Here’s Something Interesting

Oh come on. You grouse about the NYT being an Obama mouthpiece and you link directly to McCain’s site?

By the way, here’s McCain…the deregulator, who is now all about regulation. Apparently.

That’s some pretty major flip-flopping, from a guy who’s dedicated his career to removing government oversight from Wall Street.

I, like Jim, would like to hear what it is that’s frightening about Obama. I’ll tell you one thing that I like about the guy: we can be sure his strings aren’t being pulled by the neocons who’ve been Bush’s puppetmasters for the last eight years. McCain on the other hand was their biggest rival in 2000 until they slandered him out of the race. And he’s now embraced them and they’re running large parts of his campaign. I’d call that some major flipping as well. And I sure as hell don’t want neocons anywhere near Washington ever again.

Obama’s flip-flop, on the other hand, is purely about self-interest. He promised to accept public financing before he knew he could raise more money from donors. Now that he can raise twice as much from donors as Uncle Sam would give him if he forswore private donations, of course he’s pursuing the bigger bucks.

Okay. So, Obama decided that he’d rather accept small donations from millions of donors rather than taking money from lobbyists and PACs. That’s a bad thing…how?

What’s more troubling is Obama’s list of flip-flops is so limitless, he’s beginning to sound like he tailors his position to whichever audience he’s addressing at the moment.

Just like every other politician ever. Including John McCain, if he can keep his notes straight when he talks.

When he spoke to an AIPAC meeting a couple of weeks back, he said he supports Israeli control of Jerusalem. The next day, trying to placate angry Arab supporters, Obama said “negotiators” should work out the contentious Jerusalem issue.

Okay, so Obama personally supports the Israelis. But he doesn’t have jurisdiction there, so he says that the subject should be negotiated by the people who actually do have a stake in what happens in Jerusalem.

As a New York Post editorial observed:

This is where I pause and point out that the Post is every bit the Republican mouthpiece that Fox News is. And why not, they’re both owned by the sleazeball Rupert Murdoch. His company, News Corporation, fought a court battle to be able to report whatever the hell they like - even if they know it’s untrue - and won. Which brings every single thing you read or hear from his news companies into question. How do we know what is and isn’t true, when they actually spent millions of dollars to ensure their right to lie?

He [Obama] ripped Hillary Clinton for months for voting to list Iran’s Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization. Days after Clinton conceded, Obama flipped and said he supported the definition.

By “flipped” you mean “reevaluated his position and decided that that position needed to be amended.”

Obama repeatedly vowed to meet with various heads of terror states—most notably Ahmadinejad of Iran—”without preconditions.” Then, with the nomination in sight, he zigzagged: “There’s no reason why we would necessarily meet with Ahmadinejad. He’s not the most powerful person in Iran.”

So he didn’t say that he wouldn’t meet with the leader of Iran. Just that Ahmadinejad wasn’t necessarily the Iranian he would meet with. And hey…he’s right! Ahmadinejad is not the most powerful person in Iran. He’s just the most obviously annoying.

In October, he supported NAFTA expansion. In March, campaigning in the Ohio primary, he called for a “reopening” of the trade pact’s terms. This week, he called his own primary rhetoric “overheated” and said NAFTA has had a positive effect on the US economy.

Yeah, I don’t get this either. As far as I can tell, NAFTA’s sucked. I’d like to see him remain firm on this one.

Yesterday, after signaling opposition to nuclear power, he told Democratic governors he’s open to expanding it.”

What Obama has opposed is expanding the number of nuclear plants in this country while we still don’t know what we’re going to do with the waste. But why listen to me when you can read it here.

There are many, many other examples, some of which I’ve noted in prior posts. Change we can believe in? No, change we can count on, because as soon as he takes a position, we can count on the fact he’s going to change it in front of the next audience.

That’s simply not true, Bonnie Erbe of US News. Like any politician on the stump, he’s delivering pretty much the same speech as he travels around the country.

Having worked in a union shop for 30 years, it amazes me that this NAFTA flip is totally ignored by all the unions.

That’s probably because they know it’s not true.

http://townhall.com/columnists/PatrickJBuchanan/2008/08/12/a_catholic_case_against_barack

Pat Buchanan is a lunatic. A “religious leader” who publicly calls for the assassination of a sitting head of state should be stoned as a heretic. And I’ve never voted for/against any candidate because of his stand on abortion. I believe it’s a red herring issue used to energize bases on the left and right, rather than an issue that will ever actually be addressed.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/06/obama-shifts-on.html

From that article:
“He made clear at the time, however, that he probably would have opposed the federal welfare overhaul. Speaking on the floor of the Illinois state senate, Obama described his on-going concerns as including a lack of job training, insufficient oversight, and provisions blocking legal immigrants from receiving benefits.”

This is a mistake way too many reporters with an agenda make. On the one hand, a politician is said to be for something before they’re against it (because it changed in committee or came back from the other house with provisions that were unacceptable to that lawmaker. This is what happened to John Kerry, and what lead to popularization of the idiotic term “flip-flopping” in the first place.)

Or that they opposed something that everyone should be for. “Senator Smith voted against the Help for Kids with Disabilities Act! They say he hates retards!” When in fact, programs for disabled children is a subject very close to Smith’s heart and he didn’t vote for the HKDA because he didn’t think it did enough. Or the funding was too low. Or because there was a rider attached that said that every Wednesday was Kick a Slow Kid day. But we cherry-pick one or two or twelve words that say just what we want people to hear.

And that isn’t the only thing that scares me.
He hasn’t done anything in the 143 days he has been a senator.
Most of the time he voted “present” not willing to take a stand on anything.

Oh, that’s complete nonsense. Where did you hear that?

The “143 days” thing is another Republican talking point. That refers to the (supposed) number of days he’s spent in the chamber, right? Because there were a few more than 143 days between January 4, 2005 and now, and Senators tend to do most of their work when they’re not on the Senate floor.

Here, some stats (non-partisan, non-mouthpiece stuff) for you:

Obama was the primary sponsor of 152 bills and resolutions introduced in the last Congress. These included bills to create a federal standard for renewable diesel fuel (S.1426), to improve benefits and services for members of the armed forces and veterans (S.3988), and to direct the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to establish guidelines for tracking spent fuel rods (S.1194).

Senator Obama is one of the authors of the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act (S. 2180). The bill would lengthen the cooling off period to two years for lawmakers and staff who seek to become lobbyists, and it would require immediate disclosure as soon as any job negotiations begin. The bill would open conference committee meetings to the public and require that all bills be posted on the Internet for 24 hours before they can be voted on by the Senate. Finally, the bill would end all lobbyist-funded gifts, meals, and travel and strengthen the Senate office that monitors lobbyist disclosure forms.

That sounds like a whole lot of transparent government to me. He was also cosponsor of the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act, a bill that will create a Google-like search engine and database to track approximately $1 trillion in federal grants, contracts, earmarks and loans. Also a lot of transparency there.

Say what you like about the sky falling during an Obama presidency; if we have that level of transparency we’ll at least know why it’s falling. Contrast that with the Bush administration, which is about as transparent as obsidian. And McCain has apparently decided he likes that kind of opaqueness. I mean hell, he’s not even elected yet and we’re seeing it in the way they’re handling Palin!

Anyway, here’s a few more bills he either sponsored or cosponsored:
His first bill as a U.S. Senator was the HOPE Act (Higher Education Opportunity Through Pell Grant Expansion Act) (S.697)
The Congressional Ethics Enforcement Commission Act (S. 2259)
The Transparency and Integrity in Earmarks Act (S. 2261)
The Curtailing Lobbyist Effectiveness through Advance Notification, Updates, and Posting Act (The CLEAN UP Act) (S. 2179)
The Lead-Free Toys Act (S. 2048)
The Home Lead Safety Tax Credit Act (S. 2053)
The Great Lakes Environmental Restoration Act (S. 508)
Passed legislation in the Senate that requires all soldiers to be assessed for Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) after they return from deployments.
Cosponsored Dru’s Law (S. 792) which creates a nationwide sex offender database and requires greater monitoring of sex offenders upon their release from prison.
Cosponsored extension of Violence Against Women Act (S. 1197), which passed the Senate on October 4, 2005, and was signed into law.
Played a key role in the crafting of the immigration reform bill that the Senate passed in May 2006.
The Chemical Safety and Security Act (S. 2486)
The Spent Nuclear Fuel Tracking and Accountability Act (S. 1194)
Introduced the Homes for Heroes Act (S. 3475), which would expand access to long-term affordable housing for homeless veterans

Now, not all of these passed, of course, which isn’t surprising considering the Republicans were in charge of both houses for the first two years of Obama’s tenure.

From the Washington Post’s vote database:

Barack Obama has missed 295 votes (45.9%) during the current Congress.
Barack Obama has voted with a majority of his Democratic colleagues 96.0% of the time during the current Congress

John McCain has missed 412 votes (64.1%) during the current Congress.
John McCain has voted with a majority of his Republican colleagues 88.3% of the time during the current Congress. This percentage does not include votes in which McCain did not vote.

Oh, and it turns out that Rick Davis’ firm was still making $15,000 a month from Freddie Mac up until a month ago. The McCain campaign, in its diatribe against the NY Times, failed to mention that. If there’s no impropriety, why not say something? Not sure what that means at this point, but it sure doesn’t smell very good.