Friends in High Places

The Obama Justice Department went to bat for the New Black Panther party—and then covered it up.

From The Weekly Standard
By Jennifer Rubin

The case is straightforward. On Election Day 2008, two members of the New Black Panther party (NBPP) dressed in military garb were captured on videotape at a Philadelphia polling place spouting racial epithets and menacing voters. One, Minister King Samir Shabazz, wielded a nightstick. It was a textbook case of voter intimidation and clearly covered under the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

A Department of Justice trial team was assigned to investigate. They gathered affidavits from witnesses—one of the poll watchers was called a “white devil” and a “cracker.” A Panther told him he would be “ruled by the black man.” The trial team, all career Justice attorneys and headed by voting section chief Chris Coates, filed a case against the two Panthers caught on tape. Malik Zulu Shabazz, head of the national NBPP, and the party itself were also named based on evidence the party had planned the deployment of 300 members on Election Day and on statements after the incident in which the NBPP endorsed the intimidation at the Philadelphia polling station.

The trial team quickly obtained a default judgment—meaning it had won the case because the New Black Panther party failed to defend itself. Yet in May 2009, Obama Justice Department lawyers, appointed temporarily to fill top positions in the civil rights division, ordered the case against the NBPP dismissed. An administration that has pledged itself to stepping-up civil rights enforcement dropped the case and, for over a year, has prevented the trial team lawyers from telling their story.

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Conyers suggests probe of ACORN

Calls fraud charges 'serious'

From The Washington Times
By S. A. Miller

In an startling partisan shift, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. on Thursday proposed holding hearings on claims the liberal activist group ACORN engaged in a pattern of crimes ranging from voter fraud to a mob-style “protection” racket.

Mr. Conyers, Michigan Democrat and fierce partisan, suggested a congressional probe after scathing testimony about the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) during a hearing on various voting issues related to the 2008 presidential election.

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Barack Obama and the Question of the Anti-Christ: A Canadian Perspective

President Barack Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper walk
down the Hall of Honour for a joint news conference.

From Catholic Canada
By Michael O'Brien

All Saints Day, 1 November 2008

Dear Friends,

From just north of the border, we Canadians, like other people throughout the world, are observing and praying for the coming federal election in the United States of America. I would prefer to keep private my counsel about political choices, because it is not my country. However, I am receiving letters from American subscribers and visitors to my studio website asking me some rather surprising questions about Barack Obama, related to one of my novels.

During the past year I have read a number of his pronouncements, and saw the smoke and mirrors beneath the rhetoric, but couldn't understand why everyone south of the border (the other south of the border, the 49th parallel) was getting so excited about him, both pro and con. Then a few weeks ago a German friend called me immediately after Obama's speech in Berlin, to say that the presidential candidate had mesmerized the crowds, and that a commentator on German television had said: "We have just heard the next President of the United States...and the future President of the World." My friend felt that Obama bore an uncanny resemblance to the fictional character of the President in my novel Father Elijah. I have received several other letters saying the same thing and asking what I thought about it.

From my own reading of Obama's declarations and stated positions, I knew he was an ultra-liberal, a social revolutionary with visionary pretensions. But the Antichrist? No, not possible, I thought. I felt that he was too shallow a man to be the Son of Perdition, the Man of Sin, the Beast of the Book of Revelation. And I still think so. Obama is a crowd-pleaser with just the right ethos of idealistic crusader. That the crusade and the banners under which it marches are evil does not automatically prove that he is the Antichrist.

But now that I have seen the video of the Berlin speech I think there is more here than meets the eye. He is indeed a powerful manipulator of crowds, even as he appears ever so humble and wholesomely charming. I doubt that he is the long-prophesied ruler of the world, but I also believe that he is a carrier of a deadly moral virus, indeed a kind of anti-apostle spreading concepts and agendas that are not only anti-Christ but anti-human as well. In this sense he is of the spirit of Antichrist (perhaps without knowing it), and probably is one of several key figures in the world who (knowingly or unknowingly) will be instrumental in ushering in the time of great trial for the Church under its last and worst persecution, amidst the numerous other tribulations prophesied in the books of Daniel and Revelation, and letters of St Paul, St. John, and St. Peter.

Of course the mystique that has grown up around him is endlessly reinforced by the liberal media, which presents him to us as a high-minded humanist, a kind of secular messiah (see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 675). Yet when all the rhetoric is boiled down to its substance, the man is advocating unlimited state-sanctioned murder, and compounds it by indulging in habitual falsehood. He is well accustomed to playing loose with the truth whenever it is expedient for him to do so; or else he is the victim of the largest memory lapses in recorded history; or perhaps he is just not careful about how he expresses things——a blurring or selectivity regarding facts for the purpose of aggrandizing his public image. There is a controversy currently raging in the (admittedly unreliable) forum of the internet, prompted by an African-American talk show host in Los Angeles who listed 39 significant details that Barack Obama claimed were facts about himself, but on further investigation were proved to be simply untrue. There has been some wild-fire debunking of the debunking, and then more counter-debunking, but it remains obvious that forthrightness and clarity are not major concerns in the Obama camp.

What are we to make of a man who has appeared out of semi-obscurity and become, nearly overnight, so very much an idol of the popular imagination? That he intends to become the most effective advocate of murder of the unborn ever seen in America should give us pause. Murder and lies are as old as the lands east of Eden, of course, but when they are charmingly packaged, proposed as reasonable and just policies (with a smile, a resonant voice, and an appealing flash of the eyes), one begins to wonder just what is afoot in the modern age. It brings to mind a passage from the first Act of Shakespeare's Hamlet:

"That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain..."

The line is from a scene where prince Hamlet has just encountered the ghost of his father, who informs his son that he was poisoned by his own brother Claudius (the "smiling, damned villain"), who after murdering him, seized the king's crown and his queen.

Barack Obama is an image-maker, creating his own myth as he goes along. This would be a sad defect in any human being, but it takes on ominous proportions in a person who may become, after November 4th, one of the most powerful figures in the world. How is it possible that such a tragic turn of events may come about, if indeed a majority of Americans choose to believe the smile and the myth? Why is it that so many people have come to believe that a mirage is reality, even destiny? Do pro-Obama voters hanker for a world figure who would heal old divisions between races and religions, thus heralding a new age for mankind? During this time of near intolerable tensions, does he appear to be the one who can reconcile Islam and Christianity, Africa and America, occident and orient, black and white, rich and poor? Do they see his racial origins as a symbolic victory over the history of racial oppression? Do they see in him the good-hearted "under-dog", the gutsy street fighter who agitates for the rights of the "little guy," whose meteoric rise to a position of maximum influence represents themselves enthroned at last in the high seat of power? Is this why they ignore his every grave fault and hungrily consume his vague idealist platitudes as if these were a kind of new gospel for the third millennium? Our hero. Our visionary. Our Great Friend and spokesman in the forum of the world?

Clearly, contemporary man needs heroes. But why not choose a genuine one, why not look a little deeper and work a little harder to find a man of courage and principle, and if it helps in the historical healing process, why not a very different kind of black man, say a person like Alan Keyes, a scholar, former ambassador, experienced in different levels of government, and (it might be added) an African-American married to a woman from India. Moreover, he is a devout Catholic who believes in moral absolutes and has amply proved that he will stand firm to defend them regardless of the cost to his own career. He knows that kings and presidents cannot usurp the natural law, the moral order of the universe, without bringing down judgment upon their nations. But it need not be Keyes. It might be any number of other men and women of clear thought and clear principle. Surely there are "Ten Just Men" still out there somewhere in America. So why Obama? And why does he rise and rise as his mouth smiles and smiles, exuding sincerity as he speaks lies and death?

And why, most horribly, most shamefully, are so many Christians of malformed or unformed conscience supporting him? Is it because they have never been clearly instructed in the truth, never understood the foundation upon which the moral cosmos is built? Is morality for them merely another system of abstract "values" in a crowded playing field of such systems, from which one may pick and choose? In the case of Catholics, for example, have they been blinded by a diet of theological nuances and deadly little loopholes offered to them by the committees of national episcopal conferences — committees that have absolutely no authority over Catholics, yet which are widely revered as a kind of alternative Magisterium? Have they been deadened by a habitual dismissing or dissembling of the solid teaching given to them by the universal Church under Peter? Have they grown accustomed to listening to opinion shapers who tell them that certain excellent apostolic Bishops in America who teach the truth without compromise are merely hidebound reactionaries, moralistic extremists, contemporary manifestations of those old boogymen who still haunt the American psyche — the Chillingworths and Dimmesdales and the judges in The Scarlet Letter? And so it goes, this over-reaction to Puritanism played out over centuries, an over-reaction that breeds tragedies a thousand times worse than Salem's. Lies compounding on lies, and it all floats on an ocean of spilled innocent blood. And who can gaze at that ocean (or be splashed by it) without coming to a radical choice: One either turns away into a deeper state of denial, or one turns heart and mind toward the splendor of Truth, and changes one's life accordingly.

Is this why many of our Catholic people have become impulse-driven impressionists? Of course, the blindness is not due to the failure of pastors alone. The Ministry of Disinformation (by which I mean most modern media) has played a major role. There is also the erosion of truth in the education systems, combined with the gradual confusion and weakening of conscience through our addiction to the "soma" drugs supplied by the entertainment industry. Other factors may be the war in Iraq, or Republican economics, or the Bush administration, or the structure of Capitalism itself, or any number of prudential questions in the sociopolitical order, all of which are presently tangled nests of moral dilemma. But why do they not see that these questions are secondary to the fundamental issue of life itself? Why would they replace one reigning oligarchy with another kind of oligarchy — moreover, one that would kill vast numbers of its own citizens?

"I call on heaven and earth today to witness against you: I have set before you life or death, blessing or curse. Choose life, then, so that you and your descendants may live...." (Deuteronomy 30:19)

May God bless and guide you,
in Jesus our Saviour,

with prayers and fasting,

Michael O'Brien

Mike Huckabee Reflects on South Carolina Primary During Speech at Clinton Library

Religion's Big and Unprecedented Role in '08 Politics

From the Presidential Election to the Debate on Gay Marriage, Faith-Based Issues Dominated

From The Washington Post
By Kevin Eckstrom

Barack Obama chose Joe Biden, and John McCain turned to Sarah Palin, but in the end the most sought-after running mate in the 2008 campaign never appeared on a single ballot.

God, it seems, couldn't be entirely wooed by either party.

The unprecedented and extraordinary prominence of religion in the 2008 election was easily the year's top religion story. Both parties battled hard for religious voters, and both were forced to distance themselves from outspoken clergy whose fiery rhetoric threatened to become a political liability.

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Politics in the Anti-Christian Age

"False messiahs only appeal to societies that have abandoned the True One"

From Chronicles

By Gregory M. Davis

So what is the real significance of Barack Obama’s victory? Pundits’ fingers and tongues have been flying, of course, scoring the triumph in a variety of ways: the terrible legacy of slavery and racism has been dealt a conclusive blow; the Democratic Party has displaced the Republicans as the party of Middle America; the nation has rejected the pro-war policies of the last seven years; etc., each with its grain of truth. At the same time, shell-shocked Republican fingers are pointing: McCain was too old; it was the financial crisis; it was Bush; it was Iraq; it was Tina Fey. But the real reason that the near-nobody Barack Obama bested the war hero and veteran senator John McCain was that the latter’s campaign was insufficiently messianic. More important than the black or white or Jewish or Hispanic vote, Obama took the messiah vote, that burgeoning segment of the electorate consciously or unconsciously looking for a savior, an ersatz Christ figure, who will deliver them from the oppressive burden of post-Christian existence.

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Another Priest Urges Confession for Catholics who Voted for Pro-Abortion Obama

From LifeSiteNews
By Kathleen Gilbert

A California priest has garnered international attention and strong praise for pointing out the moral peril of Catholics who voted for President-elect Barack Obama despite being aware of his agenda to aggressively promote abortion.

"If you are one of the 54 percent of Catholics who voted for a pro-abortion candidate, you were clear on his position, and you knew the gravity of the question, I urge you to go to confession before receiving communion," wrote Fr. Joseph Illo, pastor of St. Joseph's Catholic Church in the Stockton diocese, in a letter to his parishioners. "Don't risk losing your state of grace by receiving sacrilegiously."

Fr. Illo's kind but firm letter, dated November 21, mapped out at length the complex but grave moral situation, and took pains to outline the extent to which his admonition pertains to any particular Catholic voter.

“If you voted for a pro-abortion candidate, I cannot say for certain if you should refrain from Holy Communion. I don’t know what you were thinking," wrote Fr. Illo. "But voting for a candidate who promises ‘abortion rights,’ even if he promises every other good thing, is voting for abortion. It is a grave mistake, and probably a grave sin. No issue can compare with the legalized destruction of a mother’s child.

"I am writing to you because I love you and I care about your relationship with God," said the letter. "I am also writing because God requires this of me as a Catholic priest."

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Supreme Court to Review Obama Citizenship Arguments

From WorldNetDaily
By Bob Unruh

A case that challenges President-elect Barack Obama's name on the 2008 election ballot citing questions over his citizenship has been scheduled for a "conference" at the U.S. Supreme Court.

Conferences are private meetings of the justices at which they review cases and decide which ones to accept for formal review. This case is set for a conference Dec. 5, just 10 days before the Electoral College is scheduled to meet to make formal the election of Obama as the nation's next president.

The Supreme Court's website listed the date for the case brought by Leo C. Donofrio against Nina Wells, the secretary of state in New Jersey, over not only Obama's name on the 2008 election ballot but those of two others, Sen. John McCain and Roger Calero.

The case, unsuccessful at the state level, had been submitted to Justice David Souter, who rejected it. The case then was resubmitted to Justice Clarence Thomas. The next line on the court's docket says: "DISTRIBUTED for Conference of December 5, 2008."

If four of the nine justices vote to hear the case in full, oral argument may be scheduled.

The action questions whether any of the three candidates is qualified under the U.S. Constitution's requirement that a president be a "natural-born citizen."

According to America's Right blogger Jeff Schreiber, there also was a development in a second case presented to the Supreme Court on the same issue.

His report said the Federal Election Commission now has waived its right to respond to a complaint brought by attorney Philip Berg.

"There are a number of reasons why the respondents here would choose not to respond. First, because the court only grants between 70 and 120 of the 8,000 or so petitions it receives every year, perhaps they just liked their odds of Berg's petition getting denied. Second, because they have made arguments as to Berg's lack of standing several times at the district court level and beyond, perhaps they felt as though any arguments had already been made and were available on the record. Or, perhaps the waiver shows that the FEC and other respondents do not take seriously the allegations put forth by Berg, and did not wish to legitimize the claims with a response," the blogger speculated.

"Another thing which is not completely clear is whether the FEC is filing for itself or on behalf of all respondents," he added.

"If it were just the FEC filing the waiver, I must say that I'm surprised," Berg told America's Right. "I'm surprised because I think they should take the position that the Supreme Court should grant standing to us. I think they have a responsibility not only to Phil Berg, but to all citizens of this country, to put forth a sense of balance which otherwise doesn't seem to exist.

"However, if this was filed by the FEC on behalf of the DNC and Barack Obama too, it reeks of collusion," he said, noting that the attorney from the solicitor general's office should be representing federal respondents and not the DNC or Obama.

But he noted that "questions surrounding this aspect of Obama's candidacy are seemingly beginning to see the light of day."

Just last week, WND reported on worries over a "constitutional crisis" that could be looming over the issue of Obama's citizenship.

Former presidential candidate Alan Keyes and others filed a court petition in California asking the secretary of state to refuse to allow the state's 55 Electoral College votes to be cast in the 2008 presidential election until Obama verifies his eligibility to hold the office.

The disputes all cite "natural-born citizen" requirement set by the U.S. Constitution.

WND senior reporter Jerome Corsi even traveled to Kenya and Hawaii prior to the election to investigate issues surrounding Obama's birth. But his research and discoveries only raised more questions.

The biggest question is why Obama, if a Hawaii birth certificate exists as his campaign has stated, simply hasn't ordered it made available to settle the rumors.

The governor's office in Hawaii said there is a valid certificate but rejected requests for access and left ambiguous its origin: Does the certificate on file with the Department of Health indicate a Hawaii birth or was it generated after the Obama family registered a Kenyan birth in Hawaii?

Obama's half-sister, Maya Soetoro, has named two different Hawaii hospitals where Obama could have been born. There have been other allegations that Obama actually was born in Kenya during a time when his father was a British subject.

The California action was filed by Gary Kreep of the United States Justice Foundation on behalf of Keyes, the presidential candidate of the American Independent Party, along with Wiley S. Drake and Markham Robinson, both California electors.

"Should Senator Obama be discovered, after he takes office, to be ineligible for the Office of President of the United States of America and, thereby, his election declared void, Petitioners, as well as other Americans, will suffer irreparable harm in that (a) usurper will be sitting as the President of the United States, and none of the treaties, laws, or executive orders signed by him will be valid or legal," the action challenges.

An Obama spokesman interviewed by WND described such lawsuits as "garbage."

The popular vote Nov. 4 favored Obama over Sen. John McCain by several percentage points. But because of the distribution of the votes, Obama is projected to take the Electoral College vote, when it is held in December, by a 2-to-1 margin.

The California case states, "There is a reasonable and common expectation by the voters that to qualify for the ballot, the individuals running for office must meet minimum qualifications as outlined in the federal and state Constitutions and statutes, and that compliance with those minimum qualifications has been confirmed by the officials overseeing the election process," the complaint said, when in fact the only documentation currently required is a signed statement from the candidate attesting to those qualifications.

"Since [the secretary of state] has, as its core, the mission of certifying and establishing the validity of the election process, this writ seeks a Court Order barring SOS from certifying the California Electors until documentary proof that Senator Obama is a 'natural born' citizen of the United States of America is received by her," the document said.

"This proof could include items such as his original birth certificate, showing the name of the hospital and the name and the signature of the doctor, all of his passports with immigration stamps, and verification from the governments where the candidate has resided, verifying that he did not, and does not, hold citizenship of these countries, and any other documents that certify an individual’s citizenship and/or qualification for office.

The "certificate of live birth" posted by the Obama campaign cannot be viewed as authoritative, the case alleges.

"Hawaii Revised Statute 338-178 allows registration of birth in Hawaii for a child that was born outside of Hawaii to parents who, for a year preceding the child’s birth, claimed Hawaii as their place of residence," the document said. "The only way to know where Senator Obama was actually born is to view Senator Obama's original birth certificate from 1961 that shows the name of the hospital and the name and signature of the doctor that delivered him."

The case also raises the circumstances of Obama's time during his youth in Indonesia, where he was listed as having Indonesian citizenship. Indonesia does not allow dual citizenship, raising the possibility of Obama's mother having given up his U.S. citizenship.

Any subsequent U.S. citizenship then, the case claims, would be "naturalized," not "natural-born."

WND has reported other challenges that have been raised in Ohio, Connecticut, Washington, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Georgia and Hawaii.

'I'm Pagan and I Vote'

From OneNewsNow.com
By Dr. Paul Kengor

Old Town Alexandria, Northern Virginia — Jogging through this gorgeous, historic town the first Saturday after the Tuesday vote, which elected the most leftist presidential candidate in American history, it isn't difficult to see how the typically Republican state of Virginia went Democrat in 2008. The sheer volume of "Obama-Biden" signs in the windows of BMWs and million-dollar townhouses is stunning, surpassed only by dogs on leashes — and in direct contrast to the conspicuous lack of children.

Likewise, the bumper stickers on Lexuses on cobblestone streets offer a tutorial on the force of liberal migration to Northern Virginia. They shout out a visceral hatred of George W. Bush — plus much more. As I ventured closer to the DC border, one particular bumper sticker caught my eye: "I'm Pagan and I Vote."

That, too, is telling — and worthy of careful consideration, especially given its failure to register among the press. Once again, in this presidential election, non-religious Americans came out in large numbers, and again cast ballots overwhelmingly for the Democratic nominee. As these citizens become more bold and vocal — evidenced by the spate of bestselling atheistic books in the last few years — they can no longer be ignored.

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The Moment To Decide

Once to every man and nation, comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side.

Obama Promises to Bankrupt Coal Industry -- "Soaring Electricity Rates" for All

Once again Barack Hussein Obama has shared with his friends in San Francisco his contempt for the untermenschen in places like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and Indiana. Promising to bankrupt the coal industry on which thousands of jobs depend and which supplies half of our electrical power, he's let us all know just in the nick of time about the soaring rates for electricity we will all pay to finance his radical environmental agenda.

Here's what the Ohio Coal Association has to say about the candidate with one platform for Ohio and Pennsylvania and another for Hollywood and San Francisco:

Ohio Coal Association Says Obama Remarks Make It Clear: Obama Ticket Not Supportive of Coal

COLUMBUS, Ohio, Nov. 3 /PRNewswire--USNewswire/ -- Mike Carey, president of the Ohio Coal Association (OCA), today issued the following statement in response to just-released remarks from Senator Barack Obama about the nation's coal industry.

"Regardless of the timing or method of the release of these remarks, the message from the Democratic candidate for President could not be clearer: the Obama-Biden ticket spells disaster for America's coal industry and the tens of thousands of Americans who work in it.

"These undisputed, audio-taped remarks, which include comments from Senator Obama like 'I haven't been some coal booster' and 'if they want to build [coal plants], they can, but it will bankrupt them' are extraordinarily misguided.

"It's evident that this campaign has been pandering in states like Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Indiana and Pennsylvania to attempt to generate votes from coal supporters, while keeping his true agenda hidden from the state's voters.

"Senator Obama has revealed himself to be nothing more than a short- sighted, inexperienced politician willing to say anything to get a vote. But today, the nation's coal industry and those who support it have a better understanding of his true mission, to 'bankrupt' our industry, put tens of thousands out of work and cause unprecedented increases in electricity prices.

"In addition to providing an affordable, reliable source of low-cost electricity, domestic coal holds the key to our nation's long-term energy security - a goal that cannot be overlooked during this time of international instability and economic uncertainty.

"Few policy areas are more important to our economic future than energy issues. As voters head to the polls tomorrow, it is essential they remember that access to reliable, affordable, domestic energy supplies is essential to economic growth and stability."

The Ohio Coal Association (OCA) is a non-profit trade association representing the interests of Ohio's underground and surface coal mining producers. The OCA represents nearly 40 coal producing companies and more than 50 Associate Members, which include suppliers and consultants to the mining industry, coal sales agents and brokers and allied industries. The Ohio Coal Association is committed to advancing the development and utilization of Ohio coal as an abundant, economic and environmentally sound energy source.

Neuhaus on the Election and Freedom of Religion

The following reflection by Father Richard Neuhaus is an excellent summation of why this election is pivotal and of such great concern to people of faith.

Why this Election is About the Freedom of Religion

By Richard John Neuhaus

One can argue that every presidential election is a “historic” election. But some are more historic than others. Daniel Henninger had a provocative column yesterday making a strong case that this one is a “tipping point” between America continuing as an entrepreneurial society or going the way of the European “social democracies.” He cites the late Senator Pat Moynihan who said the big difference between Europe and America is that the former gives priority to equality and the latter to liberty. I’m not sure that Henninger is right in saying there would be no turning back after four or eight years of President Obama and an overwhelmingly Democratic Congress imposing their passion for a government-directed program of redistribution and social coordination, but the future he depicts is both plausible and ominous.

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Spreading the Wealth Around

GOP Internal Polls (NJ, CA, MI, PA) Show Possible Landslide for McCain

Hat Tip to The Patriot Room blog for some astounding news that I pray is true. They and a number of other blogs are reporting on a discussion that was broadcast by the Quinn and Rose Show, a radio program on which GOP internal polling was discussed. The gist of the discussion is that an historic movement away from Barack Obama and to John McCain is underway. The audio file is very slow to download but well worth the wait. The link is here.

The polling is focused on 15 to 20 states. The polling shows "undecideds breaking for McCain by 4 to 1.

• New Jersey: McCain leads 48 to 43, with 7% undecided.
• Michigan: McCain leads 44 to 42, with 10% undecided.
• California: Obama leads 44 to 43, with 9/% undecided, 3% for Barr.
• Pennsylvania: McCain leads 55 to 33, with 10% undecided. In Pennsylvania Obama only leads among Democrats by 47 to 37, with 14% undecided.

The two reasons Democrats are citing for voting for McCain are because Obama is "cheating" and "attempting to buy the election."

If this proves to be true, it will be one of the greatest testaments to the goodness, wisdom and decency of the American people ever manifested in our history. Despite all the concerted efforts of the media and political elites, and the millions spent to move America to an agenda we have always rejected, Americans, in the quiet of their hearts, have seen what the Obama campaign is really about. Should we be shocked that even Democrats see their party's nominee as an American-hating liar, fraud and cheat, who will say or do anything to hide his core beliefs, his closest friends and associates, his radical, Marxist ideology, and his commitment to undermine the Constitution, the freedoms and institutions of our country?

If these extraordinary numbers are true, God has heard the fervent prayers of millions, and not the hate-filled injunction of Obama's pastor that America be damned.

Obama's Core: The West, For Him, Is Not The Best

From National Review
By Michael Knox Beran

LEON TROTSKY's The Russian Revolution does not occupy a high place in the literature of conservatism. But the old Bolshevik could on occasion be perceptive. Analyzing the improbable rise of Rasputin, he noted how frequently shamanism flourishes in the bowels of a decaying oligarchy, when the languishing elites crave the stimulus that only a certain kind of messianic figure can give. The commissar had a point. In the fourth Eclogue, Virgil beguiled the patricians of the collapsing Roman republic with a vision of a miraculous child who would inaugurate a golden age. Eighteen centuries later such charlatans as Mesmer and Cagliostro practiced their mystic arts in the salons of the ancien regime.

True to the morphology of exhausted elites, it is the privileged element in the American polity that has proved most susceptible to Barack Obama's appeal. Historians of the future, seeking to understand this enthusiasm, may well conclude that it was a kind of despair, the despair of those who, having lost their faith in the traditional remedial institutions of their culture, embraced a mirage.

T. S. Eliot put his finger on the problem when he compared the poetry of Dante to that of the modern age. Dante's poetry, Eliot said, stood for a "principle of order in the human soul, in society and in the universe." Eliot suggested that the old poetic culture of the West, with its emphasis on harmony, proportion, and order, brought coherence to the world and did much to reconcile men and women to the larger rhythms of life. The roots of this culture, Werner Jaeger showed in his classic study, Paideia, grew out of the Greek belief that poetry and music, together with rhythm and harmony, powerfully influence the mind and are therefore one of the bases of civilization. Fletcher of Saltoun expressed the Greek view when he said that "if a man were permitted to make all the ballads, he need not care who should make the laws of a nation."

Already in the 19th century, Nietzsche detected in Europe a "brutalization and decay of rhythm." Generalizations are over-simple, but the culture that has to a great extent replaced the old poetic culture values cacophony rather than harmony, brokenness rather than wholeness, and ungraceful forms of order rather than those grounded in poetic rhythm. The new culture--a significant force in education, popular entertainment and the arts, and modern architecture and town planning--has much less unifying power than the old culture; its perfection lies not in the organic whole but in the isolated fragment. Eliot, indeed, formed The Waste Land out of poetic fragments in part because he was attempting to render, in verse, the effect on the mind of the desolate and fragmented waste land he found modern life to be.

Whatever its merits, the new culture has failed to give people the tools they need to amalgamate disparate experience and perceive what the Greeks called the "wholeness of life." Dissatisfied and profoundly isolated, confined, in Tocqueville's image, "within the solitude of his own heart," the modern man, and in particular the modern man who comes from the well-to-do and predominantly agnostic classes, seeks consolation in the various and always inadequate intellectual and spiritual opiums on sale in the philosophical markets--Marxism, psychoanalysis, multiculturalism, Weatherman-style radicalism, the pharmaceutical eucharist of the anti-depressant tablet.

Obama is, if not quite the messiah of this new culture, certainly an artifact of it. He discovered early that what he calls his "story," that of a multi-racial prophet equally at home at Harvard and in the slums, struck the profoundest chords in desolate upper-caste hearts. Middle America, by contrast, has mixed feelings about the new culture. It has embraced television and adjusted to a new set of musical rhythms, but it remains suspicious of other elements of the modernist and progressive sensibility. Obama's healer-redeemer qualities, which find so warm a reception in the hearts of the elites, make Joe Six-Pack uneasy. Were it not for the coincidence of his candidacy with a stock-market panic, the Democratic nominee's campaign for the White House would almost certainly end in failure. But the stock market crashed, and as a result Obama is, at this writing, the front-runner.

The conservative case against Obama goes beyond both questions of policy and questions about his record and background. Obama is widely regarded, by his supporters, as a visionary statesman, yet nowhere in his rhetoric does he bring this visionary power to bear on the most pressing problem of the age, the vulnerability of the old culture of the West, which is the ultimate source of its freedoms.

The omission is disconcerting. Like Obama, I am a graduate of Columbia College. I arrived on the campus in the fall of 1984, a little more than a year after he took his degree. I understand that he almost never speaks of Columbia, and to do him justice, there was much that was grim in pre-Giuliani Morningside Heights. But Columbia nevertheless had (and still has) its Core Curriculum, a group of obligatory courses in literature, art, and music that force the student to come to terms with the miracle of Western civilization--with the Greeks, Virgil, Dante, and Shakespeare; with Montaigne, Locke, Hume, Smith, Marx, and Mill; with Bach and Beethoven and Mozart. Of course you don't take it all in at 18 or 19, but even so the Core is bound to be one of the memorable intellectual experiences of a thoughtful person's life.

Yet the Core seems to have made little impression on Barack Obama. Its themes find no echo in his reflection on politics, The Audacity of Hope. Thucydides, describing the plague at Athens, showed that the virtues which characterize Western civilization at its best--freedom, a sense of fair play, a consciousness of the dignity of human life--cannot be taken for granted. Obama is much less attentive to the fragility of the West's peculiar culture. In Berlin he spoke of tearing down the walls that separate Western nations from the rest of the world: "People of the world--this is our moment. This is our time.... There is no challenge too great for a world that stands as one.... The walls between the countries with the most and those with the least cannot stand." This wall-wrecking sentiment is in some ways admirable, but those with a heritage as unique as ours can consent to such a demolition only if we are certain that the culture that has made us what we are will afterwards be safe.

Barack Obama is not the right leader to preside over this moment of crisis in the West, when the old civilization is dying in Europe and has lost its hold on the greater part of this country's ruling classes. John McCain is the better choice: His experience has given him a keener sense of history and of the world. Some people are skilled in talking about the defense of freedom and civilization; McCain has actually defended them. He is not so stirring an orator as the senator from Illinois. But he has only to walk into the room, and his presence sounds the theme.

Mr. Beran is a contributing editor of City Journal. His most recent book is Forge of Empires 1861-1871.

Bishop Compares Election To Battle of Lepanto

From Catholic World News

Bishop Robert W. Finn of Kansas City-St. Joseph compared the upcoming presidential election to the Battle of Lepanto, in which Christian forces against overwhelming odds defeated Ottoman Turkish invaders bent on the conquest of Europe. ‘Together with the other Bishops of Missouri I am calling on all the faithful to make this last week before the election a week of prayer for our nation-- a week of prayer for the protection of Human Life,’ Bishop Finn wrote in an October 24 diocesan newspaper column. ‘Join me in calling upon Mary in this month of the rosary. In In 1571, in the midst of the Battle of Lepanto, when the future of Christian Europe was in the balance and the odds against them were overwhelming, prayer to Our Lady of the Rosary brought the decisive victory. We ask her now to watch over our country and bring us the victory of life.’

‘Our Catholic moral principles teach that a candidate’s promise of economic prosperity is insufficient to justify their constant support of abortion laws, including partial-birth abortion, and infanticide for born-alive infants,’ Bishop Finn noted. ‘Promotion of the Freedom of Choice Act is a pledge to eliminate every single limit on abortions achieved over the last thirty-five years … I ask you to join me in invoking the Guardian Angels of 47 million babies lost through abortion in our country in the last thirty-five years. This horrendous loss of life remains one of the greatest threats to human civilization we have ever faced.’

Source(s): these links will take you to other sites, in a new window.

• Bishop Finn: Week of Prayer for Our Country (Catholic Key)

America's First Far-Left Radical President?

By Melanie Phillips

With all eyes glued to the collapse of global capitalism as we know it, attention has been somewhat distracted from the race to lead what still remains the most powerful nation on earth — the United States. We ignore it at our peril.

From the shockingly partisan presentation by the pro-Obama media on both sides of the Atlantic, you’d think this was a contest between twin pillars of rectitude and inspirational high seriousness on the Democratic side, and a joke Republican ticket consisting of an erratic old man and a brainless, wacko, gun-toting beauty queen, who in a fit of madness John McCain picked as his vice-presidential candidate.

Unfortunately for the Democrats, the beauty queen in question, Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska, has struck an enormous chord with Middle America. As a result, Barack Obama’s media supporters are making a huge effort to destroy her.

Now the Left thinks it has shot its moose. It has been crowing that an inquiry by Alaska’s legislature has found Palin abused her office by firing Alaska’s Commissioner of Public Safety for refusing to fire in turn Palin’s former brother-in-law, Trooper Michael Wooten.

This really is a case of half-baked Alaska. First, the inquiry’s conclusions were ambiguous. It found that Palin had violated public trust through using official action for personal interest; but it also said the firing was a proper and lawful exercise of her authority, and that personal interest had only been a contributory factor in the Commissioner’s firing.

And just what was that personal interest? Palin wanted a state Trooper fired because he had assaulted his 11-year-old stepson with a stun gun, been caught drinking alcohol in his patrol car, and the Palins say was threatening to kill a member of their family.

Certainly, there was a conflict of interest because Wooten was the Governor’s sister’s ex-husband. But shouldn’t the real question be why such a man was not fired?

What is really astounding, however, is the hue and cry over this non-event in Alaska while a raft of disturbing evidence about Senator Obama’s connections is being either glossed over or not reported at all.

This may come as a shock to most people, but Obama is at the centre of a network of radical associations which he has tried to conceal.

Take for example his relationship with William Ayers, founder of the terrorist Weather Underground which bombed federal buildings in the 1960s and who has consistently maintained his radical views ever since.

Obama’s own political career was actually launched in Ayers’s Chicago house at a fundraising-event in 1995 which fired the starting gun for his run at the Illinois Senate.

Not only that, Obama and Ayers both sat on the boards of two organisations, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge and the Woods Fund. These organisations put into practice Ayers’s revolutionary ideology by channelling money supposed to fund regular educational projects into extreme radical groups instead.

Obama now says he didn’t know of Ayers’s terrorist past and never endorsed his views, simply working with him on an educational project. But it defies belief he didn’t know about Ayers, who was notorious in Chicago. In 2001, indeed, Ayers told a magazine: ‘I don’t regret setting bombs. I feel we didn’t do enough.’

The crucial point was that this educational project was itself a vehicle for subversion; in the view of Ayers, its driving force, education was ‘the motor-force of revolution’. Moreover, Obama wrote a rave review about Ayers’ book on criminal justice, which compared America to South Africa under apartheid.

Through the Woods Fund, Obama also funnelled millions of dollars to the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN). Described by an academic sympathiser as ‘a uniquely militant organisation’, ACORN played a significant role in the sub-prime scandal - which detonated America’s financial crisis — by physically intimidating banks into lowering credit standards for poor and minority customers.

The Obama campaign has paid an ACORN subsidiary $800,000 to register new voters. But now, numerous states are launching investigations into massive voter fraud being carried out by ACORN activists who are being caught falsifying voter registration cards, registering fictitious individuals and hounding voters to register multiple times.

But Obama’s connections with ACORN go even deeper. Even though his campaign has denied this, for several years running he trained its activists and in 1992 even ran one of its voter registration projects.

Such radical links fit with other highly dubious associations Obama has made. We all know that, under pressure, he distanced himself from his longstanding mentor Pastor Wright, who infamously coined the phrase ‘God damn America!’

But Obama never distanced himself from the anti-white teachings of his church, which was heavily influenced by the philosophy of the black racist James Cone who claimed that ‘whiteness is the symbol of the antichrist’.

And after the controversy over Wright, Obama has become close to another preacher, Jim Wallis, who spews out the same anti-American message — once calling the U.S. ‘the great power, the great seducer, the great captor and destroyer of human life’.

That’s not all. ACORN is heavily involved with a Marxist group called the Chicago New Party, whose strategy is to force the Democratic Party to the far Left by infiltrating it and ‘ burrowing from within’. In 1996, the New Party exulted that one of its members who had just been successful in the political primary season was — Barack Obama.

Whenever any of this surfaces, the Left tries to suppress it by screaming ‘guilt by association’. Not so. This is guilt by participation.

The left cries ’smear’ and ‘racism’. On the contrary — if Obama wasn’t a black Democrat, with this history his candidacy would have been toast before it got started.

Just consider if the boot had been on the other foot and McCain’s political career had been launched by an abortion clinic bomber, his mentor for 20 years had been a Ku Klux Klansman, and he had paid nearly a million dollars to far-right militias who strong-armed voters into fraudulent registrations.

Of course, there is no suggestion that Obama supports terrorism or intimidation. But the question is whether through expediency or ideological sympathy or a combination of the two, he has allowed himself to be associated with thinking that threatens the basic values of America and Western society.

This may sound too incredible for words. But what’s really incredible is that, with dozens of reporters feverishly combing Alaska for any evidence to tarnish Sarah Palin, the mainstream media has largely refused to investigate any of this.

What’s really incredible is that a man with such a background in anti-Western thinking can now stand on the verge of becoming the leader of the free world.

Please don’t get me wrong. I am not a particular fan of John McCain. I think he is indeed erratic, and has run a lousy campaign. And the exhausted Republicans deserve to lose. But the prospect of Obama in the White House as America’s first far-Left radical president is deeply worrying.

It would be a crowning triumph for the anti-Western ideology which has wrought such havoc on both sides of the Atlantic.

The reason Sarah Palin has struck such a chord is that Middle America sees her as the first candidate in its lifetime who stands against that destructive nihilism. That’s why she is the key target for Western radicals who are now poised to gain the biggest prize of all.

Melanie Phillips is a columnist for the Daily Mail in London and author of Londonistan.

Obama & DNC Admit All Allegations of Federal Court Lawsuit - Obama’s “Not” Qualified to be President

Obama Should Immediately Withdraw his Candidacy for President

For Immediate Release: - 10/21/08 - Complete contact details and pdfs of this press release and motions filed by plaintiff Berg today are at the end of this article

(Lafayette Hill, Pennsylvania – 10/21/08) - Philip J. Berg, Esquire, the Attorney who filed suit against Barack H. Obama challenging Senator Obama’s lack of “qualifications” to serve as President of the United States, announced today that Obama and tbe DNC “ADMITTED”, by way of failure to timely respond to Requests for Admissions, all of the numerous specific requests in the Federal lawsuit. Obama is “NOT QUALIFIED” to be President and therefore Obama must immediately withdraw his candidacy for President and the DNC shall substitute a qualified candidate. The case is Berg v. Obama, No. 08-cv-04083.

Berg stated that he filed Requests for Admissions on September 15, 2008 with a response by way of answer or objection had to be served within thirty [30] days. No response to the Requests for Admissions was served by way of response or objection. Thus, all of the Admissions directed to Obama and the DNC are deemed “ADMITTED.” Therefore, Obama must immediately withdraw his candidacy for President.

OBAMA - Admitted:

1. I was born in Kenya.

2. I am a Kenya “natural born” citizen. 3. My foreign birth was registered in the State of Hawaii.

4. My father, Barrack Hussein Obama, Sr. admitted Paternity of me. 5. My mother gave birth to me in Mombosa, Kenya.

6. My mother’s maiden name is Stanley Ann Dunham a/k/a Ann Dunham. 7. The COLB [Certification of Live Birth] posted on the website “Fightthesmears.com” is a forgery.

8. I was adopted by a Foreign Citizen. 9. I was adopted by Lolo Soetoro, M.A. a citizen of Indonesia.

10. I was not born in Hawaii. 11. I was not born at the Queens Medical Center in Hawaii.

12. I was not born at Kapi’olani Medical Center for Women and Children in Hawaii. 13. I was not born in a Hospital in Hawaii.

14. I am a citizen of Indonesia. 15. I never took the “Oath of Allegiance” to regain my U.S. Citizenship status.

16. I am not a “natural born” United States citizen. 17. My date of birth is August 4, 1961.

18. I traveled to Pakistan in 1981 with my Pakistan friends. 19. In 1981, I went to Indonesia on my way to Pakistan.

20. Pakistan was a no travel zone in 1981 for American Citizens. 21. In 1981, Pakistan was not allowing American Citizens to enter their country.

22. I traveled on my Indonesian Passport to Pakistan. 23. I renewed my Indonesian Passport on my way to Pakistan.

24. My senior campaign staff is aware I am not a “natural born” United States Citizen. 25. I am proud of my Kenya Heritage.

26. My relatives have requested changes to the portion of my birth certificate that identifies my first name. 27. My relatives have requested changes to the portion of my birth certificate that identifies my last name.

28. My relatives have requested changes to the portion of my birth certificate that identifies my place of birth. 29. I requested changes to the portion of my birth certificate that identifies my first name.

30. I requested changes to the portion of my birth certificate that identifies my last name. 31. I requested changes to the portion of my birth certificate that identifies my place of birth.

32. The document identified as my Indonesian School record from Fransiskus Assisi School in Jakarta, Indonesia is genuine. 33. I went to a Judge in Hawaii to have my name changed.

34. I went to a Senator and/or Congressman or other public official in Hawaii to have my name changed. 35. I had a passport issued to me from the Government of Indonesia.

36. The United States Constitution does not allow for a Person to hold the office of President of the United States unless that person is a “natural born” United States citizen. 37. I am ineligible pursuant to the United States Constitution to serve as President and/or Vice President of the United States.

38. I never renounced my citizenship as it relates to my citizenship to the country of Indonesia.39. I never renounced my citizenship as it relates to my citizenship to the country of Kenya.

40. I am an Attorney who specializes in Constitutional Law. 41. Kenya was a part of the British Colonies at the time of my birth.

42. Kenya did not become its own Republic until 1963.43. I am not a “Naturalized” United States Citizen.

44. I obtained $200 Million dollars in campaign funds by fraudulent means. 45. I cannot produce a “vault” (original) long version of a birth certificate showing my birth in Hawaii.

46. My “vault” (original) long version birth certificate shows my birth in Kenya.47. The only times I was to a Hospital in Hawaii was for check-ups or medical treatments for illnesses.

48. Queens Medical Center in Honolulu, Hawaii does not have any record of my mother, Stanley Ann Dunham (Obama) giving birth to me.49. Kapi’olani Medical Center for Women and Children in Honolulu, Hawaii does not have any record of my mother, Stanley Ann Dunham (Obama) giving birth to me.

50. I was born in the Coast Province Hospital in Mombasa, Kenya. 51. I represented on my State Bar application in Illinois that I never used any other name other than Barack Hussein Obama.

52. I went by the name Barry Soetoro in Indonesia. 53. My Indonesian school records are under the name of Barry Soetoro.

54. I took an Oath to uphold the United States Constitution when admitted to the State Bar of Illinois to practice Law. 55. I took an Oath to uphold the United States Constitution when I was Sworn into my United States Senate Office.

56. I hold dual citizenship with at least one other Country besides the United States of America.

DNC - Admitted:

1. The DNC nominated Barrack Hussein Obama as the Democratic Nominee for President.

2. The DNC has not vetted Barrack Hussein Obama. 3. The DNC did not have a background check performed on Barrack Hussein Obama.

4.The DNC did not verify Barrack Hussein Obama’s eligibility to serve as President of the United States. 5. The DNC admits Barrack Hussein Obama was born in Kenya.

6. The DNC admits Barrack Hussein Obama is not a “natural born” United States citizen.7. The DNC admits Barrack Hussein Obama was not born in Hawaii.

8.The DNC admits they have not inquired into Barrack Hussein Obama’s citizenship status.
9. The DNC admits they have a duty to properly vette the Democratic Nominee for President.

10.The DNC admits Lolo Soetoro, M.A., an Indonesian citizen adopted Barrack Hussein Obama.
11. The DNC admits the Credentials Committee has been aware of this lawsuit since August 22, 2008 as the lawsuit was faxed to our Washington D.C. Office on August 22, 2008.

12. The DNC admits their Credentials Committee failed to verify and/or inquire into the credentials of Barack Hussein Obama to serve as the President of the United States. 13. The DNC admits their Credential Committee’s Report failed to address the issues of Barack Hussein Obama’s ineligibility to serve as President of the United States.

14.The DNC admits Howard Dean, Chair Person has and had knowledge Barack Hussein Obama was born in Kenya and ineligible to serve as the President of the United States. 15. The DNC admits Plaintiff and all Democratic citizens of the United States have been personally injured as a result of not having a qualified Democratic Presidential Nominee to cast their votes upon.

16. The DNC admits Plaintiff and all citizens of the United States have a Constitutional Right to vote for the President of the United States and to have two (2) qualified candidates of which to choose from. 17. The DNC admits Plaintiff and all citizens of the United States have a Constitutional right to have a properly vetted Democratic Presidential Nominee of which to cast their vote.

18. The DNC admits an FBI background check is not performed on the Presidential or Vice Presidential Candidates. 19. The DNC admits the United States Constitution does not allow for a Person to hold the office of President of the United States unless that person is a “natural born” United States citizen.

20. The DNC admits they collected donations on behalf of Barack Hussein Obama for his Presidential campaign.21. The DNC admits Plaintiff and Democratic citizens donated money based on false representations that Barack Hussein Obama was qualified to serve as the President of the United States.

22. The DNC admits if Barack Hussein Obama is elected as President and allowed to serve as President of the United States in violation of our Constitution, it will create a Constitutional crisis.23. The DNC admits Barack Hussein Obama took an Oath to uphold the United States Constitution.

24. The DNC admits allowing a person who is not a “natural born” citizen to serve as President of the United States violates Plaintiff’s rights to due process of law in violation of the United States Constitution.25. The DNC admits allowing a person who is not a “natural born” citizen to serve as President of the United States violates Plaintiff’s rights to Equal Protection of the laws in violation of the United States Constitution.

26. The DNC admits the function of the DNC is to secure a Democratic Presidential Candidate who will protect Democratic citizen’s interests, fight for their equal opportunities and fight for justice for all Americans. 27. The DNC admits the Democratic National Committee has been promoting Barack Hussein Obama’s Presidential election knowing he was ineligible to serve as President of the United States.

Our website obamacrimes.com now has 50.7 + million hits. We are urging all to spread the word of our website – and forward to your local newspapers, radio and TV stations. Berg again stressed his position regarding the urgency of this case as, “we” the people, are heading to a “Constitutional Crisis” if this case is not resolved forthwith.

Philip J. Berg, Esquire
555 Andorra Glen Court, Suite 12
Lafayette Hill, PA 19444-2531
Cell (610) 662-3005
(610) 825-3134
(800) 993-PHIL [7445]
Fax (610) 834-7659

A Cuban-American Writes to the Richmond Times-Dispatch

McCain Owns the Evening at Al Smith Dinner