martha
Blue Crack Supplier
A_Wanderer said:
The funniest thing would be if Sting2 turned out to be right
Never underestimate the fickleness and the idiocy of America voters.
A_Wanderer said:
The funniest thing would be if Sting2 turned out to be right
Irvine511 said:McCain is enjoying a grace period.
we'll see what happens in the general.
there's no question, he was, by far, the smartest GOP nominee out of that field.
Irvine511 said:McCain is enjoying a grace period.
Sen. John McCain, traveling in the Middle East to promote his foreign policy expertise, misidentified in remarks Tuesday which broad category of Iraqi extremists are allegedly receiving support from Iran.
He said several times that Iran, a predominately Shiite country, was supplying the mostly Sunni militant group, al-Qaeda. In fact, officials have said they believe Iran is helping Shiite extremists in Iraq.
Speaking to reporters in Amman, the Jordanian capital, McCain said he and two Senate colleagues traveling with him continue to be concerned about Iranian operatives "taking al-Qaeda into Iran, training them and sending them back."
Pressed to elaborate, McCain said it was "common knowledge and has been reported in the media that al-Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran, that's well known. And it's unfortunate." A few moments later, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, standing just behind McCain, stepped forward and whispered in the presidential candidate's ear. McCain then said: "I'm sorry, the Iranians are training extremists, not al-Qaeda."
The mistake threatened to undermine McCain's argument that his decades of foreign policy experience make him the natural choice to lead a country at war with terrorists. In recent days, McCain has repeatedly said his intimate knowledge of foreign policy make him the best equipped to answer a phone ringing in the White House late at night.
Irvine511 said:
there's no question, he was, by far, the smartest GOP nominee out of that field.
deep said:
the whole rap on him,
that he is fly off the handle wacko
has been put to bed
anitram said:
If Obama had said this, people would be up in arms over his lack of foreign policy knowledge...
Irvine511 said:but let's remember,
general elections are between two individuals. it's a choice that people make between two candidates.
Obama is also the only candidate who a majority of Americans -- roughly 60 percent -- say does not have the right experience to be president
That number is significantly higher than the 31 percent who say the same for McCain.
Irvine511 said:
he was the only electable candidate out of that bunch.
If there were an election for President of the United States today, and the only two names on the ballot were Republican John McCain and ... Democrat Hillary Clinton, who would you vote for?
48% McCain
46% Clinton
6% Undecided
What if it was John McCain against Democrat Barack Obama?
53% McCain
39% Obama
9% Undecided
Anderson Cooper:
“How badly do you think this has– has damaged you? Obviously you’ve been taking it very seriously over the last couple days. I mean, you’ve been very available to the media. You made this speech yesterday. How much has it hurt? ‘National Review online’ says, you know, bottom line, will the speech help you win white working-class voters?”
Sen. Barack Obama:
“Well, you– you know– one of the things I said early on in this campaign was if– if I was just running the textbook campaign– doing the conventional thing, I probably wasn’t gonna win because Senator Clinton was gonna be much more capable of doing that than I would be. We had tremendous success– and I think we were starting to get a little comfortable and conventional right before Texas and Ohio. And, you know, in– in some ways this– this controversy has actually shaken me up a little bit and gotten me back into remembering that– the odds of me getting elected have always been– lower than– than some of the other conventional candidates…”
if I was just running the textbook campaign– doing the conventional thing,
I probably wasn’t gonna win because Senator Clinton was gonna be much more capable of doing that than I would be.
During visits to the Middle East in December 2002, Hagel said, Israel's top security officials asked, "Do you really understand what you are getting yourselves into?"
Hagel said Bush personally assured him that he would exhaust diplomatic avenues before committing troops to Iraq. The senator said he voted for the war resolution based on those assurances, but regrets the vote because it's now clear that lawmakers were presented with lies and wishful thinking.
Last year, Hagel was the only member of his party on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to support a nonbinding measure critical of Bush's decision to dispatch an additional 30,000 troops to Iraq.
"There is no strategy. This is a pingpong game with American lives," Hagel said at the time.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/20/hagel-us-may-need-new-po_n_92512.html
phanan said:I'm surprised Obama is taking such a beating lately.
Richardson endorses Obama
Hispanic governor says presidential hopeful a 'once-in-a-lifetime leader'
The Associated Press
updated 9:02 a.m. ET, Fri., March. 21, 2008
SANTA FE, New Mexico - New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, the nation's only Hispanic governor, is endorsing Sen. Barack Obama for president, calling him a "once-in-a- lifetime leader" who can unite the nation and restore America's international leadership.
Richardson, who dropped out of the Democratic race in January, is to appear with Obama on Friday at a campaign event in Portland, Ore., The Associated Press has learned.
The governor's endorsement comes as Obama leads among delegates selected at primaries and caucuses but with national public opinion polling showing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton pulling ahead of him amid controversy over statements by his former pastor.
Richardson has been relentlessly wooed by Obama and Clinton for his endorsement. As a Democratic superdelegate, the governor plays a part in the tight race for nominating votes and could bring other superdelegates to Obama's side. He also has been mentioned as a potential running mate for either candidate.
No primaries are scheduled until Pennsylvania's on April 22, a gap in time Obama hopes to use for such announcements to assert that he is the front-runner for the nomination.
'Once-in-a-lifetime leader'
"I believe he is the kind of once-in-a-lifetime leader that can bring our nation together and restore America's moral leadership in the world," Richardson said in a statement obtained by the AP. "As a presidential candidate, I know full well Sen. Obama's unique moral ability to inspire the American people to confront our urgent challenges at home and abroad in a spirit of bipartisanship and reconciliation."
Richardson's endorsement also could help Obama pick up support among Hispanics, who are the nation's largest and fastest-growing minority.
Clinton has been the favorite of Hispanics in primaries and caucuses, according to exit polls. She won the New Mexico caucus in early February with a nearly 2-to-1 advantage among Hispanics.
Richardson backed Obama despite his ties to Clinton and her husband, the former president. He served as ambassador to the U.N. and as secretary of the Energy Department during the Clinton administration. Last month, Richardson and former President Clinton watched the Super Bowl together at the governor's residence in Santa Fe.
Clinton a 'distinguished leader'
Richardson praised Hillary Clinton as a "distinguished leader with vast experience." But the governor said Obama "will be a historic and great president, who can bring us the change we so desperately need by bringing us together as a nation here at home and with our allies abroad."
Richardson was a roving diplomatic troubleshooter when he was a congressman from New Mexico, negotiating the release of U.S. hostages in several countries and meeting with a rogue's gallery of U.S. adversaries, including Saddam Hussein and Fidel Castro.
"There is no doubt in my mind that Barack Obama has the judgment and courage we need in a commander in chief when our nation's security is on the line. He showed this judgment by opposing the Iraq war from the start, and he has show it during this campaign by standing up for a new era in American leadership internationally," Richardson said.
Obama said he was "deeply honored" to have Richardson's support.
"Whether it's fighting to end the Iraq war or stop the genocide in Darfur or prevent nuclear weapons from falling into the hands of terrorists, Gov. Richardson has been a powerful voice on issues of global security, peace and justice, earning five Nobel Peace Prize nominations," Obama said in a statement.
© 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23740104/
2 fired over Obama passport breach
Third employee at State disciplined over accessing candidate’s records
NBC News and news services
updated 9:19 a.m. ET, Fri., March. 21, 2008
The State Department says it is trying to determine whether three contract workers had a political motive for looking at Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's passport file.
Two of the employees were fired for the security breach and the third was disciplined but is still working, the department said Thursday night. It would not release the names of those who were fired and disciplined or the names of the two companies for which they worked. The department's inspector general is investigating.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that for now it appears that nothing other than "imprudent curiosity" was involved in three separate breaches of the Illinois senator's personal information, "but we are taking steps to reassure ourselves that that is, in fact, the case."
'Outrageous breach of security'
It is not clear whether the employees saw anything other than the basic personal data such as name, citizenship, age and place of birth that is required when a person fills out a passport application.
Bill Burton, a spokesman for Obama's presidential campaign, called for a complete investigation.
"This is an outrageous breach of security and privacy, even from an administration that has shown little regard for either over the last eight years," Burton said. "Our government's duty is to protect the private information of the American people, not use it for political purposes."
"This is a serious matter that merits a complete investigation, and we demand to know who looked at Senator Obama's passport file, for what purpose and why it took so long for them to reveal this security breach," he said.
Dealt with at the office level
The breaches occurred on Jan. 9, Feb. 21 and March 14 and were detected by internal State Department computer checks, McCormack said. The department's top management officer, Undersecretary Patrick Kennedy, said certain records, including those of high-profile people, are "flagged" with a computer tag that tips off supervisors when someone tries to view the records without a proper reason.
The firings and unspecified discipline of the third employee already had occurred when senior State Department officials learned of the breaches. Kennedy called that a failing.
"I will fully acknowledge this information should have been passed up the line," Kennedy told reporters in a conference call Thursday night. "It was dealt with at the office level."
In answer to a question, Kennedy said the department doesn't look into political affiliation in doing background checks on passport workers. "Now that this has arisen, this becomes a germane question, and that will be something for the appropriate investigation to look into," he said.
The department informed Obama's Senate office of the breach on Thursday. Kennedy said that at the office's request, he will provide a personal briefing for the senator's staff on Friday. No one from the State Department spoke to Obama personally on Thursday, the officials said.
Obama was born in Hawaii and lived in Indonesia for several years as a child before returning to the United States. As a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he has traveled to the Middle East; the former Soviet states with Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind.; and Africa, where in 2006 he and his wife, Michelle, publicly took HIV tests in Kenya to encourage people there to do the same.
Obama's father was born in Kenya, and the senator still has relatives there.
Previous incident
The disclosure of inappropriate passport inquiries recalled an incident in 1992, when a Republican political appointee at the State Department was demoted over a search of presidential candidate Bill Clinton's passport records. At the time he was challenging President George H.W. Bush.
The State Department's inspector general said the official had helped arrange the search in an attempt to find politically damaging information about Clinton, who had been rumored to have considered renouncing his citizenship to avoid the Vietnam War draft.
The State Department said the official, Steven Berry, had shown "serious lapses in judgment."
After a three-year, $2.2 million probe, a federal independent counsel exonerated officials in the incident, saying that while some of the actions investigated were "stupid, dumb and partisan," they were not criminal. The independent counsel also said that Berry and others who were disciplined for their involvement were treated unfairly.
Doug Hattaway, a spokesman for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady who is challenging Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination, said of the current breach: "It's outrageous and the Bush administration has to get to the bottom of it."
Kennedy and McCormack said it was too soon to say whether a crime was committed. The searches may violate the federal Privacy Act, and Kennedy said he is consulting State Department lawyers.
The State Department inspector general's power is limited because two of the employees are no longer working for the department. McCormack said it was premature to consider whether the FBI or Justice Department should be involved.
McCormack said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was informed of the breaches on Thursday.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23736254/
Clinton: Legitimacy of nominee at stake
Posted: Thursday, March 20, 2008 2:45 PM by Mark Murray
From NBC/NJ's Athena Jones
TERRE HAUTE, IN -- Clinton kept the pressure on Obama for another day, urging him to sign on to a re-vote in Michigan and saying not re-doing primaries there and in Florida would call into question the legitimacy of the ultimate nominee.
"I went to Michigan yesterday because I feel so strongly that it is not in the best interests of our party or our chances for victory in November to deny the rights of the people of Florida and Michigan. I do not see how two of our largest and most significant states can be disenfranchised and left out of the process of picking our nominee without raising serious questions about the legitimacy of that nominee," she told reporters after a roundtable at a diner. "So again I would call on Sen. Obama to join me in supporting the rights of the people of Michigan and Florida to have their voices and their votes counted."
She said she would support finding a way to seat the two states' delegates regardless of the outcome. "I would be in favor of fixing this problem no matter what my position," she said. "I have been consistently in favor of it. Remember, I'm the one who kept my name on the ballot. I had no idea what the outcome would be. I did not run advertising in Florida. I abided by the rules and did not campaign in Florida. I didn't know what the outcome would be."
Clinton suggested Obama was afraid to have a re-vote. "For the life of me, I don't understand why Sen. Obama seems to be afraid of letting there be a re-vote in Michigan," she said.
diamond said:I see 3 psychologically abused spouses; one has moved forward; another is stilled trapped in a her relationship; and one has sacrificed her dignity in a quest for power, inadvertently making her gender tolerate more of the same; therefore universally amd unwittingly bringing her gender down.
In all, all 3 have been abused in one way or another.
dbs