Obama '08?

Blatham, check out this post of mine.

Well, Obama is a member of the minority party in the senate, so it wouldn't be unusual for none of the measures that he sponsored to have been passed into law. That's what happens when you're in the minority party.


No, he answered it. He said that education funding is primarily a state issue. And he's right. In Illinois, and in other states that rely primarily on property taxes to support K-12 education, the disparities in funding are due almost entirely to disparities in wealth. Any plan to equalize funding would either have to shift property tax revenues from rich districts to poor districts, or else find some other mechanism for funding education. Those are exclusively state issues: the feds play no part in that.

The surprising thing here, then, is Possum's apparent support for more federal interference in local and state government. I'm not eager for the federal government to act as a super-school board, and Obama apparently isn't either, but it looks like Possum is. Typical, I guess, for the don't-tax-but-spend-anyway neocons.

I think Joe from Chicago should read what the incompetent Obama did in the Illinois Legislature on Education!!





Looking at Obama's Education Record.
From the Obama site..

Barack Obama -- EDUCATION:




"OBAMA'S RECORD
Training New Teachers. As an Illinois State Senator, Obama co-sponsored legislation to create a National Teaching Academy of Chicago that recruits, prepares and develops quality teachers for high-need urban school districts. Obama also co-sponsored legislation that created the Future Teacher Corps Scholarships to provide financial aid for undergraduate and graduate students studying to become teachers. [SB 1919; 2000] [SB 1521; 2001; PA 92-0445]

-- The one bill out of these two that passed SB 1521, appears to be in part the act that created the Education license plate as well as created a scholarship program it seems to have nothing to due with the National Teaching Academy of Chicago. SB 1919 also died in the Senate, it was the bill that was to create the National Teaching Academy of Chicago

From SB 1919...

Creates the National Teaching Academy of Chicago to recruit, prepare, and develop quality teachers in urban school districts.

Again an example of him making proposals (see the National Teacher idea) that seem to focus on education in Urban areas while ignoring the issues in rural education.

Rewarding High Quality Teachers. Senator Obama was chief sponsor of a bill creating the Certified Teacher Retention Bonus Program, which provides grants to reward high quality teachers in low performing schools by giving them a bonus of up to a quarter of their annual salary. In return, the teachers must commit to four more years of teaching in that school. [SB 2005; 2002]
-- It turns out that SB 2005 never passed, in fact it never made it out of committee.



Promoting Collaboration and Innovation. Senator Obama co-sponsored legislation that allied education reformers, the Chicago Board of Education, and the Chicago Teacher's Union in expanding innovation by creating additional charter schools. [SB 636; 2001]"

-- This one SB 636 at least made it out of the Senate, it did not even get voted on in the House.

Some of you readers may think, well that was a Republican gov. at that time, so that's why they never went anyplace. If these were important ideas, why hasn't re re-introduced bills in this session (you know the one with the Democrats in control of both houses down in Springfield as well as the Governors mansion) and as the US Senate candidate he would have had a good chance of getting this bills passed.

It's a little sad when your 'record' on education involves 4 Bills, only one of which passed. Some would also be interested to know that two of the bills SB 1521 and SB 636 were co-sponsored by Sen. Chris Lauzen, the kind of Republican that would make most of the posters to the Obama blog freak out.

So the Obama Education record is, one scholarship bill passed, some other bills submitted that got no-where and nothing done since 2002?

Heck of a Record....

If Mike Madigan doesn't like Obama, then that's just one more reason to like Obama.

I did. And just composed a reply of considerable size and undeniable brilliance which disappeared.

Why do folks who live in Chicago suburbs always say, they're in Chicago?

Guilt-complex?

Does Joe from Chicago know that Mike Madigan RUNS the Legislature in Illinois?

Now, Miller, Obama is going to Africa to help with the AIDS epidemic there.

He said he is going to Africa because Africa is important>

What BS!!! He is not the Senator of Africa, he is the Senator from Illinois and should work here to help his constitutents. Of course, we know he has practically cut himself off from the African-Americans who live in the Chicago Slums and lives in the hoity-toity neignborhood of HydePark and has his children cared for by a Hispanic rather than one of those--You know- African Americans.

He is a fraud who won only because the man who opposed him was also AFRICAN-AMERICAN. Fitzgerald, had he not retired, would have cleaned his clock.

Obama is a failure thus far in the Senate. He has done almost nothing except to try to get publicity.

When the leader of the Illinois Legislature, Mike Madigan, who is a life long DEMOCRAT labels Obama "the Messiah" you know that there is absolutely no respect coming from Madigan to the son of the Kenyan!!

A can't miss article written about Obama before he was elected--He sounds as if he is to the left of George McGovern---

The Barack Obama Myth
By Michael P. Tremoglie
FrontPageMagazine.com | August 6, 2004

If the Democratic National Convention failed to produce a bounce for John Kerry, the same cannot be said of Illinois State Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic Party's candidate for United States Senator from Illinois. While this rising star in the Democratic Party spouted some conservative themes during his speech, the rhetoric may be deceptive. While Obama spoke of individual responsibility - such as stating that the government cannot teach kids to read, parents must - his ideology and voting record is quite different.

Obama is very liberal. Among his campaign contributors are George Soros, People for the American Way, pro-abortion groups and teacher's unions. Soros got his money's worth from Obama, who turned out redmeat antiwar quotations during the run-up to Operation Iraqi Freedom. At an October 2002 antiwar rally, he repeated the false "economy and war" canard of fanatical antiwar liberals. Obama said:

"I don't oppose all wars…What I am opposed to is the attempt by political hacks like Karl Roves to distract us from a rise in the uninsured, a rise in the poverty rate, a drop in the median income...to distract us from corporate scandals and a stock market that has just gone through the worst month since the Great Depression."

When confronted with this quotation by Tim Russert on "Meet the Press," Obama shrugged it off, not choosing to repeat its conspiracy theories. Russert uncharacteristically did not press the issue. But the quotation would seem to indicate Obama's inclination to parrot the Michael Moore Left.

In fact, Obama has bristled at being referred to as a mainsteam Democrat. When he was accused by Black Commentator magazine as being co-opted by the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC). Black Commentator believes the more moderate rhetoric of the DLC and Bill Clinton's willingness to compromise with Republicans for political gain have harmed the party. It believes the DLC's candidates are corrupted by corporations, and refers to conservative black politicians as "black stealth candidates," which is how they characterized Obama.

Obama was so disturbed by this, he wrote a letter to Black Commentator stating:

"To begin with, neither my staff nor I have had any direct contact with anybody at DLC…I don't know who nominated me for the DLC list of 100 rising stars…I certainly did not view such inclusion as an endorsement on my part of the DLC platform…I spend much of my time with audiences trying to educate them on the dangers of both the Patriot Act, Patriot Act 2, and the rest of John Ashcroft's assault on the Constitution…In the last three months alone, I passed and sent to Illinois governor's desk 25 pieces of major progressive legislation, including groundbreaking laws mandating the videotaping of all interrogations and confessions in capital cases; racial profiling legislation; a new law designed to ease the burden on ex-offenders seeking employment; and a state earned income tax credit that will put millions of dollars directly into the pockets of Illinois' working poor."

His voting record certainly displays the ideology characteristic of an indulgent liberal. (Sorry, "Progressive.") Obama favors abortion, socialized medicine, and Affirmative Action. Obama sponsored a bill in the Illinois legislature requiring local police departments in Illinois to record the race of anyone stopped for questioning so that the data can be used to track the occurrence of racial profiling. He opposes a $2,000 tax credit for retirement and has voted against private gun ownership, mandatory sentencing and the death penalty. During his tenure as a legislator, he abstained from voting about an abortion parental notification bill and on legislation that would keep pornographic video stores and strip clubs from within 1,000 feet of schools and churches. He has also voted against laws requiring students to complete suspensions before being transferred to other school districts. He abstained from legislation requiring adult prosecution for students who fire guns on school grounds. He opposed legislation making it a criminal offense for accused gang members to associate with known gang members.

Ironically, Obama is the candidate of the racial segregationist. It is not because segregationists want him to be a Senator. It is because he is classified African-American using the standards of racial segregationists.

Obama is called an African-American. However, Obama is half-white. His father, who was black, abandoned him and his mother when he was about two years old. He lived with his white mother and white grandparents.

Considering a mixed race individual an African-American is a typical liberal practice. They routinely refer to anyone who is partially black as black. Tiger Woods, Halle Berry and Mariah Carey are all mixed race celebrities regularly referred to by the liberal media as black. Tiger Woods has had the gall to complain about this. (With good reason; his mother is Asian.)

Ironically, this custom by liberals and Democrats of referring to partially black people as black is simply a reiteration of the old racist, Jim Crow, "one-eighth law." In racist locales, such as segregation-era Louisiana, people with as little as one-eighth African-American ancestry were classified as black. This classification led to dramatic curtailments of freedom. In Missouri and Mississippi, "The marriage of a white person with a negro or mulatto or person who shall have one-eighth or more of negro blood, shall be unlawful and void." Obama is black only by the standards of white segregationists.

By insisting that mixed-race individuals be considered black, Democrats -- the party of the unreconstructed South -- are displaying their segregationist roots.

Obama the candidate is conservative only when addressing a national television audience. Ironically, the oddball Black Commentator magazine is partially correct. Obama is a stealth candidate -- a liberal stealth candidate

I'm not sure what the reference for this is, or what it has to do with this thread, but when I'm talking to someone on the east or west coast it makes much more sense to say I'm 'in Chicago' than to try to get any more detailed. If soz talks about having lived 'in Chicago' (not that I'm sure she's ever said such a thing), it would reference a time when she was in this area. What difference does it make?

I certainly have no guilt-complex about living in the suburbs, why would I?

Everybody does the same thing. People who live in Nassau or Westchester County, for instance, say they are in New York when speaking to someone from completely out of the area.

Even the Jets and Giants call themselves from New York, and they play in New Jersey.

when i say I live in Wolf Hole Az do people get confused as to where I live?

When someone says they live in Chicago, I always say, which "side". Then they reply, by saying some small town in Illinois.
Why not mention the town in the first place? If you don't livein the city of Chicago, why not be honest and say where you live.

In NY, if you live in Queens, then you don't live in the Bronx. If you live in Elgin, Peoria, Skokie Illinois, then you don't live in Chicago. If you want to be resident of Chicago, then you should move to within the City limits.

I've found that most of these individuals are white and left the City of Chicago, when they felt threatened by the diverse cultures and races infiltrating their City neighborhoods.

Miller:

Because if people live in a small town just outside a large town or city, a person from completely outside the area probably never heard of the small town, but probably did hear of the city.

Suburb names usually are known only to people familiar with the area. City names are very often known by many people who never lived in the area at all.

So to someone from say, Arizona, an individual who says they live in Lynbrook, NY is not giving much information. However, if they say they live in New York City, the Arizonan has a much better idea of where they live.

I'm just the opposite of you in this regard. If someone tells me the name of a small town and the state, I assume this place is out in the sticks. I get exapserated when I find out this "small town" is located five miles from a large well-known city-I feel deceived.

Let's go back to what this thread is about--Obama.

Here is more evidence that he is a poor choice to serve as Senator of Illinois:


10/11/2004
Obama's Record
By: Cao in: General, Keyes/Obama

Obama has been pretty slick on avoiding the press and always having some lame spokesman from his campaign answer questions and speak for him.

The most compelling evidence to date that I have about Barack Obama and how terrible he would be as an elected representative (and I don't care what capacity that's in-IMHO he doesn't deserve to be a garbage man-I think he would find a way to mess THAT up but he'd sure look good while he was doing it) are the following quick points.

The guy is so damned corrupt that he sponsored a bill that would require a confession in a capital murder case.
That guy voted against a measure that would have allowed law enforcement to come down on gangs.
He was THE ONLY SENATOR IN THE ENTIRE STATE ASSEMBLY to vote against a passed measure that denied SEXUAL PREDATORS early release!!!! The man was willing to let sexual predators loose on his constituents!
HRC's (House Republican Caucus) leadership PAC gave him $10,000.
Need I go on?

Why not!

Let's continue on with what this thread is about- OBAMA--

Here was a question posed before he was elected:


quote
Does Obama Have a Foreign Policy
It's not really fair to expect Barack Obama to have a clearly thought out position on world affairs ... thus far his political responsibilities have ended at the state line. On the other hand, it would be foolish to send anyone to the Senate without considering how that individual will approach issues of national security. After all, the Senate is the only body outside the presidency that can affect foreign policy. The Senate is the sole constitutional check on the president's representation of this country abroad. It's an awesome responsibility and it's also our responsibility.

At least initially Obama has been vague about his foreign policy vision, not only has the press not really asked the requisite questions, but Obama hasn't offered up policy suggestions voluntarily (except Iraq). His website doesn't even feature a section discussing his opinions on Afghanistan, Iraq, and the War on Terror!

To be fair Obama has vocalized his opinions on Iraq in speeches and interviews. He originally opposed it as a "dumb war", but argues rightly that we've got to stay the course now. This is a sound position which would draw very little criticism even from the most ardent war opponents. Yet, ironically, despite the fact that Iraq will play a big part in this election, it will likely be only one amid numerous complex foreign policy questions Obama will face over the next six years.

The exception to Obama's general neglect of foreign policy came on July 12th as he appeared in front of the Council on Foreign Relations here in Chicago. So I decided to examine the speech closely to see if there were any clues to Obama's basic understanding of world politics.

One thing clear immediately is that the young politician believes Bush to have soiled our image throughout the world. Obama complains that Bush's unilateralism "in all aspects of foreign affairs, has added to the burden of restoring American prestige." Obama is concerned that America has abandoned the good council of the world and thus painted itself into a unilateral corner.

"This Administration walked away from a host of efforts to promote international security, environmental protection, and human rights, including the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, the Biological Weapons Convention, the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the International Criminal Court for war crimes and genocide."

Any one of these agreements could be debated separately ... and have been discussed vigorously in a variety of forums, but what's important here is that they are all lumped together; the one unifying thread being that they all, supposedly, had "international" support. This is a theme throughout Obama's speech. In fact in many place is serves a place holder for actual solutions.

"We desperately need international assistance in Iraq in order to succeed" he tells us. But given the complexity of the situation, how is it going to be any better for French contractors to be kidnapped than Americans? Or how is the tough decision of going after al Sadr going to become any easier when there are twenty more nations that have to have a say? Obama doesn't say.

Obama rightly points out that Iran poses a significant security threat to both Europe and the US, and that they are pursuing their weapons program despite the Non-Proliferation Treaty they signed and despite international pressure. Yet, Obama's solution is simply to internationalize. "What better illustration is there of the importance of United State to be able to lead and work with other nations than in Iran, where the United States can work together with Russia and European nations who supply the expertise and the business connections there." But what do Russian and European business connections have to do with Iran's decision to build a nuclear weapon? And how can they fix it?

There are answers to these questions I'm sure. I am not accusing of completely vaccant rhetoric, but he has to brings those answers to the people and just the CFR.

But there is also some tension in Obama's commitment to internationalism. He criticizes the President for demanding multinational participation in talks with North Korea, calling bilateral (which is really just the PC word for unilateral) talks the key to progress. So, on the one hand American should act only in unison with the world. On the other, we should not demand that nations join us in solving a problem in their own hemisphere. Would Obama have use act multilaterally when it's convenient for Europe and unilaterally when it's convenient for China?

Another point of tension is Obama's blaming Bush for not being more involved in the Israel-Palestine situation. Why is the US the only nation that is held responsible for the situation? Moreover the "international" community has never really accepted Israel as a legitimate state, which makes a two-state policy a bit more difficult doesn't it? The UN Human Rights council, chaired by the likes of Syria and Libya, has dedicated one forth of its activities to the criticism of Israel. So the question seems to be what is the "international community" doing to fix the Israel/Palestine conflict. Where is Obama's internationalism here?

These are all really hard questions and I certainly respect Obama's admission that he does not in fact have all the answers. Humility in the face of adversity is no vice, but ambiguity can be. In the end Obama's speech raised more questions than it answered. Did Obama support the war in Afghanistan? Would he support a surgical strike to disable Iran's nuclear capacity? Under what circumstances is unilateral action acceptable ... if ever? Do you trust Vladimir Putin? Would you continue our alliance with Pervez Musharaff? The list goes on and on.

In recent history Senate Candidates have had the luxury of being grilled only on domestic policy. But in the post 9/11 world, in which Homeland Security and Foreign Affairs often weigh more on citizens' minds than health care, these kinds of questions should be a staple of public discourse.
end of quote


WE NOW KNOW WHAT HIS FOREIGN POLICY IS--HIS FOREIGN POLICY IS TO GO TO AFRICA TO CURE AIDS THERE!!!

He is quite deluded. He should take care of his state, Illinois, first, and then, if there is time, go to Africa. Maybe he just wants to visit his relatives. I understand his grandmother is still alive there!!

A newspaper report (from today's Chicago Tribune, page 8) instead of the puking of one member:

Online: Obama returns to Africa as celebrity

Miller, I would love to continue this discussion with you, but it doesn't belong in this thread. Why don't you start a thread and we'll take the discussion there.