Countless articles, documentaries and films recently heralded the Woodstock Festival’s 40^th anniversary. Few of the retrospectives mentioned the soldiers dying in Vietnam as stoners rocked out in rural New York.

Something similar is happening now. Afghan War Commander General McChrystal requested 40 thousand additional troops weeks ago. Instead of complying, President Barrack Hussein Obama continues to stall even as he attends to matters he deems more important than losing a war.

But Obama must consider the 2016 Olympics his most pressing political matter. He wants the games held in Chicago. So of course, he and First Lady Michelle are jetting off to Copenhagen– in separate planes – to make a personal appeal to the Olympic Committee. Never mind that the cost of Obama alone making the four thousand mile trip aboard Air Force One will set American taxpayers back anywhere from $300K to $500K, each way (Penny Starr, CNS News, September 30,2009, http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/54762).   After all, there’s no other way to get in touch with the Olympic Committee except to go meet it face-to-face, right?

The Afghan war should be tops on Obama’s list. Instead, he’s doing anything but making a decision on whether or not to honor General McChrystal’s troop request. That stall is costing us lives. McChrystal admitted on last Sunday’s 60 Minutes that he’s spoken to Obama just once in the past 70 days. Never mind that there’s a chain of command in place and Obama wants McChrystal to communicate with the Pentagon first. The president can do better than have a single direct communiqué with his on-site commander in 70 days. To do otherwise is an insult to McChrystal and every soldier who volunteered to serve his country in any way it deems necessary.

Funny how Obama continues to hedge – and liberals continue to give him a pass – on an Afghan war decision. Remember how the libs crucified President George W. Bush for not taking a firmer stance on Afghanistan? Remember how they vilified W for the troop surge in Iraq, which finally turned things around?

Truth be told, the Iraq surge was a resounding success. And in that fact is the key to Obama’s fudging on a similar Afghan surge. Sure, angering liberals may account for part of the president’s hesitancy, but there’s also this to consider: To give McChrystal the additional troops he requested would be tantamount to admitting that W was right in ordering the Iraq surge.

In fact, George W. Bush was right about a lot of things. He was right about the Iraq surge and he was right about Iran. Recall that Bush was laughed at for treating Iran as a dangerous enemy determined to join the nuclear arms community. Now we’ve learned that Ahmadinejad and company have long been cooking up uranium in hidden sites throughout the country.

W understood what President Ronald Reagan understood all too well: peace is best upheld through strength. Iran wouldn’t be processing nuke fuel and preparing an Israel doomsday bomb if Reagan, George W. Bush and VP Cheney were still in power.

And neither Reagan nor W would be running a fool’s errand to Denmark in order to secure a round of games while our troops are pleading for help.

Fear of communism permeated American culture in the 1950s.  Neighbors turned in neighbors for suspicious activities.  Libraries turned in book checkout lists to the government.  Everyone was in each other’s business. 

Leftist historians like to demonize Joseph McCarthy and there’s a certain degree of good reason for that.  He took his communist searches to extremes and made mistakes – but he was also right more often than liberal history books would have us believe.  There were officials in power with communist/socialist links.

Imagine what McCarthy would think of Washington now.  At least in the past, one had to dig deeply to trace the connections.  So many people in government today have virtually transparent past affiliations with socialist groups. 

In fact, in many respects, the commie with-hunt 1950s are back – except that this time, the hunted are the hunters. 

The Obama camp has set up a website for watchdog citizens to turn in what they perceive to be misinformation about the healthcare plan.  Ostensibly, they want to know who’s misleading the American public and – um, correct – these poor misinformed souls. 

But anyone can see that this is a 21^st century spy-on-your-neighbor operation designed to silence all Obama dissenters. 

This comes from the same administration that regarded phone surveillance against suspected terrorists as a gross violation of human rights; from the same administration that wants to go after Bush 43 administration members who saw fit to waterboard three terrorists in order to glean information from them and prevent future attacks on American soil. 

So now the Obama camp resorts to intimidation tactics that are themselves a form of aggression.  It shouldn’t surprise us.  Camp Obama has never hesitated to resort to threats.  Note his violent rhetoric during the presidential campaign.  At a stopoff in Elko, Nevada, Obama implored his supporters to help him turn uncertain and Republican voters:  “I want you to get in their face and argue with them” (Kathleen Hennessy, “Obama mocks McCain in Nevada stops,” San Francisco Chronicle, September 17, 2008, http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/09/17/politics/p185733D40.DTL&type=politics).

Picture that kind of belligerent suggestion coming from Senator John McCain – or President George W. Bush or VP Cheney.  The lamestream media would have roasted them up one side and down the other.

Yet it’s even more disturbing:  At a June ’08 Democratic fundraiser, Obama promised to outdo the Republicans in any way possible:  “If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.  Because from what I understand, folks in Philly like a good brawl” (Ben Smith, “Obama brings a gun to a knife fight,” June 14, 2008, http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0608/Obama_brings_a_gun_to_a_knife_fight.html). 

But now the battle goes stealth, to be fought in subterranean depths. Turn-in-thy-neighbhor is clearly designed to stoke fear in all Obama dissenters and silence those who dare oppose the current administration’s actions. 

So we shouldn’t protest another loan to Fannie Mae. We shouldn’t oppose the 40-plus Obama-czars.  The birthers – wacky or not – shouldn’t have a voice to protest a president they see as a usurper.  And we damn well better stop questioning Obamacare and just let it sail through. 

In fact, Americans shouldn’t dare voice a whisper – let alone a cry – against any action undertaken by our government. 

Take a good look and assess how radically the American tables have turned in just a little over half a year.  And how 1950s paranoia has been resurrected by those in power. 

Yet what irony.  The watched have become the watchers.

There’s a disturbing video clip making its way around the Internet. It features President Barack Hussein Obama dashing up to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, shaking his hand exuberantly and then bowing to Putin. We can quibble about whether it’s an actual bow or not, but it’s very close. Given Obama’s past supplicating behavior – his literal and figurative bowing to people who don’t care for America – this could well be a bow.

Certainly, the president’s antics in Russia constitute a bow to the country. Obama wasted no time in deeding away the American National Security farm when he got there. And things might get worse if he decides to toss our nuclear missile defense system plans into the bargain.

We heard that a guarded Prime Minister Putin spent the first 50 minutes or so of their meeting lecturing Pupil Obama on Cold War history.  The truth is that it’s in part because of our missile defense shield plans that Putin can't stand America.  He and President George W. Bush got along initially, but things soured when Bush wouldn’t budge on plans to erect a nuke shield in Poland. Putin isn’t happy that we still have those plans on the table.

Now Obama seems ready to scrap those defense plans, even though he hasn't out and out stated so.  Given his pacifist idealism, we must suspect that Obama has every intention of giving away the missile defense farm.  Long before he became president, Obama was showcasing pacifism. Andy McCarthy points out a 1983 Columbia campus newspaper article the New York Times recently unearthed. In “Breaking the War Mentality,” Obama quoted Rastafarian Peter Tosh song lyrics (“Obama: Student Radical,” National Review, July 6, 2009, http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NDEyMGNkZTI4MWE1ZjU4MzBiZjcwZjJhNzMyYzljYTA). In the article, Obama reflects, “When Peter Tosh sings that ‘everybody’s asking for peace, but nobody’s asking for justice,’ one is forced to wonder whether disarmament or arms control issues, severed from economic and political issues, might be another instance of focusing on the symptoms of a problem, and not the disease itself” (“Obama’s 1983 College Magazine Article,” New York Times, http://documents.nytimes.com/obama-s-1983-college-magazine-article#p=1). What idealistic profundity! Catch us as we swoon! Who didn’t anticipate a future national leader after reading that stunning missive?

Obama has already gift-wrapped a third of our nukes to Russia.  In turn, Russia is letting us cut across their backyard on land and on air as we fight the Afghan war.  They’ve also thrown a few antiquated rotting missiles into the mix. Who’d want them? Who has state-of-the-art technology? Who comes out a winner here? A genuine no brain barter just took place, and Russia came out the winner.

Even more disturbing: Ralph Peters contends that “the Russians don’t care much about our warhead numbers . . . What they really wanted – and got – was a US cave-in regarding limits on our nuclear-capable bombers, submarines and missiles that could leave us with as few as 500 such systems, if the Russians continue to have their way as the final details are negotiated” (“Desperate Deal,” New York Post, July 7, 2009).

Since “President Obama even expressed an interest in further nuclear-weapons cuts” (Ralph Peters, “Desperate Deal”), OK believes the next step for our pacifist prez may well be to scrap our U.S. nuclear missile defense system.

Iran is moving ever closer to having nuclear capabilities. The U.S. needs the nuke defense shield to keep Amoudinajad in check. Can we trust Russia to police Iran for us? Obama think so. He wants Russia to strong-arm Iran into cutting its nuclear program.

An attempt to forge a stronger U.S.-Russian alliance makes sense – but we should be prepared to flex our own muscle instead of relying on a former prime adversary to solve an impending crisis.

By the way, cutting through Russia saves the U.S. a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of what the porkulus bill cost us.  So money isn't an issue.  It's having an idealistic president in charge of America; a president whose actions repeatedly signal diffidence for the welfare of the American people and re-election and legacy building as his ultimate goals.

Conservatives leaders like Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush never deeded the National Security Farm, nor did they waver in their resolve to protect America.  Obama is already doing the former and hasn't begun to do the latter.

By Kelly L. Goodridge and Oscar De Los Santos

Conservative lives, freedom and property are under assault by a volley of daily liberal attacks.  The Left is perpetrating racism, sexism, smears, and falsehoods.  Conservatives who counter the Left are met with no-holds-barred assaults.  The MEANstream media rarely misses an opportunity to demean the Right.  Tragically, six months into Barack Hussein Obama’s presidency, it’s obvious that the war on conservatism is a joint White House / Right Wing venture.

The White House and the MEANstream Media

In April, we learned that Rahm Emanuel has “daily phone calls” with the press and that top Obama cabinet members attend secret dinners with media darlings (Warner Todd Huston, “WaPo Shocker: Obama Staffers Attend Secret Dinners with Lefty Media,”  April, 28, 2009, www.newsbusters.org).  Huston also reports that, “Rahm Emanuel, Sec. of the Treasury Tim Geithner, and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke have all recently had their chance to schmooze the press and guide them with the spin desired by the White House.”

The “transparency” of the Left-leaning press’s Obam-bias is frightening.  Listen to a Rush Limbaugh montage of breaking news as showcased by talking heads (Olberman, Brewer, Mathews, Couric, Mitchell).  Any un-Obam-biased mind will pick up the liberal agenda and hateful message.  Conservatives are painted as cold and clueless idiots and liberals as compassionate geniuses.  Above it all is Obama, who remains Oblameless.

Of course, when it comes to the blame game, no one beats the left-leaning media.  They spend as much time looking back as forward in order to stir the conservative hate soup.  For instance, CBS published - via New Republic - an article (June14, 2009) that shows a picture of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad beneath the headline, “Meet Iran’s George Bush” (http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/).  Ahmadinejad’s regime was and will continue to be violent as witnessed by the arrests and shootings of protestors that followed his reelection this weekend.  He’s the same dictator who denies the Holocaust happened, and who most likely was behind the jamming of communications out of Iran after its recent election.  Yet, rather than report extensively on the violence that ensued after outraged Iranian voters cried election fraud, CBS published a story about Ahmadinejad that compared him to President George W. Bush.

As many conservative voices have pointed out, we’ve been subjected to eight years of hard-hitting Bush-hate and it continues.  A new condom pack features some of the most evil dictators of the last 100 years.  It includes Hitler, Saddam Hussein and George W. Bush.  The product description says the images are designed “to remind of the painful consequences of having sex without a condom” (http://www.thedieline.com/blog/2009/06/trouble-maker-campaign.html).  OK has read – and witnessed first-hand – that Obama is “cool” among America’s youth.  His silence on the nasty tactics of the Left speaks volumes.

As do the antics of others who should know better: the college students wearing Marx and Che Guevara shirts; the legion of communist and dictator-loving celebrities; the Black Caucus singing the praises of murderers and thugs.

More Hate, and Hate-Rape Jokes

Earlier in the month, Playboy online magazine posted an article about hate-raping the top ten conservative women in the country.  Feminist groups were silent.  So was the current administration. Pamela Geller (Atlas Shrugged) observed, “Obama promised us the dream of post-partisanship—a cuckoo land where party affiliation and factional animosity were forgotten. Turn on cable news or open any newspaper, however, and you’ll quickly discover that the dream has yet to materialize. But there is a way to reach across the aisle without letting principles fall by the wayside. We speak, naturally, of the hate [f**k]. We may despise everything these women represent, but godda**it they’re hot” (http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2009/06/playboy-hate-fks-women-they-could-never-touch-literally-or-figuratively.html, June 1, 2009, second set of asterisks OK’s).  And Seton Motley, the Director of Communications for Media Research Center (MRC) pointed out the media double standard for conservatives on Fox News.  Conservatives have no “grievance group” or one-man-complaint-band like the Rev. Al Sharpton on their side.  Motley discussed Letterman’s statutory rape joke in the context of radio shock jock Don Imus’s racist comment regarding the female Rutgers basketball team.  Motley concludes that “Being liberal means never having to say you’re sorry” (FoxNews.com, 6/15/09).

Last Sunday, The Boston Phoenix ran a photo of Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly dressed in KKK hats and robes.  The photo accompanied a story on “the new anti-choice terror” and the murder of abortion doctor George Tiller (gatewaypundit.com, June 5, 2009).  The Left is fueling hate in this country, yet Oblameless and his camp remain quiet.

During the election Obama warned that digs at his family were off limits.  The Left-leaning press all too readily obliged.  In fact, most American journalism won’t risk sullying Obama with even the most tangential bad press.  It took a foreign press to release the pre-election story of Obama’s Aunt Zeituni Onyango – an illegal Kenyan immigrant and half sister of Obama’s late father – living illegally in Boston (www.telegraph.co.uk/).  And there was little coverage about Obama’s half-brother molesting a 13-year-old during his visit to England last year and being denied reentry into Britain in April (gatewaypundit.com, April 12, 2009).

The left-heavy entertainment crowd won’t slam Obama either.  No comedians are joking about the President’s daughters – nor Elliot Spitzer’s, for that matter.  Yet, CBS’s late night talk show host, David Letterman, has targeted Sarah Palin and her family with sexist and sexually orientated jokes for months now.  Michelle Malkin’s June 12 blog lists the numerous sexually charged jokes that Letterman has told about Palin over the past few months.  She calls him a “p*rv” for his jokes and admission that he is “aroused” by Palin.  Palin was with her daughter Willow at a Yankee weekend June game.  The following Monday (June 8, 2009), Letterman joked about Willow “getting knocked-up” during the seventh inning stretch by Yankee third baseman Alex Rodriquez.  It was a scripted joke – even more reason to fault Letterman, who should vet his material.  CBS remained quiet about the incident, hoping it would blow away.  It didn’t. On NBC (Friday, June 12), Gov. Palin defended her 14-year-old daughter against Letterman’s statutory rape joke.  She also called on Letterman to apologize to all young women for such a comment and demonstration that it’s okay to talk about young women in this manner.  CBS closed its E-mail complaint address late Friday afternoon.  In a move that would make liberal hypocrites and Orwell’s Ministry of Truth proud, the network removed Letterman’s joke from the show’s online-posted transcript.  Nice try, CBS.  You can pretend the Letterman debacle didn’t happen – except that viral Internet footage of the original program tells the world otherwise.

Finally, there was a slight, almost grudging shift in tide. The National Organization for Women (NOW) finally added “Late Show” host Letterman to its Media Hall of Shame (Noel Sheppard, “ NOW bashes Limbaugh while Putting Letterman in the Hall of Shame,” June 12, 2009, www.newsbusters.org). Of course, not all the change was change we could believe in.  Joe Scarborough of MSNBC was on “Meet the Press” (Sunday, June 14, 2009) when he accused Palin of “picking fights” with Letterman.  Keith Olberman did worse and accused Palin of parading her children during the election and declared she is now getting what she deserves.

So much for media sensitivity and families being off limits.  So much for Obama rallying to the aid of a former campaign opponent – and underage girls – by denouncing such jokes as Letterman’s.  But why expect such help?  This is the same Obama who made fun of John McCain on Ellen DeGeneres’s show last fall and declared himself a better dancer than McCain. (OK wonders if Obama would dance as well if he had endured the torture Vietnam POW McCain endured as his legs and shoulders were repeatedly broken.)  This is the same Obama who laughed during the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on May 9, when angry lesbian Wanda Sykes called a well-known conservative talk show host a terrorist and wished him dead.  This is the same Obama who made fun of the Special Olympics on his “Tonight Show” appearance earlier this year.

Lying is also a tool of the MEANstream media.  Look at the way they covered (up) the Holocaust Museum shooting in Washington, D.C. on June 11, 2009.  ABC, MSNBC, CNN, The New York Times, The Huffington Post and others identified the killer as “a right-winger” even after the FBI released information and labeled the killer a left-wing Nazi supporter and Bush hater.

So Long, MEANstream & Co.?

Character assassinations and falsehoods are the modus operandi of today’s Left.  They never miss the opportunity to promote their agenda – which is more often than not Obama’s agenda.  Is it any wonder that newspapers across America are tanking?  Is it any wonder that the Left’s TV news ratings are disappearing faster than water slipping through a fat-holed sieve?

Laughably, many in the MEANSstream media blame the Internet for their death pangs.  There’s too much free news on the Internet, they claim.  Wrong.  There’s too much news distortion these days and the Left’s longtime posterior kissing is finally catching up to them.  That’s the one positive offshoot of this long and shameless display of Obama worship.  Yes, leftist journalism has caused extensive damage to our culture by promoting hate and violence to women and conservatives, but it’s also angering folk who are bailing from such distortion in droves.  And if they’re finally rejecting the MEANstream media, they may be on the brink of rejecting the MEANstream’s Number One D.C. darling.  Maybe, just maybe, it won’t be long before we’re rattled by a resounding cry that declares, “Emperor, you and your toadies – especially those in the peacock shirts – are NAKED!”  (Easy there, Chris Mathews.)

By Oscar De Los Santos and Kelly L. Goodridge

Remember when Massachusetts Senator John Kerry was the Democrat Flip-Flop Poster Boy?  Nobody flip-flopped better than Kerry during the 2004 presidential race.  His hemming and hawing, this-ing and that-ing, served President George W. Bush well.  In fact, it helped him win the election.  To the very end, Kerry continued to go back and forth on positions.  Many Americans went to bed late on election night after hearing Kerry – the apparent loser – claim that he would not admit defeat until every vote was recounted.  Yet by the time many woke up, Kerry had already conceded the election to W.  That was some firm resolve on display.

Now it’s clear that flip-flopping is a Democratic disease – perhaps like liberalism itself.  In recent weeks, we’ve seen an alarming number of Dems stricken with it.

Take Senator Chris Dodd (D – CT) who claimed to be in the dark about the AIG bonuses, when it was he who wrote a provision into the bill that insured such payouts.  Dodd had to flip-flop on his denials and historical reconstructions after the truth leaked.

Then there’s House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who vociferously asserted she was clueless about the interrogation tactics used on Guantanamo detainees and other suspected terrorists captured by the American military.  After her comments were disputed, Pelosi changed her story and said the CIA briefed her on interrogation tactics but she didn’t think they would include waterboarding (Dan McLaughlin, “Nancy Pelosi Was Briefed On Waterboarding But Says She Didn’t Inhale,” April 24, 209, 4/24/09, http://www.redstate.com/dan_mclaughlin/2009/04/24/nancy-pelosi-was-briefed-on-waterboarding-but-says-she-didnt-inhale/). Some reports show that Pelosi was briefed as far back as 2002 – and as many as 30 times – on interrogation tactics such as waterboarding. So she knew about these techniques for years and neither said nor did a thing about them until they became a hot-button topic.

But it’s President Barrack Hussein Obama whose flip-flopping is most disturbing these days.  Obama vowed to close the Guantanamo Bay Detention Facility as soon as he became president.  With the flourish of a pen, he seemed to sign an order to do so.  Of course, that’s not happening anytime soon. OK can live with that.  We’re strong advocates of Gitmo interrogation procedures that have been squelched. We believe “Club Gitmo” (as El Rushbo calls the place) needs to stay open for business.

Anyone who claims that the military’s interrogation techniques at Gitmo and other detention centers are useless is in denial. Such tactics have yielded strong results. Look beyond what the Dems tell you and it’s clear that the interrogations have led to the capture of other terrorists and squelched plans to inflict more harm on America.  (Dick Morris covers such near misses in his powerful book, Fleeced.)

What alarms us about Obama’s flip-flopping is that he makes his country seem increasingly weaker in the eyes of the world.  Our enemies are laughing at us.  They recognize that Obama is naïve when it comes to making informed decisions.  Like a kid, he acts before thinking things through and then when he is informed that some moves can’t be implemented, no matter what he signed, he has to backpedal.

Cue global laugh track.  And the sitcom continues.

But for those of us living in America – especially those of us who didn’t vote for Obama – the new president’s antics are anything but funny.  In fact, they’re infuriating.

Obama’s latest flip-flop is really his most dangerous.  At first he claimed that those responsible for the previous administration’s prisoner interrogation techniques – procedures he regards as abusive – were going to be exposed and held accountable.  Then he decided – wisely – to let things be.  Yet a day later, Obama flip-flopped again and said he was leaving it up to the Attorney General to decide whether to pursue investigation of Bush administration interrogation officials.

If such a witch-hunt occurs, it’s another blow to America’s National Security.  Which future intelligence official is going to order any strong interrogation techniques if he knows his head may end up on the chopping block as soon as one administration exits and another enters?

This latest debacle on the part of Obama and his administration underscores their utter inexperience. They are babes playing grownup games.  Let’s do it this way – no, this way!  No, no, -- THIS WAY!  What could be more dangerous than letting kids run the country?

Even their revelation process designed to convince us that an interrogation commission is needed is flawed. In the interest of “transparency” (what a joke), Obama green lighted the release of memos that ostensibly reveal that harsh interrogation procedures on Gitmo detainees yielded no valuable information. However, even the mainstream media now admits that such a position is flawed.

Worse: Rather than act to advance transparency, Obama & Co.’s release of the memos was designed to obfuscate the truth. They released only a few memos; those that show that past interrogation techniques yielded valuable information were withheld. Vice President Dick Cheney recently requested that the full documents be released. This needs to happen. He says the unreleased documents show that lives were saved as a result of government interrogations. 

President George W. Bush once said, “Building a durable peace requires . . . tough realism in our dealings with China and Russia.  It requires firmness with regimes like North Korea and Iraq, regimes that hate our values and resent our success.  And the foundation of our peace is a strong, capable, and modern American military.”  He never shifted from his resolve.

Oh, and by the way, Bush made those statements in his book, A Charge to Keep, before he was first elected president (see p. 239).  Even then, as Governor of Texas, Bush knew what it would take to keep our country safe, and that if elected, he had “a charge to keep.”  He never flip-flopped or looked back.

Thanks, W.  Maybe Obama and staff will finally quit regarding everything you did a mistake, study your moves and implement some of them.  That’s one flip-flop from the Obama administration that we would welcome.

By Kelly L. Goodridge and Oscar De Los Santos

Barack Hussein Obama is a buzzword-obsessed president who campaigned on the ideas “hope” and “change.” Like an “American Idol” contestant, the people voted for Obama based on his stage performances on the campaign trail. Many didn’t bother to learn about his “present” voting record in Congress or his radical associations (Frank Marshall Davis, Jeremiah Wright, Tony Rezko, Bill Ayers, Raila Odinga, and Rashid Khalidi). Many didn’t care about his paltry list of achievements. Obama was a celebrity, deified by the press. For many it was enough that he looked good. For others, he sounded good too. Never mind that his words, when scrutinized, were alarming, scripted and read off a teleprompter (a trend that continues).

The wise are doubters. They know that Obama is all looks and words and little substance – and when there is substance, it’s usually harmful to America. There’s also speculation centering on Obama’s writing ability. Did he pen his autobiographies? Do a Google search on Obama, William Ayers and Obama’s book titles and several articles turn up written by those who question the president’s flair for the pen.

When it comes to Obama, the brainwashed are all too eager to use deceptive wordplay to praise their leader. To wit: a good portion of the mainstream media has been lauding Obama since he delivered his speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. In spite of the fact that little was known about Obama at the time – and in spite of the fact that little of substance was learned about him during his run for the presidency – the mainstream media began to stroke the president with wordplay. Even now, the mainstream press continues to faun over Obama, calling him “charismatic,” “smart” and “articulate.”

But is he, really? More than anything else, Obama has shown himself to be a dangerous huckster. Dangerous because he’s selling his followers damaged goods; dangerous because even those of us who didn’t vote for him are theoretically under his protection. Thus far, there’s been little sign that he’s willing to protect us or anyone else in his charge.

Obama began using loaded words to woo followers with his book titles. “Dreams,” “Audacity” and “Hope” are in the titles. “Change” became part of his campaign arsenal. Too bad his verbiage meant that “change” would arrive in the form of trillions of dollars of debt for future generations; that Obama’s administration would have “the audacity” to power grab private corporations; that the Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education (GIVE) Act really means compulsory service (the government plan is to steal US citizens’ time by enforcing labor requirements under the guise of “volunteerism”).

What is it with liberals and lexicon? We don’t know but it’s obviously contagious. To wit: Janet Napolitano sidestepped the use of the now verboten “War on Terror” and “terrorists” in her first House Homeland Security Committee meeting (February 24).   We’ve since heard of a terrorist attack referred to as a “man-made disaster.” Hey, isn’t that sexist, Napolitano?

We’re supposed to be a nation that abides by carefully written laws, yet this administration seems to have no desire to enforce our laws. We will never forget what terrorists did on 9/11. We believe that enforcing homeland security is vital. Terrorism is a real threat to our safety, yet Napolitano and President Obama worry about word choice in order to avoid insulting terrorists who would love nothing more than to see every American dead. As Newt Gingrich says, “I’m not comforted with words instead of serious systematic policy” (“Gingrich On Obama’s Tour: He Talks to Bill O’Reilly,” FOX News video, April 7, 2009).

When North Korea fired a missile in violation of UN sanctions this weekend, our current administration called it “provocative.” Secretary of State Clinton warned that there will be "international consequences" and Obama said that we will "take the appropriate response." These words are tantamount to empty rhetoric. Instead of being more forceful in his response, President Obama continued his European bash-America tour – a tour in which more damaging wordplay and supplication were employed as he bowed to the king of Saudi Arabia, told a Turkish audience that the US is not a Christian nation, avoided Normandy for fear of offending Germany, and accused America of “arrogance,” being “dismissive” and “derisive.”

Serious threats to our national security are building around the world. Obama needs to use more than idealistic talk about a world without nuclear weapons when he addresses North Korea’s actions and any other national security threats that arise. Such words may make liberals swoon but they’re sure to make scores of terrorists and hostile nations double over with laughter.

Maybe another wordsmith on Team Obama – one Eric Holder – needs to remind the administration not to behave like “a nation of cowards” when it comes to protecting our country. Maybe Team Obama should review the no-nonsense rhetoric uttered by politicians with strong convictions and a love of country:

“You’re either with us or against us in the fight against terror.” – George W. Bush (November 6, 2001)

“North Korea is a totally irresponsible dictatorship run by a person who is clearly out of touch with reality, and I think to say . . . we’re now going have another meeting with the UN, to have another paper resolution that has meaningless effect is very dangerous . . . . I have yet to see the United Nations do anything effective with either Iran or North Korea.” – Newt Gingrich (“FOX News Sunday,” April 5, 2009)

The problem, of course, is that Obama doesn’t want to master rhetorical truths because he’s quite comfortable twisting words like pretzels and telling America one thing when his objective is to do just the opposite. We were promised “unprecedented openness” and “transparency.” Instead, we’ve received befuddlement, contradictions and surprises. Obama vowed to be a “bipartisan president.” Instead, Benedict Obama is turning out to be the most partisan president in US history.

What does the tired phrase tell us? That a picture is worth a thousand words? Obama makes us long for the picture instead of the President’s deceptive – and often dangerous – words.

By Oscar De Los Santos and Kelly L. Goodridge

Barack Hussein Obama’s dependence on teleprompter speeches and suggested responses on his laptop screen to help him field softball questions from the lamestream media might cause some to question the new president’s ability to think for himself. Such questioning is certainly warranted. Broken campaign promises leave us with the impression that Obama is at best an inept huckster. At worst, he may be a puppet whose strings are being pulled.

Words come easy when they’re scripted, but substance and the opportunity to demonstrate character seem nonexistent to Obama. After all, he could have vetoed the pork from the stimulus bill and the omnibus budget, as he promised he would during his campaign. Instead, Obama signed away and turned bill and budget into law.

Much was made of President George W. Bush’s speech patterns, but OK loved them because it was obvious we were getting honesty from Bush: genuine, heartfelt rhetoric. In his responses came the voice of a leader true to his convictions, with a firm vision for running and protecting the United States. OK says give us W’s unscripted responses any day rather than Obama’s carefully prepared speechmaking.

It’s so bad that the new president even uses the teleprompter to introduce new appointees. Why? In fact, the teleprompter is even rolled out at White House parties (such as the St. Patrick’s Day gathering last week). Again, we wonder why.

We’ve heard about Obama’s flair for the written word; that he writes much of his own material. Yet Obama has as many speechwriters as any president – perhaps more. And if one studies Obama’s non-scripted speeches, he sounds much less sure of himself than when he’s reading off the teleprompter.

Last Christmas, Karl Rove, who served as Senior Advisor to President George W. Bush for seven years, revealed his former boss to be a voracious reader. According to Rove, W “reads instead of watching TV. He reads on Air Force One and to relax and because he's curious. He reads about the tasks at hand, often picking volumes because of the relevance to his challenges.” Rove talked about their reading contests, which began in 2006. Rove won each round – but not by much: In 2006, he read 110 books to W’s 95. The following year, Rove won again, besting W 76 to 51. And in 2008, Rove took the prize again with a 64 to 40 upset.

Contra those who regarded Bush as a buffoon, Rove’s picture doesn’t paint a loser but rather someone in charge of a nation who still found time to feed his intellectual hungers. Far from the clown the press loved to cast him as, George W. Bush was a thinker. As Rove observes, his friend “plays up being a good ol' boy from Midland, Texas, but he was a history major at Yale and graduated from Harvard Business School. You don't make it through either unless you are a reader” (Karl Rove, “Bush Is a Book Lover,” Wall Street Journal, December 26, 2008, www.wsj.com). 

W skeptics believed Vice President Dick Cheney called most of the shots in Bush 43’s administration, but extensive scrutiny of both men reveals that Cheney was a partner in running the country, but W was definitely in charge.

Now that W is gone, who’s minding the store? Is Obama the puppetmaster or a puppet whose strings are being pulled by someone in the rafters? We wager he’s the latter – and that’s worrisome on a multiplicity of levels.

A president needs to be in charge of the country. Moreover, if Obama is just mouthing off what’s being scripted for him, it reveals that the puppetmaster – be it David Axelrod, Rahm Emanuel, George Soros, or The Wizard of Oz – is as incompetent as the puppet he commands.

The Obama administration is passing bills that will cripple America with increasing taxes. This behavior ignores economists’ warnings that taxing a country into prosperity won’t work.

But we have more to worry about than jacked up taxes. The Obama administration is making wrong decision after wrong decision. The porkulus bill brings on an orgy of spending. The national recovery act that’s supposed to herald a flood of new jobs has yet to kick in. In fact, each week brings news of more industries cutting more jobs.

Polls are starting to show that the American people don’t like Obama’s policies or broken promises. House Speaker Nancy “Queen” Pelosi’s recent mention of a second stimulus package caused taxpayers to agonize over the government’s continuing plans to pickpocket our wallets and bloat itself ever larger.

By Oscar De Los Santos and Kelly L. Goodridge

Over the past few days, we’ve heard various stories about the Obama administration’s attempt to revamp military veterans’ healthcare benefits. Rumors are flying but one element that carries from tale to tale is the notion that the government can save about $540 million if it reconfigures veterans’ medical insurance. Considering the fact that the government just passed a trillion-dollar stimulus package, the half billion in assistance that would go to injured veterans is chump change. So is a reversal of healthcare assistance for returning veterans really the issue? What’s true and what’s tall tale?

While Team Obama is not responsible for conjuring up this lunacy, it can be faulted for tossing gasoline into the growing conflagration.

It’s the Congressional Budget Office that wants discharged veterans covered by other medical insurance to use it to treat injuries sustained while in the service. In other words, those who have put their lives on the line to defend our freedom are in danger of being further penalized for their efforts. Service-connected disabilities need to be covered for our veterans – they fought, sacrificed and earned it. To not do so is an insult to every living veteran.

In the interest of fairness, we reiterate that neither President Obama nor his administration had anything to do with this proposal. This is the brain(dead) child of the Congressional Budget Office and it was proposed before Obama took office.

It should also be noted that President George W. Bush recognized the proposal as a gross insult to all military personnel and their families. He refused to sign such a bill into law.

Will President Obama do the same thing? He should. Yet during a White House meeting with Commander David K. Rehbein, head of the American Legion, Obama refused to rule out the signing of such a bill. Instead, he tried to make it seem as if he was acting in the best interest of the very soldiers who would be left holding the tab for their own healthcare. He claimed that having private insurance cover such expenses could be used “as a way of generating $540 million for the Department of Veterans Affairs in 2010” (Adam Levine, “Veteran’s group irate at Obama’s private insurance proposal,” www.cnn.com, March 17, 2009).

Does anyone else see the flaw in this reasoning? The Commander in Chief is making his troops pay for their own treatments and fund the organization that’s supposed to help them. This is the same Commander in Chief who supports mortgage bailouts, corporate bailouts, gifting money to Gaza, and paying for abortions around the world.

“It became apparent during our discussion today that the President intends to move forward with this unreasonable plan,” Rehbein said after meeting with Obama. The Commander said the President “refused to hear arguments about the moral and government-avowed obligations that would be compromised by it” (“The American Legion Strongly Opposed to President’s Plan to Charge Wounded Heroes for Treatment,” Yahoo! News, March 16, 2009). 

By Oscar De Los Santos and Kelly L. Goodridge

President Barack Obama sports a Janus face – er, faces – for America. In Greek mythology, Janus had the ability to gaze simultaneously into the past and the future. The symbolism is relevant: We should study the past and avoid remaking mistakes as we move forward.

Obama is pretending to glance back as he moves us toward a positive future. But the more one studies the president, the more it seems as if his forward face is completely shrouded and the only one exposed is the one glancing backward. Worse, he’s fixating on our weakest past moments rather than taking the positives and applying them to our tomorrow. This is sure to lead America into deeper trouble on all levels.

If Obama were really concerned with the future of our country, he would not have saddled us with more debt than at any other time in our nation’s history. If he were concerned about our future, he wouldn’t have committed what Senator John McCain calls “generational theft” and mortgaged our children’s future. In less than 50 days an Obama economy has resulted in a tumbling stock market and people losing major chunks of their investments, 401(k)’s and retirement plans. The value of homes has plunged. There are record job losses and yet Obama plans to limit tax deductions for small businesses and higher income taxpayers. Last week we learned that some companies – icons of our economy – lost so much of their stock value that shares could be purchased for less than what it costs for a tank of gas. Take a breath, there’s more – healthcare stocks have dived due to the threat of a healthcare overhaul. Gore’s “bogus warming scheme” has cost oil and carbon-based industries.

If Obama were really concerned with moving our country into the future, he would have already completed filling all the posts in his administration. That hasn’t happened yet. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is the latest figure to withdraw (bringing the total to seven)from an offered position. (Gupta was being considered for Attorney General.)

Tim “Turbotax” Geithner is also having his share of headaches. In spite of the U.S. living through the greatesty financial crisis since the Great Depression, Geithner is playing $uperman and trying to do everything by himself. As a result, at least one Congressional hearing went without a tax officer to answer participants’ questions on March 5. And Geithner’s pick for deputy secretary, Anette Nazareth, withdrew her name from consideration (3/5/09).

If Obama were looking out for America’s future, he wouldn’t be acting as if he was still on the hopey-changey campaign trail and fixating on figures like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.

Bottom line: Obama needs to put its own house in order and stop looking back. We thought that was the game plan of this new administration that promised hope and change. Yet there are now two investigations underway that are probing the way the CIA interrogated criminals during the Bush administration. Why? In part, for the same reason that Obama & Co. is so obsessed with El Rushbo: they want to distract us from the national economic mess that is only getting worse.

But another reason for the CIA skewering centers on more lying from Obama. Even though he claimed his administration was going to forego any Bush administration witch-hunts, it is hell-bent on conducting them.

More evidence that Obama’s employees are looking back more than forward lies in the fact that W’s former Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove is under attack. The House Judiciary Committee is looking into Rove’s role in dismissing federal prosecutors and what hand – if any – he played in the prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman. This investigation is clearly fueled by hate. According to FOX News, Representative John Conyers (R – Mich.), who heads the Judiciary Committee, was overheard boasting, “We’re closing in on Rove . . .Someone’s got to kick his a**” (“Rove warns of ‘Show Trial,’” March 5, 2009, www.foxnews.com).

Obama complains that he inherited a mess left behind by George W. Bush. That’s getting to be an aging tune. The president should remember that the economy was actually quite strong during most of the W presidency – and that it really started to get shaky when Democrats took over Congress. Obama also inherited a strong military. Now he’s doing all he can to buckle its might.

Even Obama’s new policies ring old; his lofty rhetoric doesn’t match his actions. His scam to introduce big government into the private sector is a con job that equates to socialism. He’s trying to imitate FDR with his National Recovery Act, but it’s a sure bet this program won’t create enough jobs to get us out of our financial fix. And Obama’s plan to move national healthcare forward is also backward thinking. Other administrations have tried to pass it and failed; and it too moves us closer to a socialist nation. Why this fixation with socialism? It’s the antithesis of our capitalist country and it has failed everywhere it’s been tried.

Greek mythology cast Janus as the god of gates and doorways. Obama needs to pay more attention to the door facing future. Of course it’s important to remember past mistakes to avoid making them again, but too much backward gazing will not help our country get out of its financial quagmire.

With one exception: Obama would do well to implement past policies that have made our nation’s economy thrive. He should cut government spending, cut labor and capital taxes and lessen government economic regulation. In other words, he should stop trying to cast himself as Lincoln and FDR and embrace Ronald Reagan’s trickle-down economics.

Any more looking back and Obama may lead tomorrow’s America into another Great Depression (if we’re not already there).

By Oscar De Los Santos and Kelly L. Goodridge

Few would argue that America needs to explore alternative energy sources, but our obsession with going “green” is borne out of the same alarmist position that helped pass the Obama administration’s ‘stimulus bill.’ In fact, the greenies want to micromanage us. (It’s Gore-ish!) Obama, Al Gore and other environmentalists want us to abandon gasoline-powered automobiles in the near future. That is easier said than done – and unnecessary. At a speech in Michigan, President George W. Bush declared that “Unlike Al Gore, I don’t consider the internal combustion engine a threat to the future of mankind” (Stephen H. Hayes, Cheney, 314). Neither do we.

If electric cars were already good enough and cheap enough to haul us about, most of us would be driving them. Unfortunately, hybrid cars are great in theory but still costly and impractical for long commutes. Until bio-fuels and efficient long-range electric vehicles are perfected, we still need our old gasoline-powered reliables.

Rather than concede that we’re several years away from eliminating gasoline vehicles, the Obama camp is determined to make it harder and more expensive for us to obtain such fuel. They want us to live greener.

Consider offshore drilling: During his presidential run, Obama seemed against it, but as the race to the White House intensified, he said he was willing to rethink his position. He even went so far as to claim that he had always been at least somewhat in favor of offshore drilling.

To the end of his presidency, George W. Bush fought for America. That included looking after its energy needs. In October 2008, Bush lifted a ban – in place since 1981 – that prevented oil drilling in over 80% of America’s offshore waters from New England to the Pacific Northwest.

In Feb. 2009, representatives from the nation’s largest oil companies went before the House Natural Resources Committee to push for offshore drilling. Such drilling would yield more than crude; it would also create thousands of jobs.

Whatever Bush giveth, Obama will taketh away. Although W left us with a great parting gift when he lifted the offshore oil drilling ban, Obama’s Interior Secretary Ken Salazar wants to review all plans for such drilling before green-lighting them. Salazar’s decision didn’t sit well with Washington’s Doc Hastings, the House’s ranking Republican. “Let’s call it what it really is,” Hastings said, “a moratorium, not a delay” (“Oil chiefs urge offshore drilling,” Feb. 25, 2009, www.2theadvocate.com/news40310962.html).

We should also give strong consideration to drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Reserve (ANWR). The Bush administration favored such a move, in spite of the wails of conservationists. So do most Americans. Newt Gingrich points out that conservative government estimates figure we could extract 10.4 billion barrels from “an amazingly small patch of land” that comprises a tiny piece of the ANWR. According to Gingrich, “we wouldn’t even need to drill that entire parcel to recover all that oil. By using the latest drilling technology, it’s estimated that only 2,000 acres of the coastal plain would actually be affected. That means that overall, drilling would affect just one ten-thousandth of ANWR’s land” (Gingrich, Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less, p. 42-43).

Surprisingly, there’s good news on the oil shale front. The Obama administration restarted such exploration in Colorado and Utah (Feb. 25, 2009).   As Newt Gingrich points out, “We have three times as much oil as Saudi Arabia in estimated oil shale deposits located in just the three states of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming” (Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less, p. 40). Critics argue that it would be extremely costly and environmentally hazardous to extract such oil. Not so. Shell Oil has developed an “in-situ” method whereby rods are inserted into the ground, large areas of rock are heated, and the oil is made to rise up, where it can be collected. The system hasn’t been perfected but it’s getting there.

Environmental extremists stifle energy production. They claim that drilling for oil in areas such as the ANWR will hurt animal populations, which is untrue. (In fact, animal populations have been known to surge near drilling areas.) Radical environmentalists claim that offshore drilling pollutes the waters. Actually, human beings are responsible for roughly 5% of such spillage; much of the rest is Mother Nature’s doing. Nevertheless, thanks to the fear mongers, it’s been over 30 years since a new oil refinery was built in America.

The same environmental doomsters who argue against offshore drilling are deathly afraid of nuclear power. Just as with oil refineries, there hasn’t been a new nuclear power plant built in America in 30 years.

One of the arguments against expanding our country’s oil drilling is that it will take years before we see any of the oil. That shouldn’t be a factor. The minute that an aggressive drilling campaign is announced, oil prices will drop. Sure, gas is affordable again and the cost of crude dipped below 40 bucks a barrel recently – but we should remember that a few short months ago, we were paying close to four dollars a gallon at the pump. It can happen again.

Bryan Walsh called green “the new red, white and blue” in a TIME magazine report (Apr. 28, 2008). We like red, white and blue just fine – without a green tint.

Rather than stifle energy staples, the Obama administration should ensure their affordability even as alternative energy and transportation are explored. It makes economic – and environmental – sense to us. Which is why we won’t hold our breath that Team Obama will help us save some “green” on the way to going “green.”

By Kelly L. Goodridge and Oscar De Los Santos

An unprecedented assault on free speech (far worse than Nixon’s or Papa Bush’s attacks on Dan Rather) is underway. President Barack Obama recently warned Republicans on Capital Hill to stop listening to El Rushbo if they want to get along with Democrats. He said, “You can’t just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done” (January 23, 2009, http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/01/23/obama-quit-listening-rush-limbaugh-want-things/Fox news). This isn’t the first time the new president has taken a swipe at the media. Obama appeared on Bill O’Reilly’s show last September and claimed, “There’s a whole bunch of stuff said on FOX about me that is completely biased.” Obama claimed that “hateful things” have been said about him and mentioned FOX news commentator Sean Hannity in the same sentence (http://crooksandliars.com/2008/09/10/obama-calls-out-fox-news-and-sean-hannity-as-promoting-hate-against-himself).

Yet during the election Obama didn’t seem to remember biased or hateful speech spoken during Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s sermons – a church he attended for twenty years. Today, those who dare speak against Obama and his plans are being bullied, if not directly by Obama, then by his camp.

For instance, last week White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs took on Rick Santelli, a 14-year veteran reporter for CNBC, after Santelli went on a rant about the unfair “loan modifications through bankruptcy judges” plan that appears in the stimulus bill (2-20-09). As written, the stimulus bill allows for refinancing of irresponsible mortgages – despite whether or not the person who took out the loan could meet the original payments. Santelli is upset because the government wants to refinance these irresponsible loans and charge all taxpayers for the deadbeats’ mistakes. Gibbs’ attack on Santelli was demeaning and insulting. Besides mentioning that Santelli should drink “decaffeinated coffee,” Gibbs also suggested that the reporter “print it [the stimulus bill], and begin to read it.” It’s an ironic comment from the president’s press secretary, considering members of Congress have admitted to voting on the bill without having read the bill or knowing all that it contains.  At least Santelli read the mortgage document portion of the bill and cited the populous revolt of Obama’s recovery act (see The Kudlow Report, 2-21-09).

Later that day, Gibbs' attack was followed by MSNBC's Chis Matthews, who interviewed Santelli. Besides asking Santelli whom he voted for (a dirty dig), Mathews accused Santelli of attacking Obama. Matthews also likened Santelli to other Obama enemies. “You're up there with Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. It's quite a team. You're probably the smartest in that group, I'll tell you that," said Matthews (http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2009/02/cheap-shot-chris-matthews-attacks-rick.html).

Last October, Hannity interviewed then Obama spokesman, Gibbs and asked him about Obama’s friendship with Bill Ayers, a known terrorist and Pentagon bomber. Gibbs called Hannity an anti-semitic on-air, and later posted that Hannity was a “Jew hater” on a liberal website (http://celebgalz.com/sean-hannity-robert-gibbs-hannity-gibbs-video/). 

This bullying is in addition to the current administration – and many Democrats – constantly attacking the previous administration. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass) has been bashing President George W. Bush since 2004. Last week, Kerry slammed Bush before meeting with Syrian officials in Damascus. As Gateway Pundit reports, Kerry’s Bush-bashing follows Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s attack on W earlier in the week. Hillary, another long-time Bush-basher, went so far as to blame W for pushing “the North Korean regime to develop Nukes” (Gateway Pundit, 2/21/09). Gateway also reported that Hillary’s attack on Bush follows Obama’s attack of Bush in his television interview with Al-Arabiya.

Such attacks on any who dare to oppose Obama and his positions – past or present – are more than snarls and smears; they are unreasonable assaults leveled on free speech by some who are misinformed and others who simply wish to obfuscate the truth to serve their own purposes. Indeed, they are another signal that when it comes to dirty fighting in politics, liberals bring new meaning to the term “low blow.”