So what, exactly, can we eat?
It's a question I'd never expected to spend much time thinking about.
I thought those issues were in the past history of America. Well, we are repeating that history in China.
Now I think about it regularly. Media reports of the recent tainted baby milk powder disaster in China hint at the most severe damage: At last tally, eight infants have died and tens of thousands of others have suffered ill health (kidney stones) after consuming milk laced with melamine, an industrial chemical, that tests out as protein. It is a cheat. Don't put protein in your product, put poison.
It was the same cheat used on Cat and Dog food from China.
It is the reason that I avoid food products that contain food ingredients from China.
Look on the label. At least here in the USa, we have to tell you where it came from....
FD
But it's hard to capture the social element of this tragedy -- what happens when people can no longer trust that the food they're eating is safe.
Not sure whom to trust: Buying milk in
Shanghai, Sept. 22.
For one thing, you suddenly start spending a lot of extra time reading labels in the supermarket. Shortly after this scandal came to light, I found myself scrutinizing an array of cans of condensed milk at the local grocery store. In the U.S. I might have grabbed whichever brand my eye happened to fall on first. Not here. I stood there for a minute or two poring over the various labels for the right combination of brand name and country of origin. The choice came down to a well-known Western brand that had been manufactured in Qingdao, China, or a brand I'd never heard of from Thailand. Thailand won.
I later saw reports that some of the same Western brand's other dairy products had tested positive for nondangerous trace levels of melamine. The company has said such a minute amount of chemical could find its way into any food product, no one has been reported sick, and condensed milk isn't on the list of problem products. I still had a comfortable sense I'd made the right choice anyway.
Signs of the safety scare are everywhere. One acquaintance reported pouring soy milk over her breakfast cereal because all the supermarkets were out of foreign cow's milk on shopping day. Over the past month, I've received several emailed lists of foods that are supposedly safe or supposedly dangerous.
And all that is nothing compared to the worry in China itself, a fear of which we see only passing glances here. One friend recalls standing in a Hong Kong post office on a recent afternoon. She saw an elderly lady mailing 10 large tins of milk powder to mainland China -- a sign of the lengths to which parents are going to obtain safe baby milk.
Some people I know have been much more careful for much longer than others. The same friend who recently had to resort to soy milk in the mornings started changing her food-shopping habits years ago, after a local television station uncovered alleged safety problems with Chinese food imports sold in street markets. After years of enduring ribbing for buying costly Japanese eggs, she suddenly finds she doesn't need to defend such extravagance to her friends anymore.
Note here the expense. I and my friends are fortunate -- extremely so -- to be able to afford paying up to twice as much for, say, cream from France as we would for the locally made equivalent. Many other Hong Kongers are able to do the same. So while concern and frustration here are high, anger and panic are under control.
Not so in China. Chinese parents who can afford to, pick Western brands. The greatest toll is on the families who can't. These parents knew there was reason to be careful. A milk-powder adulteration scandal in 2004 (the protein was removed) claimed more than a dozen lives and sickened hundreds of babies with malnutrition. This time, parents had thought milk powder they bought in a store under what they believed to be a reputable brand would surely be safe. Now that it's not, whom can they trust?
Which is why Beijing's failure to clean up its food-safety act is so much more pernicious, and disgraceful, than at first it appears. This milk has poisoned thousands of infants with melamine. It also poisons the society at large with fear.
Mr. Sternberg is an editorial page writer for The Wall Street Journal Asia.
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Friday, October 10, 2008
FD: Healthcare is still MY issue. Everyone needs it and we could make it available to everyone of USa and then sell it abroad in do it yourself kits..
(CBS) To help you make an informed decision in the presidential election, CBS News is devoting a large part of our broadcasts until Nov. 4 to telling you where the candidates stand on major issues - from the war in Iraq to health insurance to education … and a lot more. Each piece will be an in-depth look at the issues facing the 44th president. In this installment, CBS News correspondent Seth Doane reports on how the proposed health care policies of Barack Obama and John McCain would affect you and your community.
Click here to see Where They Stand on more of the issues.
The Issue It's the barbeque that draws customers to The Hickory House just outside Columbus, Ohio. "Award-winning ribs, that's for sure!" said Randy Wolfe, the restaurant's general manager. But the employees keep coming back, too. The staff has worked here an average of 15 years. "Keeping these employees, keeping this consistency is important ... and health insurance is part of that?" Doane asked. "Yes," Wolfe said. But health-care benefits may soon be off the menu for Hickory House employees, and their boss.
In 1990, the restaurant picked up the check for the full cost of medical benefits for everyone. Now, the staff must pay half themselves, and only three of the 35 workers participate. "What we do to make it affordable for us - is we keep raising our deductible," Wolfe said. "Which, again, means more out-of-pocket for the employees."
That's more out of 25-year-old bartender Lisa Martensen's pocket - when she's already feeling the pinch. Making less than $17,000 a year, Martensen stretches to pay her $260 monthly premium. But she does it for one reason - so that her 3-year-old daughter, Madison, is covered. Can she continue to pay for health care? "Right now I'm saying yes … but if it continues to go up, then I say no," she said. Lunchtime server Candy Cooper had to say no years ago. She says she makes about $22,000 a year and can't afford the $400 a month the company health insurance would set her back. "I've checked into this and I can't swing it - I can't do it," she said. Doane asked: "Does that frustrate you? Does that worry you?" "Very frustrating," she said. Cooper is one of the 45 million Americans who simply go without insurance. When she recently got dizzy at work, an ambulance was called - but she didn't get in. "I didn't want to go to the hospital due to the medical costs," she said. And that worries her boss, who is counting on the next president to find a solution. "I don't have the answers. That's why we're hoping they do," Wolfe said. The Candidates Both Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain agree that health care costs are out of control - but they have radically different ideas on how to fix them. McCain's approach is all about driving down costs to make it more affordable. Under his plan, individuals would pay taxes on the health insurance benefits they receive from their employer. To offset that new cost - or to encourage people to go buy insurance on their own, McCain would provide a tax credit that could only be used for health care: $2,500 for individuals - double that for families. "I will give every family, every family in America, a $5,000 credit to buy their own health insurance policy and let them choose their own doctor," McCain said. "This will make insurance affordable to every American." Though today, the average family plan is worth $12,000. But McCain thinks these tax credits would spur market competition - as insurance companies vie for their piece of the tax credit money, cheaper health insurance options would be created. Obama's emphasis is on increasing access. He would give small businesses a tax credit to ease the burden of offering health insurance to their employees. And larger companies would be required to either provide insurance or pay into a national fund, called the "Health Insurance Exchange," which could offer more affordable options to those currently uninsured. "I will finally keep the promise of affordable, accessible health care for every single American," Obama said. "You'll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves." The Impact So, what's the potential impact of these proposals? CBS News checked in with a healthcare consultant at Towers Perrin to see how Martensen, Cooper and the Hickory House would fare under these plans. "I think Candy and Lisa are more alike than they are different - both of them are lower-wage employees who are currently finding health care unaffordable in its current state," the consultant, Ron Fontanetta, said. Though each candidate tackles the problem in different ways, both would give each of them a number of cheaper options. Under Obama's proposal, they would be able to choose from an array of plans through the National Exchange, and may qualify for subsidies as lower-income workers. Under McCain's proposal, both women could use their tax credit to buy healthcare on the open market. "Does the idea of having a tax credit seem appealing to you, where you could go out and buy your own insurance?" Doane asked. "It seems kind of scary, I think, really," Cooper said. "I just wouldn't know what I was choosing, what I was picking, whose policy I'm getting into." But Martensen likes the idea of more choices. "If you could have a scaled-down plan, which would cover you in case of emergency - but would cost a lot less each month, would you take that?" Doane asked. "If there was a way I could pay less and have less coverage for me, but maybe pay a little more and have coverage for her, I would do it," she said. But the biggest change may be for the Hickory House itself. "Under either proposal it really begs the question - does the Hickory House need to provide coverage any more? Both proposals obviate the need for a small employer - like the Hickory House - to be in the health care business at all," Fontanetta said. You'd think that'd be a relief to Wolfe. "I would like to go ahead and to be able to help the employees through our business with health insurance," he said. "Even though you spend a lot of time thinking, worrying about healthcare, you still want to be … part of offering it?" Doane asked. "I would still like to - I would like to have that option," he said. It's likely that larger employers, under both candidates' proposals, would stay in the health care game - to attract and retain good employees. But the only hope for the Hickory House is that a new president makes health care the first order of business.
© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Click here to see Where They Stand on more of the issues.
The Issue It's the barbeque that draws customers to The Hickory House just outside Columbus, Ohio. "Award-winning ribs, that's for sure!" said Randy Wolfe, the restaurant's general manager. But the employees keep coming back, too. The staff has worked here an average of 15 years. "Keeping these employees, keeping this consistency is important ... and health insurance is part of that?" Doane asked. "Yes," Wolfe said. But health-care benefits may soon be off the menu for Hickory House employees, and their boss.
In 1990, the restaurant picked up the check for the full cost of medical benefits for everyone. Now, the staff must pay half themselves, and only three of the 35 workers participate. "What we do to make it affordable for us - is we keep raising our deductible," Wolfe said. "Which, again, means more out-of-pocket for the employees."
That's more out of 25-year-old bartender Lisa Martensen's pocket - when she's already feeling the pinch. Making less than $17,000 a year, Martensen stretches to pay her $260 monthly premium. But she does it for one reason - so that her 3-year-old daughter, Madison, is covered. Can she continue to pay for health care? "Right now I'm saying yes … but if it continues to go up, then I say no," she said. Lunchtime server Candy Cooper had to say no years ago. She says she makes about $22,000 a year and can't afford the $400 a month the company health insurance would set her back. "I've checked into this and I can't swing it - I can't do it," she said. Doane asked: "Does that frustrate you? Does that worry you?" "Very frustrating," she said. Cooper is one of the 45 million Americans who simply go without insurance. When she recently got dizzy at work, an ambulance was called - but she didn't get in. "I didn't want to go to the hospital due to the medical costs," she said. And that worries her boss, who is counting on the next president to find a solution. "I don't have the answers. That's why we're hoping they do," Wolfe said. The Candidates Both Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain agree that health care costs are out of control - but they have radically different ideas on how to fix them. McCain's approach is all about driving down costs to make it more affordable. Under his plan, individuals would pay taxes on the health insurance benefits they receive from their employer. To offset that new cost - or to encourage people to go buy insurance on their own, McCain would provide a tax credit that could only be used for health care: $2,500 for individuals - double that for families. "I will give every family, every family in America, a $5,000 credit to buy their own health insurance policy and let them choose their own doctor," McCain said. "This will make insurance affordable to every American." Though today, the average family plan is worth $12,000. But McCain thinks these tax credits would spur market competition - as insurance companies vie for their piece of the tax credit money, cheaper health insurance options would be created. Obama's emphasis is on increasing access. He would give small businesses a tax credit to ease the burden of offering health insurance to their employees. And larger companies would be required to either provide insurance or pay into a national fund, called the "Health Insurance Exchange," which could offer more affordable options to those currently uninsured. "I will finally keep the promise of affordable, accessible health care for every single American," Obama said. "You'll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves." The Impact So, what's the potential impact of these proposals? CBS News checked in with a healthcare consultant at Towers Perrin to see how Martensen, Cooper and the Hickory House would fare under these plans. "I think Candy and Lisa are more alike than they are different - both of them are lower-wage employees who are currently finding health care unaffordable in its current state," the consultant, Ron Fontanetta, said. Though each candidate tackles the problem in different ways, both would give each of them a number of cheaper options. Under Obama's proposal, they would be able to choose from an array of plans through the National Exchange, and may qualify for subsidies as lower-income workers. Under McCain's proposal, both women could use their tax credit to buy healthcare on the open market. "Does the idea of having a tax credit seem appealing to you, where you could go out and buy your own insurance?" Doane asked. "It seems kind of scary, I think, really," Cooper said. "I just wouldn't know what I was choosing, what I was picking, whose policy I'm getting into." But Martensen likes the idea of more choices. "If you could have a scaled-down plan, which would cover you in case of emergency - but would cost a lot less each month, would you take that?" Doane asked. "If there was a way I could pay less and have less coverage for me, but maybe pay a little more and have coverage for her, I would do it," she said. But the biggest change may be for the Hickory House itself. "Under either proposal it really begs the question - does the Hickory House need to provide coverage any more? Both proposals obviate the need for a small employer - like the Hickory House - to be in the health care business at all," Fontanetta said. You'd think that'd be a relief to Wolfe. "I would like to go ahead and to be able to help the employees through our business with health insurance," he said. "Even though you spend a lot of time thinking, worrying about healthcare, you still want to be … part of offering it?" Doane asked. "I would still like to - I would like to have that option," he said. It's likely that larger employers, under both candidates' proposals, would stay in the health care game - to attract and retain good employees. But the only hope for the Hickory House is that a new president makes health care the first order of business.
© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Acorn --- Here is what Fox News says about it.
Could this just be the October Surprise?
Swift Boat Two right out of the GOP playbook?
ACORN stories are being generated by someone sending out PR press releases via PRNews Wires out of Fort Worth Texas.
PRNews wires are something I used to do for clients. See at the bottom.....Stanley Kurtz seems to be the original source of the story but someone is pushing it to the press.
And as I write this... I have the feeling that I have been here before?
Freddallas
ACORN Investigations Provide Rallying Cry for Republicans
John McCain and congressional Republicans are railing against ACORN, which is under investigation for voter fraud.
FOXNews.com
Thursday, October 09, 2008
The ongoing investigations into a controversial advocacy group that specializes in registering low-income voters are becoming a rallying cry for Republicans just weeks before Election Day.
John McCain said at a rally Thursday in Wisconsin that the voter-fraud allegations against The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, "must be investigated."
"No one should corrupt the most precious right we have. That is the right to vote," he said to applause.
His campaign later issued a statement highlighting Barack Obama's past legal work for the group, saying "he has a litany of concerning associations that should be fully examined."
Meanwhile, eight senators have demanded the Federal Housing Finance Agency cut off any funding that could wind up in ACORN's coffers. Late Thursday, House Republican Leader John Boehner demanded all federal funding to the group stop, saying the organization can't be trusted with one more taxpayer dollar.
"We're wasting way too much money in Washington, D.C., and this is just a perfect example of taxpayers' monies that are being flushed down the toilet and actually doing harm to our democracy," Republican Nevada Sen. John Ensign said.
But ACORN identifies itself as a non-partisan group that does not accept government funding. And Democrats say the accusations against ACORN amount to nothing more than election-year desperation.
"The idea that they are somehow doing some kind of an organized conspiracy to steal this campaign from John McCain is beyond silly. It's a waste of time and it's grasping at straws from a campaign that's not doing very well," Democratic strategist Bob Beckel said.
ACORN is facing investigations in more than 10 states, including Nevada -- where authorities raided the group's Las Vegas office Tuesday following claims that workers tried to fill out voter forms using the names of several Dallas Cowboys players.
ACORN released a statement saying: "ACORN staff reviews every single application submitted by our canvassers. Special, dedicated staff makes up to three phone calls attempting to reach the voter listed on EVERY SINGLE CARD before they are turned in to verify the information."
FOX News' Shannon Bream contributed to this report.
FREDDALLAS,
This is the last comment I will make about this campaign to you. The info about the foundation that Obama and Ayers worked together on did not completely surface until 10 days ago. That is why the complete story is just now coming out and did not come up in the primaries. Please refrain from sending out this type of info, because people have no use for it.
Obama link to ex-radical is honesty issue
By PHILIP ELLIOTT - 5 hours ago WAUKESHA, Wis. (AP) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain said Thursday that questions about Democratic rival Barack Obama's association with a former war protester linked to Vietnam-era bombings are part of a broader issue of honesty. In his strongest personal criticism since his faltering campaign began casting Obama as an unknown and unacceptable candidate, McCain told supporters that Obama had not been truthful in describing his relationship with former radical William Ayers. The Arizona senator also said Obama himself has "a clear radical, far-left pro-abortion record." McCain and the Republican National Committee also launched new Web and TV ads about Obama and Ayers. Loud cheers from 4,000 people gathered at a sports complex near Milwaukee greeted McCain's attacks over Ayers, who helped found the Weather Underground, a Vietnam protest group that bombed government buildings 40 years ago. Obama has noted that he was a child at the time and first met Ayers and his wife, ex-radical Bernadine Dohrn, a quarter-century later. "Look, we don't care about an old, washed-up terrorist and his wife," McCain said. "That's not the point here." "He's a terrorist!" a man in the audience screamed without making clear to whom he was referring. "We need to know the full extent of the relationship," McCain replied. Later, McCain told ABC News: "It's a factor about Sen. Obama's candor and truthfulness with the American people." Obama has denounced Ayers and his violent actions and views. He dismisses McCain's criticism as an effort to "score cheap political points." The Associated Press and other news organizations have reported that Obama and Ayers, now a college professor who lives in Obama's Chicago neighborhood, are not close but that they worked together on two nonprofit organizations from the mid-1990s to 2002. In addition, Ayers hosted a small meet-the-candidate event for Obama in 1995 as he first ran for the state Senate. David Axelrod, a senior campaign adviser, says Obama, who was a child living in Indonesia and Hawaii in the late 1960s and early 1970s, was not aware of Ayers' radical past at the time of that campaign event. Some McCain supporters have expressed skepticism about that. Some of those at the rally questioned why McCain was trailing Obama and why no one was talking about Obama's past associations. Obama's history with Ayers was explored during the primaries in news reports and in a campaign debate. The GOP campaign has resurrected it as the economic crisis deepened in recent days. Responding to McCain's criticism, Obama campaign spokesman Tommy Vietor said: "It's now clear that John McCain would rather launch angry, personal attacks than talk about the economy or defend his risky bailout scheme that hands over billions in taxpayer dollars to the same irresponsible Wall Street banks and lenders that got us into this mess, a scheme that guarantees taxpayers will lose money." One person at the rally here suggested McCain get tougher in his final debate with Obama next Wednesday: "I am begging you, sir." "Yes, I'll do that," McCain said. To press its argument, the McCain campaign also released a 90-second Web ad about Obama and Ayers. "Barack Obama and domestic terrorist Bill Ayers. Friends. They've worked together for years," the ad says. The ad also claims that one of the nonprofits on which Obama and Ayers worked was a radical education foundation. That educational foundation was The Annenberg Challenge. It was funded by the Annenberg Foundation, a charity set up by longtime Republican backer and newspaper publisher Walter Annenberg. Annenberg has died, but his wife has endorsed McCain this year. For his work on this educational project, Chicago gave Ayers its "Citizen of the Year" award in 1997. On Friday, the Republican National Committee will start running a TV ad in Indiana and Wisconsin that links Obama to Ayers and other Chicago figures. "The Chicago Way. Shady politics. That's Barack Obama's training," the ad says. McCain and his campaign have sought to raise doubts about Obama, who could become the nation's first black president. Supporters have used Obama's middle name, Hussein, during introductions of McCain and his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin this week - trying to remind voters that he shares a name with deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. The Obama campaign denounced the move, which also plays to Internet rumors that Obama is a Muslim, even though he grew up in a secular household and is a Christian. After the fact, the McCain campaign said in an e-mailed statement that it did not condone using the middle name. Palin joined McCain at the town hall - the first of two events in this swing state with 10 electoral votes - and blamed "mainstream media" for not asking Obama tough questions about his proposals. "Are Americans having an opportunity to ask all the questions and are we receiving straight answers from our opponent?" Palin asked. The crowd shouted, "No!" In a response for the Obama campaign, Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle said it was preposterous to suggest Obama hadn't been scrutinized during one of the toughest primaries and general elections in modern history. McCain also repeated the false claim that Palin opposed the so-called Bridge to Nowhere, for which she campaigned in her race for governor and accepted federal money to build. When the project drew national scorn as an example of wasteful spending, Congress withdrew its support for the bridge but Alaska kept the money for other projects. A poll released Wednesday by WISC-TV in Madison showed McCain trailing Obama by 10 points, the Arizona senator's largest deficit in Wisconsin since July when polls also showed Obama with a double-digit lead. "Do you know how many times the political pundits in the last two years have written off my campaign?" McCain asked. He later repeated the line at an airport rally in Mosinee. Palin had flown to Cincinnati. Associated Press writer Scott Bauer contributed to this report.
On the Net: * McCain campaign: http://www.johnmccain.com/* Obama campaign: http://www.barackobama.com/index.php
Here is the PAID NEWS WIRE STORY:
Mortgage Fallout has ACORN Roots to Presidential Candidate
Barack Obama has strong ties to the group that pressured banks into making high-risk loans
(WiredPRNews.com - Real Estate, Top Stories)
Fort Worth, TX (WiredPRNews.com)—
ACORN, which stands for Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, pressured banks into making mortgages to those who would otherwise not qualify for them, according to an October 7, 2008 article by Stanley Kurtz, which appeared on the website for National Review.
As all Americans are footing the bill for the $700 billion bailout to prevent the collapse the financial market, ACORN leader Madeline Talbot—who has close ties to Senator Obama—personally strong-armed banks into making mortgage loans to low income minorities in the Chicago area, according to the National Review article. Kurtz writes that ACORN intimidation tactics include showing up at the home of bankers, breaking into offices and flooding bank lobbies with protestors.
Talbot, according to the Kurtz article, was able to use a provision from the Community Reinvestment Act to coerce banks into lowering their credit standards by blocking the banks’ efforts to expand their business. The program expanded to the national level when prominent Obama advisor Jim Johnson—then the head of government-backed mortgage giant Fannie Mae—joined ACORN’s efforts to expand home ownership among minorities who normally would not qualify for a mortgage, according to the article.
Kurtz adds that the Obama is closely tied to ACORN because he gave $800,000 to the group to get out the vote when Obama kicked off his presidential campaign. In addition to this, the article indicates that Obama worked with ACORN on the Project VOTE effort, which registered 500,000 voters for the 1992 election.
Speaking of voter registration drives, ACORN is in hot water for allegedly submitting fraudulent voter registration cards, according to an October 8, 2008 Las Vegas Review-Journal.com article by Adrienne Packer and Molly Ball. On Tuesday, Nevada authorities raided the Las Vegas offices of ACORN and confiscated files as part of a voter fraud investigation.
According to the Review-Journal article, Nevada Secretary of State Ross Miller—a Democrat—stated that some of the registration forms raised red flags because they had names like Terrell Owens and Tony Romo.
Aside from the fraudulent forms, the article indicates that ACORN may have hired prisoners from a nearby halfway house to do some of the work. The effort, called Project VOTE, is similar to what Barack Obama worked on in 1992.
Jason Meeks · Filed Under Real Estate, Top Stories
-->Online Real Estate News Press Release Distribution - WiredPRNews.com
Friday, October 10, 2008
OK Who is this Guy?
:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Kurtz
Stanley Kurtz
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Stanley Kurtz is an American social commentator who identifies with the conservative movement. He is an adjunct fellow of the Hudson Institute and a Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, with a special interest in America's "culture wars." Kurtz writes regularly for publications such as National Review, Policy Review, the Weekly Standard, Wall Street Journal, and Commentary. [1] [2] Kurtz graduated from Haverford College and holds a Ph.D. in social anthropology from Harvard University. He did his field work in India and taught at Harvard and the University of Chicago. He has published extensively on family life, child rearing, religion, and psychology in various parts of the world. [3]
During the 2008 election cycle, he has published several pieces detailing the relationships between Barack Obama and various Chicago church leaders such as Jeremiah Wright as well as former member of the radical Weather Underground Organization William Ayers.[4][5]
In August 2008 Kurtz attempted to obtain the University of Illinois at Chicago's Annenberg records detailing the professional relationship between Obama and Ayers. Kurtz's efforts to explore the association between the two men has been controversial. Their relationship was characterized as "a tenuous one" by the Washington Post in February 2008. [6]
In September 2008 Kurtz published his initial findings from his study of the Annenberg records, writing, "As [Chicago Annenberg Challenge] chairman, Mr. Obama was lending moral and financial support to Mr. Ayers and his radical circle." Kurtz also wrote, "The CAC's agenda flowed from Mr. Ayers's educational philosophy, which called for infusing students and their parents with a radical political commitment, and which downplayed achievement tests in favor of activism." According to Kurtz, the educational program on which Obama and Ayers collaborated was ultimately unsuccessful: "CAC's in-house evaluators comprehensively studied the effects of its grants on the test scores of Chicago public-school students. They found no evidence of educational improvement."[7]
Stanley Kurtz's reporting became the subject of an "Obama Action Wire" issued by the Obama campaign. This release, issued in advance of Kurtz's August 2008 appearance on the popular Chicago radio show, "Extension 720 with Milt Rosenberg," requested Obama supporters to call WGN radio prior to his appearance and ask them not to allow Kurtz to on the air [8], and to call into the show "Us[ing] the talking points above" and "report back on your call" [9]. Zack Christenson, executive producer of "Extension 720 with Milt Rosenburg," told the Chicago Tribune that the Obama campaign was asked to have someone appear on the show, and declined the request. [10] . Christenson further said that this was the largest response from a campaign that Extension 720 has ever received, stating "This is really unprecedented with the show, the way that people are flooding the calls and our email boxes." [10] A followup Chicago Tribune story, "Obama campaign flubs a defense", said that "The grass-roots response was weak," but also editorialized that "Kurtz really had nothing new to add" to the Obama–Ayers controversy. [11]
========================== Bottom Line ===============================
CNN’s Drew Griffin Does a Real Fact-Check on Obama/Ayers Connection
By Matthew Balan (Bio Archive)October 7, 2008 - 16:21 ET
During a report on Monday’s Anderson Cooper 360 program, CNN investigative correspondent Drew Griffin presented many of the missing details about the relationship between Barack Obama and left-wing terrorist William Ayers that two earlier "Truth Squad" reports on the network on Sunday and Monday omitted. Griffin stated that despite the spin of the Obama campaign and their mainstream media supporters, "...the relationship between Obama and Ayers went much deeper, ran much longer, and was much more political than Obama said."
Host Anderson Cooper introduced Griffin’s report, which began 19 minutes into the 10 pm Eastern hour, as one of the CNN program’s "Keeping Them Honest" features.
Oddly, a on-screen graphic that read "The Dow Plunges," which had nothing to do with the subject of the segment, ran during its entirety. The correspondent began by repeating Ayers and his wife Bernadine Dohrn’s background in the Weather Underground, "an anti-Vietnam War group that bombed federal buildings, including the U.S. Capitol and the Pentagon." He then gave Obama’s early characterization of his relationship with the 1960's radical, that the Democrat "confirmed... that he knew Ayers, and, when pressed, said they served on a charitable foundation board together, and Obama condemned Ayers' support of violence."
Griffin then outlined how "the relationship between Obama and Ayers went much deeper, ran much longer, and was much more political than Obama said." After playing a sound bite from senior Obama campaign adviser Anita Dunn, who thought it was "just wrong, and, frankly, it's quite unfair" that Obama’s opponents were going after her candidate "because of Bill Ayers' past," the CNN correspondent introduced how Obama and Ayers’ "paths repeatedly crossed" as members of the board of the Annenberg Challenge Project, where for seven years, "Bill Ayers and Obama, among many others, worked on funding for education projects, including some experiments supported by Ayers."
In another sound bite, National Review Online’s Stanley Kurtz characterized how this funding worked: "Instead of giving money directly to schools, they gave men to what they called external partners, and these external partners were often pretty radical community organizer groups."
Later, Griffin detailed how Ayers and Obama were also board members for the Woods Fund, another foundation which donated money to liberal groups: "Among its recipients -- Jeremiah Wright's Trinity United Church, where Obama attended, and a children and family justice center where Ayers' wife worked."
The CNN correspondent concluded his report with details about the 1995 meeting at Ayers’ house where then-Illinois State Senator Alice Palmer introduced Obama as her heir-apparent: "In 1995, months after the little-known Barack Obama became Annenberg Project chair, [Illinois] State Senator Alice Palmer introduced the young Obama as her political heir-apparent. Where was that introduction made? At the home of the '60s radicals Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn."
Dunn, in another sound bite, tried to portray this meeting as innocent: "A Democratic state senator organizes a meeting of her supporters at the house of another one of her supporters. What is the problem here, Drew? It is the worst kind of inference and the worst kind of politics to say that, somehow, that says something about Barack Obama."
However, after his report concluded, Griffin countered that "this meeting at Bill Ayers' home has been classified in many different ways. What I can tell you from two people who were actually there is: number one, former State Senator Alice Palmer says she in no way organized this meeting. She was invited, and attended it briefly. And, Dr. Quinton Young, a retired doctor, told us this indeed was Barack Obama's political coming-out party and it was hosted by Bill Ayers."
The full transcript of Drew Griffin’s report from Monday’s Anderson Cooper 360:
SARAH PALIN: It turns out one of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers.
(Crowd Boos)
PALIN: And, according to The New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that quote,'launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol.'
ANDERSON COOPER: Well, that, of course, is Sarah Palin today on the stump spearheading this new effort by the McCain campaign to raise doubts about Barack Obama. Now, critics say they're simply trying to change the focus from the economy to this issue back on Obama. But, in this case, they're linking him to a '60s radical, Bill Ayers. Supporters of the McCain campaign say, look, this is all fair game. In a debate earlier this year, Barack Obama described Ayers as quote, 'a guy who lives in my neighborhood,' and with whom he served on a board. Now, the Obama campaign is clearly trying to play down any allegations of a relationship between these
two men, and, just as clearly, the McCain is trying to play up allegations of a relationship. So, what's the truth? CNN Special Investigations Unit correspondent Drew Griffin is 'Keeping Them Honest.'
DREW GRIFFIN (voice-over): Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn, in the 1960s and '70s, were radicals -- members of the Weather Underground, an anti-Vietnam War group that bombed federal buildings, including the U.S. Capitol and the Pentagon. On the run for years, the case against them was thrown out, due to illegal wiretaps and prosecutor misconduct. Ayers has never repented and has said, as late
as 2001, he wished he had done more to stop the war.
Barack Obama confirmed during a primary debate that he knew Ayers, and, when pressed, said they served on a charitable foundation board together, and Obama condemned Ayers' support of violence. But the relationship between Obama and Ayers went much deeper, ran much longer, and was much more political than Obama said.
ANITA DUNN, SENIOR OBAMA CAMPAIGN ADVISER: What they are arguing is that, somehow, the fact that these two people who served -- both [as] educational reformers in Chicago, both of whom did have their paths cross professionally, as well as -- as neighbors occasionally, that, somehow, this association is a problem for Barack Obama because of Bill Ayers' past and things that happened in the 1960s, when Barack Obama was 7 years
old. And that's just wrong, and, frankly, it's quite unfair.
GRIFFIN: One place their paths repeatedly crossed, according to a CNN review of board minutes and other records, was Chicago's Annenberg Challenge Project, where a $50 million grant from the Annenberg Foundation matched locally-raised funds to improve schools. According to participants and project records, Bill Ayers fought to bring the Annenberg grant to Chicago. Barack Obama was recruited as its chair. For seven years, Bill Ayers and Obama, among many others, worked on funding for education projects, including some experiments supported by Ayers.
Stanley Kurtz, a conservative researcher for the Ethics and Public Policy Center, has also been reviewing the recently released records of Chicago's Annenberg Challenge.
STANLEY KURTZ, NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE: Instead of giving money directly to schools, they gave men to what they called external partners, and these external partners were often pretty radical community organizer groups.
GRIFFIN: And the board gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to Bill Ayers' Small Schools Project promoting alternative education, like the Peace School, with a curriculum centered around a United Nations theme, and another school where the focus was African-American studies.
GRIFFIN: (on-camera): And this was directly funded by Annenberg?
KURTZ: Oh, yes.
GRIFFIN: Under Obama's chairmanship?
KURTZ: Oh, yes, and the specific job of the board of directors was to give out the money.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): While continuing work on the Annenberg Challenge, Barack Obama and Bill Ayers also served together on a second charitable foundation, the Woods Fund. Among its recipients -- Jeremiah Wright's Trinity United Church, where Obama attended, and a children and family justice center where Ayers' wife worked. Ayers has strong defenders in Chicago, among them Richard Daley, the mayor, who called Ayers a valued member of the Chicago community. The city gave Ayers its Citizen of the Year award in 1997 for his work on the Annenberg Project.
For Obama, the chairmanship of the $100 million Annenberg board helped vault him from South Side Chicago lawyer to political player, and that, too, has another connection to Bill Ayers. In 1995, months after the little-known Barack Obama became Annenberg Project chair, [Illinois] State Senator Alice Palmer introduced the young Obama as her political heir-apparent. Where was that introduction made? At the home of the '60s radicals Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn. The Obama campaign again says it is just a coincidence.
DUNN: A Democratic state senator organizes a meeting of her supporters at the house of another one of her supporters. What is the problem here, Drew? It is the worst kind of inference and the worst kind of politics to say that, somehow, that says something about Barack Obama.
GRIFFIN (on-camera): Anderson, this meeting at Bill Ayers' home has been classified in many different ways. What I can tell you from two people who were actually there is: number one, former State Senator Alice Palmer says she in no way organized this meeting. She was invited, and attended it briefly. And, Dr. QuintonYoung, a retired doctor, told us this indeed was Barack Obama's political coming-out party and it was hosted by Bill Ayers.
COOPER: So, Drew -- bottom line, if Obama and Ayers worked together with others to, I guess, improve schools, what exactly is the McCain/Palin camp saying is wrong with -- with this relationship, or this working relationship, or however you want to characterize it?
GRIFFIN: Well, Anderson, I haven't contacted the McCain campaign on this issue. What they're saying on the stump is the same thing that Hillary Clinton brought up during the primary campaign. It is the issue of trust. You know, by raising this issue of Bill Ayers, and whether or not Barack Obama was hanging around with him, palling around with him, or just working with him -- Bill Ayers, in the '60s, had a very, very different view of the United States that many Americans did. A lot of Americans were against the Vietnam War, but not a lot of Americans formed a group and started bombing things because of it. Now, they're trying to say that that raises judgment issues on Barack Obama, which has been the tag other campaigns -- now McCain's, have been trying to peg on him ever since he started running for president.
COOPER: But Barack Obama has publicly stated he does not agree with this guy, correct?
GRIFFIN: Well, he has said that he does -- I forget his exact words, but he certainly deplores the -- the violence in the past.
COOPER: Right.
GRIFFIN: I haven't been able to ask him directly about the relationship he has or had with -- with Bill Ayers.
COOPER: All right, Drew Griffin, thanks very much.
—Matthew Balan is a news analyst at the Media Research Center.
Swift Boat Two right out of the GOP playbook?
ACORN stories are being generated by someone sending out PR press releases via PRNews Wires out of Fort Worth Texas.
PRNews wires are something I used to do for clients. See at the bottom.....Stanley Kurtz seems to be the original source of the story but someone is pushing it to the press.
And as I write this... I have the feeling that I have been here before?
Freddallas
ACORN Investigations Provide Rallying Cry for Republicans
John McCain and congressional Republicans are railing against ACORN, which is under investigation for voter fraud.
FOXNews.com
Thursday, October 09, 2008
The ongoing investigations into a controversial advocacy group that specializes in registering low-income voters are becoming a rallying cry for Republicans just weeks before Election Day.
John McCain said at a rally Thursday in Wisconsin that the voter-fraud allegations against The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, "must be investigated."
"No one should corrupt the most precious right we have. That is the right to vote," he said to applause.
His campaign later issued a statement highlighting Barack Obama's past legal work for the group, saying "he has a litany of concerning associations that should be fully examined."
Meanwhile, eight senators have demanded the Federal Housing Finance Agency cut off any funding that could wind up in ACORN's coffers. Late Thursday, House Republican Leader John Boehner demanded all federal funding to the group stop, saying the organization can't be trusted with one more taxpayer dollar.
"We're wasting way too much money in Washington, D.C., and this is just a perfect example of taxpayers' monies that are being flushed down the toilet and actually doing harm to our democracy," Republican Nevada Sen. John Ensign said.
But ACORN identifies itself as a non-partisan group that does not accept government funding. And Democrats say the accusations against ACORN amount to nothing more than election-year desperation.
"The idea that they are somehow doing some kind of an organized conspiracy to steal this campaign from John McCain is beyond silly. It's a waste of time and it's grasping at straws from a campaign that's not doing very well," Democratic strategist Bob Beckel said.
ACORN is facing investigations in more than 10 states, including Nevada -- where authorities raided the group's Las Vegas office Tuesday following claims that workers tried to fill out voter forms using the names of several Dallas Cowboys players.
ACORN released a statement saying: "ACORN staff reviews every single application submitted by our canvassers. Special, dedicated staff makes up to three phone calls attempting to reach the voter listed on EVERY SINGLE CARD before they are turned in to verify the information."
FOX News' Shannon Bream contributed to this report.
FREDDALLAS,
This is the last comment I will make about this campaign to you. The info about the foundation that Obama and Ayers worked together on did not completely surface until 10 days ago. That is why the complete story is just now coming out and did not come up in the primaries. Please refrain from sending out this type of info, because people have no use for it.
Obama link to ex-radical is honesty issue
By PHILIP ELLIOTT - 5 hours ago WAUKESHA, Wis. (AP) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain said Thursday that questions about Democratic rival Barack Obama's association with a former war protester linked to Vietnam-era bombings are part of a broader issue of honesty. In his strongest personal criticism since his faltering campaign began casting Obama as an unknown and unacceptable candidate, McCain told supporters that Obama had not been truthful in describing his relationship with former radical William Ayers. The Arizona senator also said Obama himself has "a clear radical, far-left pro-abortion record." McCain and the Republican National Committee also launched new Web and TV ads about Obama and Ayers. Loud cheers from 4,000 people gathered at a sports complex near Milwaukee greeted McCain's attacks over Ayers, who helped found the Weather Underground, a Vietnam protest group that bombed government buildings 40 years ago. Obama has noted that he was a child at the time and first met Ayers and his wife, ex-radical Bernadine Dohrn, a quarter-century later. "Look, we don't care about an old, washed-up terrorist and his wife," McCain said. "That's not the point here." "He's a terrorist!" a man in the audience screamed without making clear to whom he was referring. "We need to know the full extent of the relationship," McCain replied. Later, McCain told ABC News: "It's a factor about Sen. Obama's candor and truthfulness with the American people." Obama has denounced Ayers and his violent actions and views. He dismisses McCain's criticism as an effort to "score cheap political points." The Associated Press and other news organizations have reported that Obama and Ayers, now a college professor who lives in Obama's Chicago neighborhood, are not close but that they worked together on two nonprofit organizations from the mid-1990s to 2002. In addition, Ayers hosted a small meet-the-candidate event for Obama in 1995 as he first ran for the state Senate. David Axelrod, a senior campaign adviser, says Obama, who was a child living in Indonesia and Hawaii in the late 1960s and early 1970s, was not aware of Ayers' radical past at the time of that campaign event. Some McCain supporters have expressed skepticism about that. Some of those at the rally questioned why McCain was trailing Obama and why no one was talking about Obama's past associations. Obama's history with Ayers was explored during the primaries in news reports and in a campaign debate. The GOP campaign has resurrected it as the economic crisis deepened in recent days. Responding to McCain's criticism, Obama campaign spokesman Tommy Vietor said: "It's now clear that John McCain would rather launch angry, personal attacks than talk about the economy or defend his risky bailout scheme that hands over billions in taxpayer dollars to the same irresponsible Wall Street banks and lenders that got us into this mess, a scheme that guarantees taxpayers will lose money." One person at the rally here suggested McCain get tougher in his final debate with Obama next Wednesday: "I am begging you, sir." "Yes, I'll do that," McCain said. To press its argument, the McCain campaign also released a 90-second Web ad about Obama and Ayers. "Barack Obama and domestic terrorist Bill Ayers. Friends. They've worked together for years," the ad says. The ad also claims that one of the nonprofits on which Obama and Ayers worked was a radical education foundation. That educational foundation was The Annenberg Challenge. It was funded by the Annenberg Foundation, a charity set up by longtime Republican backer and newspaper publisher Walter Annenberg. Annenberg has died, but his wife has endorsed McCain this year. For his work on this educational project, Chicago gave Ayers its "Citizen of the Year" award in 1997. On Friday, the Republican National Committee will start running a TV ad in Indiana and Wisconsin that links Obama to Ayers and other Chicago figures. "The Chicago Way. Shady politics. That's Barack Obama's training," the ad says. McCain and his campaign have sought to raise doubts about Obama, who could become the nation's first black president. Supporters have used Obama's middle name, Hussein, during introductions of McCain and his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin this week - trying to remind voters that he shares a name with deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. The Obama campaign denounced the move, which also plays to Internet rumors that Obama is a Muslim, even though he grew up in a secular household and is a Christian. After the fact, the McCain campaign said in an e-mailed statement that it did not condone using the middle name. Palin joined McCain at the town hall - the first of two events in this swing state with 10 electoral votes - and blamed "mainstream media" for not asking Obama tough questions about his proposals. "Are Americans having an opportunity to ask all the questions and are we receiving straight answers from our opponent?" Palin asked. The crowd shouted, "No!" In a response for the Obama campaign, Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle said it was preposterous to suggest Obama hadn't been scrutinized during one of the toughest primaries and general elections in modern history. McCain also repeated the false claim that Palin opposed the so-called Bridge to Nowhere, for which she campaigned in her race for governor and accepted federal money to build. When the project drew national scorn as an example of wasteful spending, Congress withdrew its support for the bridge but Alaska kept the money for other projects. A poll released Wednesday by WISC-TV in Madison showed McCain trailing Obama by 10 points, the Arizona senator's largest deficit in Wisconsin since July when polls also showed Obama with a double-digit lead. "Do you know how many times the political pundits in the last two years have written off my campaign?" McCain asked. He later repeated the line at an airport rally in Mosinee. Palin had flown to Cincinnati. Associated Press writer Scott Bauer contributed to this report.
On the Net: * McCain campaign: http://www.johnmccain.com/
Here is the PAID NEWS WIRE STORY:
Mortgage Fallout has ACORN Roots to Presidential Candidate
Barack Obama has strong ties to the group that pressured banks into making high-risk loans
(WiredPRNews.com - Real Estate, Top Stories)
Fort Worth, TX (WiredPRNews.com)—
ACORN, which stands for Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, pressured banks into making mortgages to those who would otherwise not qualify for them, according to an October 7, 2008 article by Stanley Kurtz, which appeared on the website for National Review.
As all Americans are footing the bill for the $700 billion bailout to prevent the collapse the financial market, ACORN leader Madeline Talbot—who has close ties to Senator Obama—personally strong-armed banks into making mortgage loans to low income minorities in the Chicago area, according to the National Review article. Kurtz writes that ACORN intimidation tactics include showing up at the home of bankers, breaking into offices and flooding bank lobbies with protestors.
Talbot, according to the Kurtz article, was able to use a provision from the Community Reinvestment Act to coerce banks into lowering their credit standards by blocking the banks’ efforts to expand their business. The program expanded to the national level when prominent Obama advisor Jim Johnson—then the head of government-backed mortgage giant Fannie Mae—joined ACORN’s efforts to expand home ownership among minorities who normally would not qualify for a mortgage, according to the article.
Kurtz adds that the Obama is closely tied to ACORN because he gave $800,000 to the group to get out the vote when Obama kicked off his presidential campaign. In addition to this, the article indicates that Obama worked with ACORN on the Project VOTE effort, which registered 500,000 voters for the 1992 election.
Speaking of voter registration drives, ACORN is in hot water for allegedly submitting fraudulent voter registration cards, according to an October 8, 2008 Las Vegas Review-Journal.com article by Adrienne Packer and Molly Ball. On Tuesday, Nevada authorities raided the Las Vegas offices of ACORN and confiscated files as part of a voter fraud investigation.
According to the Review-Journal article, Nevada Secretary of State Ross Miller—a Democrat—stated that some of the registration forms raised red flags because they had names like Terrell Owens and Tony Romo.
Aside from the fraudulent forms, the article indicates that ACORN may have hired prisoners from a nearby halfway house to do some of the work. The effort, called Project VOTE, is similar to what Barack Obama worked on in 1992.
Jason Meeks · Filed Under Real Estate, Top Stories
-->Online Real Estate News Press Release Distribution - WiredPRNews.com
Friday, October 10, 2008
OK Who is this Guy?
:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Kurtz
Stanley Kurtz
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Stanley Kurtz is an American social commentator who identifies with the conservative movement. He is an adjunct fellow of the Hudson Institute and a Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, with a special interest in America's "culture wars." Kurtz writes regularly for publications such as National Review, Policy Review, the Weekly Standard, Wall Street Journal, and Commentary. [1] [2] Kurtz graduated from Haverford College and holds a Ph.D. in social anthropology from Harvard University. He did his field work in India and taught at Harvard and the University of Chicago. He has published extensively on family life, child rearing, religion, and psychology in various parts of the world. [3]
During the 2008 election cycle, he has published several pieces detailing the relationships between Barack Obama and various Chicago church leaders such as Jeremiah Wright as well as former member of the radical Weather Underground Organization William Ayers.[4][5]
In August 2008 Kurtz attempted to obtain the University of Illinois at Chicago's Annenberg records detailing the professional relationship between Obama and Ayers. Kurtz's efforts to explore the association between the two men has been controversial. Their relationship was characterized as "a tenuous one" by the Washington Post in February 2008. [6]
In September 2008 Kurtz published his initial findings from his study of the Annenberg records, writing, "As [Chicago Annenberg Challenge] chairman, Mr. Obama was lending moral and financial support to Mr. Ayers and his radical circle." Kurtz also wrote, "The CAC's agenda flowed from Mr. Ayers's educational philosophy, which called for infusing students and their parents with a radical political commitment, and which downplayed achievement tests in favor of activism." According to Kurtz, the educational program on which Obama and Ayers collaborated was ultimately unsuccessful: "CAC's in-house evaluators comprehensively studied the effects of its grants on the test scores of Chicago public-school students. They found no evidence of educational improvement."[7]
Stanley Kurtz's reporting became the subject of an "Obama Action Wire" issued by the Obama campaign. This release, issued in advance of Kurtz's August 2008 appearance on the popular Chicago radio show, "Extension 720 with Milt Rosenberg," requested Obama supporters to call WGN radio prior to his appearance and ask them not to allow Kurtz to on the air [8], and to call into the show "Us[ing] the talking points above" and "report back on your call" [9]. Zack Christenson, executive producer of "Extension 720 with Milt Rosenburg," told the Chicago Tribune that the Obama campaign was asked to have someone appear on the show, and declined the request. [10] . Christenson further said that this was the largest response from a campaign that Extension 720 has ever received, stating "This is really unprecedented with the show, the way that people are flooding the calls and our email boxes." [10] A followup Chicago Tribune story, "Obama campaign flubs a defense", said that "The grass-roots response was weak," but also editorialized that "Kurtz really had nothing new to add" to the Obama–Ayers controversy. [11]
========================== Bottom Line ===============================
CNN’s Drew Griffin Does a Real Fact-Check on Obama/Ayers Connection
By Matthew Balan (Bio Archive)October 7, 2008 - 16:21 ET
During a report on Monday’s Anderson Cooper 360 program, CNN investigative correspondent Drew Griffin presented many of the missing details about the relationship between Barack Obama and left-wing terrorist William Ayers that two earlier "Truth Squad" reports on the network on Sunday and Monday omitted. Griffin stated that despite the spin of the Obama campaign and their mainstream media supporters, "...the relationship between Obama and Ayers went much deeper, ran much longer, and was much more political than Obama said."
Host Anderson Cooper introduced Griffin’s report, which began 19 minutes into the 10 pm Eastern hour, as one of the CNN program’s "Keeping Them Honest" features.
Oddly, a on-screen graphic that read "The Dow Plunges," which had nothing to do with the subject of the segment, ran during its entirety. The correspondent began by repeating Ayers and his wife Bernadine Dohrn’s background in the Weather Underground, "an anti-Vietnam War group that bombed federal buildings, including the U.S. Capitol and the Pentagon." He then gave Obama’s early characterization of his relationship with the 1960's radical, that the Democrat "confirmed... that he knew Ayers, and, when pressed, said they served on a charitable foundation board together, and Obama condemned Ayers' support of violence."
Griffin then outlined how "the relationship between Obama and Ayers went much deeper, ran much longer, and was much more political than Obama said." After playing a sound bite from senior Obama campaign adviser Anita Dunn, who thought it was "just wrong, and, frankly, it's quite unfair" that Obama’s opponents were going after her candidate "because of Bill Ayers' past," the CNN correspondent introduced how Obama and Ayers’ "paths repeatedly crossed" as members of the board of the Annenberg Challenge Project, where for seven years, "Bill Ayers and Obama, among many others, worked on funding for education projects, including some experiments supported by Ayers."
In another sound bite, National Review Online’s Stanley Kurtz characterized how this funding worked: "Instead of giving money directly to schools, they gave men to what they called external partners, and these external partners were often pretty radical community organizer groups."
Later, Griffin detailed how Ayers and Obama were also board members for the Woods Fund, another foundation which donated money to liberal groups: "Among its recipients -- Jeremiah Wright's Trinity United Church, where Obama attended, and a children and family justice center where Ayers' wife worked."
The CNN correspondent concluded his report with details about the 1995 meeting at Ayers’ house where then-Illinois State Senator Alice Palmer introduced Obama as her heir-apparent: "In 1995, months after the little-known Barack Obama became Annenberg Project chair, [Illinois] State Senator Alice Palmer introduced the young Obama as her political heir-apparent. Where was that introduction made? At the home of the '60s radicals Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn."
Dunn, in another sound bite, tried to portray this meeting as innocent: "A Democratic state senator organizes a meeting of her supporters at the house of another one of her supporters. What is the problem here, Drew? It is the worst kind of inference and the worst kind of politics to say that, somehow, that says something about Barack Obama."
However, after his report concluded, Griffin countered that "this meeting at Bill Ayers' home has been classified in many different ways. What I can tell you from two people who were actually there is: number one, former State Senator Alice Palmer says she in no way organized this meeting. She was invited, and attended it briefly. And, Dr. Quinton Young, a retired doctor, told us this indeed was Barack Obama's political coming-out party and it was hosted by Bill Ayers."
The full transcript of Drew Griffin’s report from Monday’s Anderson Cooper 360:
SARAH PALIN: It turns out one of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers.
(Crowd Boos)
PALIN: And, according to The New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that quote,'launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol.'
ANDERSON COOPER: Well, that, of course, is Sarah Palin today on the stump spearheading this new effort by the McCain campaign to raise doubts about Barack Obama. Now, critics say they're simply trying to change the focus from the economy to this issue back on Obama. But, in this case, they're linking him to a '60s radical, Bill Ayers. Supporters of the McCain campaign say, look, this is all fair game. In a debate earlier this year, Barack Obama described Ayers as quote, 'a guy who lives in my neighborhood,' and with whom he served on a board. Now, the Obama campaign is clearly trying to play down any allegations of a relationship between these
two men, and, just as clearly, the McCain is trying to play up allegations of a relationship. So, what's the truth? CNN Special Investigations Unit correspondent Drew Griffin is 'Keeping Them Honest.'
DREW GRIFFIN (voice-over): Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn, in the 1960s and '70s, were radicals -- members of the Weather Underground, an anti-Vietnam War group that bombed federal buildings, including the U.S. Capitol and the Pentagon. On the run for years, the case against them was thrown out, due to illegal wiretaps and prosecutor misconduct. Ayers has never repented and has said, as late
as 2001, he wished he had done more to stop the war.
Barack Obama confirmed during a primary debate that he knew Ayers, and, when pressed, said they served on a charitable foundation board together, and Obama condemned Ayers' support of violence. But the relationship between Obama and Ayers went much deeper, ran much longer, and was much more political than Obama said.
ANITA DUNN, SENIOR OBAMA CAMPAIGN ADVISER: What they are arguing is that, somehow, the fact that these two people who served -- both [as] educational reformers in Chicago, both of whom did have their paths cross professionally, as well as -- as neighbors occasionally, that, somehow, this association is a problem for Barack Obama because of Bill Ayers' past and things that happened in the 1960s, when Barack Obama was 7 years
old. And that's just wrong, and, frankly, it's quite unfair.
GRIFFIN: One place their paths repeatedly crossed, according to a CNN review of board minutes and other records, was Chicago's Annenberg Challenge Project, where a $50 million grant from the Annenberg Foundation matched locally-raised funds to improve schools. According to participants and project records, Bill Ayers fought to bring the Annenberg grant to Chicago. Barack Obama was recruited as its chair. For seven years, Bill Ayers and Obama, among many others, worked on funding for education projects, including some experiments supported by Ayers.
Stanley Kurtz, a conservative researcher for the Ethics and Public Policy Center, has also been reviewing the recently released records of Chicago's Annenberg Challenge.
STANLEY KURTZ, NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE: Instead of giving money directly to schools, they gave men to what they called external partners, and these external partners were often pretty radical community organizer groups.
GRIFFIN: And the board gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to Bill Ayers' Small Schools Project promoting alternative education, like the Peace School, with a curriculum centered around a United Nations theme, and another school where the focus was African-American studies.
GRIFFIN: (on-camera): And this was directly funded by Annenberg?
KURTZ: Oh, yes.
GRIFFIN: Under Obama's chairmanship?
KURTZ: Oh, yes, and the specific job of the board of directors was to give out the money.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): While continuing work on the Annenberg Challenge, Barack Obama and Bill Ayers also served together on a second charitable foundation, the Woods Fund. Among its recipients -- Jeremiah Wright's Trinity United Church, where Obama attended, and a children and family justice center where Ayers' wife worked. Ayers has strong defenders in Chicago, among them Richard Daley, the mayor, who called Ayers a valued member of the Chicago community. The city gave Ayers its Citizen of the Year award in 1997 for his work on the Annenberg Project.
For Obama, the chairmanship of the $100 million Annenberg board helped vault him from South Side Chicago lawyer to political player, and that, too, has another connection to Bill Ayers. In 1995, months after the little-known Barack Obama became Annenberg Project chair, [Illinois] State Senator Alice Palmer introduced the young Obama as her political heir-apparent. Where was that introduction made? At the home of the '60s radicals Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn. The Obama campaign again says it is just a coincidence.
DUNN: A Democratic state senator organizes a meeting of her supporters at the house of another one of her supporters. What is the problem here, Drew? It is the worst kind of inference and the worst kind of politics to say that, somehow, that says something about Barack Obama.
GRIFFIN (on-camera): Anderson, this meeting at Bill Ayers' home has been classified in many different ways. What I can tell you from two people who were actually there is: number one, former State Senator Alice Palmer says she in no way organized this meeting. She was invited, and attended it briefly. And, Dr. QuintonYoung, a retired doctor, told us this indeed was Barack Obama's political coming-out party and it was hosted by Bill Ayers.
COOPER: So, Drew -- bottom line, if Obama and Ayers worked together with others to, I guess, improve schools, what exactly is the McCain/Palin camp saying is wrong with -- with this relationship, or this working relationship, or however you want to characterize it?
GRIFFIN: Well, Anderson, I haven't contacted the McCain campaign on this issue. What they're saying on the stump is the same thing that Hillary Clinton brought up during the primary campaign. It is the issue of trust. You know, by raising this issue of Bill Ayers, and whether or not Barack Obama was hanging around with him, palling around with him, or just working with him -- Bill Ayers, in the '60s, had a very, very different view of the United States that many Americans did. A lot of Americans were against the Vietnam War, but not a lot of Americans formed a group and started bombing things because of it. Now, they're trying to say that that raises judgment issues on Barack Obama, which has been the tag other campaigns -- now McCain's, have been trying to peg on him ever since he started running for president.
COOPER: But Barack Obama has publicly stated he does not agree with this guy, correct?
GRIFFIN: Well, he has said that he does -- I forget his exact words, but he certainly deplores the -- the violence in the past.
COOPER: Right.
GRIFFIN: I haven't been able to ask him directly about the relationship he has or had with -- with Bill Ayers.
COOPER: All right, Drew Griffin, thanks very much.
—Matthew Balan is a news analyst at the Media Research Center.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
What I found most interesting was what McCain said last night....
McCain: Well, thank you, Tom. Thank you, Belmont University. And Sen. Obama, it's good to be with you at a town hall meeting.
And, Alan (ph), thank you for your question. You go to the heart of America's worries tonight. Americans are angry, they're upset, and they're a little fearful. It's our job to fix the problem.
Now, I have a plan to fix this problem and it has got to do with energy independence. We've got to stop sending $700 billion a year to countries that don't want us very -- like us very much. We have to keep Americans' taxes low. All Americans' taxes low. Let's not raise taxes on anybody today.
We obviously have to stop this spending spree that's going on in Washington. Do you know that we've laid a $10 trillion debt on these young Americans who are here with us tonight, $500 billion of it we owe to China?
We've got to have a package of reforms and it has got to lead to reform prosperity and peace in the world. And I think that this problem has become so severe, as you know, that we're going to have to do something about home values.
You know that home values of retirees continues to decline and people are no longer able to afford their mortgage payments. As president of the United States, Alan, I would order the secretary of the treasury to immediately buy up the bad home loan mortgages in America and renegotiate at the new value of those homes -- at the diminished value of those homes and let people be able to make those -- be able to make those payments and stay in their homes.
Is it expensive? Yes. But we all know, my friends, until we stabilize home values in America, we're never going to start turning around and creating jobs and fixing our economy. And we've got to give some trust and confidence back to America.
I know how the do that, my friends. And it's my proposal, it's not Sen. Obama's proposal, it's not President Bush's proposal. But I know how to get America working again, restore our economy and take care of working Americans. Thank you.
Brokaw: Senator, we have one minute for a discussion here. Obviously the powers of the treasury secretary have been greatly expanded. The most powerful officer in the cabinet now. Hank Paulson says he won't stay on. Who do you have in mind to appoint to that very important post?
Sen. McCain?
McCain: Not you, Tom.
Brokaw: No, with good reason.
McCain: You know, that's a tough question and there's a lot of qualified Americans. But I think the first criteria, Tom, would have to be somebody who immediately Americans identify with, immediately say, we can trust that individual.
A supporter of Sen. Obama's is Warren Buffett [chairman of Berkshire Hathaway]. He has already weighed in and helped stabilize some of the difficulties in the markets and with companies and corporations, institutions today.
I like Meg Whitman [former CEO of eBay and current McCain campaign adviser], she knows what it's like to be out there in the marketplace. She knows how to create jobs. Meg Whitman was CEO of a company that started with 12 people and is now 1.3 million people in America make their living off eBay. Maybe somebody here has done a little business with them.
But the point is it's going to have to be somebody who inspires trust and confidence. Because the problem in America today to a large extent, Tom, is that we don't have trust and confidence in our institutions because of the corruption on Wall Street and the greed and excess and the cronyism in Washington, D.C.
Brokaw: All right. Sen. McCain -- Sen. Obama, who do you have in mind for treasury secretary?
Obama: Well, Warren would be a pretty good choice -- Warren Buffett, and I'm pleased to have his support. But there are other folks out there. The key is making sure that the next treasury secretary understands that it's not enough just to help those at the top.
Prosperity is not just going to trickle down. We've got to help the middle class.
And we've -- you know, Sen. McCain and I have some fundamental disagreements on the economy, starting with Sen. McCain's statement earlier that he thought the fundamentals of the economy were sound.
Part of the problem here is that for many of you, wages and incomes have flat-lined. For many of you, it is getting harder and harder to save, harder and harder to retire.
And that's why, for example, on tax policy, what I want to do is provide a middle class tax cut to 95 percent of working Americans, those who are working two jobs, people who are not spending enough time with their kids, because they are struggling to make ends meet.
Sen. McCain is right that we've got to stabilize housing prices. But underlying that is loss of jobs and loss of income. That's something that the next treasury secretary is going to have to work on.
Brokaw: Sen. Obama, thank you very much.
Here is the whole thing ... the rest of it is a REMIX of Stump Speeches ... but an endorsement of Obama by Warren Buffet coming out of the mouth of your opponent, that is priceless!
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/07/presidential.debate.transcript/
And, Alan (ph), thank you for your question. You go to the heart of America's worries tonight. Americans are angry, they're upset, and they're a little fearful. It's our job to fix the problem.
Now, I have a plan to fix this problem and it has got to do with energy independence. We've got to stop sending $700 billion a year to countries that don't want us very -- like us very much. We have to keep Americans' taxes low. All Americans' taxes low. Let's not raise taxes on anybody today.
We obviously have to stop this spending spree that's going on in Washington. Do you know that we've laid a $10 trillion debt on these young Americans who are here with us tonight, $500 billion of it we owe to China?
We've got to have a package of reforms and it has got to lead to reform prosperity and peace in the world. And I think that this problem has become so severe, as you know, that we're going to have to do something about home values.
You know that home values of retirees continues to decline and people are no longer able to afford their mortgage payments. As president of the United States, Alan, I would order the secretary of the treasury to immediately buy up the bad home loan mortgages in America and renegotiate at the new value of those homes -- at the diminished value of those homes and let people be able to make those -- be able to make those payments and stay in their homes.
Is it expensive? Yes. But we all know, my friends, until we stabilize home values in America, we're never going to start turning around and creating jobs and fixing our economy. And we've got to give some trust and confidence back to America.
I know how the do that, my friends. And it's my proposal, it's not Sen. Obama's proposal, it's not President Bush's proposal. But I know how to get America working again, restore our economy and take care of working Americans. Thank you.
Brokaw: Senator, we have one minute for a discussion here. Obviously the powers of the treasury secretary have been greatly expanded. The most powerful officer in the cabinet now. Hank Paulson says he won't stay on. Who do you have in mind to appoint to that very important post?
Sen. McCain?
McCain: Not you, Tom.
Brokaw: No, with good reason.
McCain: You know, that's a tough question and there's a lot of qualified Americans. But I think the first criteria, Tom, would have to be somebody who immediately Americans identify with, immediately say, we can trust that individual.
A supporter of Sen. Obama's is Warren Buffett [chairman of Berkshire Hathaway]. He has already weighed in and helped stabilize some of the difficulties in the markets and with companies and corporations, institutions today.
I like Meg Whitman [former CEO of eBay and current McCain campaign adviser], she knows what it's like to be out there in the marketplace. She knows how to create jobs. Meg Whitman was CEO of a company that started with 12 people and is now 1.3 million people in America make their living off eBay. Maybe somebody here has done a little business with them.
But the point is it's going to have to be somebody who inspires trust and confidence. Because the problem in America today to a large extent, Tom, is that we don't have trust and confidence in our institutions because of the corruption on Wall Street and the greed and excess and the cronyism in Washington, D.C.
Brokaw: All right. Sen. McCain -- Sen. Obama, who do you have in mind for treasury secretary?
Obama: Well, Warren would be a pretty good choice -- Warren Buffett, and I'm pleased to have his support. But there are other folks out there. The key is making sure that the next treasury secretary understands that it's not enough just to help those at the top.
Prosperity is not just going to trickle down. We've got to help the middle class.
And we've -- you know, Sen. McCain and I have some fundamental disagreements on the economy, starting with Sen. McCain's statement earlier that he thought the fundamentals of the economy were sound.
Part of the problem here is that for many of you, wages and incomes have flat-lined. For many of you, it is getting harder and harder to save, harder and harder to retire.
And that's why, for example, on tax policy, what I want to do is provide a middle class tax cut to 95 percent of working Americans, those who are working two jobs, people who are not spending enough time with their kids, because they are struggling to make ends meet.
Sen. McCain is right that we've got to stabilize housing prices. But underlying that is loss of jobs and loss of income. That's something that the next treasury secretary is going to have to work on.
Brokaw: Sen. Obama, thank you very much.
Here is the whole thing ... the rest of it is a REMIX of Stump Speeches ... but an endorsement of Obama by Warren Buffet coming out of the mouth of your opponent, that is priceless!
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/07/presidential.debate.transcript/
Here is the race I am following locally...and since I am supporting Lupe Valdez. Support your local SHEriff in the left column!
Reforms, experience focus of Dallas County Sheriff's debate
10:07 PM CDT on Tuesday, October 7, 2008
By KEVIN KRAUSE / The Dallas Morning Newskkrause@dallasnews.com
Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez said her record of reforming her department makes her deserving of re-election Tuesday night while her Republican opponent, Lowell Cannaday, said his long record of experienced leadership makes him the better choice for the job of top cop.
The two candidates faced off for the third time this year in a debate held at the Preston Hollow Elementary School auditorium in Dallas, which was sponsored by the League of Women Voters.
Sheriff Valdez, 60, focused on her agency's law enforcement operations, saying she’s expanded highway patrols and drunken driving enforcement while also bringing financial accountability to the department with better contracts and responsible budget cutting.
She also said she’s ended overcrowding and understaffing at the jail and brought maintenance and sanitation up to state standards. The jails are currently staffed properly, but they have not been complaint with state standards since 2003. Another inspection is due early next year.
Mr. Cannaday, 71, the former Irving police chief, said he has experience managing multi-million dollar budgets and has put criminals in jail. “I know how to do this job,” he said.
Mr. Cannaday said morale in the department is low. He said the fact that all local police labor groups have endorsed him is evidence. He said he has a record of creating trust and fairness and making employees feel appreciated, which he said will increase morale.
Sheriff Valdez disagreed that morale is low and said the association leadership doesn’t represent the feelings of all members. She said she wouldn’t have been able to make so many changes without the help of her employees. “Otherwise, we wouldn’t have been able to get things done,” she said.
She said she has increased the number of minority supervisors with a fairer promotion system. And she announced a new initiative during the debate, saying her department will create part-time positions for college students who can get training during the summer.
For the first time, the candidates were allowed to ask each other a question.
Sheriff Valdez questioned Mr. Cannaday about what she said was a rise in thefts, robberies and assaults in Irving during his 10-year tenure as police chief. Mr. Cannaday said there was an overall reduction in violent crimes while he was chief.
He asked the sheriff to explain why so many local police associations, including sheriff’s associations, endorsed him. Sheriff Valdez said there will always be people who resist change and want to continue doing things the “same old way.”
Mr. Cannaday said he would work better with county commissioners given his “record of coalition building.”
Sheriff Valdez said she has a good working relationship with the commissioners, who she said have granted many of her requests during the last two years. Commissioners have during that time approved more funding for the jails — in part because of a lawsuit the federal government filed against the county to enforce required improvements.
The candidates sparred over a recent consolidation of the sheriff’s patrol and highway divisions to save money. Mr. Cannaday said it will mean fewer proactive patrols in unincorporated areas while Sheriff Valdez disputed that, saying her deputies will be expected to patrol neighborhoods as well as highways and respond to wrecks.
Sheriff Valdez defended her record on DWI enforcement, saying it’s strong, while Mr. Cannaday said she wasn’t using a converted semi-trailer enough for enforcement operations.
When asked about her management style, Sheriff Valdez said she occasionally drops by the jails to see the situation for herself while also delegating most jail oversight to her commanders.
“You delegate but verify,” she said.
Mr. Cannaday said he believes in management by “walking around” and that his door is always open. “It’s intellectually lazy to hide behind the chain of command,” he said.
In her closing statement, Sheriff Valdez said the department has come a long way since 2004. The jail is now staffed properly while highways are safer due to expanded patrols, she said.
Mr. Cannaday said he has a proven record of building and maintaining relationships. He said the job of sheriff is “not meant to be run by amateurs” and that it’s not an “entry level position.” He challenged the audience members, who barely filled about a third of the seats (in the local middle school auditorium) , to ask their local police officer what they think.
The next sheriff’s debate will be Wednesday morning at the Hilton Garden Inn in Duncanville, 800 N. Main St., at 11:30 a.m. It is sponsored by the Duncanville Chamber of Commerce.
10:07 PM CDT on Tuesday, October 7, 2008
By KEVIN KRAUSE / The Dallas Morning Newskkrause@dallasnews.com
Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez said her record of reforming her department makes her deserving of re-election Tuesday night while her Republican opponent, Lowell Cannaday, said his long record of experienced leadership makes him the better choice for the job of top cop.
The two candidates faced off for the third time this year in a debate held at the Preston Hollow Elementary School auditorium in Dallas, which was sponsored by the League of Women Voters.
Sheriff Valdez, 60, focused on her agency's law enforcement operations, saying she’s expanded highway patrols and drunken driving enforcement while also bringing financial accountability to the department with better contracts and responsible budget cutting.
She also said she’s ended overcrowding and understaffing at the jail and brought maintenance and sanitation up to state standards. The jails are currently staffed properly, but they have not been complaint with state standards since 2003. Another inspection is due early next year.
Mr. Cannaday, 71, the former Irving police chief, said he has experience managing multi-million dollar budgets and has put criminals in jail. “I know how to do this job,” he said.
Mr. Cannaday said morale in the department is low. He said the fact that all local police labor groups have endorsed him is evidence. He said he has a record of creating trust and fairness and making employees feel appreciated, which he said will increase morale.
Sheriff Valdez disagreed that morale is low and said the association leadership doesn’t represent the feelings of all members. She said she wouldn’t have been able to make so many changes without the help of her employees. “Otherwise, we wouldn’t have been able to get things done,” she said.
She said she has increased the number of minority supervisors with a fairer promotion system. And she announced a new initiative during the debate, saying her department will create part-time positions for college students who can get training during the summer.
For the first time, the candidates were allowed to ask each other a question.
Sheriff Valdez questioned Mr. Cannaday about what she said was a rise in thefts, robberies and assaults in Irving during his 10-year tenure as police chief. Mr. Cannaday said there was an overall reduction in violent crimes while he was chief.
He asked the sheriff to explain why so many local police associations, including sheriff’s associations, endorsed him. Sheriff Valdez said there will always be people who resist change and want to continue doing things the “same old way.”
Mr. Cannaday said he would work better with county commissioners given his “record of coalition building.”
Sheriff Valdez said she has a good working relationship with the commissioners, who she said have granted many of her requests during the last two years. Commissioners have during that time approved more funding for the jails — in part because of a lawsuit the federal government filed against the county to enforce required improvements.
The candidates sparred over a recent consolidation of the sheriff’s patrol and highway divisions to save money. Mr. Cannaday said it will mean fewer proactive patrols in unincorporated areas while Sheriff Valdez disputed that, saying her deputies will be expected to patrol neighborhoods as well as highways and respond to wrecks.
Sheriff Valdez defended her record on DWI enforcement, saying it’s strong, while Mr. Cannaday said she wasn’t using a converted semi-trailer enough for enforcement operations.
When asked about her management style, Sheriff Valdez said she occasionally drops by the jails to see the situation for herself while also delegating most jail oversight to her commanders.
“You delegate but verify,” she said.
Mr. Cannaday said he believes in management by “walking around” and that his door is always open. “It’s intellectually lazy to hide behind the chain of command,” he said.
In her closing statement, Sheriff Valdez said the department has come a long way since 2004. The jail is now staffed properly while highways are safer due to expanded patrols, she said.
Mr. Cannaday said he has a proven record of building and maintaining relationships. He said the job of sheriff is “not meant to be run by amateurs” and that it’s not an “entry level position.” He challenged the audience members, who barely filled about a third of the seats (in the local middle school auditorium) , to ask their local police officer what they think.
The next sheriff’s debate will be Wednesday morning at the Hilton Garden Inn in Duncanville, 800 N. Main St., at 11:30 a.m. It is sponsored by the Duncanville Chamber of Commerce.
Another story I have been following: Why have we not used this ship for target practice? Weapons for genecide in African wars?
Somali pirate says ransom reduced to $8 million
By SALAD DUHUL – 21 hours ago
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — A Somali pirate on a hijacked cargo ship transporting tanks reduced the ransom Tuesday to $8 million (euro5.87 million), but it was unclear if he was speaking officially for the bandits holding the Ukrainian vessel.
A man who identified himself as Jama Aden and spoke by satellite phone Tuesday is not the usual spokesman for the pirates. He answered the telephone of the spokesman, Sugule Ali, and said Ali was not immediately available.
"There are high hopes we will release the ship within hours if they pay us $8 million," Aden told The Associated Press. "The negotiations with the ship owners are going on well."
The pirates originally demanded $20 million (euro14.67 million).
Aden said a small boat was resupplying the vessel with food and qat, a narcotic leaf popular in Somalia. "The crew is doing well," he added.
Six U.S. warships are surrounding the Faina, which was hijacked late last month with 21 crew on board. Officials in Moscow say the ship's Russian captain died of a heart condition soon after the hijacking nearly two weeks ago.
A Russian frigate also is headed toward the standoff. The U.S. Navy warships have been tracking the ship amid fears its weapons might fall into the hands of al-Qaida-linked insurgents in Somalia.
The Faina's hijacking, the most high-profile this year, illustrates the ability of a handful of pirates from a failed state to menace a key international shipping lane despite the deployment of warships by global powers. More than two dozen ships have been hijacked off Somalia's coast this year.
Somalia's government has given foreign powers the freedom to use force against the pirates, raising the stakes significantly. Russia, whose warship is not expected for several days, has used commando tactics to end several hostage situations on its own soil, but hundreds of hostages have died in those efforts.
Somalia, a nation of around 8 million people, has not had a functioning government since warlords overthrew a dictator in 1991 and then turned on each other. A quarter of Somali children die before age 5 and nearly every public institution has collapsed. Fighting is a daily occurrence, with violent deaths reported nearly every day.
Islamic militants with ties to al-Qaida have been battling the government and its Ethiopian allies since their combined forces pushed the Islamists from the capital in December 2006. Within weeks of being driven out, the Islamists launched an insurgency that has killed thousands of civilians.
Foreign Affairs Minister Ali Ahmed Jama said the government wants world powers to coordinate their approach to Somalia's insecurity.
It is not an issue "that is going to go away. There are a number of dimensions, whether it is pirates, whether it is humanitarian issues, whether it is counterterrorism," Jama said at a news conference in Kenya's capital.
Associated Press writer Tom Maliti contributed to this report from Nairobi, Kenya.
By SALAD DUHUL – 21 hours ago
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — A Somali pirate on a hijacked cargo ship transporting tanks reduced the ransom Tuesday to $8 million (euro5.87 million), but it was unclear if he was speaking officially for the bandits holding the Ukrainian vessel.
A man who identified himself as Jama Aden and spoke by satellite phone Tuesday is not the usual spokesman for the pirates. He answered the telephone of the spokesman, Sugule Ali, and said Ali was not immediately available.
"There are high hopes we will release the ship within hours if they pay us $8 million," Aden told The Associated Press. "The negotiations with the ship owners are going on well."
The pirates originally demanded $20 million (euro14.67 million).
Aden said a small boat was resupplying the vessel with food and qat, a narcotic leaf popular in Somalia. "The crew is doing well," he added.
Six U.S. warships are surrounding the Faina, which was hijacked late last month with 21 crew on board. Officials in Moscow say the ship's Russian captain died of a heart condition soon after the hijacking nearly two weeks ago.
A Russian frigate also is headed toward the standoff. The U.S. Navy warships have been tracking the ship amid fears its weapons might fall into the hands of al-Qaida-linked insurgents in Somalia.
The Faina's hijacking, the most high-profile this year, illustrates the ability of a handful of pirates from a failed state to menace a key international shipping lane despite the deployment of warships by global powers. More than two dozen ships have been hijacked off Somalia's coast this year.
Somalia's government has given foreign powers the freedom to use force against the pirates, raising the stakes significantly. Russia, whose warship is not expected for several days, has used commando tactics to end several hostage situations on its own soil, but hundreds of hostages have died in those efforts.
Somalia, a nation of around 8 million people, has not had a functioning government since warlords overthrew a dictator in 1991 and then turned on each other. A quarter of Somali children die before age 5 and nearly every public institution has collapsed. Fighting is a daily occurrence, with violent deaths reported nearly every day.
Islamic militants with ties to al-Qaida have been battling the government and its Ethiopian allies since their combined forces pushed the Islamists from the capital in December 2006. Within weeks of being driven out, the Islamists launched an insurgency that has killed thousands of civilians.
Foreign Affairs Minister Ali Ahmed Jama said the government wants world powers to coordinate their approach to Somalia's insecurity.
It is not an issue "that is going to go away. There are a number of dimensions, whether it is pirates, whether it is humanitarian issues, whether it is counterterrorism," Jama said at a news conference in Kenya's capital.
Associated Press writer Tom Maliti contributed to this report from Nairobi, Kenya.
The is an interesting history behind this story.....
NAIROBI, Kenya — The Somali pirates who hijacked a Ukrainian freighter loaded with tanks, artillery, grenade launchers and ammunition said in an interview on Tuesday that they had no idea the ship was carrying arms when they seized it on the high seas.
“We just saw a big ship,” the pirates’ spokesman, Sugule Ali, said in a telephone interview. “So we stopped it.”
“We just saw a big ship,” the pirates’ spokesman, Sugule Ali, said in a telephone interview. “So we stopped it.”
The pirates quickly learned, though, that their booty was an estimated $30 million worth of heavy weaponry, heading for Kenya or Sudan, depending on whom you ask.
He said that so far, in the eyes of the world, the pirates had been misunderstood. “We don’t consider ourselves sea bandits,” he said. “We consider sea bandits those who illegally fish in our seas and dump waste in our seas and carry weapons in our seas. We are simply patrolling our seas. Think of us like a coast guard.”
The pirates who answered the phone call on Tuesday morning said they were speaking by satellite phone from the bridge of the Faina, the Ukrainian cargo ship that was hijacked about 200 miles off the coast of Somalia on Thursday. Several pirates talked but said that only Mr. Sugule was authorized to be quoted. Mr. Sugule acknowledged that they were now surrounded by American warships, but he did not sound afraid. “You only die once,” Mr. Sugule said.
He said that all was peaceful on the ship, despite unconfirmed reports from maritime organizations in Kenya that three pirates were killed in a shootout among themselves on Sunday or Monday night.
He insisted that the pirates were not interested in the weapons and had no plans to sell them to Islamist insurgents battling Somalia’s weak transitional government. “Somalia has suffered from many years of destruction because of all these weapons,” he said. “We don’t want that suffering and chaos to continue. We are not going to offload the weapons. We just want the money.”
He said the pirates were asking for $20 million in cash; “we don’t use any other system than cash.” But he added that they were willing to bargain. “That’s deal-making,” he explained.
Piracy in Somalia is a highly organized, lucrative, ransom-driven business. Just this year, pirates hijacked more than 25 ships, and in many cases, they were paid million-dollar ransoms to release them. The juicy payoffs have attracted gunmen from across Somalia, and the pirates are thought to number in the thousands.
The piracy industry started about 10 to 15 years ago, Somali officials said, as a response to illegal fishing. Somalia’s central government imploded in 1991, casting the country into chaos. With no patrols along the shoreline, Somalia’s tuna-rich waters were soon plundered by commercial fishing fleets from around the world. Somali fishermen armed themselves and turned into vigilantes by confronting illegal fishing boats and demanding that they pay a tax.
“From there, they got greedy,” said Mohamed Osman Aden, a Somali diplomat in Kenya. “They starting attacking everyone.”
By the early 2000s, many of the fishermen had traded in their nets for machine guns and were hijacking any vessel they could catch: sailboat, oil tanker, United Nations-chartered food ship.
“It’s true that the pirates started to defend the fishing business,” Mr. Mohamed said. “And illegal fishing is a real problem for us. But this does not justify these boys to now act like guardians. They are criminals. The world must help us crack down on them.”
The United States and several European countries, in particular France, have been talking about ways to patrol the waters together. The United Nations is even considering something like a maritime peacekeeping force. Because of all the hijackings, the waters off Somalia’s coast are considered the most dangerous shipping lanes in the world.
On Tuesday, several American warships — around five, according to one Western diplomat — had the hijacked freighter cornered along the craggy Somali coastline. The American ships allowed the pirates to bring food and water on board, but not to take weapons off. A Russian frigate is also on its way to the area.
Lt. Nathan Christensen, a Navy spokesman, said on Tuesday that he had heard the unconfirmed reports about the pirate-on-pirate shootout, but that the Navy had no more information. “To be honest, we’re not seeing a whole lot of activity” on the ship, he said.
In Washington, Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon press secretary, declined to discuss any possible American military operations to capture the ship.
“Our concern is right now making sure that there’s a peaceful resolution to this, that this cargo does not end up in the hands of anyone who would use it in a way that would be destabilizing to the region,” Mr. Morrell told reporters at the Pentagon. He said the United States government was not involved in any negotiations with the pirates. He also said he had no information about reports that the pirates had exchanged gunfire among themselves.
Kenyan officials continued to maintain that the weapons aboard were part of a legitimate arms deal for the Kenyan military, even though several Western diplomats, Somali officials and the pirates themselves said the arms were part of a secret deal to funnel weapons to southern Sudan.
Somali officials are urging the Western navies to storm the ship and arrest the pirates because they say that paying ransoms only fuels the problem. Western diplomats, however, have said that such a commando operation would be very difficult because the ship is full of explosives and the pirates could use the 20 crew members as human shields.
Mr. Sugule said his men were treating the crew members well. (The pirates would not let the crew members speak on the phone, saying it was against their rules.) “Killing is not in our plans,” he said. “We only want money so we can protect ourselves from hunger.”
When asked why the pirates needed $20 million to protect themselves from hunger, Mr. Sugule laughed and said, “Because we have a lot of men.”
Mohammed Ibrahim contributed reporting from Mogadishu, Somalia, and Eric Schmitt from Washington.
But I seem to remember something about this...something in the U.S. Marine song.
The First Barbary War (1801–1805), also known as the Barbary Coast War or the Tripolitan War, was the first of two wars fought between the United States of America (briefly joined by a small Swedish fleet) and the North African states known collectively as the Barbary States. These were the independent Sultanate of Morocco, and the three Regencies of Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli, which were quasi-independent entities nominally belonging to the Ottoman Empire.
However, by 1783 America became solely responsible for the safety of its own commerce and citizens with the end of the Revolution. Without the means or the authority to field a naval force necessary to protect their ships in the Mediterranean, the nascent U.S. government took a pragmatic, but ultimately self-destructive route. In 1784, the United States Congress allocated money for payment of tribute to the Barbary pirates and instructed her British and French ambassadors (John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, respectively) to look for opportunities to negotiate peace treaties with the Barbary nations. Unfortunately, the price demanded for these treaties far exceeded the amount that Congress had budgeted.
In 1786, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams went to negotiate with Tripoli's envoy to London, Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdrahaman or (Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja). Upon inquiring "concerning the ground of the pretensions to make war upon nations who had done them no injury", the ambassador replied:
It was written in their Koran, that all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave; and that every mussulman who was slain in this warfare was sure to go to paradise. He said, also, that the man who was the first to board a vessel had one slave over and above his share, and that when they sprang to the deck of an enemy's ship, every sailor held a dagger in each hand and a third in his mouth; which usually struck such terror into the foe that they cried out for quarter at once. [2] [3]
Jefferson reported the conversation to Secretary of State John Jay, who submitted the Ambassador's comments and offer to Congress. Jefferson argued that paying tribute would encourage more attacks. Although John Adams agreed with Jefferson, he believed that circumstances forced the U.S. to pay tribute until an adequate navy could be built. The U.S. had just fought an exhausting war, which put the nation deep in debt. Federalist and anti-federalist forces argued over the needs of the country and the burden of taxation. Jefferson's own Democratic-Republicans and anti-navalists believed that the future of the country lay in westward expansion, with Atlantic trade threatening to siphon money and energy away from the new nation on useless wars in the Old World.[4] The U.S. paid Algiers the ransom, and continued to pay up to $1 million per year over the next 15 years for the safe passage of American ships or the return of American hostages. Payments in ransom and tribute to the privateering states amounted to 20 percent of United States government annual revenues in 1800.
Jefferson continued to argue for cessation of the tribute, with rising support from George Washington and others. With the recommissioning of the American navy in 1794 and the resulting increased firepower on the seas, it became more and more possible for America to say "no", although by now the long-standing habit of tribute was hard to overturn.
In 1786, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams went to negotiate with Tripoli's envoy to London, Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdrahaman or (Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja). Upon inquiring "concerning the ground of the pretensions to make war upon nations who had done them no injury", the ambassador replied:
It was written in their Koran, that all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave; and that every mussulman who was slain in this warfare was sure to go to paradise. He said, also, that the man who was the first to board a vessel had one slave over and above his share, and that when they sprang to the deck of an enemy's ship, every sailor held a dagger in each hand and a third in his mouth; which usually struck such terror into the foe that they cried out for quarter at once. [2] [3]
Jefferson reported the conversation to Secretary of State John Jay, who submitted the Ambassador's comments and offer to Congress. Jefferson argued that paying tribute would encourage more attacks. Although John Adams agreed with Jefferson, he believed that circumstances forced the U.S. to pay tribute until an adequate navy could be built. The U.S. had just fought an exhausting war, which put the nation deep in debt. Federalist and anti-federalist forces argued over the needs of the country and the burden of taxation. Jefferson's own Democratic-Republicans and anti-navalists believed that the future of the country lay in westward expansion, with Atlantic trade threatening to siphon money and energy away from the new nation on useless wars in the Old World.[4] The U.S. paid Algiers the ransom, and continued to pay up to $1 million per year over the next 15 years for the safe passage of American ships or the return of American hostages. Payments in ransom and tribute to the privateering states amounted to 20 percent of United States government annual revenues in 1800.
Jefferson continued to argue for cessation of the tribute, with rising support from George Washington and others. With the recommissioning of the American navy in 1794 and the resulting increased firepower on the seas, it became more and more possible for America to say "no", although by now the long-standing habit of tribute was hard to overturn.
In October 1803, Tripoli's fleet was able to capture USS Philadelphia intact after the frigate ran aground while patrolling Tripoli harbor. Efforts by the Americans to float the ship while under fire from shore batteries and Tripolitan naval units were unsuccessful. The ship, its captain, William Bainbridge, and all officers and crew were taken ashore and held as hostages. The Philadelphia was turned against the Americans and anchored in the harbor as a gun battery.
On the night of February 16, 1804, Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, Jr. led a small contingent of the U.S.'s first marines in the captured Tripolitan ketch rechristened USS Intrepid, to deceive the guards on board the Philadelphia and float close enough to board the captured ship. Decatur's men stormed the vessel and decimated the Tripolitan sailors standing guard. With support from American ships, the Marines set fire to the Philadelphia, denying her use to the enemy, and captured the city. This action was memorialized in the Marine Hymn — "the shores of Tripoli" — and announced to the world that American forces, though arguably not to the degree of the British or the French, should too be recognized as capable of shaping the world. Subsequently the bravery in action of Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, Jr. made him one of the first American military heroes since the Revolutionary War.
Preble attacked Tripoli outright on July 14, 1804 in a series of inconclusive battles, including a courageous but unsuccessful attack by the fire ship USS Intrepid under Captain Richard Somers. Intrepid, packed with explosives, was to enter Tripoli harbor and destroy itself and the enemy fleet; it was destroyed, perhaps by enemy guns, before achieving that goal, killing Somers and his crew.
The turning point in the war came with the Battle of Derna (April-May 1805). Ex-consul William Eaton, who went by the rank of general, and US Marine First Lieutenant Presley O'Bannon led a mixed force of 500 United States Marines and Greek, Arab and Berber mercenaries on a remarkable overland march across the desert from Alexandria, Egypt to assault the Tripolitan city of Derna.
On the night of February 16, 1804, Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, Jr. led a small contingent of the U.S.'s first marines in the captured Tripolitan ketch rechristened USS Intrepid, to deceive the guards on board the Philadelphia and float close enough to board the captured ship. Decatur's men stormed the vessel and decimated the Tripolitan sailors standing guard. With support from American ships, the Marines set fire to the Philadelphia, denying her use to the enemy, and captured the city. This action was memorialized in the Marine Hymn — "the shores of Tripoli" — and announced to the world that American forces, though arguably not to the degree of the British or the French, should too be recognized as capable of shaping the world. Subsequently the bravery in action of Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, Jr. made him one of the first American military heroes since the Revolutionary War.
Preble attacked Tripoli outright on July 14, 1804 in a series of inconclusive battles, including a courageous but unsuccessful attack by the fire ship USS Intrepid under Captain Richard Somers. Intrepid, packed with explosives, was to enter Tripoli harbor and destroy itself and the enemy fleet; it was destroyed, perhaps by enemy guns, before achieving that goal, killing Somers and his crew.
The turning point in the war came with the Battle of Derna (April-May 1805). Ex-consul William Eaton, who went by the rank of general, and US Marine First Lieutenant Presley O'Bannon led a mixed force of 500 United States Marines and Greek, Arab and Berber mercenaries on a remarkable overland march across the desert from Alexandria, Egypt to assault the Tripolitan city of Derna.
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In agreeing to pay a ransom of sixty thousand dollars for the American prisoners, the Jefferson administration drew a distinction between paying tribute and paying ransom.
FD: I bet $8 Million today is about $60,000 then...maybe this a fair price for the return of the ship, adjusted for inflation, etc.
At the time, some argued that buying sailors out of slavery was a fair exchange to end the war. William Eaton, however, remained bitter for the rest of his life about the treaty, feeling that his efforts had been squandered by the State Department diplomat Tobias Lear. Eaton and others felt that the capture of Derna should have been used as a bargaining chip to obtain the release of all American prisoners without having to pay ransom. Furthermore, Eaton believed the honour of the United States had been compromised when it abandoned Hamet Karamanli after promising to restore him as leader of Tripoli. Eaton's complaints generally fell on deaf ears, especially as attention turned to the strained international relations which would ultimately lead to the War of 1812.
The First Barbary War was beneficial to the military reputation of the United States. America's military command and war mechanism had been up to that time relatively untested. The First Barbary War showed that America could execute a war far from home, and that American forces had the cohesion to fight together as Americans rather than Georgians or New Yorkers. The United States Navy and Marines became a permanent part of the American government and the American mythos, and Decatur returned to the U.S. as its first post-Revolutionary war hero.
However, the more immediate problem of Barbary piracy was not fully settled. By 1807, Algiers had gone back to taking American ships and seamen hostage. Distracted by the preludes to the War of 1812, the U.S. was unable to respond to the provocation until 1815, with the Second Barbary War.
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