Barack Obama to small town America - I don't respect you

The Jackass party lives up to its nickname with the "rock star" Obama showing his true colors at a San Francisco fundraiser at a place nicknamed "Billionaire's Row." Billionaires Row isn't a place for people like you and me. Far away from the Midwest, he showed what he thought about us small town Midwesterners with these comments:

You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.

And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

"No guts" gives out some arrogant elitism at its worst. Not the bitter comment, and I'll get to that later and the Thomas Frank attitude among the elitist wing of the democrats (Obama, Hillary although she's hiding it better, John Kerry). Obama, who claims to be religious himself, says that small town Midwesterners claing to religion because of being "bitter." He says that's why they "cling to guns." Now, I don't see what clinging to guns have to do with being bitter. Gun owners do tend to be more apt to be middle class, anyway (and have jobs). Antipathy toward people who aren't like them? That's what Obama seems to have. Anti-trade? No shit sherlock. That's a bad thing, Obama? Son, look what your party's NAFTA and GATT has done. Anti-immigrant? No son, but very anti-ILLEGAL immigration - and their taking of blue-collar jobs.

Now I know what Obama is getting at here. The leftist elite is obsessed with the book "What's the matter with Kansas" by Thomas Frank. To sum it up, the leftist elite thinks that white working class voters vote republican because in their view "we vote against our best interest" and vote on "unimportant wedge issues." They think our real interest is with the "democrats for the workin' man." That's absolute piles of horse manure.

First off, democrats do not know our best interests. Hell, I don't claim to know the best interest of my small-town neighbors. That makes me smarter than a lot of democrats who think they do know them. I do know my best interests and vote accordingly. This attitude hurts democrats immensely. This isn't going to sell. Arrogance from big city politicians does not sell in small town America.

Secondly, what did democrats do for small town Midwestern voters? The answer is a lot of damage. Bill Clinton signed NAFTA and GATT. Republicans share some blame for that one, but it passed a democrat house, democrat senate, and democrat president. Tax increases. What do we get for tax increases? Nothing but bridges to nowhere, $500 hammers, and $600 toilet seats. Energy Independence. Pennsylvania is coal country. With $3.50 gallons of gas (much of it taxes), why not eliminate oil for non-gasoline related things - like heating and electicity. The anti-coal lobbies though want to keep our dependence on foreign oil. The CAFE standards push doesn't help either. Rapid government regulations increase the costs of American automobiles. Most of them are made from STEEL. Western and Northeastern Pennsylvania is steel country. Democrats wonder why so many people out here don't trust them? It is not only because of the cultural issues, derisively called "God, guns and gays" which really cuts across all class lines (gay issues being quite overrated). It is due to regulating the industries of these areas out of business. It's not solely the factor for going out of business, but it is one of them, due to the San Francisco wing of the democrats. It's a long time story of the rust belt to one degree or another. From Rochester NY around the great lakes through Pennsylvania, Northern Ohio, most of Michigan, Milwaukee, to parts of Illinois (Rockford), and arguably St Louis. The rise and decline of industry. Many small towns are dependent on the industry of larger towns through suppliers, etc.

The voters in small towns are some of the most independent voters I've ever come across. Notice what I said. Independent. Most are moderate on economic issues and conservative to some extent on social issues, but do not support a theocracy. They are NOT necessarily Republicans. I'm going to repeat that. They are NOT necessarily Republicans. A lot of them are ticket splitters and three way swing voters. Democrat, Republican, and skipping the race. Right now, I think skipping the race is leading. Obama's comments, policies, and style show he is a poor fight for small town American. Hillary Clinton isn't well liked either. Bill Clinton shifted these areas to the right. Now I can't let the Republicans off the hook. I have limited experience with Pennsylvania, but I have spend a lot of time in Midwestern small towns. Brighton and Howell used to be, and I've been in every county except two in this state. Farmlands, woodlands, and "company towns." Some I have been more than others. Republicans often think they are entitled to the small town vote. They aren't. In this state alone, you have a lot of ticket splitters in the rural areas. The thumb has had a lot of it lately. North Michigan as well. Some areas lean one way more than another, but they can not be taken for granted. Republicans have a LOT of work to do there, between war weariness, high gas prices, big spending from Bush and Ted Stevens, corrupt jerks like Mark Foley and Don Sherwood which hurt immensely among ethical voters. McCain has a lot of work to do there. He was dealt a hanging curve by Obama with his "What's the matter with Kansas?" and Thomas Frank attitude, but he needs to hit it out of the park. He can not take an attitude of "Who are they going to vote for? Obama?" The answer is probably not, but they might not show up at all instead.

Obama disrespected small town America. McCain needs to show the area respect. Not with pandering which is another form of disrespect, but with a plan. The ball is now in his court. We'll see what happens.

Dumb and Dumber (and a new No guts award winner)

It's a very interesting political day today. As Vince Lombardi said, "What the hell's going on out here."

First off, this isn't the dumb and dumber part, but the GOP got whacked in Illinois. Illinois is a bad state for us overall with the Chicago influence, but this one really hurt. There was a special election with the resignation of Dennis Hastert. Democrat Foster knocked out Jim Oberweis

Why did this happen? It's quite simple. You do not win when you don't show up. In a marginal GOP leaning district, low turnout hurt bad, since there enough democrats to win if they show up. That happened here.

Special Election 08:
Bill Foster - 52,010
Jim Oberweis - 46,988

That's VERY low turnout for a congressional seat. 06 was an off year, and 04 is a presidential year.

2006
Dennis Hastert - 117,870 - 60%
Jonathan Laesch - 79,274 - 40%

2004
Dennis Hastert - 191,616 - 69%
Ruben Zamora - 87,590 - 31%

Bush won the district 55-44 in 04 and 54-42 in 00. There's no reason we should have lost this. The LOSER in 04 and 06 had 35,000 and 27,000 more votes than the WINNER in the 08 special election. There's going to be a rematch this fall, but Oberweis is obviously behind the 8 ball.

Now, on to Dumb and Dumber.

Dumb goes to New York Governor Elliot Spitzer. No, not for likely (based on his comments) being involved in a prostitution ring.
From the London Times

Eliot Spitzer, the crusading New York Governor often tipped as a future American president, suffered a spectacular fall from grace yesterday when he was implicated in a prostitution ring.

Mr Spitzer, whose eight years as New York State’s Attorney-General earned him a reputation as “the sheriff of Wall Street”, reportedly told senior aides that he was a client of an international escort service that charged up to $5,500 (£2,750) an hour. Court papers hinted at risky sexual practices. He cancelled all his public appearances and met officials in his Fifth Avenue apartment before making a public apology to his family and the public.

“I have acted in a way that violates my obligations to my family and in a way that violates my or any sense of right and wrong,” he said, with his wife Silda at his side. “I apologise first and most importantly to my family. I apologise to the public, whom I have promised better. I am disappointed I have not lived up to the standards I have set for myself.”

Mr Spitzer, 48, who was elected Governor with a record 69 per cent of the vote, is married with three daughters. He did not immediately step down, but said that he needed to dedicate some time to regaining the trust of his family. If he steps aside, he will be replaced by Lieutenant-Gover-nor David Paterson

The dumb part is this.

In 2004 he voiced revulsion as he announced the arrests of 16 people for running a prostitution ring out of Staten Island

Is that a competition ring, Spitz? Apt last name for you if I may add?

The real dumb part - $5500 an hour? THAT's dumb. You're the governor of New York, and have to pay that much? For that price, not to mention your career, she better be really hot.


Dumber goes to the Arkansas GOP. I'm bringing back the No Guts award for these guys. They are our third winner. Our first "No Guts" award winner was Barack Obama. Our 2nd winner was an apartment complex in Jacksonville for firing a guy who did the right thing. Our next winner is the Arkansas GOP for this.

From CQ Politics:

Arkansas Democrat Mark Pryor ’s bid for a second Senate term soared from highly likely to virtually certain Monday, when no Republican challenger met the state’s congressional filing deadline at noon central time.

CQ Politics has changed its rating on Pryor’s race to Safe Democratic from Democrat Favored, reflecting the fact that he is the first Senate incumbent running this year to officially draw no major-party opponent.

It was likely that this rating change would have been made even if the GOP had fielded a candidate. Republicans’ hopes for seriously competing faded after Asa Hutchinson, a former House member and former high-ranking official at the federal Department of Homeland Security, declined a Senate bid. Then former Gov. Mike Huckabee stuck to his pledge not to run for the Senate this year, even though he dropped his presidential campaign last week after Arizona Sen. John McCain won enough delegates to clinch the Republican nomination.

Pryor is a FIRST TERM incumbent. The GOP didn't show up. They could not get John Doe even to run? Pryor was a very beatable incumbent, and one of the best shots in the Senate - and this is a very tough cycle for the GOP Senate (as will be 2010). 2012 is our best shot at a comeback there. Because of the ineptness of the Arkansas GOP, we're handicapped even more. Thanks, guys. As I said in the Hastert seat, you don't win if you don't show up. That earned you all a No Guts award. Every race should be contested. Period.

Obama hates Civil Rights and the Constitution - Again

I wouldn't expect anything less out of the former board member of the Joyce Foundation. Scratch a Chicago liberal and find a fascist - and I don't use that term for many people. No guts award winner and so called "rock star" Barack Obama has earned it as much as the Detroit Lions earned their reputation for losing. His true colors and hatred for civil rights and the 2nd Amendment are shown here in this slanted Chicago Tribune puff piece.

Obama called for better enforcement of existing gun laws, tighter background checks on gun buyers and for making an expired assault weapon ban permanent.

For those outside the people's republic of Illinois - that means total gun registration, ID cards for ammo buyers, and total gun bans in some areas - like his hometown of Chicago.

"A couple weeks ago, cops found an AK-47 near a West Side school," he said. "That type of weapon belongs on a battlefield, not on the streets of Chicago."

But Obama said the "power of the gun lobby in Washington" has blocked tougher gun laws and enforcement.

Son, let me tell you about the power of the gun lobby. It's not in Washington son. It's at the ballot box in real America. I also highly doubt your cops found a real AK-47 since I doubt automatic weapons are a common occurence there.

"If you want to go hunt, go hunt. Nobody is trying to take your shotgun or rifle away," he said. "But when you've got the gun lobbying saying that we can't use ballistics to trace back where guns came from ... then it is time for us to stand up to the gun lobby and say enough. It is time for a change in Washington."

Son, the Second Amendment isn't about hunting. It has nothing to do with hunting. Gun rights have little to do with hunting. It's about people protecting themselves from politicians.

Also, YOU voted to BAN hunting rounds, including the .30-30. When you talked about not taking our shotguns and rifles away, you lied. As far as ballistics go, that's one of the stupidest ideas I've ever heard in my life. If you want to beat a ballistics test, just alter the barrel. If you knew something besides the talking points from the Joyce Foundation, you would maybe understand that -- if you are smart enough.

"I believe that the majority of NRA members would not object to doing a background check from a bullet that has been used to kill a child on the South Side of Chicago, or the West Side, and find out who sold that gun," he said. "That's a law that's already in the books. The problem is that we're not enforcing it."

We already have background checks. It's called NICS, son. Illinois even has tougher checks. Hell, guns are banned in Chicago. It looks like it's doing a lot of good there, huh?

"That wasn't part of my growing up, but I am sympathetic, as I say, to the fact that if you go down to Downstate Illinois, that's an important part of the culture there and people use guns responsibly in those situations

Quit your pandering, son. It's about freedom and civil rights, and you once again oppose it. This goes right along with your vote to support prosecuting those in Chicago who use a firearm to protect their homes from burglars.

This so called "rock star" needs to get rocked at the polls.

Obama blames staff for his campaign attacks....again

Obama blames his staff again for "mistakes." This is no surprise from the first winner of the No Guts award for his refusal to make a decision.

Obama again blames staff for miscues

By John McCormick
Tribune staff reporter
Published June 21, 2007, 10:55 PM CDT


Despite often-lofty rhetoric that he plans to bring the nation a "new kind of politics," Sen. Barack Obama has surrounded himself with operatives skilled in the old-school art of the political back stab.

Yet when Obama was criticized this week for opposition research memos critical of Sen. Hillary Clinton's ties to India and Indian-Americans, he was quick to blame his staff.

"It was a screw-up on the part of our research team," he told editors and reporters with The Des Moines Register. "It wasn't anything I had seen or my senior staff had seen."

That is starting to sound familiar. It was at least the third time since February the Illinois Democrat has blamed his staff for a glitch.

Cut this holier than thou BS, Obama. You're a politician. You know the type of people you hire or people your staff hires in a campaign.

We have our 2nd "No Guts" award winner - Pansies in Jacksonville fire guy for doing the right thing

There's another word instead of pansies that I would like to use here. It's another name for a "cat". From Jacksonville.com in Florida

'You're fired,' man hears after saving a woman's life

The 24-year-old grabbed a gun before going to help his neighbor who had been shot.

By Jim Schoettler, The Times-Union

When a neighbor screamed she'd been shot, Colin Bruley grabbed his shotgun, found the victim and began treating her bloodied right leg.
Tonnetta Lee survived Tuesday's pre-dawn shooting at her Jacksonville apartment, and her sister and a neighbor praised Bruley's actions. But his employers, the same people who own the Arlington complex where Bruley lives, reacted differently. They fired him.

Bruley, a leasing agent at the Oaks at Mill Creek, said he lost his job after being told that brandishing the weapon was a workplace violation, as was failing to notify supervisors after the incident occurred. He'd worked at the Monument Road complex since December and for the owner, Village Green Cos., since 2005.

Bruley said he was too shaken to call his supervisor immediately after the incident, which occurred just before 2 a.m., but planned to eventually do so. He also said he was acting as a citizen, not an employee, and shouldn't have been punished for trying to protect himself and others. He never fired the shotgun.

"I was expecting work to give me some kind of commendation," said Bruley, 24. "I was totally blown back. It was a crisis that most people don't go through."

I caught this Jacksonville story over on a thread on "The High Road", a 2nd Amendment message board. Stories like this piss me off. Thanks largely to insurance companies and corporations afraid of liability, as well as leftist anti-gun culture, there is a strong enforcement of forced passiveness - or cowardness - in the American workplace. You hear it all time on TV and in the papers. "Don't be a hero. Let the professionals handle it. You'll get killed, etc"

A woman gets shot in the leg. A neighbor who worked at the apartment complex (was off duty) grabs his shotgun and helps out with first aid. He did not fire the shotgun and the perp was gone. He may have saved her life. He was fired for doing so. The guy should get a medal instead.

Apparently this was on FoxNews as well according to a High Road poster. He was fired for responding to the incidence in the first place, with the shotgun being a secondary offense.

Awhile back, Barack Obama was made our first No Guts award winner. Due to the actions of The Oaks at Mill Creek,they are our 2nd winner of the No Guts award. I sure as hell wouldn't want to live there.

Barack Obama - All style, no substance

The AP of all places is finally wondering what Barack "Vote Present" Obama's plan is.

The voices are growing louder asking the question: Is Barack Obama all style and little substance? The freshman Illinois senator began his campaign facing the perception that he lacks the experience to be president, especially compared to rivals with decades of work on foreign and domestic policy. So far, he's done little to challenge it. He's delivered no policy speeches and provided few details about how he would lead the country.

He has focused instead on motivating his impressive following with a call for unity and change in Washington. But along with the attention comes a hunger to hear more about what he's about.

What's the plan? What is your plan for this country? This isn't American Idol, son. If you are running for president, the LEAST you could do is tell the public what you plan to be doing.

At a union forum Tuesday, Obama sought to answer the questions, arguing that he has experience as a state legislator, community organizer and constitutional law professor

Let's look at his state legislature record. It shows him to be a gutless wonder. When the going gets tough at the top spot, is he going to sign "present" on the bills that come to his desk? Being a law professor and community organizer from Hyde Park is much different than being a chief executive. Chief executives need to be able to make real decisions. Obama has either shown an inability to make decisions, or has followed his Trotskyite mentor Saul Alinsky in taking the most left wing one possible. He's not tough enough for the job from a competency standpoint, and too leftist for the job by a mainstream values test.

Barack Obama - Winner of the "No Guts" Award

The Wall Street Journal shows Obama's unwillingness to make a decision and his creative voting. Due to that, we make him our first winner of the "No Guts" award.

Finally and officially, Barack Obama is running for president. His symbolic announcement, in the Land of Lincoln, called for a new era in politics. Obama downplayed his thin federal experience while championing his record on the state and local level, and he talked about the need to change Washington, set priorities, and "make hard choices."

"What's stopped us is the failure of leadership, the smallness of our politics--the ease with which we're distracted by the petty and trivial, our chronic avoidance of tough decisions," Obama said in his announcement speech

But then we have this.....

While some conservatives and Republicans surely will harp on what they call his "liberal record," highlighting applicable votes to support their case, it's Obama's history of voting "present" in Springfield--even on some of the most controversial and politically explosive issues of the day--that raises questions that he will need to answer. Voting "present" is one of three options in the Illinois Legislature (along with "yes" and "no"), but it's almost never an option for the occupant of the Oval Office.





We aren't talking about a "present" vote on whether to name a state office building after a deceased state official, but rather about votes that reflect an officeholder's core values.
For example, in 1997, Obama voted "present" on two bills (HB 382 and SB 230) that would have prohibited a procedure often referred to as partial birth abortion. He also voted "present" on SB 71, which lowered the first offense of carrying a concealed weapon from a felony to a misdemeanor and raised the penalty of subsequent offenses.

In 1999, Obama voted "present" on SB 759, a bill that required mandatory adult prosecution for firing a gun on or near school grounds. The bill passed the state Senate 52-1. Also in 1999, Obama voted "present" on HB 854 that protected the privacy of sex-abuse victims by allowing petitions to have the trial records sealed. He was the only member to not support the bill.

In 2001, Obama voted "present" on two parental notification abortion bills (HB 1900 and SB 562), and he voted "present" on a series of bills (SB 1093, 1094, 1095) that sought to protect a child if it survived a failed abortion. In his book, the "Audacity of Hope," on page 132, Obama explained his problems with the "born alive" bills, specifically arguing that they would overturn Roe v. Wade. But he failed to mention that he only felt strongly enough to vote "present" on the bills instead of "no."

I should mention that a present vote is a way of voting no in result, without having that on your record. For that reason, Barack Obama is our first recepient of the "No Guts" award.

Congratulations on your award, Mr. Obama.