The Proviso Insider is a web log where you can find unbiased, straightforward information about politics that affect Proviso Township. Our goal is to be a beacon of light in the midst of Proviso's darkness.
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Barack Obama Looking Presidential!!!
Barack Obama is projected to win at least 11 states on Super Tuesday. Barack Obama is one step closer to winning the Democratic nomination for President. Go Barack!!!
6 comments:
Anonymous
said...
There’s a big difference between the Republican and Democratic campaigns: The Republicans have split on policy grounds; the Democrats haven’t. There’s been a Republican divide between center and right, yet no Democratic divide between center and left.
But when you think about it, the Democratic policy unity is a mirage. If the Democrats actually win the White House, the tensions would resurface with a vengeance.
The first big rift would involve Iraq. Both Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have seductively hinted that they would withdraw almost all U.S. troops within 12 to 16 months. But if either of them actually did that, he or she would instantly make Iraq the consuming partisan fight of their presidency.
There would be private but powerful opposition from Arab leaders, who would fear a return to 2006 chaos. There would be irate opposition from important sections of the military, who would feel that the U.S. was squandering the gains of the previous year. A Democratic president with few military credentials would confront outraged and highly photogenic colonels screaming betrayal.
There would be important criticism from nonpartisan military experts. In his latest report, the much-cited Anthony Cordesman describes an improving Iraqi security situation that still requires “strategic patience” and another five years to become self-sustaining.
There would be furious opposition from Republicans and many independents. They would argue that you can’t evacuate troops just as Iraqis are about to hold national elections and tensions are at their highest. They would point out that it’s insanity to end local reconstruction and Iraqi training efforts just when they are producing results. They would accuse the new administration of reverse-Rumsfeldism, of ignoring postsurge realities and of imposing an ideological solution on a complex situation.
All dreams of changing the tone in Washington would be gone. All of Obama’s unity hopes would evaporate. And if the situation did deteriorate after a quick withdrawal, as the National Intelligence Estimate warns, the bloodshed would be on the new president’s head.
Therefore, when a new Democratic administration considered all these possibilities, its members would part ways. A certain number of centrists would conclude that rapid withdrawal is a mistake. They would say that the situation had changed and would call for a strategic review. They’d recommend a long, slow conditions-based withdrawal — constant, small troop reductions, and a lot of regional diplomacy, while maintaining tens of thousands of troops in Iraq for the remainder of the term.
The left wing of the party would go into immediate uproar. They’d scream: This was a central issue of the campaign! All the troops must get out now!
The president would have to make a terrible decision.
Which brings us to second looming Democratic divide: domestic spending. Both campaigns now promise fiscal discipline, as well as ambitious new programs. These kinds of have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too vows were merely laughable last year when the federal deficit was running at a manageable $163 billion a year. But the economic slowdown, the hangover from the Bush years and the growing bite of entitlements mean that the federal deficit will almost certainly top $400 billion by 2009. The accumulated national debt will be in shouting distance of the $10 trillion mark. With that much red ink, the primary-season spending plans are simply ridiculous.
It’d be 1993 all over again. The new Democratic president would be faced with Bill Clinton’s Robert Rubin vs. Robert Reich choice: either scale back priorities for the sake of fiscal discipline or blow through all known deficit records for the sake of bigger programs. Choose the former, and the new president would further outrage the left. Choose the latter and lose the financial establishment and the political center.
This is the debate that Democrats have been quietly rearguing during the entire Bush presidency. The left wing of the party is absolutely committed to winning it this time. It will likely demand the clean energy subsidies and the education spending, the expensive health care coverage and subsidies to address middle-class anxiety. But no Democratic president can afford to offend independent voters with runaway spending. No president can easily ignore the think tank establishment, which is rightfully exercised about the nation’s long-term fiscal health.
It would be another brutal choice.
As William J. Stuntz of Harvard Law School wrote in The Weekly Standard, the Democrats have conducted their race amid unconstrained “Yes We Can!” unreality. Because the Democratic candidates appear to agree on so much, they’ve never tested each other’s policy proposals or exposed each other’s assumptions. But governing means choosing, and reality will be unkind. The artificial unity between the Democratic center and the Democratic left would be smashed by the harsh choices of 2009. My guess? The centrists would win.
"(S)ome Americans do not understand why the sight of a noose causes such a visceral reaction," declared President Bush to the White House gathering for Black History Month. As The Washington Post rushed to remind us, President Bush was "responding to news coverage of such episodes as the 'Jena Six.'"
But if history is about truth, not myth, that news coverage deserves another look, before the Jena Six enter the history books alongside Emmett Till and "the Scottsboro Boys." By now, most folks know the media story. White students at Jena High in Louisiana hung nooses on a tree to warn black students not to sit under it. After a fistfight over this racist outrage, black kids in the fight were indicted for attempted murder, while the white racists who hung the nooses walked away with a verbal spanking.
Last September, 20,000 traveled to Jena to march against this prosecutorial outrage. Fortunately, however, there are still a few real journalists around. Among them are Craig Franklin, assistant editor of the Jena Times, whose wife teaches at Jena High, and Charlotte Allen, who wrote an extended piece for The Weekly Standard. According to Allen and Franklin, here are the facts and chronology you have been denied by the Mainstream Media.
There never was a "whites-only" tree at Jena High. Both races sat under it, though whites congregated there. The nooses, or lariats, were the work of three young teens, who got the idea from watching "Lonesome Dove" on TV, where rustlers are hanged.
Franklin says they were a joke aimed at white friends on the rodeo team. As they were painted in Jena High's gold and black, Allen reports that the kids said the nooses were directed at a rival school's Western-themed football team.
When school officials confronted them, all were remorseful. All had black friends, and none knew the nooses were offensive to blacks.
Far from being let off, they spent "nine days at an alternative facility, followed by two weeks of in-school suspension, Saturday detentions, attendance at Discipline Court and evaluations by licensed mental-health professionals."
They were not prosecuted for a hate crime because none of those who investigated the incident believed they committed a hate crime. Hung on Aug. 31, 2006, the nooses had been taken down instantly. Only a few students ever saw them. Case closed.
September, October and November passed at Jena High with no racial conflict emanating from the noose incident of August.
On Dec. 1, however, Robert Bailey Jr. tried to crash a party at the Fair Barn in Jena. One Justin Sloan, 22, not a student, put a fist in his face. So witnesses and Bailey reported to police. And Sloan was prosecuted for battery.
On Dec. 2, Bailey and two friends jumped a white male entering the "Gotta Go" grocery. When the latter ran to get a shotgun out of his car, they wrested it from him and took it. So two witnesses at the "Gotta Go" agreed.
Two days later came the "schoolyard fight." Only this was no fight. Black students barricaded an exit to the gym and lay in wait for Justin Barker. As Barker went for another exit, he was struck in the head from behind by Mychal Bell. Multiple witnesses say Barker fell unconscious as a gang of eight or 10 blacks stomped and kicked him in the head. The assistant principal who reached Barker thought he was dead. Barker's emergency room bill ran to more than $5,000.
When the six were arrested and charged with attempted second-degree murder, none of them and none of the witnesses mentioned the noose incident. It had had nothing to do with this vicious racist assault.
After the charges were reduced to battery, Bell, tried as an adult, was indeed convicted by an all-white jury -- because no blacks answered the summons to the jury pool. Why was Bell prosecuted as an adult? Because he had four prior convictions for crimes of violence.
After his conviction was overturned, Bell was ordered retried as a juvenile. Rather than face the same 17 witnesses, he pled guilty in December to hitting Barker from behind, slamming his head into a concrete beam and kicking him in the head. Sentenced to 18 months in juvenile detention, he agreed to testify against his co-conspirators.
While some $500,000 has been raised for the Jena Six defense, its whereabouts is unknown. Bailey did pose on the Internet grinning, however, with $100 bills in his mouth. Bell's mom is said to be driving a new Jaguar, and Bailey's mom a new Beamer. Two other Jena Sixers, Carwin Jones and Bryant Purvis, appeared in rapper attire on Black Entertainment Television as presenters of a Hip-Hop Award.
A week ago, 6-foot, 6-inch Purvis, who had transferred to Hebron High in Carrollton, Texas, was charged with assault, choking a student and ramming his head into a bench. And that's the Saga of The Jena Six. It belongs right up there with the Rev. Al's other classics: Tawana Brawley and the Duke rape case.
The Opportunistic Rise of Barack Obama By Guy Benson Sunday, February 17, 2008
By now it's a familiar tale: On July 27, 2004, Barack Obama strode to the podium at the Democratic National Convention and captivated the nation with a soaring and memorable keynote address entitled "The Audacity of Hope." The speech marked America's first encounter with a rising political star. By the time Obama took the stage in Boston, he was already a shoo-in to become the next United States Senator from Illinois; he enjoyed a massive lead in the polls back home, where the state Republican Party was in total disarray and his carpet-bagging opponent seemed to specialize in alienating voters. Since that summer night more than three years ago, Obama has rocketed into the political stratosphere and now faces the possibility—if not the probability—of becoming his party's standard-bearer in the 2008 election.
Several questions still linger. How did Barack Obama rise from relative obscurity to his current level of prominence? How many Americans have heard of Alice Palmer, Blair Hull, or Jack Ryan? These names may hold no significance to the legions who now chant "yes we can," but they are names that Barack Obama should remember well. The mainstream press, which affords Obama nearly unanimous glowing coverage, has repeatedly failed to report a reality that doesn't quite fit the Obama-as-Messiah narrative. Namely, that this self-stylized agent of hope and change is a political opportunist extraordinaire. Barack Obama's dizzying ascendancy to political celebrity has been marked by less-than-inspirational bare-knuckle politics, an unremarkable legislative career, and a slew of lurid scandals that conveniently sunk formidable opponents.
Obama's first big break came in 1995 when Democratic Congressman Mel Reynolds resigned from office amid allegations of a sexual relationship with an underage girl. As state officials convened a special election, a venerable Chicago politician and civil rights leader named Alice Palmer chose to vacate her State Senate seat to pursue the open Congressional slot. After she was defeated handily, Palmer returned to run for re-election, only to discover that her hand picked successor was unwilling to relinquish his spot on the ballot. Though a series of legal challenges, Barack Obama strong-armed Palmer—and several other Democratic challengers—off the ballot, clearing a path to victory by destroying all potential competition.
During his unexceptional tenure in Springfield, Obama managed to rack up 129 "present" votes, including numerous noncommittal tallies on controversial issues such as abortion and gun rights. He also developed a curious, albeit rare, pattern of registering incorrect votes—including an accidental "no" vote on a hotly contested child welfare bill. When confronted with his mistaken vote, Obama asserted that he was "unaware" that he had voted the way he had, and asked that the record reflect that he had "intended" to vote the other way. Similar cases of supposed vote-casting confusion afflicted Obama on five additional occasions.
As the 2004 general election approached, Obama began to eye greener pastures. He decided to run for US Senate, positioning himself as an antiwar candidate. His longshot effort attracted throngs of college students, yet Obama gained little traction against the party's frontrunner, millionaire Blair Hull. But a bombshell scandal resurrected Obama's prospects. In amazingly short order, Hull experienced what the Chicago Tribune described as "the most inglorious campaign implosion in Illinois political history." Late in the primary race, unsealed divorce papers revealed allegations that Hull had verbally and physically abused his ex-wife. The Hull campaign tanked, and Team Obama celebrated. The nomination was theirs.
Illinois political observers then turned their attention to what promised to be a fiercely competitive general election race between Obama and GOP frontrunner Jack Ryan, a well-funded, charismatic businessman. Once again, however, scandal lurked in sealed divorce papers. Over the objections of both Ryan and his ex-wife—actress Jeri Ryan—the damning documents were made public, and the resulting headlines were salacious: Ryan had allegedly pressured his wife to visit sex clubs. Like Reynolds and Hull before him, Ryan dropped out of public life in disgrace, with Obama happily playing the role of beneficiary.
With Jack Ryan out of the picture, a desperate Republican Party trotted out a polarizing non-Illinoisan to face Obama in the fall. Alan Keyes' disastrous Senate campaign is perhaps best remembered for Keyes' spate of vicious, counterproductive attacks launched against Obama, including the assertion that Jesus Christ himself would have voted against Obama. The rout was on.
DNC organizers, anticipating Obama's assured victory and recognizing his potential widespread appeal, wisely offered him a coveted primetime speaking slot during the summer convention. Although the Beantown gathering was designed to be a political infomercial for the ill-fated Kerry/Edwards ticket, Obama stole the show with a speech that inspired millions and, more-importantly, transformed him into an instant media darling. Obama had seized his moment and smashed a rhetorical homerun. Less than half a Senate term later, he announced his Presidential bid.
Now only two figures impede Obama's path to the presidency. Unless Hillary Clinton can revitalize her sputtering campaign, or John McCain can defy the political odds and prevail in a tough electoral climate for Republicans, Barack Obama will become our next Commander-In-Chief. Unlike most seasoned politicians, who earn presidential nominations through many years of legislative, executive, or military accomplishments, Obama has exploited his rock-star status to skip to the front of the line. With many of his supporters apparently distracted by his powerful persona and vague, uplifting message, few people seem to notice, or care, that Obama's qualifications to be president are more than a bit thin. Americans would be well-served to shake themselves from the "change" trance long enough to examine Senator Obama's relatively meager record.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson, the civil rights leader and two-time presidential candidate, warned Wednesday that Democrats “could hurt themselves substantially, perhaps irreparably, in November” if fallout from the clash between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton is not addressed quickly.
Jackson, who has endorsed Obama but who maintains good relations with both Hillary and Bill Clinton, listed three rifts among Democrats that could allow Republicans to win in the general election:
“First, we must not allow people to exacerbate black-Hispanic tensions,” Jackson said in a lengthy phone interview from New York. “I think the differences there are exaggerated. You just can’t characterize things as Hispanics for Hillary and blacks for Obama.”
Black and Hispanic tensions, to whatever extent they exist, may be exacerbated, however, in the Texas primary on March 4, where, due to a complicated delegate-selection process, predominantly black districts have been awarded more delegates than predominantly Hispanic districts.
But Jackson said blacks and Hispanics are “all in one big tent” in America and their political relationship “is very substantial.”
Jackson’s second warning came over the use of superdelegates, those 795 or so Democratic big shots who are not elected in primaries or caucuses but get to cast a vote at the convention.
Many have predicted a party-splitting crisis if Obama goes into the convention with a majority of delegates earned in primaries and caucuses but that result is overturned by superdelegates voting for Clinton.
“If the superdelegates are substantially out of line with the popular vote, it could very damaging,” Jackson said. “There must be some reasonable relationship.”
Jackson said the final rift — which could prove the most difficult to heal — is genuine reconciliation between Obama and Clinton at the Democratic convention in Denver in August.
“The two sides must be able to embrace fervently in Denver and heal campaign wounds,” Jackson said, or else, he said, Republicans could win in November.
Jackson pointed out that in 1968, Hubert Humphrey forces and Lyndon Johnson forces “could not heal the wounds of the Vietnam War” and Richard Nixon won the presidency. Jackson also said that in 1980, the forces of Jimmy Carter and Ted Kennedy “did not warmly embrace” and “they allowed Ronald Reagan to come down the middle” and win the presidency.
Obama win sets stage for showdown Obama turns tables on Clinton Congress conflicted on U.S.-Cuba relations Jackson, who praised both Obama and Clinton throughout the interview, sounded very much like a man who was willing to try to bring them together.
“I have certainly talked to both campaigns,” Jackson said. “I have urged them that while they have to keep one eye on a hard-fought playoff season, they must also keep one eye on reconciliation for the Super Bowl and the Super Bowl is November.”
Last month, Bill Clinton discounted an impending victory by Obama in South Carolina, by saying, “Jesse Jackson won South Carolina in ‘84 and ‘88. Jackson ran a good campaign. And Obama ran a good campaign here.”
Some felt, however, the former president was unnecessarily bringing up race by comparing Obama to Jackson. A Washington Post reporter called Bill Clinton’s comments a “sour note” and an ABC reporter compared it to “race-baiting.”
Jackson told me, however, he was not offended by the remarks, though he recognized that some were.
“To many people that was hurtful,” Jackson said, “but I did not read it that way.” Jackson said race should not be off the table in political discussion as long as it is done properly.
“I think we must distinguish between race-baiting, which is unacceptable, and the need to address race as a moral dilemma, which has haunted the nation since its very beginning,” Jackson said.
I asked Jackson if he thought it was fair for Obama to use the argument that a vote for him as an African-American can make people feel better about themselves and about the nation and send a good signal to the rest of the world.
“Racial justice is the key for the salvation of the nation and that is fair game to discuss; it is a fair message,” Jackson said. “Blacks reaching out is not new; white receptivity is new. Barack is reaching out.”
Jackson also said that the work that he and others involved in the civil rights movement did in decades past has helped make the current political climate possible.
“I just take some delight in the fact that we knocked down barriers, and now Barack and Hillary are open-field runners,” Jackson said. “A healthier, more secure, more mature America is emerging from race and gender shock.”
Too bad Jesse Jackson is a hypocrite with his whole NAACP organization. Why is it that his organization ignores "brown" issues. I have heard several complaints from Latino's in regard to how the NAACP handles their affairs. If I were Obama.......I would distance myself from Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton -- American's two cheap pimps.
Jesse Jackson defines HYPOCRITE!
"Jesse Jackson could hurt the democrat party substantially, perhaps irreparably, in November if he doesn't keep his piehole shut".
A question for Jesse Jackson who claims his organziation is "multi-racial":
Where are the hispanics, the Asians, the Arabic and so forth with regard to your leadership? You are a hypocrite.
NATIONAL BOARD OF DIRECTORS National Board Officers Julian Bond Roslyn M. Brock Dennis Courtland Hayes Jesse Turner, Jr. National Board Members
LEADERSHIP COUNCIL Dennis Courtland Hayes Angela Ciccolo J. Linloy Cox Hilary O. Shelton Vic Bulluck SPECIAL CONTRIBUTION FUND Roy L. Williams,Chris Welch
6 comments:
There’s a big difference between the Republican and Democratic campaigns: The Republicans have split on policy grounds; the Democrats haven’t. There’s been a Republican divide between center and right, yet no Democratic divide between center and left.
But when you think about it, the Democratic policy unity is a mirage. If the Democrats actually win the White House, the tensions would resurface with a vengeance.
The first big rift would involve Iraq. Both Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have seductively hinted that they would withdraw almost all U.S. troops within 12 to 16 months. But if either of them actually did that, he or she would instantly make Iraq the consuming partisan fight of their presidency.
There would be private but powerful opposition from Arab leaders, who would fear a return to 2006 chaos. There would be irate opposition from important sections of the military, who would feel that the U.S. was squandering the gains of the previous year. A Democratic president with few military credentials would confront outraged and highly photogenic colonels screaming betrayal.
There would be important criticism from nonpartisan military experts. In his latest report, the much-cited Anthony Cordesman describes an improving Iraqi security situation that still requires “strategic patience” and another five years to become self-sustaining.
There would be furious opposition from Republicans and many independents. They would argue that you can’t evacuate troops just as Iraqis are about to hold national elections and tensions are at their highest. They would point out that it’s insanity to end local reconstruction and Iraqi training efforts just when they are producing results. They would accuse the new administration of reverse-Rumsfeldism, of ignoring postsurge realities and of imposing an ideological solution on a complex situation.
All dreams of changing the tone in Washington would be gone. All of Obama’s unity hopes would evaporate. And if the situation did deteriorate after a quick withdrawal, as the National Intelligence Estimate warns, the bloodshed would be on the new president’s head.
Therefore, when a new Democratic administration considered all these possibilities, its members would part ways. A certain number of centrists would conclude that rapid withdrawal is a mistake. They would say that the situation had changed and would call for a strategic review. They’d recommend a long, slow conditions-based withdrawal — constant, small troop reductions, and a lot of regional diplomacy, while maintaining tens of thousands of troops in Iraq for the remainder of the term.
The left wing of the party would go into immediate uproar. They’d scream: This was a central issue of the campaign! All the troops must get out now!
The president would have to make a terrible decision.
Which brings us to second looming Democratic divide: domestic spending. Both campaigns now promise fiscal discipline, as well as ambitious new programs. These kinds of have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too vows were merely laughable last year when the federal deficit was running at a manageable $163 billion a year. But the economic slowdown, the hangover from the Bush years and the growing bite of entitlements mean that the federal deficit will almost certainly top $400 billion by 2009. The accumulated national debt will be in shouting distance of the $10 trillion mark. With that much red ink, the primary-season spending plans are simply ridiculous.
It’d be 1993 all over again. The new Democratic president would be faced with Bill Clinton’s Robert Rubin vs. Robert Reich choice: either scale back priorities for the sake of fiscal discipline or blow through all known deficit records for the sake of bigger programs. Choose the former, and the new president would further outrage the left. Choose the latter and lose the financial establishment and the political center.
This is the debate that Democrats have been quietly rearguing during the entire Bush presidency. The left wing of the party is absolutely committed to winning it this time. It will likely demand the clean energy subsidies and the education spending, the expensive health care coverage and subsidies to address middle-class anxiety. But no Democratic president can afford to offend independent voters with runaway spending. No president can easily ignore the think tank establishment, which is rightfully exercised about the nation’s long-term fiscal health.
It would be another brutal choice.
As William J. Stuntz of Harvard Law School wrote in The Weekly Standard, the Democrats have conducted their race amid unconstrained “Yes We Can!” unreality. Because the Democratic candidates appear to agree on so much, they’ve never tested each other’s policy proposals or exposed each other’s assumptions. But governing means choosing, and reality will be unkind. The artificial unity between the Democratic center and the Democratic left would be smashed by the harsh choices of 2009. My guess? The centrists would win.
"(S)ome Americans do not understand why the sight of a noose causes such a visceral reaction," declared President Bush to the White House gathering for Black History Month.
As The Washington Post rushed to remind us, President Bush was "responding to news coverage of such episodes as the 'Jena Six.'"
But if history is about truth, not myth, that news coverage deserves another look, before the Jena Six enter the history books alongside Emmett Till and "the Scottsboro Boys."
By now, most folks know the media story. White students at Jena High in Louisiana hung nooses on a tree to warn black students not to sit under it. After a fistfight over this racist outrage, black kids in the fight were indicted for attempted murder, while the white racists who hung the nooses walked away with a verbal spanking.
Last September, 20,000 traveled to Jena to march against this prosecutorial outrage. Fortunately, however, there are still a few real journalists around. Among them are Craig Franklin, assistant editor of the Jena Times, whose wife teaches at Jena High, and Charlotte Allen, who wrote an extended piece for The Weekly Standard. According to Allen and Franklin, here are the facts and chronology you have been denied by the Mainstream Media.
There never was a "whites-only" tree at Jena High. Both races sat under it, though whites congregated there. The nooses, or lariats, were the work of three young teens, who got the idea from watching "Lonesome Dove" on TV, where rustlers are hanged.
Franklin says they were a joke aimed at white friends on the rodeo team. As they were painted in Jena High's gold and black, Allen reports that the kids said the nooses were directed at a rival school's Western-themed football team.
When school officials confronted them, all were remorseful. All had black friends, and none knew the nooses were offensive to blacks.
Far from being let off, they spent "nine days at an alternative facility, followed by two weeks of in-school suspension, Saturday detentions, attendance at Discipline Court and evaluations by licensed mental-health professionals."
They were not prosecuted for a hate crime because none of those who investigated the incident believed they committed a hate crime. Hung on Aug. 31, 2006, the nooses had been taken down instantly. Only a few students ever saw them. Case closed.
September, October and November passed at Jena High with no racial conflict emanating from the noose incident of August.
On Dec. 1, however, Robert Bailey Jr. tried to crash a party at the Fair Barn in Jena. One Justin Sloan, 22, not a student, put a fist in his face. So witnesses and Bailey reported to police. And Sloan was prosecuted for battery.
On Dec. 2, Bailey and two friends jumped a white male entering the "Gotta Go" grocery. When the latter ran to get a shotgun out of his car, they wrested it from him and took it. So two witnesses at the "Gotta Go" agreed.
Two days later came the "schoolyard fight." Only this was no fight. Black students barricaded an exit to the gym and lay in wait for Justin Barker. As Barker went for another exit, he was struck in the head from behind by Mychal Bell. Multiple witnesses say Barker fell unconscious as a gang of eight or 10 blacks stomped and kicked him in the head. The assistant principal who reached Barker thought he was dead. Barker's emergency room bill ran to more than $5,000.
When the six were arrested and charged with attempted second-degree murder, none of them and none of the witnesses mentioned the noose incident. It had had nothing to do with this vicious racist assault.
After the charges were reduced to battery, Bell, tried as an adult, was indeed convicted by an all-white jury -- because no blacks answered the summons to the jury pool. Why was Bell prosecuted as an adult? Because he had four prior convictions for crimes of violence.
After his conviction was overturned, Bell was ordered retried as a juvenile. Rather than face the same 17 witnesses, he pled guilty in December to hitting Barker from behind, slamming his head into a concrete beam and kicking him in the head. Sentenced to 18 months in juvenile detention, he agreed to testify against his co-conspirators.
While some $500,000 has been raised for the Jena Six defense, its whereabouts is unknown. Bailey did pose on the Internet grinning, however, with $100 bills in his mouth. Bell's mom is said to be driving a new Jaguar, and Bailey's mom a new Beamer. Two other Jena Sixers, Carwin Jones and Bryant Purvis, appeared in rapper attire on Black Entertainment Television as presenters of a Hip-Hop Award.
A week ago, 6-foot, 6-inch Purvis, who had transferred to Hebron High in Carrollton, Texas, was charged with assault, choking a student and ramming his head into a bench.
And that's the Saga of The Jena Six. It belongs right up there with the Rev. Al's other classics: Tawana Brawley and the Duke rape case.
The Opportunistic Rise of Barack Obama
By Guy Benson
Sunday, February 17, 2008
By now it's a familiar tale: On July 27, 2004, Barack Obama strode to the podium at the Democratic National Convention and captivated the nation with a soaring and memorable keynote address entitled "The Audacity of Hope." The speech marked America's first encounter with a rising political star. By the time Obama took the stage in Boston, he was already a shoo-in to become the next United States Senator from Illinois; he enjoyed a massive lead in the polls back home, where the state Republican Party was in total disarray and his carpet-bagging opponent seemed to specialize in alienating voters. Since that summer night more than three years ago, Obama has rocketed into the political stratosphere and now faces the possibility—if not the probability—of becoming his party's standard-bearer in the 2008 election.
Several questions still linger. How did Barack Obama rise from relative obscurity to his current level of prominence? How many Americans have heard of Alice Palmer, Blair Hull, or Jack Ryan? These names may hold no significance to the legions who now chant "yes we can," but they are names that Barack Obama should remember well. The mainstream press, which affords Obama nearly unanimous glowing coverage, has repeatedly failed to report a reality that doesn't quite fit the Obama-as-Messiah narrative. Namely, that this self-stylized agent of hope and change is a political opportunist extraordinaire. Barack Obama's dizzying ascendancy to political celebrity has been marked by less-than-inspirational bare-knuckle politics, an unremarkable legislative career, and a slew of lurid scandals that conveniently sunk formidable opponents.
Obama's first big break came in 1995 when Democratic Congressman Mel Reynolds resigned from office amid allegations of a sexual relationship with an underage girl. As state officials convened a special election, a venerable Chicago politician and civil rights leader named Alice Palmer chose to vacate her State Senate seat to pursue the open Congressional slot. After she was defeated handily, Palmer returned to run for re-election, only to discover that her hand picked successor was unwilling to relinquish his spot on the ballot. Though a series of legal challenges, Barack Obama strong-armed Palmer—and several other Democratic challengers—off the ballot, clearing a path to victory by destroying all potential competition.
During his unexceptional tenure in Springfield, Obama managed to rack up 129 "present" votes, including numerous noncommittal tallies on controversial issues such as abortion and gun rights. He also developed a curious, albeit rare, pattern of registering incorrect votes—including an accidental "no" vote on a hotly contested child welfare bill. When confronted with his mistaken vote, Obama asserted that he was "unaware" that he had voted the way he had, and asked that the record reflect that he had "intended" to vote the other way. Similar cases of supposed vote-casting confusion afflicted Obama on five additional occasions.
As the 2004 general election approached, Obama began to eye greener pastures. He decided to run for US Senate, positioning himself as an antiwar candidate. His longshot effort attracted throngs of college students, yet Obama gained little traction against the party's frontrunner, millionaire Blair Hull. But a bombshell scandal resurrected Obama's prospects. In amazingly short order, Hull experienced what the Chicago Tribune described as "the most inglorious campaign implosion in Illinois political history." Late in the primary race, unsealed divorce papers revealed allegations that Hull had verbally and physically abused his ex-wife. The Hull campaign tanked, and Team Obama celebrated. The nomination was theirs.
Illinois political observers then turned their attention to what promised to be a fiercely competitive general election race between Obama and GOP frontrunner Jack Ryan, a well-funded, charismatic businessman. Once again, however, scandal lurked in sealed divorce papers. Over the objections of both Ryan and his ex-wife—actress Jeri Ryan—the damning documents were made public, and the resulting headlines were salacious: Ryan had allegedly pressured his wife to visit sex clubs. Like Reynolds and Hull before him, Ryan dropped out of public life in disgrace, with Obama happily playing the role of beneficiary.
With Jack Ryan out of the picture, a desperate Republican Party trotted out a polarizing non-Illinoisan to face Obama in the fall. Alan Keyes' disastrous Senate campaign is perhaps best remembered for Keyes' spate of vicious, counterproductive attacks launched against Obama, including the assertion that Jesus Christ himself would have voted against Obama. The rout was on.
DNC organizers, anticipating Obama's assured victory and recognizing his potential widespread appeal, wisely offered him a coveted primetime speaking slot during the summer convention. Although the Beantown gathering was designed to be a political infomercial for the ill-fated Kerry/Edwards ticket, Obama stole the show with a speech that inspired millions and, more-importantly, transformed him into an instant media darling. Obama had seized his moment and smashed a rhetorical homerun. Less than half a Senate term later, he announced his Presidential bid.
Now only two figures impede Obama's path to the presidency. Unless Hillary Clinton can revitalize her sputtering campaign, or John McCain can defy the political odds and prevail in a tough electoral climate for Republicans, Barack Obama will become our next Commander-In-Chief. Unlike most seasoned politicians, who earn presidential nominations through many years of legislative, executive, or military accomplishments, Obama has exploited his rock-star status to skip to the front of the line. With many of his supporters apparently distracted by his powerful persona and vague, uplifting message, few people seem to notice, or care, that Obama's qualifications to be president are more than a bit thin. Americans would be well-served to shake themselves from the "change" trance long enough to examine Senator Obama's relatively meager record.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson, the civil rights leader and two-time presidential candidate, warned Wednesday that Democrats “could hurt themselves substantially, perhaps irreparably, in November” if fallout from the clash between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton is not addressed quickly.
Jackson, who has endorsed Obama but who maintains good relations with both Hillary and Bill Clinton, listed three rifts among Democrats that could allow Republicans to win in the general election:
“First, we must not allow people to exacerbate black-Hispanic tensions,” Jackson said in a lengthy phone interview from New York. “I think the differences there are exaggerated. You just can’t characterize things as Hispanics for Hillary and blacks for Obama.”
Black and Hispanic tensions, to whatever extent they exist, may be exacerbated, however, in the Texas primary on March 4, where, due to a complicated delegate-selection process, predominantly black districts have been awarded more delegates than predominantly Hispanic districts.
But Jackson said blacks and Hispanics are “all in one big tent” in America and their political relationship “is very substantial.”
Jackson’s second warning came over the use of superdelegates, those 795 or so Democratic big shots who are not elected in primaries or caucuses but get to cast a vote at the convention.
Many have predicted a party-splitting crisis if Obama goes into the convention with a majority of delegates earned in primaries and caucuses but that result is overturned by superdelegates voting for Clinton.
“If the superdelegates are substantially out of line with the popular vote, it could very damaging,” Jackson said. “There must be some reasonable relationship.”
Jackson said the final rift — which could prove the most difficult to heal — is genuine reconciliation between Obama and Clinton at the Democratic convention in Denver in August.
“The two sides must be able to embrace fervently in Denver and heal campaign wounds,” Jackson said, or else, he said, Republicans could win in November.
Jackson pointed out that in 1968, Hubert Humphrey forces and Lyndon Johnson forces “could not heal the wounds of the Vietnam War” and Richard Nixon won the presidency. Jackson also said that in 1980, the forces of Jimmy Carter and Ted Kennedy “did not warmly embrace” and “they allowed Ronald Reagan to come down the middle” and win the presidency.
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Jackson, who praised both Obama and Clinton throughout the interview, sounded very much like a man who was willing to try to bring them together.
“I have certainly talked to both campaigns,” Jackson said. “I have urged them that while they have to keep one eye on a hard-fought playoff season, they must also keep one eye on reconciliation for the Super Bowl and the Super Bowl is November.”
Last month, Bill Clinton discounted an impending victory by Obama in South Carolina, by saying, “Jesse Jackson won South Carolina in ‘84 and ‘88. Jackson ran a good campaign. And Obama ran a good campaign here.”
Some felt, however, the former president was unnecessarily bringing up race by comparing Obama to Jackson. A Washington Post reporter called Bill Clinton’s comments a “sour note” and an ABC reporter compared it to “race-baiting.”
Jackson told me, however, he was not offended by the remarks, though he recognized that some were.
“To many people that was hurtful,” Jackson said, “but I did not read it that way.” Jackson said race should not be off the table in political discussion as long as it is done properly.
“I think we must distinguish between race-baiting, which is unacceptable, and the need to address race as a moral dilemma, which has haunted the nation since its very beginning,” Jackson said.
I asked Jackson if he thought it was fair for Obama to use the argument that a vote for him as an African-American can make people feel better about themselves and about the nation and send a good signal to the rest of the world.
“Racial justice is the key for the salvation of the nation and that is fair game to discuss; it is a fair message,” Jackson said. “Blacks reaching out is not new; white receptivity is new. Barack is reaching out.”
Jackson also said that the work that he and others involved in the civil rights movement did in decades past has helped make the current political climate possible.
“I just take some delight in the fact that we knocked down barriers, and now Barack and Hillary are open-field runners,” Jackson said. “A healthier, more secure, more mature America is emerging from race and gender shock.”
Too bad Jesse Jackson is a hypocrite with his whole NAACP organization. Why is it that his organization ignores "brown" issues. I have heard several complaints from Latino's in regard to how the NAACP handles their affairs.
If I were Obama.......I would distance myself from Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton -- American's two cheap pimps.
Jesse Jackson defines HYPOCRITE!
"Jesse Jackson could hurt the democrat party substantially, perhaps irreparably, in November if he doesn't keep his piehole shut".
A question for Jesse Jackson who claims his organziation is "multi-racial":
Where are the hispanics, the Asians, the Arabic and so forth with regard to your leadership? You are a hypocrite.
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