ONCE A MARINE - An Iraq War Tank Commander’s Inspirational Story of Combat, Courage, and Recovery. Nick Popaditch appeared in an AP photo on April 9, 2003. The striking image was of the Marine tank commander smoking a victory cigar in his tank, the haunting statue of Saddam Hussein hovering in the background. “Gunny Pop” was immortalized forever as “The Cigar Marine.” A year later he fought heroically in the First Battle for Fallujah and suffered head wounds that left him legally blind and partially deaf. The United States Marine Corps awarded him a Silver Star for his valor and combat innovation. Coming home, however, is when the toughest fight of his life began - a battle to remain the man and Marine he was. Join Political Pistachio Radio on Tuesday Night at 10:00 pm Eastern Time/7:00 pm Pacific for a riveting interview with Nick Popaditch, a Marine’s Marine, a man who embodies everything noble and proud in the Corps’ long tradition.
What You Missed Last Week:
Saturday Sgt. Michael Volkin joined us to discuss his latest book, The Accomplishments of Senator Barack Hussein Obama. (From the book’s site, www.obamaresearch.com) The Accomplishments of Senator Barack Hussein Obama is a comprehensive, factual book about presidential candidate Barack Obama. The book is based on hours of research, dozens of speeches and listening to dozens of his supporters. The Accomplishments of Barack Hussein Obama accounts for all the presidential qualifications of Senator Barack Obama.
Some of the various topics this book discusses are:
+ His Detailed Plans of Change
+ His Senate Accomplishments
+ His Presidential Qualifications
+ Important Points He Has Made Without a Teleprompter or Prepared Script
This book includes title page, copyright page, a complete table of contents, running page headers, and a conclusion. Each book’s chapters, however, are BLANK!
The Political Director, Dr. Bill Smith, of Let’s Get This Right .com joined us to discuss the Republican National Convention, Election 2008, and how the New Media is becoming a major force in shaping the public’s opinion and the rebirth of the Conservative Movement. Dr. Bill Smith, Political Director of LGTR on PPR
Dr. Jerome Corsi, staff writer for World Net Daily, has suddenly found himself in the midst of a violent storm of controversy. The WND writer, this week alone, has been the object of numerous television and radio shows as the media tries to wade through the information contained in the book, and determine if the book is truly filled with falsehoods, or is a well researched piece of literature that takes a close and hard look at the Democratic Presidential front-runner, Barack Obama.
The book at the center of the controversy is, The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality. The Huffington Post calls the book, “…one of the worst political books ever written. Corsi piles distortion upon innuendo to create a gigantic heap of right-wing garbage, with a seemingly endless parade of basic factual errors running through the text like rats. Corsi’s book is an embarrassment to the craft of journalism, and any of the conservatives who have praised and promoted it should feel humiliated at how bad it truly is.” Media Matters writes that The Obama Nation “contains numerous falsehoods about Sen. Barack Obama.” Even Conservative talk show host and Townhall writer Hugh Hewitt exclaims about the book, “Corsi’s from the fringe. . . the book contains errors.”
Hugh Hewitt, however, also points out that the Obama Campaign has given us an “absurd set of non-responsive responses,” and that, “Now they botch a gimmie — defining Corsi as a nut while not putting attention on the charges he leveled.”
Sean Hannity has stated that The Obama Nation “may have made his [Obama’s] campaign a bit nervous.”
Joseph Farah, founder of World Net Daily, says about the controversy surrounding the book, and Jerome Corsi, “Unlike most of the critics of The Obama Nation, I have actually read the book from cover to cover. It is a thoroughly well-documented piece of first-rate journalism. Are there mistakes in it? Show me a first edition that doesn’t have some – other than the Bible. But is it truthful? Does it add considerably to the public’s knowledge of the front-running candidate for the presidency? Do we know much more about Obama than we would had we relied exclusively for our information from the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post and the Associated Press? I offer a resounding ‘yes’ to all three of those questions. I am privileged to call him my friend, colleague and co-worker. I stand with Jerry Corsi today as he is viciously maligned by an attack media that would prefer to aim its potent artillery at a man who dared to do their job when they refused, when they laid down, when they sucked up, when they failed to ask the tough questions, when they took sides.”
In response, Barack Obama’s advisers have been tracking Corsi’s media appearances, quickly telephoning producers to react to the book’s charges, and last night, the Democratic presidential candidate’s campaign issued a 40-page response to the book.
The Democratic National Committee has its own rapid response team to take aim at Corsi’s book, saying, “One of the most vile smear peddlers of the 2004 election has found a new target. We cannot afford to let Corsi get away with the same dirty tricks that fooled so many people in 2004. We can’t rely on the media to hold him accountable – in fact, the sheer brazenness of the lies is attracting even more coverage. The media have shown that they aren’t going to stop him. It’s up to you to spread the truth.”
So, what is the truth? Is this book a classic smear job? Or is Corsi’s book simply caught up in the crosshairs of the leftists because it hits a chord? Is Dr. Jerome Corsi a discredited liar peddling garbage in order to help continue Bush-Cheney politics? Or is he a simply being lynched by the mainstream media and Democratic Party for daring to write the truth? Be the judge yourself. Read the book, and listen to what Dr. Jerome Corsi has to say tonight on Political Pistachio Radio.
The show airs live at 10:00 pm Eastern Time, but will be archived for later listening for those unable to listen live. Access the program HERE.
by Andrea Shea-King — published on July 17th, 2008
Some of Washington’s best and brightest conservative writers can be found at The American Spectator, a daily online magazine (often mentioned by el Rushbo who frequently includes it in his “stack of stuff’) that features conservative perspectives and analyses on the day’s events and issues.
ON THE RADIO! Tonight at 9 ET we’ll be talking to two of these sharp political writers.
“Despite the dispirited state of the GOP, the ideological muddling of the McCain campaign, and the media accolades for Obama, it is far from a foregone conclusion that Hope and Change will triumph Nov. 4.”
“Obamamaniacs were thrilled by last month’s Newsweek poll showing their candidate ahead by 15 points. Alas for the apostles of Hope, either that poll was a statistical mirage or else the mass movement toward Obama quickly receded, and Newsweek reported last week that his lead is now an insignificant 3 percentage points.”
UPDATE: Rep. Jim McGovern’s Press Secretary Michael Mershon responded to my requests for additional information. View his statement in its entirety HERE.
Are Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) bad actors in a tragedy about the Separation of Powers?
In Spring 2007, Speaker Pelosi visited Syria, where she met with President Bashar Assad in a highly publicized, and much criticized trip. She was the poster child for Obama-esque ‘without pre-condition’ foreign policy. But this year, the Speaker chose to avoid the limelight, allegedly preferring to task loyal foot soldier Rep. Jim McGovern with chatting up leftist guerillas closely affiliated with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (FARC) - a group identified by the US State Department as terrorists. Not to mention the talks with Columbian Senator Piedad Cordoba, who remainsunder investigation by the Columbian Attorney General - and who is closely aligned with Venezuelan dictator/President Hugo Chavez.
Much of the main stream media seems content to ignore the Pelosi-McGovern-FARC story. Too much of a political hot potato. Brings to mind Pelosi’s own language regarding Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s repeated attempts to impeach President Bush. Remember? She told us all that was ‘off the table.’ Until yesterday, when Pelosi indicated that Kucinich’s latest attempt might get hearings.
Insert the uncomfortable pause here. All is fair in love and politricks.
So I placed a few calls. Speaker Pelosi’s press staff: delightful but refused to provide on-the-record comments each of the several times we spoke. I’m still waiting to hear back from McGovern’s office. Somehow, I am unsurprised by the lack of candor.
In multiple conversations with sources close to Speaker Pelosi, I was told the assertions made in the Wall Street Journal reports are “categorically false” and “without merit.” (This wins the prize for least original evasive answer)
Gee, I suppose if a Republican stood accused of colluding with a terrorist to undermine the democratically elected government of a US ally that it would be a non-story. Oh wait… the entire country would be enraged. And demanding answers. Hearings. Accountability.
This is where the average American should step in. Call Speaker Pelosi. 202.225.0100. The role of Speaker of the House is supposed to transcend partisan politics. She is a public servant. Our tax dollars may have funded these misadventures.
Never ask permission to engage in our national dialogue. Your tax dollars matter. And Speaker Pelosi should address this Obama-esque policy directly. Was she engaging with an agent of a foreign government to undermine our ally, the democratically elected government in Columbia? Did Speaker Pelosi direct Rep. McGovern to tell FARC that all military aid from the US to Columbia would be suspended under an Obama presidency?
If Speaker Pelosi was a pawn in McGovern’s game, where he invoked her name to play-up his own street-cred and power - then Pelosi should promptly throw him from the Democratic train. Give him a little partisan spanking. Go public. Offer a little straight-talk to the American people.
From the Wall Street Journal… House Speaker Nancy Pelosi may well have committed a felony in traveling to Damascus this week, against the wishes of the president, to communicate on foreign-policy issues with Syrian President Bashar Assad. The administration isn’t going to want to touch this political hot potato, nor should it become a partisan issue. Maybe special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, whose aggressive prosecution of Lewis Libby establishes his independence from White House influence, should be called back.
The Logan Act makes it a felony and provides for a prison sentence of up to three years for any American, “without authority of the United States,” to communicate with a foreign government in an effort to influence that government’s behavior on any “disputes or controversies with the United States.”
A hard drive recovered from the computer of a killed Colombian guerrilla has offered more insights into the opposition of House Democrats to the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement.
A military strike three weeks ago killed Raúl Reyes, No. 2 in command of the FARC, Colombia’s most notorious terrorist group. The Reyes hard drive reveals an ardent effort to do business directly with the FARC by Congressman James McGovern (D., Mass.), a leading opponent of the free-trade deal. Mr. McGovern has been working with an American go-between, who has been offering the rebels help in undermining Colombia’s elected and popular government.
Mr. McGovern’s press office says the Congressman is merely working at the behest of families whose relatives are held as FARC kidnap hostages. However, his go-between’s letters reveal more than routine intervention. The intervenor with the FARC is James C. Jones, who the Congressman’s office says is a “development expert and a former consultant to the United Nations.” Accounts of Mr. Jones’s exchanges with the FARC appeared in Colombia’s Semana magazine on March 15. This Mr. Jones should not be confused with the former Congressman and ambassador to Mexico of the same name from Oklahoma.
“Receive my warm greetings, as always, from Washington,” Mr. Jones began in a letter to the rebels last fall. “The big news is that I spoke for several hours with the Democratic Congressman James McGovern. In the meeting we had the opportunity to exchange some ideas that will be, I believe, of interest to the FARC-EP [popular army].”
Last fall, Mr. Chávez and the FARC hatched an audacious plan whereby the Venezuelan would take “proof of life” of Ms. Betancourt to French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris, where the plight of Ms. Betancourt was a cause célèbre. The rebels wrote that Mr. Chávez was sure French pressure for negotiations would cause President Bush to “order Uribe to allow the meeting” between Mr. Chávez and the rebels on Colombian soil, something Mr. Uribe had refused to do. The rebels reported that Mr. Chávez was “super-motivated,” because he viewed the rendezvous as a public-relations coup that would give him and the FARC “continental and world renown.”
That plan flopped, but Mr. Chavez had other cards up his sleeve. One involved Ms. Cordoba, who is currently under investigation by the Colombian attorney general for ties to the FARC. She figures prominently in the captured rebel documents, and is notoriously close to Mr. Chávez.
She met at the Venezuelan presidential palace with FARC leaders last fall. From that meeting the rebels reported that “Piedad says that Chávez has Uribe going crazy. He doesn’t know what to do. That Nancy Pelosi helps and is ready to help in the swap [hostages in exchange for captured guerrillas]. That she has designated [U.S. Congressman Jim] McGovern for this.”
If the speaker of the House was working with Ms. Cordoba in this scheme, her judgment was more than a little misguided. The rebels write that on a trip to Argentina Ms. Cordoba told them, “It doesn’t matter to me the proposal that Sarkozy has made to free Ingrid. Above all, do not liberate Ingrid.” In short, why give up such a useful pawn?
Here is the text of the Logan Act:
Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.
This section shall not abridge the right of a citizen to apply himself, or his agent, to any foreign government, or the agents thereof, for redress of any injury which he may have sustained from such government or any of its agents or subjects.
STATEMENT FROM REP. JIM MCGOVERN’S PRESS SECRETARY MICHAEL MERSHON:
It’s important to remember that what INTERPOL determined is that there was no evidence of any tampering of the FARC computers by the Colombian military once the military took possession of those computers. Which is very good news. What INTERPOL did NOT determine, of course, was whether any of the statements in those computers were somehow empirically true. Which, of course, they could not, as we made very clear in our letter to the Wall Street Journal.
As to the Journal column in question which attacked Colombian-based human rights groups for their alleged ties to the FARC (therefore suggesting that the FARC would easily be convinced to turn the hostages over to these groups), we were disappointed to see that one of the Colombian military members involved in the hostage rescue was wearing the insignia of the International Committee of the Red Cross during the mission, in apparent violation of the Geneva Conventions. We were pleased to see that President Uribe has apologized for that error.
As to the specific questions you have asked:
Rep. McGovern met with Sen. Cordoba during the time she was the official mediator (appointed by President Uribe) for a potential humanitarian exchange of the hostages. She also met with high-level U.S. State Department officials during this period.
Rep. McGovern never said that Sen. Obama would win the election. At the time, he was a strong supporter of Sen. Clinton.
Rep. McGovern never ‘ensured’ the end of military aid to Colombia. He doesn’t believe that would be a proper policy position to take. He has argued, and will continue to argue, that a higher percentage of our aid should be used for the building of civilian and judicial institutions in Colombia; for economic redevelopment; and for assistance to the hundreds of thousands of Colombians who have been internally displaced by the conflict.
I have attached a copy of Rep. McGovern’s floor statement from yesterday’s debate on an amendment offered by House Republican Whip Roy Blunt to the intelligence authorization bill. It lays out a lot of his thinking about the way forward, and I hope you find it useful.
I’d be happy to respond by e-mail to any other specific questions you may have.
Regards,
Michael Mershon, Press Secretary
U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA)
Barack Obama is on fire. The presumptive democratic nominee for president has thoroughly defeated Hillary Clinton in the race for the White House, the two of them have apparently kissed and made up, she’s now on the campaign trail hawking his wares, and all is right with the world as far as the Democratic National Committee is concerned. All polls seem to indicate that Obama is beating his republican rival John McCain. McCain himself has indicated that he is the underdog in this race, and has a lot of work to do between now and November. Obama is the oncoming juggernaut that cannot be stopped.
Hold the phone.
Obama may not even be qualified to run for president. And I don’t mean because of his lack of experience in any of the areas that the commander-in-chief and the leader of the free world has to deal with. No, I mean he may not meet constitutional requirements to run for the highest office in the land.
You see my friends, there is a little question of his citizenship. And Obama may be covering up the truth.
For several weeks now, the Internet has been abuzz with reports that Obama may not meet the citizenship requirements as laid out in the United States Constitution. Those requirements state that a candidate must be a natural born citizen. Obama’s status has come into question. Supposedly, Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961, after it became a state on August 21, 1959. Obama became a citizen at birth under first section of the 14th amendment.
“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside….”
Case closed. But wait.
Some questions have arisen about whether there is proof that Obama was really born in Hawaii in 1961, as well as the legal status of his mother at that time, and what is exactly on his original birth certificate…which by the way, may not even exist. When bloggers brought Obama’s citizenship into question, the Daily Kos published what purported to be the original State of Hawaii birth certificate. The problem is…the document appears to be a fake, and a poorly executed one at that. Examination of this document indicates it has been modified with Photoshop or other image-editing software, rendering it a forgery.
This could prove very troubling for the Obama campaign for a number of different reasons. If a true certificate of live birth cannot be produced to prove that Obama is a natural born citizen rather than a naturalized citizen, one would have to question whether Obama is qualified under the constitution to run for president.
So why wouldn’t the Obama campaign just lay all of this suspicion to rest by producing the real documentation rather than this cheap imitation which doesn’t cut muster? Could it be that The father listed on the birth certificate is not Barack Hussein Obama? Or the father’s race is listed as something other than African, perhaps Muslim or Arab? Or the mother was no longer at that time an American citizen? Or the child’s name is not listed as Barack Hussein Obama II?
Jim Geraghty, reporting on the Campaign Spot blog of the National Review, cited the “rumor” that Obama was born not within the United States, but elsewhere, possibly Kenya.
Geraghty stated that “If Obama were born outside the United States, one could argue that he would not meet the legal definition of natural-born citizen — because U.S. law at the time of his birth required his natural-born parent (his mother) to have resided in the United States for ‘10 years, at least [f]ive of which had to be after the age of 16.’”
He then points out that Ann Dunham, Obama’s mother, was 18 when Obama was born “so she wouldn’t have met the requirement of five years after the age of 16.”
If the rumors that Obama is not a natural born U.S. citizen are true, it would stop the campaign in its tracks. So far, no major news organization appears to be following this important story. The blogosphere appears to be the only quadrant of the journalistic universe that is attempting to bring this story to the forefront.
And this most recent development regarding the fake documentation published by the Daily Kos and touted by the Obama campaign as enough evidence to lay these “smear rumors” to rest only adds to the mystery.
Someone had better pick up the ball on this story and run with it.
If Obama is truly eligible under our constitution to run for president, then let’s get the proof out there and move on to finding other ways to prevent Obama from being elected. But if this story has legs, let’s expose it and stop Obama dead in his tracks.
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