Redstate

Posted at 6:36pm on Jul. 11, 2008 Dueling June Obama fundraising claims?

Seems like there's an easy enough way to settle this.

By Moe Lane

To walk you through this: today there was a Wall Street Journal article discussing yesterday's fundraising announcement by the McCain campaign. Said article noted in passing (via Political Punch):

Meanwhile, June fund-raising for Sen. Obama appears to be falling below the expectations of some supporters. The campaign hasn't released its June numbers, but people close to the fund-raising operation say the total will likely be just over $30 million. While this isn't a poor showing, it is an underwhelming haul for a campaign that has ballooned in recent months, has promised a true, 50-state electioneering effort and has told its biggest fund-raisers that it wants to collect $300 million in general-election cash by mid-October.

The reason for the lower-than-expected numbers for Sen. Obama, fund-raisers said, was his continuing difficulty in getting former supporters of Democratic rival Hillary Clinton to open their purses for him, following a protracted, bitter primary battle. Sen. Obama has also tacked to the middle on some recent policy issues, annoying many in the left wing of the Democratic Party. These more liberal-leaning supporters make up a large proportion of his small-donor cadre. The campaign says that some 1.7 million people have given $200 or less, making up 45% of Sen. Obama's total.

A bit of an eye-opener, that. And subject to what is ostensibly a swift pushback (Read on)...

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | fundraising | Obamafiles — Comments (2)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 9:12am on Jul. 11, 2008 Blue-on-Blue Watch: NYT versus Charlie Rangel.

Although there's a subtext, here. There usually is, with these things.

By Moe Lane

Let's say that you're a news/media organization, and you have yourself a problem. There's this guy running for President. You loved that the guy was running for President. You got totally into fact that the guy was running, to the point where you pretty much gushed and cooed and did all sorts of really, really embarrassing things on your front page in support of the guy. You did everything that you could to get the guy the Democratic nomination, and lo! - he did.

And then the guy abandoned public financing for the election.

You loved public financing. It was like a starving puppy that you found in a storm drain during a blizzard, all whimpering and scared and alone. You took public financing home and kept it alive, cleaning its sores and giving it its worm medicine, making sure that it had all its shots and got housebroken. And the guy? When he came over, he made you think that he loved public financing just as much as you did... up until the moment where he took a rock and did his level best to bash its brains in. And when you came home to discover what he had done, he shrugged at you. He actually shrugged.

So what do you do?

Well, if you're the Washington Post, you tell your editors to take off the filter that gives the guy his halo. If you're the LA Times, you let your house blogger know that it's no longer Be Kind To The Guy Millenium. If you're ABC News, hey, Jake Tapper suddenly sees himself on TV more often. But if you're the New York Times, maybe you don't have those options. Direct action is going to get squashed before it starts. The people who control your paper don't care about public financing, really. They're still entranced by the guy. So, you can't go after him directly.

But that's actually OK: he has friends.

Read on.

Posted in 2008 | Charlie Rangel | Culture of Corruption | Obamafiles — Comments (10)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 12:59am on Jul. 11, 2008 Obama/... DODD?

Clearly, I am in some sort of benevolent version of the Truman Show.

By Moe Lane

It's like this entire election season was created to make me laugh like a loon on a regular basis.

Obama seeks info on Dodd in vice president search
By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer 57 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Barack Obama's presidential campaign has requested information from Democratic Sen. Chris Dodd as part of its search for a possible vice presidential candidate.

The former White House hopeful and Connecticut lawmaker indicated Wednesday that he has been approached by the campaign. "There's been some inquiries, yeah," Dodd said. "They ask for a lot of stuff. I'll leave it there."

Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton and Dodd's Senate office declined comment Thursday.

Probably wise of both. Free hint to the Obama campaign: when the AP, on looking over a potential VP candidate's recent history, decides to go with the "may be implicated in mortgage kickback scandal" bit over the "sorta-kinda fought to derail the FISA bill" bit... yeah, maybe this was a bit of a time-waster for you. But don't let me stop you from picking the man. All I ask is that you wait for my air-popper to finish the latest bowl of popcorn.

Because you can't put BACON SALT* on microwave popcorn, of course.

Moe Lane

*It's even kosher! No, really.

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Chris Dodd | Obamafiles | Veepstakes — Comments (12)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 12:43pm on Jul. 10, 2008 Video from Obama's Unity Gaffe.

Normally I'd just update, but this is prime stuff.

By Moe Lane

Via AoSHQ, via Ed Morrissey, watch this video from the gaffe I mentioned earlier. Remember, this is for a event specifically designed for Unity:

Contra Ed, I'll call the MSNBC coverage a wash: fawning introduction, yes, but they were also kind of mean in their commentary while watching the clip in question. Not that I blame them for not resisting temptation: that was such a dumb error to make. We expect a certain professionalism from our professional politicians, yes?

Moe Lane

PS: Given that Obama is telling his people that fundraising efforts are going a "little slow" right now, and that Clinton's campaign debt needs to go away, just why is he being so sloppy?

Actually, the real question there is whether anybody knows the answer to that.

Posted in 2008 | A Child wearing an adult's clothes | Barack Obama | gaffes | Hillary Clinton | Obamafiles | unity — Comments (8)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:14am on Jul. 10, 2008 Yeah. He's *Really* into this entire Unity thing.

It shows.

By Moe Lane

Call me nuts, but when you throw together an event explicitly designed to try to convince your supporters to give money to retire a former opponent's debt - isn't it a good idea to not forget to put that request in your actual speech?

Apparently not:

Obama briefly forgets to urge help for Clinton
By BETH FOUHY – 11 hours ago

NEW YORK - It was all part of a careful arrangement: Democrat Barack Obama would get fundraising help from his erstwhile rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton, in exchange for his help retiring about $10 million of her campaign debt.

But Obama momentarily forgot his part of the deal at a major New York fundraiser Wednesday night, forcing him to retake the stage after he had concluded the event and said goodnight to the audience.

The Illinois senator spoke to about 1,000 donors in a Manhattan ballroom, all of whom had paid at least $1,000 to attend. Many were Clinton supporters until she dropped out of the race last month.

Read on.

Posted in 2008 | A Child wearing an adult's clothes | Barack Obama | Hillary Clinton | Obamafiles | unity — Comments (8)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 1:45am on Jul. 9, 2008 Did anybody... *talk* to anybody else before they decided on this Obama stadium thing?

Or was this just one of those "Hey, let's get a blimp!" moments, and nobody was there to say no?

By Moe Lane

Because I don't think that this is what the Democratic Party (note noun) wanted:

Networks may limit convention coverage

Obama’s decision “makes it enormously more expensive,” said Paul Friedman, senior vice president at CBS News. “It does add to the overall question of how the networks should cover what is a non-news event.”

Major television networks are considering curtailing coverage of the Democratic National Convention after Monday’s announcement that Barack Obama will accept his party's nomination in a Denver stadium.

According to several broadcast executives, the networks will still cover all the major speeches. But beyond that, all options are open as they look for savings to balance out the anticipated costs surrounding the stadium event. The acceptance event is an unexpected departure from the traditional convention hall format for which they have spent months planning.

Network executives expect Obama’s relatively late-breaking decision to speak at Invesco Field at Mile High, a 76,000-seat football stadium, could add hundreds of thousands of dollars in costs to already cash-strapped news divisions. Each network has budgeted millions to cover the political conventions, but that spending is already accounted for in specific costs ranging from hotel rooms to staffing to building convention platforms.

For most networks, any additional outlays for the convention would come out of their 2008 campaign budget.

The article goes on to discuss various ways that the networks are thinking of saving cash at this late a date - and reading between the lines, they're actually already inclined to find any handy excuse to cut back convention coverage, probably because these things are usually as dull as dishwater. Unfortunately for the Democrats, the networks want to cut back coverage as being not a good ROI: cutting back because they don't have enough to cover sudden expenses inflicted upon them by a third party is about as aggravating to them as it would be to you, me, or anybody else reading this.

As witnessed by the pull-quote above. Allow me to clue in the Obama campaign: when somebody at Paul Friedman's level permits his name to be linked to a comment like that, it's a subtle hint. Paul Friedman would like somebody from the Obama campaign to give him a call. Somebody who is not an intern.

And he'd like to be getting that call first thing in the morning, thanks.

Posted in 2008 | DNC | Obamafiles | Things to Do In Denver When You're Broke — Comments (17)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 12:05am on Jul. 9, 2008 Dear Senator Obama: What You HAVE And What You Want?...Well, It Ain't Gonna Happen

By haystack

I couldn't help but laugh out loud at the title of THIS piece at Army Times. Apparently, the would-be Commander in chief wants to make kissy face with the Military now...in hopes they might trust him somehow if he gives them some candy. Mind you, there won't be much OF it because he wants to give as much of it as he can to lesser-deserving Americans...but he hopes a few limp carrots on an over-bent stick might just be enough to buy their love after all:

Obama said he hopes the military community will see him as “a guy looking out for us and not someone trying to score cheap political points.”

Military members and their families deserve better pay and benefits, he said, and although money might be hard to find for a generous increase, he supports increasing basic pay to keep up with inflation and private-sector salaries, and he believes housing allowances need to be increased so young service members and their families can afford adequate places to live.

He also wants to spend more to improve veterans’ health care and reduce the wait for a disability claim to be processed.

“I don’t know a higher priority than making sure that the men and women who are putting themselves in harm’s way, day in and day out, are getting decent pay and decent benefits — so that when they return home as veterans, they don’t have to wait six months to get benefits that they’ve earned, that they’re not winding up homeless on the streets, that they’re being screened for post-traumatic stress disorder, that if a spouse is widowed, the benefits are sufficiently generous,” he said. “These are just basic requirements of a grateful nation.”

Obama said he did not want to be more specific because he did not want to make promises he might not be able to keep. “I think we can do a much better job than we’re doing right now,” he said. But, he added, “I want to be honest: We are going to be in a tight budget situation. We’re not going to be able to do everything all at once.”

A promise of a cost of living raise isn't "trying to score cheap political points?” Hunh...and he knows of "no higher priority" yet he's gangbusters on a lot of OTHER priorities...none of which we can actually afford...? Ah, well, who cares about those nasty little details anyway? There's lies to be told, promises to be made and broken, and fat ladies to make faint in the audience.

Tight budget situation, indeed, Obama. By the time you rape the rest of us in new and expanded taxes and give it all back to "Fathers" and "Health Care" and "Global Poverty"...what will these Soldiers see? Bupkus.

A one or two percent raise in salary? Give me a freaking break. Trust starts with believing in the cause YOUR Soldiers are fighting for...not telling them they'll be made to surrender and forfeit the field because you promised your MoveOn and Code Pink friends you'd withdraw if they gave you that $2300.00 check.

Nice try though Barry...nice try.

Posted in 2008 | Obamafiles — Comments (6)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 7:10pm on Jul. 8, 2008 Now the fun starts.

Game on.

By Moe Lane

Expect the Democrats to howl about this one:

(H/T: Hot Air)

...and expect the Republicans to smile nastily and murmur "100 years, boychiks. 100 years." Not that the situation's the same, of course. The Democrats twisted McCain's position into a pretzel, but we can't do that to the Iraq position of the junior Senator from Illinois.

Obama himself beat us to it.

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Obamafiles | RNC — Comments (26)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 2:39pm on Jul. 8, 2008 Part of the Problem

Obama Campaign Ad

By absentee

We've got to run a different kind of campaign. So we're not going to go around doing negative ads. We're going to keep it positive. We're going to talk about the issues." - Sen. Barack Obama

You know an attack ad when you see it. They have lots of red text and "ominous" stills. They have that voice. You've seen them. The DNC has been running them for months now against John McCain.

Senator Obama, though, is bringing a new kind of politics. Right?

If the New York Times knows it's a negative ad, then it's a negative ad. Negative, as in not "positive." As the McCain campaign said today, "Barack Obama's commitment to a new type of politics is officially over."

Read On ...

Posted in 2008 | campaign ads | Obamafiles — Comments (26)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:23am on Jul. 8, 2008 Bob Herbert freeloads his disillusionment.

Silly op-ed writer!

By Moe Lane

Bob Herbert is subbing for David Brooks today in the NYT Op-Ed, and his plaintive lament for the way that Senator Barack Obama's running away from his base is well worth the perusal (H/T: Hot Air). It's also meaningless, for the simple reason that the only way that Obama's going to even remotely care about Blue-on-Blue criticism is if it's accompanied with a torn-up check; and as near as I can tell, Bob Herbert's never given any money to Barack Obama at all.

Of course, people who have already given the maximum to the junior Senator from Illinois are (oddly enough) pretty much in the same boat as Mr. Herbert. Ah, the perils of premature infatuation...

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Obamafiles | The Audacity Of Hype — Comments (18)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 8:44am on Jul. 8, 2008 Question and answer time: the Senate FISA vote.

I spied something convex?

By Moe Lane

Q. OK, what's going on?
A. Assuming that Jesse Helms' funeral doesn't interfere, FISA passes the Senate today with telecom immunity intact. [UPDATE: The final votes will take place tomorrow, in order to allow Senators to attend Helms' funeral.]

Q. Just like that?
A. Just like that.

Q. Aren't there people in the Senate trying to stop it?
A. Not really, no. There are people in the Senate trying their best to look like they're stopping it, but this was all hashed out last week. What happens tomorrow will be about as spontaneous as Kabuki theater. Or any kind of traditional theater, really.

Read on.

Posted in Barack Obama | Congress | FISA | Obamafiles — Comments (21)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 11:04pm on Jul. 7, 2008 The Answer: Because they know it's *not real*

By Jeff Emanuel

The Question:

Why is it that the anti-theist Left wing goes nuts shrieking "Church and State" and spouting accusations of "[breaking] with longstanding precedent" by "unveil[ing] a presidential campaign ad infused with deeply religious tones" when they look hard enough, with enough prejudice, at the image below to find a phantom religious symbol in it...

...yet there's nary a peep from those same anti-religion Lefties when Barack Obama does this:

Evangelical Christians, and other religious individuals who occasionally feel drawn in by Barack Obama's rapidly-changing message, should keep that question, and the answer, in mind when considering who they want to support -- and why -- this election season.

The anti-religious Left allows Obama and other Democrats to use the imagery and the language of the Church, to attend and be active in churches for two decades-plus, and to speak to people of faith in what they assume is "their" language without argument or protestation (when a fraction of that level of "religious" activity would earn a Republican the title of "theocrat") because the Left knows Obama, et al are simply doing those things out of a need to appeal to the bitter religion-clingers, not because they actually believe or mean them in any way.

Christians should simply look at the Left's reaction to Barack Obama or any other Democrat politician's religious statements and claims of faith to gauge just how real those claims are. Just refer to the above exhibit for evidence of how serious, and how authentic, Barack Obama's are.

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Church and State | Mike Huckabee | Obamafiles — Comments (57)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 4:05pm on Jul. 7, 2008 Attempts to defend Obama's shift on Iraq lack logic, seriousness, chronology

By Jeff Emanuel

Attempts to come to terms with, and to defend, Barack Obama's sudden attempt to walk back the centerpiece of his presidential campaign -- unwavering opposition to the effort in Iraq, regardless of facts on the ground or of new information -- have abounded over the last few days, with each falling well short of anything even remotely resembling intellectual honesty or seriousness.

A couple of the latest have come from the New Yorker's George Packer, and from our old friend Andrew Sullivan -- someone whose writing contains intellectual honesty only rarely, and intellectual seriousness never.

Sullivan has this to say about Obama's sudden lurch to the right on Iraq:

"Any potential president who is uninterested in the facts on the ground in calibrating his Iraq policy would be another George W Bush."

All I have to say is, whoever usurped Bush's presidential duties from December 2006 onward, and is therefore actually responsible for effecting a wholesale change in the entire strategy of operations in Iraq as a result of the deteriorating situation on the ground there, while Sully's ideological allies on the left side of the legislative aisle were fighting tooth and nail to prevent any changes from being made, did one heckuva job.

There's no doubt the situation in Iraq progressively worsened over a long enough period of time that the administration has little or no excuse for not recognizing and responding to it with a series of adjustments in how the postwar was being waged. However, for Sully to make that claim after 2006 is simply ridiculous. Fortunately, none of us are surprised to see such ridiculousness emanating from that dank, musty corner of the blogosphere.

The New Yorker's George Packer took a slightly different tack, deciding that acknowledging progress in Iraq as a result of President Bush's willingess to change strategy was an Okay thing to do -- but, in the process of twisting things around as much as possible to defend Obama, he screwed up his timeline royally (while also doing wonderful imitation of Sullivan in terms of abandoning intellectual seriousness). According to the UK First Post:

Read on...

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | New Yorker | Obamafiles — Comments (28) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 3:30pm on Jul. 7, 2008 Obama Will Sell Anything

"I Sell the Things You Need To Be. I'm the Smiling Face on Your TV"

By Mark I

The Obama campaign officially announced today that Sen. Obama will accept the Democratic presidential nomination in an open air event expected to draw 75,000 people. The campaign takes pains to point out that free tickets will be available for the torchlight rally acceptance speech, but...

If you make a donation of $5 or more between now and midnight on July 31st, you could be one of 10 supporters chosen to fly to Denver and spend two days and nights at the convention, meet Barack backstage, and watch his acceptance speech in person. Each of the ten supporters who are selected will be able to bring one guest to join them.

This guy will sell anything. So much for the new politics. Obama's campaign is more motivated by money and fundraising than any campaign in recent memory. One wonders if this will continue into an Obama presidency.

"For a donation of $25 dollars or more, you could be one of 10 lucky people to be flown to Washington D.C. to sit in on an exciting intelligence briefing in the White House Situation Room. Afterwards, you'll be given an exclusive tour of the Oval Office and get to listen in on a secure phone call between President Obama and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. Your whirlwind day will conclude with a special de-briefing by the president and the opportunity to personally sign one letter of President Obama's signature to the official roll back of the Bush Tax Cuts."

I guess "fixing a broken public finance system" means "sell anything that isn't nailed down including my dignity and the dignity of the office in order to out raise my opponents" in Obamian.

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Democratic Convention | fundraising | Liberals | Obamafiles | Same as the Old Politics — Comments (29)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 2:28pm on Jul. 7, 2008 "Because this is your convention, not mine, I'm holding an event that is even more about ME than anything else we've done yet"

You can come, maybe, if you keep giving me money and promise to cheer loud enough, or faint.

By Jeff Emanuel

Well, it's official: Barack Obama will be accepting the Democratic nomination for President at Invesco Field at Mile High, the 75,000-seat open-air home of the Denver Broncos, rather than at the convention hall as originally planned.

Campaign manager David Plouffe said the following in an email:

At the Democratic National Convention next month, we're going to kick off the general election with an event that opens up the political process the same way we've opened it up throughout this campaign.

Barack has made it clear that this is your convention, not his.

On Thursday, August 28th, he's scheduled to formally accept the Democratic nomination in a speech at the convention hall in front of the assembled delegates.

Instead, Barack will leave the convention hall and join more than 75,000 people for a huge, free, open-air event where he will deliver his acceptance speech to the American people.

It's going to be an amazing event, and Barack would like you to join him. Free tickets will become available as the date approaches, but we've reserved a special place for a few of the people who brought us this far and who continue to drive this campaign.

If you make a donation of $5 or more between now and midnight on July 31st, you could be one of 10 supporters chosen to fly to Denver and spend two days and nights at the convention, meet Barack backstage, and watch his acceptance speech in person. Each of the ten supporters who are selected will be able to bring one guest to join them.

This is simply the next logical step in a campaign that has been all about one man and his quest for adulation and power.

Opening up the political process? Only by pun are they doing that; the rest is simply another manufactured event for a manufactured candidate. The way they're "opening up the process" here is as they've done it to this point -- by bringing more people in to sit and listen to Obama talk (and have the opportunity to faint, I suppose).

"This is your convention, not his"? Only if you're a willing member of the Obama cult of personality. If you're not -- say, for example, you're a Clinton delegate, as almost half the assigned delegates are -- then an event like this has to feel like an attempt to drown you out, if not to exclude you altogether.

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Democratic Convention | Denver | Obamafiles — Comments (87)/ Email this page » / Read More »