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event
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1995 |
In his memoir, Obama writes of one of the watershed
moments of his racial awareness — time and again in remarkable detail.
It is a story about a Life magazine article that influenced him. The
report was about a black man who tried to bleach his skin white. When
Obama was told no such article could be found in Life, he says “it might
have been Ebony.He is 9 years old, living in
Indonesia, where he and his mother moved with her new husband, Lolo
Soetoro, a few years earlier. One day while visiting his mother, who was
working at the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, Obama passed time by looking
through several issues of Life magazine. He came across an article that
he later would describe as feeling like an “ambush attack.”The
article included photos of a black man who had destroyed his skin with
powerful chemical lighteners that promised to make him white. Instead,
the chemicals had peeled off much of his skin, leaving him sad and
scarred, Obama recalled.“I imagine other black
children, then and now, undergoing similar moments of revelation,” Obama
wrote of the magazine photos in “Dreams.”Yet no such photo
exists, according to historians at the magazine. No such photos, no
such article. When asked about the discrepancy, Obama said in a recent
interview, “It might have been an Ebony or it might have been … who
knows what it was?” (At the request of the Tribune, archivists at Ebony
searched their catalogue of past articles, none of which matched what
Obama recalled.)In fact, it is surprising, based
on interviews with more than two dozen people who knew Obama during his
nearly four years in Indonesia, that it would take a photograph in a
magazine to make him conscious of the fact that some people might treat
him differently in part because of the color of his skin. |
2003 |
Barack Obama in 2003, talking
to the AFL/CIO:“I happen to be a proponent of single-payer universal
healthcare coverage. That’s what I’d like to see.”In January, 2008,
Obama claimed in a nationally televised debate:”I never said that we
should try to go ahead and get single-payer.” |
2004
|
In Obama’s famous DNC
Convention speech, Obama says, “My father was a foreign student, born
and raised in a small village in Kenya. He grew up herding goats, went
to school in a tin-roof shack. His father — my grandfather — was a cook,
a domestic servant to the British.”
Kezia, Obama Sr.’s first wife tells a story that puts Obama’s account to lie.
Kezia said: In 1955 Obama
Sr. was 18 and working in an office in Nairobi, when he took Kezia from
her family at the age of 16. Her father was furious. “He did not like
Obama. My father and brothers came to Nairobi to bring me back.
They said I had to go back to school. “When I wouldn’t, they said they
would never speak to me again. “Barack was also worried about what his
father would think because I was so young, but he gave us his approval.
Obama’s father (often described as poor) sent my mother and father 14 cows for my dowry.
Just how can a cook, a domestic servant to the British, provide a dowry of 14 cattle for Senior’s first wife? Also, Obama’s father had been working in a Nairobi office since the age 16, not herding goats.
As an aside, can you imagine if a
Republican was running for president and it came out that his father had
bought his first wife for 14 cows???!!!Just wow!! |
2004 |
Responding to questions about his intent to serve out the six year senate term, Obama says, in this video, (link removed), that he will not run for the presidency in four years.Notice:
The video has disappeared. Using WayBackMachine, I found two links —
both played empty videos — a lot of stuff is being scrubbed from the
web.Here is what he said in the video:“I
think I’ve been very clear. Ah-ah-mumble-mumble, there’s a presidential
election in four years. I’m not running for president in four years.”Here
is a backup story — during a meeting with reporters at his Illinois
campaign headquarters after his election to the U.S. Senate, he ridiculed
as “a silly question” whether he would run for president or vice
president before his term ends in 2011. “I’ve never worked in
Washington,” he said. “I can unequivocally say I will not be running for
national office in four years, and my entire focus is making sure that
I’m the best possible senator on behalf of the people of Illinois.” |
2004 |
On July 28th, the day after his speech at the Democratic convention catapulted him into the national spotlight, Barack Obama told
a group of reporters in Boston that the United States had an “absolute
obligation” to remain in Iraq long enough to make it a success.”The
failure of the Iraqi state would be a disaster,” he said at a lunch
sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor, according to an audiotape of
the session. “It would dishonor the 900-plus men and women who have
already died. . . . It would be a betrayal of the promise that we made
to the Iraqi people, and it would be hugely destabilizing from a
national security perspective.”In late winter, 2008, on the campaign
trail, Obama says he wants to bring the troops home yesterday — you
decide — was he lying then or is he lying now? |
2006 |
On the January 22nd edition of “Meet the Press,” Tim Russert and Obama had the following exchange:Russert:
“When we talked back in November of ‘04 after your election, I said,
‘There’s been enormous speculation about your political future. Will you
serve your six-year term as United States senator from
Illinois?’”Obama: “I will serve out my full six-year term. You know,
Tim, if you get asked enough, sooner or later you get weary and you
start looking for new ways of saying things. But my thinking has not
changed.”Russert: “So you will not run for president or vice president
in 2008?”Obama: “I will not.” |
2007 |
As another example, consider Obama’s stirring tale
for the Selma audience about how he had been conceived by his parents,
Barack Obama Sr. and Ann Dunham, because they had been inspired by the
fervor following the “Bloody Sunday” voting rights demonstration that
was commemorated March 4. “There was something stirring across the
country because of what happened in Selma, Alabama,” he said, “because
some folks are willing to march across a bridge. So they got together
and Barack Obama Jr. was born. So don’t tell me I don’t have a claim on
Selma, Alabama. Don’t tell me I’m not coming home to Selma, Alabama”Obama
was born in 1961, and the Selma march occurred four years later, in
1965. The New York Times reported that when the senator was asked about
the discrepancy later that day, he clarified: “I meant the whole civil
rights movement.” |
2007 |
Obama went on to tell his audience that the Kennedys — Jack and
Bobby — decided to do an airlift. They would bring some young Africans
over so that they could be educated and learn all about America. His
grandfather heard that call and sent his son, Barack Obama, Sr., to
America.The problem with that scenario
is that, having been born in August 1961, the future senator was not
conceived until sometime in November 1960. So, if his African
grandfather heard words that “sent a shout across oceans,” inspiring him
to send his goat-herder son to America, it was not Democrat Jack
Kennedy he heard, or his brother Bobby, it was Republican President
Dwight D. Eisenhower.Actually, Senior was awarded
an American sponsored scholarship in economics to the University of
Hawaii at Manoa. He was selected by a former Kenyan cabinet minister,
the late Tom Mboya, who was earmarked as the successor to Jomo Kenyatta, Kenya’s first prime minister.The presumption was that Senior would return to Africa and use his “Western-honed skills in a new Kenya.” |
2007 |
On January 24, the Obama campaign released a statement, saying, “To
be clear, Senator Obama has never been a Muslim, was not raised a
Muslim, and is a committed Christian who attends the United Church of Christ in Chicago.On March 14th, in a statement
to The Times, the Obama campaign offered this statement to correct
their previous statement, that appears to be a bold-faced lie:”Obama has
never been a practicing Muslim. The statement added that as a
child, Obama had spent time in the neighborhood’s Islamic center.”And,
the original statement began, “To be clear …”So, in three months,
Barrack’s campaign has gone from describing the U.S. presidential
hopeful as never having been a Muslim and never having been raised as a
Muslim to now never having been a practicing Muslim.What’s with the
semantics? Statements from Obama’s campaign appear to have evolved,
to say the least. |
2007 |
On March 25th, the Chicago Tribune reports that an extensive search found no basis for an episode Obama recounts
about a picture he ran across in Life magazine of a “black man who had
tried to peel off his skin” in a failed effort to use chemicals to
lighten it. Obama writes that “seeing that article was violent for me,
an ambush attack.”The Tribune continued: “Yet no
such Life issue exists, according to historians at the magazine. No such
photos, no such article. When asked about the discrepancy, Obama said
in a recent interview, “It might have been an Ebony or it might have
been … who knows what it was?”At the request of
the Tribune, archivists at Ebony searched their catalogue of past
articles, none of which matched what Obama recalled.” |
2007 |
On March 27th, Obama, tells the crowd at fundraiser ,
“I was a constitutional law professor, which means unlike the current
president I actually respect the Constitution.”For
the record, Obama is a “Senior Lecturer (on leave of absence)” at the
University of Chicago Law School. He has taught Constitutional Law III:
Equal Protection and Substantive Due Process, Current Issues in Racism
& the Law, and Voting Rights & the Democratic Process. |
2007 |
On May 8th, Obama, caught up in the fervor of a campaign speech Tuesday, drastically overstated
the Kansas tornadoes death toll, saying 10,000 had died.”In case you
missed it, this week, there was a tragedy in Kansas. Ten thousand people
died — an entire town destroyed,” the Democratic presidential candidate
said in a speech to 500 people packed into a sweltering Richmond art
studio for a fundraiser.The death toll was 12. |
2007 |
On May 10th, Obama botched
his facts in a speech criticizing the U.S. auto industry for “investing
in bigger and faster cars while foreign competitors invested in more
fuel-efficient technology.”Obama stated that “while our fuel standards
haven’t moved from 27.5 miles per gallon in two decades, both China and
Japan have surpassed us, with Japanese cars now getting an average of 45
miles to the gallon.” But Toyota, which should know, has responded, “No
carmaker gets 45 mpg; ours is closer to 30 mpg.”Well, we’re glad to see
Obama’s shifting the blame from the consumer to the automakers. That
must explain why the Illinois Senator and Presidential candidate owns a
HEMI-powered V8 Chrysler 300C.Obviously it’s Chrysler’s fault Obama bought a big 5.7-liter engine from them — he just didn’t have a choice. |
2007 |
During his 12 years in politics, Sen. Barack Obama has received nearly three times more campaign cash from indicted businessman,
Tony Rezko and his associates, than he has publicly acknowledged, the
Chicago Sun-Times has found.Seven months ago, Obama told the Sun-Times
his “best estimate” was that Rezko raised “between $50,000 and $60,000″
during Obama’s political career.However, Obama has collected at least
$168,308 from Rezko and his circle. Additionally, Obama also has taken
in an unknown amount of money from people who attended fund-raising
events hosted by Rezko since the mid-1990s. Everything you ever wanted to know about Obama and Rezko. |
2007 |
Responding to criticism of his disrespect of the flag of the United
States during the National Anthem, Obama defended himself by saying “My
grandfather taught me how to say the Pledge of Allegiance when I was 2.”
He didn’t even remember what he was doing on September 17th,
when Obama, Hillary and Bill Richardson attended the Steak Fry of Sen.
Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) in Indianola, IA.How can he possibly remember what
happened when he was two years old? |
2007 |
On October 6th,
Obama accused his fellow American citizens of the indiscriminate murder
of Iraqi civilians, saying, “And these private (Blackwater USA)
contractors, they go out and they’re spraying bullets and hitting
civilians and that makes it more dangerous for our troops.”Obama lies
with the same ease as the Clintons and proves that he will say anything
to win the nomination and election. |
2007 |
Last fall during a nationally televised presidential debate, Obama
hesitantly raised his hand and joined with most of his Democratic rivals
to declare that he opposed decriminalizing marijuana. (first video).But
as a candidate for the U.S. Senate four years ago, Mr. Obama told
Illinois college students that he supported eliminating criminal
penalties for marijuana use or possession, according to a videotape of a
little noticed debate that was obtained by The Washington Times.”I
think we need to rethink and decriminalize our marijuana laws,” Mr.
Obama told an audience during a debate at Northwestern University in
2004. “But I’m not somebody who believes in legalization of marijuana.” (second video).Asked about the two different answers, Mr. Obama’s presidential campaign said
he in fact has “always” supported decriminalizing marijuana as he
answered in 2004, meaning the candidate mistakenly raised his hand
during the presidential debate last fall. |
2007 |
On the 1st of December, Obama said, “I’m not running because I’m trying to fulfill some long-held plan.”Oh, really?Iis
Darmawan, 63, Obama’s teacher in 1970, remembers him as an
exceptionally tall and curly haired child who quickly picked up the
local language and had sharp math skills. “He wrote an essay titled, ‘I Want To Become President,’” the teacher said.In 1971, Obama’s sister Maya, has also said, “There was always a joke between my mom and Barack that he would be the first black president.”In 1991, David B. Wilkins , the Kirkland and Ellis professor of law, said
he advised Obama to become a Supreme Court Clerk. “Obama recognized the
honor in pursuing that post,” Wilkins said, but quickly added that he
wasn’t interested.“He said that he
wanted to write a book about his life and his father, go back to
Chicago, get back into the community, and run for office there. He knew
exactly what he wanted and went about getting it done,” Wilkins said.In 1992, Obama’s brother-in-law, Craig Robinson pulled him aside and asked
about his plans. “He said, ‘I think I’d like to teach at some point in
time, and maybe run for public office,’” recalls Robinson, who assumed
Senator Obama meant he’d like to run for city alderman. “He said no — at
some point he’d like to run for the U.S. Senate. And then he said,
‘Possibly even run for President at some point.’ And I was like, ‘Okay,
but don’t say that to my Aunt Gracie.’ I was protecting him from saying
something that might embarrass him.”In
1993, Obama began teaching at the University of Chicago Law School,
where he declined to pursue a tenure-track post, hoping to save time for
politics.The one thread, that
remains consistent, throughout Obama’s life, is his teacher’s, mentor’s
and friend’s recollection of Obama’s single-minded pursuit of high
political office. |
2007 |
On December 22nd,
in a small-town café in Pleasantville, Omaha, Obama was asked a
question that typically only circulates on the Internet. As he sat down
to have a slice of pie with a small group of potential voters and an
elderly woman asked him about being Muslim. “I’ve always been a
Christian,” the Illinois Democrat responded. “I have never practiced
[Islam].”Note: The newspaper editors had to add the word, “Islam.”In
his autobiography, “Dreams From My Father,” Obama mentions studying the
Quran. He was enrolled in two Jakarta schools as a Muslim. His teacher
Tine Hahiyary said that she remembered that he had studied “mengaji”
(recitation of the Quran).” Classmate Rony Amiris described Obama as
being a very devout Muslim, saying, “Barry was previously quite
religious in Islam.” Another classmate, Emirsyah Satar, now the CEO of Garuda Indonesia, was quoted as saying, “He (Obama) was often in the prayer room wearing a ’sarong.’” (See Obama’s Education.)Yet, on his official campaign website, Obama has posted this statement,
“Barack has never been a Muslim or practiced any other faith besides
Christianity.”Obama’s grandfather was a Muslim. Obama’s father was a
Muslim. Obama’s stepfather was a Muslim. His African relatives are
Muslims. What was he for the 27 years before his alleged conversion if
he wasn’t a Muslim? If Obama has always been a Christian, why was he
enrolled in two Jakarta schools as a Muslim, and why did he study the
Quran?And note his Clintonesque defense, “I have never practiced.”This
is Obama’s biggest problem — his dissimulation.Saying, “I’ve always been
a Christian,” is a bold-faced lie. |
2008 |
On January 22nd,
the Hillary Clinton Campaign releases a video that proves that Obama
lied about his position on “single-payer healthcare.”The video compares
statements Obama made during the January 21st Democratic debate with
those he made to an AFL-CIO conference in June 2003 while campaigning
for the Senate. Contradicting what Obama said at the debate, the old
footage shows the senator saying, “I happen to be a proponent of
single-payer universal healthcare coverage. That’s what I’d like to
see.”At the debate, Obama stated: “I never said that we should try to go
ahead and get single-payer (healthcare).”Single-payer healthcare is an
euphemism for socialized medicine. |
2008 |
February — As Sen. McCain has pointed out,
Obama promised to use public funding in the general election if the
Republican candidate would do so also. Well, McCain has agreed to it,
but now Obama wants to back out of the deal. After all, when he made the
promise, he didn’t have a chance of raising more than the public’s $85
million stipend. But now that he can raise $300 million, well, what’s a
little untruth between the waited-for one and his people? Yes, he can. |
2008 |
On February 29th, the Obama campaign told
Canadian Television (CTV) that no message was passed to the Canadian
government suggesting that Obama does not mean what he says about opting
out of NAFTA if it is not renegotiated.However, the Obama camp did not
respond to repeated questions from CTV on reports that a conversation on
this matter was held between Obama’s senior economic adviser, Austan
Goolsbee, and the Canadian Consulate General in Chicago.Earlier
Thursday, the Obama campaign insisted that no conversations have taken
place with any of its senior ranks and representatives of the Canadian
government on the NAFTA issue. On Thursday night, CTV spoke with
Goolsbee, but he refused to say whether he had such a conversation with
the Canadian government office in Chicago. He also said he has been told
to direct any questions to the campaign headquarters.CTV didn’t stop
there. They announced that their sources, at the highest levels of the
Canadian government,” reconfirmed the story to CTV and one of their
primary sources provided a timeline of the discussion to CTV. |
2008 |
On March 2nd, Obama told another whopper
while criticizing Hillary Clinton.Obama said that Sen. Jay Rockefeller,
a fellow Democrat from neighboring West Virginia, had read the
intelligence estimate as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee
and after a brief pause said the then-chairman had voted against the war
resolution.However, Rockefeller was not the chair at the time and voted
in favor of the war authorization. Sen. Bob Graham of Florida was the
intelligence committee chair in 2002 and voted against the resolution.
Obama did not mention Graham’s name in the passage.His exact words are,
“She didn’t read the National Intelligence Estimates. Jay Rockefeller
read it. But she didn’t read it. I don’t know what all that experience
got her because I have enough experience to know that if you have a
National Intelligence Estimate and the chairman of the national, um,
Senate Intelligence Committee says you should read this, this is why I’m
voting against the war, that you should probably read it. I don’t know
how much experience you need for that.” |
2008 |
March 7th — Obama’s courage: Contrary to a recent hyperbolic campaign ad, it wasn’t “courageous”
to give his 2002 anti-war speech, primarily because he delivered it at
an anti-Iraq war rally.At the last debate, America’s former co-president
claimed that it was easy to give that speech, and it wasn’t a gamble
for him because he wasn’t in the US Senate and therefore wasn’t in a
position of responsibility. Obama’s impassioned reply was, “I was in the
midst of a U.S. Senate campaign. It was a high-stakes campaign.”Wrong.
In reality, Obama did not announce his intentions to run for the US
Senate until January 2003. |
2008 |
March 7th — Obama say he doesn’t take money
from DC lobbyists and special interest PACS. This is the type of
double-talk “politics of the past” rhetoric Obama rails against.While
his claim is technically true, what he does do is take money from state
lobbyists and other big money contributors who have substantial lobbyist
machines in DC, like law firms and corporations.In April 2007, the LA
Times quoted the Campaign Finance Institute’s Stephen Weissman as
pointing out that the distinction Obama makes on lobbyist money is
meaningless: “He gets an asterisk that says he is trying to be
different. … But overall, the same wealthy interests are funding his
campaign as are funding other candidates, whether or not they are
lobbyists.”The Capital Eye reported that “[a]ccording to the Center for
Responsive Politics, 14 of Obama’s top 20 contributors employed
lobbyists this year, spending a total of $16.2 million to influence the
federal government in the first six months of 2007.”Obama’s no stranger
to being influenced by those campaign donations, either. |
2008 |
March 14th — In one of the biggest lies he ever told —
Obama says he “vehemently condemns” the words of his pastor and mentor,
Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright, an official member of Obama’s campaign, as a member of Obama’s African American Religious Leadership Committee. What an absolute pile of crap!Obama says he’s never witnessed or heard these statement before.
Double click arrow on tool bar to view. (01:30)Another load of crap! Obama has! Later, in a cover-his-ass speech, Obama even admits he heard “the REv’s” despicable words.Obama and his wife Michelle have been listening to this man for 20 years.Obama is a bold-faced liar to now claim he had no idea the “the Rev” was such an anti-American, racist, hate-monger!Why hasn’t Obama denounced “the Rev” at any time in the past 20 years?The answer, of course, is because Obama wasn’t running for national office before — that’s one reason.Another?Obama and Wright are of the same mind — now and then! |
2008 |
March 14th — OK, OK! Maybe he didn’t hear those words. But what about Reverend White’s words that appear in Obama’s very own book,
“Dreams of My Father.”"It is this world, a world where cruise ships
throw away more food in a day than most residents of Port-au-Prince see
in a year, where white folks’ greed runs a world in need,
apartheid in one hemisphere, apathy in another hemisphere… That’s the
world! On which hope sits!”Reverend Wright spoke of Sharpsville and
Hiroshima, the callousness of policy makers in the White House and in
the State House. That was 13 years ago, in 1995. |
2008 |
March 14th — Barack may not have heard Wright’s rants, but did he read them?In the Trinity United Church of Christ Bulletin,
January 21, 2007, on pages 9 and 10, “The Pastor’s Page,” are these
words:”We have lost over 3,000 boys and girls in an illegal and unjust
war, and the media is on a feeding frenzy about Barack Obama’s church.
Where is the outrage about the 3,000 dead American military personnel
and the 600,000 dead Iraqi civilians who are dead for no reason other
than greed and ego? What’s goin’ on?”"I use his words today on the third
Sunday of a New Year to keep before you the painful truth of who we are
and where it is we are in this racist United States of America! What’s
goin’ on?”"The reality, however, is that the entire war in Iraq and the
larger “war on terror” have been based on lies, half-truths and
distortions to serve the agenda of the United States imperialism. Where
is the public outcry? Where is the outrage? What’s goin’ on?”He may
never have heard Wright actually say the U. S. was racist or some
aspiring empire. But he never read it in his bulletin? Ever? |
2008 |
On Friday, the 14th, presidential candidate Barack Obama repudiated
what he called “inflammatory and appalling remarks” made by his Chicago
pastor.Obama said he had not been present during the sermons in
question.Obama told MSNBC,
“Had I heard them in church I would have expressed that concern
directly to Rev. Wright.”Please note, he says that he would have
expressed concern, not repudiate, the wordsYet, in this video, “the Rev” places Obama in the congregation, by saying, “There is a man here,
who can take this country in a new direction” and he points at
him.In the next clip, during Wright’s 2007 Christmas services, Wright
rails, “Barack knows what it means to be a black man living in a country
and a process that is controlled by rich white men, Hillary can never
know that, Hillary ain’t ever been called a nigger!”While Wright rails,
“Bill did us like he did Monica Lewinsky,” Wright’s successor, Otis Moss
III, jumps into the picture frame, attempting to high-five “the
Rev.”Barack was in Chicago
for Christmas 2007 and Wright is addressing him from the pulpit.
Will Barack say me didn’t attend Christmas services?When Obama said,
“Had I heard them in church …” Obama lied. He listened to Wright’s
sermons for 20 years.These two men, Obama and Wright, are two peas in
the same pod.And before I get feedback from the loony libs, remember, it
was Obama, himself, that wrote these words in “‘Dreams of My Father,” —
“I found solace in nursing a pervasive sense of grievance and animosity
against my mother’s race.”And, please notice the congregation in that
video. They are going nuts during Wright’s preaching. All of them
believe this “evil white man” crap and eat it up. The whole bunch of
them are the worst kinds of hateful racists — and remember, Wright’s
congregation is composed of successful, educated African-Americans. |
2008 |
And on the same day, he admits to another whopper!Obama
now says Rezko played a bigger fundraising role.Indicted Chicago
businessman Antoin “Tony” Rezko was a more significant fundraiser for
presidential candidate Barack Obama’s earlier political campaigns than
Obama has previously admitted. Rezko raised as much as $250,000 for the
first three offices Obama sought, the senator told the Tribune on
Friday.Obama also said for the first time that his private real estate
transactions with Rezko involved repeated lapses of judgment. The
mistake, Obama said, was not simply that Rezko was under grand jury
investigation at the time of their 2005 and 2006 dealings. “The mistake
was he had been a contributor and somebody involved in politics,” he
said.And this from a guy who is running for office based upon his
judgment. |
2008 |
March 15th — Will Obama deny he was in attendance
at the controversial Chicago church when the pastor referred to “white
arrogance” and “the United States of White America” on July 22, 2007,
accompanied by his Secret Service detail.Wright laced into America’s
establishment, blaming the “white arrogance” of America’s Caucasian
majority for the woes of the world, especially the oppression suffered
by blacks. To underscore the point he refers to the country as the
“United States of White America.” Many in the congregation, including Obama, nodded in apparent agreement as these statements were made. |