Looking Deeper Into Benghazi Emails

In the immediate aftermath of the 2012 attack on the consulate in Benghazi, Libya, the White House quickly jumped from questions about the cause of the attack to blaming the incendiary YouTube video promoted by Florida pastor Terry Jones.

Last May, a set of emails was leaked by opponents of President Obama outlining the development of the talking points then-UN Ambassador Susan Rice used in a series of television appearances following the September 11, 2012 attack. The White House then released a more complete set of messages, effectively neutralizing critique of how the talking points were created.

New documents, obtained by the conservative group Judicial Watch by a Freedom of Information Act request, include a different set of talking points created by Obama advisor Ben Rhodes and sent to administration officials including spokesman Jay Carney. At the top, it outlines four goals:

1. To convey the USA is doing everything that we can to protect people and facilities abroad;
2. To underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, and not a broader failure of policy;
3. To show that we will be resolute in bringing people who harm Americans to justice, and standing steadfast through these protests;
4. To reinforce the President's and Administration's strength and steadfastness in dealing with difficult challenges.

I've highlighted the most important point: number 2 - Rhodes' assertion that the protests "are rooted in an Internet video."

At the time this email was sent — about 8 p.m. on Friday, September 14 — a separate set of emails was bounding back-and-forth between the CIA, the FBI, the State Department, and the White House. Those emails, the ones that were the subject of the discussion last May, offer a much different and much more reserved description of what prompted the attack. An email sent from the CIA to the White House at about 5 p.m. included this language:

The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the US Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the US Consulate and subsequently its annex. … On 10 September we warned of social media reports calling for a demonstration in front of the Embassy and that jihadists were threatening to break into the Embassy.

Over the next night, much of those specifics were stripped out by CIA director Michael Morell. But when Rhodes sent his proposed talking points, the nuance of "currently available information" was lost.

The new documents also include an email sent from a staffer for Rice to a group of employees in her office. It walks through a conversation the State Department's Victoria Nuland held on background with members of the press on the Wednesday after the attacks. In that conversation, Nuland was similarly vague. "Toria said that she couldn't speak to the identity of the perpetrators but that it was clearly a complex attack," the email reads. When Nuland was asked if the attack was linked to the video disparaging the Prophet Muhammed, "she said she could not confirm a connect as we simply don't know — and we won't know until there's an investigation."

What Rhodes was apparently advocating was to eliminate that nuance. And when Rice appeared on Fox News that Sunday with Chris Wallace, she was asked to respond to a statement made by Carney.

CARNEY (on video): This is not a case of protests directed at the United States writ large or at U.S. policy. This is in response to a video that is offensive.WALLACE: You don't really believe that?
RICE: Chris, absolutely I believe that. In fact, it is the case. We had the evolution of the Arab spring over the last many months. But what sparked the recent violence was the airing on the Internet of a very hateful very offensive video that has offended many people around the world.

One point of critique on the Benghazi affair has long been that the White House wanted to play up the role of the YouTube video in order to deflect critique of their policies. It's not clear if Rhodes had information about the attack (or believed he had information about the attack) that isn't reflected in the documents, but it seems clear that he overstepped the caution that was exhibited by other members of the administration — perhaps leading to Rice's strong and much-derided assertion that the attack was in response to the video. It was his job to protect the White House, but it's likely that this argument has caused much more trouble for Obama than it prevented.

 On September 27,2012,  the key actors in the White House's response team passed around a news article from FoxNews.com which indicated that the administration knew by September 12 that the video didn't play a role. All of the discussion about that article was redacted.

View photo

Documents Tie White House to Benghazi

Hat tip to The Japan Times Herald

From:

The Washington Post

AP, AFP, and UPI

As the result of a Freedom of Information Act battle waged by the conservative group Judicial Watch, new documents have emerged tying the messaging of the Sept. 11, 2012 attack in Benghazi, Libya, to the White House. Judicial Watch reports:

[The documents] include a newly declassified e-mail showing then-White House Deputy Strategic Communications Adviser Ben Rhodes and other Obama administration public relations officials attempting to orchestrate a campaign to “reinforce” President Obama and to portray the Benghazi consulate terrorist attack as being “rooted in an Internet video, and not a broader failure of policy.” 

Other documents show that State Department officials initially described the incident as an “attack” and possible kidnap attempt.The documents were released Friday as result of a June 21, 2013, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed against the Department of State (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:13-cv-00951)) to gain access to documents about the controversial talking points used by then-UN Ambassador Susan Rice for a series of appearances on television Sunday news programs on September 16, 2012.  Judicial Watch had been seeking these documents since October 18, 2012. . . . Among the top administration PR personnel who received the Rhodes memo were White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, Deputy Press Secretary Joshua Earnest, then-White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer, then-White House Deputy Communications Director Jennifer Palmieri, then-National Security Council Director of Communications Erin Pelton, Special Assistant to the Press Secretary Howli Ledbetter, and then-White House Senior Advisor and political strategist David Plouffe.

 In addition a document showed Susan Rice was informed before her TV appearance: “Responding to a question about whether it was an organized terror attack, Toria said that she couldn’t speak to the identity of the perpetrators but that it was clearly a complex attack.” Toria refers to Victoria Nuland, then State Department spokeswoman and now assistant secretary for Europe and Eurasia. She had been unfairly maligned in some quarters and falsely accused of participating in the illicit editing of the talking points. These documents exonerate her entirely, pointing the finger directly at the White House and the CIA. (It is noteworthy that in the days between the attack and Rice’s TV outing, Nuland never tied the video to the attack; Carney did, most clearly on Sept. 14.) With regard to the CIA:

The Judicial Watch documents confirm that CIA talking points, that were prepared for Congress and may have been used by Rice on “Face the Nation” and four additional Sunday talk shows on September 16, had been heavily edited by then-CIA deputy director Mike Morell. According to one email:

The first draft apparently seemed unsuitable….because they seemed to encourage the reader to infer incorrectly that the CIA had warned about a specific attack on our embassy.  On the SVTS, Morell noted that these points were not good and he had taken a heavy hand to editing them. He noted that he would be happy to work with [then deputy chief of staff to Hillary Clinton]] Jake Sullivan and Rhodes to develop appropriate talking points.

The e-mails were exchanged at a time when the State Department and CIA already knew that the video was not at issue and that this was a staged attack of some type. Former United Nations spokesman Richard Grenell who was briefly part of the Mitt Romney presidential team told Right Turn, “The e-mail from Ben Rhodes to a bunch of political appointees at the White House proves that there was a scramble inside Obama’s inner circle to protect him from the fallout of a U.S. Ambassador being killed on the anniversary of 9/11 and a few short weeks from his reelection.” He pointedly added: “ It’s time for real journalists to confront the President. It’s clear now that he and his team have not been truthful with the American people.”

Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz’s spokesman Catherine Frazier was quick to jump on the news. She told Right Turn, “ Here we are more than 19 months after the attack – seven months after Sen. Cruz called for a joint select committee to investigate – and more revelations continue to surface, confirming how little we really know about what happened in Benghazi on Sept 11, 2012.” She stressed, “This administration must be held accountable to telling the truth so that we can find closure, bring our attackers to justice, and prevent future attacks — and Hillary Clinton’s regrets are not enough. All witnesses with knowledge of the attack including administration officials should be called to testify before a joint select committee so we can once and for all know the truth about what happened.”

Since mainstream media reporters have been loath to press the issue (and Congress may well convene new hearings), let me offer a few questions to start the inquiry:

Will Rhodes be allowed to testify under oath?

Who instructed Rhodes to send the memo and who reviewed it before it went out?

Will the president instruct all the people mentioned in the emails to cooperate with congressional or other investigators?

Since the issue now involves senior White House officials, is a special prosecutor appropriate?

If any individuals conspired to falsify a reason for the attack knowing of evidence to the contrary, will the president fire them?

At the time of the e-mails, did the president understand the video was not at issue?

Is the White House planning on conducting its own internal investigation?

When White House Spokesman Jay Carney received the talking points and in subsequent press conferences stressed the role of the video, did he know that assertion to be untrue?

The Election Is Over, Remember Benghazi

All bloggers I call on you to demand with me justice for Ambassador Stevens and three Americans who were killed with him in a terrorist attack that Obama knew would happen beforehand and after nearly two months later Obama has done nothing. We need to get on our blogs and begin to fight with our words. Let's join together and show the lamestream media a big portion of America hasn't forgotten Benghazi and won't let Obama just sweep it under the rug.

In college I had a professor who taught our English and Literature courses who cautioned us, “Be careful of jumping on bandwagons and following the herd. You just may find that you jumped to nowhere and following along to your own harm.” I am sure a few more took her caution to heart and realized she was talking beyond research and teaching a life lesson as well. Others I am sure let her teaching go in one hole and out another. Such is the plight of lessons, I saw the same as I taught in Japan a few years later.  The only wasted lesson is one which the student pays no heed to.

In 2008 I saw this lesson played out when Obama was hailed first as the new hope for America, then the guy who change things, then the new sensation for young women to have crushes on, then the outsider who keep the evil Clintons from retaking America, to finally the messiah who will make all things new and more importantly give away phones and other freebies. Unlike the sheeple, I decided to shun both the savior and the former sailor and go for Nader, who actually had a real record of doing something good for many and also showed real compassion that was not scripted on a teleprompter like the holy one.

Alas, I find myself now realizing the sheeple have learned nothing after four years. The proof is that we still Obama as president. The man wholly created by and sustained by the media and a team of red in tooth and claw Chicago king makers. Romney didn't stand a chance against this union of thugs and criminals, not to mention journalistic failures.

We today face the end of the United States of America as we know it. President Barack Obama, with no surprise, has been reelected. I shall not delve into why Romney lost as I have covered that before. What I shall do is inform you where our nation is headed.

Take a look at Europe and the European nations. That is our future under this president. Deep in debt and spending our way into a future of people more unemployed than employed, a currency that is worthless, and leaders more fascinated with their own persona than possessing a desire to lead. Our future is also being arranged with the fact campaigning for 2016 begins in earnest today for the Democrats. This past election splintered the Republicans and their finger pointing will be their demise four years from now. We now face the fact the UN and EU are the maps of America's future, not our constitution.

I began to get concerned when Forbes article entitled, “The Manchurian Candidate” was suddenly purged from their website. I copy and pasted the article because I knew it would not last long. Someone at the White House, you can bet, threatened Forbes with their White House press clearance if they kept it up. Valerie Jarrett comes to mind. The main focus of the article is this:

After the first three plus years of the presidency, it is painfully clear that Barack Obama was a “pretty face,” and “glib speaker” and a lightweight liberal politician with a community organizer/radical background. The American people should be outraged at this man’s behavior and even his candidacy. Why are they not? Because of the misinformation delivered by sympathetic liberal/mainstream media who loves his nonsensical form of governing.

Obama’s perceived preparedness for the presidency is a terrible delusion, from which it is difficult to escape. Mistakes build upon each other and result in even more complex problems. Difficult problems that are mishandled become even more difficult to fix. When you have too little experience, lack substance (other than the words of your latest speech), then leading, managing and problem solving simply don’t happen. And that is what has occurred. When you compound the problem by surrounding your self with like-minded theorists, lacking in real-world experience, things become worse yet. The theoretical solutions to problems often don’t work due to the messiness of the real world — and the reasons are almost unfathomable to these rookie executive/politicians.

What should Americans think about this “imposter?” Will he divulge his true background so we can all see who he is and where he came from — really? If not, is this just a man who should never have been sworn into the office of President in the first place, and who has crippled Americans miserably during his term? What if a real crisis like one involving China – either faltering or military engagement, forces Obama to make real decisions involving close to a million lives?

Will we continue to believe his misstatements (the politically correct term for lies)? Can he simply use the media to “erase and forget the past three years of misery and missteps?” Or will we learn from his imperialistic behavior and terrible results and throw him out in disgrace?

This article appeared in Forbes on March 25 and was suddenly gone a few hours later. It still survives on a few pages on the internet like Gateway Pundit .

Obama from the beginning was a manufactured bandwagon. Obama's entire autobiography was a fraud created by Chicago Democrats with tons of experience in stealing elections. Valerie Jarrett, Rahm Emmanuel, David Axelrod all created the myth and fiction that is Barack Obama. The very reason that this administration opposes any laws that will make voter fraud difficult - the Democrats had to oppose them to fulfill their goals for America. With voters having to prove their identities, ACORN and others can't help Democrats seal wins on their own, they need election fraud.

The heir to the Obama dynasty has already been chosen and campaigning begins today. Hillary survived Obama throwing her under the bus on Benghazi, and it is certain little will be revealed or done about Benghazi, the dialogue will shift, perhaps. The dialogue and goal of this administration will be their “reshaping and redirection of America, and spreading wealth around”. Maybe congress will humor Obama and let him have his way on things. Taking example from European nations Obama will transform the US economy into the Keynesian paradise that Paul Krugman and other leftists are pushing for. Regulations on business will pose too great a burden and force them to nationalize.

All the while knowing Socialism is failing Europe and the UK's system is near collapse. That makes no difference to Obama, he will continue to push his American “transformation”. Logic and sense have no place in Obama's plans, the very fact he demands American Socialism is enough, and the proof has been in his willingness to sacrifice lives to accomplish this. Remember the names of Brian Terry, Ambassador Chris Stevens, they were sacrificed by Obama to push his agenda forward, American lives are of no consequence to his thirst for wealth, power, and implementing his Socialist agenda on America. This new term for Obama seals the deal.

Now the petty bickering of Axelrod vs Holder can be put to rest. It really does not matter if Holder resigns now or not. Obama has nothing to fear if his entire cabinet and pool of advisers leave. Valerie Jarrett is guaranteed to stay gate keeper so long as Obama occupies the Oval Office. Jarrett can begin in earnest her promised letting hell loose on the perceived enemies and under achievers of Obama. Jarrett can unleash her worst and there in nobody and nothing to stand in her way. After all, we now know Obama called off killing Bin Laden three times at Jarrett's demand, and Jarrett is actually the one who gave the go ahead to Seal Team 6 in May 2011, so much for the Obama the terrorist slayer monicker. With Obama's apologetics and his penchant to refuse to use the words terrorist and terrorism, the monicker was more sarcastic anyway.

Now Obama can sit back and groom Hillary to be his successor. Bill Clinton was unable to convince Hillary to stage a coup this year, so now Bill can look forward to being first husband in 2016. The only things that will hinder this are: Hillary decides not to run (perhaps), the Benghazi ordeal blasts the Obama administration into chaos after inquiries (unlikely, there is no interest now the election is over), or Obama commits random acts of self destruction like Carter did (impossible, he survived the first term, and Jarrett is much more intelligent than Hamilton Jordan). Obama can now push his agenda for America's reshaping and spread the wealth around like he wishes now.

There still could be a fly in the ointment. Suppose China falls into chaos due to ethnic uprising or the Islamist regimes China has been bankrolling turn against the godless Chinese communists and launch jihad on China. Either are completely possible. The gulf between rural poverty and urban expansion have widened tremendously the last seven years. Today the vast majority in China live in deeper poverty and even less chance to rise out of poverty. This is a ticking time bomb that the elite in Beijing pretend does not exist, yet know perfectly well that the tiniest spark could set off ethnic tensions that would lead the 80% caught in rural poverty to rise up. This was narrowly averted twice already. After the 2008 Western China Earthquake and the 2009 Uighur Uprisings. A third spark just may set off the powder keg.

If this happens (and it is a real possibility) Obama would be caught absolutely in shock. Clinton's State Dept. would be even more unprepared than it was for Benghazi. Obama and his drones have been band wagoning Chinese ascension to number one, and anything that stood in the way would come as a complete surprise they could not handle. The fall of China as we know it now would throw Obama's team into such chaos that Republicans could retake a majority in both houses of congress in 2014 and also have a real chance to take the White House in 2016.

China has been trumpeted as the inheritor to America's greatness for so long by the leftists like Obama that a failure for China to do so would throw economic plans, diplomatic relations, and the balance of power in Asia in complete chaos. There is a real chance that China could actually find itself a splintered third world nation before ever reaching number one. Even if China reaches number one, how long could they stay there with the poverty, disparity, and privation that actually exist in China? I have always stated there is no guarantee China will either keep its prosperity or rise any further. For the simple fact that China's success like Obama's autobiography are media generated and advanced myths. A closer look makes both fail serious inspection. There was a reason that Forbes article was titled “The Manchurian Candidate”, a real crisis bigger than the Arab Spring or Benghazi will topple Obama's success and throw the Democrats into a tailspin.

Now consider this final thought. Obama has been reelected and Congress has gained more Republicans. The Benghazi affair is much, much bigger than Watergate was. Obama will now go through the same sad process that Richard Nixon went through after he won his second term. Now that Obama has a second term there will be no way that the lame-stream media could or can whitewash the cover-up that has been committed by the Obama administration in handling Benghazi.

The Benghazi investigation will pre-occupy Congress for the next two years of Obama’s second term and will bring down his sorry administration in impeachment proceedings in the House and trial in the Senate. Republicans do not need majorities of both houses of Congress, it will be a slam-dunk. The corrupt White House team lead by Valerie Jarrett will fight it tooth-and-nail, and the complicit and corrupt lame-stream media will continue to support the corrupt POTUS and his corrupt administration, however, justice will prevail in the end because as in 1974, the American people will finally demand something be done to right the injustice, lies, and criminality emanating from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

So perhaps Obama may have been better off losing. China would be dealt with by Romney and his brain trust of a Bush IV team. Benghazi could have easily been swept under the rug and kept there. Now that Obama has won a second term it all rests in his lap. Like Nixon, Obama has been glib, smug, and arrogant, those are dangerous traits for a leader. Like Nixon, Obama's second win could be his colossal failure. Be careful of jumping on bandwagons indeed, especially if they are marked China or Obama. Congratulations Mr. President.

Time Warner Cable Has No Excuse

There is no excuse today for a poor user interface. Technology allows touch screen, touch and move, and voice command.  So why are there so many?

I remember asking a friend who works in IT in New Zealand if there was a reason why TVs are still boxy and unattractive. Was it somehow cheaper to make them ugly? The answer was no.

And today, I am just as awed that so many digital user interfaces are ridiculously bad. I can’t imagine that good designers are that much more expensive than bad ones, especially when you’re talking about well-financed firms like Time Warner Cable, one of the world’s worst TV interfaces for customers.

I’m pretty sure I saw my daughter cry the other day while clutching a TWC remote, unable to get to a recording of “Cougar Town.”

It’s no wonder. The DVR menu is under the HELP tab. Makes perfectly good sense.

I won’t even go into the unnerving universal remote that TWC supplies with its digital cable service. Even if I could see the tiny labels on the tiny buttons, they wouldn’t make sense.

The entire TWC experience is epitomized by the video-on-demand feature – something I had never used until about a month ago. I think I hit the VoD button by accident.

What a mess!

Seems like a nice feature, right? You can watch some good prime-time shows whenever you want? As long as you can find them? Which you can’t?

VoD is an attractive service, which I never knew about from my last cable experience (12 years with Comcast) since I used a Windows Media Center with CableCard. It could potentially keep me from cutting the cord with TWC, but TWC does everything to repel me from the service.

In the video below, I demonstrate how a person might find Honey Boo Boo on TWC VoD. It isn’t pretty. On so many levels.

You think cable companies are losing subscribers because of cheap online competition? Maybe they’re defecting because of the bad user experience and even worse customer service.  With self service becoming the rage - gas stations, grocery stores (self checkout), and even some fast foods (all you do is press a touch screen, swipe your debit card, and when the order is ready an actual human places it in a pick up window) there is no excuse for company reps to treat their customers with an attitude short of belligerence.  

If Time Warner wants to compete with Dish, Direct TV, Cox, and other competitors then I suggest Time Warner makes all their services customer friendly.  Gee what an idea guys!  Or Time Warner can continue to watch the massive defection to their competitors. 

Instruction Video

US Monetary Collapse

America is already in an economic collapse. We are balancing on the edge of a monetary collapse of the US Dollar.

However, we can look at the bright side of a Monetary Collapse, all you have to do is video people at the grocery store trying to buy a loaf of bread with a $100 bill and record everyone falling down in laughter. Your video will go viral in minutes.

You can even go to every trash can in your neighborhood and pull out all the US Dollars you can stuff in a bag and it still wont buy a loaf of bread.

We probably have around 18 months to two years before the Monetary System of the US does collapse. At least then, Obama voters will know they have been put together by the US Destroyer and Chief.

It will even be funnier to video people going to the mail box looking for their Welfare Check – It will not be there – because Change has come to America.

Reich Predicts Romney Win

Mitt Romney has turned into such a skilled debater that he could trounce President Barack Obama in their three head-to-head encounters in the run-up to the election,  former Democratic Labor Secretary Robert Reich believes.

Romney “is going to be debating somebody who is not nearly as good a debater as his reputation,” Reich tells Atlantic Magazine in its September issue. He says that under live questioning, Obama “can seem kind of wooden” and “at a loss for words.”

“Even if Romney is scripted and not spontaneous, he will come across as ‘on his game,’ ” Reich tells the Atlantic. “The danger for Obama is that Romney can still look better than Obama, if Obama does not have the same degree of discipline about the debates.”

Reich, now Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was quoted in an extensive article in the Atlantic by its longtime national correspondent, James Fallows. The magazine’s report was based on an examination of tapes of Romney’s debates throughout his political career.

That first began with three contests against Democratic Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy for the U.S. Senate in 1994 and continued with Romney’s successful 2002 quest for the statehouse, his failed 2008 presidential bid and finally with the 2012 Republican presidential primaries.

Reich ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination for Massachusetts governor in 2002. Romney defeated Shannon O’Brien in the general election.

“He will have done a huge amount of homework,” Reich says of Romney. “He will have moot debates with debating partners, as they all do. But he truly will have internalized a lot of the questions and the most-effective responses.

“He will have the zingers ready, and he knows the importance of those zinger lines. He will have it down — even the humor. He will know that self-deprecating humor is enormously useful, and will have rehearsed it.”

Generally, debate watchers will see a comfortable, confident Republican presidential candidate with a style that embodies “faultless preparation, crisp and precise expression, a readiness both to attack and to defend, and an ability to stay purely on message,” the Atlantic reports.

The magazine says Romney’s weaknesses are “thin factual knowledge on many policy issues, a preference to talk in generalities and a palpable awkwardness when caught unprepared and forced to improvise.”

He will face an incumbent president who is a seasoned debater, having sparred with Hillary Clinton, and who has had four years’ experience in setting policy. But Obama’s theme from 2008 — “Change you can believe in” — has now become “Things could be worse” and “I need more time.”

Thus, “the Romney team has the impossible challenge of trying to imagine every question or attack line that might come up in debates with Obama, while the Obama team tries to imagine what Romney’s might have missed.”

Still, the Atlantic continues: “Debates are and have been his strength. The Romney who took on Teddy Kennedy 18 years ago remains a highly useful guide to the candidate who will stand next to Barack Obama in the three debates scheduled this fall.”

This Mitt Romney solidified his strategy within minutes of his first debate with Kennedy in 1994, two weeks before the election. It came in a response to why the six-term Kennedy, 62 at the time, was not trouncing the younger upstart.

“People in Massachusetts have been watching, for 32 years, Sen. Kennedy,” Romney said in his response. “They appreciate what he has done, but they recognize that our world has changed and that the answers of the 1960s aren’t working anymore.”

With that, Romney’s basic tact was set: “That it was possible to love Teddy Kennedy but recognize that his time had passed, and that the ‘real’ answers weren’t the ones Kennedy could present,” the Atlantic reports.

“This is instantly recognizable as his frame for the 2012 presidential race as well: his opponent is likable but not up to the job.”

Romney then added: “People recognize that government jobs just can’t do it for Massachusetts. We need private-sector jobs. And so they are looking for people who have skill and experience in the private sector, who know how to help create jobs, who will do the work of traveling from state to state and around the country to bring jobs to Massachusetts.”

The Atlantic report concludes, “Through the rest of that evening and in the follow-up debate two days later, Romney did not succeed in breaking Teddy Kennedy’s connection with the people who had voted for him six times before. But he did his level best, with a variety of tools and tactics he has relied on ever since.”

They are: attack your opponent, defend your record, anticipate the opposition’s arguments and be ready to counter, show “a flash of sly wit’ — and stay “unwaveringly on message,” bringing “every question on every topic back to his main theme.”

It was, in this case, “Sen. Kennedy was great for his time; that time has passed; I know about business, which is what we need.”

Kennedy won, but Romney got 41 percent of the vote.

During the 2012 presidential primaries, Romney, in none of the nearly 50 televised hours, was “judged the big loser; in many, he was the clear winner, and as the campaign wore on, the dominant image from the debates was of a confident Romney, standing with a slight smile on his face and his hands resting easily in his pockets, looking on with calm amusement as the lesser figures squabbled among themselves and sometimes lashed out at him,” the Atlantic reports.

A few gaffes occurred — most notably, the “$10,000 bet,” offered to Texas Gov. Rick Perry during an Iowa debate — but, overall, “As his rivals were felled, or destroyed themselves, Romney kept moving ahead,” the Atlantic reports. “His mistakes were few, and his focus was steady, on whichever of the sequential challengers was most threatening week by week.”

Jim Messina, Obama’s campaign manager, tells the Atlantic: “Romney is a seriously under¬rated debater. The truth is, he under¬stood what his job in all those debates was. When it was to go out and finish Rick Perry, he did it. When it was to hold the lead in New Hampshire, he did it.”

Even David Axelrod, Obama’s chief campaign strategist who prepared the president for his debates with Arizona Sen. John McCain in 2008, praised Romney.

“As a debater, he is remarkably disciplined,” Axelrod tells the Atlantic. “It is very unlikely that he is going to come in there without knowing much of what he is going to say, or without having practiced it relentlessly or delivered it over and over.

“He is very good at internalizing the one-liners and knowing when to fire. And he can run off large set pieces from memory pretty effectively.”

A Response to Obama's Marxist Leaning

Obama Is No Marxist - I Know For A Fact

By Daniel J. Rea

I take much amusement hearing right wing radio hosts spew their piffle about President Obama being a Marxist.  First, there is absolutely no evidence to prove this ridiculous accusation.  Their guilt by association of a few people Obama spoke with in the past is dangerous because I can show all these radio hosts can be homosexuals, Nazis, and conspirators to defraud the USA.  Second, they seem to not understand what a Marxist is by definition, and Obama does not meet the definition.  Just because he supports universal health care (which Obama Care is not – this simply requires all Americans to have health insurance, private or government) does not make him a Marxist any more than it did Truman, JFK, Eisenhower, Johnson, Ford, Ted Kennedy, Bob Dole, John Tower, or Bill Clinton (all of these people called for public supported government sponsored health care).  Finally, because I had been a Marxist and Obama by no means qualifies like the people I knew and associated with in the CPUSA.

The definition of a Marxist is a person who follows Karl Marx or his theories.  Problem is, Obama does neither.  Obama has never praised Karl Marx nor has Obama followed the theories of Marx.  Quite the opposite actually, Obama has praised the need for private property, helped bail out the auto makers to keep them going instead of nationalizing them, and Obama has repeatedly spoke of the need to preserve America’s capitalist system.  Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Mark Levin simply won’t let a little thing like the truth hinder them though.  Instead because President Obama met Bill Ayers, was inspired by his professor Charles Ogletree, and worked with ACORN organizer Madeleine Talbott then Obama is Marxist by association.  Even if these people were to be Marxists, which it is doubtful about Ogletree and Talbott, it would not make Obama a Marxist because he knew them or even worked with them.

Many of us know or work with drug addicts (actually Limbaugh is an addict) that does not make us addicts.  Many of us know and work with mentally ill people, that does not make us mentally ill.  Guilt by association is a logical fallacy for a reason, it is ridiculous.  So let’s play the guilty by association game.  By this logic Rush Limbaugh is a homosexual because he associated with homosexuals Eliot Sanders and Norm Woodruff.  Sean Hannity is a Nazi because he associated with well-known Neo-Nazi Hal Turner.  Mark Levin is guilty of perjury because he associates with Oliver North.  That is how ridiculous it is for these petty little charlatans to call our president a Marxist.  These hate prattlers have no shame or decency.

There is a more full definition of a Marxist: One who supports the complete control of private property that is then made communal to gain complete control of labor and capital for adjudication by the collective state.  This definition comes from the Merriam – Webster Dictionary.  Obama fails by this definition because Obama repeatedly has called for the preservation of private property rights.  A big reason he nixed the pipeline deal.  He didn’t want people losing their farm, ranch, and business property to make room for it.  Something the neo-Cons intentionally do not mention.  Obama has not made any comment nor drafted any legislation that would put all employment or money under control of the state.  Instead Obama has drafted legislation that eases employment policies and laws so people can be more easily employed.  Every US bank could have easily been collectivized by Obama just hours after January 20, 2009.

Obama did away with restrictions on who can be classified as a trainee for heavy industry jobs and Obama even pissed off many unions over the summer when he said in Kansas, “I believe unions control employment in some jobs they have no need controlling.”  Obama fails as a Marxist by this more complete definition.  Those who call Obama a Marxist are full of shit, plain and simple.

Honestly, if one wishes to dislike the Obama presidency there are numerous reasons.  One, Obama’s pathological promise breaking.  The deficit is not cut in half yet.  Obama has not created the millions of jobs he promised.  There is no foreclosure protection agency.  Two, one could also look at his failed policies.  Obama’s Mid-east policies have failed.  Egypt is moving closer to Islamist control.  Syria continues to ignore Obama and the State Department.  Iran refuses to talk to Obama or Sec. of State Clinton.  Obama’s presidency is the biggest failure since that of Jimmy Carter’s, there is simply no need to falsely label Obama as Marxist.  Three, the absolute refusal of Obama to submit a budget to Congress.

I know firsthand Obama is not a Marxist because I used to be a Marxist.  I associated with people who hated capitalism and were willing to do almost anything to bring down the US government.  When the Soviet Union fell we fell apart as American Marxists.  The CPUSA crawled into a shell that it will never be able to escape, especially after 9/11.  There was nothing to hold to because Marxism had proven a huge failure.  Today, the Marxists I knew who stayed on with the movement are pathetic imitations of their former selves.  If I were still a Marxist I would definitely be against Obama and his half assed policies that have further wrecked our nation at the price of the suffering of the poor.  What Obama actually wants is for the US to be a nanny state like the European states are.  A cheap Euro Socialist imposter that joins hands with Socialist Europe and redistributes the world’s wealth until Ayn Rand is seen as a prophet and not the dime store novel writer she was.

Obviously Obama isn’t noticing the miserable failure Europe’s experiment with Socialism is.  There is wide difference between Socialism and Marxism.  The UK was a Socialist state through much of the Cold War but stood against Soviet Marxism.  Some dumb asses in the Lamestream Media forget real history and just like to throw labels and names around.  Personally, I always thought if Europe wanted to solve all of their problems then they should stop screwing around and become real Marxist states.  That helped the Soviets because when it all fell apart they became more capitalist and republican than the US is.  There is much that can be criticized of Obama, but calling him a Marxist is like calling the Pope an Atheist.  The label just does not fit.

 Obama is obviously an Uncle Tom for big industry.  Look at his handling of BP, his recent refusal to have Google’s privacy policy checked by the FTC and FCC for consumer privacy violations, and his acceptance of election donations by huge insurance, energy, and technology corporations.  Obama is as much a big industry ass kisser as Regan and Bush I and II were.  That is a far cry from being Marxist.  My Marxist friends would eat Obama for lunch and shit him out for dinner.  They have absolutely no respect for a man who pretends to be friends of the poor while kissing the asses of the likes of Warren Buffet, Jeremiah Wright, and Tony Hayward.  Oh well, to each according to need and from each according to ability to lie in the Lamestream Media. 

I miss those days some times.  In the end we were no more than middle class suburban kids looking to be different from the soulless neocons around us.  We had a penchant for Toyota, Edie Brickell, and Mondale.  Our neocon classmates had a penchant for BMW, Tom Petty, and Reagan.  We wanted nothing to do with them.  Some of us grew out of it and others stayed in the “Party” and were in central Dallas over the summer Occupying Old City Park.  To those comrades I say with teary eyed nostalgia and fondness, the revolution is past.  Now occupy a job.

Daniel Rea is a good friend of mine and sent me this in an email.  I reprint it here with approved editing as a response to my previous post.