes'' pledge, in the manner of former President George H.W. Bush, who made that pledge as a candidate and then raised taxes as president. Rather, it's a "look you in the eye,'' no new taxes.

""I want to look you in the eye: I will not raise your taxes nor support a tax increase,'' McCain said today at a "town-hall'' styled campaign appearance at the Wagner Company, a Caterpillar dealer, in Aurora., Colo. "I will not do it.''McCain has often told his town hall audiences that he "wants to'' or "has to'' look them in the eyes. Most often, it's had to do with his stance on the war in Iraq."

Okay, so John's aware when he's going to look, and when he's not going to look. He made a conscious decision not to EVEN LOOK AT HIM. Even when Obama shook his hand at the beginning, McCain didn't hear what Obama said, jerked his head up as if to say "What?" and still NEVER LOOKED AT HIM.

Something is going on. It's either subconscious, or its Karl Rove. So let's examine why another human being, standing in front of him for 90 minutes, would never even glance at him. Here's one doctor's response:

You may be aware that many people consider the eyes to be "windows to the soul." Looking into another person's eyes can be a very intimate act. We may feel as though we're seeing more of the "real person" as compared to the mask or persona many of us don for more superficial interactions. And, of course, we may feel the other person is also seeing more of us.

Sometimes we're afraid of what others might see when they look into our eyes, usually because we're uncomfortable or ashamed of some aspect of ourselves. We may be afraid of what we'll see reflected in the other's eyes. We may fear exposure or rejection of the "real" us. Or we might be afraid of seeing love or caring or acceptance in the other's eyes, feeling we don't deserve such kindness or that it might lead to a more emotionally or, perhaps, physically, intimate relationship. If we've been hurt or betrayed in other intimate relationships (whether with friends, lovers or family members), we may be especially reluctant.

Here's another doctor's response:

Eye Contact

When someone talks to you, do they look directly at you or look away? Maintaining eye contact when talking (or listening) to someone gives an impression that you/they are confident and honest. Making little eye contact can say that the other person doesn't like you, is nervous or shy, or perhaps believe that they are higher in status and think that eye contact isn't necessary.

Check it out:

What was Palin talking about???

"The fib I told was this big..."

So, reporters finally got a chance to lob some questions at Sarah Palin. I guess they showed enough deference, except perhaps this tricky one:

Palin was asked if she thought the U.S. presence in Iraq and Afghanistan was helping to mitigate terrorism.

"I think our presence in Iraq and Afghanistan will lead to further security for our nation. We can never again let them onto our soil," she said.

Excuuuuuuuuuuse me? What Iraqi, what Afghani has ever been on our soil, other than the happy-to-meet-anyone-Bush-asks-me-to Hamid Karzai at the UN? I think she's not aware that it was 19 SAUDIS ARABIANS that were in the planes at the World Trade Center.

But then maybe she thinks they're one and the same; that we're fighting a war in Iraq to "go after those responisble for 9/11." What an ignoramoose!! (a genderless word by the way) We'll never know what McPalin knows, because she'll be President and running the country before we get a chance to ask the question.

My two cents

Impeach Sarah Palin? Ouch!

Palin's Troopergate Moves Getting Bad Reviews in Alaska

By NATHAN THORNBURGH / ANCHORAGE Wed Sep 24, 1:15 PM ET

On Monday, Sarah Palin's lawyers announced the Alaska governor's intention to cooperate with the Troopergate investigation.

Sort of.

Palin won't actually cooperate with the original investigation - the one approved unanimously by a majority Republican committee in the state legislature this summer, which Palin welcomed in a spirit of transparency and accountability before she became the Republican Party's vice-presidential nominee. The Alaska Senate Judiciary Committee had started the inquiry when former public safety commissioner Walt Monegan alleged that he might have been dismissed for not firing the allegedly loutish state trooper Mike Wooten, who was in a bitter custody battle with Palin's sister Molly McCann and was accused of threatening members of the governor's family. The investigation has since been painted by John McCain and Palin backers as a purely partisan exercise, particularly because the committee chair, state senator Hollis French, is an Anchorage Democrat who made several seemingly prejudicial statements to the media early on, including that the probe could yield an "October surprise" right before the election. Palin spokeswoman Meg Stapleton says French has already made up his mind about the governor's guilt and at this point is "just leading people into an ambush."

Instead, Palin plans to cooperate with an investigator from the state personnel board. That investigator is a Democrat, but the board's three members are political appointees who ultimately answer to the governor herself. (One was appointed by Palin, the other two by her predecessor.) They got involved only after Palin took the unusual step of filing an ethics complaint against herself in early September to spark an investigation that her lawyers hoped would overshadow - and effectively kill - the legislature's inquiry.

But the Alaska senate inquiry is moving ahead. Last week, after many of Palin's aides and associates, as well as her husband, reversed their positions and refused to testify in front of the legislative committee, French said the senate investigator would issue findings on the matter in early October with or without their testimony. As if to parry that move, Palin's lawyer, Thomas Van Flein, met with the personnel board's investigator on Monday and promised that he would furnish a list of who would be interviewed on Tuesday. The McCain campaign told the Associated Press that after Tuesday, the entire personnel board process would be confidential and that the campaign would have no further comment. The Alaska personnel board is "the only legal forum in the state for the Monegan inquiry," Palin's spokeswoman explained.

For many Alaskans, all this maneuvering is a bit too clever. Palin's jockeying doesn't just clash with her previous image as a good-government reformer. It strikes some here almost as a matter of state sovereignty. There was grumbling when the McCain campaign brought in a high-powered cheechako (that's an outsider), former federal terrorism prosecutor Ed O'Callaghan, to dictate the governor's strategy and deal with the media. Spokeswoman Stapleton says O'Callaghan is in Alaska because she and Van Flein need the extra help, and that the media have made this a national issue, so bringing in advisers from outside of Alaska is only appropriate. But the campaign's public bashing of Monegan, a widely respected, longtime public official in the state, didn't help its case. Now that O'Callaghan's hardball tactics are becoming clearer, the complaints have grown louder, from all sides of the political spectrum.

(See photos of Sarah Palin on the campaign trail here.)
(See photos of Sarah Palin's rise here.)

As the Anchorage Daily News wrote in a blistering op-ed over the weekend: "Is it too much to ask that Alaska's governor speak for herself, directly to Alaskans, about her actions as Alaska's governor?" One longtime observer - a Palin fan who says she's done "brilliant" things in the state - worried aloud to me over coffee in downtown Anchorage that allowing the McCain campaign to antagonize both parties in the legislature on Palin's behalf could even lead to her eventual impeachment, if her bid to become Vice President fails and she returns to the state with a little less political luster.

That seems far-fetched, but the whole affair is a rarity in Palin's charmed career: a political miscalculation. To many observers, the underlying accusations in Troopergate are not all that damning. Many Alaskans have sympathy for the anxiety and frustration the Palins felt over Wooten's continued employment. In Anchorage, I've heard time and again that Palin could have avoided further scrutiny with a single convivial mea culpa at the outset, apologizing in particular for her initial inaccurate denial that anyone in her administration, including herself, had contacted Monegan about Wooten. Stapleton says the firing was a personnel matter that the state attorney general advised Palin not to comment on initially. But still, Alaskans say that if Palin had ignored that advice and spoken openly to the public, she could have defanged any investigation and signaled to Alaskans that even as the vice-presidential nominee, she would still be the same supposedly straight-talking Sarah they had voted for overwhelmingly.

But almost every move she has made related to Troopergate since she was named McCain's running mate has damaged her credibility and standing. Most recently the shifting public explanations for why Monegan was fired have looked shaky - at one point, it was that they didn't share the same general law enforcement priorities, at another it was that he hadn't done enough to crack down on rural bootlegging, and most recently it was for his unauthorized travel to Washington to lobby for federal dollars. After many Democrats complained that the McCain campaign appeared to be trying to run out the clock on the investigation, the campaign's announcement that Palin would work with the personnel board is designed to blunt such criticism and show voters nationwide a renewed openness in the case. But it's unclear whether the board will actually reach any findings before the Nov. 4 election.

Even in iconoclastic Alaska, there are rabid Democrats and rabid Republicans who now view Troopergate only through the lens of national politics. But far more people, on both sides, see this as a more nuanced situation, and one that may end up costing Palin more here than it ever should have.

(See photos of Sarah Palin on the campaign trail here.)
(See photos of Sarah Palin's rise here.) View this article on Time.com