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Taking Stock of Barack (Linked Version)

By Anne Leary, Backyard Conservative
Posted in Our Columns on April 25, 2008 with 7 comments.
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Time to take stock of Barack Obama. He lost decisively in Pennsylvania despite outspending Hillary a whole lot. Yes, she was expected to take the state, but not as handily as she did. Obama moved on to Indiana and North Carolina for his next test. It's his to lose, but he's on the defensive, and why is that? Who is he anyway? And how many more surprises will come up between now and November? Already there are more than I can ever remember for a presidential candidate. With George W. there were the trumped-up charges on the National Guard and an October surprise low-speed drunk-driving charge in small town Maine.

They used to be policy shifts, then secret plan conspiracy theories, then congressional witch hunts criminalizing policy, lately personal “dirt”. But who needs to pull any of that with Barack Obama?

Just Google the guy. Just look at who hosted his first few fundraisers. Just cast an eye on his political allies. Just look at his self-proclaimed spiritual mentor(s). Just check out his campaign site, his campaign experts. Just look at his campaign posters. Just listen to his wife. Just listen to him. For such a seemingly bland man he has an astonishingly radical array of friends and beliefs. For someone who was reputed to hide in the bathroom to avoid controversial votes, or set some kind of record for voting a cautious present in the Illinois legislature, he was very casual about who he hung out with. This is a huge disconnect, and raises once again the question of his judgment.

Tony Rezko, currently on trial for fraud and extortion. Rezko was Obama's chief fundraiser early and often, until the presidential race, as he was already in legal trouble. He bought an adjoining empty lot (essentially Obama's side yard) to Obama's Hyde Park house on the same day, which has raised obvious questions. Rezko got his start through Nation of Islam relationships and was awarded a concession with the Chicago Park District. Rezko first approached Obama when Obama was still a Harvard Law Student to offer him a job with Rezko's real estate firm, RezMar. Obama turned him down, but took a job with the firm of ,

Allison Davis, who employed Obama as a lawyer, and later became a developer. Obama's firm still did the legal work for Davis, and Obama joined the board of the Woods Fund, which donated to Davis' and Rezko's real estate deals, as well as Rashid Khalidi's group, and Obama served along with Bill Ayers, (raised son of two terrorist friends, Chesa Boudin. Ayers and Boudin currently serve on the board of advisory group to state sponsor of terror and supreme leader of Venezuela Hugo Chavez). Ayers was a member of the domestic terror group Weather Underground, which bombed numerous government and private sector buildings, but was never convicted due to government procedural errors. During his 11 year underground flight from the law, Ayers married fellow terrorist Bernadine Dohrn, who was also an accessory to armed robberies. Together, they held a fundraiser early on in their home for Barack Obama, singing his praises and introducing him to other local luminaries of the left. Documented donation here. 2007 SDS reunion audio here. More Powerline on Ayers. Andy McCarthy and Jim Geraghty, NRO. Recent Tribune profile. More here. Rashid Khalidi, PLO operative, Arab-American Action Network recipient of Woods Fund grant, U of Chicago professor now at Columbia. Also fundraiser for Obama, celebratory dinner in company with terrorist sympathizer? Obama needs to progress in Chicago politics, so he joins the up and coming church of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, former Muslim and friend of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan. (These two traveled to Libya together in the 80's when Libya was engaging in state terrorism.) Obama was a member of Wright's church for 20 years, married by him, had his children baptized, and named his political book after him, the Audacity of Hope, describing the first radical sermon he heard in that book. The Rev. Wright recently gave an award to Minister Farrakhan (a blatant anti-Semite.) The Rev. Wright's sermons and bulletins are much better known now and are still being explored. Obama has not disavowed the Rev. Wright, though he disapproves of some of the things he's said. Wright is no longer a member of Obama's campaign advisory group on ministerial matters. Obama has also claimed as spiritual adviser the Rev. James Meeks, who is also a state Rep. in the Illinois legislature, and the Rev. Michael Pfleger, together the three most radically political preachers in Chicago. With the support of these people, plus the Democrat establishment, notably Sen. Dick Durbin, Mayor Daley, and Governor Bought Blagojevich, Barack Obama launched his campaign for President. A controversial endorsement prominently displayed at one time or another on his website, the New Black Panther Party. There is also some evidence of ties to Ali Abunimah of the Electronic Intifada. Among his official campaign posters and merchandise, apparently without batting an eye, Obama enlisted the talents of the poster artist Shepard Fairey, who is an obvious admirer of great socialist realism and murderous socialists or worse. Most recently surfacing, especially to those less initiated in the internet, is Obama technology adviser on the campaign Larry Lessig, known as a digital communist, who produced a video for Google of a singing, near nude, diaper-wearing gay Jesus getting run over, just for fun. Then there's the Obama campaign's official blogger, Sam Graham-Felsen, is at the very least a communist sympathizer--he prefers the hammer and sickle flag. And let's not forget, to Wrap up loose ends. Obama's Che-chic supporters. The endorsement by the DSA and The New Party back in the day. Currently Baltimore Communists for Obama. ACORN. Vote fraud is always useful for Dems in winning elections. Barack Obama was instrumental on their behalf. Final link (read on for more strange stuff):
In November 1997, Ayers and Obama participated in a panel at the University of Chicago entitled Should a child ever be called a "super predator?" to debate "the merits of the juvenile justice system".

In April 2002, Ayers, Dohrn, and Obama, then an Illinois state senator, participated together at a conference entitled “Intellectuals: Who Needs Them?” sponsored by The Center for Public Intellectuals and the University of Illinois-Chicago. Ayers and Obama were two of the six members of the “Intellectuals in Times of Crisis” panel.

Is it crisis time for the Obama campaign? Let’s HOPE so. Otherwise America may be on the way to electing its most radical president ever.

Commentary:

1

Dani says:

What an absolutely pathetic pile of crap. Amazing what passes for journalism these days. Guess I shouldn't expect better from a "backyard conservative."

April 25, 2008 at 10:11 a.m.
2

Anne Leary says:

This is not guilt by association. This is a pattern of radical friendships and alliance, and jars with his bland talk of wanting to unite America, be post-partisan.

It still amazes me he thinks he can pull this off, without anyone looking at all of this--which is in your face if you barely scratch the surface. But I guess we should never underestimate the blind allegiance of Dem voters to a smooth talker who says what they want to hear.

April 25, 2008 at 10:36 a.m.
3

Pat H. says:

I have just finished reading the thesis that Barack Obama's wife, Michelle Obama, submitted when she received her degree at Princeton.

I now understand her comments regarding "proud to an American for the first time" and his unwillingness to denounce the Reverend Wright.

It should be read by anyone who wants to understand were they are coming from.

It can be found at google and is titled "Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community" by Michelle LaVaughn Robinson. http://Politco.com has ontained the entire document and has published same.

April 25, 2008 at 11:10 a.m.
4

Anne Leary says:

Thanks Pat. Very sad and disturbing stuff.

April 25, 2008 at 11:21 a.m.
5

Joe Jank says:

Michelle Obama's thesis is very troubling to me and it does explain her comments.

April 25, 2008 at 4:17 p.m.
6

Bill Baar says:

When you get down to it though, Barack really believes just in Barack; not liberalism or leftism or progressivism, or much of anything other than his own destiny to be Prez.

When he spoke to those SF Liberals Obama was telling them what they wanted to hear, not what he belived. He just confirmed their "frames" to soak them for donations.

He'd be better off just revealing the Chicago Pol and admitting what drives him is "where's mine" and if elected he'd be sure to include yours too.

He'd become authentic because that's really what our Senator is about.

April 26, 2008 at 4:11 a.m.
7

jim says:

think about what your children will have to face in life if either one of these dem,s by chance get into the comander and chief position please dear god help them because no one else can!!!i love my kids & grandkidsto much to cast my vote for crazy clinton or obammy commi !!!!!!!

April 27, 2008 at 10:22 p.m.

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