I’m a little sick of the idea of using children to promote political positions and especially candidates, so I’m inclined to look at this kind of effort with a jaundiced eye under any circumstances. However, this video seems even creepier than most.
Just keep humming…
’cause you got to have friends.
Da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, friends.
That’s right you, oh you, yeah you,
I said you gotta have some friends,
I’m talkin’ about friends, that’s right, friends.
Friends, friends, friends.
Careful about bringing them up as Obama surrogates will label you a RACIST if you start yapping about them. Gov. Palin is now being accused of being a racist, just because she brought up Ayers.
One of the clearest examples you’ll ever see of why The One seldom dirties his hands by playing the race card. Not only will his political surrogates do it for him, his media surrogates happily will, too. There were stories out yesterday about how McCain’s planning to go after him on Ayers over the next month and how Team Barry’s planning a little “preemptive” action. Here’s part of the preemption, courtesy of the AP: Mention Obama’s connection to a white domestic terrorist and you’re a racist.
I would have thought he would be proud. Hmm, he sure doesn’t understand that “loyal” thing about being a friend. After you get through with the list, check out Iowahawk’s advice from Barry’s friends. Good laughs.
I intend this article to be part of a much needed grassroots effort to educate those that only get their news from the Main Stream Media or do not follow politics closely, so feel free to link it, print it, e-mail it, or do whatever you need to do to get the word out (giving proper credit and/or links to Insight Analytical and myself is always appreciated).You can consider it an Obama 101 Picture Book Primer and a serious attempt to save this great nation.
Antoin “Tony” Rezko: Convicted Chicago developer (16 out of 24 felony counts) that helped the Obamas buy their expensive Hyde Park mansion. Investigation by a Federal prosecutor is ongoing into whether Rezko received government contracts in exchange for political contributions to Barack Obama, and whether Obama was a conspirator in the “Pay to Play” scheme. There is still the possibility that Obama will be named as a defendant, which likely depends on the outcome of the November election.
Nadhmi Auchi: This former member of Saddam Hussein’s government lent money to Tony Rezko just prior to the Obama’s purchasing their Hyde Park mansion. Auchi has also donated money to Obama’s campaign.
(Photo: Auchi is on the left, shown with former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, right)
Rev. Jeremiah Wright (right): Obama’s radical pastor for 20 years (at Trinity United Church of Christ), whose claims that the AIDS epidemic was caused by the US government and 9/11/01 was an “inside job,” caused Obama to leave the church earlier this year amid a firestorm of controversy about Wrights comments and connection with Marxism-based “Black Liberation Theology”.
Rod Blagojevich: Illinois Governor and Obama supporter under investigation for his involvement in Chicago’s “Pay to Play” political corruption trials and possible connections to Tony Rezko.
Penny Pritzker: Obama Campaign Finance Chair, whose family owned Superior Bank which was the first in the nation to go under (in 2001) as part of the current Wall Street sub-prime mortgage crisis. She is rumored to be a candidate for Treasury Secretary in an Obama Administration.
Franklin Raines: Former head of the recently rescued lender Fannie Mae who walked away with some $25 million as the institution crumbled in the Sub-Prime Mortgage fraud. Once claimed to a reporter to be a personal advisor to Barack Obama.
Frank Marshall Davis: This confirmed member of the Communist Party USA has been identified as the childhood mentor Obama calls simply “Frank” in Dreams From My Father. Obama’s grandfather, Stanley Dunham, introduced him to the boy as a black male role model in Honolulu. In his writings, Davis confesses that he and his wife once had sex with a 13-year-old girl named Anne.
Rashid Khalidi: A Hyde Park neighbor of Obama and the co-founder of the Arab American Action Network, which calls the establishment of Israel a “catastrophe”, Khalidi is a former spokesman for the PLO, served on the Woods Foundation with Barack Obama, and has raised funds for him.
Cecil Butler: A Chicago real estate developer who profited from the privatization of low income, public housing during the 1990s (similar to Tony Rezko) in the “Pay to Play” fraud. Butler is a major supporter of Barack Obama whose low-income tenements were ultimately seized by the government for multiple building code violations.
(No photos of Butler are readily available, but this building has been identified as one of his west side projects.)
Valerie Jarrett: An Obama insider once stated of this Iranian-born real estate developer: “She’s always been the other side of Barack’s brain.” She is considered by some to be a top candidate for Obama’s Chief of Staff, and is a longtime political insider (part of Mayor Richard Daley’s team responsible for hiring Michelle Robinson Obama) and stands at the center of Chicago’s controversial efforts to redevelop public housing limiting the number of residents, mostly poor and black, who can live in the new communities.
Louis Farrakhan: Supreme Minister of the Nation of Islam, considered by many to be a radical anti-Semite, he had also accused the US government of launching “a war against the black people of America, the Nation of Islam and Louis Farrakhan.” He provided NOI bodyguards for Obama during the 2008 Democratic Primary until Obama received Secret Service protection. Farrakhan has endorsed Obama’s bid for the Presidency in February 2008 calling him the “hope of the entire world”.
“You are the instruments that God is gonna use to bring about universal change, and that is why Barack has captured the youth. And he has involved young people in a political process that they didn’t care anything about. That’s a sign. When the Messiah speaks, the youth will hear, and the Messiah is absolutely speaking.”
State Sen. Rev. James Meeks: Obama’s mentor in the Illinois legislature widely believed to have taken bills developed and worked on by various Illinois State Senate members and offered them to Obama to be introduced for votes with his own name listed as author in order to pad his resume for a US Senate run in 2006.
William Ayers & Bernadette Dohrn: Unrepentant domestic terrorists with the Weather Underground, Ayers and Dohrn participated in bombings and plots to murder policemen and judges in the 1960s. Obama’s political career was launched at a party in the couple’s living room, and Ayers hired Obama as the Chair of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge and served with him on the Woods Foundation. Ayers is famous for stating, “I don’t regret setting bombs” and “I feel we didn’t do enough”, and, when asked if he would “do it all again” as saying “I don’t want to discount the possibility.”
Update: E&P makes a good point, inadvertently, in trying to absolve Obama: If The One is guilty of looking the other way at Ayers’s terrorist past, so is pretty much every other Democrat in Chicago. This isn’t an “Obama problem,” in other words, as much as it is a problem with his side not fretting overly much about youthful ’60s indiscretions like killing cops with pipe bombs in the name of progress.
“The last four weeks of this election will be about whether the American people are willing to turn our economy and national security over to Barack Obama, a man with little record, questionable judgment, and ties to radical figures like unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayers. Americans need to ask themselves if they’ve ever befriended an unrepentant terrorist, or had a convicted felon help them buy their house — because those aren’t smears, those are true facts about Barack Obama.” —Tucker Bounds, spokesman McCain-Palin 2008
Fr. Michael Pfleger: Radical pastor of the mostly African American parish of Saint Sabina in Chicago, and frequent visitor to Obama’s former congregation at Trinity UCC. Obama has called Pfleger a spiritual mentor, but was forced to denounce him during the Democratic primary for making inflammatory racial statements about opponent Hillary Clinton.
(Photo: Father Pfleger left, shown with Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam)
Hatem El-Hady: Theformer chairman of the Toledo-based Islamic charity Kindhearts, which was shut down by the US government in 2006 for terrorist fundraising and ties to Hamas. Elhady once had a web page on the official Barack Obama campaign site, but it was removed in April 2008.
(Again, no photo of el Hady is readily available, but the image at left is a screen capture of the el Hady profile page on the official Obama site before it was removed. There are 3 friends listed on the right, the last of which is Michelle Obama. Her name was removed immediately after el Hady’s name began to appear in the Blogosphere.)
Robert Malley: Controversial former Middle East policy advisor to the Obama campaign. Malley was fired only after he acknowledged holding private meetings with the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas. Malley argues that negotiations with the Palestinians today must include Hamas.
Zbigniew Brzezinski: High profile Obama Foreign Policy advisor criticized for his 2008 article defending the book “The Israel Lobby”, which accuses American Jews of McCarthyism. The former national security adviser has been at odds with elements of the American Jewish community since his stint in the Carter administration, and is seen by many as staunchly anti-Russian, which could exacerbate the current tensions between Russia and the democratic nation of Georgia.
Howard Dean: Current Chair of the Democratic National Committee, Dean identified Obama as one of his “Dean’s Dozen” (a group of handpicked potential Democrats to run for President) as far back as 2002. Dean himself lost a bid for the Presidency in 2004 after his infamous “I Have a Scream” speech, and has been strongly criticized for steering the 2008 Presidential primaries in Barack Obama’s favor and even illegally using his position to declare the race over before the August 2008 convention.
Joseph Biden: Obama’sVice Presidential pick, he is also known as “Credit Card Joe” due to his deep and fruitful connections to lender MNBA (based in Biden’s home state of Delaware). Biden is also known for his mishandling of the Senate confirmation hearings of Clarence Thomas for the Supreme Court. Biden accused former Thomas employee Anita Hill (who claimed Thomas had sexually harassed her) of “fantasizing” the entire incident. Activists lambasted Biden at the time for trivializing Hill’s experiences and setting back the cause of Women’s Rights.
Michelle Robinson Obama: Obama’s wife of 15 years has caused much controversy throughout the campaign by stating she was proud of America “for the first time in my life”, stating of former President Bill Clinton that she would like to “scratch his eyes out”, and calling Barack Obama “pathetic” in an appearance on ABC’s The View and referring to him as “My babies’ Daddy” when introducing him at a campaign event. Robinson is thought to have introduced Barack Obama to domestic terrorist Bill Ayers at the Sidley law firm. Her thesis at Princeton has been restricted until November 5, 2008 (the day following the Presidential election), but an excerpt reads: “My experiences at Princeton have made me far more aware of my ‘Blackness’ than ever before,” she wrote in her thesis “I sometimes feel like a visitor on campus, as if I don’t really belong.”
George Soros: This Hungarian-bornbillionaire and self described global financier and philanthropist is suspected by many of being the power and money source behind the Obama campaign. He recently bought Moveon.org, a progressive political organization that has been highly critical of anyone opposing Obama. Soros has stated “The Bush administration and the Nazi and communist regimes all engaged in the politics of fear. Indeed, the Bush administration has been able to improve on the techniques used by the Nazi and Communist propaganda machines by drawing on the innovations of the advertising and marketing industries, ” as well as “supporting the Israeli government in its refusal to recognize a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas, which the U.S. State Department considers a terrorist organization.”
Donna Brazile: Campaign Manager for Al Gore’s 2000 run for President, she also serves on the Rules and Bylaws Committee of the DNC that infamously stripped delegates from Florida and Michigan in the 2008 primaries. Following the embarrassing 2000 defeat, Brazile became e-mail buddies with Republican strategist Karl Rove and adopted his tactics against fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton in the 2008 campaign. As a CNN analyst, Brazile has been aggressively supporting Barack Obama since the start of the year, despite calling herself an “undeclared” Super Delegate.
Nancy Pelosi: The Speaker of the US House of Representatives took no action on ending the war in Iraq or rescuing the failing US economy, but found time to get involved in the Democratic primary race by pushing for NY Senator Hillary Clinton to drop out significantly before the Democratic Convention, and to write her own book. Pelosi leads the Democratic majority of the Congress with the lowest approval rating of all time.
Foreign Leaders Who are Admirers of Obama
Raila Odinga: Obama’s African cousin on his father’s side, who Barack campaigned for in the Kenyan Presidential election in 2007. Odinga is now the country’s Prime Minister in a coalition government thrown together to avert civil war, and has been accused of mass political genocide across Kenya after his failed bid for the presidency.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: In March 2008, virulently anti-American Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told the Spanish El Pais newspaper that he would have no problems if the junior senator from Illinois were to be elected US President. Ahmadinejad has also denied the reality of the holocaust and stated that Israel should be destroyed, as well as denying that homosexuality exists in Iran. Currently the US and allies are trying to keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons. Hardly the type of man you want to be comfortable with an American Presidential candidate, but not the only foreign leader to endorse an Obama Presidency (see below).
Editor’s Note; Jodie Evans, co-founder of Code Pink and major Obama bundler, was among a large contingent of peace activists who met with Ahmadinejad on Wednesday, September 24, following his appearance before the U.N. General Assembly (Code Pink press release).
Kim Jong II: The dictator of North Korea recently allowed it’s mouthpiece Chosun Sinbo to announce “We will see a better relationship between the U.S. and the Korean Peninsula with Obama, who sternly criticizes Bush and who would meet the leader of Chosun without pre-conditions”.
Obama repeatedly stated that he would meet leaders such as Il in debates during the Democratic primaries.
Muammar Al-Gaddafi: The de facto leader of Libya since a 1969 coup, he has called America a dictatorship and refers to the Senator as “our brother Obama”. He recently stated “all the people in the Arab and Islamic World … prayed for his success” and “a person lies and lies so that people will vote for him”. Gaddafi also said returning the Palestinians to their homeland is the “change Americans want”.
Fidel Castro: The ailing Cuban dictator called Obama “the most progressive candidate to the U.S. presidency” and refused to formally endorse him, as “Were I to defend him, I would do his adversaries an enormous favor”.
Hugo Chavez: The Socialist President of Venezuela is a fierce critic of American and US foreign policy, but (again) Obama has stated publicly that he would meet with Chavez without preconditions, and Chavez indicated his endorsement of Obama on Sept. 11, 2008.
Alexi Giannoulis: Became Illinois State Treasurer after Barack Obama vouched for him. He has been described as a “man who has long been dogged by charges that the bank his family owns helped finance a Chicago crime figure”. Giannoulis “pledged to raise $100,000 for the senator’s Oval Office bid,” Charles Hurt reported September 5, 2007, in the New York Post. Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times reported, “Before he promised to raise funds for Obama, Giannoulias bankrolled Michael ‘Jaws’ Giorango, a Chicagoan twice convicted of bookmaking and promoting prostitution.
“Giannoulias is so tainted by reputed mob links that several top Illinois Dems, including the state’s speaker of the House and party chairman, refused to endorse him even after he won the Democratic nomination with Obama’s help.” States Congresspedia
Jim Johnson: Former Fannie Mae Chair that was hired to vet Vice Presidential candidates for the Obama Campaign. Johnson allegedly received $7 million from Countrywide Mortgage, one of the biggest players in the sub-prime mortgage fiasco. He received below market mortgage rates form the lender that Obama railed against personally:
“This is a company that is as responsible as any firm in the country for the housing crisis we’re facing today. When Countrywide Financial was sold a few months ago, its top two executives got a combined $19 million. These are the folks who are responsible for infecting the economy and helping to create a home foreclosure crisis….They get a $19 million bonus while people are at risk of losing their home. What’s wrong with this picture?”
Emil Jones: President of the Illinois Senate and Obama’s political mentor. When in the State Senate, all of Obama’s accomplishments were in his 7th year. Jones was discovered to have handed Obama all these bills after being worked on by other legislators. Jones is credited with the statement “I’m gonna make me a U.S. Senator.” When asked who that might be, Jones replied “Barack Obama”.
David Axelrod: Chicago political consultant and Chief Strategist and Media Advisor to Obama, Axelrod has worked on the campaigns of John Edwards, Deval Patrick, and Eliot Spitzer. He also owns ASK Public Strategies, a firm credited with mastering the tactic of “Astroturfing” or organizing a political effort and making it look like a grassroots effort. Wikipedia describes it as follows: “Astroturfing may be undertaken by an individual pushing a personal agenda or highly organized professional groups with financial backing from large corporations, non-profits, or activist organizations. Very often the efforts are conducted by political consultants who also specialize in opposition research.”
Tom Daschle: Former Democratic Senate Majority and Minority leader who was voted out of office by South Dakotans despite his presitgious position. Daschle is now a nationa Co-Chair for the Obama campaign. According to Wikipedia: “On February 13, 2006, Daschle became one of two Democrats (with Rep. Jane Harman of California) to endorse a warrantless domestic surveillance program conducted under the authority of President George W. Bush by the National Security Agency (NSA).”
Percy Sutton: This 87-year-old icon of the Civil Rights Movement recently recounted a story where he claimed he was asked to write a recommendation for Barack Obama to enter Harvard. Sutton’s quote follows:
“I was introduced to him by a friend who was raising money for him and the friend’s name was Dr Khalid al Mansour from Texas. He is the principle adviser to one of the world’s richest men. He told me about Obama. He wrote to me about him and his introduction was ‘there is a young man that has applied to Harvard and I know that you have a few friends left there because you used to go up there to speak, would you please write a letter in support of him?’ That’s before Obama decided to run. And he interjected the advice that Obama had passed the requirements, had taken, and passed, the requirements necessary to get into Harvard and become President of the Law Review. That’s before he ever ran for anything. I wrote a letter in support of him to my friends at Harvard saying to them I thought there was a genius that was going to be available and I surely hoped they would treat him kindly.”
Khalid al Mansour/Donald Warden: The mysterious man Percy Sutton referred to in his interview is somewhat difficult to identify (a very common name in several countries). The al Mansour that is also known as Donald Warden has ties to both the radical Black Panthers and has served on the board of a bank in Nigeria that may have connections to money raised for Barack Obama. For more detail, I recommend the following 2 articles, and bear in mind again the caveat “follow the money”: (photo not readily available)
While not all directly associated with Barack Obama, these people formed the basis of his political philosophy and influenced him heavily, sometimes via theory, often via a strong organizational connection. Understanding who they are leads to a better understanding of the 2008 Presidential election.
Saul Alinsky: Writing a brief overview of Alinsky is nearly impossible; so I strongly urge you do look into the varied sides of this man further. That being said, Alinsky was a radical and community organizer (sound familiar?) who started the movement that grew into the SDS and ACORN (among other groups). Perhaps his own words explain his ideas best:
“Make the enemy live up to their (sic) own book of rules,” Alinsky wrote in his 1989 book Rules for Radicals. When pressed to honor every word of every law and statute, every Judeo-Christian moral tenet, and every implicit promise of the liberal social contract, human agencies inevitably fall short. The system’s failure to “live up” to its rule book can then be used to discredit it altogether, and to replace the capitalist “rule book” with a socialist one. (Courtesy Discover the Networks.org)
Alinsky served as mentor to many (including Hillary Clinton, who is said to have studied him and then continued on her political career, and Barack Obama, who still uses his techniques on a daily basis in this election), and put the fear of God into just as many (he one traveled to Oakland, CA and the local politicos were so shaken that they actually passed a resolution to ban him from the city). His talent was for organizing the poor into powerful political forces that can combat government and replace it with Socialism. Barack Obama is said to have taken Alinsky training when he began his Community Organizer career in Chicago. To understand Saul Alinsky and his followers is to gain much insight into Obama.
Richard Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven: Columbia University radicals and creators of the so-called “Cloward-Piven strategy,” which called for swamping the welfare rolls with new applicants, beyond what the system could bear. The idea was that the resulting economic collapse would lead to political turmoil and ultimately socialism. This concept was used effectively in New York City, and was cited as one of the causes of the city’s financial collapse as welfare rolls jumped from 150,000 to over a million in just 10 years.
(Photo not readily available)
Wade Rathke: The founder and chief organizer of ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), a group Obama has worked for and represented in lawsuits, and Service Employees International Union (SEIU). Rathke’s brother Dale was reported to have embezzled over $940,000 from ACORN and it’s affiliates, which Wade did not report to the full board and kept hidden for 8 years. ACORN is under investigation for voter registration fraud in 18 states, and past employees have admitted to simply making up names of supposed voters. Many consider ACORN to be a leftist extremist organization using the principles of Saul Alinsky and Cloward & Piven.
George Wiley: Mentor of Wade Rathke, founder and leader of the radical ACORN, best know for his use of the Cloward & Piven strategy. Wiley is known as the Founder of the National Welfare Reform Organization, and as a pioneer of the radical “franchise” concept, now used by ACORN and other groups, which helps local activists quickly build local outlets of national activist organizations by using church groups and other pre-existing community groups.
Carl Davidson: Former President of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) with Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dorhn (a precursor to the Weather Underground), Davidson is credited with organizing the 2002 Anti-War rally where Obama gave his infamous speech against the Iraq war. Davidson is a self-styled “progressive for Obama” according to his blog http://carldavidson.blogspot.com/
Claire McCaskill: This Missouri Senator has supported Obama since her children shamed her into it in the beginning of 2008. McCaskill has been a vocal supporter, and her name was bandied about as a potential VP pick by Obama. She has been accused by ACORN workers in MO of using the organization to bring out new voters to support her instead of registering new voters or getting them to support a minimum wage bill as they were hired to do. The workers were all fired from ACORN after refusing to campaign for McCaskill.
Herbert and Marion Sandler: A New York lawyer and Wall Street analyst that sold Golden West Financial (GDW), one of the largest savings and loans in the nation to Wachovia Bank just before their portfolio dragged the S & L under. Wachovia failed in the recent Wall Street crisis as a result of the high number of sub-prime mortgages it acquired in its $24 billion purchase of GDW. The Sandlers personally made billions (yes, that’s with a B), and went on to fund organizations like ACORN and the International Crisis Group, the staff of which is said to form the basis of the future State Department of an Obama Administration.
Peter Lewis: Chairman of Progressive Insurance who along with George Soros gave $23 million to Moveon.org, and formed a group called The Democracy Alliance, both strong ACORN supporters. In 2004 he was one of the top donors to 527 groups promoting a far left agenda. Lewis describes himself as “half screwball, half businessman” and once showed up to a City Council meeting wearing a Lone Ranger outfit.
[...] It does NOT go away. He may look benign, but his actions have always been anything but benign. Americans need to ask themselves if they’ve ever befriended an unrepentant terrorist, or had a convicted felon help them buy their [...]
[...] Let us not forget that he is not responsible for Ayers’ actions in the sixties or Rev Wright, but he is responsible for choosing to work for, work with, and solicit political support from Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernadette Dohrn and the rest of “his friends or acquaintances”. [...]
[...] are looking at a man whose judgment of character is questionable. He has chosen his alliances for opportunistic reasons. These people have backgrounds that ARE of ill repute. Reformed [...]
Nadhmi Auchi: This former member of Saddam Hussein’s government lent money to Tony Rezko just prior to the Obama’s purchasing their Hyde Park mansion. Auchi has also donated money to Obama’s campaign.
Rev. Jeremiah Wright (right): Obama’s radical pastor for 20 years (at Trinity United Church of Christ), whose claims that the AIDS epidemic was caused by the US government and 9/11/01 was an “inside job,” caused Obama to leave the church earlier this year amid a firestorm of controversy about Wrights comments and connection with Marxism-based “Black Liberation Theology”.
Rod Blagojevich: Illinois Governor and Obama supporter under investigation for his involvement in Chicago’s “Pay to Play” political corruption trials and possible connections to Tony Rezko.
Penny Pritzker: Obama Campaign Finance Chair, whose family owned Superior Bank which was the first in the nation to go under (in 2001) as part of the current Wall Street sub-prime mortgage crisis. She is rumored to be a candidate for Treasury Secretary in an Obama Administration.
Franklin Raines: Former head of the recently rescued lender Fannie Mae who walked away with some $25 million as the institution crumbled in the Sub-Prime Mortgage fraud. Once claimed to a reporter to be a personal advisor to Barack Obama.
Frank Marshall Davis: This confirmed member of the Communist Party USA has been identified as the childhood mentor Obama calls simply “Frank” in Dreams From My Father. Obama’s grandfather, Stanley Dunham, introduced him to the boy as a black male role model in Honolulu. In his writings, Davis confesses that he and his wife once had sex with a 13-year-old girl named Anne.
Valerie Jarrett: An Obama insider once stated of this Iranian-born real estate developer: “She’s always been the other side of Barack’s brain.” She is considered by some to be a top candidate for Obama’s Chief of Staff, and is a longtime political insider (part of Mayor Richard Daley’s team responsible for hiring Michelle Robinson Obama) and stands at the center of Chicago’s controversial efforts to redevelop public housing limiting the number of residents, mostly poor and black, who can live in the new communities.
Louis Farrakhan: Supreme Minister of the Nation of Islam, considered by many to be a radical anti-Semite, he had also accused the US government of launching “a war against the black people of America, the Nation of Islam and Louis Farrakhan.” He provided NOI bodyguards for Obama during the 2008 Democratic Primary until Obama received Secret Service protection. Farrakhan has endorsed Obama’s bid for the Presidency in February 2008 calling him the “hope of the entire world”.
State Sen. Rev. James Meeks: Obama’s mentor in the Illinois legislature widely believed to have taken bills developed and worked on by various Illinois State Senate members and offered them to Obama to be introduced for votes with his own name listed as author in order to pad his resume for a US Senate run in 2006.
William Ayers & Bernadette Dohrn: Unrepentant domestic terrorists with the Weather Underground, Ayers and Dohrn participated in bombings and plots to murder policemen and judges in the 1960s. Obama’s political career was launched at a party in the couple’s living room, and Ayers hired Obama as the Chair of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge and served with him on the Woods Foundation. Ayers is famous for stating, “I don’t regret setting bombs” and “I feel we didn’t do enough”, and, when asked if he would “do it all again” as saying “I don’t want to discount the possibility.”
Fr. Michael Pfleger: Radical pastor of the mostly African American parish of Saint Sabina in Chicago, and frequent visitor to Obama’s former congregation at Trinity UCC. Obama has called Pfleger a spiritual mentor, but was forced to denounce him during the Democratic primary for making inflammatory racial statements about opponent Hillary Clinton.
Hatem El-Hady: The former chairman of the Toledo-based Islamic charity Kindhearts, which was shut down by the US government in 2006 for terrorist fundraising and ties to Hamas. Elhady once had a web page on the official Barack Obama campaign site, but it was removed in April 2008.
Zbigniew Brzezinski: High profile Obama Foreign Policy advisor criticized for his 2008 article defending the book “The Israel Lobby”, which accuses American Jews of McCarthyism. The former national security adviser has been at odds with elements of the American Jewish community since his stint in the Carter administration, and is seen by many as staunchly anti-Russian, which could exacerbate the current tensions between Russia and the democratic nation of Georgia.
Howard Dean: Current Chair of the Democratic National Committee, Dean identified Obama as one of his “Dean’s Dozen” (a group of handpicked potential Democrats to run for President) as far back as 2002. Dean himself lost a bid for the Presidency in 2004 after his infamous “I Have a Scream” speech, and has been strongly criticized for steering the 2008 Presidential primaries in Barack Obama’s favor and even illegally using his position to declare the race over before the August 2008 convention.
Joseph Biden: Obama’s Vice Presidential pick, he is also known as “Credit Card Joe” due to his deep and fruitful connections to lender MNBA (based in Biden’s home state of Delaware). Biden is also known for his mishandling of the Senate confirmation hearings of Clarence Thomas for the Supreme Court. Biden accused former Thomas employee Anita Hill (who claimed Thomas had sexually harassed her) of “fantasizing” the entire incident. Activists lambasted Biden at the time for trivializing Hill’s experiences and setting back the cause of Women’s Rights.
Michelle Robinson Obama: Obama’s wife of 15 years has caused much controversy throughout the campaign by stating she was proud of America “for the first time in my life”, stating of former President Bill Clinton that she would like to “scratch his eyes out”, and calling Barack Obama “pathetic” in an appearance on ABC’s The View and referring to him as “My babies’ Daddy” when introducing him at a campaign event. Robinson is thought to have introduced Barack Obama to domestic terrorist Bill Ayers at the Sidley law firm. Her thesis at Princeton has been restricted until November 5, 2008 (the day following the Presidential election), but an excerpt reads: “My experiences at Princeton have made me far more aware of my ‘Blackness’ than ever before,” she wrote in her thesis “I sometimes feel like a visitor on campus, as if I don’t really belong.”
George Soros: This Hungarian-born billionaire and self described global financier and philanthropist is suspected by many of being the power and money source behind the Obama campaign. He recently bought Moveon.org, a progressive political organization that has been highly critical of anyone opposing Obama. Soros has stated “The Bush administration and the Nazi and communist regimes all engaged in the politics of fear. Indeed, the Bush administration has been able to improve on the techniques used by the Nazi and Communist propaganda machines by drawing on the innovations of the advertising and marketing industries, ” as well as “supporting the Israeli government in its refusal to recognize a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas, which the U.S. State Department considers a terrorist organization.”
Donna Brazile: Campaign Manager for Al Gore’s 2000 run for President, she also serves on the Rules and Bylaws Committee of the DNC that infamously stripped delegates from Florida and Michigan in the 2008 primaries. Following the embarrassing 2000 defeat, Brazile became e-mail buddies with Republican strategist Karl Rove and adopted his tactics against fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton in the 2008 campaign. As a CNN analyst, Brazile has been aggressively supporting Barack Obama since the start of the year, despite calling herself an “undeclared” Super Delegate.
Nancy Pelosi: The Speaker of the US House of Representatives took no action on ending the war in Iraq or rescuing the failing US economy, but found time to get involved in the Democratic primary race by pushing for NY Senator Hillary Clinton to drop out significantly before the Democratic Convention, and to write her own book. Pelosi leads the Democratic majority of the Congress with the lowest approval rating of all time.
Raila Odinga: Obama’s African cousin on his father’s side, who Barack campaigned for in the Kenyan Presidential election in 2007. Odinga is now the country’s Prime Minister in a coalition government thrown together to avert civil war, and has been accused of mass political genocide across Kenya after his failed bid for the presidency.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: In March 2008, virulently anti-American Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told the Spanish El Pais newspaper that he would have no problems if the junior senator from Illinois were to be elected US President. Ahmadinejad has also denied the reality of the holocaust and stated that Israel should be destroyed, as well as denying that homosexuality exists in Iran. Currently the US and allies are trying to keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons. Hardly the type of man you want to be comfortable with an American Presidential candidate, but not the only foreign leader to endorse an Obama Presidency (see below).
Kim Jong II: The dictator of North Korea recently allowed it’s mouthpiece Chosun Sinbo to announce “We will see a better relationship between the U.S. and the Korean Peninsula with Obama, who sternly criticizes Bush and who would meet the leader of Chosun without pre-conditions”.
Muammar Al-Gaddafi: The de facto leader of Libya since a 1969 coup, he has called America a dictatorship and refers to the Senator as “our brother Obama”. He recently stated “all the people in the Arab and Islamic World … prayed for his success” and “a person lies and lies so that people will vote for him”. Gaddafi also said returning the Palestinians to their homeland is the “change Americans want”.
Hugo Chavez: The Socialist President of Venezuela is a fierce critic of American and US foreign policy, but (again) Obama has stated publicly that he would meet with Chavez without preconditions, and Chavez indicated his endorsement of Obama on Sept. 11, 2008.
Alexi Giannoulis: Became Illinois State Treasurer after Barack Obama vouched for him. He has been described as a “man who has long been dogged by charges that the bank his family owns helped finance a Chicago crime figure”. Giannoulis “pledged to raise $100,000 for the senator’s Oval Office bid,” Charles Hurt reported September 5, 2007, in the New York Post. Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times reported, “Before he promised to raise funds for Obama, Giannoulias bankrolled Michael ‘Jaws’ Giorango, a Chicagoan twice convicted of bookmaking and promoting prostitution.
Jim Johnson: Former Fannie Mae Chair that was hired to vet Vice Presidential candidates for the Obama Campaign. Johnson allegedly received $7 million from Countrywide Mortgage, one of the biggest players in the sub-prime mortgage fiasco. He received below market mortgage rates form the lender that Obama railed against personally:
David Axelrod: Chicago political consultant and Chief Strategist and Media Advisor to Obama, Axelrod has worked on the campaigns of John Edwards, Deval Patrick, and Eliot Spitzer. He also owns ASK Public Strategies, a firm credited with mastering the tactic of “Astroturfing” or organizing a political effort and making it look like a grassroots effort. Wikipedia describes it as follows: “Astroturfing may be undertaken by an individual pushing a personal agenda or highly organized professional groups with financial backing from large corporations, non-profits, or activist organizations. Very often the efforts are conducted by political consultants who also specialize in opposition research.”
Tom Daschle: Former Democratic Senate Majority and Minority leader who was voted out of office by South Dakotans despite his presitgious position. Daschle is now a nationa Co-Chair for the Obama campaign. According to Wikipedia: “On February 13, 2006, Daschle became one of two Democrats (with Rep. Jane Harman of California) to endorse a warrantless domestic surveillance program conducted under the authority of President George W. Bush by the National Security Agency (NSA).”
Percy Sutton: This 87-year-old icon of the Civil Rights Movement recently recounted a story where he claimed he was asked to write a recommendation for Barack Obama to enter Harvard. Sutton’s quote follows:
Khalid al Mansour/Donald Warden: The mysterious man Percy Sutton referred to in his interview is somewhat difficult to identify (a very common name in several countries). The al Mansour that is also known as Donald Warden has ties to both the radical Black Panthers and has served on the board of a bank in Nigeria that may have connections to money raised for Barack Obama. For more detail, I recommend the following 2 articles, and bear in mind again the caveat “follow the money”: (photo not readily available)
Saul Alinsky: Writing a brief overview of Alinsky is nearly impossible; so I strongly urge you do look into the varied sides of this man further. That being said, Alinsky was a radical and community organizer (sound familiar?) who started the movement that grew into the SDS and ACORN (among other groups). Perhaps his own words explain his ideas best:
Richard Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven: Columbia University radicals and creators of the so-called “Cloward-Piven strategy,” which called for swamping the welfare rolls with new applicants, beyond what the system could bear. The idea was that the resulting economic collapse would lead to political turmoil and ultimately socialism. This concept was used effectively in New York City, and was cited as one of the causes of the city’s financial collapse as welfare rolls jumped from 150,000 to over a million in just 10 years.
Wade Rathke: The founder and chief organizer of ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), a group Obama has worked for and represented in lawsuits, and Service Employees International Union (SEIU). Rathke’s brother Dale was reported to have embezzled over $940,000 from ACORN and it’s affiliates, which Wade did not report to the full board and kept hidden for 8 years. ACORN is under investigation for voter registration fraud in 18 states, and past employees have admitted to simply making up names of supposed voters. Many consider ACORN to be a leftist extremist organization using the principles of Saul Alinsky and Cloward & Piven.
George Wiley: Mentor of Wade Rathke, founder and leader of the radical ACORN, best know for his use of the Cloward & Piven strategy. Wiley is known as the Founder of the National Welfare Reform Organization, and as a pioneer of the radical “franchise” concept, now used by ACORN and other groups, which helps local activists quickly build local outlets of national activist organizations by using church groups and other pre-existing community groups.
Carl Davidson: Former President of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) with Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dorhn (a precursor to the Weather Underground), Davidson is credited with organizing the 2002 Anti-War rally where Obama gave his infamous speech against the Iraq war. Davidson is a self-styled “progressive for Obama” according to his blog http://carldavidson.blogspot.com/
Claire McCaskill: This Missouri Senator has supported Obama since her children shamed her into it in the beginning of 2008. McCaskill has been a vocal supporter, and her name was bandied about as a potential VP pick by Obama. She has been accused by ACORN workers in MO of using the organization to bring out new voters to support her instead of registering new voters or getting them to support a minimum wage bill as they were hired to do. The workers were all fired from ACORN after refusing to campaign for McCaskill.
Herbert and Marion Sandler: A New York lawyer and Wall Street analyst that sold Golden West Financial (GDW), one of the largest savings and loans in the nation to Wachovia Bank just before their portfolio dragged the S & L under. Wachovia failed in the recent Wall Street crisis as a result of the high number of sub-prime mortgages it acquired in its $24 billion purchase of GDW. The Sandlers personally made billions (yes, that’s with a B), and went on to fund organizations like ACORN and the International Crisis Group, the staff of which is said to form the basis of the future State Department of an Obama Administration.
Peter Lewis: Chairman of Progressive Insurance who along with George Soros gave $23 million to Moveon.org, and formed a group called The Democracy Alliance, both strong ACORN supporters. In 2004 he was one of the top donors to 527 groups promoting a far left agenda. Lewis describes himself as “half screwball, half businessman” and once showed up to a City Council meeting wearing a Lone Ranger outfit.
October 8, 2008 at 5:57 pm
[...] It does NOT go away. He may look benign, but his actions have always been anything but benign. Americans need to ask themselves if they’ve ever befriended an unrepentant terrorist, or had a convicted felon help them buy their [...]
October 10, 2008 at 2:38 am
[...] Let us not forget that he is not responsible for Ayers’ actions in the sixties or Rev Wright, but he is responsible for choosing to work for, work with, and solicit political support from Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernadette Dohrn and the rest of “his friends or acquaintances”. [...]
October 10, 2008 at 2:09 pm
[...] some of your friends, eh? Opportunist. You have banked on how far those connections would take you. Does the name [...]
October 12, 2008 at 4:36 am
[...] are looking at a man whose judgment of character is questionable. He has chosen his alliances for opportunistic reasons. These people have backgrounds that ARE of ill repute. Reformed [...]