Barack Obama -- February 4, 2009

February 04, 2009

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"This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal"

Barack Hussein Obama

event	description
Snatching Defeat From The Jaws Of Victory	CENTCOM commander General David Petraeus, supported by Defense Secretary Robert Gates, tried to convince President Barack Obama that he had to back down from his campaign pledge to pullout all US combat troops from Iraq within 18 months at an Oval Office meeting on January 21, sources have said. But Obama informed Gates, Petraeus and Joint Chiefs Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen that he wasn't convinced and wanted Gates and the military leaders to come back quickly with a detailed 16-month plan, according to two sources who have talked with participants in the meeting. Obama's decision to override Petraeus' recommendation has not ended the conflict between the president and senior military officers over troop withdrawal, however. There are indications that Petraeus and his allies in the military and the Pentagon, including General Ray Odierno, now the top commander in Iraq, have already begun to try to pressure Obama to change his withdrawal policy. A network of senior military officers is also reported to be preparing to support Petraeus and Odierno by mobilizing public opinion against Obama's decision. Petraeus was visibly unhappy when he left the Oval Office, according to one of the sources. A White House staffer present at the meeting was quoted by the source as saying: "Petraeus made the mistake of thinking he was still dealing with George Bush instead of with Barack Obama." Obama, who was never even a boy scout, has the arrogance to believe he knows better than his generals. He prefers to take his military strategy from the likes of Cindy Sheehan and Media Benjamin.
Obama's Attorney General	The Senate confirmed Eric H. Holder Jr. as Attorney General by a vote of 75 to 21 on Monday. Last month, Holder labeled as "torture" the simulated drowning technique called waterboarding and vowed to make national security his top priority. He also said that he would not conclusively rule out prosecution of Bush administration officials for their involvement in detainee questioning and warrantless surveillance operations. Obama already has put the attorney general in charge of a task force deliberating where to send nearly 250 terrorism suspects detained at the U.S. military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Obama last month instructed officials to close the prison within one year. Holder also will play a critical role in developing legal guidelines for interrogation practices and in deciding whether the Obama administration will adopt broad claims of executive power in court cases over warrantless eavesdropping and the firings of nine prosecutors during the Bush years. Holder also vowed to revitalize the department's civil rights division, which enforces voting and employment laws for minorities. During the 1970s and 1980s, Marc Rich made billions of dollars by trading with enemies of the United States, including selling weapons to the Iranian regime of Ayatollah Khomeni and helping Russian mafia figures launder money from smuggling drugs and material for nuclear weapons. He fled the United States and renounced his citizenship in order to avoid paying at least $48 million in income taxes in what U.S. attorneys called "the largest tax-evasion scheme ever prosecuted." He spent years on the FBI’s "Most Wanted" list and even his own lawyer called him a traitor. In 2001, Holder helped arrange a Bill Clinton pardon for this career criminal. In 1982, the Puerto Rican separatist terrorist group FALN bombed the headquarters of the New York City police department, maiming several police officers. According to the Wall Street Journal, "By 1996, the FBI had linked FALN to 146 bombings and a string of armed robberies -- a reign of terror that resulted in nine deaths and hundreds of injured victims." In 1999, Holder helped arrange pardons for 16 unrepentant members of FALN who had been convicted of "a variety of charges that included conspiracy, sedition, violation of the Hobbes Act (extortion by force, violence or fear), armed robbery and illegal possession of weapons and explosives -- including large quantities of C-4 plastic explosive, dynamite and huge caches of ammunition." In the period before armed agents seized Elian Gonzales at gunpoint, the Justice Department had been leaking its intention to avoid any sort of armed intervention. It would all be done quietly, they suggested. When top Department officials were asked about it, they said nothing to change that impression. About two weeks before the raid, Tim Russert asked Holder, "You wouldn't send a SWAT team in the dark of night to kidnap the child, in effect?" Holder answered, "No, we don't expect anything like that to happen." Then the Department did precisely that. The day after the seizure, Holder appeared again with Russert, who asked, "Why such a dramatic change in position?" "I'm not sure I'd call it a dramatic change," Holder answered. "We waited 'til five in the morning, just before dawn." Holder was a leader in the Clinton/Reno Waco cover up. U.S. Attorney James W. Blagg, who dared to publicly question the Department of Justice cover-up of the Waco/Branch Dividian Disaster, was personally removed from the investigation by then-Deputy Attorney General, and Clinton foot-soldier, Eric Holder. In his October 2001 comments Holder implied that only terrorists and criminals buy guns at gun shows. His remarks also included his case for strengthening the unconstitutional Brady Registration Act. Holder went so far as to say that there were "numerous" and "chilling" examples of terrorists being armed at gun shows, but only provided two, incidental and unrelated incidents as evidence. Holder has been a strong supporter of the notoriously anti-gun BATFE. After the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks, Holder went so far as to claim in a Washington Post Op-Ed that, "the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms should keep a record of every firearm sale." He is convinced justice in America needs to be "established" rather than enforced; he’s excited about hate crimes and enthusiastic about the constitutionally dubious Violence Against Women Act; he’s a supporter of affirmative action and a practitioner of the statistical voodoo that makes it possible to burden police departments with accusations of racial profiling and the states with charges of racially skewed death-penalty enforcement; he’s more likely to be animated by a touchy-feely Reno-esque agenda than traditional enforcement against crimes; he’s in favor of ending the detentions of enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay and favors income redistribution to address the supposed root causes of crime. This guy is perfect for Obama's Attorney General. They both think alike.
Michelle Misleads	Michelle Obama set out Monday on a listening tour through the federal bureaucracy, stopping first at the US Department of Education (DOE) to thank employees for their service and rally them for the tough work ahead. "There's a lot of work to do and we're going to need you," Mrs. Obama said. "The children of this country are counting on all of us." In thanking the workers, she told the DOE staff members, "I am a product of your work." Michelle conveniently overlooked the fact that the DOE was created by the Department of Education Organization Act (Public Law 96-88), and was signed into law by President Jimmy Carter on October 17, 1979. The DOE began operating on May 4, 1980, when Michelle was entering her senior year of high school. Her hypocritical speech, espousing the importance of the public schools system, also brought focus to the fact that her own children have NEVER attended a public school. They recently started attending the exclusive Sidwell Friends private school in the capital that costs almost $30,000 each a year, and before that the girls both attended the private University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, where their mother was on the board.