The question of character continues to be broached but no one seems willing to say it matters. I am all for the issues but I do believe character is important as many have pointed out when attacking Hillary Clinton repeatedly for her Bosnia description or because some people question her honesty.

But let's look at both sides and the issue of honesty and good character. Since I posed the Hillaryisms up front, let's take a look at Obama:

Today, Obama's tainted truth was a sub topic of the talk shows. Seems people are beginning to realize that he has been flipflopping unmercifully regarding Resko, now Wright.

A video aired on the McLaughlin Group of Obama talking about how Wright "counseled" him, critiques him and has been a driving force for the last 20 years, is certainly contradictory to what he said last week about him not being a spiritual advisor and that he has never counseled him.

I'd be mad if I was the media who received the cheap shot from Obama last week when he blamed the media for establishing a non-existant, close relationship between himself and Wright..

It also is contradictory or a mistruth that he said he had no idea what the pastor was speaking about for the last 20 years. Huh?

Maybe, since Obama has used Wright's sermon's to write his book and give a speech himself, and has told us that Wright actually is a great American who served in the military and brought him to Jesus Christ, we should believe Wright when he said last week that Obama is simply a politician saying whatever to get elected...

I do believe that if people knew the real Obama back in January, the Democrats would not have this situation on their hands now.

Those of you who are now fuming because you are Obama supporters will tell me, in reverse, about Clinton's character, her lies, her infractions of rules, etc, even though I tried to air those up front.

That's fair game.

But if you are speaking about character, does it not go both ways? Or three ways, if you bring McCain into the mix?

Please tell me:
1. Is Character important or not?
2. Does having good "character" mean being honest?
3. Since all the candidates have "pandered," is it possible to see beyond that and actually ascertain what is pandering and what is dishonesty?
4. Do you believe that you can honestly vet your own candidate and come to a realistic conclusion with warts and all?

So bitter, I'm just sitting home clinging to my ol' Winchester, "Betsy," in the name of Lord. I'm just like any other white woman who sees a black man and gets scared or the rest of America that wants all the immigrants out.

But, don;t worry, all my frustrations are calmed by dear ol' Betsy sitting here on my lap!

Thank goodness, we po' crackas have a Harvard grad who went to the finest schools growing up telling us po' uneducated folks how we feel and why - Hallelujah!

Senator Obama is fighting more than just Pastor Wright. He may be fighting a persona that has been created not from his own personality or genetic make-up, but like Frankenstein, the little bit of this and the little bit of that that that the good doctor sewed together to create him.

Every day, we witness more Hillary Bashing, yet the stories Obama weaves intentionally go unnoted.

Most recently we have been swayed by what some are calling his magnificent March speech that has set a tone for America. Yet has anyone challenged him once again on his use of words?

First he takes the words of a fellow legislator. He then does not leave his church or his pastor, whose words he used for his book.

And, in his March speech he uses similar rhetoric that Wright's dear friend, Louis Farrakhan, used in his Million Man March speech.

Check it out:

http://rezkowatch.blogspot.com/2008/04/one-degree-of-separation-did-obama-lift.html

Of course, both men are using the words from the Constitution(if you don't believe the comparison): “toward a more perfect union."

The fact remains that Obama doesn't even say he was sleep-deprived when he wrote his speech...or his other speech, or his book…

Who has created this candidate for us? Everyone keeps saying that he is inspirational, but we don't know who he is. We know he has flip flopped on issues, takes the policies from other candidates and has not voted on many of the legislation that came his way.

It's time we find out who he is, before it is too late and this union heads for disaster rather than perfection.

Obama said on The View today that he might have left his church had Wright not said he understood that his remarks had hurt people.

Uh, anyone remember that Wright said that? Or was that in a private meeting with Obama??

Gee, that makes me feel a whole lot better.

By the company they keep.

I don't care about the flag pin or not saluting the flag or singing the anthem.

I care about someone who quotes a racist's philosophy, who continues to pay dues in an organization that supports a racist minister and his words and publishes a racist publication.

I identify someone as a racist by his own words and actions, whether from his book, his speeches or his comments.

I am sickened by the hatred that has killed people throughout history, the Holocaust and the recent genocides.

And I am sickened that we might elect someone for president who makes no bones about his feelings about whites and who makes no apology for enjoying the "family" of a congregation that embraces anti-Semitism, and other Black Supremacy ideology.

"Poetry," Obama called it in his book.

Who the heck are Dodd and Leahy?

I think it takes quite a bit of nerve to ask a candidate running neck and neck with the opponent to step down. This is, afterall, not a Naderesque situation.

If the Obama supporters and the Democratic Party continue to seek the disenfranchisement of Michigan and Florida as well as Hillary Clinton supporters, Nader will look awfully good in November.

So, why are the Obama supporters running so scared if they claim Obama is going to be the nominee? Perhaps, they are afraid that the great Obama will be exposed for what he truly is between now and the convention and not deliver them the jobs he promised.

Jump on that train now, Dodd and Leahy, and "don't you come back no more, no more and don't you come back no more!"

If you think that McCain's camp isn't getting ready to launch an aggressive attack against Obama should he win the nomination, think again.

Obama has handed McCain more damaging fare on a silver platter than John Kerry did for George W. Bush.

John Kerry lost the election because of his "flipflopping." Obama has done that in the past few months ad nauseum with the descrepancy between his mantra words of rising above race, unity and change and his constant race cards, affiliation with Wright and his advisors saying he will do something different than he sauys about NAFTA and the war.

John Kerry lost the election because of a photograph that was circulated of him attending an anti-Vietnam war rally with Jane Fonda sitting just a couple of bodies away.

Obama is caught with Pastor Jeremiah Wright as his confidante and mentor even after his racist and unpatriotic remarks.

John Kerry lost the election because of the Swift Boat people who claimed he was a terrible leader putting people in harm's way.

Obama's lack of experience should take care of this one, particularly because of his insistance that he would never have voted for the war even if he was a Senator at the time.

Yes, the Republicans are just gearing up for this surge against Obama. It won't be pretty and the "typical white people" will sign on to it without much persuading. Obama has already taken care of that.

I have to admit, I never liked our presidential election process with the popular vote undermined by the electoral vote.

And somewhere in the recesses of my mind, I knew how the Democratic nomination process worked, with some caucuses and some primaries. I never liked the Iowa and New Hampshire thing because it seemed ridiulous that two states such a big deal should make.

However, until this election, I have never seen just how ineffective, undemocratic the system is on the Democrats' side.

Having caucuses are not having elections. They do not uuphold one man, one vote. They are debates. They disenfranchise voters who would rather not stand up in a room and declare their choice. Cowards, maybe, but certainly if you believe that the McCarthy era was one of the most despicable in American history, you can understand why someone would rather have their vote shrouded in secrecy.

Then there are primaries with caucuses. Why should someone be able to vote twice because they have the freedom to get out of the house or work twice, or because they are so politically active they understand the process while their neighbor has not idea that the system even exists?

The primaries themselves, we have seen, are bound by rules so compicated that we have the state of Florida now not being counted because the Democrats wouldn't permit it to change its date and the Republicans forced it anyway. How fair is that?

Then we have porportional handing out of the delegates rather than winner takes all like the Republicans.

And why do we give such freedom to both parties to determine how we cast our vote for the nominee? Where is our voice in all of this?

Both the Democrats' candidates will have fallout whoever wins the nomination. If Obama wins, Clinton can say two states were not counted and the voting was all screwed up anyway. If Clinton wins, Obama will say she bucked the system because the Super Delegates voted for her when he won with the delegates and popular vote, he hopes.

But the system puts the Super Delegates in place to do just that. So anyone saying she would be cheating if that happens, doesn't understand how the Democratic party works. It's not cheating, it's how the process works. They are the very same rules Obama keeps talking about when he speaks of Florida and Michigan. Can't have it both ways.

So, the infighting among the two supporting camps should not be aimed at the candidates but the Party itself for making these outlandish, unequal, and convoluted rules in the first place.

One can't help to think that it's no wonder we have such a hard time getting our folks in the White House.

A good speech does not a president make.

As Abraham Lincoln said, “You may deceive all of the people part of time, and part of the people all the time, but not all of the people all the time.”

We have seen the unprecedented rise of Barak Obama in such a short period of time, have we not been listening to the very words he says matter?

Just within the same timeframe as his short rise, Obama has continually used words to seduce us and then, not long after, retracts them. Have we been so caught up in the glitz and glamour of electing this new Emperor that we have lost the ability to see, as the little boy in the story, that the illustrious leader does not have a new suit of clothes but is so befuddled by the tailors that he, in fact, is naked?

I, like most, was very impressed with his first speech at the Democratic Convention. But I have never been impressed with his resume, the few gems of which were, according to a journalist who followed him back in the day, due to a political agenda to make him rise as quickly as he did, rather than on his own virtues and volition.

So far, we have seen Obama say he was against the war when he was not a member of the Senate and privy to the information our US Senators were receiving. Now, we see that he is trying to prove that he made that decision not because he is a dove, but because he would rather charge the hills of Afghanistan. Seeking out Osama Bin Laden is a very American thought one would think, especially in an election year. But when Obama says get out of the war and “invest at home,” are we to believe that his new war will be less costly?

Even if it is, his own advisor has refuted Obama’s pitch to the American people by saying it is campaign rhetoric and once in the White House, he would not be withdrawing so readily.

OK, that was just an advisor, perhaps, twisting the words that Obama holds so dear. We won’t even discuss that that was the second time an advisor told another country that what Obama says on the campaign, in this case about Nafta, is different from what he shall do once president.

Instead, let’s talk about judgment and leadership.

Obama says he has the experience to lead and the judgment to make the right decisions. If we look at another “right,” that is, Pastor Jeremiah Wright, we see a relationship that Obama found comfortable in a familial way, despite the hateful words Wright has for whites and the country and his unabashed glorification of Black Supremist Louis Farrakhan.

I understand, as he put forth in his now famous speech that has rung ‘round the world, that these people are a part of him and his family and he cannot disown them, though he does denounce the words they speak.

Obama, however, has continually told us that he is the candidate that can rise above race. His attacks on the Clinton have taken their undisputed, decades-long commitment to minorities and their issues and turned them into a junk-heap. Instead, Obama argues, he is the person with the leadership skills and the experience to take us along new paths regarding these same issues.

Should we not, because of his own words, question Obama’s association with people who make it part of their livelihood to attack with incendiary words? It seems there is such a discrepancy here that we must question Obama’s words on judgment and leadership.

All of us do not need a lesson by Professor Obama about the deep-seated consequences of our actions as an American people regarding minorities. America has tried to turn the tide, though not completely successful, and Obama admits he is one of the recipients of those efforts. However, Obama sat in Wright’s church for almost 20 years and was unable to effect change. He was unable to turn the course of a congregation he calls his “family” and a pastor he calls an “uncle.”

One might think that a good leader could have honed his skills in that environment if he was preparing to take on the ills of America. One might have thought such a closed environment, of which he was a family member, would be ideal for someone to speak out against such hateful words. What is the expression, if you make a difference in the life of just one person….?

Now we see another contradiction in Obama’s words when he lumps his doting grandmother together with the rest of the white race when he calls her a “typical white person,” or vice versa.

What audacity for him to question Bill Clinton’s use of the words “fairy tale” when it came to Obama’s rhetoric or even Geraldine Ferraro’s comments that Obama, as she was, is riding on the coattails of being a minority. Obama’s own definition or stereotype of a typical white person certainly isn’t one of praise and obviously reflects his opinion of his grandmother’s race.

Now Obama is backtracking from those statements as well as others, including his earlier statements regarding his association with Resko. Just last week, knowing everything else was about to hit the fan, Obama came clean and said his association with Resko was more than he first admitted.

Words, judgement, leadership, change. Does any of this matter, Sen. Obama?

Lincoln seemed to think so.

When Obama says he is ready to lead this country, what does that mean?

When Obama says we need to address the race issue in this country, why didn't he start with his own congregation two, five, ten, 20 years ago?

Many people say he should have left the Church and Pastor Wright. Obama says he couldn't do that anymore than he could disown his own grandmother.

I certainly can see the latter.

But Obama had an alternative to leaving the church if he found its message uncomfortable (to say the least) and that was to effect change. Afterall, he says he is capable of doing that for our country. He says he is ready for leadership.

Where was his leadership role in this church? A small community compared to a country.

So far, Obama says words matter and he has proven that they don't.

So far, Obama says he has leadership skills to run a country and he has proven that he doesn't.

So far, Obama has said that he can effect change and bring unity to this country and so far he has proven that he can't.

It was a great speech. But I found it somewhat arrogant that he was teaching us a lesson about race and changing this country when he had done nothing to bring about that change in his own church.

I guess, if I am to believe that Barak Obama had no idea that his pastor of almost 20 years has questionable ideology or that Obama had never heard him condem America from the pulpit before, then his poor "uncle" suffered a moment of lunacy the day he asked his congregation to say "God Damn America."

And now we have a teachable moment about race led by the good Professor Obama tomorrow. I cannot wait.

But in addition to the pedagogy, will Obama clear up the conflicting statements he has made regarding when and what he knew about Wright?

After all, first Obama said he never heard these statements when he was in church, then he said he heard about them when he began his presidential campaign. If the latter is true, how come he didn't distance himself from these remarks a year ago?

The great Obama, whose real persona we have yet to meet, has much explaining to do rather than taking the insulting approach to teach Americans about race and race relations. I liken this to the great Wizard of Oz: "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain."

I have continued to post comments relentlessly lately since Barak Obama's latest issue with Pastor Wright. To me this has been the most eggregious display of his poor judgement, the fact that we don't know who he really is and the flipflopping responses he almost insultingly gives us when he is finally questioned.

His supporters have said move on. Many from both sides have said let's keep in mind the good of the Party and not show such a divide. After all, this is supposed to be the Party Building site, right?

Right.

That's exactly why I post.

Closing one's eyes to what is going on on both sides of this internal race will not a Party build.

I don't want a party that determines its future with, as one poster said, "eyes wide shut."

I want to know that our candidates ARE vetted, that when we have a nominee, it is someone who has been tested and is still standing.

I understand that no candidate is perfect. But how closely do they follow our ideals? How true to the cause are they? Where have they lapsed in judgement and where have they risen to meet difficult challenges?

If we don't ask these questions, who will? If we don't vet our candidates before the Republicans get a hold of them, what chances do we have?

While we all will never be completely satisfied, I, for one, will at least be comfortable in the fact that everyone heard all there is to hear. If, after that, we make our final decision, there's nothing left to be said.

I consider that Party building.

if all of you find this Obama-Wright thing as just another supporter gone south?

I am so disgusted by Obama's connection to this man that goes beyond a supporting relationship and his subsequent interviews about it on the news last night as though we would be assuaged by his declaration that he has never heard Wright speak this way in all of his 20-year association with the man.

Do you really believe this? Doesn't it matter to you?

Am I such a cynic that I am afraid this is the message the Obama's embrace, particularly when you couple it with Michele Obama's words?

We have seen a candidate repeatedly say one thing and change it when the light is shown on the words. Perhaps they all, even my candidate, does it. But this is someone's moral and ethical base from which all of his tenets spring if he is the religious man he claims to be.

I cannot sit by and allow this issue to be shoved under the carpet. Too often, we have seen world leaders elected based upon their charisma, their promises and their message of unity only to see it turn into something ugly once elected.

Even Anderson Cooper asked Obama if he thought we could really believe that he had no idea that Wright espoused such viciousness when he had been a member of his church for 20 years and had been married by the man and involved in a very close relationship.

Pastor Moss, Obama's ne pastor did not reject any of Wright's words either. What does that say about Obams's continued relationship with what he calls his "family."

This is not about a supporter saying something questionable or raising the race issue in a politically incorrect manner. This is about a man's belief system.

I love the fact that Obama's camp and the media are playing this ridiculous card about the girl in Hillary Clinton's commercial.

Are we to be swayed by the fact that a child model that has grown up to support Obama in any way lends credence to his campaign?

What a joke for anyone to hold this over Clinton. In fact, it is pretty pathetic. Desparate for the media, too. Must be a REALLY slow news month.

I believe anyone who urges unity and a message of hope for this country should more than distance himself from an anti-semitic, ethnic-centric leader, such as Pastor Wright, who approves of the likes of Farrakhan.

Jewish or not, no one should support someone for president who supports Wright and remains, basically, a disciple in his church, bringing up his children with this kind of ideology from the pulpit.

This is not about unity, no matter how inspirational his speeches are. Clearly, this is a very mixed message.

While Obama continues to say Hillary's White House years do not count, CNN conducted one of its "truth tests" and verified that when Hillary said she was involved in different foreign policy issues during her White House years, it is the truth.

CNN confirmed with other legislators that Hillary was involved in issues that occurred during that time, although she did not have a particular title or designated role.

Many of the pundits have confirmed that Hillary did not just conduct White House tours as First Lady but was so involved Al Gore felt upstaged as vice president. It's one of the reasons (along with her term and a half as US Senator) hy most people know that she does, in fact, have the experience she speaks of from the podium.

Why is it when someone brings up Obama's experience, his past or his ties to unsavory characters, it is deemed negative but when someone "vets" HIllary Clinton, it is not?

A negative campaign to me, is when people go after family members like Bush did to McCain.

So far, there has not been negativity. To illustrate differences or facts about a candidate's performance or questionable connections or dealings is making fair comparisons.

I also don't understand why a commercial about who you would call at 3 a.m. is negative to another person when simply questioning their experience. It raises a question the American people should be asking about BOTH candidates. While I disagree with Bush and his tactics regarding the war and terroism, I cannot ignore the fact that we do have concerns about terroism and shouldn't let our guard down.

I think pointing these things out in ads that are truthful, is just and certainly how campaigns have been run in the past. While that doesn't make it right, it doesn't make it wrong either. Candidates should be held up to scrutiny and they should respond accordingly when unfairly attacked.

I love it when Obama criticizes Clinton for her tactics but when it is the reverse, he calls it "whining." How arrogant.

If the media will not ask these important questions or report on these differences or the history of the candidates, then it is only fair that the candidates bring them up. It is then the job of the media to discern whether they are factual or not.

The media may finally be vetting Obama and holding him accountable for his track record...or lack thereof.

Howard Kurtz in the Washington post today said the media has started to revisit some of Obama's less than great points:

"Some of this involves recycled reporting that didn't get much traction the first time around. Within the last two weeks, ABC's "World News" has done a story on Obama voting "present" nearly 130 times as an Illinois legislator, two months after that information was on the New York Times front page. "NBC Nightly News" has followed up a two-week-old Times piece about Obama compromising on Senate legislation affecting a nuclear energy company that contributed to his campaign. A "CBS Evening News" segment reviewed a series of negative points -- Obama's controversial pastor, his ties to indicted fundraiser Tony Rezko, voting present, the nuclear contributions and the lack of a flag pin. "

Mark Halpern also admitted today that the press has been harder on Clinton than any other candidate. Well, it's about time! (No pun intended.)

Of course Obama says it is all "nonsense." INfact, everytime someone calls him on something bei it Clinton or the press, he says it is "silly," "nonsense" or "whining."

When will he answer these questions? SOunds like the last eight years not the next.

Is it too little too late? Will the Democrats lose out once again because the candidate falls from his high horse in the end, almost Quixoticly, and we no longer have Hillary Clinton to be our champion?

here's a great video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Swnvrh9EV30

Pass it around!

http://www.youtube.com/user/collegedemocrat4

It's great!

When my kids were home from school in December, their friends hung out at our home for a party, sleeping over Saturday night.

I served breakfast in the morning saying my husband and I were political junkies and they would have to have their breakfast listening to the pundits on CBS, NBC, ABC and CNN. We must have been really annoying as we constantly clicked the remote to find yet another discusion, another point of view...

One of my kids' best friends was supporting Obama. This young woman is one of the smartest "kids" I know and I respect her opinion but my loyalty for Hillary Clinton is on my sleeve. I have to admit I ranted a bit, pointing out the differences between the two candidates. At the time, the emphasis was on experience or, lack thereof, whichever the case was.

I know I got carried away but I felt I had to impart what I knew. The young woman had her own thoughts on the subject and I commended her for the intellectual conversation no one else engaged in.

Well, she returned for a visit last night. I told my daughter that we would all go out to dinner but that we weren't to mention the names of the two candidates or discuss election politics.

I told my daughter that if she thought I had ranted back in December, she hadn't see what I was really capable of. I said I would explode, be immature and downright nasty if faced with a conversation about Obama, given what I had learned since December, and I did not want to do that as I truly love her friend and realize I am supposed to play the adult.

Well, I was really good. Until the young woman, with whom I have an excellent relationship with, wanted to see my blogs. I said I was not going to share them, that I was going to respect her choice and not discuss it.

The young woman was making calls for Obama as I am making calls for Clinton. I thought that was cool and, finally, she insisted on asking me why I still thought Obama was not a good choice when Hillary was known for being a such and such...

Well, I tried really hard to quietly point out some of the things I had learned in the meantime about Obama and that I would never vote for him. Well, my passion exploded and I went on and on.

The young woman said she did not know many of the things I had told her. She said things about Hillary that just weren't true and I found myself telling her to google this and google that. In fact, she pretty much knew nothing about Hillary. She did not know much about many of the leaders that were mentioned in the course of our conversation. I was astonished that her prep school was not more on the ball in having the kids learn about one of the most historical junctures in American politics.

She also, being too busy at school, had not seen all the debates.

Now the Obama people can say I fed her propaganda while dismissing Obama's record.

But I'm not writing this to point out who is a better candidate but, rather, that it is SO important that people do not go into the voting booth uninformed on this Tuesday or any other.

I urge every American to READ the record of these two people, learn their history as public servants and activists, do not rely on the pundits who are getting paid for being entertaining, do not vote or stay home because the polls favor one or another and, and by all means, don't get your news from the Daily Show. No offense, Jon.

We are all passionate about our candidates. This young woman brought home the fact, however, that unconditional love is meant only for our children, not for our leaders...