Is Our Children Reading?
A review of records of the schools project and interviews with a dozen people who know both men, suggest that Mr. Obama, 47, has played down his contacts with Mr. Ayers, 63. But the two men do not appear to have been close. Nor has Mr. Obama ever expressed sympathy for the radical views and actions of Mr. Ayers, whom he has called “somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8.”
[snip]
In fact, according to several people involved, Mr. Ayers played no role in Mr. Obama’s appointment [to be Chair of the Chicago Annenberg Project]. Instead, it was suggested by Deborah Leff, then president of the Joyce Foundation, a Chicago-based group whose board Mr. Obama, a young lawyer, had joined the previous year.
[snip]
It was later in 1995 that Mr. Ayers and Ms. Dohrn hosted the gathering, in their town house three blocks from Mr. Obama’s home, at which State Senator Alice J. Palmer, who planned to run for Congress, introduced Mr. Obama to a few Democratic friends as her chosen successor. That was one of several such neighborhood events as Mr. Obama prepared to run, said A. J. Wolf, the 84-year-old emeritus rabbi of KAM Isaiah Israel Synagogue, across the street from Mr. Obama’s current house.
“If you ask my wife, we had the first coffee for Barack,” Rabbi Wolf said. [my emphasis]
There’s been a lot of interest in what I read lately. I was reading today a copy of The New York Times. And I was really interested to read in there about Barack Obama’s friends from Chicago. Turns out one of his earliest supporters is a man who, according to The New York Times, was a domestic terrorist, that, quote, ‘launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and the United States Capitol’.
Several news agencies have looked into the relationship and concluded the men are not close.
Palin said she doesn’t believe it.
"Wait a minute there," she said. "You mean to tell me he doesn’t know he launched his political career in the living room of a domestic terrorist?"
I guess she’s "reading" the NYT. It’s just that her definition of "reading" is a little different from most peoples’ definition of reading.
I guess Palin thinks the good Rabbi and his wife are terrorists?
Perhaps she’s channeling that Jews for Jesus preacher she listens to.
And she sleeps with whom? The major influence in her life is associated with? Oh yea, an Anti-American extremist group, the Alaskan Independence party.
That would be Todd Palin, the hubby of great influence. Treading on major “thin ice” there Ms. Palin… forgive the pun..
“Wait a minute there,” she said. “You mean to tell me he doesn’t know he launched his political career in the living room of a domestic terrorist?”
Now, Sarah, just YOU wait a minute there. Do you mean to tell us that you and The First Dude have never talked to Joe Vogler, never spent time in HIS livingroom? Who actually made arrangements for you to make that video for their convention? Was it Vogler or Lynn Clark the current chair? Wouldn’t YOU consider a group that advocates breaking away from the United States of America(that’s right, UNITED) to be a ‘domestic terrorist group’? Or, is it ok, to be a member of that sort of group up there in Alaska…but it’s not ok for Obama to have met and spoken with Bill Ayers?
from previous thread, Sarah Palin DID have a nanny, she says so herself in her Assembly of God talk to the Master Program graduates, here is the link, the quote at 5:30, her name was “Christine,”
http://video.aol.com/video-det…..1000098672
Really? Wow…thank you for looking that up for me..I thought sure that her use of her kids as unpaid help was as far as she got. In which case, why is Christine not the person taking care of and carrying poor Trig? I realize that it doesn’t look ‘right’ to have ‘the help’ carry around the baby, but at least you’ve got a shot that Christine is not going to fall down the stairs with the baby in her arms.
Oh, don’t get me started on the baby or her daughters, because the hypocrisy of this whole family cannot be overstated. Why doesn’t First Dude ever hold “the baby,” why would Levi kiss the baby on the forehead at the RNC convention? Why is 14-year-old Willow traspsing around the USA holding a baby on the stage (with First Dude folding his hands) instead of futhering HER future by actually having a life? AND why the hell is this family so clueless as to humiliate their poor Bristal Bay before an entire world?
She is just one rubber band ball of lies and hypocrisy.
Paging Christine, paging Christine!
I sure hope “almost” President-elect Obama calls out McCain tonight for his running mate’s lies.
And then I want to see McCain’s head explode (metaphorically speaking, mods) trying to defend the indefensible.
Actually, I hope McCain actually uses the phrase “you’re a liar” to Obama and I hope he handles it correctly, gracefully, effectively and firmly. That will drive Johnny Mac absolutely apoplectic.
correction, its a 5:26, and her name is “Christy”
Caribou Barbie also better be careful that nobody asks her if she’s related to any drug dealers (via Roger Ailes):
http://www.wowowow.com/post/lo…..ard-117251
“It would have far more factual validity for Obama, or a surrogate, to publicize the fact that Track, the kid who joined the Army, did so because a judge told him it was that or jail due to his dealing drugs.”
Now THAT is truth to power. GO Margo!
Doh! OMG.
I distinctly recall Obama saying that family issues are off limits.
It doesn’t surprise me Obama’s avoided this story.
It would surprise and dismay me if the Democrats pursue it.
I’m actually more pissed off by her slandering of William Ayers than I am of her sliming Obama. Bringing former insurgents into the political process is a sign of stability for a government.
Oh yeah. Isn’t that one of the milestones for success in Iraq?
Clearly, the next step for the Republican Fear Factory is for Jerome Corsi to surface with a forged letter sent to the 8 year old Obama from the CIA, saying that “Bill Ayers is determined to strike in the United States”. Of course, if Bush or McCain had received a warning like that about a known terroris at the head of the transcendental threat to civilization, you betcha he would have done something to stop it!
Corsi is in jail in Nairobi busted apparently trying to dig up dirt on Obama
By the way, the format for tonight’s debate is totally worthless. From Taegan Goddard:
OH, this is bad. So, if someone asks something that allows McCain to call Obama a liar…he can’t respond to that. Bad.
Despite the prohibition on follow-up questions, the Internet questions allow for Brokaw to really put his thumb on the scale if he is allowed to choose the questions that are put to each of the candidates.
Can’t remember where I read that although McCain and Obama had agreed, Brokaw had not.
Here’s a question for Obama to McCain, why on McCain’s website Timeline does the green line representing the Civil Rights Movement end with MLKJr death? http://capwiz.com/aol04/webret…..mccain.com
Someone who’s taking coaching from Henry Kissinger doesn’t have a lot of leeway on the terrorist front. I wonder if she knows about Kissinger having coffee with nd Pinochet?
I think the 24 hour news networks should have to devote an hour each to qualifying history and geography programs in order to keep their protected licenses.
Oh well, meanwhile the SEC’s IG has released a report on the axing of a SEC attorney who was investigating hedge fund Perquot Capital Management. The attorney was wanting to take testimony from a hedge fund exec, John Mack. Mack was being vetted to be CEO of Morgan Stanley.
The attorney for Morgan Stanley (Mary Jo White – who gave the consult to Scheurer for the Clinton era “extraordinary” renditions) chit chatted directly with the SEC attorney’s supervisor, getting the inside scoop assurance that Mack wasn’t invovled in any “fire” and when the SEC attorney pushed to interview Mack – he was fired.
This is actually the second IG investigation on this – during the first one the SEC was completely cleared. Of course, during that one, the investigator never bothered to even talk to the attorney who was fired. Oh, and Morgan Stanley’s pick – Mack – was finally interviewed. After the SOL had expired.
POP (pissed off Patricia) hit the nail on the head the other day when she said “Every time Sarah speaks I feel smarter”
Over at Huffington Post
October 5, 2008 at 01:16 AM
At a rally on Saturday in California, Sarah Palin offered up a rather jarring argument for supporting the Republican ticket. “There’s a place in Hell reserved for women who don’t support other women,” the Alaska Governor said, claiming she was quoting former Clinton Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.
The statement came after Palin had recounted a “providential” moment she experienced on Saturday: “I’m reading on my Starbucks mocha cup, okay? The quote of the day… It was Madeleine Albright, former Secretary of State [crowd boos] and UN ambassador. … Now she said it, I didn’t. She said, ‘There’s a place in Hell reserved for women who don’t support other women.’”
Actually, Albright didn’t say that. The accurate quote is, “There’s a place in Hell reserved for women who don’t help other women.” (Sources made the same point to CBS’s Scott Conroy.)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..31967.html
—————————————————————————-
5125 comments in response to Sarah’s last comment. Sure does have me wondering about who it was that selected Palin, maybe they wanted McCain to lose. I swear when McCain was standing behind Palin early on he looked like he was going to vomit. I think when he realized what a mistake Sarah was as soon as he heard her speak without a teleprompter he had to know it was all over.
Gah. Mayor I charge women for rape kits Palin saying that? I want to toss her mocha in her face.
I give her a pass on the misquoting cuz she got it right in meaning (for once). But geez! I guess Palin’s doing her part for the economy by joining Save Our Starbucks?
I’m wondering the same thing.
At some level, McCain must know he’s screwed.
No wonder he’s erratic and angry.
——————————————————-
Palin’s Reading Style: One Onlooker’s Reasonably Educated Hunch
As for her ‘reading’ style … it doesn’t surprise me that the word ‘terrorist’ leaps out at her from a NYT article — note that what she MISSED is the CONTEXT. What’s even more disturbing is HOW MUCH of the context she MISSED.
Without context and a sense of history, Ayers becomes a ‘terrorist’. The NYT assumes that reasonably educated readers bring enough context to the page to place the topics in a larger mileu. So it’s very worthwhile to take a moment and note the ways in which Palin fails at this very basic task. Basically, we have a VP candidate incapable of bringing enough CONTEXT to the articles printed in a major American daily publication to be able to correctly read, interpret, and comprehend the full meaning of the text.
That is terrifying.
In contrast, any reader capable of bringing the necessary context to the article will probably see Ayers as an aging guy with a hothead, socially disruptive past, who’s trying to get it right. In a sense, it’s a larger story about personal change, social change, and demographic shifts that require decades to achieve.
For skilled readers, Ayers becomes a metaphor for larger historical shifts.
For an unskilled reader — a person with no context, and little curiosity — he’s the most simplistic of cartoons. In this case, a ‘terrorist’.
This is in large part because unskilled readers DO NOT connect dots.
They see dots as individual, unrelated things.
The see very little relationship between Dot A and Dot B.
A poor reader — and/or one with little background doing a lot of reading — would see just what Palin saw: ONLY the emotional, ‘hot button’ terms in that NYT article. Poor readers lack the demographic, political, economic, or social history required to read and comprehend the NYT article.
But of all the articles in the NYT that day, why on earth was Palin reading that article — RATHER THAN the financial news?! Because this week, the meaningful information is mostly on the biz pages.
The real action in the US right now is financial.
The financial action is linked to complex computer models of financial behavior.
The financial behavior is premised on homebuying habits.
Homes have been built in subdivisions, based on cheap oil.
War and hurricanes have affected oil production; that plus other factors related to energy consumption have driven other pressures on the economy.
Palin would be able to connect all those dots if:
1. She was a reasonably skilled reader
2. She was even moderately intellectually curious.
Her lack of curiosity makes her the perfect political tool for certain private interests, and her limited reading ability suggests that — like George W Bush** — she’d be easy to manipulate. Her personal experience is too limited, and the fact that she’s already relied on McCain’s
lobbyistsstrategists speaks volumes about her willingness to be a tool.** Kevin Drum claims that GWBush reads and comprehends complex books; I’m skeptical. I need more than Kevin Drum’s claims to convince me, particularly given Bush’s speaking style and word-slurs.
I like this @10 (plus what you are saying about the unskilled reader)
Part of what scares the sh*t out of me about Palin is her 90:10 ratio of emotion:reason.
The next part of what scares me is the emotional complexion that I see coming from the McCain -Palin campaign: resentment, defiance, sneering, insults, vehemence, anger, aggressiveness.
None of those make for sound decision-making.
Dangerous situation.
Actually that’s what George Washington and others used the power of the pardon for…the Veterans of the Revolution who rose up during the Shay’s Rebellion because of foreclosures and the failure of the Feds to pay them their promised pensions were eventually pardoned (except for about a handful that were executed before the pardons came in).
The pardon power was not intended to be used to protect ones political cronies, but to show mercy to ones political and governmental opponents. Funny how the Repugs use it in just the opposite way.
I think Kevin Drum is more optimistic and willfully naive than Barton Gellman. I agree that George Bush is capable of reading complex books or of complex thought; he’s capable of a lot of things, as his mother might say, but he rarely does them.
For starters, Bush seems to have great trouble with reading, dyslexia perhaps, and dislikes it. He doesn’t like the exposition necessary in longer works of any kind, from full-blow financial statements to novels or position papers. He has a visceral dislike for arguments he doesn’t already agree with. He has a short attention span and lacks the self-confidence needed to deal with the temporary frustration of learning new things: logic, facts or perspectives.
He “works” from the gut, a contradiction in terms, because it is intuitive, autonomic, immediate. It doesn’t tax his patience, his self-esteem or his schedule, the latter being something he prides himself in sticking to, even if his assessment of its utility is caricatured, like everything else he remembers from bidness school. Those traits are what drove him into oil and politics, and what drove the businesses and the country he was hired to run into the ground.
John McCain has many of those same characteristics. But he has a much bigger chip on his shoulder, less ability to control his temper, and, being two decades older than Shrub, feels less need to control it. If he becomes president, he will consider it his due. His enemies list is long and it’s woefully, irrationally easy to get on it. McCain will not hesitate to pay back slights, no matter how petty or ancient. If Bush has managed his country into the dumpster, McCain will light a match to it.
Jeez, you make enough sense to really send a shiver down my spine.
I can’t disagree, but didn’t think it was THAT bad.
Leen, like you I’ve thought McCain looked falsely proud of Palin; that’s not a warm smile he’s been wearing. And is it just me, or do his events seem stale and small? I thought the GOP convention looked more like a glorified Home Show. Not even comparable to the Denver convention in scale, sophistication, or emotional heft. (And not to mention idea-power.)
When McCain announced Palin in Dayton Ohio I was watching his face as she talked he looked like he was going to vomit. He continued to look really worried every time she opened her mouth at other events soon after.
There were a few times where he faked some smiles. He knew but only after who ever it was forced Palin on the ticket. It could not have been McCains choice.
Why not Kay Bailey Hutchison..too late now. Really wonder who pushed Palin?
That story was on the front page on, um, Shabbos, so the financial stories were all House passing the bailout.
Adam Brickley is a college kid who pushed for Palin as VP, or something. Here is an article on him.
And I saw him on Colbert’s show. This is the same show as when Colbert laughed like Rudy did at the GOP convention.
I post this not so people will flame Brickley, but so you know a little bit about it.
Sorry – more OT.
Gov has used recent DC Cir precedent to ask that the Dist Ct Judge reverse himself on the GITMO detainee ruling.
Gov is arguing that because the appeals for the ruling won’t be completely resolved by the time that there is a new President, it’s all moot. After all, a new President might do something different. And if it’s not all moot, then, well, it’s not like it important enough to deal with now – those guys have been held in hell for years and years, what’s the rush allofa sudden?
Meet DOJ’s new mascot – Ms. Moot.
This is a nice little joke you are playing on old bmaz right???
Oh. I was about to lose my temper.
Kenya has released and deported Corsi. I’m sure he’ll do a press conference about evil muslims from DC in about 6 hours.
Jane up with her interview with Corsi from last week
yea, lets talk staged event for tonights debate.. these friggin buffoons have a lot of evil intent and need to be punched right between the lights..
this is what she read when she said she read “the new york times”
that big bold type up top that says “the new york times”
the rest of the story she was spoon fed, and by the way, she was fed to the lions, her apprehension skills are now the subject of even more ridicule since she CLEARLY did not understand a word the ny times wrote
TPM:
28 – What, is Syria not the endpoint for every country’s deporations? Who knew?
ah HA!
I figured it out, check this out you’ll see what I mean;
now when she says “a copy”;
I have “a copy” of a rolex watch, this “copy” is not worth the leather strap that holds it on the wrist
This is a nice little joke you are playing on old bmaz right???
Except for the mascot part, yeah.
When Mukasey discovered a woman who would dress in a cow suit, urinate on their neighbor’s porch and chase terrified children, he knew he’d found “The One”
You have been hanging around me too long, it is rubbing off; can no longer tell your sardonic jokes from the bitter truth we face.
Maybe that’s because she’s come to realize that sardonic wit is one of the most valuable antidotes to the toxic bitternesses we face?
ot
Important listen
Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett (still lobbying Chris Matthews to bring Flynt Leverett on his program to talk about Iran
http://www.newamerica.net/even…..rgain_iran
A bit off topic, lest we forget that Sarah Sixpack isn’t the only female wingnut in the universe.
Here in Minnesota, our own lovable (not!) Michele Bachmann has been touched Petters Group scandal that burst on the scene two weeks ago tomorrow with simultaneous raids by the Feds on the Tom Petters’ home and business HQ, as well as on the homes of several of his business associates. One of the latter was convicted in the 1980s for money laundering, and last year Michele wrote a letter on his behalf to the Pardon Poobah at the DOJ. Now she wants it back. I guess she’s embarrassed about the fact that although he’s not a constituent, more than $45K of his probably ill-gotten gains found their way to her campaign coffers. Here’s the Bachman story in the Minnesota Independent, and here’s a brief summary I put up about the $2B and counting fraud and Bachmann’s connection to it. The Strib has had pretty good coverage on this story since its inception.
Bridgette Bardot “no pitbull is a dangerous as Sarah”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..32671.html
Ms. Palin must have skimmed the excerpts given her by McCain’s handlers. I wonder if she read her tax returns? She certainly reads personnel files of those she doesn’t like or who have “done wrong” to her or hers. She seems to have a sadist’s love of retribution, a narcissistic love of herself, Cheney’s ambitions and Bush’s curiosity and management talent. Now that’s a cake that oughtn’t to rise in any political oven, no matter the altitude or temperature.
Agree. Wm O’s calm logic is an antidote to much of the madness that seems to be swirling at increasing velocities around the world today.
There is definitely a dire need for calm, well-reasoned, deductive logic grounded in moral choices that recognize the bigger picture and the longer term.
Now, more than ever.
Chris Matthews talked about these Obama qualities last night. A tribute of sorts
ot
Lots of news up about Taliban meeting with Afghani leaders
http://www.chron.com/disp/stor…..43592.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200…..fghanistan
This was just what my friend from Afghanistan was saying for the three years he was here studying in the states on a Fulbright. His family back in Afghanistan kept saying the Taliban were regaining power after the Bush administration took their eye off of Afghanistan when they invaded Iraq. His whole family (his dad is a retired Brigadier General and fought against the Russians) felt the only way to deal with the Taliban was to be inclusive. Pull the Taliban who are not as radical as the rest into talks. Looks like it is hapenning.
He is now back in Afghanistan working for the government. He misses the states but happy to be back with his family and hoping to help with positive developments in his country.
Somebody tell Olberman that Ayers was not the host of the first party!!!
“That was one of several such neighborhood events as Mr. Obama prepared to run, said A. J. Wolf, the 84-year-old emeritus rabbi of KAM Isaiah Israel Synagogue, across the street from Mr. Obama’s current house.
“If you ask my wife, we had the first coffee for Barack,” Rabbi Wolf said.”
“Bill’s mad at me because I said he was a toothless ex-radical…He’s a professor, for God’s sake.” Absolutely great line, although Ms. EW mentioned knowing academic Marxists in another post.
And one Wachovia story which I didn’t read because I was trying to get to the Shabbos Shuva drasha at 3:45.