Rick Santorum has grabbed the President Obama’s war on religion narrative and has choked the life from it.  Santorum may prove to be more adept at scoring points from this talking point than Mitt Romney.  It’s his strength as the principled religious conservative in the race.  But this play will only work with conservative evangelicals, not the broad swath of support he would need in a general election.  One of the reasons Santorum is unelectable.

Related posts:

1. The GOP Debate Begins To Flesh Out The Winners From The Losers Two observations about the first GOP Presidential Debate: Mitt Romney...
2. The GOP’s Lazy Black People Meme Goldberg’s take on Republican strategy: Black people have lost the desire...
3. The Consequences Of Religious Zealotry We are an unhinged society: This is not the beginning...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

This speaks for itself:

Even needing to ask the question provides the answer. It matters not where he was born; this man is deeply and fiercely alien to the American tradition. He thinks ordinary Americans “cling” to Gods and guns because we are “bitter.” He believes we should “redistribute the wealth.” He thinks cops are “stupid” for politely asking a Harvard professor to show proof of residence when a neighbor reported a burglary in progress. He thinks that if Congress doesn’t immediately do his bidding, he can ignore the Constitution because he supposedly has a superceding need to”act.” He thinks government has a right to tell people when they have made “too much money.”

He is an alien menace.

This what the president is supposed to compromise with? This is what passes as substantive policy debate these days?  These people have no monopoly on understanding what “the core of America stands for.”  The sheer audacity, arrogance, and ignorance of this borders on the obscene.

Related posts:

1. Obama The African, Not The Negro The straw grasping begins: Taitz thinks that the birth certificate...
2. Thank You Rush Limbaugh… …For giving us a snapshot of the only possible direction...
3. Racism Fuels Newt Gingrich’s Campaign Newt Gingrich has always painted broadly outside the racial lines,...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Conservatives continue to push narratives outside the mainstream–and in the case of Carmen San Diego Palin–out and out make shit up without regard to fallout, and seemingly without consequence.

Mitt Romney continues to deny a record as governor he built, and programs he initiated quite proudly. How can anyone govern sensibly and with a bi-partisan approach in today’s politically charged climate?  Romney– aside from the ken doll looks, the Mormonism, the family wealth, the spotty business record, and the unvarnished and quite transparent liberal governing style–is quite hollow.  But he seems to be successfully co-opting the conservative talking point about individualism and antipathy toward the individual mandate.

The irony drips here.  For years, conservatives have embraced the mandate as part of a process to insure American citizens.  When did they decide to build an iron wall against the mandate?  When liberals began to embrace it.  And this is the crux of the problem in finding middle ground.

Barack Obama’s style lends itself to reaching for and walking on the middle ground.  He is anything but an avid progressive, despite how he’s painted by his conservative opponents.  The problem he’s encountering is instead of finding commonality when he usurps conservative ideology, conservatives vilify his attempt, and recast it as liberal government machinations.

Romney, in all of his pandering glory, epitomizes this theory perfectly.  Running away from one of his most solid achievements simply because liberals believe in it, is the height of hypocrisy.  Politics is all about the flip-flop, but never has it been so readily accepted or easily achieve without consequence.

Related posts:

1. American Unexceptionalism WTF: “In my opinion, any mandate coming from government is...
2. Are Conservative Political Rules Of Engagement Racial Code? Let’s just call it what it is:  idiocy, lunacy, and...
3. An American Black Conservative This is Herman Cain, as captured by The American Prospect’s...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

God Bless Fox News for reporting on what is really important. The president finally decided to put the Guinness down, leave Europe, and pay his respects to those lost in the devastating tornadoes in Joplin.

Fox breaks the REAL news.  That news wasn’t the terrific, humbling, unifying speech given by the president.  It wasn’t the moving ceremony conducted by the city of Joplin.  It was the fact that the president may, or may not have been chewing gum during the service.  Watch the very socialist, Kenyan-like behavior below:

I’m sure it was watermelon flavored too.  Trifling.

Related posts:

1. Obama The African, Not The Negro The straw grasping begins: Taitz thinks that the birth certificate...
2. The War For Representation In D.C. While it may not seem important to some, there is...
3. Was Trump Born In Kenya? Someone better start explaining: Donald Trump made headlines earlier today...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Image via Wikipedia

I’m of the mind that the crisis in the middle east is best left to those directly involved– simply because it’s too much of a conflation of fear, dishonesty, anger, stubbornness, and bitterness.  It’s strangling debate and beating down some Israeli citizens:

As an Israeli citizen, I want to thank you for this post. You should know that many Israelis actually do understand that we should go back to 67′ borders, but the environment here is so toxic – Not unlike what the far right has done in America - that you just can’t say anything out loud or you’ll be denounce as almost Antisemitic. What’s going on here is awful, Bibi is taking us straight to hell. It’s amazing to think that if Ulmert was still in charge, he would have cut a deal with Obama a year ago. What a waste to finally have an American president who is so sincere, serious and decent, at a time when there’s no leader, no vision and no hope in Israel.

What path is Netanyahu leading his country down?  Aside from his utter disdain and hatred of the Palestinians–and his obvious contempt for this administration– there is no clear path toward compromise being discussed by Netanyahu and his government.  It’s a pity really.  Why is Netanyahu not held responsible for devising a plan to achieve peace?  Why are his belligerent attacks on an American president tolerated–and why are they universally accepted by the American media and Washington?  Apparently Netanyahu is unaware of the dynamic that has formed here.  It is Israel that needs America, not the other way around.  His lack of respect and humiliatingly failing attempts at bullying  this president are appalling.

When has a foreign official or government ever been able to guide the hand of an American administration in crafting policy?  Were this Merkel, Sarkozy, or Medvedev–what tempest would their interference  stir from the opposition in America?  They not only would continue to demagogue his presidency, they would ratchet up their isolation and continue berating him as weak-kneed.

The relationship the United States has with Israel is not worth the U.S. ceding power or authority.  No foreign power should ever dictate any policy of this country.    Conservatives and the pro-Israeli lobby should actually be supporting the president here.  He is attempting to show strength in the face of indomitable ambivalence and arrogance.  Yet it seems anathema for any conservative to lend any support to this president here.  After all, Washington is built on a foundation of hypocrisy and duplicity.

The reality here is something quite different.  This process is not about lip service or acquiescence; it’s about patience.  It’s about compromise.  It is about tough choices and the earnest discussion that must be had by all parties involved.  It is about rational thought which does not suffer fools.  It’s simply about the truth, and have the balls to listen to it.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

This is epic. Conservatives know Newt doesn’t stand a chance.

The man cannot make a statement about anything, without having to either clarify it the next day, or completely reverse course . It’s part of his history. Not a good look for a leader is it? Is it any wonder why he crashed and burned as speaker of the house?

Related posts:

1. Racism Fuels Newt Gingrich’s Campaign Newt Gingrich has always painted broadly outside the racial lines,...
2. Birthers Face A Deluge Of Facts They Choose To Ignore President Obama has played his card: The White House has...
3. About That Revolution… Uh-oh: Exit polls showed independents supporting the GOP by a...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Newt Gingrich has always painted broadly outside the racial lines, and his deft ability to cocoon himself inside of a pseudo-intellectual balloon curries favor for him in conservative circles on issues of race.  This quote deserves and demands more examination:

Republican Newt Gingrich told a Georgia audience on Friday evening that the 2012 presidential election is the most consequential since the 1860 race that elected Abraham Lincoln to the White House and was soon followed by the Civil War.

Addressing the Georgia Republican Party’s convention, Gingrich said the nation is at a crossroads and that the re-election of Democratic President Barack Obama would lead to four more years of “radical left-wing values” that would drive the nation to ruin.

Gingrich also blasted Obama as “the most successful food stamp president in modern American history.”

Related posts:

1. Are Conservative Political Rules Of Engagement Racial Code? Let’s just call it what it is:  idiocy, lunacy, and...
2. Thank You Rush Limbaugh… …For giving us a snapshot of the only possible direction...
3. Trig Palin And Birth Certificates This  is one of the most succinct and thorough articles...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Even if you’re in a Benz, you’re still a nigger in a coupe–Kanye West

I realize this is a few weeks old, but it was just too revealing not to share.  Thanks to Baratunde Thurston (Jack Turner) of Jack & Jill Politics–one of my favorite blogs.

Turner writes:

It was during my viewing of this video [Trump's remarks in New Hampshire] that I began to cry. I thought of my ancestors, both direct and collective, who had fought and died so that I might be treated as an American. I then thought of this fetid, smug, hate-filled, wealthy white man taking credit for the release and yet still not being satisfied. It does not matter how long we’ve been in these United States. We will never be American.

So, tears in my eyes, pain in my heart and rage in my soul, I composed this video message. More than written text, it comes close to expressing my full pain at witnessing a white man who was handed everything call the President of the United States (and me) a nigger.

For me, this is the perfect way to end this maddening Trump-Birther-grades saga–and any political aspirations the attention whore might have.   At the risk of revisiting this issue yet again, I have to ask the question in a broader context:  when is it ever acceptable for the host of a reality show to question the intellect of the president of the United States–the former  editor of the Harvard law review?  This thinking lends credence to the barbs of Indonesian welfare thug and Kenyan Socialist.  This sad episode drips of racism.  Thank you Barantunde for summarizing it so succinctly and powerfully.

No matter your thoughts on this subject, Turner’s assessment can’t be seen as anything other than poignant, searing, and truthful

H/T: Angry Black Lady

Related posts:

1. The History Of The World… … In 18 minutes.  Pretty sweet....
2. Birtherism Is Defining The Agenda For The Conservative Base “Obama has produced his birth certificate. There were announcements that...
3. Context Is Just As Important As The Facts When discussing the act of defunding National Public Radio– and...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

America delivers retribution at the tip of a spear, or more specifically, a Navy Seal’s bullet.  Turns out this was a bit of foreshadowing by the president:

Sullivan adds this:

The more I hear the more Obama seems very close to this over the last few months: in weekly meetings, deeply involved in five national security meetings recently. This was not a lucky break. This was the end-point of several weeks of coordination. And Obama’s cool throughout. As Donald Trump was birthering out, Obama was aiming right at this country’s deadliest enemy.

How impossibly cool is this guy?  As this fucking circus about birth certificates swirled about, all he continued to do was conduct a highly covert operation under the cover of darkness–away from the muck and the mire– while his name, the office of the presidency, and his American authenticity continued to be sullied.

Let us not kid ourselves.  This invariably will be made a politically partisan issue.  So let’s be clear:  The most noted piece of President Obama’s  foreign policy platform during the 2008 campaign was to expand the war in Afghanistan– and to kill Osama Bin Laden.  This expansion also included perhaps the most controversial and dangerous tenet –taking the war into Pakistan if necessary to make the kill.  Not one political leader had the guts to advocate such a maneuver.  Not John McCain.  Not Sarah Palin.  Not George W. Bush– who not only shrunk from truly pursuing Bin Laden and attempted to downplay his actual existence–he did not pursue the course as stringently as he should have in Afghanistan.  Instead, he diverted resources for a war in Iraq.  Barack Obama knew Bin Laden was hiding in Pakistan, and was not afraid to tread where others feared in order to exact retribution for America.  Barack Obama not only led this charge while others were too weak-willed to do so, he told us all he would to so:

If the purpose of this war was to capture and/or kill Bin Laden, President Bush failed.  I don’t doubt President Bush’s resolve to the cause.  I’m just stating an irrefutable fact.  President Obama did not fail.  He led boldly, unabashedly, and with strength and courage.

Those questioning the methodology of the Obama Doctrine, have now received a true taste of what real American leadership looks like.  In one of the most important moments in American history, President Obama’s cool  authoritative countenance helped him execute this mission. Character and commitment are markers of American determination, and clearly they could not have been exhibited better.  Thank you Mr. President, and  thank you to the greatest military force and intelligence community the world has ever know.

It was a necessity we kill this man.  A man responsible for plunging our nation into a chaos we’ve never seen.  It was a necessity for the victims and their families, and it was necessity for America–not to celebrate not death– but glorify justice. I am a proud believer in the Obama Doctrine and the American military.

Related posts:

1. Charlie Sheen And The New American Value System What do Americans value? Charlie Sheen made a visit to...
2. America And Exceptionalism Reactions have poured in: It was a beautiful speech, especially...
3. The American Nightmare That Is The Westboro Church Take a peek inside the psyche of Shirley Phelps-Roper.  This...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

The straw grasping begins:

Taitz thinks that the birth certificate should peg Obama’s race as “Negro” and not “African.” “In those years … when they wrote race, they were writing ‘Negro’ not ‘African’,” Taitz says. “In those days nobody wrote African as a race, it just wasn’t one of the options. It sounds like it would be written today, in the age of political correctness, and not in 1961 when they wrote white or Asian or ‘Negro’.

It no longer matters what is presented.  Crazy will be crazy, and shills such as Taitz and Joseph Farah will continue to cultivate their culture of hatred to pursue their narrative.  In the end, we should all resign ourselves to the fact that the Birther Conspiracy is now a part of American lore like the Kennedy assasination, aliens in Roswell, and 9/11 truthers.

Related posts:

1. …You’re Tired! “I tell it like it is. [Y]ou’ll hear a political...
2. Birthers Face A Deluge Of Facts They Choose To Ignore President Obama has played his card: The White House has...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.