Obama And Ayers
The New York Times has taken a "look" at the Obama and Ayers relationship and concluded that their paths "crossed" a couple of times.
Whether there is anything of concern in the Obama and Ayers relationship or not, the New York Times piece smells like an article that's been trotted out to innoculate Obama from attacks by the McCain campaign. The Times looked into it and found nothing there. These guys met a couple of times, but so what?
The Times piece reminds me of the investigative reporting that was done on Obama and Rezko at the beginning of the primaries. The reporters concluded that Rezko had done Obama a favor by buying the lot next to the Obama home, but they decided they couldn't prove that someone else might not have bought that lot at the same time if Rezko hadn't bought it, and they couldn't prove that Rezko ever got anything in return for the favor.
That's where common sense and a working BS detector come in to pose questions like "who says the payoff needs to be right away?" and "why didn't somebody else buy that lot on the same day Obama bought his house if there were other people willing to?"
The key issue in the Obama and Ayers relationship is the Chicago Annenberg Challenge. That's the only significant work they did together.
Who did Obama and Ayers approve giving money to, and what did the people who got the money do with it?"
When we have the answers to those questions, we'll know if Obama has been completely honest about his relationship with Ayers, and we'll know whether he has been completely honest about his work as a community organizer.
Right now, the picture we have of Obama the community organizer is of a dedicated lawyer, helping people get asbestos out of their apartments.
The fastest way to cut through the BS around Obama's relationship with Ayers is to take a look at whom they gave Annenberg money to. If the funds were used for purposes as clean as asbestos abatement, the Obama and Ayers relationship is a dead issue.
Whether there is anything of concern in the Obama and Ayers relationship or not, the New York Times piece smells like an article that's been trotted out to innoculate Obama from attacks by the McCain campaign. The Times looked into it and found nothing there. These guys met a couple of times, but so what?
The Times piece reminds me of the investigative reporting that was done on Obama and Rezko at the beginning of the primaries. The reporters concluded that Rezko had done Obama a favor by buying the lot next to the Obama home, but they decided they couldn't prove that someone else might not have bought that lot at the same time if Rezko hadn't bought it, and they couldn't prove that Rezko ever got anything in return for the favor.
That's where common sense and a working BS detector come in to pose questions like "who says the payoff needs to be right away?" and "why didn't somebody else buy that lot on the same day Obama bought his house if there were other people willing to?"
The key issue in the Obama and Ayers relationship is the Chicago Annenberg Challenge. That's the only significant work they did together.
Who did Obama and Ayers approve giving money to, and what did the people who got the money do with it?"
When we have the answers to those questions, we'll know if Obama has been completely honest about his relationship with Ayers, and we'll know whether he has been completely honest about his work as a community organizer.
Right now, the picture we have of Obama the community organizer is of a dedicated lawyer, helping people get asbestos out of their apartments.
The fastest way to cut through the BS around Obama's relationship with Ayers is to take a look at whom they gave Annenberg money to. If the funds were used for purposes as clean as asbestos abatement, the Obama and Ayers relationship is a dead issue.
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October 6, 2008 5:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's strange that Billy Glad didn't post any comments under his own blog. He usually argues back and forth with penis-flapping crack pimps like "liam" in highly indented sub-threads, but here...
Nothing.
October 6, 2008 6:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've given up talking to them on my threads.
October 6, 2008 7:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Now that you're here...
I can't understand how even the most dedicated Obamabot ditto-heads can give Obama a free pass for voting for the bail-out.
Chris Hedges has a good essay on this subject on Common Dreams... http://www.commondreams.org/view/2008/10/06
"We are on our own. And don't expect any help from Barack Obama and Joe Biden, who lobbied hard for the bill and voted for it. Ignore their rhetoric. Look coldly at the ballots they cast against us. We, as citizens, have only a handful of representatives left in Washington, most of whom were left sputtering in rage and frustration on the House floor. The sad irony is that some of them were Republican."
Hedges also has a good quote from Dennis Kucinich:
"This was the largest single act of class warfare in the modern history of this country," Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, who led the fight in the House against the bailout, told me by phone from Cleveland. "It is a direct attack on the American people's ability to be able to stabilize their homes and their neighborhoods. This single vote will define the careers of everyone. We are back to taxation without representation, to markets that are openly rigged."
October 6, 2008 7:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think the "impending" credit crunch frightened a lot of people. Interesting that they used the stock exchange crash to argue for the bailout. Then, after the bailout, the stock exchange crashed even more. I think there's not enough time to figure the bailout out. For me anyway. It's amazing how quickly and viciously the Obama faction turned on Kucinich.
October 6, 2008 7:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
The great war-correspondent Chris Hedges wrote a beautiful endorsement of Kucinich during the primaries...
"He was alone among the major candidates to vote against the Patriot Act, against authorizing the war in Iraq, and he wants to repeal the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and withdraw from the World Trade Organization (WTO)."
"Kucinich is the only candidate in the race who advocates a single, not-for-profit health-care system for all citizens, in essence a national Medicare. He coauthored H.R. 676, which would provide universal health coverage. This coverage would, he said, not only assure that people will not suffer or die from lack of medical care, but would also stem the epidemic of personal bankruptcies, half of which are attributed to people who cannot pay their medical bills."
The Democrats could have nominated a real leader like Kucinich, but they chose Obama because of his "talent" for telling everybody exactly what they want to hear.
We're already paying for the nomination of a TV personoid instead of an honest progressive...
The bail-out will cost every man, woman, and child in the United States at least $2000 apiece, and it won't even stop the bleeding.
October 6, 2008 7:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Here is some food from outside the Hive. Of course, it's tainted, because it's from the National Review, but it gives an idea of the relevance of Ayers compared to the relevance of Keating.
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZjA2ZTllMTQwYTc1MjZkM2U5ZGY3MjFjNzY0MjI0OTQ=
October 6, 2008 8:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Whatever the source, your link has a useful summary of Obama's stone-walling about his personal history, beyond the self-serving fiction of Dreams From My Father:
"...journalists have been denied access to his state legislative office records, documents about state earmarks he distributed in Illinois, a list of his legal clients, his state bar application, billing records related to Tony Rezko, medical records, academic records — all of which are the sort of documents candidates routinely make public."
Vote for Obama, the Mystery Meat of American Politics!
October 6, 2008 8:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Get a room.
October 6, 2008 9:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
Jacob Freeze and Billy Glad are, like, the cutest couple on TPM. I agree: they should get a room. A tiny echo chamber would be just perfect.
October 6, 2008 9:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
This one is so brain dead it doesn't realize this is my room! ROFL. Take him to the vats!
October 6, 2008 9:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Speaking of bull shit detectors, mine BS alarm is going nuts at your post.
Let's see, a bunch of reporters and "opposition researchers" from the McCain and Clinton campaigns have for months been looking into both Obama's Ayers and Rezko associations and have found nothing really untoward. But that's not good enough for you, there just must be some dirt there.
So why not go find it, rather than just voicing your innuendos?
October 6, 2008 6:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
The records were made public earlier this year, but (sorry, Billy) nothing scandalous turned up.
Asbestos abatement? The Annenberg Challenge gave out grant money to improve education quality in public schools.
October 6, 2008 6:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey, I think it's perfectly appropriate to find out what, exactly, the CAC was promoting. If it was promoting children to have sex with animals, or classes in the many ways to fashion a Molotov cocktail, then we might want to ask Senator Obama about it.
If, on the other hand, it was promoting positive reform in education ("positive" being a highly subjective term, and therefore open to interpretation), then it is, perhaps a laudatory attempt at improving a flawed system, and therefore, a good deed and a good cause.
The proof is in understanding the CAC's agenda. I haven't taken the time to investigate it, but I did discover on Wikipedia that the group was operating, at least in part, from funds given to them by Brown University. I don't think Brown is a hotbed of radical terrorists, and if this Annenberg Challenge is associated with the Annenberg Foundation (http://www.annenbergfoundation.org/),
then it's probably pretty legitimate.
October 6, 2008 6:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
And if you were really interested in who the Chicago Annenberg Challenge gave "money to, and what did the people who got the money do with it" you would have done an internet search and found that in August "The Annenberg Foundation and the Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University are making available all materials related to the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC)."
October 6, 2008 6:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Please decide if you intend to oppose McCain honestly, or to undercut Obama. This crap is tiresome. Nothing there means something there?
October 6, 2008 6:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
From Frontline Leader to Rearguard Action: The Chicago Annenberg Challenge by Alexander Russo
The money was divided amongst 61 networks and 223 schools. Various networks are mentioned in the article, including: Best Practices Network, the Center for International Technology, the Chicago Comer School Network, the Chicago Middle Grades Network, the Flower Cluster, the Beverly/Morgan Park International Baccalaureate Middle Years Program, the Network for Experiential and Adventure Learning, and the Woodlawn Schools/Community Network. It ultimately affected ~40% of Chicago students.
October 6, 2008 6:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Those are mostly terrorist organisations.
This is very, very troubling.
October 6, 2008 6:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
But you would not understand, demosaur. Waaaay over your head.
October 6, 2008 6:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
You two obviously didn't read the article.
October 7, 2008 10:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
You obviously did not read the post.
October 7, 2008 7:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Someone recently did a brilliant piece on Corsi, the far-right lunatic smear-meister who wrote a book attacking Obama, and who wrote the anti-Kerry "Unfit for Command".
The piece on Corsi asked if he is a pedophile. It went into all sorts of detail about the research done to find out. Nothing was found -- one can't say he's a pedophile. But, even though no evidence was found that he IS a pedophile, he MIGHT be.
This Billy Glad is an arrogant full-of-shit twit who perceives himself as clever but is nothing new in the smear-meister dept., and wastes perfectly good air everytime he inhales.
I'll bet he wears a tie in order to assure himself of his superior intelligence.
October 6, 2008 6:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Indeed.
October 6, 2008 6:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is strange.
Billy Glad usually argues back and forth with scabby, drooling, grade-school drop-outs like JNagarya in highly indented sub-threads, but here...
Nothing.
October 6, 2008 7:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Jacob, I like the way you so deftly personalize these comments. Very precise. Next week, I begin my master work: Annals Of The Hive. I'm sure there will be much work to do on that day.
October 6, 2008 7:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Like new categories invented for exotic deep-sea creatures that defy classification on pre-existing branches of the evolutionary hierarchy, the sub-genus of scabby, drooling, penis-flapping crack pimps had to be created specifically for Obamabots.
October 6, 2008 8:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
We usually try to ignore Billy. I'd say that probably explains it.
October 6, 2008 8:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Jacob, I wonder if the pussy hare knows I had the comment that offended it removed from my Iran post. Probably not. Too bush trying to stay out of the vats.
October 6, 2008 8:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ooooh... Veiled threats from the fascist snitch. Billy, I'm shaking in my boots here. You are so fucking butch. God, I'm sporting a chubbie. You're so hot.
October 6, 2008 8:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
By the way, Billy. That's nothing to brag about in a Democracy. Especially here. And it's nothing to be proud of either.
October 6, 2008 8:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
And the other one, Jacob, doesn't understand that I post here for feedback, then post better versions other places. How amusing. Wet.
October 6, 2008 9:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
Whatever, Billy. Still "managing" Hillary's campaign, you delusional nit?
October 6, 2008 9:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
You see, Jacob. First it asks me to remove a comment, then, when I remove it, it gets upset. What's a blogger to do? Sometimes, the little, angry ones throw themselves into the vats. Usually, it's for the best.
October 6, 2008 9:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Billy, I was only calling your bluff. I thought you were kidding when you threatened to censor another person on the boards simply because they had the temerity to disagree with you. I just figured you must be joking because I could believe anyone could be such an enormously arrogant jackass.
October 6, 2008 10:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
But don't you worry, son. That rude boy has cleaned his language up.
October 6, 2008 11:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh no, Jacob! I thought the pussy hare was offended because the commentor shouted rude words like a**hole and f**ker and said mean things instead of carrying on a civil conversation. I must have misunderstood.
October 6, 2008 11:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why not do us all a favor and just post a note that you have put up a new post on your blog, rather than consuming band width by reposting your blog posts here?
October 6, 2008 6:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Billy Glad! A noun, a verb, and The Hive. That is all he has, except for when he tells us about the echo chamber, when he is listening to the bees in his Madonna Style Vanity Bonnet.
October 6, 2008 7:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
That has got to be one of the stupidest, most paranoid statements I've ever read on this site. Could it be the Times looked into it and found nothing there? Nah. That's too obvious. There's GOT to be a conspiracy here somewhere...
October 6, 2008 8:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
By the way, Billy--championship fence-sitting. You played both sides like a true master of equivocation. Swarm! Swarm! Hive! Hive! Echo chamber! Etc....
October 6, 2008 8:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
Jacob, Bill O'Reilly did the most vicious number on Barney Franks tonight that I've seen on television. The man is really furious about the meltdown of Fannie Mae and the sub-prime market. He seems determined to destroy Barnie Franks utterly.
October 6, 2008 9:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Republican.
October 6, 2008 9:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
I saw that too, Billy. O'Reilly actually blew a gasket. I've never seen anything quite like it. It surpassed Dan Rather's confrontation with GHWB and Bill Clinton's rant at Chris Wallace.
October 7, 2008 10:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
And it looks like Fox News is backing him up. They are claiming major conflict of interest behind Franks' forward looking statements about the prospects for Fannie Mae as an investment.
October 6, 2008 9:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oooh... Fox News! If they're backing him up, it's GOT to be true, right? Republican.
October 6, 2008 10:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Did you hear someone say Republican, Jacob? I think O'Reilly claims he's an Independent.
October 6, 2008 11:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
October 6, 2008 11:32 PM | Reply | Permalink