Pajamas Media

77 Comments

1. David Thomson:

“Listening to President Obama speak Tuesday at the New Economic School in Moscow, it became completely clear that his intellect is greatly overrated.”

I realized that Barack Obama was poorly read and shallow almost immediately. I have been personally been describing him in such a manner long before he replaced Hillary Clinton as the darling of the Democratic Party. Furthermore, many naive individuals were unaware that a Harvard soft science degree is generally not worthy of respect. Obama received a second rate education from this vastly overrated academic institution. He was obviously one of its affirmative action beneficiaries. The current president is not a dumb man. He has the gray matter to do serious work. He was not compelled, however, to do any serious studying. Obama instead used his student years to learn how to manipulate guilt tripped whites. He became a master on how best to jack the system.

Jul 9, 2009 - 1:46 am 2. RE:

Enough complacent Americans sat out the last election to enable a very, very small man to become president of the United States. Hopefully they will come to understand the cost of their complacency.

And then there are those who sat out the election because of their disgust with the GOP betrayals on big government, spending, and feckless leadership. It seems the GOP has learned nothing and continue to place all their hopes on ‘the other guy is worse’ instead of principled leadership.

And so we end up with a government of morons in Reid, Pelosi, and 0bama – but they’re not just any morons, these are malicious, dishonest, and destructive morons and we are beginning to pay the price for allowing such incompetence to rise to such levels of power.

Obama is such a very, very small man. How embarrassing for America!

Jul 9, 2009 - 3:16 am 3. Tito:

How can President Obama’s intellect be overrated? He went to Columbia University and Harvard Law School, prestigious Ivy League institutions. That obviously proves he is smarter than the rest of us, doesn’t it? Only the best come from the Ivy League and they know what’s best for everyone else. Just look at McNamara.

Jul 9, 2009 - 3:18 am 4. LeighB:

“Idealism without intellect” and wisdom is a good description of our current President. And while he may be a “peace and love man of the highest order trying to remake the world”, that is not his current role.

I enjoyed the coverage of his trip to Russia and the photo op of him and Putin was uncomfortable for his as Putin made clear he had not heard (or believed) tales of the Great Obama. The students in the audience seemed bored by his speech and were not impressed with “just words” without specifics.

Let’s hope the “cocky teenager” is not too tempting a target to the world’s bullies.

Jul 9, 2009 - 3:45 am 5. System Jacker:

“Obama instead used his student years to learn how to manipulate guilt tripped whites. He became a master on how best to jack the system.”

What the hell is a “guilt tripped white?” Do they fall down a lot, slobber or do their frail bodies just lean when they walk around the corner of a building?

And Obama became a master on how best to jack the system?

How about the simple truth? Obama was smart enough to clean Hillary Clinton’s clock and blow smoke up the rear ends of a whole lot of “very intelligent” American voters. Voters that the rest of the “uninformed” world knew were dumber than a mud fence.

Maybe that’s what guilt tripped whites means? White people that thought that they were the smartest people in the world, so they voted for Obama – who is busy seizing everything they own and crushing what’s left over.

Jul 9, 2009 - 4:10 am 6. TennesseeVolunteer:

TK, though I will give you a few of your points, you still need to grasp the fact that you cannot listen to what this administration says, you must watch what they do.
their words are used to mask their true intentions, to mislead you. The President is a lightweight for sure, but they have an agenda. It is not to be a bunch of idealists but to be statists of the worst design. Only use their words to compare with their actions.

Jul 9, 2009 - 4:33 am 7. Realist:

How true System Jacker and the dumb dumb dumb Americans are in the mainstill too stupid to see the world is laughing at them and their Mohammedan BOGUS POTUS. But don’t worry their dumb MSM will continue feeding the dummies idiotic celebrity worship and will continue Obama ars*licking to keep them quiet.

Jul 9, 2009 - 4:54 am 8. Terry Gain:

What the hell is a “guilt tripped white?” Do they fall down a lot, slobber or do their frail bodies just lean when they walk around the corner of a building?

They’re the sort of people who get tingles up their legs or regard Obama as a god even as their occupations require that they do not turn off their reasoning powers just because he’s the first black president.

I hope this helps you to recover yours.

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:15 am 9. Cato:

David Thomson: Obambi graduated from Columbia, having transferred there from Occidental College in Los Angeles. He went to Harvard Law School. Nonetheless, your point that a soft degree from an ivy league university may not mean the holder knows a damned thing is still valid.

As an aside, apparently the New York Times just got around to publishing a story about an article – quite leftist and confused – the Obambi wrote in 1983.

The facts about Obambi’s radical anti-American views and Marxism was there for anyone with eyes to see or ears to hear.

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:29 am 10. Meryl:

One of the goofiest and most revealing things about his speaking that drives me absolutely up the wall is his voice “going up” at the end of a phrase or sentence.

That, to me, nearly always indicates either uncertainty on the speaker’s part or a desire to please, wanting affirmation from the listener.

He’s the parents’ nightmare: an adolescent at the wheel of the family car at midnight, showing off for his friends.

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:44 am 11. RE:

The facts about Obambi’s radical anti-American views and Marxism was there for anyone with eyes to see or ears to hear.

Willful ignorance is he most frightening aspect of our current situation.

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:45 am 12. Frank:

Obama is the poster boy for affirmative action. All these prestigious degrees and not one hint of actual education.

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:59 am 13. David Thomson:

“your point that a soft degree from an ivy league university…”

This distinction is of utmost importance. A hard science degree from these same Ivy League universities is well deserved. You can take for granted that their graduates truly represent the cream of the crop. The softer disciplines, however, are primarily the victims of affirmative action grading that has been institutionalized since no later than the mid 1960s.

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:22 am 14. Blackwater:

Obama is your typical bleeding heart 19 year old college ultra-leftist who thinks they understand the entire world. The difference is as most college age ultra-leftists grow older they often question the soundness of a lot of the insane BS they were fed from far left activists. Obama seems to have not done that however and is still an ignorant and brainwashed far left true believer. Take his ultra-80s leftist Reagan era hatred era of anti-nukes idiocy for example. I think it’s only a matter of time before he starts lambasting missle defense programs by referring to them as “ridiculous Star Wars projects”.

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:25 am 15. AThinkingPerson:

Re #9 Cato: Here’s a link to the NYT with the paper that Obama wrote during his college years.

http://documents.nytimes.com/obama-s-1983-college-magazine-article#p=1

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:26 am 16. pelaut:

Just a “cocky teenager”? So was Che Guevara. Don’t underestimate the explosive quality of the teenagers inside our generation of “leaders”.

During the 60s/70s turbulence I asked Margaret Mead what our future held given the degeneration of our youth (my contemporaries, BTW). She said, like Rick Moran does here, that they’d grow up, get married, pay taxes and have children. That I shouldn’t worry. It’s just all part of the marvelous haphazardnous of human experience …

Well, they grew up all right. They made children all right. They didn’t bother to get married. They didn’t pay their taxes like I did. But they had children anyway and their children became worse than they. They now run and ruin our financial institutions, our corporations, our universities-community colleges-high schools, our government agencies and NGOs and all media propaganda mills.

The “great” anthropologist was dead wrong. She knew less after her lifetime in academia than my young man’s common sense knew.

And you are just as wrong about =:obama, this American Che Guevara. Like Che, Obama stands frozen in his adolescent authority rejection period. He’s a product of Frank Marshall Davis, Saul Alynski, Bill Ayres, Tom Hayden, you name ‘em. Note his praise yesterday of the Italian communist fundamentalist Napolitano.

But also like Che he carries a monstrous load of resentments beneath his genius demagoguery that, as it erupts, will produce an American holocaust which will dwarf the destruction of any former civilization.

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:30 am 17. Cato:

David Thomson: to be fair, for a student who wants to obtain a serious, rigorous, old fashioned liberal arts education, it can be done at the ivies and similar schools (Stanford, Chicago, Northwestern, etc., and a few ‘public ivies’), it IS possible. It requires, however, very careful course planning to get the ‘traditional’ courses taught by rigorous (usually older) faculty. When this is done at these places, with heavy emphasis on classics, philosophy, history, and what we used to call the Western canon, there is probably no better education in the world today, because of the quality of those faculty and the brilliant and focused students who seek them out. My daughter just finished doing something close to this at Northwestern, and is much the better for it.

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:30 am 18. antaine:

“Does the leader of the free world not understand that serving his own people will often be in direct conflict with shared international progress?”

oh, but they’re not “serving their own power” there…their protecting all of us from the biggest threat since the Nazis – CLIMATE CHANGE

this is the democrats’ Holy Mission™ – besides, according to obama, the debate on that is “over” and it is clearly the will of the American people (the “educated” ones and the ones who matter, anyway) that we all WANT the democrats to lead the country down this course and save us from ourselves.

Now if only all those backward, hayseed conservatives would stop trying to prove their silly anti-global-warming agenda with, of all things, scientific facts…

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:45 am 19. "progressive"watch:

Obama does sound highschool-like but not valedictorian-like.

He is becoming a man-made disaster.

First Zelaya,then Akmadinejad,then Obama.

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:45 am 20. Strawman:

The pursuit of power is no longer a zero-sum game — progress must be shared…

He manages to build a contradiction into a single sentence. Only zero-sum games require sharing. If it’s a nonzero sum, there’s plenty to go around, and no sharing is necessary.

These intellectoolz r so brite…

Jul 9, 2009 - 7:37 am 21. 888:

In other words, Obama’s an idiot.

Well, we already knew that.

Jul 9, 2009 - 7:40 am 22. Meryl:

21.888

LOL! Succinct is good!

Jul 9, 2009 - 8:01 am 23. sheesh:

11. RE . . . “Willful ignorance is he most frightening aspect of our current situation.”

WMDs

Jul 9, 2009 - 8:02 am 24. AThinkingPerson:

Re #21: “In other words, Obama’s an idiot.

Well, we already knew that.”

Nothing left to say that could be any more accurate than that!

Jul 9, 2009 - 8:17 am 25. abi:

It is a defense mechnism for ignorance…

Other people “tell” you a little about things…then you try to talk about it without research..arrogance

He and Gore are trying to control the world’s “pollution” without having China and India (*the largest polluters)on board, now that’s stupidity.

Obama gave Russia everything Putin and the boys wanted, and Obama was handed his own butt to carry home as a trophy.

Ignorance and arrogance, a dangerous conbination, we have two, Biden and Obama…joy

Jul 9, 2009 - 8:25 am 26. Mike W.:

So if President Obama is an idiot, but is running laps around the Republicans right now, laughing at their apparent helplessness to do anything to stop him from doing everything he wants to do, does that then make the Republicans super idiots?

Jul 9, 2009 - 8:50 am 27. Peter the Bubblehead:

I suspect (and fear) the reason Obama supports Zelaya the way he has is because he someday hopes to pull the same stunt, repeal the prohibition against more than 2 presidential terms, and remain our dictator for life.

Jul 9, 2009 - 9:27 am 28. susieQ!:

#26…No, it makes the American public “super idiots” for being fooled by Obama and his retoric.

Maybe we will see the tide turn in a year or so..new vote coming up..2010

Fool me once, shame on you…fool me twice shame on me..

Jul 9, 2009 - 9:31 am 29. Peter the Bubblehead:

23. sheesh:
WMDs

Peter:
800 tons of weapons grade uranium found in Iraq.

Jul 9, 2009 - 9:34 am 30. Delia:

It’s like a good chunk of the Country fell for a really bad, late night infomercial from hell.

Vat O’ Kool-Aid. Only $19.95!

Act now and we’ll throw in a Cha-cha-chia pet with a ‘fro’, a ‘Clapper’ [you'll need it when that cap and trade hits] and a Sham WOW to dry your tears!

Jul 9, 2009 - 9:39 am 31. reader:

Well said, T.K. Farrow! I am glad I recently bookmarked Pajamas Media and started reading the opinion pieces contained therein! I look to Drudge to see what is happening, but I look to Pajamas for thoughtful analyses. . .

Jul 9, 2009 - 9:51 am 32. Steve:

No Mike W. Republicans are not idiots because they can not do anything to stop Obama because mathematically that is impossible. What was stupid were those that did vote for him and those that chose not to vote to punish Republicans and handed the congress senate and White house to the democrats.

Jul 9, 2009 - 9:59 am 33. Dee:

We don’t refer to him as The Boy King for nuthin’.

Jul 9, 2009 - 10:08 am 34. Meryl:

23.Sheesh
WMDs

Iraqi General Georges Sada who served on Saddam’s military staff for years wrote an autobiographical book entitled Saddam’s Secrets (2006).

In it, he details what WMDs Saddam had, when they were moved out of Iraq (under cover of the Red Crescent organization’s activity in Syria in the wake of floods that destroyed villages).

Try to inform yourself.

Jul 9, 2009 - 10:08 am 35. Mike W.:

28. susieQ!: “#26…No, it makes the American public “super idiots” for being fooled by Obama and his retoric.”

I think only a super idiot would actually believe what you just wrote. As if the geniuses who voted for Bush suddenly became idiots when they pulled the lever for Obama.

The logical explanation is that people were just tired of Republican misrule and saw McCain as a fundamentally flawed candidate.

The crazy-pants explanation is that Obama brainwashed everyone with his dazzling smile and devilish silver tongue, and they were just so helpless and overcome with white guilt that they were literally powerless to stop themselves from voting for him, even thought they knew deep down in their hearts that he was an evil Socialist/Communist/Fascist/Marxist/Totalitarian/Sith Lord.

It’s completely unsurprising that that crazy-pants explanation is the one that is believed by most of the denizens of this looney bin. There’s no room for logic or rational thought when blind hatred is your guiding principle.

“Fool me once, shame on you…fool me twice shame on me..”

That’s not how the saying goes. It goes: “Fool me once, shame on … shame on you. Fool me … you can’t get fooled again.”

Jul 9, 2009 - 10:14 am 36. Mike W.:

29. Peter the Bubblehead: “800 tons of weapons grade uranium found in Iraq.”

You moron. Most industrialized nations deal in uranium as a commodity used for nuclear power generation, so it’s no surprise that it would be in Iraq. It is not enriched and cannot be used without first going through a complicated enrichment process. It was not weaponized and posed absolutely no threat.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/07/07/iraq.uranium/

It’s very sad and pathetic that even years after this Bush administration WMD bull**** was debunked as a lie, there continue to be traitors like you who would continue to lie in order to cover up the lies of the treasonous Bush administration.

Jul 9, 2009 - 10:26 am 37. Adina Kutnicki,Israel:

David # 1 – You made two very important points, and tragically a mostly undiscerning public propelled a no nothing radical into the most powerful position in the world through their clueless behavior.

Those who heralded his Ivy League education missed the most salient points of his so called intellectual heft. First, Obama was not only an affirmative action candidate to Columbia, (having been a transfer student from Occidental, having admitted to smoking dope much of his high school years and his first 2 years at college) but entered Harvard Law on the bootstraps of a Saudi Prince. You don’t have to take my word for this, just google in Percy Sutton & Obama and you should come to a youtube(if they haven’t taken it down already) where Sutton admits during the election that he helped Obama’s entrance into Harvard on the say so of his Saudi pal. Very strange.

Putting that aside, the halo around Harvard is VASTLY overrated. The ones who are truly intellectuals to reckon with are those who study at the other end of the Charles River, over at MIT.

MIT and Harvard allow some cross registering. Whenever my son wanted to relax, clear his head from the real intellectual rigors at MIT, he would opt to take a humanities course at Harvard. I kid you not, he acted as if he was taking a vacation when he studied at their ‘hallowed’ halls. An A at Harvard is a given, at MIT-not so much.Harvard is SO overrated it is pathetic.

Further, the area which propelled Obama over the top was not in his grasp of policy issues; not in his understanding of history, and not in his intellectual and moral fortitude. What pushed him to the forefront (aside from his puppet masters behind the scenes) was his highly skilled rhetoric, his oratory abilities.

It was through his mesmerizing speeches (which he didn’t even write) that he was able to manipulate the general masses using his high rhetorical skills. Not unlike a televangelist who is able to con millions of dollars out of devoted viewers, so too was Obama able to convince millions that he was The One.

He is a cult-like figure, not unlike Jim Jones. Hopefully his kool aid drinkers won’t swallow much more poison to prove their devotion.

It is not impossible to conclude that if something isn’t done to rein him in the immediate future,the entire country will be pushed off a cliff with him-willingly or not.

Jul 9, 2009 - 11:29 am 38. Peter the Bubblehead:

Hey Mike W @ 36,

Before you go calling someone with military experience and knowledge (particularly a veteran of OIF) a moron, try educating yourself first.

Some (though not all) of the 800 tons of yellow cake uranium taken out of Iraq was enriched and was only good for WEAPONS (thus the term WEAPONIZED). It had NO use in power generation. No use in peaceful nuclear pursuits. It had ONE and ONLY ONE purpose. WMD!

That added to the fact scientists formerly working for Saddam and now cooperating with Coalition forces have shown where Saddam hid the plans (for componants and facilities) he needed to re-start his nuclear program, which would have made it quite simple for him to start building bombs if the US had simply lobbed a few TLAMS his way again, like Clinton used to, and call it a day, which is what he expected, not the full-scale invasion he got.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/01/24/60minutes/main3749494.shtml?source=mostpop_story

Go read a real news account from time to time before you show off your ignorance.

Jul 9, 2009 - 11:30 am 39. Steve:

I bet Mike W voted for or at the least supports Obama and the democrats in the congress and senate. These types are great with half truths and get all their information from others that feed them the crud they dispel in various forums and blogs.

If I am not correct you need at least three verifiable sources for a well researched document or paper, but I guess now unidentified and anonymous sources are just fine, but not with me.

Jul 9, 2009 - 12:00 pm 40. Roderick Reilly:

I too am one of those who knew what Obama was all about early on. It didn’t take great prescience or detective skills. He let slip multiple times who he really was, and his long-time associates/mentors made it so glaringly obvious it was like a piece of skywriting with a 747 and an LED-signed blimp over the Super Bowl combined.

A significant portion of people who voted for Obama did so out of willful blindness or against their own better judgment. A second portion did so out of boredom with the then-current order, as if cancelling a TV show that had gone stale. We have millions of useful idiots such as these to thank for our current shamateurish, neo-criminal administration.

Would McCain have been so bad, considering he’s a RINO and the Democrats would have still controlled both houses of Congress? Would Palin have been any more “embarrassing” as VP than that doll-hair-implant dolt who holds that office now?

Thanks a lot, you dutiful voters who are now showing buyer’s remorse. Cram it.

Jul 9, 2009 - 12:05 pm 41. noprisoners:

Roderick @ #40:

I sense your frustration with the 52% that gave us our current situation. I too am having difficulty being civil to people that I know to be Obama voters. My “Dean of Fine Arts” brother-in-law and his family spent the Independence Day holiday with us this year. Talk about an exercise in self-restraint!!!

Jul 9, 2009 - 12:19 pm 42. Mike W.:

Hey Peter The Bubblehead @ 38,

Before you post a MSM article in defense of your delusional bull**** about WMDs (how ironic, by the way, that you right-wingers who trash the media will never think twice about linking to an MSM article to make your point), please make sure you read the article.

From the article you posted:

“And what did [Saddam] tell you about how his weapons of mass destruction had been destroyed?” Pelley asks.

“He told me that most of the WMD had been destroyed by the U.N. inspectors in the ’90s. And those that hadn’t been destroyed by the inspectors were unilaterally destroyed by Iraq,” Piro says.

“So why keep the secret? Why put your nation at risk, why put your own life at risk to maintain this charade?” Pelley asks.

“It was very important for him to project that because that was what kept him, in his mind, in power. That capability kept the Iranians away. It kept them from reinvading Iraq,” Piro says.

Sure, Saddam says that he “intended” someday to start up a new WMD program, as any leader of a country neighboring Iran would claim. but when we invaded Iraq, Saddam clearly had no such ability or capacity to do so. He was just puffing up his chest to deter the Iranians.

So, you’re full of it.

Jul 9, 2009 - 12:42 pm 43. Mike W.:

40. Roderick Reilly: “Would McCain have been so bad, considering he’s a RINO and the Democrats would have still controlled both houses of Congress?”

Yes, and I thank God and the American people each day that he lost.

Jul 9, 2009 - 12:45 pm 44. Roderick Reilly:

Understand, noprisoners, but, to be fair, I was actually talking about a lot fewer people than the whole 52%. I was referring to that critical mass of people who needn’t have put Obama over the top. In that number I not only include friends and acquantainces whose ideology is much more moderate than Obama’s, but also well-known useful idiots like David Brooks, Christopher Buckley, Peggy Noonan, that “Cramer” guy, and a host of “libertarians” (frauds to a man and woman), who were too snobbish and intellectually lazy to try and sort out what Obama was really all about, despite the fact that the Presidential campaign went on for months after Obama had revealed his true self and his close associations. I wasn’t excited about McCain either, and was very mixed about Palin, but I didn’t pull my brains out through my nose and punt them down the street like my friends did with theirs.

How bankrupt does one’s judgment have to be to vote for a man who kept throwing out clues that he wasn’t going to be acting in your best interest? These people I mentioned above went to the voting booth like drunk, horny sailors who insist the crackwhore they’re about to hook up with is actually Megan Fox. Frying Pan, meet Head.

Jul 9, 2009 - 1:06 pm 45. Marc Malone:

#42 Mike W – So… Saddam was claiming to have the WMD in order to cling to power. Wherefore should we not take him at his word? He was violating the cease-fire agreement at a time after 9/11. What was he thinking? Oh, he was thinking Bush was a Democrat. Oops!

Jul 9, 2009 - 1:20 pm 46. Mike W.:

44. Roderick Reilly: How bankrupt does one’s judgment have to be to vote for a man who kept throwing out clues that he wasn’t going to be acting in your best interest?”

I dunno, how bankrupt does one’s judgment have to be to vote for a man who admitted that he didn’t really understand the economy, who joked about bombing Iran, a country that is currently fighting for its freedom, who didn’t even fully vet his vice presidential candidate, and who eratically suspended his campaign in order to “address the economic crisis”, but then proceeded to add absolutely no value or answers to the discussion, leading everyone to believe that he was just posturing and stalling?

Jul 9, 2009 - 1:39 pm 47. Obama: No Valedictorian:

A Valedictorian is the highest rated student among the graduating class. When Obama concealed his grades and LSAT scores, we all realized how he got into those Ivy League schools. Obama’s been carried his whole life by white people who felt sorry for him, starting with his grandparents and ending with American voters. He’s an inauthentic Affirmative Action Frankenstein.

Jul 9, 2009 - 1:46 pm 48. Mike W.:

45. Marc Malone: “#42 Mike W – So… Saddam was claiming to have the WMD in order to cling to power. Wherefore should we not take him at his word?”

How dumb are you? Why the hell do we even have a CIA if our foreign policy should be to just believe, and act on, every word that every foreign dictator spouts?

So Kim Jong Il claims to have sharks with laser beams on their heads ready to deploy to attack America? Naw, don’t send our CIA field operatives to Korea to investigate, that would take time and effort! Instead, let’s just take the words of an insane dictator at face value and start dropping bombs! That way, when we find out that he was full of **** after we kill a boatload of Korean civilians, we can incur the wrath of East Asia just as we incurred the wrath of the Middle East. Genius!!

Jul 9, 2009 - 1:51 pm 49. AThinkingPerson:

Mike W: Read your post(#46). You just described Obama to a T. “Posturing and stalling”. Hello? Iran? N. Korea? Geez. “Didn’t understand the economy”. Hello? Can you spell tragic stimulus down the rabbit hole? No wonder you voted for Obama. You have no idea what he stood for during the campaign and not a clue what he has been (and not been) doing since the election.

Mike, READ and get some info on Dear Leader. If you find all of those things you listed in your post to be the sign of a bad leader, you’ve been hoodwinked. You voted for the exact candidate you described.

Did all liberals do that? Sad.

Jul 9, 2009 - 1:54 pm 50. Roderick Reilly:

“”"”"”I dunno, how bankrupt does one’s judgment have to be to vote for a man who admitted that he didn’t really understand the economy, who joked about bombing Iran, a country that is currently fighting for its freedom, who didn’t even fully vet his vice presidential candidate, and who eratically suspended his campaign in order to “address the economic crisis”, but then proceeded to add absolutely no value or answers to the discussion, leading everyone to believe that he was just posturing and stalling?”"”"”"”

Let me see, Mike W:

When given a choice between a man who fought for a country he still loves, and has way more experience than his opponent whose ideological orientation I detest, and whose real policy intentions I was aware of, which way am I going to vote? As for vetting the VP choice, how big a prize is Biden? Palin would at least have looked good while gaffing. And what’s that disingenuous, silly, convoluted “joked about bombing Iran, a country that is currently fighting for its freedom” all about? Why did you toss that in if you don’t even believe the substance of it? The President you’re defending sure as hell doesn’t. You don’t care about “Iranian freedom” anymore than Obama does. Lay off the strawmen if you want to make a valid point.

Jul 9, 2009 - 2:12 pm 51. JackTar:

Don’t bother engaging Mike W. It’s a Troll. It’s not interested in being persuaded. Don’t give it the time of day and it will slink back under it’s bridge.

Jul 9, 2009 - 2:21 pm 52. tjproudamerican:

Obama is the Democratic Party’s Ronald Reagan. Obama strikes Americans as a man and a leader, so keep dreaming that he is a silly person because we want you to underestimate him. It makes 2012 easier for us. Thx. ::hugs::

As far as your substace: The United States acted the only way it could in Iran and Honduras.

With regard to the Honduran Coup (and yes, by definition when the Army replaces a duly-elected President, it is a coup, and there is nothing anyone cited in the Honduran Constitution to say that the Army can step in–at best they need a written Impeachment Process, and at worst, the Army Leaders are seizing power for their own gain), an elected sovereign state can hardly endorse a Coup.

You write as if George H. W. Bush sided with the uprising against Saddam Hussein or as if he sided with the Tiennamen Protesters. All American Presidents have found themselves boxed in when other countries have a movement toward Democracy. I am positive that President George W. Bush would not have endorsed Mondavi, not the least because it strengthens the Mullahs.

As for your critique of Obama’s speech, it is bizarre to claim that any High School Valedictorian would address international polity, so your analogy is flawed, but please (please!!!!) keep telling yourself and yourselves that Obama is a lightweight.

The Race in 2012 is already won, so why don’t you all keep repeating these conformist talking points and take a nice long nap. I am certain when you wake up St. Sarah with her amazing grasp of issues will be president.

::hugs::

Jul 9, 2009 - 2:37 pm 53. Mike:

“… it became completely clear that his intellect is greatly overrated.”

The truth is much worse. Obama is not an intellectual, he is simply an actor in search of a cause. He has been given so much credit for being politically shrewd, but there is nothing to point to except his rhetoric.

It is clear that Obama rehearses the answers to questions. This process of rhetorical regurgitation is his talent. Over the years, it is possible that he has become infatuated with his own voice, so that his memory is tuned to remember what he has said. That skill would prevent him from routinely contradicting himself.

However, his oratory is not balanced with other skills, and detrimentally affects his creativity. This is evident because he is reluctant to delve into complex issues where his memory might betray him. Also, he uses the same sentence structure over and over again like “not only”, “not just”, and “look”.

His high regard for his own rhetoric, coupled with the disregard for his opponent’s, results in his pervasive use of strawmen. He is unable to correctly state the position of his opponents because he listens to himself more than listens to others. The strawman takes the place of the hypothetical opponent in his rhetoric, because he is much more prepared to addresses an opponent of his own creation. When confronted directly with a real opponent, he rhetorically converts the opponent’s arugment into a different one, to put the opponent on the defensive.

“Yes, the president is an idealist.”

The president is an idealist out of necessity. His rhetoric is about intentions, rather than reflections on the past. His audacity of hope allows him to pretend that his intentions guarantee results. A pragmatist must behave much more like an auditor, taking stock of accomplishments when they happen, rather than accounting for their successes beforehand.

Jul 9, 2009 - 3:18 pm 54. Anonymous:

Too bad you do not understand the analogy of a high school V.,speech and the Obama thing… but we don’t have time to stop and get you up to speed.

the hondouras thing was farfarfar from a step towards democracy..more like Chavezoracy.

Agreed, Mike W is not worth answering. Probably a Soros plant, gets paid by the word. The more degrading crap he spews the better his paycheck.

Jul 9, 2009 - 3:37 pm 55. Anonymous:

Too bad you do not understand the analogy of a high school V.,speech and the Obama thing… but we don’t have time to stop and get you up to speed.

the hondouras thing was farfarfar from a step towards democracy..more like Chavezoracy.

Agreed, Mike W is not worth answering.

53, good read…..

Jul 9, 2009 - 3:44 pm 56. Sebastian Shaw:

Without his script, Obama’s intellect is nonexistent; he needs to read lines from a teleprompter to appear to be something he’s not. Even then, President Obama screws up his lines. The man is already sleepwalking on a high wire, yet he thinks he can fly.

Jul 9, 2009 - 3:57 pm 57. abi:

hey, 53,54 are me..sorry..forgot to put my name and did it twice ..part of the Obama head start program..sorry

Jul 9, 2009 - 4:22 pm 58. David:

Bush mangles his words. With Obama the words are all nicely pronounced, but the thoughts are mangled.

Obama may never say anything like ‘misunderestimate’ but he has produced a steady stream of just plain stupid comments. Just about all educated people know that the US has 50 states, that Austrian is not a language, and that carbon dioxide does not ‘contaminate our water’. But style seems to matter more than substance.

Jul 9, 2009 - 4:24 pm 59. Roderick Reilly:

#52 tjproudamerican:

How long have you been a “Proud American,” since Jan. 20, 2008, perhaps?

Jul 9, 2009 - 4:24 pm 60. Peter the Bubblehead:

To Mike W @ #36:

I didn’t have access to some of my sources earlier, so here’s some more info for you.

From the LA Times, one of the most recognized liberal papers in the country:
Bush never lied to us about Iraq
The administration simply got bad intelligence. Critics are wrong to assert deception.
By James Kirchick
June 16, 2008

In its May 22, 2004 edition, the New York Times confirmed “The repository, at Tuwaitha, a centerpiece of Saddam Hussein’s nuclear weapons program, . . . . holds more than 500 tons of uranium . . . . Some 1.8 tons is classified as low-enriched uranium.” The paper conceded that Saddam’s nearly 2 tons of partially enriched uranium was “a more potent form” of the nuclear fuel. …the 1.8 tons could be used to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make a single nuclear bomb.

The physicist tapped by Saddam to run his centrifuge program says that after the first Gulf War, the program was largely dismantled. But it wasn’t destroyed.

In fact, according to what he wrote in his 2004 book, “The Bomb in My Garden,” Dr. Mahdi Obeidi told U.S. interrogators: “Saddam kept funding the IAEC [Iraq Atomic Energy Commission] from 1991 … until the war in 2003.”

“I was developing the centrifuge for the weapons” right through 1997, he revealed.
And after that, Dr. Obeidi said, Saddam ordered him under penalty of death to keep the technology available to resume Iraq’s nuke program at a moment’s notice.

Dr. Obeidi said he buried “the full set of blueprints, designs – everything to restart the centrifuge program – along with some critical components of the centrifuge” under the garden of his Baghdad home.

“I had to maintain the program to the bitter end,” he explained. All the while the Iraqi physicist was aware that he held the key to Saddam’s continuing nuclear ambitions.

“The centrifuge is the single most dangerous piece of nuclear technology,” Dr. Obeidi said in his book. “With advances in centrifuge technology, it is now possible to conceal a uranium enrichment program inside a single warehouse.”

Consider: 500 tons of yellowcake stored at Saddam’s old nuclear weapons plant, where he’d managed to partially enrich 1.8 tons. And the equipment and blueprints that could enrich enough uranium to make a bomb stored away for safekeeping. And all of it at the Iraqi dictator’s disposal.

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:40 pm 61. larry:

Mike , your so smart , the rest of us should just wait for your response to everything . By the way , if you really want to start calling people traitors , try Pelosi ,Reid , Murtha etc. B . A better discription of Obama , he’s your tipcal spoiled black male of today . He think’s all white females can’t resist them , there are bumper stickers here in the northwest ,” Women For Obama ” , I have yet to see one on a black female’s car .

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:46 pm 62. Peter the Bubblehead:

52. tjproudamerican wrote:
Obama strikes Americans as a man and a leader

Peter asks: Hey tj, you ever see your vaunted man and leader when his teleprompter breaks down? More like stuttering idiot.

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:52 pm 63. Peter the Bubblehead:

53. Mike wrote:
It is clear that Obama rehearses the answers to questions.

Peter writes: That is more than evident when at what was supposed to be a purely unrehearsed Q&A session about his new health plan (ie rationed care) he had ringers planted in the audience with rehersed questions that he was able to read the answers from the off-screen teleprompter.

It would all be funny if it weren’t destroying this once-great nation.

Jul 9, 2009 - 5:56 pm 64. Dave:

“Sure, Saddam says that he “intended” someday to start up a new WMD program, as any leader of a country neighboring Iran would claim. but when we invaded Iraq, Saddam clearly had no such ability or capacity to do so. He was just puffing up his chest to deter the Iranians.”

Yeah right.

Our intelligence agencies, most of the intelligence agencies of the free world (not to mention a large number of Democrats including the previous administration) said the Iraqi regime was developing WMD and was probably stockpiling, but it was clear that Saddam was just kidding – puffing his chest. The fact that he had already used them on his own people was just a minor point. No doubt that as soon as the inspection regime was dismantled, Saddam would have NEVER made any WMD’s or shared them with terrorists. He was WAY to stable and rational for that.

I guess if you insult people and wrap this logic with enough bile and hate, it starts to sound right. I’m just not sure to who.

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:09 pm 65. zanne:

Since all his records are sealed…I have no point of reference. Somebody does.

Jul 9, 2009 - 6:31 pm 66. Delia:

65. zanne:

“Since all his records are sealed…I have no point of reference. Somebody does.”

Even his teachers who ‘graded’ him have clammed up? Why? Surely, this brilliant genius of a teleprompter reading thespian must have surely achieved stellar grades?????

Non?

Jul 9, 2009 - 7:49 pm 67. MArtin:

It is the good fortune of Barack Obama that the ignorance of the American electorate is greater than his. With each passing day, Obama’s incompetence in both domestic and foreign affairs becomes more obvious to those who are able to see. Unfortunately, the majority of Americans have become willfully blind and stubbornly continue to support him and show no concern that he is leading the country into certain bankrupcy.
Where is the honest young American child who like the child in Hans Christian Andersen’s famous fairy tale,”The Emperor’s New Clothes”, cries out “The emperor is naked!”

Jul 9, 2009 - 8:00 pm 68. Juvenal:

I like it when trolls like MikeW reveal their mercenary motives. They are quite willing to make themselves look like complete fools in order to collect another dime out of the Soros fund.

Saddam told one of his cronies that all the WMDs and WMD materials are gone–but that they’ll restart that program as soon as things die down and the coast is clear? This is not exactly damaging to Peter’s argument.

Saddam told his guy that there were no longer weapon materials in Iraq, yet they found 800 tons of the stuff? Clearly, Peter’s an idiot, and “Bush Lied, People Died.” The fact that it might be idiotic to suppose that Saddam would [i]never[/i] lie to one of his minions doesn’t seem to occur to MikeW.

The only way I can explain this behavior is that MikeW gets paid, as someone earlier said, by the word. He doesn’t care about having a logical or coherent argument. He doesn’t even care if he’s made to look like a complete dumbass.

But cut the guy some slack: Ever since the Tower Records in Berkley closed in ‘06, he’s been out of a job, and that master’s degree in Hobo Studies just hasn’t turned into quite the meal ticket he thought it would be. He’s grateful to have the Soros gig.

Jul 9, 2009 - 8:41 pm 69. Delia:

67. MArtin,

Don’t forget the power er ‘Powwa’ of ‘ACORN’.

Jul 9, 2009 - 8:47 pm 70. John:

Are you guys serious? Are you really suggesting the Obama is somehow the intellectual inferior to BBQ-George? My christ… Republicans left a gigantic turd on the living room rug, and still you can’t admit that the people you vote for screw up everything they touch.

Where do you buy your crack? Clearly you are getting the good stuff.

Jul 10, 2009 - 11:28 am 71. Frank:

#70.
I’ve read through the comments and no one here implied Bush has a superior intelect, though if you could manage to base the performance on actions rather than words that case can certainly be made.

As an obvious Obama backer aren’t you at least a bit curious as to how he has glommed onto W’s formertly unacceptable positions, wire taps, terrorist detention, signing statements, executive priveledge secrecy? So then by your logic, since Obama the genious is simply adopting all of these policies must that not mean that Bush is also a genious, because you certainly won’t argue the naked emperor is screwing up right?

I am not making the argument that W is a genious by any stretch, but you should be open to the possibility we elected 2 idiots in row. Eloquence equals brilliance no more than its lack therof does idiocy and you will find no better examples than in our current president and his predecessor, the one who released his college transcripts from before they began dumbing down grades.

Consider; the guy who screwed up everything he touched had 32 quarters in office, at least 28 of which saw economic growth. What are the chances the current occupant will able to achive that record? To call the liberation of 50 million and prevention of subsequent terror attcks here at home for 7 1/2 years screw ups leaves one wondering just whose side you are on.

Jul 10, 2009 - 12:32 pm 72. Marc Malone:

I never found Bush to be idiotic, because I looked at ALL the evidence.

His address to Congress after 9/11 was stellar! He greatly reassured the American public. It is why his approval ratings were so high after 9/11. Interestingly, he wrote it himself.

His position speech on stem-cell research was thorough and well-reasoned. Throughout, it was hard to tell on which side he’d come down. Excellent bit of work. Again, his work.

His 2003 State of the Union with his declaration of the intent to launch PEPFARS. Excellent work. And he followed through! This was his policy plan.

His decision to hold fast in Iraq, to push for the “Surge” strategy. He had to determine the viability of the plan. He clearly made the right call. His decision!

When he goes places and gives speeches to small groups, the reviews are always the same after people meet him: He’s not at all what we expected, based on what the press reported; He’s warm, engaging, funny, wise, impressive even. They’re always surprised.

Did he make some bad calls? Absolutely. Putin? Yep! Bailouts? Check! Spending? Check! When he was acting as a Conservative, he did well. When he was busy being “moderate”, he did poorly.

The Presidency is not so much about intelligence as wisdom and character. Obama may indeed be smart. I’ve never seen ANY evidence of this. Bush has good character and some decent wisdom. And he’s not stupid. Obama? Stupid is as stupid does. No character or wisdom. None. Character matters.

Jul 11, 2009 - 12:20 pm 73. Marc Malone:

I never found Bush to be idiotic, because I looked at ALL the evidence.

His address to Congress after 9/11 was stellar! He greatly reassured the American public. It is why his approval ratings were so high after 9/11. Interestingly, he wrote it himself.

His position speech on stem-cell research was thorough and well-reasoned. Throughout, it was hard to tell on which side he’d come down. Excellent bit of work. Again, his work.

His 2003 State of the Union with his declaration of the intent to launch PEPFARS. Excellent work. And he followed through! This was his policy plan.

His decision to hold fast in Iraq, to push for the “Surge” strategy. He had to determine the viability of the plan. He clearly made the right call. His decision!

When he goes places and gives speeches to small groups, the reviews are always the same after people meet him: He’s not at all what we expected, based on what the press reported; He’s warm, engaging, funny, wise, impressive even. They’re always surprised.

Did he make some bad calls? Absolutely. Putin? Yep! Bailouts? Check! Spending? Check! When he was acting as a Conservative, he did well. When he was busy being “moderate”, he did poorly.

The Presidency is not so much about intelligence as wisdom and character. Bush has good character and some decent wisdom. And he’s not stupid. Obama? Stupid is as stupid does. No character or wisdom. None. Character matters. Obama may be smart, but I have never seen ANY evidence of this.

Jul 11, 2009 - 12:23 pm 74. myth buster:

#36 Mike W. YOU FAIL NUCLEAR PHYSICS FOREVER
Reactor grade uranium is only 3% U-235. Even high burnup reactors only call for 10% enrichment, though going higher gets a better burnup. However, you can’t build a bomb unless the fissile material, either U-235 or Pu-239, is at least 95% pure.

Jul 11, 2009 - 6:48 pm 75. Jshub:

One of the most annoying things about Obamaphiles is their insistence that their guy is so superior because he “could have made millions in the private sector but chose to commit himself to public service.” This actually meant grant-writing, poltics and empty speechifying. My take on this is that the both Mr. and Mrs. O are just plain lazy. I’m a hack lawyer scrabbling for clients and, believe me, establishing a law practice is bloody hard work even for the Harvard-educated elite. My take on the Obamas “committment to public service” is that neither one of them wanted to put the 90 hours a week into actually representing real human beings in real courts of law. But then again real human beings seem to take up very little room in the Obama universe.

Jul 11, 2009 - 7:14 pm 76. Nancy in Texas:

The hypocrisy of the current POTUS is amazing. He admitted he wouldn’t use his own Obamacare for HIS family, but deems it sufficient for the citizens of the country he is determined to destroy. His first act as POTUS was signing the bill funding overseas abortions. His cap and trade bill is based on false science. His wife flaunts $600 sneakers and $6000 handbags. He is certainly a socialist/Marxist/Communist. The idiots who elected him have catapulted our country into growing disaster. There are MANY of us who WILL NOT SUBJECT OURSELVES TO SOCIALIST SERVITUDE. If this terrible man’s Apologetics European Tour can’t bring some kind of comprehension to the idiots who voted for him that they have contributed to the potential collapse of this nation, perhaps they’ll get it when told to move to the back of the line for that kidney transplant because they’re “too old” or the wrong ethnicity…perhaps that first electric bill following the cap and trade passage will hit them…somehow, I doubt it. I think these people actually believe that government should run people’s lives.

“Hope and change?”

Pathetic.

Jul 14, 2009 - 12:00 am 77. ate mely:

This POTUS has no wisdom.
‘Terribly and swiftly shall he come against you, because judgment is stern for the exalted’ Wisdom 6:5

Jul 14, 2009 - 7:09 am

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