Obama the most admired man in 2010? Not exactly.

Maybe the biggest problem with public life both in terms of politicians and in the case of the news media is the truth no longer matters, only spin. The worst of the violators are naturally the news media to whom there is no such thing as facts, only opinions, and pollsters insist on polling opinions and then distorting and twisting the results in order to create a false reality and follow an agenda.

Gallup is one of the worst offenders and that trend continues with their "Most Admired" poll, reported by many news organizations.

The headline blared, "Obama the Most Admired Man in America" a statement that had to cause the jaws to drop of anyone who spent the last year in something other than a comatose state.

Obama's approval ratings were dropping every day, he has become persona non grata by almost every moderate and liberal Democrat in the country who is not African American, he is personally and solely responsible because of his duplicitous and inept presidency for the Democrats suffering the worst political defeat of any party in 80 years, and during the recent short lived revolt among congressional Democrats over Obama's inability to deal with the Republicans on tax cuts one congressional Democrat was heard to shout in a closed door meeting "Fuck the president!".

The disgust and anger at Obama by Democrats, liberals, moderates and indpendents so evident in the last election might make the claim that Obama is the most admired man in 2010 a little hard to believe.  So how was it possible? When you get past the headline and look at the actual poll results, you find that it isnt exactly as the poll claims.

Based on the actual poll numbers, 22% picked Obama as the most admired man in America. That number did lead everyone else, but people were not given choices, but were asked to name or write in their most admired man.

People named others such as George W Bush, Bill Clinton, Glenn Beck, the Pope and a few others all of whom received less than Obama's 22%. But Gallup and the news organizations touting the poll refused to deal with the obvious reality of what the poll was actually saying.

Given that Obama is the most visible and recognizable man in America and possibly the world, that he is the man with the most exposure, the most power, the man who has the machinery of the United States government at his disposal, the man whose every word and act is covered and broadcast around the world on a daily basis, a man whose name is mentioned more times every day in every medium more than anyone else.a man whose decisions affect more people and have more consequences than any other man in America, given all that, almost 80% of Americans don't admire Obama and think someone else is the most admired man in America.

Which is why the least admired people in America are probably journalists.

Hillary Clinton supporters' Christmas message: We told you so.

After the worst two years any Democratic president has ever had, with Democrats, liberals, and moderates fed up with him and knowing there is nothing but coal in their political and policy stockings, and after Obama did to the Democratic Party in 2 years what it took George W Bush to do to the Republicans in 8, Hillary Clinton supporters Christmas message to all those responsible for the mess of a presidency that is Obama is undoubtedly " we told you so".

And it's not like it wasn't obvious from the beginning. Obama had displayed his entire political life, but especially during the Democratic primaries, that he was the most underhanded, unscrupulous, dishonest, untrustworthy politician since Richard Nixon. But with none of Nixon's grasp on real politics, how government works, foreign policy and certainly none of Nixon's toughness.

So why all of Obama's supporters are complaining now is hard to understand. There was nothing, absolutely nothing from day one, to recommend Obama on any level or suggest to anyone that Obama had any business being president, from his flagrant political dishonesty on display daily during the primaries and continuing into his presidency, his complete lack of conscience when it came to anything except his own political fortunes and his lack of ability evidenced in the fact that he had accomplished exactly nothing -- zero -- in 13 years as an elected official. Democrats can now add to Obama's resume that he absolutely wasted the biggest congressional majority any president has had in 50 years

But his father was born in Kenya, and because of a lot of misguided people who unfortunately now pass for liberals he was fawned over simply because of the color of his skin. The press turn a blind eye to his rank dishonesty, reneging on pledges, his empty speeches, the throngs of college students at his rallies bribed by free rock concerts and free food, ( which the press did not report) and his history of doing nothing and having no accomplishments.And the DNC, spearheaded by Nancy Pelosi, Howard Dean and Donna Brazille did everything they could to rig the process to give Obama the nomination, aided and abetted by a dishonest news media.

This isn't speculation or hyperbole. I had personally been contacted by Hillary Clinton delegates at the convention who told me that they were being threatened with having their credentials stripped by the DNC if they didn't change their votes to Obama in clear violation of DNC nominating procedure rules because the DNC wanted to avoid an open convention where there could be an old fashioned political floor fight. Instead they preferred the facade of phony party unity.

And there was a lot more going on. But the aim of the DNC in a year when any Democratic candidate with the possible exception of James Trafficante, would have beaten any Republican, was to insure that Obama got the nomination, pretend the entire party was behind him, and in so doing forced Obama down the throats of the majority of the Democrats who voted against him during the primaries. And even with the dishonest playing field created by Obama, the DNC and the press, still neither Clinton nor Obama finished the primaries with the 2/3 needed to secure the nomination with Obama only 63 delegates ahead of Clinton.

If the Democrats had used the same system in their primaries that's used in electing the president instead of a bizarre apportionment system based on the results of the 2004 presidential election, Clinton would have beaten Obama by more than 1,000 delegates. Michael Barone in US News did an analysis and based on the metrics wrote that Clinton would have beaten McCain by an even wider margin than Obama. So what the basis was for rigging the game for Obama is hard to say beyond race. Or even possibly fear that if Obama was not the nominee the African American vote would desert the Democrats and they would lose which was a theme spread freely by Obama supporters at the convention.

So amazingly, even in a year and in an election where it was virtually impossible for the Democrats to lose, the leadership of the Democratic party found a way to lose. It took two years and Obama botching everything from healthcare to the stimulus to the Bush tax cuts,but the defeat of the Democrats in the last election solely because of Obama's failures was breathtaking in its scope.

Geraldine Ferraro was absolutely right even though she was torched by a knee jerk news media for saying it, that if Obama had been white he would have been a joke as a presidential candidate. Now Obama is president but the only ones laughing are Republicans while liberals, moderates and independents keep trying to figure out what went wrong. And the answer still is, nothing went wrong. Obama has been exactly the same duplicituous politician he was during the primaries and in his prior political career as he has been as president.

That Hillary Clinton was clearly the most qualified candidate was obvious then and more painfully obvious now. But those at MoveOn and the Huffington Post, and NY Times and the Nation and all those who turned a blind eye to Obama's lack of qualification and character flaws because they wanted to support a black candidate for president, ironically had to take everything Martin Luther King lived for and took a bullet for -- the idea that people should be judged by the content of their character not the color of their skin -- and threw it in a dumpster in order to do it.

You don't have to wonder how different things would have been had the DNC and the press did nothing more than simply be honest. If the process had played out honestly Clinton most likely would have been the nominee since there would have been no disenfranchising of 1,600.000 voters in Florida and Michigan who voted for Clinton over Obama in landslide numbers (which is the real reason for the Florida and Michigan fiasco), and the entire set of expectations, fueled by the press, would have been different.

So for those who supported Obama during the primaries because they turned a blind eye to who and what he was politically and are now wondering what went wrong, they can spend the holiday season reflecting and ruminating on the fact that there would have been real healthcare reform that included a public option instead of Obama's selling out and pushing a health care bill that Howard Dean said should be junked. There would have been real financial reform, and there would have been tax cuts for the middle class without adding $700 billion to the deficit to give tax cuts to the upper 2% of income earners., And Democrats would still be handily in control of both houses of congress. There would have also been a much better use of the stimulus instead of Obama's now famous admission that, $800 billion later, he miscalculated what "shovel ready projects" really meant. And of course there wouldn't be the constant lying and reneging on a daily basis.

So Clinton's supporters Christmas message this year for the DNC and others is undoubtedly "We told you so". And while politically for the Democrats both in and out of congress it doesn't look like its going to be much of a happy new year, they still have time to get their house back in order and start looking for a 2012 nominee who can actually win and do some good. Unless they want to hear "we told you so" all over again in 2012.

Poll on tax cut compromise shows the majority do get the government they deserve

A new poll is one of the most revealing ever done in terms of showing who the majority of the American people really are and in the end what really matters most. It also shows why the country has been in the mess its been in for so long.

According to a Pew Research poll, (Pew is the most reliable of the big polls, Gallup and Rassmussen are proven disasters and unreliable in every possible way and so are the news organization polls) ) a majority of Americans, in numbers virtually equal between liberals, conservatives Democrats and Republicans favor the tax cut deal capitulated to by Obama.

According to the poll 62% of Democrats, 63% of Republicans and 60% of independents favor the tax cut deal breaking down to the same percentages whether liberal or conservative. Yet according to the same poll, when asked if the tax cut deal would be bad for the country by adding to the deficit, the answer was yes, by 46-26%. Which shows that a great plurality believes the tax cuts will not do what those who supported them claim they will do in terms of the economy and job growth, but do believe it will add substantially to the already crushing deficit. So the bottom line is, that what the American people care about in the end, what really matters, is everyone wants to get theirs.

It shows that the Tea Party marching and haranguing about the deficit was as phony as it always looked, the refusal of Joe Lieberman to back a public option because he said ( wrongly) it would add to the deficit while backing the tax cut for the upper 2% even though it adds $700 billion to deficit,and all the posturing by Republicans about debt and deficits, was also as phony as everyone knew it was, ( if John Bohener didn't cry, you know he didn't mean it).

And of course, through it all we have the press, the constitutionally protected watch dogs envisioned by the Founders, doing a lot of watching but showing they are no guard dogs, refusing to point out any of this hypocrisy and essentially being more lap dog than watchdog.

The fact that a majority of Democrats, Republicans, independents, liberals and conservatives all favor the same thing in almost identical numbers,pretty much proves that the American people, each group in their own way, despite whatever posturing conservatives do about patriotism on holidays or election day, or liberals posture about Republicans creating the deficits, and wanting to fight against Republican cronism, or one more of Obama's phony promises going down the drain without Democrats standing up to it, what really matters is only one thing -- getting theirs. Like they did in ancient Rome.

Which is why it often takes leadership in Washington to do the right thing and which is why there is practically none of it to be found and hasn't been for ten years with Obama making everything worse when he had all the tools to have made it a lot better. That is he could have if he had a shred of integrity, honesty or skill which he doesn't.

There is an old saying that people get the government they deserve. For the 8 years of the Bush administration the people that voted him in got exactly that, paid for unfortunately andcou to a great extent by a majority who didn't vote for Bush. When the opportunity finally came to vote them out of office and form a government that represented their values, the Democratic Party courtesy of Nancy Pelosi, Howard Dean, Donna Brazille and a few others, blew it by rigging the nominating process in every way they could with a big assist from a totally corrupted press, to send Obama, the most underhanded and duplicitous candidate since Nixon and as unqualified as George W. Bush, to the White House. So in many ways Pelosi and the Democrats got what they deserved to when they were blown out of the House only two years after Obama's election.

Though now many liberals and Democrats who supported Obama are complaining about him they got what they deserved too since Obama's dishonesty and all his others flaws were clearly on display during the primaries.

And based on the Pew Research poll and the "I want mine" mentality of a majority of Americans, they will continue to get what they deserve.Only based on past performance, most of them are not going to like it.

Obama asks Democrats to take another dive. So far the House says no.

It wasn't him, Charley! It was you. You remember that night in the Garden, you came

down to my dressing room and said: 'Kid, this ain't your night. We're going for the price on

Wilson.' You remember that? 'This ain't your night!' My night! I coulda taken Wilson

apart! So what happens? He gets the title shot outdoors in the ball park - and whadda I

get? A one-way ticket to Palookaville.
You was my brother, Charley. You shoulda looked out for me a little bit. You shoulda

taken care of me - just a little bit - so I wouldn't have to take them dives for the short-

end money.

Charley: I had some bets down for you. You saw some money.

Terry : You don't understand! I couldda had class. I couldda been a

contender. I couldda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am.

From "On the Waterfront".

Whether it was a public option on healthcare, financial reform and now tax cuts for the wealthy Obama has always had the confidence that the Democrats in congress would take a dive when he told them to. And they always did. So when he told them to take another dive, this time for tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% in America he was stunned when Democrats played Terry Malloy, stood up to Obama's Johnny Friendly and told him no. Obama called them "sanctimonious purists".

For someone with no guts, no integrity, no values, no principles, a glass jaw, and will sell out anyone and anything at any time, anyone who stands up for anything or believes in anything must seem like "sanctimonious purists".

How caving in is a way of life for Obama was on display again when he said about the tax cuts, "this is the public option fight all over again.I pass a signature piece of legislation where we finally get health care for all Americans... but because there was a provision in there that they didn't get that would have affected maybe a couple million people, even though we got health insurance for 30 million people... that somehow that was a sign of weakness and compromise."

The number of lies Obama can get into one sentence is truly breathtaking. First, there was no public option "fight". There was only Obama capitulating, groveling for Republican votes, wasting a year when it all could be done using reconciliation, and then in the end taking a dive with a back room deal with lobbyists to drop the public option. When she was asked why there was no public option in the legislation when the votes were there to pass it, Nancy Pelosi said, "there is no public option because the president didnt fight for it". So much for Obama's idea of fighting, which, as everyone has seen, is taking a dive. Second, what makes Obama a little scary is that not only was every word a lie, the truth is so well known that it makes Obama close to being pathological to think he can lie so brazenly and no one would notice.

The piece of legislation Obama passed was not only garbage it was called as much by just about every Democrat who voted for it.No one called it "signature" anything. Howard Dean said it should have been junked. Democrats who reluctantly voted for it called it "better than nothing". And the "they" that Obama is referring to in terms of not getting what "they" wanted, was the Speaker of the House, the overwhelming number of Democrats in congress and the overwhelming number of people in this country ( at least 60% according to polls) including just about everyone who voted for him.

Obama's other blatant lie is "we got health insurance for 30 million people".

What Obama got was 30 million new customers for the insurance companies mandating that people who dont have health insurance buy it. He didn't "get health insurance" for anyone. And when he says the public option would have affected maybe 2 million people he is lying again. Because even an idiot can figure out that if 30 million uninsured were getting insurance the law now says they have to pay for, it would have been 32 million getting insurance through the public option. And that doesn't count the tens of millions of Americans who would have switched to a government run option simply because it was a better deal. What Obama did by dumping the public option wasn't just weakness, spinelessness and compromise. It was double dealing,dishonesty, caving in, selling his own party's values and doing what was right down the river and wasting the biggest congressional majority any president has had in 50 years.

This is how that scene from On the Waterfront really played out in congress:

Democrats:

It wasn't the Republicans, Barrack It was you! You remember that night in on the senate floor you came down to the cloak room and said: 'Kids, this ain't your night. We're going for the price on the insurance companies and bankers.' You remember that? 'This ain't your night!' Our night! We couldda passed a public option and real financial reform and taken the health insurance companies and bankers apart! So what happens? They get the billions and a ball park with their name on it - and whadda we get? A one-way ticket to Palookaville.

You was the president, Barrack. You shouldda looked out for the country a little bit. You shouldda taken care of people - just a little bit - and done the right thing, so we didn't have to take them dives for the short-end money.

Obama: You saw some good things in those bills.

Democrats : You don't understand! We couldda had class. We couldda been a contender. We had the biggest congressional majority in 50 years! We couldda done great things. We couldda been somebody, instead of a bunch of bums, which is what we are. For listening to you.

The Democrats and Obama could have been somebody. They could have been contenders for the most accomplished congress in history, passing landmark legislation on healthcare reform, financial reform and tax policy. But Obama took a dive on all those things and told congress to take a dive with him and they did.

Obama wants congress to take the dive again on tax cuts. He told them this was the best deal he could get. And he's right. It was the best deal Obama could get because Obama has a glass jaw, no spine, no skills, no courage and no convictions. He tells the Democrats , "the middle class'll see some money." But the upper 2% will see more. And they will get it on the backs of the middle class who will have shoulder the additional $700 billion it will add to the deficit.And unless taxes are raised on the top 2%, it will be the middle class that will have to pay off.

Now Obama is calling the Joe Dugan's in congress " sanctimonious purists" the same people Gibbs, his mouthpiece called "the professional left."

The Democrats did have a professional left. And they should have used it. If they would have thrown that professional left instead of pulling their punches it would have been the Republicans who were knocked into Palookaville not the Democrats. Instead they took the dive for Obama on healthcare reform, financial reform and the economy and then took the worst beating of any political party in 80 years.

But this time, like Terry Malloy, the Democrats are pulling themselves up off the canvas and are telling Obama, no, not anymore. No more dives for the short end money.

Obama is still puffing on his cigar and, along with Gibbs the mouthpiece, telling people his deal will pass, the Democrats will eventually cave in and they'll take the dive like they always do. Obama says they wont risk not doing it. But so far Democrats are standing up to Johnny Friendly.

There is a lot more at stake here then just the tax cuts. By standing firm the Democrats are sending a message to Obama that the game is over, that he cant count on them to cave in and sell their principles down the river anymore like he does. And it sends a message to Republicans, that like Dugan in the movie, they will have to deal with them from now on, the liberal and moderate Democrats,instead of cutting back room deals with Obama and then counting on them to take the dive when he tells them to.

So by standing up to Obama's Johnny Friendly and the Republicans, the liberal and moderate Democrats can pave the way for future negotiations, letting Obama know his game is up and there is going to be no more throwing in the towel or taking the dive.

The real end of this movie will come in two years where it remains to be seen whether a Democratic Terry Malloy will stand up to Obama's Johnny Friendly, take him on in the Democratic primaries, and beat him soundly for the Democratic nomination for president.If that happens,and they are elected ( which Obama has no chance to be) then just like in the movie, everyone will finally be able to go back to work.

Obama's delusional, narcissistic,self defense of tax cuts for the wealthy.

After hearing Barrack Obama's whiny tirade against Democrats and liberals who are taking a stand against his capitulation in extending the Bush tax cuts to those in the top 2% income bracket, essentially saying " what are you complaining about, look what I've done for you"? when in fact he did nothing but mess up and squander the biggest congressional majority any president has had in more than 50 years, makes this guy a genuine head case.

It was mind boggling in its arrogance, its disconnection to reality and pathetic in how self serving it was. And to hear him defending it as being politically realistic. What he left out was that its politically realistic for him, someone with no political savvy, no courage and no convictions.

He actually had the nerve (or is it simply denial or disconnected to reality) to bring up his dropping of the public option when the votes were there to pass it as an example of Democrats not knowing what's good for them. He characterized the reaction of Democrats to his spineless backroom deal with healthcare lobbyists to drop the public option as the reactions of a bunch of unrealistic liberal ingrates. Those unrealistic liberal ingrates include the majority of Democrats in the House in including Nancy Pelosi and just about every Democratic member of the senate.

There is no one, not one Democrat who spoke publicly who wasn't disgusted with Obama's healthcare bill and his dropping of the public option and who didn't call the bill they passed "better than nothing".

Nancy Pelosi had called the public option the :"centerpiece of healthcare reform" as did most House Democrats. Howard Dean said of Obama's disjointed mess of a healthcare bill that it should be junked and Democrats should start over. The public option was a proposition that 72% of Americans said they wanted according to a CBS News poll in June of 2009, it was the ONLY real meaningful reform on the table, the one thing that would have done the most good for most people AND according to the CBO would have cut the deficit by $160 billion. And Obama dropped it because he couldn't stand the heat from the town hall crazies or the Republicans even though the votes were there to pass it using reconciliation. So let everyone get it straight. The public option was dropped not because Obama couldn't get it through and not because the votes weren't there to pass it. It was dropped because Obama didn't have the stomach or any other essential part of a persons anatomy to see it through despite Republican opposition. He caved, pure and simple.

He also doesn't seem to connect with the fact that the drubbing the Democrats took in the last election was completely because of him and the Democrats failure to stand up to him or take the agenda out of his hands.

People were and still are fed up with his constant capitulation, his mealy mouthed excuses and political and policy incompetence. And an open and shut case can easily be made that the dropping of the public option which reduced the healthcare bill to a waste of time and will increase premiums, is the single biggest reason the Democrats were wiped out in the last election. It resulted in a lot of political bloodletting, angst and in the end didn't accomplish what people wanted. It was the worst of all possible worlds courtesy of Barrack Obama.

For no other reason than his own spinelessness Obama dropped the public option, something that would have CUT the deficit by $160 billion and be exactly what most people wanted and needed, and for no other reason than his own spinelessness, Obama caved in to Republicans to extend Bush's tax cuts to the upper 2% which will ADD $700 billion to the deficit, a number almost equal to the stimulus that conservatives and Republicans railed about and said we couldn't afford.

And Obama doesn't see the hypocrisy,the dishonesty or his own spinelessness in any of it. Instead he talks about his "accomplishments" and all the things he has done for everyone. What he has done, or more accurately didn't do, is why the Democrats took the worst political beating of any party in 80 years.

What House and senate Democrats need to do is deep six this bill, take it up in the next session and if Republicans refuse to extend tax cuts unless the top 2% are included which adds $700 billion to the deficit, then they can remind people of that every day until the next election. And in the process show that they are willing to stand for something. Which is something beyond Obama's capacity and always has been.

How Obama can let the Republicans have it both ways is only a result of his lack of backbone, conviction and ability. On one hand the Republicans claim it was the stimulus adding $800 billion to the deficit that they claim was instrumental in the Democrats taking their political beating, and on the other hand they want to add $700 billion to the deficit to give a tax break to people who don't need it. And Obama whines and wrings his hands and says there is nothing he can do.

According to Republicans $40 billion for a public option that would have extended health care and made it available to all who needed it, and cut the deficit at the same time, was fiscally irresponsible and something the country couldn't afford but a tax cut for the top 2% which will add $700 billion to the deficit is perfectly okay.

It shows just how truly inept and incompetent Obama really is when it comes to politics,debate,policy, winning an argument, having any convictions at all, or being willing to stand up for what's right. Instead he spends most of his time reading the political tea leaves and making excuses. But now it's gotten to the point that what would be most intersting to read would be the results of his Rorschach test.

Why Julian Assange is everything Obama isn't.

The two people most in the news lately has been Julian Assange and Barrack Obama. Assange because of what he's been able to do and Obama because of what he hasnt. Regardless of what you think of Assange (and there is not the slightest shred of evidence that the release of those cables has harmed anyone), Assange has shown what one person with scant resources but who believes in what he is doing, has convictions, and is willing to stand up against adversaries can accomplish while Obama has shown what doesn't get accomplished even with vast resources when someone has no courage, no convictions and believes in nothing.

Whatever you think of Julian Assange he has shown he is everything Barrack Obama isnt,. And he has shown he has everything that Obama doesn't, Assange has shown what one person can do to change things while Obama his entire political life has never given anything but a lot of empty talk.

Assange believes in what he is doing. Obama believes in nothing. Assange has the courage of his convictions. Obama has no courage and no convictions. Assange is willing to risk everything including his freedom to do what he thinks is right. Obama is willing to put everyone else at risk in order do what he thinks is right for him. Which is why there is no public option, no meaningful financial reform, and chronically high unemployment. All because Obama didn't have the backbone to stand up to Republicans and do what was right whether it was the public option, or the size of the stimulus. Instead he made needless and destructive capitulation his hallmark.

Assange has been willing to stand up to world governments and take on the most influential government in the world, the United States to expose what he thinks is wrong with the way governments do business. Obama didn't have the courage to stand up to Olympia Snow, Joe Lieberman, Mitch McConnell and John Boehner, the town hall crazies or Wall Street bankers. And how destructive to the U.S. has the release of the cables been? Well the most recent commeent by the Secretary of State is that the cables "show U.S. diplomacy at work".

We've been hearing from the government how Assange's release of hundreds of thousands of cables from American embassies around the world could put lives at risk. That was a lie. We heard the same nonsense after the Afghanistan leaks and to date there has been absolutely no incident of anyone losing their life because of the release of the documents. What it did do was reveal rampant and systematic corruption in the Karzai government. Which makes the parallel to Viet Nam and what was a corrupt regime in the South only more stark and raises more questions about the U.S. mission there. That was the real danger of Assange's document leaks.

What is also obvious and embarrassing in comparing Assange and Obama, is that Assange has been so much more effective at what he does with such limited resources than Obama has ever been as president with more resources and power than anyone in the world. Obama's resources were so great that at one time he had the biggest congressional majority of any president in 50 years, and then squandered and lost it because of the conduct of his presidency and his betrayal of the people who elected him.

The influence of Assange has so far shaken the world diplomatically. The only thing Obama has shaken is his supporters and the Democratic Party. Assange has shaken the way governments do business in secret, and has opened up the process and made it public to the people in whose name these acts are carried out. Obama has succeeded in shaking the Democrats chances of holding the White House in 2012 if he runs.

Assange has had more influence, done more to upset the status quo and has done more to change the way business is done with his slight resources than any of the false promises Obama made to change how Washington works. And so far there is not the slightest evidence that the release and publishing of the cables has put anyone's life at risk and calling it espionage as some Republicans have reveals ignorance of what espionage is.

Recently a State Department spokesman said they were going to rethink what they ask their diplomats around the world to do after some cables revealed that many diplomats were asked to spy. While that should come as no surprise to anyone,the exposure is making the US rethink that and other policy. No one has claimed that's a bad thing. And to date there has no cable or document marked "Top Secret" that has been published. Not one. So the idea that this is somehow espionage is simply preposterous. It hasn't provided enemies of the United States with anything they could possibly use against us.

What it does show is how the determination of one person, who believes in what he is doing even with scant resources and is willing to stand up to anyone or anything against the biggest odds, can shake the world, while a U.S. president, with all the resources of the most powerful country in the world, and who had more political resources than any president in 50 years but had no convictions and no courage has shaken nothing but his own supporters and own party while throwing 300 million Americans under the bus over everything from healthcare to financial reform to the economy and unemployment. And while it's not espionage, a lot of people would say that's a crime.

NOTE:

Obama continued his duplicitious capitulation to Republicans and his selling out, not only of his own party's ideals but good policy and the people who elected him, by announcing what I predicted here two weeks ago -- that he would pull a bait and switch and agree to extend the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, something he vowed repeatedly he wouldn't do during his 2007-2008 campaign, and vowed repeatedly for the last two years. Obama now adds his promise on taxes to the long list of promises on which he has reneged. Adding to the farce of who and Obama is, he said it "was the right thing to do". What he didnt say was for who.

Republicans make fools of Obama and the Democrats. Again

Mitch McConnell and the Republicans announced that they intend to block every single piece of legislation coming in the senate from now on until the issue of the Bush tax cuts are resolved. And, though left unsaid, they mean resolved the way they want it resolved. Which means extending the tax cuts for everyone. And this while the Democrats still control the House and senate.

Contrast that with Obama's weak kneed spineless, conviction-less bowing to the Republicans on the public option and financial reform when the Democrats had the biggest congressional majority in 50 years.

Instead of saying "you had your chance, the American people rejected you, your policies ran the country into the ground and now we are going to do things our way" Obama, instead of laying down the law, simply laid down period, and folded to Republicans, wasted a year groveling for one Republican vote that the didn't get,, made empty, almost imbecilic speeches about bi-partisanship when no one was asking for bi-partisanship especially the voters since it wasn't a value worth pursuing, and then eventually threw the public option under the bus is a sleazy backroom deal with healthcare lobbyists because he couldn't stand the heat from the Republicans and the town hall crazies.

Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid did their part too, showing why the Democrats have the weakest most compromised leadership either political party has shown in anyone's memory. And this goes back at least 15 years.

Instead of demanding Obama use the huge congressional majorities they had and pushing the public option through using reconciliation like the Republicans pushed through their catastrophic Bush tax cuts that created the huge deficit, they bowed to Obama and let a leaderless rudderless president who reeked of compromise in the worst sense of the word, set the agenda and lead them over the cliff to the worst political defeat of either party in 80 years. And this after only two years in power. And judging by what Pelosi and Reid have said, they still don't understand the true nature of their defeat.

The Republicans are now showing the Democrats again how to wield power. And the Democrats, as well as "progressive" commentators are doing nothing but whining about it, with Harry Reid saying things publicly about holding the American people hostage, blah blah blah and whiny complaints on "progressive" blogs about Republicans and what bad boys they are, instead of looking at themselves and admitting the enormous mistake they made in supporting Obama in the first place. Instead they insist on doing what losers do -- always blame the other guy.

The Republicans vowed two years ago to do everything in their power to block the Democratic agenda even after a devastating defeat . But the rudderless Obama with capitulation from congressional Democrats did the Republicans a favor and gutted their own agenda. That is why they paid such a huge price.

The country is in a mess because the Republicans know how to play politics but haven't a clue as to how to govern. The Democrats tend to know what's best for the majority of Americans and have right on their side most of the time ( with Obama being the rare exception since he always throws everyone and every thing under his bus) but they haven't a clue as to how to play politics. Their leadership is weak and spineless from Pelosi and Reid all the way down to Obama. The Republicans are tough and take no prisoners politically. They also know how to run the country into the ground.

As soon as the Republicans wiped the Democrats out in the last election, they started talking about holding investigations into the Obama Administration. Obama and the Democrats could have and should have done the same when they had the power. The evidence that Bush lied the country into war in Iraq was overwhelming and irrefutable yet Obama, the ever spineless said " I do not think it useful to litigate how we got into this war". They could have investigated 911 and come to the conclusions the 911 Committee were forbidden by agreement with the Bush Administration to conclude: that George W Bush, Rice and Cheney were guilty of the worst case of gross, even criminal negligence with regards to national security in ignoring persistent and specific warnings of an impending attack including proof that Al-Qaeda planned on hijacking US airliners as part of their attack and that they had buildings in New York City under surveillance. What the 911 Commission proved but couldnt say was that the 911 attacks were successful because the Bush Administration dismissed terrorism as a real threat in the eight months leading up to the attacks.

But no investigations from the Democrats or Obama.Which far from playing politics would have been in the best interests of the country.

So a memo to Democrats. Stop complaining now that you're out of power that the Republicans are playing hardball, and doing the things you should have but didn't, rubbing your nose in the fact that you were wiped out of the House after only two years in power, and that they were able to successfully stifle every major piece of legislation on your agenda even though you were in the majority. You had your chance and you blew it.

Instead of complaining maybe its time for Nancy and Harry and Barrack to skip down the yellow brick road to the Great and Powerful Carville and see if they can beg him to give them all an anatomical refit. Or better yet, just get new leadership, starting with the 2012 Democratic presidential primary.

One thing is certain for now. With Republicans putting Obama in a hammerlock he is almost certain to say " I give". And what he will give is the same thing Bush gave. Tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans which will add another $700 billion to the deficit while he ditched the public option which would have cut the deficit by $160 billion and provided accessible healthcare to tens of millions of Americans who dont have it. And one more important thing to remember. Both the House and senate can pass legislation renewing the tax cuts for the middle class and letting the tax cuts for the wealthy expire and there is nothing the Republicans can do about it. Tax legislation can be passed using reconciliation, the same way the Republicans enacted the tax cuts in the first place. That would prevent a Republican filibuster. So dont be fooled by anything less coming from the still Democratically controlled congress. If they dont pass the tax legislation through reconciliation and instead compromise with Republicans, going against their own consciences, you'll know who to blame and who is at the heart of it.

And why this White House is not so much a ship of state but a Ship of Fools.

Carville and Obama's Anatomy

James Carville recently caused an uproar, by saying or actually reiterating that Barrack Obama "has no balls". Reportedly the White House expressed "outrage" at Carville's remark, but Carville called in to John King's show on CNN to say he was not sorry for the remark and would not apologize.

If anything, the White House's "outrage" proves they can get outraged as long as its at someone who isn't a legitimate opponent or threat, like Republicans or Ahmadinejad. No one can remember Obama expressing "outrage" at Iranians being shot in the street protesting a rigged election, ( instead saying he "didnt want to meddle") or "outrage" at signs showing him with a Hitler mustache or "outrage" at Republican lies about the public option. But they were "outraged" about Carville simply stating the truth.

But its not just balls that Obama is missing. You don't need a political cat scan to see that Obama doesn't' have a backbone or spine either and neither do many of the people who still support him none of whom have demonstrated they have the anatomy necessary to admit they were wrong about who and what they claimed he was and supporting him in the first place. Which of course they were.

Obama's missing anatomy has been on display his entire political life but was ignored by the press and his supporters who were all caught up in making race, something you would think they would have known by now is irrelevant to a person's abilities, the most important issue.

What Carville said about Obama has been true about Obama his entire political life and was amply displayed when he was in the Illinois state legislature where he voted " present" over 100 times so he didn't have to vote for or against anything. And displayed as president on everything from healthcare reform to financial reform to tax cuts for the wealthy and dealing with Iran.

And what Geraldine Ferraro said about Obama was also true -- that with his record of non-accomplishment, his flimsy resume, his lack of real ideas, his lack of any substance and maybe the most underhanded and untrustworthy politician since Richard Nixon, if he had been white he would have been considered a joke as a presidential candidate.

What both Carville and Ferraro said about Obama showed that they have anatomically everything that Obama doesn't. And judging by the way the news media treated Obama and treats him now, not to mention the way they covered the 8 years of Bush's presidency, they don't have the anatomy to do their jobs either.And whether they or Democrats in congress or the liberal organizations who turned a blind eye to Obama's catastrophic flaws finally get any is, based on past performance not likely. Unless someone comes along with some political Viagra. Which even then may not help though, as doctors will tell you, admitting the problem is always the first step.

Obama's stupid pet trick on tax cuts for the wealthy

When dealing with anything Obama says you always have to be aware of semantics. One of Obama's most successful semantic games and stupid pet tricks is to say he is going to do something he knows will be unpopular with the left, then when the predictable outrage hits, say that all the silly peons out there simply didn't understand what he was saying, retreat from the decision, wait until the furor dies down then pull the bait and switch anyway. Then count on the press and what's left of the Kool Aid drinkers suffering from Battered Obama Syndrome to take him back and pretend it was all the Republican's fault, they made him do it.

He did it on healthcare, he did it with financial reform, he did it with the stimulus and he's done it with foreign policy including Afghanistan. Its called talking out of both sides of your mouth and no one has ever done it as an integral part of policy like Obama because he has no policy. He only has reactions to whatever his latest political fortunes seem to be.

Axelrod was paving the way for Obama to sell out on his pledge not to extend tax cuts for the wealthy ( a Zen question -- is it really selling out if you never meant it in the first place?) by blaming the election results (which were caused by Obama's selling out on everything else in the first place).

Axelrod said something like "we have to deal with the world as we find it" because of the election results and that extending tax cuts for the wealthy is something they might have to do. This was Obama sending out Siebulus to the Sunday morning talk shows to pave the way for selling out the public option by saying it was just a "sliver" of healthcare reform and wasn't really important. And the reaction was the same. Outrage from Democrats who felt betrayed, then Obama's backing off to make the outrage go away, then dropping the public option anyway claiming he didn't sell anyone out, he was never for the public option in the first place, lying about having never campaigned for it.

Obama's same stupid pet trick is now going on with tax cuts for the wealthy. The fact that these tax cuts would add $700 billion to the deficit at a time when supposedly the Tea Party was up in arms over the deficit which one could also say had some influence on the election results seems to be beyond Obama's non-existent powers of persuasion or observation. Or Axelrod's for that matter.

Obama said the other day that his "no. 1 priority is tax cuts for the middle class". When you understand the bait and switch tactics Obama always uses, counting on liberals to be too stupid to see through it as he did with healthcare reform, and counting on them to support him anyway no matter what he does, you can see that he is laying the groundwork to capitulate to the Republicans on tax cuts for the wealthy and then claim he had to do it in order to preserve the tax cuts for the middle class.

Its a stupid pet trick and semantic game Obama has played his whole political life and has worked for him in the past with African Americans, knee jerk cocktail party liberals and the press. And once again he hopes that those cocktail party liberals, especially those in the news media will wag their tails once again. While Obama bites the hands that fed him. And calls it a lick.

They see London they see France, they see bombs in underpants

Only in America could something as serious as pat downs and body scans to keep terrorists off airplanes get reduced to the level of infantilism we've seen about the security procedures now being employed at airports because of the cases of arrested development regarding some people's psyches when it comes to nudity and sex. And leave it to the pandering news media to give it some credence and turn it into an uproard instead of mocking it.

There is actually concern among what seems mostly to be conservatives and some on the religious right, that the TSA security people are somehow getting a thrill patting down travelers or viewing body scans of people most of whom are flattering themselves not to mention reducing a procedure to spot explosive devices carried by terrorists on their bodies to the level of peeping or pole dancing. Far from a thrill, having to look at some of these people with a body scanner could qualify for hazardous duty pay. It's serious business but only in America could there be protests based on puritanical and infantile attitudes.

Pat downs and body scanners have been in place in airports in London and France for more than a year with no complaints .That's because the Europeans don't have these infantile attitudes about nudity and sex that the many in America including members of the press do. If the body scanners in London and France had been in place elsewhere a year ago they would have seen the bomb in the Christmas bombers underpants before he ever got on the plane. And those who said it was just dumb luck that the bomb never went off are right.

Its being reported that there will be even longer than usual delays at airports for the Thanksgiving weekend because of protests against the pat downs and body scanning by these cases of arrested developemnt, procedures that again, have been in use at airports in Europe without a problem.

One man who obviously has some obviously bizarre issues when it comes to sex called the pat down and body scan procedures sexual assault. If he thinks anyone is getting a thrill out of patting him down, one can only wonder what his sex life must be like. He's probably trying to figure out right now how to install a scanner in his bedroom.

Then there are those who are "concerned" that having children going through the scanners would somehow be a boon to pedophiles. Other guardians of morality have said that the body scans might qualify as child pornography.

The body scanners should be here to stay. Not because its going to catch some terrorist trying to get on with a bomb but because we now know for certain that they act as a deterrent. How do we know? We know because the latest attempt at blowing up an airplane had a UPS cargo jet as the target. And the flight emanated from overseas where body scanners have been in wide spread use for more than a year for commercial airliners. The very fact that they targeted a cargo plane instead of a passenger plane is proof enough that body scanners can prevent a terrorist attempt on a passenger plane.

but ironically the body scanners have revealed more than what's under a travelers clothes. Its also revealed just how completely strange many Americans still are, and how medieval their ideas are about sex and nudity. And as in other areas of life, they shouldn't be allowed to lower the bar and cause problems for everyone else.

What conservatives and others who object to the body scans need to do is grow up. So terrorists won't stop others who fly from growing old.

Liberals show not only why they lose but why they don't know how to win.

By re-electing Nancy Pelosi as minority leader, liberals more than anyone have shown they really don't know how to win at anything. And after reading comments by those who opposed her but voted for Pelosi anyway, its clear Democrats still don't get the message of the election.

Pelosi and Obama are the two biggest reasons Democrats took the clobbering they did because neither Pelosi and certainly not Obama, delivered on the promises made and the expectations people had based on the snake oil Obama sold them during nominating process. Instead they blew the biggest congressional majority either party had in 50 years.

Forget the nonsense that the agenda was too liberal and that taking on healthcare was a mistake. The mistake was that Obama was and is an inept unqualified president with no political skills combined with no convictions or inner strength to get anything done.And both Pelosi and Reid has let him get away with it. Healthcare reform with the public option should have been rammed through the senate the day after the CBO said the public option would cut the deficit by $ 160 billion. But Obama, who has no real convictions about anything, floundered for a year, groveled to Republicans, brought the entired process to a slog trying to get one Republican voted, and botched the entire process letting a party that was distinctly in the minority run the show. And when the going got tough, Mr. Going to Change How Washington Works got going by cutting a sleazy back room deal with healthcare industry lobbyists ( as reported by the NY Times and admitted by Tom Daschle) to drop the public option throwing 300 million Americans under the bus because he couldn't stand the Hitler signs. Obama couldn't stand the heat, but stayed in the kitchen and cooked up a royal inedible mess than gave Democrats heartburn. He was the cook but it was Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid who served it. Even the Democrats who voted for this mess of a healthcare bill could only call it better than nothing. But it wasnt. Howard Dean was right. If that was the best Obama could manage the congress should have dumped it and started over.

But to show how easly duped and led around by the nose many are, including those in the media still deluded about Obama, an article in Think Progress by Lee Fang said the following:

"This morning, Bloomberg reporter Drew Armstrong broke an incredible story revealing that health insurance companies, like UnitedHealth and CIGNA, funneled $86.2 million into the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 2009 to pay for the Chamber's multifaceted campaign to kill President Obama's health reform legislation"

President Obama didn't have any healthcare legislation based on any convictions. He only took it on because it had been on the Democrats wish list for 60 years. Secondly president Obama gutted health care reform and as Matt Taibi pointed out in Rolling Stone, pulled a bait and switch hoping no one would notice, ditching healthcare reform mid way through the debate for what Obama started calling "health INSURANCE reform". If Fang or Think Progress did any real thinking they'd realize that the health insurance industry wasted their money trying to gut healthcare reform because Obama did it for them.

If you think the bungling of healthcare wasn't noticed by liberals moderates and independents then you don't remember Lincoln's admonition that you cant fool all of the people all of the time. These Democrats, moderates and independents are the people responsible for clobbering Democrats in the last election by staying home, not the people who never would have voted for them in the first place.

And Pelosi and Reid are partly responsible because they never stood up to Obama when he sank healthcare reform and turned into the garbage legislation that both conservatives and liberals detest but for entirely different reasons. Yes Pelosi publicly said " we dont have a public option in the reconciliation bill because the president didnt fight for it or stand up for it". That is only partially true. We also dont have a public option because Pelosi and Reid let Obama get away with the double dealing when they could have defied him and taken matters into their own hands. What would have Obama done with the public option passing? Veto it?

The plain fact is that by not delivering on promises and playing Obama's game of compromise and capitulation, and with Obama showing no leadership skills, Pelosi, Reid and Obama turned the biggest congressional majority since Lyndon Johnson was president into the worst defeat suffered by either party in 80 years. And it took them only two years to do it. The fact that it wasn't at the hands of the people who never voted for them in the first place has totally escaped Democratic politicos. And congressional Democrats are still slow to understand that.

It was rank and file liberals who were the most angry over Obamas first two years, liberals whose ideas on healthcare reform demanded the public option and it was liberals who lost the most because of Obama, Reid and Pelosi. So it was liberals and moderates, the people Gibbs called "the professional left", and fed up with Obama who stayed home and dealt the Democrats the clobbering they saw on election day, yet it was liberals in the House who re-elected Pelosi. As Casey Stengel once said about the 1962 Mets, cant anybody here play this game?

Obama capitulated to Republicans and Pelosi and Reid capitulated to Obama and while Pelosi will no doubt loudly oppose it, if there isn't a credible challenge to Obama in the 2012 primaries by a Democrat who knows what they are doing, someone who actually stands for something and knows how to get it done, and Obama runs for re-election, they will lose the White House too.

A sports psychologist once described it best : losing is a disease. And too many Democrats are infected with it, afraid to lose, and so they do.

German Chancellor calls Bush what the American press was afraid to: a liar

Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, buttressed by other German officials who were present in an Oval office meeting with George W. Bush has called Bush's account in his new book, of a meeting to discuss the invasion of Iraq a flat out lie.

Bush claims in his memoir that Schroeder promised that Germany would join the U.S. and stand with them in an invasion of Iraq, then complained that Schroeder couldn't be trusted when Germany didn't join the war ( a decision which if nothing else made Schroeder a smarter and better leader than Bush). But Schroeder says that is not exactly what was said. According to Schroeder, he promised Germany's support only if the US could prove that Iraq was "sheltering" those responsible for the 911 attacks.

Schroeder didn't mince words in a statement released the other day in response to Bush's memoir, that Bush's invasion of Iraq and reasons given for the invasion were "based on lies". He called Bush's rationale for going to war, "false and contrived", something that was apparent even before the war but a fact that the U.S. press,including the soon to be proved incompetent New York Times and cable networks like CNN and MSNBC were too cowed and journalistically lacking to report ( I don't include Fox since hell hadnt frozen over which is what it would take for them to criticize a Republican politician). The lone exception were two reporters for Knight Ridder who wrote articles, mostly ignored by the mainstream press, claiming there was ample evidence that Sadaam didn't have WMD.

Joining the list of those caving in on the Bush Administration lies about Iraq was Mr. Integrity himself, Barrack Obama.

When it became clear that the Iraq invasion was in fact based on a premise of lies,while still running for the Democratic nomination with hopes of getting Republican votes if he were the nominee, Obama emphasized that if he became president he wouldn't want to see an investigation of the Bush Administration's lies that took the country to war. His exact words were " I do not think it useful to litigate how we got into this war".

That proved from the beginning that not only didn't Obama have the judgment to be president he didn't have the political courage to be president. Because investigating how we got into that war was probably the single most important thing the congress could have done with regards to our standing in the world and for our own sake, not only to air out the truth but to hold those accountable because it was rank dishonesty from the beginning (something Obama obviously could relate to) that took the country to war.

Nothing would have restored US standing in the world more than an open investigation into how we did get into that war and to expose Bush and Cheney's lies for what they were. That more than anything would have proved the kind of democracy the U.S. is supposed to be. But not with a gutless press and certainly not with a politics first, truth second garden variety politician as president like Obama.

Schroeder's blunt truth, that Bush was lying isn't just an indictment of Bush. It is more than anything an indictment of the press, how far they have fallen and how useless they are and have been in serving democracy.

There are no tears shed for the demise of Saddam. But it was Bush and Cheney lies, and their desire to use 911 as an excuse to get him, that threw foreign policy into chaos, needlessly cost the lives of American soldiers, allowed Bin Laden to escape, and didn't accomplish what was needed in Afghanistan which we are still paying for today.

Had Bush been honest and gone after the Taliban after 911, sent the same number of troops he sent to Iraq to destroy the Taliban, kill or capture Bin Laden at Tora Bora and destroy what was left of the Al-Qaeda fighters, he would have proved to Saddam that we meant business. He could have given Sadaam and his henchmen 48 hours to get out of Iraq and with 200,000 troops already in Afghanistan Sadaam would have known we weren't bluffing. And he and his henchmen would have grabbed as much loot as they could put into Swiss banks and would have gotten out of Dodge. Then it would have been up to Interpol to track them down for war crimes. In the meantime Sadaam would have been gone without firing a shot.

That's what happens when your honest about what you're doing. And Iraq, Afghanistan, Obama's first two years in office and the drubbing the Democrats took in the last election is what happens when your not. Someday maybe these politicians will learn.

Keith Olbermann's back? So what?

Much has been made, essentially by groups that consider themselves "progressive" about Keith Olbermann's suspension and now return. They circulated petitions "demanding" Olbermann be put back on the air. But Olbermann is not the panacea or powerful liberal voice people make him out to be. He is one of many in the media who turned a blind eye to Obama's serial lying, serial reneging, and proving he is the most untrustowrthy, underhanded duplicitous politician since Richard Nixon and Olbermann still refuses to hold Obama accountable for his convictionless mess of a presidency. It's not enough to just hate conservatives and Republicans. To have credibility you have to hold everyone accountable and Olbermann never has. He is not a beacon for what matters most in the media -- which is the truth.

Like most of the commentators on MSNBC he does attack the relentless Republican lies and misinformation put out there every day but in a way that is mostly verbose and not very effective. This is not Mort Sahl or Lenny Bruce though he does try hard to be funny. He just isnt. But his biggest failure which undermines most of his credibility has been his failure to acknowledge the many failures, lies and deceit of Barack Obama. Lies, failure and deceit which literally brought down the House for Democrats. So while Republicans are easy targets and deserving of attack and ridicule, what Olbermann does is not much different from Fox News who will never admit the failures and lies of Republicans and conservatives.

Ever since Obama began his run for the presidency and all through the first two years of his administration, Olbermann has and still does proudly display the certificate showing the piece of the Brooklyn Bridge Obama sold him. And his frequent guests are people like Richard Wolfe and Jonathan Alter, fellow Brooklyn Bridge owners each of whom has written the most laughably preposterous books about Obama one can imagine.

Olbermann's reluctance to admit Obama's failures of character and policy ( as does almost everyone else in the press) essentially reduces Olbermanns credibility and effectiveness to someone who has nothing much more to say than to bash conservatives, Republicans and Fox News. The problem is none of those people care what Olbermann says or thinks. And liberals, Democrats and people with IQ's in 3 digits already know all this. If Olbermann or any other truly liberal journalist told the truth about Obama, it would make their truth telling about conservatives and Republicans mean something. But they don't.

Olbermann's relentless defense of Obama's indefensible waste of the biggest Democratic majority in 50 years and all that could have been accomplished but wasn't, has earned him both something of an audience on MSNBC and an audience with Obama. And Olbermann has shown that, like most journalists, he is seduced by power and proximity to power.They call it access.

Michael Moore was a guest on Olbermann the night after his return and the two made an interesting pair. Moore is a good guy. His heart is in the right place, he cares about the right things and he tries to do something about it. But he as well as Olbermann, Arriana Huffington, the NY Times editorial editors, the Nation, and all the journalists in the news media that corrupted themselves in order to elect a president based on his skin color despite how clearly Obama was shown to be underhanded, deceitful and untustworthy, not to mention grossly unqualifed and unprepared to be president, share responsibility in the fiasco that has been Obama's presidency and the fiasco the Democrats suffered in the last election because of it.

Moore should have asked himself in 2008, "is it worth shredding my credibility corrupting the things I believe in, selling out my principles and my friends and neighbors and turning a blind eye to rank injustice, dishonesty and deceit to support Barrack Obama? Can anything good come of this dishonesty"? Because that is exactly what he did, throwing 600,000 of his friends and neighbors in his beloved Michigan under Obama's bus and selling out and their right to vote to support Obama. He did this when he publicly supported taking theirs, and 1 million votes of Florida Democrats and depositing them in a DNC dumpster in order to suppress Hillary Clinton's delegate count and her run for the presidency.And it became even more important because Clinton crushed Obama in landslide numbers in both Michigan and Florida. Moore joined and supported the hierarchy of the DNC who was also aided and abetted by the mainstream press, who decided to punish 1 600,000 voters because five Democratic party big wigs in those states( including the governor of Michigan) moved the dates of the primaries up. It's ironic that Moore, Olbermann, the DNC and the press in general felt they needed to use voter suppression in order to try and elect a black candidate

But that's exactly what happened. And Olbermann and Moore were part of supporting that corrupt process, as opposed to being what they should have been -- horrified at the corruption of the democratic process that supressed the votes of over 1,600,000. And that's why to be a true liberal, it's not enough to proclaim you hate conservatives and Republicans. Or their lies and deceit. You have to be willing to stand up for the truth and the right thing no matter what. And to attack lies and deceit even when it comes from Obama. Or especially when it comes from Obama. And Olbermann didn't. And hasn't. And that's why having Olbermann back on the air really means nothing. At least until he is finally willing to admit he was conned.

Democrats get wake up call and immediately hit the snooze button

Harry Reid says he gets it. Barrack Obama says he gets it. None of them get it. If they had gotten it they wouldn't have presided over the worst most devastating loss of seats in the House by either party since 1934 and wouldn't be clinging by a thread to a senate majority that just two years ago was 60-40 Democrat.

Obama, as always leads the way backwards. He said he wants to compromise. As the most compromised president in history that's no surprise.He's compromised the truth, compromised healthcare reform, compromised financial reform so why not continue to compromise with Republicans who made him look like a court jester the last two years anyway?

Reid said he gets the meaning of the election, that the American people want the Democrats and Republicans to work together. Obama says he wants to work with Republicans. Which shows Obama and Reid are still snoozing because if that's what the American people wanted the Democrats and Obama wouldn't have had the biggest congressional majority of any party in 50 years the last two years.

What they don't want to open their eyes to is that the clobbering they received wasn't at the hands of Republicans and Tea Partiers who never voted for them in the first place. This wake up call was delivered by Democrats, moderates, liberals, and independents, fed up with Obama's duplicity and flagrant lying and reneging and how he and the Democratic leadership sold out what the majority of Americans and especially Democrats wanted.

And what they wanted was all the things that Obama and the Democrats didn't deliver. That's why they got clobbered The American people wanted real health care reform. They wanted overwhelmingly to have the public option and the votes had always been there to pass it using reconciliation. Obama sold it out,making a sleazy back room deal with health industry lobbyists because the town hall crazies made his knees buckle,then publicly spoke out of both sides of his mouth pretending to support it, and Reid went along with it instead of yanking the reins from Obama and passing the public option anyway.

The difference in the election was the difference between what the American people wanted(,which had nothing to do with working and playing well others), what was promised, and what was finally delivered, a tepid mess of a health care bill that Howard Dean correctly said should have been junked and a bill that even the Democrats who finally voted for it could only call "better than nothing". This is why the Democrats got clobbered. Forget the nonsense you hear from people like Lawrence O'Donnell who is still self deluded about Obama, that it was spending time on healthcare and not the economy that was the problem.

Based on all the polls more people wanted the public option than wanted Obama as president According to a CBS News poll in June 2009, 72% said they wanted the public option and 66% said they were willing to pay higher taxes to get it. But Obama, who has a 13 year political history of doing nothing and getting nothing done, sold it out, screwed his constituency and blew it for personal political reasons because he couldnt stand the heat and the Democratic congressional leadership went along. Democrats got their political payback from their constituents not their enemies. Health care was in fact Obama's and the Democrats Waterloo, but not for the reasons Jim DeMint thought. It was because they didn't deliver what was important on healthcare and obstructing that was probably the Republican plan all along. And Obama fell for it.

Obama also blew financial reform, went with a stimulus that economists told him was too small from the beginning, did more for the banks than he did average people and a week before the election, screwed the Democrats in congress who voted for his stimulus by saying that he made a mistake about "shovel ready" projects, proving again that the only thing that is really shovel ready is what comes out of Obama's mouth.

As I predicted in July of 2009 and all through the healthcare debate,into February of 2010, Democrats finally paid the price that was clear would be coming if the public option wasn't passed. I wrote a year ago, and just about every month since that the only way the Democratic congress could save itself was to wrest control of the healthcare debate away from Obama and pass the public option and that if they didn't, they'd be finished. Yes unemployment is the big issue now but had the public option been passed in June of 2009 using reconciliation instead of the useless political game Obama played, all the attention could have then been focused on the economy from that time on and the Democrats would have passed landmark legislation that would have lifted the burden of health care costs off the shoulders of tens, if not hundreds of millions. Not to mention that with a public option, those 10 million ( and probably more ) who are unemployed, many of whom probably lost their work related health insurance would have had one less thing to worry about, one less burden to carry not having to worry about what would happen if they or someone in their family got sick. The handwriting should have been clear that if the congress didn't pass the public option they'd be finished.

They didn't and they are.

If they are looking for a way forward its not to do what Reid and Obama have pledged to do -- compromise with the Republicans. This devastating wake up call wasn't made by people who are sympathetic to Republican ideology. If that were the case the Democrats never would have won in the first place. This wake up call was made by Democrats, liberals, moderates and independents, the people who voted for them in 2008, not the people who voted against them. The Democratic leadership and Obama betrayed their own constituencies and they wont get them back till they acknowledge it, and the Democratic leadership publicly acknowledges Obama's failures with the public option, the failure not to pass it, Obama's catering to banks and corporations and not average people, his two year capitulation to Republicans, and that Obama has been a major disappointment to those who were naive enough to be taken in by his snake oil in the first place. Just admit you were conned and move on. Then completely change leadership to people willing to play as tough as the Republicans and then lay the ground work for a credible primary challenge to Obama in 2012. Or simply convince him not to run.

If they don't do any of those things and Obama is the nominee, they will lose the White House in 2012 without a doubt, make no inroads in the House and lose the senate. Then they can snooze for as long as they want.

Pelosi and the DNC got what they deserved, the country didn't

In 2008 Nancy Pelosi helped to corrupt the Democratic primary process along with other higher ups in the DNC by forcing Barrack Obama down the throats of the majority of Democrats who voted against him as the Democratic presidential candidate.

What her motives were no one but Pelosi and those around her really knows, but speculation is that she wanted to be the Democratic party's Queen Bee, something that would have never been possible had Hillary Clinton been elected.

Her other motivation might have been the same malady that infects and has infected so many Democrats for at least the last 15 years -- they are afraid of Republicans and they are afraid to lose and they act accordingly. But there is no doubt about one thing. The majority the Democrats won back in 2006 and increased in 2008 was lost for only one reason -- Barrack Obama and his inept, duplicitous and deceitful presidency that reneged on most things that was promised. And it can all be traced back to the deceitful way Obama's nomination was engineered.

Pelosi and Howard Dean for that matter were so needlessly and foolishly afraid that a contentious but honest and open Democratic national convention to choose a presidential nominee would somehow weaken the Democrats chances of winning the White House that for a period of time, they tried, hoped and applied pressure to get Hillary Clinton to take her name off the ballot at the convention, in spite of the fact that neither Clinton nor Obama had won the pre-requisite 2/3 majority of delegates needed to win the nomination. And in spite of the fact that Clinton had won the popular vote and had landslided Obama in 13 of the 15 biggest states in the country.

Their disdain for the democratic process and the majority of Democratic voters, more than 18 million, has now, thanks to Obama's predictably dismal performance, come back to haunt them and has cost them the House of Representatives and given them only the slimmest of margins in the senate.

In trying to force Obama;s nomination, they had in their arsenal a bevy of politically corrupt journalists, not the least of which was Jonathan Alter of Newsweek who tried in his articles, to elbow Clinton out of the race, writing pieces saying Clinton should quit, that the math was against her in spite of the fact that Clinton hadn't just won, but landslided Obama in every big state in the country except for Illinois and Texas which she still won. And showing that math isn't Alter's game either, in the end the math showed that far from Obama being a certain winner, neither candidate had won the prerequisite number of delegates during the primaries with Clinton finishing only 63 delegates behind Obama. It should be noted that it was only the Democratic party's apportionment system that even made it that close. Had the Democrats chosen a nominee the same way the country elects a president, Clinton would have beaten Obama by more than 1,000 delegates. And Obama's 63 delegate margin could be directly traced to the Democrats arcane caucus system.

But even before then the DNC corrupted the system with its shameful and blatantly corrupt handling of the Florida and Michigan fiasco. In both states, Clinton didn't just win but landslided Obama in the primaries. The idea that Obama's name wasn't on the ballot in Michigan was as false a contention as there was. Michigan was another example of Obama's double dealing and anyone who wants to look into what really happened in Michigan and how Obama insured that anyone in Michigan who wanted to vote for him knew what button to push can easily look it up and find out for themselves.

But the bigger point is how the DNC and Obama himself while preaching that "every voice must be heard" did all he could to silence the voices of the voters of Florida and Michigan because he didn't like what they had to say. And neither did Pelosi or the DNC. The elections were fair and the results valid. That the DNC was willing to punish 1,600,000 Democratic voters who did nothing wrong ( except vote against the DNC's preferred candidate) instead of punishing the 4 or 5 people including the governor of Michigan who were responsible for changing the date of their primaries, is perhaps one of the darkest chapters and one of the greatest stains the Democratic party will ever carry. And with the press happily corrupt and in Obama's pocket, they were all too glad to publicly dismiss the results of those primaries and not count the delegates Clinton won fairly and squarely in burying Obama in both elections. This added to and created a bogus lead in Obama's delegate count further fueling the expectation game that Obama would be the nominee. But it didn't work out that way. And neither candidate finished with enough delegates to secure the nomination.

The process, according to Democratic party rules, was then supposed to be turned over to super delegates who would be charged with casting votes to give the nomination to one candidate or the other. Pelosi tried to corrupt that process too, by making public statements to the affect that super delegates were bound to cast their votes according to which candidate won the most delegates during the primary.

That obviously was preposterous and absurd since if that was the case there would be no need to have any super delegates at all since the Democratic party could simply have changed their rules making the nominee whoever won the most delegates period. Either Pelosi was incredibly ignorant of the Democratic Party's own rules or she was sending a public message to super delegates to vote for Obama. But what made it even more insidious and corrupt was that by making that statement publicly, a statement no one in the DNC had the integrity to step forward and say was incorrect, Pelosi was adding more public expectation that Obama would be the nominee since most people had no idea what the Democratic Party's nomination rules were.

Creating the expectation that Obama would win created another problem : had Obama not won the nomination, the threats circulating on the convention floor, spread by Obama supporters was that it would inflame the majority of African American voters, creating the false belief that racism and Clintonian double dealing played a part when, ironically, it was double dealing on the part of Obama and the DNC that in fact gave Obama the nomination. Nevertheless by creating these expectations based on a dishonest presentation of the role of super delegates, the DNC ran the risk of alienating African Americans in the general election if Obama was not the nominee.

But even this wasn't enough for Pelosi and the upper echelons of the DNC. In a poll taken by Politico,com two days before the first roll call vote, more than 200 of the 400+ super delegates who had publicly declared for Obama in June after Pelosi had horse whipped them into making a public commitment ( which wasn't even binding) two months before they had to, were now deserting Obama and telling Politico they were "undecided".

With those already committed to Clinton if the 200 former Obama super delegates now claiming to be undecided cast their votes with Clinton she would have been the nominee. If half switched to Clinton it would have gone to a second ballot where the momentum would have been on Clinton's side.

So Pelosi and the DNC took the next step of trying to head off a super delegate vote which would have made Clinton the nominee, by breaking the Democratic party's own rules, and pressuring Clinton delegates to switch their votes to Obama on the first ballot.

Democratic Party rules as stated in the 2008 Call to the Convention clearly states that delegates elected as per the results of primary voting, are required to vote for the candidate they were elected to vote for. Only if there was no nominee after a first ballot could the horse trading begin and delegates were free to switch their votes. In 1932 it took four ballots to nominate FDR.

But Pelosi and the DNC would have none of an open convention. Clinton delegates were not only being pressured,there were stories of Clinton delegates threatened with being stripped of their credentials if they didn't switch their votes to Obama.

So, doing what Democrats seem to do best politically, act like they are afraid to lose, and with Pelosi being motivated by wanting to be the Democratic Party diva, they rigged the roll call vote, forcing many Clinton delegates to change their votes to Obama and virtually forced Clinton to go along with it. The California delegation, it should be noted, refused to go along with the charade and word was relayed to me at the time by someone who claimed to have first hand knowledge, that Gloria Allred who was either leading the California delegates or was simply a delegate herself, got into a shouting match with a representative from the DNC who was trying to pressure the California delegation, a state where Clinton had beaten Obama in a landslide, into going along with the program.They refused. So when the roll was called California was skipped.

Now two years later, the Democrats have lost control of the House mostly because of Obama, his ineffective and dishonest presidency, and largely because Obama sold out the public option on health care.

Whether Democrats will understand that message or not remains to be seen but there is a good bet they wont. The public option was the single most important piece of legislation since the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and in a June 2009 poll 72% said they wanted it. As recently as February 2010, 58% said they wanted the public option. But Obama didn't have the backbone,courage or conviction to see it through even though the votes were there in the House and Senate to pass it. Obama was pathetic in challenging Republican lies about it and proved that in terms of the powers of persuasion, he couldn't sell a hand warmer to an Eskimo and the country is worse off for his having sold the public option, and with it, his Democratic base down the river.

Beyond that Obama had proved in over 13 years in the Illinois State senate and the US senate that he was a do nothing par excellence. He accomplished nothing in those years - zero - and set a record by voting "present" more than 100 times so he didn't have to vote for or against anything. He continued his non accomplishment in his first two years in office, highlighted by his selling out on the public option and a stimulus that was far too small to do anything about unemployment and a financial reform bill that was tepid. He also showed, as did other Democrats that they are anemic when it comes to articulating a cogent message. But having to articulate a message wouldn't have been necessary had Obama not betrayed the people who voted for him and actually accomplished something. He didnt.

On Tuesday, they paid Obama and Nancy Pelosi back. And now the House of Representatives is back in the hands of the people who caused all the problems in the first place. And the DNC has no one to blame but themselves.

In 2008 an offshoot of the Denver Group created commercials warning Democrats of the danger of an Obama presidency. Now two years later the commercials seem prophetic.

They can be seen here

The Bible Belt lets out a notch to make room for hypocrisy

Every election cycle we always hear from Republicans and conservatives about "family values" and "values voters". The patriotic hypocrites of the Tea Party, those people who would do away with the 4th and 14th amendments and probably most of the rest of the constitution if they could, love to wrap themselves in the flag and pretend they are morally superior to Democrats, liberals, people with high IQ's, and anyone else who doesn't share their skewed view of life or moral hypocrisy.

That has become evident again in Louisiana where conservative Republican senator Jim Vitter, exposed as a former client of the Washington DC madam is leading handily in his re-election bid against Democrat Charles Melancon

In Louisiana as in other so called Bible Belt states, its always been " do as we say, not as we do". Their politics have a history of being dirty and so have been their politicians, though with the latter they are no different than any place else. They just like to pretend they are.

Vitter's campaign manager said of his opponents commercials reminding voters of Vitters cavorting with prostitutes, that "if Melancon has to resort to personal attack ads he must be desperate". So if a Democrat or liberal is caught doing it, like former NY governor Eliot Spitzer, or Clinton's romp with Monica Lewinsky, its the depths of moral depravity and he must resign or be impeached, that its conduct that disqualifies one for high office, but if a conservative is caught doing it, mentioning it is a "personal attack".

One can only wonder about how many hookers or skeletons are in the closet of Vitter's campaign manager if he thinks that pointing out Vitter's hypocrisy, and by his own admission his moral lapses, not to mention his betrayal of his marriage vows, are simply a "personal attack".

Maybe it hasn't occurred to him or to Vitter's supporters that pointing out that if his own wife cant trust him maybe the voters shouldn't either.

Evan Glass, a CNN reporter doing a story on the senate race asked a Louisiana Republican in a street interview if she planned on voting for Vitter even though he had been caught cavorting with prostitutes.Her answer was yes and she defended it by saying, "They all do it. Look at Bill Clinton".

The question Glass either didn't have the backbone or maybe the journalistic insight or instinct to ask was, since she brought it up, did she support Bill Clinton's impeachment since "they all do it"? It would have been an interesting answer because if she said "no", she probably would have been excommunicated by her friends, family and fellow conservative Republicans in Louisiana. And had she said yes, by still voting for Vitter,it would have exposed the rank hypocrisy and dishonesty that permeates most rank and file political conservatives.

Unfortunately we live in an age where journalism is practiced by people who should be in another line of work, and the fact is, most journalists at CNN are simply afraid of conservatives, almost like they are afraid conservatives will show up and slash their tires if they offend them, so her hypocrisy wasn't exposed. But the hypocrisy, dishonesty, and holier than thou self righteousness of the bible thumpers in Louisiana will be amply displayed if Vitter, as expected, wins. Just don't expect the hypocrisy to be pointed out on CNN. But for everyone else, the "family values" conservatives and Tea Party "values voters" of Bible Belt Louisiana have proved that, at least when it comes to politics, their "values" are not even worth the kind of lip service Vitter probably paid for.