David Axelrod, chief political strategist for President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign and former White House political adviser, defended Jeremiah Wright on Tuesday evening in a speech in Thousand Oaks, Ca, saying that the news reports depicting the man once called an Obama “confidant” as anti-Semite and racist were “ninety seconds of vitriol plucked from thirty years of sermons by some enterprising opposition researcher.”

Axelrod is lying.

As I wrote in the American Spectator, this wasn’t the first time that the official spin was that Wright was “selectively edited”:

Candidate Obama tried to dismiss his support for Wright, telling Charlie Gibson of ABC News, “It’s as if we took the five dumbest things that I ever said or you ever said…in our lives and compressed them, and put them out there, you know, I think that people’s reaction, would be understandably upset.” And rightly so. In sermon after sermon, Wright’s radical black nationalist ideas were clearly and emphatically stated. They were not an aberration, but the focal point of Pastor Wright’s Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, where Obama was an active member for 20 years.

As far as I know, I am the only writer to have read every single one of Jeremiah Wright’s published sermons, so take it from me when I say that they are very racist and very racialist. Here’s just a little bit of what I uncovered:

In [Wright’s] church-associated Kwame Nkrumah Academy, the congregation’s children learned such canards as the claim that “[h]istorically, Europeans tried to build themselves up by tearing down all that Africans had done.” Obama biographer David Remnick notes that Obama approved of this “African-centered” grade school, where Wright’s God loves all people, but black people especially. And why shouldn’t he? Jesus, Wright taught, was “an African Jew,” as were most of the figures of the Bible. As Wright said in Africans Who Shaped Our Faith (1995), “evidence exists within and outside of the Bible to support the notion that the people of Israel…were of African descent!”

Wright believes that the Jews as we know them aren’t really Jews.

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I have a long history with ACORN, going back years before the O’Keefe/Giles video reports. While they were mostly on the periphery of my political life, starting in 2005 they became something I had to deal with regularly,  and for an extended period even daily. This post isn’t about any of that. I mention to put in context my long-standing fascination with Wade Rathke, co-founder of ACORN. The man is simply the best at what he does.

Don’t get me wrong; there is much to dislike about him. His method of ‘community organizing’ preys on people’s fears and anxieties. They exacerbate and prolong racial tensions. And, his ultimate aim is a utopian marxist state. All that said, he is very good at what he does and understands progressive movements and how to create and maintain them better than just about anyone.

So, I was curious to read his recent take on the Occupy Movement:

Nonetheless, listening closely to the whole meeting, it was hard to escape the conclusion that as committed as many were, they were groping for a plan for the future. There was no consensus on that question, and really very little debate or discussion. Several people raised the issue during the “soapbox” session, which allows open mic griping that everyone can easily ignore. In fact most people left the room during that section to visit elsewhere in the coffeehouse.

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For years, the lawyers have not been able to resist instructing the auto industry. Since Ralph Nader began tinkering in the sixties, cars have gone from iconic to ridiculous. We have seen great cars like the Impala turned into a tiny little go-cart filled with airbags and other safety equipment. While I do not begrudge those of us who like safety equipment (after all, that’s why God created Volvos), I long for some of the breathtaking muscle cars of my youth–the proud beasts of an era gone by.

Lawyers cannot fix cars. The talent required for turning a wrench is not the same talent you use when twisting a contract. Most attorneys are not as comfortable working beneath the hood of a car as they are running behind an ambulance. So a wise nation keeps attorneys as far away from their automotive plants as possible.

But change has again found its way into the auto industry. No longer content to direct the industry from the back seat, this Administration has planted itself firmly behind the steering wheel. After taking over General Motors and selling Chrysler to Fiat (an Italian manufacturer best known for its expensive short-lived replacement parts), they invested half a billion taxpayer dollars into the the Fisker–Al Gore’s car of the future. There is no question who is driving the industry into the second decade of the new millennium.

But it’s not going as smoothly as planned. Just recently, the electric Fisker recalled its entire product line for problems that could lead to the cars catching on fire. I guess the future just came a little too early. It seems the problem is not unique to the Fisker either. A Chevy Volt burst into flames while ironically parked over at the Safety Administration. Nothing says “Green” more than black smoke car fires.

In an effort to stem the worst PR event since the Ford Pinto, GM offered Volt owners loaner cars until they could figure out what caused the fire. When two more blew up, they actually offered to buy them all back, resulting in the largest one-day sale of Volts in the history of the nameplate. (more…)

Albany Police Chief Steven Krokoff came under heavy criticism by fans of the Occupy “movement” after he ordered the clearing of their downtown encampment pursuant to a court order. The arguments over the actions by police have raged since the December 23 conflagration with Chief Krokoff getting savaged repeatedly by the media and some city councilmen alike. But this week Krokoff confronted his critics, and he wasn’t gentle about it!

Chief Steven Krokoff (Image Credit: The Troy Record)

The big criticism arose when officers used pepper spray when the Occupiers became violent. Since then, several Councilmen, such as Anton Konev, have criticized the police, saying that their actions were unnecessary. Konev, for instance, has announced that he has no confidence in the Chief and is angling to have him fired. Naturally, Konev has been an open agitator for and supporter of Occupy Albany.

But on January 6, Chief Krokoff came before the city council with a strong defense of his and his officers’ actions, delivering a withering blast to some of the councilmen that have come to the defense of the lawless Occupiers.

In what the Albany Times Union called a “scorching offensive,” Chief Krokoff scolded members of the City Council for supporting the criminal element of the Occupiers instead of supporting their own police department. (more…)

It seems like everyday I wake up and it’s the same old story with politics and politicians: If you vote for my bill, I’ll support yours; the Republicans hate this and the Democrats hate that; you scratch my earmark and I’ll scratch yours…

It’s frustrating.

If it’s not a disgraceful politician being exposed for illicit behavior, it’s somebody in some party being caught shoveling money to their friends or illegal back-door dealings, or charges being leveled. Then the other party thinks they have the moral high ground, even though it was their guy or gal that was caught the week before.

A massive cottage industry which produces nothing, builds nothing, and spends taxpayer money like it’s going out of style has grown up around Washington DC. It’s an establishment political class, grown fat and powerful on our backs which grows and grows…

… And regardless of the prevailing economic climate – it just keeps getting bigger.

What is the average American supposed to do?

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Obviously, the American Conservative Union (ACU) didn’t get the memo. After all, Governor Palin is irrelevant, donchaknow. At least that’s what the mainstream media told me, and the mainstream media never lies.

Was that the sound of Katie Couric’s head exploding I just heard … from the set of the old Geraldo show?

The other news is that this will be the Governor’s first ever appearance at the annual three-day DC gathering of thousands of grassroots conservatives from all over the country, and the timing couldn’t be better. ACU Chairman Al Cardenas sums up why perfectly in today’s announcement:

“Few national conservative leaders in America today energize and inspire our grassroots activists like Governor Sarah Palin. Her strong record of leadership, championing of our shared principles and magnetic personality have made Sarah Palin a hero to millions of conservatives across the country.”

It would be hard to argue that the Governor’s tireless championing of the Tea Party movement combined with her presence on the campaign trail didn’t have an energizing effect on the turnout that helped to deliver the GOP’s record gains in the crucial 2010 mid-terms. No one doubts that we’re going to need that energy again in 2012 — and then some. February 9 – 12 at CPAC is where so much will begin and Governor Palin is an excellent choice to close the conference and send the grassroots home fired up and ready to go to work.

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According to a recent Harvard Poll, the majority of young voters do not support the “Occupy Wall Street” movement.

An overwhelming 66% of young voters say they are not following the recent uproar of protests, and a mere 33% say that they do. With approximately 21% who are supportive, it is obvious the left has made this movement much bigger than it really is.

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The United States is at a fork in the road regarding which way we will go as a people. The 2012 election could be the most important in our lifetime, and conservative leaders have reached a consensus on how to channel the energy and concerns of the American people to realize historic change this year.

The status quo will not survive the year. Our debt and spending have reached catastrophic proportions in the context of global financial difficulties and political upheaval. Consequently, by the end of 2012, America will either have taken a decisive step toward socialistic collectivism in the name of “equality” and “social justice,” where businesses and owners are punitively taxed to “pay their fair share,” or America will take a major step in the direction of returning to our Founders’ constitutional government, restoring the rule of law, federalism, free enterprise, and individual initiative and responsibility.

The American people will decide which path to take in the 2012 elections, not only in the general election on November 6 but also in the nominating process in primaries over the next several months for all major offices, including the presidency. Conservatives must act in a concerted and informed fashion in all of these contests to shape the public dialogue and thoroughly vet the candidates.

To achieve these ends, top conservative leaders acting under the umbrella of the Conservative Action Project have released “A Conservative Consensus for 2012” announcing agreement on major policies. These issues span all three wings of the conservative movement: economic, social, and national security.

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Always ready to recruit the embittered  and disgruntled at any opportunity, the Communist Party USA has established a special veterans committee. The target – demobilized Iraq War veterans.

From the People’s World;

With the Iraq war officially over, leaving 4,500 U.S. troops and 100,000 Iraqis dead plus tens of thousands wounded, the soldiers who fought and experienced the horror are returning home. They’re stepping out of one war zone and into another.

Faced with high rates of unemployment and discrimination in hiring, many are coping with horrific injuries and post traumatic stress disorder, fueling drug and alcohol abuse, and divorce and record suicide rates.

The experience is causing veterans to draw basic conclusions about the real nature of U.S. foreign policy and even capitalism.

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Remember this video?

Though this clip was replayed again and again- a sign that Americans were “awakened” as a result of the realization that President Obama and the liberal Democrats were, indeed, on the path to “fundamentally transform” the nation- the sad, but accurate, phrase used by the woman speaking is, “sleeping giant.” Conservative America has been a “sleeping giant.”

Most Americans describe themselves as “conservative.” And conservatives, by nature, tend to mind their own business. Unless, of course, their “own business” is being run over by a controlling, liberal president and his cronies.

American conservatives have indeed had to rouse themselves out of a somewhat complacent sleep and get to work. They have done so formidably, as evidenced by the election, in 2010, of a large number of conservative members of Congress. But, more work awaits, and time is fleeting.

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Recently, an aggressive media campaign has been launched by Let’s Move, a government-funded fitness initiative led by Michelle Obama.

As you will see in this TV spot that’s airing, one of many, the message of the Let’s Move campaign is quite simple: Lying to your children is fine because it’s good for them.

Let’s Move should be relabeled Let’s Lie.

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Sydney Volanski, a 15-year-old who left the Girl Scouts of the USA and spoke out over the group directing the young members to liberal media group Media Matters for America, appeared on Fox and Friends to talk about the ordeal.

Sydney says the organization also promoted Planned Parenthood and abortion advocacy. In response she started a website, Speak Now: Girl Scouts, with the goal of exposing liberal bias within the Girl Scouts.

“Media”, the book given to the young girls which encouraged them to visit MMFA, is a publication made for those in grades six through eight that shows how they should process and understand the media messages around them. (more…)

With the new year just around the corner, Reason.tv is looking back at some of our favorite videos of 2011.

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I am pleased to announce the winner of the First Annual Breitbart “Ambiguous Entity of the Year” award.

Our choice was inspired by the most under-reported story of the year: the dark side of the Occupy Wall Street movement, which the media attempted to hide.

From its origins, the Occupy movement has been riddled by rapes, sexual assaults, and countless other serious crimes–many of which were not reported to police because Occupy organizers understood that public police reports and media dispatches about crimes would hurt the movement’s image.

And, as one Occupier noted, “This is a battle over images, not just over the park.”

Had the Tea Party been ravaged by rapes, rampant drug use, vandalism, or assaults, those crimes would not only have been over-reported, they would have stopped the Tea Party in its tracks.

The mainstream media did its best to invent Tea Party misdeeds–imaginary “N-words” and all–where none existed. Prominent celebrities, athletes—even conservative ones, who support the Tea Party’s aims—have kept a low profile in the Tea Party for fear of being judged by the mainstream media’s double standard.

Yet the media-savvy, media-embraced Occupy movement used shout-outs from President Obama, former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, rap impresario Russell Simmons, Alec Baldwin, Kanye West, Susan Sarandon, Roseanne Barr, Sean Lennon, Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, Tim Robbins, and Anne Hathaway to hide what was really going on at the makeshift encampments. (more…)

A very modern Christmas carol. Credit to Riley:

’Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that Saint Nicholas soon would be there.

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads;
And mamma in her ’kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled down for a long winter’s nap;

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below,
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer,
With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be Saint Nick.

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Shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941, Churchill went to Washington with his chiefs of staff to meet President Roosevelt and the American military leaders and coordinate plans for the defeat of the common enemy.  On Christmas Eve Churchill broadcast to the world from the White House on the 20th annual observation of the lighting of the community Christmas tree.

I spend this anniversary and festival far from my country, far from my family, yet I cannot truthfully say that I feel far from home.  Whether it be the ties of blood on my mother’s side, or the friendships I have developed here over many years of active life, or the commanding sentiment of comradeship in the common cause of great peoples who speak the same language, who kneel at the same altars and, to a very large extent, pursue the same ideals, I cannot feel myself a stranger here in the centre and at the summit of the United States.  I feel a sense of unity and fraternal association which, added to the kindliness of your welcome,  convinces me that I have a right to sit at your fireside and share your Christmas joys.

This is a strange Christmas Eve.  Almost the whole world is locked in deadly struggle, and, with the most terrible weapons which science can devise, the nations advance upon each other.  Ill would it be for us this Christmastide if we were not sure that no greed for the land or wealth of any other people, no vulgar ambition, no morbid lust for material gain at the expense of others, had led us to the field.

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Europe’s Left elites championed the introduction of the euro to “increase political cohesion” by building on the “cultural, religious and humanist inheritance of Europe”. But according to Evans-Ambrose Pritchard of the London Telegraph, as a result of that cohesion “almost 97 percent of the European Union’s population is now governed by conservative or Right-leaning coalitions or EU-imposed mandarins:

“The whole machinery of the European Union (EU) system is under the control of the Right, with variants of Rhenish corporatism in the Council, and pre-modern Hayekians at the European Central Bank (ECB). Whether you regard this Hegelian ascendancy as good or bad, it certainly has profound consequences.

For just as former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher protested at Bruges that “we have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to see them reimposed at a European level”, the Left might equally protest that they have not fought the long, hard struggle for worker rights in their own democracies to see social welfare rolled back by Brussels and Frankfurt.”

Pritchard offers numerous examples of the ascendency of conservative Europe. The most dramatic change is taking place in Italy, where the European Central Bank (ECB) forced the resignation of elected Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and his replacement with the ECB’s hand-picked technocrat, Mario Monti. Embattled by credit downgrades on Europe’s second most indebted nation and the doubling of interest rates; the Italian public has turned to the conservatives out of fears Italy might be the next nation to fall into Greek style chaos. This morning 85% of the Italian Parliament approved a $39 billion austerity budget that cut pensions, increased primary residence taxes, and cracked down on tax evaders. “We had to act in a hurry,” Labor and Welfare Minister Elsa Fornero told state-run television regarding Italian public finances. “We have been called to the sick-bed of a very ill man.”

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I don’t have a whole lot of sympathy for many of the people working on Wall Street these days, but the Occupy movement’s decision to solely target the private sector for financial corruption only distracted Americans from the real financial crisis – white collar crime.

According to recent Securities Exchange enforcement actions and news reports, financial corruption is also coming from government sponsored agencies and even Congress

As of Sept. 30, the Securities and Exchange Commission has filed a record 735 enforcement actions for the fiscal year, and of those 146 were related to investment advisers and companies – a 30 percent increase from last year. Broker-dealers also made up 112 of the actions, a 60 percent increase from before.

The SEC has also filed a lawsuit against executives with Fannie and Freddie Mae, saying that the two government-sponsored agencies played a significant role in creating the demand for sub-prime mortgages contributing to the 2008 financial crisis.

The fact of the matter is that white-collar crime, insider trading and unethical financial practices are rampant not only on Wall Street, but in government sponsored agencies and even Congress (check out Peter Schweizer’s new book, ‘Throw Them All Out’ which was recently featured by CBS’ 60 Minutes).

The word ‘greed’ doesn’t even come close to what corrupt brokers, financiers and politicians have done to this country. Criminal is more appropriate.

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