Barack Obama | 24Ahead

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Obama campaign manager tweets "chimichanga" and GOP outraged: what they won't mention - 02/15/12

... worthless controversy involves Barack Obama's campaign manager Jim Messina tweeting a comment about chimichangas. No, really. But, it's not entirely worthless: I'll tell you below some of the things you won't hear from either side. In case you haven't been following along, see [1] for a recap. Some notes: 1. There's nothing offensive about Milbank's comment or Messina's tweet of it that I can...

AttackWatch misleads about Obama's immigration amnesty (Adam Serwer, Politifact) - 09/14/11

... rumors and supposed lies about Barack Obama. Rather than laughing, I'll briefly discuss Attack Watch itself trying to mislead people about Obama's mini-amnesty for up to 300,000 illegal aliens. Under "Immigration Reform Inaccuracies" AttackWatch claims "Republican media figures have accused President Obama of refusing to deport hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants" (attackwatch.com/...

Obama, Fake 'n' Folksy: Weekly Address verbage hardly matches his policy - 08/20/11

... restaurants with America's Betters, Barack Obama's speech writing team wrote his Weekly Address (link) which he read. He was probably gritting his teeth as he read this: Hello from the Country Corner Farm in Alpha, Illinois! For the past few days, I've been traveling to small towns and farm towns here in the heartland of this country. I sat down with small business owners in Gutenberg, Iowa; and...

Jack Dorsey of Twitter asks Obama very weak questions (AskObama, Will Wilkinson, Steven Norton, Kara McGuire, Dorrine Mendoza, Raman Chadha, Karl Smith, Kim Quillen, Drew Cline) - 07/06/11

... the "AskObama" interview with Barack Obama in which - instead of doing a public service and holding Obama accountable - Dorsey simply promoted his company and asked Obama a series of very weak questions. A reporter from the mainstream media - which has likewise failed to ask Obama any questions that are even slightly challenging - said "this was an almost entirely news-less affair" [1]. The very...

AskObama on Twitter, July 6, 2011: how to make it effective - 06/30/11

... was a sham.] On July 6, 2011, Barack Obama will be answering questions sent to him via Twitter [1]. All past instances where Obama has been asked questions have been almost completely worthless shams that haven't held him accountable. This page presents a plan that - if I can get enough help - will finally hold him accountable and might force him to offer policies that are better for the U.S....

Obama zings Trump, millions of Americans at White House Correspondents Dinner - 05/01/11

Barack Obama spoke at the White House Correspondents Dinner last night and joked about Donald Trump and smeared millions of Americans who have valid questions about Obama's past. None of what Obama did was presidential, but it's what most of his supporters want and his detractors are generally unable to do anything about it. Note that even the New York Times had questions about Obama's background...

Obama gets angry (in ineffective interview featuring weak questions) - 04/19/11

Barack Obama recently spoke with Brad Watson of WFAA in an interview (link, video below) that was sold by Matt Drudge and others as some sort of watershed moment ("FIRST TIME: REPORTER TURNS AGGRESSIVE WITH OBAMA" was his headline). Certainly, almost all reporters have treated Obama extremely reverentially and from that perspective the interview is markedly different. However, the interview was...

Obama admits problems caused by mass immigration; panders to illegal aliens; takes foreign citizens' side; opposes non-criminal deportations - 03/29/11

Barack Obama spoke at Bell Multicultural High School in Washington DC yesterday at a townhall conducted in Spanish for the Univision network. The host was anchor Jorge Ramos, a U.S. resident who's a Mexican citizen, a Mexican partisan, and a strong supporter of illegal immigration. And, of course, Obama was mostly aligned with him. After admitting the major problems caused by massive immigration...

Obama plays race card on Tea Party and whites in general; "subterranean agenda"; Teaparty interferes with proper response - 03/03/11

According to the book "Family of Freedom: Presidents and African Americans in the White House" (link) by Kenneth Walsh of US News: But Obama, in his most candid moments, acknowledged that race was still a problem. In May 2010, he told guests at a private White House dinner that race was probably a key component in the rising opposition to his presidency from conservatives, especially right-wing...

U.S. and Canada create a "Shared Vision for Perimeter Security". What's next? - 02/10/11

... agreement is here. Excerpts from the Barack Obama Executive Order are at [1]. A leaked memo about propagandizing the announcement is at [2]. Note that Obama is simply continuing what George W Bush started with the "Security and Prosperity Partnership" (formerly at spp.gov). In fact - while you never heard about it from rightwing bloggers and pundits - Obama indicated his interest in continuing...

AskObama: did Steve Grove choose an unpopular immigration question because of Voto Latino? - 01/28/11

... Grove of Youtube interviewed Barack Obama with a series of questions that users had submitted through the "Ask Obama" event. The Youtube interview was a scam; see that link for the details and the backstory. To further drive home just how much of a scam it was, Grove appears to have undercut the implied rules of the competition by choosing an unpopular video as the only question about...

Another Youtube/Obama scam: ask State of the Union questions - 01/26/11

... and see this too] Youtube and Barack Obama are conducting yet another scam, soliciting questions for Obama based on the State of the Union that he'll answer on Thursday, January 27. Other users vote up or down submitted questions, and then Obama will answer the top vote-getters. The questions that get the most votes will invariably not be the best questions, the ones that Obama should be pressed...

Glenn Beck urges donations to illegal immigration-supporting U.S. Chamber of Commerce - 10/14/10

... leveled by both ThinkProgress and Barack Obama that the Chamber is soliciting foreign money (true) and then using that to influence the political process inside the U.S. (so far undetermined). Beck could have pointed out how he thinks ThinkProgress et al are wrong and kept it at that. Instead, he's encouraging his fans to donate to a group that could care less about them. And, in yet another...

Obama flames reconquista at Hispanic Caucus, gets history, Declaration of Independence wrong - 09/19/10

... here and almost nowhere else, Barack Obama flamed reconquista sentiments. Speaking at a Congressional Hispanic Caucus event recently he did it again. He also got history wrong and left "by their Creator" out of the Declaration of Independence. On the video at peekURL.com/vrbi8hy Obama says: ...long before America was even an idea, this land of plenty was home to many peoples. From British to...

Obama devastates GOP "arguments" live on TV (House Republican retreat) - 01/30/10

Barack Obama appeared at a nationally-televised House Republican retreat in Baltimore yesterday at which several leading Republicans asked him questions which he then handled with ease. He "p0wned" them so badly that Fox News cut away from the coverage twenty minutes before it ended. What the House members asked were weak, open-ended question or simply requests. They weren't adversarial questions...

SOTU 2010: Barack Obama State of the Union open thread - 01/27/10

Some light coverage of Barack Obama's 2010 State of the Union will commence shortly. However, feel free to leave comments about the speech in comments. A few largely worthless excerpts are here; expect the rest to be along those lines. He'll apparently be concentrating on healthcare and jobs. For the first, see our past coverage in Obama healthcare. For the second, note that the number of jobs...

FightTheSmears is offline for an unknown reason - 07/09/09

... picture of what is supposedly Barack Obama's COLB as well as the home of at least a couple of lies - is currently offline. The last homepage in Google's cache was from July 7, so it's not clear whether this is just a temporary issue or something permanent. A look through the same cache shows that they were hacked by spammers and those pages were there in May to the end of June, so that might...

Tom Brokaw, Wesley Clark, Tom Daschle, Obama sister, Sidwell Friends board member, others on White House Fellowships Commission - 06/17/09

... and include: * Maya Soetoro-Ng, Barack Obama's sister * Tom Brokaw * Wesley Clark * Tom Daschle (he's back!) * Deborah Harmon ("Since 2002, Ms. Harmon has served on the Board of Trustees for Sidwell Friends School (SFS) in Washington, DC, and is Chairperson of Sidwell’s Investment Committee." Sidwell is where the Obama daughters attend school). * Peter Henry (member of the Council on Foreign...

Obama, ADL, SPLC, Phil Gordon, Catherine Herridge, Shep Smith, Joan Walsh, Chris Matthews, others try to exploit shooting at Holocaust Museum - 06/11/09

... to score political points: * Barack Obama says: "This outrageous act reminds us that we must remain vigilant against anti-Semitism and prejudice in all its forms". That sounds good, until one remembers things like Rev. Jeremiah Wright, "bitter cling", his campaign's constant attempts to race-bait, his smears of Lou Dobbs and Rush Limbaugh, and how he'd deal with "hate" (see #14). * Josh Gerstein...

Obama administration briefs Bilderberg group on foreign and economic policy - 05/26/09

... "myths" in order to assist the Barack Obama campaign - offers "Obama officials gave Bilderberg briefings" (politico.com/news/stories/0509/22957.html): A handful of high-ranking Obama administration officials this month delivered private briefings at the annual invitation-only conference held by an elite international organization known as the Bilderberg group. The closed meeting of some of the...

Obama Notre Dame commencement speech: live video - 05/17/09

Discuss the commencement speech by Barack Obama at Notre Dame University. UPDATE: If that doesn't work, go here. Also, ND president Rev. John Jenkins seems to be the root of the problem. In his introduction he said, among many other things, that Obama wanted to make immigration more humane; the opposite is true. At the start of Obama's speech, some are booing and one person was just re-seated by...

Obama admin deports two illegal aliens, but only because they tried to tour the White House - 05/14/09

According to the Associated Press (link): Two people facing deportation from the United States have been taken into custody at the White House gate. They had arrived for a tour of the executive mansion... The pair was part of an adult education program, and a routine background check showed they had an outstanding immigration order against them.

Pro-freedom cartoon predicted Obama and Democratic Party... fifty years ago - 05/08/09

... recently and as a response to Barack Obama and the current state of the Democratic Party. Now, certainly, they don't want state control over all factories and farms, but it's not like that's a foreign concept to the administration and some of their policy advisors. While some of the video needs some serious caveats, the Democratic Party seems to have used "ISM" as a blueprint: When anybody...

Live coverage Obama press conference April 29, 2009 - 04/29/09

[UPDATE BELOW] Asked very weak question by Jennifer Loven of the Associated Press whether he will close the border with Mexico in regards to the swine flu. He's giving a two minute answer that boils down to what anyone should have expected he would say: no. She also asked whether he'll be ordering quarantines and he didn't answer that. Now he's engaging in what he refers to as "trivial" advice to...

Obama baits tea party protesters; will they be able to figure out what he's doing? (no) - 04/29/09

Earlier today, Barack Obama spoke in St Louis and said among other things: You see folks waving tea bags around -- let me just remind them I am happy to have a serious conversation about how we are going to cut our health care cuts over the long term, how we are gong to stabilize social security. Lets not play games. There's a very strong possibility that Obama wants to keep the tea party magic...

John Nichols /The Nation pushes bogus flu pandemic preparedness issue; distraction from Obama admin, Dem failures - 04/27/09

John Nichols of The Nation offers "GOP Know-Nothings Fought Pandemic Preparedness" (link). Sens. Arlen Spector and Susan Collins fought the addition of around $900 million for flu pandemic preparedness to the stimulus plan. Now, Nichols is disreputably trying to tie that into the current possible flu crisis, and he's getting some help from his friends (link). Yet, the issue is bogus for various...

Obama's first 100 days: immigration, stimulus plan, Cabinet nominees, and more - 04/26/09

... past wondrous 100 days of the Barack Obama administration kicked off on a high note, as the benediction at his inauguration implied that all white people are racists and all non-whites are oppressed. That was just offensive; most of what's followed has serious to very serious long-term consequences. His nominations for various posts are covered in the Obama cabinet entries. See especially Janet...

Obama names Pope-basher to White House Faith advisory council (Harry Knox) - 04/07/09

Barack Obama has named Harry Knox of the Human Rights Campaign to the White House's Advisory Council on Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships. From this: [L]ast month, [Knox] described Pope Benedict XVI and certain Catholic bishops as “discredited leaders” because of their opposition to same-sex marriage... Knox also criticized the Catholic Knights of Columbus as being “foot soldiers of a...

Is the TOTUS preparing for a coup d'etat? - 04/04/09

Is the TOTUS trying to make Barack Obama look bad? Or, is it even worse than that and the TOTUS is trying to undercut the Obama administration as part of a dastardly plan for a coup d'etat that would see Obamabots replaced by bots loyal to the TOTUS? I'll let you decide. 1/9/12 UPDATE: The account with the video that was here (Youtube ID j3zft6_mZjs) was terminated. I replaced it with MSNBC...

Some questioners at Obama town hall were plants (SEIU, donors, etc.) - 03/27/09

At yesterday's Barack Obama town hall meeting, some of those who asked questions live at the event - as distinguished from those who submitted questions online - were plants with connections to the White House or other Beltway establishments. Garance Franke Ruta of the Washington Post says: the five fully identified questioners called on randomly by the president in the East Room were anything...

Sat. 3/21/09: Obama organizing petition signing drives for his stimulus plan (door-to-door, at malls, etc.) - 03/20/09

... for America - the successor to Barack Obama's campaign organization - is organizing a "Pledge Project Canvass", where the president's supporters will go door-to-door asking people to sign a pledge in support of the stimulus plan. They'll also be stationed at malls, stores and other places with large numbers of people. The training video is attached, and the pledge itself is deceptively simple...

Obama get $500,000 children's book deal just before taking office - 03/18/09

On January 15, Barack Obama signed off on an advance for a children's version of his "Dreams From My Father" book. That was less than a week before he took the oath of office: link. Analysts say there don't appear to be any rules that would bar such transactions after a president takes office, but it's unclear whether an incoming or sitting president has ever signed a book deal upon entering the...

Obama thanks Canadians "who came over the border to campaign for me during the election" - 02/19/09

... Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Barack Obama just said this: "I want to also, by the way, thank some of the Canadians who came over the border to campaign for me during the election... It was much appreciated." If anyone has accounts of Canadians campaigning for our new, supposed U.S. president please leave a comment. And, note that the Obama campaign was helped by a large number of sockpuppets,...

Payback: union labor might be requirement on federal construction projects (example: the stimulus bill) - 02/07/09

On Friday, Barack Obama signed an Executive Order [1] that contains this: ...it is the policy of the Federal Government to encourage executive agencies to consider requiring the use of project labor agreements in connection with large-scale construction projects in order to promote economy and efficiency in Federal procurement. "Project labor agreements" mean the exclusive use of union labor, as...

Assignment: document Obama, FEMA, MSM response to ice storms in Kentucky - 02/02/09

... others. And, find out whether Barack Obama has paid as much attention to this issue as he would have had it occurred in a state that voted for him. First, on January 29, he signed an emergency declaration: whitehouse.gov/president-obama-declares-emergencies-in-arkansas-and-kentucky Has he spoken about this since then? Second, see the sycophantic report from CNN here called "KY Governor: Obama...

January 20 is now the "National Day of Renewal and Reconciliation" - 01/20/09

... of his first acts, president Barack Obama has issued a proclamation on Whitehouse dot gov proclaiming that January 20 is our new "National Day of Renewal and Reconciliation". Unfortunately, what exactly that means isn't explained, although the presumed subtext doesn't sound too good at all. The page whitehouse.gov/blog/a_national_day_of_renewal_and_reconciliation quotes Abraham Lincoln and then...

Obama's Organizing for America: a corps of supporters answerable only to him? Fight disasters and political enemies? (CNSF) - 01/17/09

The Barack Obama movement is about to get even creepier, with his announcement of "Organizing for America" ("OFA"), part of "Barack Obama 2.0", the continuation of his campaign even after he's been elected president. From this: "As President, I will need the help of all Americans to meet the challenges that lie ahead," Obama said in a video message e-mailed to supporters (and reporters) this...

The "Citizen's Briefing Book", the latest Barack Obama scam - 01/16/09

The latest scam from the Barack Obama camp is a "Citizen's Briefing Book" at change dot gov: citizensbriefingbook.change.gov It allows the citizens to submit policy ideas in one of several categories, and then others vote up or down those ideas. The categories are mostly the same as those featured in their highly similar Open for Questions. Like Open for Questions, the current effort is designed...

Obama releases official portrait: first taken with digital camera. Obama fan reveals ignorance. - 01/14/09

... out, so I'll just point out that Barack Obama's official portrait has been released, and it's the first to be taken with a digital camera: change.gov/page/-/officialportrait.jpg That's not really noteworthy in itself, but in case you want to continue to be amazed at just how ignorant Obama's fans are, the post by "SilentPatriot" from which I learned this momentous news (crooksandliars.com/...

Obama dines with illegal immigration-supporting conservatives David Brooks and ? - 01/13/09

Earlier tonight, Barack Obama went to George Will's house in Chevy Chase, Maryland for a no doubt jovial evening with a few (or more) conservative pundits. Will may or may not have been there, but three known attendees were Fred Barnes (see the update), William Kristol, David Brooks, and Charles Krauthammer (link). FWIW, the Huffington Post assures us that Rush Limbaugh was not there. We have (...