BlogWonks

Steve Chapman tells us that while Joe Biden pretends to have had a blue collar upbringing it’s just not true.

The facts are there for anyone who wants to look at them. When Joe Biden Sr. died in 2002, his obituary in the News-Journal of Wilmington reported that when he married in 1941, “he was working as a sales representative for Amoco Oil Co. in Harrisburg.”

It went on, “Biden also was an executive in a Boston-based company that supplied waterproof sealant for U.S. merchant marine ships built during World War II. After the war, he co-owned an airport and crop-dusting service on Long Island.” Upon moving his family to Delaware, the News-Journal said, Biden “worked in the state first as a sales manager for auto dealerships and later in real-estate condominium sales.”

Executive, co-owner and manager? Those titles identify the jobholder as solidly middle class, if not better. They fall in the category of white-collar occupations, not blue-collar.

And Biden Sr. clearly knew the difference. In his book, “Promises to Keep,” Biden writes that his father was “the most elegantly dressed, perfectly manicured, perfectly tailored car sales manager Wilmington had ever seen.”

Biden notes that he himself could have gone to the best public high school in Delaware. Instead, he enrolled at Archmere Academy, a Catholic prep school that made him think he had “died and gone to Yale.” He took a summer job to help pay the steep tuition, which today amounts to $18,450 a year.

The Obama/Biden ticket keeps getting phonier by the second.

According to the latest Rasmussen poll, the Obamassiah’s bounce is gone, and Obama is now polling the same as prior to the start of the convention.

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday—the day before the Republican National Convention is scheduled to begin—shows Barack Obama ahead of John McCain by three percentage points both with and without leaners. That’s exactly the same edge Obama enjoyed a week ago on the eve of the Democratic National Convention.

But wait. It gets much, much  worse from there.

There have been significant changes in perception of John McCain in the two days of polling since he named Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. Since then, 49% of Republicans voice a Very Favorable opinion of McCain. That’s up six percentage points from 43% just before the announcement. Also, 64% of unaffiliated voters now give positive reviews to McCain, up ten points since naming his running mate.

There has been little change in perceptions of Obama since his Thursday night speech and the Palin announcement (see trends and other recent demographic observations).

Palin herself made a good first impression and is now viewed favorably by 53% of voters nationwide. Her counterpart, Joe Biden, is viewed favorably by 48%. While Palin has made a good first impression, the more significant numbers will come a week from now after the nation has a chance to learn more about her.

No wonder the Democrats are getting scared. They  keep attacking Sarah Palin, but she keeps   polling  better than their own candidate. But, the real problem here for the Dems is how much better independent voters feel about McCain since he made his VP selection.  Obviously, picking Palin is playing extremely well with the very people that are going to decide this election.

Here’s an installment of Chapin’s INFERNO wherein I outline Joe Biden and his links to pernicious feminism…he is The Scourge of Man. His iron clad connection with totalitarian harridans is yet another, in a multitude, of reasons why voters should reject the Democratic Party this November.

While the Obama supporters are fairly delusional in their thinking that Sarah Palin was a last minute desperation pick in response to their sensational convention, the reality isn’t even close. Sarah Palin has been under consideration for months to be John McCains’s running mate, and was even the front runner for most of that time.

Far from being a last-minute tactical move or a second choice when better known alternatives were eliminated, Palin was very much in McCain’s thinking from the beginning of the selection process, according to McCain’s advisers. The 44-year-old governor made every cut as the first list of candidates assembled last spring was slowly winnowed. The more McCain learned about her, the more attracted he was to her as someone who shared his maverick, anti-establishment instincts.

“He looked at her like a kindred spirit,” said one close adviser, who declined to be identified in order to speak more freely. “Someone who wasn’t afraid to take tough positions.”

Rick Davis, McCain’s campaign manager and the person at the point of the vice presidential process, said there was no abrupt change of course in the final hours. Nor, he said, was Palin selected without having gone through the full vetting process that was done for other finalists. That process included reviews of financial and other personal data, an FBI background check and considerable discussion among the handful of McCain advisers involved in the deliberations.

“Nobody was vetted less or more than anyone in the final stages, and John had access to all that information and made the decision,” Davis said. “It’s really not much more complicated than that.”

In part to blunt criticism that McCain had pulled a last-minute switch and turned to Palin without all the information he may have needed to make a decision, some of those advisers shared details yesterday about the steps that led to McCain’s choice, mostly on a not-for-attribution basis.

Six people were involved in the secretive deliberations that led to Palin’s selection: McCain; his wife, Cindy; campaign manager Davis; longtime confidant Mark Salter; senior adviser Steve Schmidt; and key strategist Charlie Black. In addition, Washington lawyer A.B. Culvahouse oversaw the vetting.

Starting last spring, the inner circle met regularly with McCain to review and discuss an initial list of about three dozen possible choices. “He and several of us had multiple meetings,” one adviser said. “Discussions, strengths and weaknesses of all the candidates. He asked a lot of questions and listened — didn’t tip his hand to too many of us. He was very insistent that this process often wounds people, and we were to stay very quiet.”

The desperation pick was Obama choosing Joe Biden to add foreign policy experience, even though Biden has been wrong about many major foreign policy issues during his Senate tenure, such as opposing the troop surge in Iraq and favoring splitting Iraq into three different regions rather than having it remain a unified country. Picking Biden demolished Obama’s claim that his campaign was about “change” since Biden’s been in the Senate for 35 years. On the other hand, Palin fosters McCain’s maverick image very well. They are very much complementary, and rather than a desperation choice, Palin was an aggressive choice by a  candidate wanting to play offense rather than defense.

The online site Politico asks four Democratic historians whether Sarah Palin is qualified to be Vice President, and shockingly, they respond by saying no.

So unconventional was McCain’s choice that it left students of the presidency literally “stunned,” in the words of Joel Goldstein, a St. Louis University law professor and scholar of the vice presidency. “Being governor of a small state for less than two years is not consistent with the normal criteria for determining who’s of presidential caliber,” said Goldstein.

“I think she is the most inexperienced person on a major party ticket in modern history,” said presidential historian Matthew Dallek.

[...]

Palin, on the other hand, is a total “wild card,” said Stanford historian David Kennedy.

If she had been around for two terms as governor — or been a senator — it would have been an incredible choice,” said historian Doris Kearns Goodwin. “Who else could he have found who appealed to the conservative base … and as someone who was a reformer?”

As it turns out, Joel Goldstein is an Obama donor, Matthew Dallek is a former speechwriter for former Democratic congressman Richard Gephardt, David Kennedy is an Obama donor, and Doris Kearns Goodwin is  a Democratic Party donor.  This is who Politico asks to comment on Palin’s credentials. I thought Politico was better than that but I guess I was wrong.

But let me reiterate an important  point. Politico is full of crap. Palin has 13 years of executive experience while Obama has none. Sarah Palin is infinitely more experienced than Barack Obama is. The more they harp on the experience question, the deeper the hole the Obama supporters are going to dig for themselves.

Sarah Palin went to Landstuhl  back in 2007, before she was on the national stage. She did it because she cared, not because it would make her look good. Meanwhile, Barack Obama refused to visit our wounded troops, and went to the gym instead.  Barack Obama has no business criticizing Palin for her lack of foreign policy experience when Sarah Palin  obviously has  better judgement on these matters than Obama does.

That as governor of Alaska Sarah Palin has actually been to Iraq as many times as Senator Barack Obama has? I’d say that makes Barack Obama look pretty pathetic as far as foreign policy experience goes, and he might want to keep his arrogant yap closed if he knows what’s good for him.

Kirsten Powers says that by attacking Sarah Palin as viciously as the Democrats are doing, the Democrats  are proving that they are male chauvinists.

SHE’S just a beauty queen.

She’s another Dan Quayle.

And ironically, the biggest criticism of Sarah Palin, John McCain’s veep choice, is she has no experience. Funny, coming from the Barack Obama camp.

Following McCain’s announcement of Palin - the first female to be put on a GOP ticket for the White House, and only the second in US history - the Obama campaign skipped the niceties and blasted her as the “former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience.”

She’s also a governor of Alaska (my home state), the first woman in that office and the youngest elected in state history. She has an 80-plus percent approval rating. She has turned the state upside down with her reformist zeal and has made enemies of the Republican establishment.

And she can talk energy policy, one of the biggest issues facing this country.

Is she a gamble? Definitely. But so is Barack Obama, who has himself dismissed experience as a prerequisite for leadership, despite his spot atop the Democratic ticket.

Sarah Palin is a middle class self made woman who started at the PTA, was elected to the city council, ran for mayor of her town and won, and then was elected governor. She’s obviously an intelligent, driven woman and she’s going to bring in a lot of women voters on Election Day. And that is why the Democrats are falling all over themselves to try to make her out to be a female Dan Quayle.

Between her time as mayor and governor Sarah Palin has 13 years of executive experience while Barack Obama has zero. The Democrats say nominating Palin takes the experience issue off the the table. No, it certainly does not. What it does is point out even more clearly how little experience Barack Obama has. And the foreign policy issue is a nonstarter also, because Obama has virtually no foreign policy experience. And, whatever foreign policy decisions he’s had to make so far (like opposing the troop surge in Iraq) have been dead wrong.

Fact Check.org checks Obama’s speech and (not surprisingly) finds that much of what Barack Obama  said was bullshit.

We checked the accuracy of Obama’s speech accepting the Democratic nomination, and noted the following:

• Obama said he could “pay for every dime” of his spending and tax cut proposals “by closing corporate loopholes and tax havens.” That’s wrong – his proposed tax increases on upper-income individuals are key components of paying for his program, as well. And his plan, like McCain’s, would leave the U.S. facing big budget deficits, according to independent experts.

• He twisted McCain’s words about Afghanistan, saying, “When John McCain said we could just ‘muddle through’ in Afghanistan, I argued for more resources.” Actually, McCain said in 2003 we “may” muddle through, and he recently also called for more troops there.

• He said McCain would fail to lower taxes for 100 million Americans while his own plan would cut taxes for 95 percent of “working” families. But an independent analysis puts the number who would see no benefit from McCain’s plan at 66 million and finds that Obama’s plan would benefit 81 percent of all households when retirees and those without children are figured in.

• Obama asked why McCain would “define middle-class as someone making under five million dollars a year”? Actually, McCain meant that comment as a joke, getting a laugh and following up by saying, “But seriously …”

• Obama noted that McCain’s health care plan would “tax people’s benefits” but didn’t say that it also would provide up to a $5,000 tax credit for families.

• He said McCain, far from being a maverick who’s “broken with his party,” has voted to support Bush policies 90 percent of the time. True enough, but by the same measure Obama has voted with fellow Democrats in the Senate 97 percent of the time.
  
  
• Obama said “average family income” went down $2,000 under Bush, which isn’t correct. An aide said he was really talking only about “working” families and not retired couples. And – math teachers, please note – he meant median (or midpoint) and not really the mean or average. Median family income actually has inched up slightly under Bush.

Like I keep saying, why am I not surprised that Obama has been caught  lying again?

Somebody might need to explain to the idiots at the Associated Press that Alaska is not “a tiny, out of the way state”, but the  largest state in the United States.

In this Dec. 4, 2006 file photo, Todd Palin, right, holds the Bible for his wife, Sarah Palin, as she is sworn in as Alaska’s governor during an inauguration ceremony in Fairbanks, Alaska. As the political community turned desperate for any clues about the potential running mate of Republican Presidential candidate, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., speculation moved toward several dark horse candidates including Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the so-called ‘hockey mom’ credited with reforms of her tiny, out-of-the-way state.

Obviously, the AP is nervous that adding Palin to the ticket will hurt Obama/Biden, so they’re going after Palin themselves. It’s pretty sad really, and it won’t work.

Bernard ”Bernie” Ward, 57, a San Francisco resident who worked as a radio talk show host and was a frequent Fox News Channel and CNN guest representing the liberal-left viewpoint, was sentenced on Thursday to serve 7 years in federal prison.

The sentence includes a lifetime of supervision once he’s released, according to Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich of the Criminal Division.

On May 8, 2008, Ward pleaded guilty to one count of distributing child pornography through the Internet. According to the plea documents, Ward admitted that in December 2004, he used an online screen name to engage in an Internet chat conversation with an unknown individual also using a screen name.

During that conversation, Ward admitted that he sent an image of child pornography depicting nude children engaged in sexually explicit conduct via his e-mail account.

Ward also admitted that he used the same e-mail account to distribute 15 to 150 images of child pornography to other individuals. These images involved prepubescent children engaged in sexually explicit conduct, some with sadistic, masochistic or violent conduct.

The case was prosecuted by trial attorneys Steve Grocki, Jennifer Leonardo and Michael Yoon of the  Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section and investigated by the FBI.

Bernie Ward was a former talk host with KGO 810 AM in San Francisco and was billed by KGO as “The Lion of the Left,” was the host of both The Bernie Ward Show, a nightly news/talk show that ran weekdays 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. and the three-hour GodTalk on Sunday mornings.

In December 2007, Ward was dismissed from KGO following the federal grand jury indictment charging him the distribution of child pornography. He subsequently admitted to one of the felony charges in a plea bargain with federal prosecutors and on August 28, 2008, Bernie Ward was sentenced.

Ward is a former Catholic priest and later worked as a high school teacher. His interest in Liberal politics came about when he worked for then-Representative Barbara Boxer.

Ironically, Ward received the Scripps Howard Award for journalism as a result of his ten-part series, Heaven Help Us, which explored allegations of financial and sexual misconduct of the Catholic Church in San Francisco.

Jim Kouri, CPP is currently fifth vice-president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police and he’s a staff writer for the New Media Alliance (thenma.org).  In addition, he’s the new editor for the House Conservatives Fund’s weblog. Kouri also serves as political advisor for Emmy and Golden Globe winning actor Michael Moriarty. 

He’s former chief at a New York City housing project in Washington Heights nicknamed “Crack City” by reporters covering the drug war in the 1980s. In addition, he served as director of public safety at a New Jersey university and director of security for several major organizations.  He’s also served on the National Drug Task Force and trained police and security officers throughout the country.   Kouri writes for many police and security magazines including Chief of Police, Police Times, The Narc Officer and others. He’s a news writer for TheConservativeVoice.Com and PHXnews.com.  He’s also a columnist for AmericanDaily.Com, MensNewsDaily.Com, MichNews.Com, and he’s syndicated by AXcessNews.Com.   He’s appeared as on-air commentator for over 100 TV and radio news and talk shows including Oprah, McLaughlin Report, CNN Headline News, MTV, Fox News, etc.  His book Assume The Position is available at Amazon.Com. Kouri’s own website is located at http://jimkouri.us

In the midst of the Democrat National Convention in Denver, Colorado, Democrat Congressman Luis Gutierrez urged immigrants to join him in supporting Barack Obama in the upcoming presidential election.

While the representative from Illinois did not come out and tell illegal and legal immigrants to vote for Obama, it’s difficult to see how immigrants can help Obama except by voting for him.  And most states do little, if anything, to prevent voter fraud.

“If you want change, it is time for Latinos and for immigrants to rally behind the next President of the United States, Barack Obama. Tonight, I ask my friends in the Latino community, in the immigrant community, please join me, because Barack Obama is the change we need,” said Rep. Gutierrez

“[W]hen Barack Obama occupies the White House, that is the community our president will defend and respect by fighting for comprehensive immigration reform. Reform that keeps mothers and children and families together. Reform that brings hard-working people out of the shadows of disgrace and into the sunlight of dignity. That enforces our laws, keeps our borders secure, and our nation safe,” Gutierrez added.

Most of the mainstream media ignored the speech so as not to let Americans know what an Obama presidency will truly mean: no more borders, more aliens, more welfare, and more crime.

Congressman Gutierrez has been a long-time proponent of amnesty and opponent of immigration enforcement. He even went so far recently as to openly call for a suspension of all such immigration enforcement actions until Congress passes “comprehensive” immigration reform.

In an article I wrote earlier this month, I exposed Gutierrez and his recent remarks.
Adopting the rhetoric of the radical left, Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) explicitly compared the actions of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency to those of Nazi Germany’s most infamous secret police force, the Gestapo.

Also, in an article appearing in the online publication The Politico on August 6, Gutierrez lowered himself to using inflammatory rhetoric simply unacceptable for a member of Congress. “You know who is in charge now? The Gestapo agents at Homeland Security. They are in charge,” Gutierrez told The Politico.

In recent months ICE has increased its efforts to enforce laws against the employment of illegal aliens. In addition to arresting people for violations of US immigration law, ICE has also taken action against people involved in identity theft and the employment of underage workers.

Working with local law enforcement agencies, ICE is showing some success in capturing large numbers of illegal aliens who are members of organized crime gangs such as MS-13, the Mexican Mafia and others. In one report, obtained by the National Association of Chiefs of Police, ICE revealed that its agents arrested over 10,000 criminal aliens who are being charged with murders, rapes, robberies and other violent crimes.

Jim Kouri, CPP is currently fifth vice-president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police and he’s a staff writer for the New Media Alliance (thenma.org).  In addition, he’s the new editor for the House Conservatives Fund’s weblog. Kouri also serves as political advisor for Emmy and Golden Globe winning actor Michael Moriarty. 

He’s former chief at a New York City housing project in Washington Heights nicknamed “Crack City” by reporters covering the drug war in the 1980s. In addition, he served as director of public safety at a New Jersey university and director of security for several major organizations.  He’s also served on the National Drug Task Force and trained police and security officers throughout the country.   Kouri writes for many police and security magazines including Chief of Police, Police Times, The Narc Officer and others. He’s a news writer for TheConservativeVoice.Com and PHXnews.com.  He’s also a columnist for AmericanDaily.Com, MensNewsDaily.Com, MichNews.Com, and he’s syndicated by AXcessNews.Com.   He’s appeared as on-air commentator for over 100 TV and radio news and talk shows including Oprah, McLaughlin Report, CNN Headline News, MTV, Fox News, etc.  His book Assume The Position is available at Amazon.Com. Kouri’s own website is located at http://jimkouri.us

The US Navy, US Coast Guard and SRI International — a private security firm – are deploying a suite of advanced port security technologies, trained personnel, and are executing tactical procedures as part of a homeland security experiment in the waters of Tampa Bay through the end of August.

Collectively described as an “Adaptive Force Package,” the suite supports local incident response under the command of the Coast Guard, Captain of the Port, with the involvement of numerous federal, state and local law enforcement agencies from the Tampa Bay region. The experiment began on Aug. 20 and will conclude on Aug. 28. Civilian and military visitors will be invited to a briefing and will have an opportunity to observe Adaptive Force Package technology at the conclusion of the experiment.

The Navy’s overarching goal of the experiment is to both demonstrate the platform’s independent employment of Mine Countermeasures Mission Modules developed for the Littoral Combat Ship and to address the US Fleet Forces and Commander of the Navy’s Third Fleet Sea Trials objective for this capability. This limited-objective demonstration will serve as a core event that will benefit Coast Guard and local authorities as they work to improve civil-military procedures and incident response utilizing the Incident Command System to safeguard our nation’s ports and waterways.

The experiment offers participants the opportunity to practice working together under the framework of a Department of Defense and Department of the Navy response to a Department of Homeland Security Maritime Operational Threat Response. The team will study the best use of command and control systems for guiding the flow of information from responding units to the key decision makers in the Unified Command. Further, the team will focus on ways to reduce risks to navigation and the general public while neutralizing an underwater threat.

The Coast Guard will be responsible for incident command in the experiment. Its role is to coordinate the response and actions of private-sector maritime stakeholders with military and civilian law enforcement actions.

SRI International will support in-water operations by surveying the underwater test area, deploying inert mine and improvised-explosive-device like-objects and providing surface support. The SRI team will also deploy specialized, high-resolution 3-D sonar for new change-detection technology that will be used to confirm the identity of any potential threat.

Forensic evidence will be gathered by the Underwater Crime Scene Investigation Team from Florida State University and analyzed by the National Forensic Science Technology Center Mobile Crime Lab.

Participants include the US Coast Guard and the Port of St. Petersburg, the Naval Mine Warfare and Antisubmarine Command, Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City Division, Program Executive Office (Littoral and Mine Warfare), Office of Naval Research, Defense Threat Reduction Agency, SRI International’s Marine Technology Program and National Center for Maritime and Port Security, National Forensics Science Technology Center and Florida State University.

Source: The US Navy

More “change we can believe in” right?

Jim Messina, Barack Obama’s chief of staff, said Wednesday that if John McCain continues to be a “schmuck” the Obama campaign will be able to compete just about anywhere it wants.

“Let’s do some math,” Messina said during an Iowa delegate breakfast in which he spoke about Obama’s prospects in traditionally red states.

“If Senator McCain continues to be the schmuck he’s being, we’re going to play there, you know, and go tell some truth,” Messina said speaking of McCain’s home state of Arizona.

Is the Obama campaign being run by 12 year olds?

That’s the only way to explain this extreme response to shut down discussion of the subject.

Barack Obama’s campaign hasn’t advertised this a great deal this week, but the campaign’s “Action Wire” has been waging large-scale campaigns against critics. That includes tens of thousands of e-mails to television stations running Harold Simmons’ Bill Ayers ad, and to their advertisers — including a list of major automobile and telecommunications companies.

And tonight, the campaign launched a more specific campaign: an effort to disrupt the appearance by a writer for National Review, Stanley Kurtz, on a Chicago radio program. Kurtz has been writing about Obama’s relationship with Bill Ayers, and has suggested that papers housed at the University of Illinois at Chicago would reveal new details of that relationship.

The campaign e-mailed Chicago supporters who had signed up for the Obama Action Wire with detailed instructions including the station’s telephone number and the show’s extension, as well as a research file on Kurtz, which seems to prove that he’s a conservative, which isn’t in dispute. The file cites a couple of his more controversial pieces, notably his much-maligned claim that same-sex unions have undermined marriage in Scandinavia.

First the Obama campaign tries to get the Department of Justice to block television and radio stations from airing the ad showing Barack Obama’s ties to unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayers. And, now they’ve recruited supporters to call in to Milt Rosenberg’s radio show to denounce Stanley Kurtz. Of course, the appropriate response would have been to send somebody from the Obama campaign to debate Kurtz on the program. But, multiple phone calls to the Obama campaign by Rosenberg’s producer accomplished nothing, as the Obama campaign refused to send anyone.  Obviously, they were afraid that they wouldn’t be able to refute Kurtz, and instead chose a childish tactic that really makes it look they are scared and desperate.

The lamestream media told you:

China is on the world stage hosting the Olympic Games, and it wants to shine while on the world stage, having done all sorts of wonderful things for its time on the world stage.

The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:

“The world stage” is an effete, self-serving, self-congratulatory invention of the “news” media that creates this highly managed stage and then blows its own horn about how wonderful it is.

The communist Chinese have brutally suppressed opposition to its plans, and forced the closure of industry and banned vehicle traffic, to falsely present a world stage where you can actually see through its grossly polluted air.

The Uninvited Ombudsman admits to watching and enjoying the games on some evenings, and marveling at the prowess of the athletes, while recognizing and steadfastly resenting the “news” distortions and omissions about the vicious ChiCom dictatorship hosts and the media’s sniveling gutless groveling pandering.

The lamestream media told you:

The Heller case, which overturned D.C.’s 32-year-old gun ban, will lead to the Wild West days of Dodge City, with shootouts happening on a regular basis. “Eighty people a day die at the hands of guns,” said NYC Mayor Bloomberg. “It’s just completely befuddling that our Supreme Court would be in alliance with the gangbangers,” said Tom Barwin, village manager of Oak Park, Ill., which has a now-endangered gun ban in place.

The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:

Residents of Washington D.C. cannot legally buy guns, since there are no gun stores in the city, and direct sales across state lines have been banned by federal law since 1968. People lucky enough to already own guns in the District have not been involved in the much-feared public blood letting officials are now afraid of. How any of this will lead to shootouts was unclear at press time.

Mr. Barwin’s inane statement is very valuable, in showing how hopelessly ignorant some elected officials are. “Arguing with such vapid stupidity is less than worthless,” said an observer who refused to be named. “The man has no understanding of the good that guns do or the difference between criminals and the rest of the citizenry. He needs education along with well-deserved scorn.”

Someone needs to tell Mayor Bloomberg that guns do not have hands, and that people die at the hands of something known as criminals. Reporters failed to question the mayor about the obvious gaff. More than half of all U.S. firearm-related deaths are suicides, many related to poor care for the destitute elderly infirm. Japan suffers a far higher rate of suicides, despite a near total ban on guns (people often throw themselves under trains).

Despite an inability to get guns, D.C. residents will be able to get gun training, thanks to the NSSF “First Shots” program that teaches newcomers how to use and enjoy firearms safely. Tom Gresham’s Gun Talk Radio Show featured an interview with NSSF President Steve Sanetti on the upcoming program for the district’s residents.

No, it’s not a typo. Not only does Barack Obama have extensive ties to the political fixer and slumlord Tony Rezko  (now awaiting sentencing for multiple felony convictions), but so does Joe Biden.

Barack Obama’s ties to the prolific fund-raiser and developer - who faces up to 20 years behind bars following his June conviction for wire fraud, mail fraud, money-laundering and soliciting bribes - are relatively well-known.

Over the years, Rezko raised some $250,000 for Obama’s campaigns. And, in 2005, he helped Barack and Michelle Obama by buying a lot they couldn’t afford right next to the home they’d just purchased - then selling them part of the property.

Obama, who severed his ties to Rezko just as he started running for president, avers now that the purchase was “a bone-headed move.”

But it seems that he’s not the only “bonehead” on the ticket. It turns out that Obama’s running mate, Sen. Joe Biden, is tied into the Rezko network, too.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports that Biden has for 30 years been a close friend of Chicago lawyer Joseph Cari - a key player in the Rezko scam who pleaded guilty to extortion and admitted taking part in an $850,000 kickback scheme.

In fact, Cari was the Midwest field director for Biden’s aborted 1988 presidential bid. The Delaware senator has described him as “a friend, and he’s an honorable guy,” but added: “I don’t know anything beyond that.”

Yeah, Joe, he’s an honorable guy. Except for that little extortion and kickback thing, but that’s all just water under the bridge, right?

Actually, with leaners included, McCain has pulled slightly in front of Barack Obama.

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Wednesday shows Barack Obama and John McCain each attracting 44% of the vote for the second straight day. When “leaners” are included, though, McCain picked up another point since yesterday and now has a statistically insignificant one-point advantage over Obama, 47% to 46% (sign up for daily e-mail update).

This is the first time since August 9 that McCain has held any advantage over Obama. The candidates have been within two points of each other on every day but two for the past month (see recent daily results). Tracking Polls are released at 9:30 a.m. Eastern Time each day.

McCain is viewed favorably by 56% of the nation’s voters, Obama by 53% (see trends).

Interesting. As I thought, the convention isn’t changing anyone’s minds about Obama.  After 18 months of repeating “hope and change” over and over again, you’ve either been hypnotized, or you haven’t. And, you know what they say about hypnosis. The more intelligent you are, the lower your chances of being hypnotized successfully.

The lamestream media told you:

Most Americans believe the presidential candidates need to take a highly aggressive stance on the economy, the number one issue for most voters, which must be true because virtually every news outlet in America has reported the same thing.

The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:

Smart Americans understand that the economy is a function of the private sector and not the government, and that most government involvement with the economy adds baggage, is costly and drains energy from the world of business that finances everything.

Understanding this, the nation’s Founders provided for very tiny government involvement in the business of the people. Those principles have evaporated, or been declared illegal by the government itself, according to industry experts.

Government produces no wealth at all, it merely saps wealth from the private sector that produces it. Every dollar spent by government is a dollar taken by force through taxes from the capitalist economy that produces the products, services and profits the government leaches off.

Government programs and regulations cost the people money, and redistribute wealth from those who earn it to those who use it in a generally parasitic way. Some uses are easy to justify when they are for the common good, such as road building. Others are a total bureaucratic drain on the economy, such as huge legal and accounting industries designed to manage the incomprehensible burden of 17,000 pages of federal tax rules. American bookkeeping, which used to be a management tool for running a business, is increasingly a tax management and accounting tool for government, to keep armed tax agents away from a business’ door.

For a candidate to truly have an aggressive stance on the economy, the platform would have to include massive reduction in government interference, regulation, redistribution, social management and general spending. No such candidate could be reached at press time.

The major-party candidates all propose gigantic increases in government spending, (with accompanying tax and debt increases), as a way to “boost” the economy, vigorously encouraged by sycophants who expect to get the money for themselves. The idea is so outlandish and regressive, our language lacks words to describe the insanity. No lamestream reports address the problem, preferring instead to promote aggressive presidential “action” on the economy.

The lamestream media told you:

American Indian plaintiffs, who had sued the U.S. government for unpaid back royalties on natural resources extracted from their lands, were awarded $455 million by a federal judge, a fraction of the $47 billion they sought, according to Mary Jalonick, writing for the AP.

The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:

Reporters and editors, who are known to have little command of math, recognized that the award to American Indians was a fraction. The fraction is less than one one-thousandth of the unpaid fees the tribes had sought. That’s a small fraction. The original demand had been for $100 billion.

American taxpayers needn’t worry however, because the court didn’t decide who should get the money, meaning it will not be paid for a long time, if ever. The back payments are as much as 121 years overdue. Taxpayers did however get the benefit of the oil, gas, timber grazing and other resources which they got by promising to pay, without actually paying.

The half million Indians in the class action suit would get $910 each, for the unpaid royalties since 1887, if the award is divided equally. Because this is a number that requires use of a calculator, it was not reported.

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Oh, wonderful.

[O]n taxes, Biden has followed a path more overtly populist than the one Obama has walked, pushing for a more progressive tax code that shifts the tax burden away from lower- and middle-income families and onto high earners and businesses. …

Though Obama also wants a more progressive tax code, and supports rolling back those tax cuts passed in 2001, 2004, and 2006 that benefit wealthy households, he has also supported a corporate tax rate cut.

In recent years, Biden has voted against corporate tax cuts, the Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2006 (P.L. 109-222), and a motion to consider a permanent repeal of the estate tax. But in National Journal’s ratings of congressional voting records, he gets a 94 percent on the liberal scale on economic issues, while the National Taxpayers Union, a conservative advocacy group, rated him an “F” for voting its way only 4% of the time. (The NTU also gave Obama an F, but he got 5%.)

Biden has reliably backed Democratic initiatives such as an end to IRS contracts with private debt collection agencies, tighter basis reporting requirements for securities transactions, and incentives promoting renewable energy production. In 2003 he repeatedly proposed raising the top four income tax bracket rates to finance the war in Iraq.

Via Glenn

Joe Biden threatened to cut off U.S. aid to Israel, during the height of Israel’s war with Lebanon, if Israel didn’t stop building settlements in the West Bank.

During that committee hearing, at the height of the Lebanon War, Sen.
John Biden (Delaware) had attacked Israeli settlements in Judea and
Samaria and threatened that if Israel did not immediately cease this
activity, the US would have to cut economic aid to Israel.

When the senator raised his voice and banged twice on the table with
his fist, Begin commented to him: “This desk is designed for writing,
not for fists.  Don’t threaten us with slashing aid.  Do you think
that because the US lends us money it is entitled to impose on us what
we  must do?  We are grateful for the assistance we have received, but
we are not to be threatened.  I am a proud Jew.  Three thousand years
of culture are behind me, and you will not frighten me with threats.
Take note: we do not want a single soldier of yours to die for us.”

After the meeting, Sen. Moynihan approached Begin and praised him for
his cutting reply.  To which Begin answered with thanks, defining his
stand against threats.

Where are Democrats like Daniel Patrick Moynihan when we need them?

Well, the first night of the Democratic Party’s convention in Denver has indeed produced a bounce in Barack Obama’s poll numbers. The only problem is, Obama’s poll numbers are  bouncing the wrong way and getting worse instead of getting better.

The Democratic National Convention has begun and the poll numbers are bouncing, but not in the direction that most people anticipated.

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Tuesday shows Barack Obama attracting 44% of the vote while John McCain also earns 44%. When “leaners” are included, it’s still tied with Obama at 46% and McCain at 46%. Yesterday, with leaners, Obama had a three-point advantage over McCain.

My guess is that the stories about Obama’s close ties to the unrepentant terrorist William Ayers, and the convicted felon Tony Rezko, are starting to have the anticipated effect.  My prediction was that Obama would only get a 2-3 point bounce from the convention overall because after 18 months of trying to sell “hope and change” without much effect on his poll numbers I didn’t think the convention would have much of an impact. But, it turns out that my conservative estimate may have not been conservative enough.

The lamestream media told you:

Chinese paramilitary police kicked and beat journalists who were covering a deadly assault by “Muslim separatists” on police that left 16 dead in a remote area of the vast nation.

Writing for the McClatchy news syndicate, reporter Tim Johnson says, “A top Communist Party leader in this gas-rich region, meanwhile, said assailants had left literature at the scene of an attack a day earlier pledging ‘holy war’ in China.”

The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:

It is unclear whether “holy war,” published in quotes, was actually “jihad,” a commonly used Muslim word the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) officially recommends not using in news reports.

According to knowledgeable Muslim sympathizers, “jihad” simply means “struggle,” and is a good word. The meaning gets confused however, because radical Muslim Islamofascists waging war on western civilization use the word as part of a campaign where women, men and children wrap themselves in nails and explosives and blow themselves up on public streets, killing innocent people, as part of their “struggle.” The actions give a bad name to Muslims, Islamofascism, and the word “jihad,” and SPJ seeks to avoid creating unfair stereotypes.

(From SPJ: “Avoid using terms such as ‘jihad’ unless you are certain of their precise meaning and include the context when they are used in quotations. The basic meaning of “jihad” is to exert oneself for the good of Islam and to better oneself.”)

The Turkic-speaking Uighur Muslims near the Pakistan/Russia frontier are distinct from the rest of Communist China in most respects.

In the interest of fairness, openness and clarifying any potential conflicts of interest, the Uninvited Ombudsman notes that he is a 20-year member of SPJ, which did not approve of this memo.

The lamestream media told you:

Islam is the religion of peace. “Islamic terrorist” and “jihad” are words that no longer appear in lamestream reports, because the Society of Professional Journalists recommends against using them — it casts fundamentalist terrorists in a bad light. It’s part of their diversity guidelines, which are good.

The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:

Activities concerning the religion pf peace have virtually fallen off the radar in U.S. news reports, as “commentators” eat up endless hours with their empty opinions about the two U.S. presidential candidates, avoiding almost any real news on even that subject. Many people have forgotten about the culture war being vigorously pursued by Islam, now that it gets little mention. Britain though is suffering greatly under the culture attacks (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8aQtoE4nZM).

Commentator Pat Condell has a new scathing short video about Islamofascism, but he starts with an apology to members of the religion of peace who have sent him death threats lately. British TV recently suggested that Muslims are the victims of British intolerance, but in fact, Britain has recently tolerated the building of 1,600 ideologically-driven mosques in the country, funded by the Saudi Arabian Muslim dictatorship. The regime has declared all other religions “haram” and forbidden on the Arabian peninsula (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5F5aCUNE4Z8).

Author Mark Steyn, being sued in Canada by Muslims, because he noted that many of them are waging holy war on the western civilization, clarified an important point recently. “On the matter of Muslims being ’sheep-shaggers,’ this was not my assertion but that of the late Ayatollah Khomeini on the important question of whether one may eat, post-coitally, one’s sexual partner: ‘A man who has had sexual relations with an animal, such as a sheep, may not eat its meat. He would commit sin.’ Good to have that cleared up.”

During WWII, the U.S. press reported on the activities of our enemies. Times have changed, according to unnamed spokespeople. A noticeable reduction in Islamist attacks recently has been attributed to the fact that U.S. and allied forces have found and killed many of their leaders and followers.

Recent findings in genetics have shown a very interesting effect from fathers to their children. While a rare condition PWS (Prader-Willi Syndrome) is thought to be the leading cause of genetically caused obesity, its effects can be mitigated by the participation of the father. So our cultural changes may have led to the expression of negative genes in our environment causing obesity through father absence.  

To quote the release:

The research by University of Tennessee, Knoxville, professor Francisco Ubeda finds that the amount of care a father gives to his child may cause a shift in the syndrome in which its symptoms, in essence, reverse themselves.

In a world where fathers are now considered akin to the appendix, its interesting to find more information that the presence of a father changes the outcomes for the children in drastic ways. Yes I said more, as females raised without a blood father present have lower ages of onset of first menses. That if a human female is raised without a father, or with a stepfather, she matures earlier, and so her time to learn is clipped by biological urges appearing earlier than later.

Until now, scientists assumed that those genes and their level of expression—how much their effect was felt on the individual who carried them—was based on how the offspring drew resources from their mother. In this case, resources can mean anything from basic nourishment to less-tangible resources such as affection and attention.

Such an assumption area a modern thing, as that was not how we thought when we had a more solid culture handed down generation to generation by families. After all, there are a lot of feedback loops in biology, and this discovery shows, that since we can feel things in the abstract, those abstractions can have a serious effect in how our genetics plays out the story of our lives.

In order to have the opinions we do ideologically, the whole of the biology of life has to be simplified to the point where we deny the nuance and subtlety of how it works, and how utterly dependent it is on the structures that we lived under as we journey through time to reach the place and time we are now.

Left ideology, with particular attention to feminism, denies these subtleties so as to control behavioral outcomes of the people who choose to get their advice from the people that even make biology political. Mother Nature is about how things are; ideology is how things should be based on simplification, obfuscation, and goals identified by a select few justified by premises as a means of selling them to the many even if they have ulterior motives.

While they don’t think this could lead to a cure for the condition called PWS, it does lead to the understanding that we are much more sensitive to the things around us (and perhaps political tweaking of such is not such a good idea over letting us be who we are).

According to Ubeda, perhaps the larger implication of the research lies in his finding that a small contribution of resources by the father may influence how imprinted genes are expressed and trigger a change of expression during development.

Father’s presence in the home to provide resources is something that we respond to biologically.

Imagine that.

Though the larger question is: what will this mean, if anything, toward father policies in state interventions and law? While this is the first thing they have found that is clearly and unambiguously indicated, it will by no means be the last as long as modern genetics is allowed to proceed (and a form of Lysenkoism doesn’t take hold).

That resources are defined in this case by more than just a monetary donation to the house fund paid through state mediators, its also love, teaching, rewards, understanding, and all the other things that go with rearing children to be healthy, happy, competent adults.

Who knew that having your dad around could hide a genetic condition that makes you obese, and allow it to be expressed if he is absent?

Somehow fathers knew that their absences were causing more harm than they could express, maybe such research will help put real reasons to what they know deep in their hearts: that their children need them.

Explaining a genetic disorder’s unique shift

Findings reported in this week’s PLoS Biology give insight into the unique characteristics of the birth defect known as Prader-Willi Syndrome (PWS), and at the same time, may help explain the way that a certain type of gene is expressed in all humans.

The research by University of Tennessee, Knoxville, professor Francisco Ubeda finds that the amount of care a father gives to his child may cause a shift in the syndrome in which its symptoms, in essence, reverse themselves.At birth, children with PWS experience great difficulty suckling and have very low weight. After they are weaned from their mothers, though, their appetites become voracious, and they become obese.

Ubeda believes that this shift results from PWS’ genetic roots on what is known as a group of imprinted genes. Humans typically get two copies of every gene—one from their mother and one from their father. Imprinted genes are prevented from working in one of the two copies, so that only the mother’s gene or father’s gene is expressed. This can be problematic when the working gene is somehow damaged.

Until now, scientists assumed that those genes and their level of expression—how much their effect was felt on the individual who carried them—was based on how the offspring drew resources from their mother. In this case, resources can mean anything from basic nourishment to less-tangible resources such as affection and attention.

Ubeda’s work, however, seems to show that as more of an offspring’s resources are provided by its father, that shift can also trigger a change in how those imprinted genes are expressed.

Ubeda said that PWS, which results from a deleted portion of the father’s copy of a group of imprinted genes, provides a clear example.

“Before weaning, the mother has the monopoly on providing resources directly to her offspring,” said Ubeda, an assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at UT Knoxville. “After weaning, the father directly provides a greater share of resources to his offspring.”

Ubeda found that as the share of the father’s contribution of resources increases, there is a shift in which copies of the PWS group of imprinted genes is expressed, leading to the marked change in how PWS itself affects the child.

While Ubeda notes that this finding is unlikely to have an immediate effect on how PWS is treated, it provides implications for how diseases and conditions that are a result of imprinted genes are viewed.

“I don’t have any sense that this will somehow lead to a cure for PWS, but it does present a new area for those interested in the disease to study and hopefully a new understanding of how the disease functions,” said Ubeda.

According to Ubeda, perhaps the larger implication of the research lies in his finding that a small contribution of resources by the father may influence how imprinted genes are expressed and trigger a change of expression during development.

It’s a new finding, he said, and one that fills in a blank caused by conditions like PWS that seem to be influenced by more than just the mother’s contribution. It exemplifies how social structure may have shaped the symptoms of some diseases over the course of human evolution.

According to the Prader-Willi Syndrome Association of the United States, the syndrome is found in one out of every 12 to 15 thousand children, and while rare, is considered the most common genetic cause of obesity.

Citation: Úbeda F (2008) Evolution of genomic imprinting with biparental care: Implications for Prader-Willi and Angelman syndromes. For more information on journals please see original article through title link.

 

 

 

Barack Obama is attempting to persuade the Department of Justice to block a new ad which discussed the ties between Obama and the unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayers.

Sen. Barack Obama has launched an all-out effort to block a Republican billionaire’s efforts to tie him to domestic and foreign terrorists in a wave of negative television ads.

Obama’s campaign has written the Department of Justice demanding a criminal investigation of the “American Issues Project,” the vehicle through which Dallas investor Harold Simmons is financing the advertisements. The Obama campaign — and tens of thousands of supporters — also is pressuring television networks and affiliates to reject the ads. The effort has met with some success: CNN and Fox News are not airing the attacks.

Obama has also launched his own response ad, directly addressing Simmons’ attempt to link him to domestic terror.

The ad doesn’t really link Obama to domestic terror, as the article states. What is does is show that Obama was friendly with the terrorist Bill Ayers, getting help with his political career from Ayers, and serving on several boards with Ayers. So the real issue is one of charactor. How could Obama be such an incredibly bad judge of charactor that he’d hang around with a guy who not only blew up buildings, but thinks he didn’t blow up enough of them? And, why should we elect Obama president, when his judgement is so poor?

But, what Obama is doing here isn’t going to work. The ad is legal and will continue to run. And, the ad is truthful and will not be able to be discredited. All Obama has done by asking the DOJ to step in is draw even more attention to the ad so that even more people will find out about Obama and Bill Ayer’s relationship.