Is Obama A Hypocrite?

Gee, who or what led Drudge to dig this up today and re-link it? But fair is fair, I suppose. And, in hindsight, Obama wasn't very fair to Imus. Obama was one of the first to call for Imus' firing from MSNBC. Maybe he should have let him just give a speech, instead?

April 11, 2007 -- "I understand MSNBC has suspended Mr. Imus," Obama told ABC News, "but I would also say that there's nobody on my staff who would still be working for me if they made a comment like that about anybody of any ethnic group. And I would hope that NBC ends up having that same attitude."

Comments

[seekeronos]

"--- All roads lead to popular sovereignty , the fate of all nations since the Enlightenment. What you describe is a new Dark Age. I just don't see it. Man's destiny is to progress, not fall back into Ignorance, Intolerance and Tyranny. ---"

I was all prepared to go into a small dissertation into how current events and how Russia and Red China's roles as the Shanghai Pact may mesh very well with Bible prophesies concerning the coming Gog/Magog "king of the North" who attack Israel, followed by horrific (Russian) losses, and China along with Iran and other Asian powers (possibly India and the other Shanghai pact members fulfilling the role of the "kings of the east") occupying Iraq and moving into Saudi Arabia via Iraq and Kuwait.. but this is not practical to understanding the reasons why these events are likely to come about.

To the point, mankind is generally inclined to do evil -- thatis, we are all wretched, vile sinners. This is why we need someone greater than us, in the person of the only perfect Man who ever lived - 100% Man, and 100% God, Jesus of Nazareth.

Without Christ, we are all geared toward dwelling in darkness, ignorance, intolerance and tyranny.

Mind you, the Enlightenment did not happen in a vacuum. Behind some of it was the Protestant Reformation, which had likely given rise to thinking outside of the Roman See's box.

The Enlightenment bore two children in particular - Socialism and Libertarianism.

Libertarianism, or perhaps more accurately, "classic liberalism", took deep root in the newborn United States, and was influenced strongly by the sound faith of many of the Founding Fathers as well as the generation or two following them. It is ingrained throughout the U.S. Constitution, and especially so in the Bill of Rights. Furthermore, it allows, and perhaps even encourages the observance of, and worship of Deity, albeit not through state interference.

Socialism, on the other hand, took deep root in Europe as a revolution against the entrenched elite classes of the former feudal/Papal rule, especially in France, and by partial co-option in the parts of the Holy Roman Empire that would later emerge as Prussia. It would morph into Communism in other states, and into "social democracy" in still others, as Papal authority and state-established Protestant ecclesiastic authority were rolled back. In its extreme form, it enshrines atheism with a vigor once reserved for the Spanish Inquisition's desire to eradicate any faith not aligned with Rome.

Of course, the depredations of two world wars, postwar institutional "democratic socialism", and the effects of the Cold War cemented the impression of (practically limited) popular sovereignty whilst heralding it as the ultimate achievement of man; the effects of the wars also helped in no small way to be heap the last bit of dirt atop the coffin of both state and private Christianity in Europe, buried alongside the remains of so many murdered Jews.

We see the fruits of this even now: Socialist, faith-dead Europe ready to be hewn to pieces by the sword of Islam.

The so-thought popular sovereignty of many European states is very much in jeopardy.

As for us, we do somewhat better than Europe, but not by much socialism is making significant inroads to our destruction.

The overwhelming majority of our children are growing up without a knowledge of Christ, they are taught the fiction of Darwinism and the glories of the socialist state in our schools, and un-holy-wood invades most homes nightly to regale us with the "heroic deeds" of sexually immoral men and slatternly women who open their intimate places for all the world to see, and worse, men and women abandoning their proper affection for the other, and lifting up the practices of Sodom and Gomorrah as some enviably good thing.

Add to that the commoditization of nearly everything to such a degree of surfeiting ("keeping up with the Joneses") that makes people rush to rack up an insurmountable burden of debt, even rushing to debt slavery like lemmings over the cliff, sheep to the slaughtering chute, and ultimately, destitution and destruction as members of the once-majority middle class.

2 Thessalonians 2:7 (KJV) says:
"For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the"way."

Who is the "he that letteth"? Most Bible scholars believe that this refers to the Holy Spirit, (and for now, I'll avoid the Scofieldist argument that it is the "rapture") that God will remove His hand that restrains the Devil from acting in his full power as the "god" of this world.

I believe that the USA is a key component of this: a post-Christian America will quickly come apart at the seams on point of a severe social crisis, especially with the ethnic diversity we enjoy here. If and when that happens, Russia and China will have a whole lot of room to operate.

I'd like to go on in greater detail, but I need to attend to my business from now... so I'll sum this up by saying that I may very well be wrong in my ideas of who will do what to who and when.

But in the end, Christ will be glorified, He is coming with many terrifying judgments against the unrepentant wicked, and before He returns, America (and the rest of the world) is going to take some seriously nasty lumps. I believe that we are seeing the stage being set for this "lumping" even now.

[dw]

Well, libs have been writing America's obituary as a superpower since the Vietnam debacle, and it remains the only superpower. Economically, even if all the things you say come to pass, how is any country in better shape to weather the storm?

The fact of continued immigration into the US of not only the best and the brightest, but also eager and ambitious people on the lowest rung of the economic ladder will keep America the most vital and growing country in the world. Do you seriously think Russia, with its aging population, or Europe, with worse, is going to be in BETTER shape than the US? Hardly.

Finally, with its technological edge and wealth of research innovation, raw materials, industrial clout, military might and educated population which enjoys a very high standard of living, especially in relation to the rest of world, including very much China and Russia, I really don't see where all your Chicken Little Doomsaying is justified.

Finally, if, God forfend, the US does crash and burn, China and its allies will be damaged terribly in the process, because China's newfound prosperity is largely based on US demand for its products. Yes, the nightmare scenario you paint _might_ be possible, but if it does you are talking Armageddon, because the US economy is too tied to world economy. If we get sick, they die.

In any case, I doubt your prediction will come true. What I do think will happen is Russia will finally hit critical mass, and cave to the inexorable trend throughout the world toward democracy. When it does, it will begin to address internal problems, crushing, overarching internal problems. Russia won't have the money or priorital need to be interfering with other countries, they will have plenty on their own plates.

Chinese totalitarianism will eventually be doomed by its success the same way Russia's will be by its failures. All roads lead to popular sovereignty , the fate of all nations since the Enlightenment. What you describe is a new Dark Age. I just don't see it. Man's destiny is to progress, not fall back into Ignorance, Intolerance and Tyranny.

[seekeronos]

"--- Humorous bit of wishful thinking and America hating from seek there. ---"

Not really, Doc. I love this country, and it grieves me deeply that the possibility exists (thanks in no small to our foolish spending policies and arguably foolish decisions made in connection to the post-Saddam management of Iraq) for us to be displaced from the world stage as the preeminent superpower.

"--- To claim that Russia is now stronger than the USSR in its heyday is risible. ---"

I said no such thing. But I did say that Russia's strength is on the rise. It might be slowed down if internal power struggles develop against Putin's regime or his anointed successor Medvedev, but Putin is old school KGB, and will likely be increasing his soft and his hard power over potential rivals.

"--- Its lost about half its population, and some of its most lucrative and talented population centers at that. Its closely surrounded by new NATO members and highly antagonistic former Warsaw Pact nations instead of a buffer of compliant puppet states. ---"

Not entirely true either. Moscow is certainly in Russian hands, and Kiev, if not in close Russian orbit is definitely within Russia's economic sphere of interest. As are Minsk, Petrograd, and St. Petersburg. Culturally, the former WP nations are much closer to Russian orbit than to say, Germany or France, even if they are somewhat antagonistic to the former Soviet regime, and somewhat to Putin's current regime.

"--- If it does enter into a close alliance with China, which it has done several times in the past, with disasterous results for Russia, it will be as a junior partner, subservient to China's interests ---".

The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, despite the name (given as the city it was founded in just happened to be Shanghai) is a consortium of six nations, Russia, Red China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Russia and China are the senior partners, with the other four more or less generally falling closer to Russian interests, wherein they tend to closely match their own. Further, even if outmatched by Chinese industrial and military might, resource-poor China needs that black gold - which Russia has in abundance.

"--- The line about Saudi's wells running dry and Iraq's shutting off: not true, but even if they were,... ---"

Perhaps not, but the prices we are seeing are not only from inflation of the debased dollar - a lot of it is an honest-to-goodness decrease in production. And Iraq? Unless peace just broke out all over and the pipelines are safe and the pumps over there are running full bore... I somehow doubt that much of Iraq's considerable oil output is making it to the market.

"--- no expert in the world is even hinting that Russia will in any way be in control of most of the world's oil reserves. ---"

Russia has substantial oil reserves, and far greater natural gas reserves. If she starts harvesting the methan caltrates littering the deep floors of the Arctic Ocean and refining that into something usable, she will be in very good shape. With an 11,000 mile coastline up there, she has a lot of tapping around she could do for oil and Nat.Gas. Even without that, Russia could represent a significant military threat in a few decades, especially if she acts in concert with Red China and Iran to seize the remaining middle eastern oil supplies (and steamroll Israel too, for fun and giggles).

"--- In fact, in the coming decades we're likely to see oil replaced as the most important energy commodity, and Russia's lack of technological expertise and research, as opposed to the old USSR, is probably going to leave it as a 3rd world country in terms of quality of life. ---"

Unlikely. There is no other fuel as portable, as full of energy (BTUs) and as efficiently distributed at the present than fossil fuels, especially oil and nat. gas. and this is likely to remain the case for at least the next thirty years.

Hydrogen cells are incredibly expensive, nuclear plants are expensive to build and maintaining the waste isn't very easy, wind farms only work sporadically and in a limited range of sites, and leading solar concentrator or solar thermal towers technology would work best in areas with high exposure to the sun, like deserts. Geothermal is largely limited to nations located on tectonic plate junctions.

Good bets are to concentrate energy production as much as possible, and to combine that with local community solutions to make a more complete grid for electrified cars (which could in turn service compressed air engines - a promising propulsion technology for lightweight passenger vehicles and small vans).

Still, "Oil will remain King™" because of all the products derived from it like plastics, medical goods, fertilizers, and so forth... and locating new sources, and developing new polymers that do not require (as much use of) petrochemicals will be a priority.

"--- We're seeing the death throes of Russia's ability to influence the world stage: they can't even control Ukraine or Georgia. They are facing an encirclement by anti-missile defenses and hostile new NATO members. Can you imagine Russian tanks rolling into Hungary or Czechoslovakia or Afghanistan now? I sure don't. ---"

No, but I could see tanks deployed into Georgia. The Ukraine is less divisive than Georgia (Georgia is much more culturally and ethnically divergent from Russia than is Ukraine, i.e. Ukrainians and Russians are ethnically Slavic, while Georgians have more of an admixture of Hunnic, Turkic, Armenian and Persian bloodlines; many ethnologists consider Georgians to be an ethnicity in their own right).

Russia may not be a superpower _now_, but they have considerable influence in their sphere of economic interest, and still retain many of the weapons systems that were bequeathed to them from the USSR, not to mention the famous Mikoyan-Gurevich and Tupolev design bureau, among many others.

in short, look for Russia's desire for power to increase substantially, along with measurable gains.

"--- China is on the ascendance, but your thesis that Russia is "back and stronger than ever" shows an ignorance about Russian politics. If Russia had continued on its road to free markets and democracy, it might be in a stronger position. As it is, its a corrupt kleptocracy where tyrants steal monies that might have gone into infrastructure, modernization, industry, research. Putin, far from revitalizing Russia, has doomed it to poverty and marginalization for another generation, or until the Russia people finally throw off their oppressors and become part of the EU.

Hell, they can't even afford to subsidize CUBA for any longer, for cripe's sake. ---"

There is more to this than meets the eye though. And once again, my thesis maintains that Russia is well on the road to regaining its place in the sun; I did not claim that it is already so. There were no doubt many kleptocrats and formerly tenured KGB operatives and Party apparatchiks as well as good ol' fashioned organized crime types that gained some political ground in post-Soviet Russia; of these, Putin's faction have emerged as leaders, and Putin as their lord.

As for Cuba, there is no need to subsidize that wreck of a satellite nation; that was an ideological battle wastefully waged by Khrushchev and his successors, as were numerous other former Soviet puppets.

Finally, I'll address my "doomer" remarks concerning the USA:

Yes, we are spendthrifting ourselves into sub-mediocrity.

Yes, we have no idea how to pay the pensions of over 65million retirees who may have placed false hope in FDR's ponzi scheme to keep them afloat. And as my generation moves into retirement, we have little hope of anything being left to "take care of us". Fortunately for some of us, we are well aware that the biggest mistake we can make is to trust in Gub'mint to get things right, and are dutifully setting aside investments for tomorrow.

Yes, we are spread abroad into too many nations' conflicts, defending the borders of nations not necessarily on board with us and our policy (arguably the policies may be wrong), and we are ignoring our own crumbling infrastructure.

So yes, Doc. I will say that we are failing (however slowly and gradually) because we have spending our national treasure fighting the internationalists' wars, funding the international bankers' wealth, and forgetting the things that made us great - the fear of the Lord, respect and love for our neighbours, and making wealth and spending it wisely for our future's sake.

[dw]

Humorous bit of wishful thinking and America hating from seek there.

To claim that Russia is now stronger than the USSR in its heyday is risible.

Its lost about half its population, and some of its most lucrative and talented population centers at that. Its closely surrounded by new NATO members and highly antagonistic former Warsaw Pact nations instead of a buffer of compliant puppet states. If it does enter into a close alliance with China, which it has done several times in the past, with disasterous results for Russia, it will be as a junior partner, subservient to China's interests.

The line about Saudi's wells running dry and Iraq's shutting off: not true, but even if they were, no expert in the world is even hinting that Russia will in any way be in control of most of the world's oil reserves. In fact, in the coming decades we're likely to see oil replaced as the most important energy commodity, and Russia's lack of technological expertise and research, as opposed to the old USSR, is probably going to leave it as a 3rd world country in terms of quality of life.

We're seeing the death throes of Russia's ability to influence the world stage: they can't even control Ukraine or Georgia. They are facing an encirclement by anti-missile defenses and hostile new NATO members. Can you imagine Russian tanks rolling into Hungary or Czechoslovakia or Afghanistan now? I sure don't.

China is on the ascendance, but your thesis that Russia is "back and stronger than ever" shows an ignorance about Russian politics. If Russia had continued on its road to free markets and democracy, it might be in a stronger position. As it is, its a corrupt kleptocracy where tyrants steal monies that might have gone into infrastructure, modernization, industry, research. Putin, far from revitalizing Russia, has doomed it to poverty and marginalization for another generation, or until the Russia people finally throw off their oppressors and become part of the EU.

Hell, they can't even afford to subsidize CUBA for any longer, for cripe's sake.

[seekeronos]

As for Obama... it seems all but fait accompli that Obama is the DP Nominee (if the MSM is to be believed).

Poor old Hils is just milking out the misery in her shrew like way of being a sore loser.

DP? Yes, I'm abbreviating "Democratic Party" to DP, as I find the use of the term "democratic" to describe the mystifying process going on with these SuperDelegates™ to effectively squash the votes of the primary/caucus goers effectively into a "beauty pageant vote" to be a far cry from anything truly "democratic"...

...unless of course, the usage of the term "democratic" and "democracy" is that of the Soviet, Marxist, or Socialist type (c.f. East Germany "German Democratic Republic/Deutsche Demokratische Republik") where the only "democracy" that happens is by those lucky "proletarians" who actually have a voice in the Party™ Politburo.

As for the peon voters... well, they can just go suck on a dry lemon now, no?

Not that I mind, really. I'm hoping Hillary goes into full-on scorched earth mode and completely sabotages both herself and Obama so that whoever is left standing will be an easy target for McCain.

[seekeronos]

"--- The Soviets are back, stronger than ever, Putin just saw to that in the last "election". ---"

A quick review, shall we?

ca. 1990: The Soviet colossus stands astride a nation, nay, an _empire_ spanning eleven time zones, boasting well over 13,000 nuclear tipped missiles, the second largest land army on earth (the first being Red China) and high-technology to boot. Also present (but perhaps less noted) are a wrecked economy, a horrible distribution system, and brutal (although relaxed since the days of Stalin and Khrushchev) repression of any anti-communist thinking.

ca. 1992: The Soviet regime fell, and was replaced by a quasi-entity known as the "Commonwealth of Independent States". Post-Soviet Russia emerges as the leader by sheer mass and force of dint... and collects (most of) the keys to the former USSR's nukes. But the economy is still in a shambles.

1995-2000: Russia goes through the throes of severe economic re-adjustments and no small amount of social disorder on its borders and within its minority ethnic divisions; military is pared down greatly, and much matériel is either mothballed or auctioned off to the Red Chinese, Iraqis, Iran, Syria, etc. etc. to raise income needed to poke around the deep oil and natural gas fields in the eastern oblasts.

2000-2005: Russia slowly builds up a massive stockpile of energy resources, and begins to sell it in earnest to a world rapidly growing more and more hungry for petrofuels; this happily occurs as the first hints that Saudi gushers of oil might be starting to thin down or even stop flowing altogether, to say nothing of Iraqi oil coming to a stop.

2005-present: The restive Russian Bear begins to flex her energized muscles once more, as she lines up partnerships with Red China and Iran and possibly India as a part of a "Shanghai Pact" challenge the waning (and soon to be former) superpower of America.

[Lala]

"President Bush clearly stated that he looked into Putin's soul and found nothing but hugs and newborn kittens."''''

Really? When did he look into his soul? You should brush up on your reading comprehension.

[elixelx]

Until age 22, and before the epiphany under the wing of Jeremiah Wright, was Obama a Barack or a Barry?

I suspect that Barack's father called him Barack! Barack's mother called him Barack! So where and when and how and why did he get the name Barry? Was it from his loving Granma, whom he does not seem to love in return?

"A woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe." See? Forty words declaring her love for him, but no whisper of these four little words "I still love her."

So he went to live with Granma and she probably told him that he had a better chance to amount to something as a Barry rather than as a Barack. He likely agreed wholeheartedly; we have no reports that he found "Barry" abominable or racially abhorrent.

If it is true that Barry's Granma's talk of her fears made him cringe--and I think it's not true--then here, at the speech's most memorable moment, we may see the pathology of Barry/Barack for what it truly is--it is about making the boy Barack into the youth Barry; about making the Barack half cringe while the Barry half agreed; it is about Jeremiah Wright's killing of Barry in order to resurrect Barack; and finally it is about Barack making Granma, who made him Barry, cringe!

And that's why the tone of the speech was so cold, so distant,
so practiced. It was about revenge. That's why, today, Barack didn't get mad; today he got even!

[Fred Beloit]

An article in the WSJ by Shelby Steele explains much of the Obama mystique. (A troll here, who couldn't qualify to make a pimple on Mr Steele's derriere, basely slammed him the other day.) Good read:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120579535818243439.html?mod=todays_us_opinion

[IslamoLlama]

"-- The Soviets are back, stronger than ever, Putin just saw to that in the last "election". --"

That's ridiculous. President Bush clearly stated that he looked into Putin's soul and found nothing but hugs and newborn kittens. Are you suggesting that our Dear Leader has befriended a dirty fucking Commie? Reagen would be turning in his grave at the very idea.

[IslamoLlama]

"--I wonder if IslamoLlama knows that the Berlin wall fell in 1989?--"

I wonder if Capitalist Infidel knows that the Berlin wall is in Germany?

[Capitalist Infidel]

There's a special place in hell for someone who smears their grandmother!

I wonder if IslamoLlama knows that the Berlin wall fell in 1989?

[Chris]

Retire 05,
I'm pretty sure Trent is sockpupetting a moonbat there.

Dan,
Not sure if you're aware but Mark Levin mentioned you on his show today, specifically talking about the BHO quote in this post. I get it on tape delay on the left coast, so just heard it. If you are looking for a good nugget, there's an old quote from Jesse Jackson where he says he's more or less terrified when approached by black kids on the street. Might make for an interesting comparison to what BHO's "racist" grandma said.

Cheers

[retire05]

trentk269, you are sooooo wrong. Wright, until Friday, served on one of the Obama campaign's advisory committees. Until Obama fired him trying to prevent the road from falling out from underneath him.

And what kind of man talks of how his grandmother (who is still alive) loved him with all her heart but she was afraid of black men (making her a racist)? Nevermind that the story of his grandmother is quite different in his book where he talks of how she was almost mugged by a pandhandler but would never tell him that the man was black. He won't throw Wright under the bus, but has no problem throwing granny, who raised him, under the bus? That, my friends, is pure pandering.

[dw]

I don't know if you directly got the idea from me, but in your comments a day or 2 ago I mentioned the "200000523234 minutes Rev. Wright has preached that weren't racist" comment from Obama and wondered if Imus got the benefit of the "racist ratio", since he'd been on for what, 50 years and only made a couple racist comments.

[dw]

I don't know if you directly got the idea from me, but in your comments a day or 2 ago I mentioned the "200000523234 minutes Rev. Wright has preached that weren't racist" comment from Obama and wondered if Imus got the benefit of the "racist ratio", since he'd been on for what, 50 years and only made a couple racist comments.

[joeb]

Obama made a good speech but did it mean anything more than "If you dont vote for me America will never solve this racial mess".

[Lala]

The Soviets are back, stronger than ever, Putin just saw to that in the last "election".

[Cin]

Wasn't that school doing all the killing and it's okay cause they think we're not equals?

[IslamoLlama]

Everybody together now!

"THIS CAN ONLY BE BAD FOR THE DEMOCRATS!"

I can't wait for 2008. You'll be basking in minority status in both Congressional Houses and ousted from the Presidency, cackling to yourselves about how you've got the Dems right where you want them.

It's like watching the Soviets in Russia at the beginning of the nineties. So screwed and they're too deluded or terrified to admit it.

[trentk269]

Guys, guys, please. Uncle Jerry is NOT a member of the Obamessiah's staff. He is the spiritual advisor to Mr. Obama. He can no more fire a spiritual advisor any more than he can fire his white racist grandma. Imus is a mere DJ, and a white racist to boot.

Can't we all just get along?

[bustoff]

There's nothing wrong. So long as Mr. Obama also condemns Rev. Wright for his racist statements as well.

[jharp]

And what might I ask is wrong with Obama calling for the firing of Imus?