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It is all either party cares about...
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It is all either party cares about...
MrsSpringsteen
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She looked stunning last night
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Nobody suggested it was otherwise. But the military and republicans do have their views on these issues, and Obama is currently siding with them, not the liberals that fought so hard to get him nominated and elected into office.
Except upping the troops in Afghanistan is part of his campaign promise. If liberals are getting mad at this, they haven't been following him very closely. And conservatives who say that he is bending are ultimately wrong.
Well, when you look at Obama the Senator, you'll find that he did plenty of bending. He went from being a fierce opponent of the Surge in Iraq to admitting that the Surge had worked on O'Rielly's Fox show. He jumped on board Bush's plan for Iraq and has long abandoned his January 2007 plan to withdraw all US troops from Iraq by March 31, 2008. In fact, thinking back to his January 2007 plan, he has been the President now for 11 months and there are still 120,000 troops in IRAQ. Yes, the President is learning and he is bending, bending in the direction of the military and republicans on these issues.
On Afghanistan, nearly 70% of Democrats want to see the United States withdraw its troops from Afghanistan now, but Obama is doing the opposite!
While the latest polls show the country is suprisingly divided over Iraq now, when looking at Democrats alone, they are solidly against the war in Afghanistan and want US troops pulled out now. The latest Gallup polls show that nearly 70% of Democrats want the US to start withdrawing troops from Iraq. Republicans want the opposite. They want to send more troops to Iraq and that is in fact what Obama is doing!
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..
Obama's Kenyan aunt: 'I carry my own cross'
Called a political liability, president's relative describes her anguish
Josh Reynolds / AP
Zeituni Onyango, Obama's Kenyan aunt, became a campaign liability to her nephew after it was revealed that she was living illegally in public housing.
BOSTON - President Barack Obama's Kenyan aunt buried her face in her hands and sobbed as she described her anguish over no longer having contact with him and his family after the revelation that she had been living illegally for years in the United States in public housing.
Zeituni Onyango told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview that she is troubled that her immigration woes have made her a political liability to her nephew.
Onyango, the half sister of Obama's late father, said she has exiled herself from the family after attending Obama's inauguration because she didn't want to become fodder for his foes. Obama and his family have not reached out to her either, she said.
"Before, we were family. But right now, there is a lot of politics, and me, I am not interested in any politics at all," said Onyango, whose appeal for asylum from her native Kenya is before an immigration judge in Boston.
The Obamas are her only family in the United States, she said.
"It is very sad when such a thing happens. There are people, outsiders, you know, they come in between, they divide a family," she said last week. "It's not easy."
Onyango, 57, is protective of Obama and said she never asked him to intervene in her case and didn't tell him about her immigration difficulties.
"I carry my own cross," she said. "He has nothing to do with my problem."
The White House said Obama has had no involvement in his aunt's case and believes it should run its ordinary course.
Onyango helped care for the president's half brothers and sister while living with Barack Obama Sr. in Kenya. She moved to the United States in 2000 and applied for asylum in 2002, but her request was rejected and she was ordered deported in 2004.
However, she did not leave the country and continued to live in public housing in Boston. She had been a health care volunteer but not since her status became public. She refused to discuss how she affords to live now or who is paying for her attorney.
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Onyango said she previously had no trouble visiting Obama when he was a state senator in Illinois or after he became a U.S. senator, though she declined to discuss details of how often she had contact with Obama and his family. Her tiny apartment in a modest subsidized public housing complex for seniors and the disabled is adorned with photographs of her with Obama at the Illinois Statehouse, the president's official portrait, his family, the inauguration, her children and African wildlife.
She is disabled and learning to walk again after being paralyzed for more than three months because of an autoimmune disorder called Guillain-Barre syndrome.
Her status as an illegal alien was revealed in October 2008, days before Obama was elected. Obama said he did not know his aunt was living in the U.S. illegally and said he believes the law should be followed.
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A judge agreed to suspend Onyango's deportation order in December and reopened her asylum case. A hearing will be held in February, when Onyango can present her reasons for seeking asylum. The judge will then decide if she will be deported.
Her attorney, Margaret Wong, said Onyango first applied for asylum because of violence in Kenya, an East African nation fractured by cycles of electoral violence every five years. People who seek asylum must show that they face persecution in their homeland on the basis of religion, race, nationality, political opinion or membership in a social group.
Immigration experts say Onyango's relationship to the president could strengthen her claim that she would be subjected to danger at home.
Onyango declined to discuss the details of her case, citing the pending appeal.
She became angry when discussing Obama's half brother who wrote a semi-autobiographical novel about the abusive Kenyan father he shares with the president. She called Mark Ndesandjo, who lives in China, an opportunist eager to capitalize on his famous brother.
Ndesandjo, who wrote "Nairobi to Shenzhen," did not grow up with Obama. He has said he wrote the book in part to raise awareness of domestic violence. But Onyango said she was Ndesandjo's baby sitter while living with his father and never witnessed any abuse.
"He was only strict and argumentative, motivating one to do the best," she said, acknowledging that in those days in Kenya, "It was politically correct to slap children to discipline them just as it was done elsewhere in the world."
She said Ndesandjo's claims against a man who died 27 years ago are unfair. The senior Obama had problems with alcohol and was difficult to live with sometimes because of his frustration over years of political persecution, but he wasn't a child abuser or wife beater, Onyango said.
She also denounced persistent allegations that Obama is not a natural-born American citizen, saying that she is angered by the "outrageous, absurd, calculated conspiratory claim" that he was born outside the United States and is ineligible to be president. She recalled receiving a letter and photos from Obama's father announcing his son's birth in Hawaii.
Onyango reserved special words of kindness for former President George W. Bush for a directive he put in place days before the election requiring federal agents get high-level approval to arrest fugitive immigrants, which directly affected Onyango. The directive made clear that U.S. officials worried about possible election implications of arresting Onyango.
She said she wants to thank Bush in person for the order, which gave her a measure of peace but was lifted weeks later.
"I loved President Bush," Onyango said while moving toward a framed photo of Bush and his wife standing with Barack and Michelle Obama at the White House on inauguration day. "He is my No. 1 man in my life because he helped me when I really needed that help."
Keep up the good work trolling the non-stories, d.
Irvine511
Blue Crack Supplier
a nontroversy, indeed.
VintagePunk
Blue Crack Distributor
The pictures he chose to illustrate his point, surly Obama, and bright, shining Bush. 
MrsSpringsteen
Blue Crack Addict
The pictures he chose to illustrate his point, surly Obama, and bright, shining Bush.
We just don't get things around here so we need pictures to bring it down to our level so we do
Let's see if I can do it...
Irvine511
Blue Crack Supplier
let's not forget ...
MrsSpringsteen
Blue Crack Addict
Love the shirts
OP
OP
diamond
ONE love, blood, life
Mere novices....
AliEnvy
Refugee
An Open Letter to President Obama from Michael Moore | MichaelMoore.com
November 30th, 2009 3:44 AM
An Open Letter to President Obama from Michael Moore
Dear President Obama,
Do you really want to be the new "war president"? If you go to West Point tomorrow night (Tuesday, 8pm) and announce that you are increasing, rather than withdrawing, the troops in Afghanistan, you are the new war president. Pure and simple. And with that you will do the worst possible thing you could do -- destroy the hopes and dreams so many millions have placed in you. With just one speech tomorrow night you will turn a multitude of young people who were the backbone of your campaign into disillusioned cynics. You will teach them what they've always heard is true -- that all politicians are alike. I simply can't believe you're about to do what they say you are going to do. Please say it isn't so.
It is not your job to do what the generals tell you to do. We are a civilian-run government. WE tell the Joint Chiefs what to do, not the other way around. That's the way General Washington insisted it must be. That's what President Truman told General MacArthur when MacArthur wanted to invade China. "You're fired!," said Truman, and that was that. And you should have fired Gen. McChrystal when he went to the press to preempt you, telling the press what YOU had to do. Let me be blunt: We love our kids in the armed services, but we f*#&in' hate these generals, from Westmoreland in Vietnam to, yes, even Colin Powell for lying to the UN with his made-up drawings of WMD (he has since sought redemption).
So now you feel backed into a corner. 30 years ago this past Thursday (Thanksgiving) the Soviet generals had a cool idea -- "Let's invade Afghanistan!" Well, that turned out to be the final nail in the USSR coffin.
There's a reason they don't call Afghanistan the "Garden State" (though they probably should, seeing how the corrupt President Karzai, whom we back, has his brother in the heroin trade raising poppies). Afghanistan's nickname is the "Graveyard of Empires." If you don't believe it, give the British a call. I'd have you call Genghis Khan but I lost his number. I do have Gorbachev's number though. It's + 41 22 789 1662. I'm sure he could give you an earful about the historic blunder you're about to commit.
With our economic collapse still in full swing and our precious young men and women being sacrificed on the altar of arrogance and greed, the breakdown of this great civilization we call America will head, full throttle, into oblivion if you become the "war president." Empires never think the end is near, until the end is here. Empires think that more evil will force the heathens to toe the line -- and yet it never works. The heathens usually tear them to shreds.
Choose carefully, President Obama. You of all people know that it doesn't have to be this way. You still have a few hours to listen to your heart, and your own clear thinking. You know that nothing good can come from sending more troops halfway around the world to a place neither you nor they understand, to achieve an objective that neither you nor they understand, in a country that does not want us there. You can feel it in your bones.
I know you know that there are LESS than a hundred al-Qaeda left in Afghanistan! A hundred thousand troops trying to crush a hundred guys living in caves? Are you serious? Have you drunk Bush's Kool-Aid? I refuse to believe it.
Your potential decision to expand the war (while saying that you're doing it so you can "end the war") will do more to set your legacy in stone than any of the great things you've said and done in your first year. One more throwing a bone from you to the Republicans and the coalition of the hopeful and the hopeless may be gone -- and this nation will be back in the hands of the haters quicker than you can shout "tea bag!"
Choose carefully, Mr. President. Your corporate backers are going to abandon you as soon as it is clear you are a one-term president and that the nation will be safely back in the hands of the usual idiots who do their bidding. That could be Wednesday morning.
We the people still love you. We the people still have a sliver of hope. But we the people can't take it anymore. We can't take your caving in, over and over, when we elected you by a big, wide margin of millions to get in there and get the job done. What part of "landslide victory" don't you understand?
Don't be deceived into thinking that sending a few more troops into Afghanistan will make a difference, or earn you the respect of the haters. They will not stop until this country is torn asunder and every last dollar is extracted from the poor and soon-to-be poor. You could send a million troops over there and the crazy Right still wouldn't be happy. You would still be the victim of their incessant venom on hate radio and television because no matter what you do, you can't change the one thing about yourself that sends them over the edge.
The haters were not the ones who elected you, and they can't be won over by abandoning the rest of us.
President Obama, it's time to come home. Ask your neighbors in Chicago and the parents of the young men and women doing the fighting and dying if they want more billions and more troops sent to Afghanistan. Do you think they will say, "No, we don't need health care, we don't need jobs, we don't need homes. You go on ahead, Mr. President, and send our wealth and our sons and daughters overseas, 'cause we don't need them, either."
What would Martin Luther King, Jr. do? What would your grandmother do? Not send more poor people to kill other poor people who pose no threat to them, that's what they'd do. Not spend billions and trillions to wage war while American children are sleeping on the streets and standing in bread lines.
All of us that voted and prayed for you and cried the night of your victory have endured an Orwellian hell of eight years of crimes committed in our name: torture, rendition, suspension of the bill of rights, invading nations who had not attacked us, blowing up neighborhoods that Saddam "might" be in (but never was), slaughtering wedding parties in Afghanistan. We watched as hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians were slaughtered and tens of thousands of our brave young men and women were killed, maimed, or endured mental anguish -- the full terror of which we scarcely know.
When we elected you we didn't expect miracles. We didn't even expect much change. But we expected some. We thought you would stop the madness. Stop the killing. Stop the insane idea that men with guns can reorganize a nation that doesn't even function as a nation and never, ever has.
Stop, stop, stop! For the sake of the lives of young Americans and Afghan civilians, stop. For the sake of your presidency, hope, and the future of our nation, stop. For God's sake, stop.
Tonight we still have hope.
Tomorrow, we shall see. The ball is in your court. You DON'T have to do this. You can be a profile in courage. You can be your mother's son.
We're counting on you.
Yours,
Michael Moore
November 30th, 2009 3:44 AM
An Open Letter to President Obama from Michael Moore
Dear President Obama,
Do you really want to be the new "war president"? If you go to West Point tomorrow night (Tuesday, 8pm) and announce that you are increasing, rather than withdrawing, the troops in Afghanistan, you are the new war president. Pure and simple. And with that you will do the worst possible thing you could do -- destroy the hopes and dreams so many millions have placed in you. With just one speech tomorrow night you will turn a multitude of young people who were the backbone of your campaign into disillusioned cynics. You will teach them what they've always heard is true -- that all politicians are alike. I simply can't believe you're about to do what they say you are going to do. Please say it isn't so.
It is not your job to do what the generals tell you to do. We are a civilian-run government. WE tell the Joint Chiefs what to do, not the other way around. That's the way General Washington insisted it must be. That's what President Truman told General MacArthur when MacArthur wanted to invade China. "You're fired!," said Truman, and that was that. And you should have fired Gen. McChrystal when he went to the press to preempt you, telling the press what YOU had to do. Let me be blunt: We love our kids in the armed services, but we f*#&in' hate these generals, from Westmoreland in Vietnam to, yes, even Colin Powell for lying to the UN with his made-up drawings of WMD (he has since sought redemption).
So now you feel backed into a corner. 30 years ago this past Thursday (Thanksgiving) the Soviet generals had a cool idea -- "Let's invade Afghanistan!" Well, that turned out to be the final nail in the USSR coffin.
There's a reason they don't call Afghanistan the "Garden State" (though they probably should, seeing how the corrupt President Karzai, whom we back, has his brother in the heroin trade raising poppies). Afghanistan's nickname is the "Graveyard of Empires." If you don't believe it, give the British a call. I'd have you call Genghis Khan but I lost his number. I do have Gorbachev's number though. It's + 41 22 789 1662. I'm sure he could give you an earful about the historic blunder you're about to commit.
With our economic collapse still in full swing and our precious young men and women being sacrificed on the altar of arrogance and greed, the breakdown of this great civilization we call America will head, full throttle, into oblivion if you become the "war president." Empires never think the end is near, until the end is here. Empires think that more evil will force the heathens to toe the line -- and yet it never works. The heathens usually tear them to shreds.
Choose carefully, President Obama. You of all people know that it doesn't have to be this way. You still have a few hours to listen to your heart, and your own clear thinking. You know that nothing good can come from sending more troops halfway around the world to a place neither you nor they understand, to achieve an objective that neither you nor they understand, in a country that does not want us there. You can feel it in your bones.
I know you know that there are LESS than a hundred al-Qaeda left in Afghanistan! A hundred thousand troops trying to crush a hundred guys living in caves? Are you serious? Have you drunk Bush's Kool-Aid? I refuse to believe it.
Your potential decision to expand the war (while saying that you're doing it so you can "end the war") will do more to set your legacy in stone than any of the great things you've said and done in your first year. One more throwing a bone from you to the Republicans and the coalition of the hopeful and the hopeless may be gone -- and this nation will be back in the hands of the haters quicker than you can shout "tea bag!"
Choose carefully, Mr. President. Your corporate backers are going to abandon you as soon as it is clear you are a one-term president and that the nation will be safely back in the hands of the usual idiots who do their bidding. That could be Wednesday morning.
We the people still love you. We the people still have a sliver of hope. But we the people can't take it anymore. We can't take your caving in, over and over, when we elected you by a big, wide margin of millions to get in there and get the job done. What part of "landslide victory" don't you understand?
Don't be deceived into thinking that sending a few more troops into Afghanistan will make a difference, or earn you the respect of the haters. They will not stop until this country is torn asunder and every last dollar is extracted from the poor and soon-to-be poor. You could send a million troops over there and the crazy Right still wouldn't be happy. You would still be the victim of their incessant venom on hate radio and television because no matter what you do, you can't change the one thing about yourself that sends them over the edge.
The haters were not the ones who elected you, and they can't be won over by abandoning the rest of us.
President Obama, it's time to come home. Ask your neighbors in Chicago and the parents of the young men and women doing the fighting and dying if they want more billions and more troops sent to Afghanistan. Do you think they will say, "No, we don't need health care, we don't need jobs, we don't need homes. You go on ahead, Mr. President, and send our wealth and our sons and daughters overseas, 'cause we don't need them, either."
What would Martin Luther King, Jr. do? What would your grandmother do? Not send more poor people to kill other poor people who pose no threat to them, that's what they'd do. Not spend billions and trillions to wage war while American children are sleeping on the streets and standing in bread lines.
All of us that voted and prayed for you and cried the night of your victory have endured an Orwellian hell of eight years of crimes committed in our name: torture, rendition, suspension of the bill of rights, invading nations who had not attacked us, blowing up neighborhoods that Saddam "might" be in (but never was), slaughtering wedding parties in Afghanistan. We watched as hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians were slaughtered and tens of thousands of our brave young men and women were killed, maimed, or endured mental anguish -- the full terror of which we scarcely know.
When we elected you we didn't expect miracles. We didn't even expect much change. But we expected some. We thought you would stop the madness. Stop the killing. Stop the insane idea that men with guns can reorganize a nation that doesn't even function as a nation and never, ever has.
Stop, stop, stop! For the sake of the lives of young Americans and Afghan civilians, stop. For the sake of your presidency, hope, and the future of our nation, stop. For God's sake, stop.
Tonight we still have hope.
Tomorrow, we shall see. The ball is in your court. You DON'T have to do this. You can be a profile in courage. You can be your mother's son.
We're counting on you.
Yours,
Michael Moore
INDY500
Rock n' Roll Doggie Band-aid
For ignoring the Micheal Moores in his party and doing the right thing tonight, I'll give the president a
OP
OP
diamond
ONE love, blood, life
Actually I found a nugget in here to help your side, but you must of missed it and resorted to another tact.
Here's the nugget:
Being fair and balanced I thought this should be posted and about nullify the birther movement.
<>
So how many people here in "Little San Francisco" agree with Barack Obama rather than Michael Moore on Afghanistan?
I'm amazed at how silent "Little San Francisco" is on the night of President Obama's biggest Foreign Policy and National Security speech as President. INDY500 is the first and only person to offer a comment.
I thought the speech was good and I hope it convinces Americans who's support for the war in Afghanistan was starting to waver. But there were some obvious little attempts in the speech to placate the liberal wing of his party which I think includes many people in this forum.
Its clear that Barack Obama has learned much over the past year about national security and he is far removed from the Barack Obama who opposed the surge in Iraq in January 2007. He is light years from the Michael Moores nut case idea's on Afghanistan and US foreign Policy.
Michael Moore also opposed United States military intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo which saved the lives of millions of people.
Barack Obama today clearly has far more in common with George Bush than Michael Moore when it comes to his views on US foreign Policy.
AliEnvy
Refugee
VintagePunk
Blue Crack Distributor
So how many people here in "Little San Francisco" agree with Barack Obama rather than Michael Moore on Afghanistan?
I'm amazed at how silent "Little San Francisco" is on the night of President Obama's biggest Foreign Policy and National Security speech as President. INDY500 is the first and only person to offer a comment.
I thought the speech was good and I hope it convinces Americans who's support for the war in Afghanistan was starting to waver. But there were some obvious little attempts in the speech to placate the liberal wing of his party which I think includes many people in this forum.
Its clear that Barack Obama has learned much over the past year about national security and he is far removed from the Barack Obama who opposed the surge in Iraq in January 2007. He is light years from the Michael Moores nut case idea's on Afghanistan and US foreign Policy.
Michael Moore also opposed United States military intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo which saved the lives of millions of people.
Barack Obama today clearly has far more in common with George Bush than Michael Moore when it comes to his views on US foreign Policy.
I'm one of the leftiest of the lefties here and I wholeheartedly agree with what Obama is doing. In fact, during the campaign, I said that pulling out of Iraq too soon would be a huge mistake, that after Bush's fuck up by starting the misguided war in the first place, the US owes it to the Iraqi people not to pull out until security is restored - the Pottery Barn rule.
Now, Obama is doing what should have been done in the first place, by taking care of matters in Afghanistan, something that many liberals, myself included, and many nations, would have endorsed at the time. It's clearly what Bush should have done in the first place. Every time I see on the news that another Canadian soldier has been killed, which happens way too frequently, I curse Bush for his idiocy. If Bush had concentrated his efforts where he should have in the first place, it would be over by now, and most, if not all of the troops would be home.
So, to paint all Liberals with an anti-war brush is wrong. I don't think there are many that would dispute the need to go into Afghanistan, it's the trumped up reasons for going into Iraq that most take issue with.
BVS
Blue Crack Supplier
Sting hovering over "little San Francisco":
Well, most Democrats including Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton supported removing Saddam from power back in 2003. The Persian Gulf is a much more secure place today with Saddam removed from power and it would be rather difficult to argue that the region and the world would be better off if Saddam were still the leader of Iraq.
Obama clearly stated in his speech that as President, he does not have the luxury of just concentrating on one problem at a time. Bush did not have the luxury of simply concentrating on just Afghanistan. There were other security needs and problems. In addition, much of the reason that the Taliban is currently resurgent has to do with the safe area's in Pakistan where they were allowed to rebuild, the primitive and undeveloped nature of Afghanistan society, and much less to do with a lack of US supplied resources for Afghanistan during the Bush years.
It is not at all clear that a more concentrated effort during the Bush years in Afghanistan would have meant that all troops would be home now and the situation would no longer be a problem. Afghanistans problems, what was accomplished there during the Bush years, and why the Taliban is now resurgent is complex and involves many different factors.
Current polls show that 60% to 70% of registered Democrats are against the War in Afghanistan and do not support the troop surge in Afghanistan. Hopefully, Obama's speech will bring those numbers down. But people like Michael Moore who seem to live in their little own fantasy world will probably never be convinced.
The anti-war push has almost always nearly exclusively come from liberals. Despite what happened on 9/11, 60% to 70% of Democrats oppose the Afghanistan war and oppose the troop surge. It will be interesting to see if Obama's speech put a dent in any of those poll numbers.
"Little San Francisco" is still unusually silent after this speech.
BVS
Blue Crack Supplier
Well, I think you mean your perception of "LSF" has been squashed.
Some of us understand the nuances and the gray areas between ideals and reality.
VintagePunk
Blue Crack Distributor
I've watched for years as you've attempted to justify Bush's actions, to the extent now that when I see you've posted, I mostly just scroll right on past, because I know your arguments off by heart.
I could very easily counter argue everything that you just said, but it would be a waste of my time. I know what happened, and as time passes, the evidence piles up on the side of the Liberals, period. Now, Obama has to go and clean up another of Bush's messes. Same shit, different day.
Irvine511
Blue Crack Supplier
you need to stop with your thoughtful, nuanced perspective that makes sweeping characterizations like "little San Francisco" impossible to sustain. the only way STING can talk about anything is if he constructs non-existent strawmen and imaginary opposition to his positions, as well as fabrications about what Obama has and has not said.
please, stop.
Irvine511
Blue Crack Supplier
VintagePunk
Blue Crack Distributor
Irvine511
Blue Crack Supplier
san francisco is also a really awesome city and most people would kill to live there and it has a huge quality of life. so the slams seem kind of insane.
would you rather live in "little Topeka, KS"?
would you rather live in "little Topeka, KS"?
Maybe members of Little San Francisco have independently functioning brains and are able to think critically about events rather than being sheeple. This is an unfortunate by-product of liberal elitism, of course.
Well, I don't see any evidence that it would have been better to keep Saddam in power in Iraq, that Kuwait, Saudi Arabia would be safer today with Saddam in power, or that the Iraqi people would be better off with Saddam in power. If you want to argue for Saddam, go ahead, but the evidence continues to show that it was necessary to remove him from power for the security of the region and the world.
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