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James Johnson: The tip of Obama’s subprime iceberg [Karl]

The Wall Street Journal has a piece (nicely paraphrased at the New York Sun for non-subscribers to the WSJ ) on the ties between a prominent adviser to Barack Obama and the CEO of Countrywide Financial Corp., a company at the center of the subprime lending debacle:

James Johnson, one of three people tapped by Mr. Obama recently to oversee the search for his running mate, took at least five real estate loans totaling more than $7 million from Countrywide Financial Corp. through an informal program for friends of the company’s CEO, Angelo Mozilo, the Wall Street Journal reported Saturday. The Journal said at least two of the mortgages, among a series of loans made available to people Countrywide officials called “friends of Angelo,” were at rates below market averages, though it is difficult to predict a market rate without access to nonpublic information about a borrower’s credit history and other factors that can reduce interest charges on a loan.

Obama has “fumed” over a total of $19 million in bonuses set to be paid to Mr. Mozilo and  Countrywide prez David Sambol, calling the payments an “outrage.”

The story is getting buzz now, but Johnson is just one of a number in Obama’s circle involved in the subprime mortgage mess:

[B]y the end of March 2008, [Obama] had taken $1,180,103 from people and groups associated with the top ten issuers of subprime loans.  Since then, even a cursory glance at the list of Obama’s top contributors shows that contributions from subprime lenders has increased significantly.  Indeed, Swiss banking giant UBS, which has written off more debt from the subprime crisis than any other bank, has contributed $363,257 not included in that total.  Also excluded from the list was J.P. Morgan (which reported in April that its first-quarter profit fell by half), which contributed $353,808.

Obama failed to mention that his fundraising bundlers include: Louis Susman, Michael Froman and J. Michael Schell of Citigroup; Steve Koch of Credit Suisse; Bruce Hayman, David Heller, Eric Schwartz, and Todd Williams of Goldman Sachs; Mark Gilbert, Christine Forester, John Rhea, Nadja Fidelia, and Theodore Janulis of Lehman; and Robert Wolf of UBS Americas.  These folks raised an additional $1,800,000 for Obama.

Such bundlers get perks from the Obama campaign and are are made to feel part of its inner workings through weekly conference calls and quarterly meetings, advance copies of his speeches, access to his top advisers, opportunities to influence the campaign’s message, and so on.

One bundler who deserves special mention is Chicago billionaire Penny Pritzker, who happens to be Obama’s national Finance Chair.  Pritzker was an owner and board member of Superior Bank of Chicago, which went bust in 2001 with over $1 billion in deposits.  Timothy Anderson — who obsessively pursued the late Rep. Henry Hyde (R-IL) over his role in the failure of Clyde Federal Savings & Loan  — has been quoted as saying that “Superior’s owners were to sub-prime lending what Michael Milken was to junk bonds.”

Before being named to Obama’s Veep search team, Johnson was also a bundler who raised over $100,000 for the campaign.

“That reeks most high,” a public relations specialist and vocal critic of Mr. Mozilo, Bonnie Russell of Del Mar, Calif., said. “Where’s the ‘change to believe in’ if they’re playing the same old game using the same old players?”

That is a good question — one that should have been asked long before today.

Update: see-dubya-lanche!  Malkin readers may also want to check the next post over for a bit on Austan Goolsbee, Economic Adviser of Mystery.

97 Replies to “James Johnson: The tip of Obama’s subprime iceberg [Karl]”

  1. Carin -BONC says:

    Glad to see Ed Brill is back on his A-game.

  2. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    – Can you say “party favors” and use it in a sentence kids. I know you can.

    – If this keeps up at the rate its been going through the next 5 months, by the time we get to the debates we’ll have one candidate on life support on the other standing behind the podium naked with the stage curtain wrapped around his semi-black ass.

  3. Carin -BONC says:

    1 ) Everybody does it.
    2) When he does it, it’s not the same.
    3) O! needs to work WITHIN the system to institute the hopey/change.

  4. Carin -BONC says:

    Nice catch, Good Lt. Can’t believe I missed that one.

  5. Carin -BONC says:

    Oh, and for Thor –

    Keep at it, Karl. slurp slurp.

  6. cranky-d says:

    I decided to click over to Big Ed’s site. I know he has his blog hoover set on auto-suck, but I cannot figure out the motivation. Advertising I guess, but it isn’t particularly blatant.

    Or maybe I’m just not all there today.

  7. kelly says:

    Hmm.

    Citigroup. Credit Suisse. Goldman Sachs. Lehman. UBS Americas.

    Evil corporations. Every one of them. How dare they taint the holiness of a Dem presidential candidate?!?

  8. Carin -BONC says:

    When I looked (last week) it was my impression that Ed is some sort of comment-blog-spam. I imagine he gets $$ for every hit he gets. So, he baits with trackbacks.

  9. I don’t think it does much good to list off all these damning facts. The people who are in the tank for Obama are in it for emotional reasons.

    A better strategy would be movie shorts like the ones from Jib-Jab (e.g., http://www.jibjab.com/originals/this_land), or cartoons like Tom Tomorrow’s “This Modern World” (e.g., http://action.credomobile.com/comics/2007/11/if_the_democrats_win_in_2008.html).

    Augment the accounting with lots and lots of sharp humor. That’s the way to take Obama down.

  10. kelly says:

    I mean, really. How could the Saviour From The South Side accept cash from greedy capitalist brokerage firms and I-banks?

    “Those aren’t the greedy capitalist brokerage firms and I-banks that I knew.”

  11. kelly says:

    Uh, Patrick? Tom Tomorrow is a pretty hard core lefty, iirc, and it seems to me that the cartoon you linked is parodying the right.

  12. Rusty says:

    #13
    because the local pols that got him elected are gonna be indicted? Just a guess.

  13. Hi kelly,

    My point being where’s the right-wing Tom Tomorrow?

    Patrick

  14. 2klbofun says:

    I’m sure that Obama had no inkling of what Mr. Johnston had done in the past (same excuse for Wright, Pfleger, Rezko, Ayers, . . .). Must be the most clueless man alive.

  15. […] by See-Dubya; h/t on the second to Protein Wisdom.} Posted in: Barack Obama, John McCain, Subprime crisis Send to a Friend Printer Friendly […]

  16. Salt Lick says:

    More and more, Obama resembles a grinning skull wearing a skin-thick mask.

  17. Karl says:

    Patrick,

    I generally agree, though I’m not sure TT has much of an audience beyond his ‘net niche and the alt-papers (choir preaching). I would say that Chris Muir is like Garry Trudeau, except that Muir is funny. And I have long encouraged Jeff to do more of his Peter Fonda-esque posts for similar reasons.

  18. Carin -BONC says:

    I’m sure that Obama had no inkling of what Mr. Johnston had done in the past (same excuse for Wright, Pfleger, Rezko, Ayers, . . .). Must be the most clueless man alive.

    I believe the meme goes like this … “That is not the Mr. Johnston I knew …”

  19. […] Protein Wisdom – James Johnson: The tip of Obama’s subprime iceberg [Karl] […]

  20. Carin -BONC says:

    spit …

    how dare you compare Muir to Trudeau. That many hasn’t brought the funny since … shit, was he ever funny?

    I remember being, like 12, and reading some compilation of Trudeau’s work. He used to do a funny bit about a guy who was tanning all the time. As a 12-y/o I found that amusing.

  21. N. O'Brain says:

    sniff….sniff….

    That’s not teen spirit.

    THAT’S CORRUPTION!

  22. Karl says:

    The early Uncle Duke stuff was okay. I was about to add “though it doesn’t take talent to make Hunter S Thompson funny,” when I remembered the movies made about HST.

  23. Hi Karl,

    Point about TT well taken. I hope someone does an updated version of “Godzillary”, with McCain vs. Obama.

    Patrick

  24. kelly says:

    Zonker in the tanning contests was pretty funny.

    Patrick: Got it. FWIW, I’ve commented several times on PW about the confluence of political cartoonery and an Obama presidency. The double standard of how a GOP president is limned vs. the Holy Son of the South side will be enough to make a contortionist envious. Hell, there isn’t enought chlorophyll on earth to match the green envy.

  25. kelly says:

    FTR, an Obama presidency would be the ne plus ultre of a political cartoon.

    Gah.

  26. Mike Bilek says:

    I worked for Fannie Mae in the 90s when Jim Johnson took over the helm there as CEO with his buddy Larry Small COO (read how small was booted from his post as Smithsonian Secretary http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/26/AR2007032600643.html. Another known criminal to make the trio is Jamie Gorlic who was Fannie Mae’s Chief Counsel during the Johnson/Small days. You all remember her as the 9/11 panel member and architect of the wall between the FBI and CIA….all of them got their appointments from the Clintons.

    All of these idiots are responsible for the beginnings of the Sub Prime mess….read Johnsons book (Showing America a New Way Home)The clown was into give away mortgages……and he was in charge of the company with the largest base of assets in the United States….backed by your home loan! What a bunch of “Dangerous” morons!

  27. dre says:

    “Augment the accounting with lots and lots of sharp humor.”

    The only way to “get” the O! is to mock him.

  28. cynn says:

    “The only way to “get” the O! is to mock him.”

    As opposed to actually debating the issues, instead of trying to dig up dirty laundry or make a disparaging characiture out of him. Solid strategy. Do you not even see how absurd you are?

  29. SDN says:

    Well, cynn, if I thought that Obamanation could tell what the issues were without a Teleprompter, it might be worth a shot…. kind of like debating you, come to think of it.

  30. cynn says:

    Great deflection, SDN. Please address your party’s inability to articulate its stance on prevalent issues: Iraq and economy to start. Rather than cutting taxes for the richies, what do you have? Nothing. So, don’t bother. Just be a good satellite and keep bouncing the message back to the mothership.

  31. Pablo says:

    This issue, as I’m often reminded, is change.

  32. E. Nough says:

    I thought Mr. Carroll made a good point: many people’s positive reactions to Obama are emotional. All those “young people” and “inspired” folks and babblers about him being a “Lightworker” aren’t fainting in response to some Powerpoint of talking points he has prepared — it’s really his natural charisma and manufactured image, which they have transformed into a cult of personality.

    Debate on “issues” isn’t going to do much, especially since Obama’s issue positions are ephemeral. You break the cult, you have to deflate the personality: that is, mock it. Fortunately, the Distinguished Gentleman seems eager to provide the material.

  33. cynn says:

    Yes, politics is a diaper that must be changed now and then.

  34. cynn says:

    Why do I picture you with a Civil War beard and a lot of harrumphs?

  35. Mikey NTH says:

    Because you stereotype everyone you disagree with and have a running series of Thomas Nast cartoons in your head?

    N.B. cynn – it isn’t the late nineteeth century any more.

  36. Sean M. says:

    “I didn’t get a harrumph out of that guy!”

  37. cynn says:

    MikeyBaby, you guys are perpetuating the time warp. Where’s my hoop skirt?

  38. TmjUtah says:

    Must suck to be Obama’s bus driver. I bet he mutters “Pressure washer AGAIN, dammit” a lot.

    CSI guy peeking under the bus: “Ooh. A party!”

  39. thor says:

    O! hand feeds baby pink unicorns… into a wood chipper. Just ask KK.

  40. Mikey NTH says:

    You bring it up all of the time, cynn. I just made a shoe and you put it on and loudly complained about how well it fits.

    Sounds like your problem, not mine.

  41. thor says:

    Barack Obama is $100M man
    By Alexander Bolton
    Posted: 06/09/08 07:31 PM [ET]

    Leading Democratic fundraisers predict that Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) will raise hundreds of millions of dollars over the next few months if he opts out of public financing and begins raising money for the general election.

    Specifically, they say Obama could raise $100 million in June and could attract 2.5 million to 3 million new donors to his campaign.
    ——————————————————————————

    That Barack Obama is the Michael Milken of hostile government takeovers, eh KK?

    $100-mill of campaign bling in a month. He’s an idiot, I tell ya!

  42. Karl says:

    I don’t think I’ve ever said Obama is an idiot.

    People like thor who think it’s some sort of new politics are another matter.

  43. datadave says:

    Damn, after working so much I have to sleep early and then wake up to this mess:

    thor, I prefer Karl (KK) over jeffy as K isn’t politically illiterate, has read a bit more than Goldberg’s Liberal Fascism, and he has copious references although Karl’s contradictions are amazing. He perhaps has a very WIDE stance: first accusing Obama of being too “liberal”, too socialist, and then on the other foot….Obama is so very tied to corporate interests, has too wealthy of associates, etc. Obama has become K’s Tricyle. If you get bored with Obama’s corrupt wealthy friends (which seems to be okay for McCain and other conservatives), Karl can then lean on the other big rear wheel: Obama is the most liberal Senator in the Nation. So which is it? The Socialist Obama or the Capitalist Obama?

    At least we get some interesting links from Karl. And I don’t really think he’s racist.

    note: small donations are Obama’s life blood which is in contrast to Republicans… which is like Howard Dean’s campaign of ’04. (unfortunately, the similarities to Howard Dean’s quest just don’t end there. Obama isn’t as radical or ‘liberal’ as many of his supporters might think…..any more than Gov. Dean was — from my observations being in Vermont. Dean was a conservative Democratic governor who resisted universal health care when it had a good chance of passage early in his governorship) and it’s amazing how right-wing the media was in portraying Dean as some sort of wild liberal. It seems Obama has learned from Dean’s campaign being very bipartisan in his criticisms. Stressing responsibility and not liberal taxes for working people is going to be his mantra. Just watch (he’ll be very Bill Clinton-like on those issues…and his not pandering about the insignificant federal gas tax is part of that responsible stance).

    I suspect if Obama ever gets the Presidency he’ll not be very radical nor revolutionary. But at least a more responsible spender than the current occupant by far.

    In contrast, McCain’s embrace of voodoo Enron economics in the form of Phil Gramm’s economic advice will certainly lead to the more corrupt speculation that is currently ruining the lower middle class’s budget en masse at the moment. Note, “KK” ignored Phil (and wife) Gramm’s complicity in the current distress on the USA: Phil’s encouragement of the Enron-loophole is in fact the reason for Oil’s incredible price hikes of late (the avoidance of necessary transparency and regulation that also leads to huge unnatural pricing of energy ‘futures’ unwarrented by supply nor demand… a similar fiasco to what led to the Great Depression).

    the Subprime fiasco is old news and tepid indeed compared to the devastation wrung out by the oil speculation price hikes due to insiders like Phil Gramm. Personally I don’t mind higher prices bringing down oil consumption and increasing conservation as I am an expert in energy conservation in my home construction and remodeling work. It’s just that conservatives in govt. have lulled the USA into thinking that it didn’t matter and that we’d always have a easy ride with Big Oil’s Bush/Cheney in command. Mostly lower middle class people such as myself now are forced into market damaging non-consumption mode. Gasoline is a price that poorer people have to pay just to get to work..as the jobs aren’t where most people can walk to. Gasoline is less of a concern the further up the income ladder you go….except if you own a business…and then it hurts and that means layoffs to counter the losses due to required transportation costs. Again leading to spiral downwards in the economy. And alternatives to gasoline are limited especially for the working poor as mass transit was disdained and attacked by the Conservatives as socialistic and thus thrown out with the bathwater after the baby was drowned by Reagan/Bush/Gingrich types of idiots.)

    I bring up differences in our appreciation of Obama, but know that your support is more conservative-based than mine. I’d hope for more ‘radical’ change but knowing ‘change’ coming from a Democrat could be just as bad as the slow death of the middle class that Republicans are promoting. Hillary Clinton’s health care policies for example that Obama seems to be leaning towards. Forcing lower middle class people to pay insurance that would then become a regressive tax benefiting the wealthy (which our current private health insurance system already does.)

  44. The Lost Dog says:

    Yup, Karl.

    O! is a “new” progg hack with a sorta black complexion.

    It’s hard for me to get my mind around how much more important his “blackness” is than are his ideas.

  45. Tennyson Hayes says:

    You break the cult, you have to deflate the personality: that is, mock it.

    Yeah, not so sure that even the most cogent appeal to reason will have any effect on the True Believers. In any case, we all have a role to play, and I will leave the detailed policy wars to those better qualified. Mocking though – that may be something I can contribute.

    I’ve gotten a little traction from a couple one-off cartoons; this one is probably the best-known. I like Patrick’s TT idea. An ongoing series. Cast of characters. Hmmm.

    Collaborators and suggestions welcomed, although I’m not sure how best to connect with the rest of youse out there, don’t want to spam ProteinWisdom’s comment section with inappropriate personal stuff.

  46. gee, ddave, took you a couple months to find that article Karl “ignored” did it? BWAH HA HA HAaaaa

  47. Karl says:

    Tennyson,

    I saw that up at MM and thought it was fab (and wasn’t the interference w/ merching it lovely)!

    Our usual host has some urgent family matters at the moment, but you can shoot an e-mail via jeff -dot- proteinwisdom -at- gmail – dot- com

    Mention Karl and I should get it once the emergency has passed.

  48. datadave says:

    eh? these threads usually only last a day. So, have to bring it up in a current one.

    You need to read up on Gramm a bit more. Ultra Sleazy. “In 1981, Gramm attended Democratic Caucus budget meetings and then secretly shared their strategy with Republicans to help pass newly inaugurated President Ronald Reagan’s budget.[citation needed] In response, the House Democratic leadership stripped him of his seat on the committee. Following this action, Gramm resigned his House seat, forcing a mid-term special election. Gramm ran in that election to fill the vacancy that he had created, but as a Republican.

    spying turn-coat. that’d make even Benedict Arnold blush.

    and more: “Gramm was one of five co-sponsors of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000,[3] which critics blame for permitting the Enron scandal to occur.[4]”

    “While advising the McCain campaign, Gramm was being paid by a UBS to lobby Congress about the U.S. mortgage crisis. During this time, “the mortgage industry pressed Congress to roll back strong state rules that sought to stem the rise of predatory tactics used by lenders and brokers to place homeowners in high-cost mortgages.”[5] According to Politico.com, Gramm had input on McCain’s March 26, 2008 policy speech on the mortgage crisis.[6] He was deregistered as a lobbyist for UBS on April 18th, 2008.[7]

    Also, he has been rumored to be a possible running-mate for John McCain in 2008.[citation needed]”

    McCain traveling with associations like that then Obama’s got clear sailing.

  49. Karl says:

    dd,

    You wouldn’t see a contradiction if you understood The Chicago Way, which is why I’m doing a series on it.

    And though maggie linked my direct post on that TMV piece, there is an update also.

  50. citation needed

    oh yes, that’s quite the authoritative source.

  51. Sean M. says:

    Karl’s contradictions are amazing. He perhaps has a very WIDE stance: first accusing Obama of being too “liberal”, too socialist, and then on the other foot….Obama is so very tied to corporate interests, has too wealthy of associates, etc.

    Uhhhhhhh…that would be one of those BECAUSE OF THE [fill in the blank]! dealies.

  52. Karl says:

    Sean M,

    There certainly is a strong element of that in The Chicago Way, but it’s more than that also. Chicago is a one-party Democratic fiefdom, which breeds the myriad forms of corruption for which the city is known, including coziness with all sorts of business interests, savory and otherwise.

    As noted above, I’ll be fleshing that out in the days and weeks to come.

  53. Uhhhhhhh…that would be one of those BECAUSE OF THE [fill in the blank]! dealies.

    um, GAY PORN COCK OF LIES!?

  54. datadave says:

    it’s up to you to de-cite. Maggie. I assume McCain wouldn’t be so stupid to put Grimm up for study in our current crisis. VP? no way! But then we can hope. So why is USB’s lobbyist still on the Straightalking Express? Show me the accolades for Phil Gramm’s energy policies.

    Chicago? No longer Fly-over country eh? Karl. Commodity future’s city. So how is Chicago so bad and Houston or NYC is better? Guilt by association? The fact that a Daley is still in power maybe a good reason to condemn Chicago…somehow I don’t think that’s Obama’s fault. Remember Conservatism also has deep roots in the windy city.

  55. thor says:

    Graham’s wife sat on the board of Enron. Her eyes are so squinty she didn’t recognize the Godzilla-sized fraud.

  56. datadave says:

    GAY PORN COCK OF LIES

    very lady like. eh, trying to digest that one or visualize it. David Sedaris? Maybe a real fowl? a Rooster? dildo? that is why it’s noteworthy…could mean anything. A MX missle? Devil’s tower?

    jeff called me a ‘hard charger’ But we’re in the same company I guess. thor mentions unicorns perhaps for Obama’s alleged gayness.

    Note, on NPR, heard George Will almost rooting for Obama to win as he fears McCain will lead us into a war w/ Iran (the most friendly to American people in the ME by several accounts including his_) and that the conservatives are suggested to be able to comeback after a Obama presidency.

    and David Mamet sucks toads.

  57. datadave says:

    fuck, Thor. And I almost praised Karl to keep him in business after all the buggering badgering you give him. I kinda hoped you didn’t read that.

    I want that lady who called Hillary a Monster back on the Obama team. She’s good I hear.

  58. *sigh* blog language. it was that or PAT BOONE IS MY MASTER!

  59. datadave says:

    thor, that’s just racist. You know she’s Asian.

    SNARK BAIT!!!

    and maggie:

    that’s WORSE.
    Don’t even try to be a Lady. That’s boring!

    and I thought about wiki’ing Pat Boone and let the urge pass.

  60. here dave, it’s like a trail of little bunnies.

  61. datadave says:

    Obama=Harvard snob? Is that the response about Phil Gramm’s enron-loophole? Prior to that I was just told to ‘shut-up’ on Karl’s prior defense of Gramm concerning Gramm’s complicity in the current wringing of unearned profits from energy commodities. Note, that Libertarians are even having a hard time explaining away the speculative binge in profit taking at the public’s expense. (“Speculation and greater world demand have also driven up oil and gasoline prices,…” and that’s from a Randista crazy) Seems this Phil Gramm connection isn’t making Republicans too happy. Maybe Dick Cheney for Vice President?

  62. datadave says:

    yeah, thanks. maggie. I am a little mystified. I learned that armadillos are a theme of George Will too in explaining that global warming is a fraud….but he’s such a liar. Incredible Liar. So is that where the armadillo thing came from here too? From George Will? Will’s Almost too funny of a liar. JD and others here keep bringing up a unscientific short term journalistic rumor when global cooling as a hysteria of the past…lived thru that and it wasn’t as scientific based as the current concern. And a short lived media thing. But then Ice Ages happen! (now the worst killer is the theory that global warming leads to Ice Ages with reversal of warming currents due to more ice melting..)

    What me worry? I’ll just buy a Hummer on extreme discount.

  63. Tennyson Hayes says:

    Karl: (and wasn’t the interference w/ merching it lovely)!

    Yeah. Commandment 11: Thou shalt not besmirch the Official Logo of the Chosen One.

    Although MM found numerous instances of it on CafePress merch elsewhere – one, as I recall, on Men’s Thongs, Suitable for Prancing.

    Email sent. If there’s something here, let’s do it.

  64. Sean M. says:

    Graham’s wife sat on the board of Enron. Her eyes are so squinty she didn’t recognize the Godzilla-sized fraud.

    You know what, thor? Fuck you and the horse you rode in on. If you’ve got some beef with Phil Gramm, that’s fine. But you can argue that without making racist remarks about his wife.

    You’re a real piece of shit, and I hope nobody ever engages you here again since you’ve shown your true colors as a backward motherfucker.

    I hope you get banned, you worthless, retrograde piece of shit.

    Oh, and if anybody on the conservative side of the debate ever made an argument about Barack’s harpy of a wife that you could construe as a racist statement, you’d be up in arms about that, wouldn’t you, you piece of racist shit? How does it feel to be called out as a hypocrite, dicknose?

    You’re what’s wrong with the political climate in this country. Especially on the left side. I hope you’re happy, douchebag.

  65. Sean M. says:

    I’m sure not the person who lays down the law here, but I hope nobody ever engages thor again, seeing as how he’s a racist piece of shit.

    He should be shunned by decent people.

  66. datadave says:

    sean, I think he was pulling the chain here. some sort of snark, to get someone upset. Apparently he gotcha. It was a weird joke as somewhat worse things are said here often (usually with humor).

  67. Carin- says:

    He perhaps has a very WIDE stance: first accusing Obama of being too “liberal”, too socialist, and then on the other foot….Obama is so very tied to corporate interests, has too wealthy of associates, etc. Obama has become K’s Tricyle. If you get bored with Obama’s corrupt wealthy friends (which seems to be okay for McCain and other conservatives), Karl can then lean on the other big rear wheel: Obama is the most liberal Senator in the Nation. So which is it? The Socialist Obama or the Capitalist Obama?

    It is both, DD. Obama is promising socialist ideas, yet – in reality- he’s the same-old, same-old. FOR HIMSELF. The problem with all the ‘isms is that it’s a lie. Government advocates one way of life, while they live another. Do what we say, not what we do. Socialist policies would exist for us little people. See Cuba. See North Korea.

    That’s why Michelle and O! can talk down about greed, and not working together all the while they live in a mansion (thanks TONY!)

    Looking through almost EVERY liberal politician, the same thing can be found. Al Gore and his mansions, for example. The populist bullshit doesn’t fly.

  68. Rob Crawford says:

    what do you have? Nothing. So, don’t bother.

    That’s the kind of efficiency we’ll have in an O! administration — cut right through the debate by asserting the other side has nothing!

    Working on your goose-step, cynn? Or did you perfect that during the Clinton years?

  69. JD says:

    dataless woke up full of teh krazy today. Gramm single-handedly passed deregulation and sub-prime lending, and is a heretic for switching parties. He conveniently ignores the facts that Karl diligently laid out about Gramm, and even moreso, Baracky’s close ties to the actual people who engaged in these “nefarious” practices, rather than a politician that worked to pass bipartisan legislation. But, we all know that facts just get in the way of Teh Narrative.

  70. JD says:

    dataless – Is it global warming, global cooling, or climate change this week? Wasn’t all of this just called weather in the past?

  71. guinsPen says:

    as somewhat worse things are said here often

    BS, dd.

  72. Pablo says:

    Definitely global warming this week, JD. Hotter than a fucked fox in a forest fire, I tell ya. Are y’all on high ground there?

  73. B Moe says:

    now the worst killer is the theory that global warming leads to Ice Ages with reversal of warming currents due to more ice melting..

    Global warming may lead to global cooling? You don’t say! I suppose next they are going to tell us they suspect these things may come in cycles.

  74. Mikey NTH says:

    It was a weird joke as somewhat worse things are said here often (usually with humor).

    I don’t write things like that, and I don’t read other people writing things like that here.

  75. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    “first accusing Obama of being too “liberal”, too socialist, and then on the other foot….Obama is so very tied to corporate interests, has too wealthy of associates, etc”

    – And of course, for you dumbdave, the ever faithful Obama puppy dog, that seems a contradiction, because, well, your fearless messiah could never being doing the class warfare two step.

    – Hey, at least O! will be paying for Rezko’s landscaping on that side lot while hes cooling his heels up the river.

    – But you better get busy if you want to nail McDinosaur. You’ll need to go to 12th tier “associations” of the nature that someone that lives in his neighborhod got a traffic ticket once if you want his junk. McCain is notorious for not playing ball, while at the same time your boy is starting to have a fairly long special friends rap sheet, with new little tidbits popping up almost daily.

    – But then he is from the South side of Chicago, where they grow them meaner than a junk yard dog. So he’s going to keep you busy airbrushing footprints. You’re going to need a lot of rest.

  76. Pablo says:

    You know what else comes in cycles? Blasphemy.

    CO2 is nature’s fertilizer, bathing the biota with its life-giving nutrients. Plants take the carbon from CO2 to bulk themselves up — carbon is the building block of life — and release the oxygen, which along with the plants, then sustain animal life. As summarized in a report last month, released along with a petition signed by 32,000 U. S. scientists who vouched for the benefits of CO2: “Higher CO2 enables plants to grow faster and larger and to live in drier climates. Plants provide food for animals, which are thereby also enhanced. The extent and diversity of plant and animal life have both increased substantially during the past half-century.”

    Lush as the planet may now be, it is as nothing compared to earlier times, when levels of CO2 and Earth temperatures were far higher. In the age of the dinosaur, for example, CO2 levels may have been five to 10 times higher than today, spurring a luxuriantly fertile planet whose plant life sated the immense animals of that era. Planet Earth is also much cooler today than during the hothouse era of the dinosaur, and cooler than it was 1,000 years ago during the Medieval Warming Period, when the Vikings colonized a verdant Greenland. Greenland lost its colonies and its farmland during the Little Ice Age that followed, and only recently started to become green again.

    They shoot traitors, don’t they?

  77. Carin -BONC says:

    Cynn wants to have discussion on policy? Sure he does…

    From my looksee, Obama is promising just about everything, and the Fed Government is gonna give it to you. I especially like this one:

    Deploy Next-Generation Broadband: Obama believes we can get broadband to every community in America through a combination of reform of the Universal Service Fund, better use of the nation’s wireless spectrum, promotion of next-generation facilities, technologies and applications, and new tax and loan incentives.

    BROADBAND FOR EVERYONE! And unicorns.

  78. B Moe says:

    I am left wondering where Obama is going to get the money to turn nishfong into a transhuman. I would hate to see him break her little heart.

  79. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    – Climate change is natures way of telling the SecProggs they’ll have to find some other scam if they want to bring down the American economy.

  80. JD says:

    Pablo – Our abode stayed dry, except for one window that appears to have decided to do a cheesecloth impersonation down in the basement. The in-laws have not been able to make it back to their house yet, but it looks like their house stayed above water.

  81. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    – Where does everyone stay while they’re riding it out JD? We used to head for the high school every spring when the Ohio river would do its thing. On the only hill in town. Taking classes in a row boat, even band practice, too much fun.

  82. JD says:

    They are all staying with us, BBH, along with a couple of their Vietnamese friends from their neighborhood. But throughout the central part of the state, people were staying anywhere that stayed dry – Churches, gyms, anywhere that could help out. There really has been a remarkable amount of water, over 10″ overnight in some places.

  83. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    – Whoa. 10 foot of snow if it was winter. People always used to ask why I joined the military so young. I always told them “Three things. Dry shows, no snakes, and clean air”. I know what you’re dealing with. Hope things recede faster than my hairline for you.

  84. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    -Shoes, not shows….I need coffee….

  85. Education Guy says:

    I am glad I don’t hang around these parts when cynn does. She is just an intolerable scold whose every post boils down to everything done or spoken about by someone here is done incorrectly, every criticism of someone else is the wrong sort of criticism, and every complaint misses the marks that she wishes to set.

    She probably taught herself to write left handed so she could be more ideologically pure.

  86. Sdferr says:

    Edu Guy et al
    On ideology and moral dispute, check out link at #183 in the Jay Rockefeller thread. It goes to arguments found here on PW all the time.

  87. Sean M. says:

    some sort of snark, to get someone upset. Apparently he gotcha. It was a weird joke as somewhat worse things are said here often (usually with humor).

    some sort of snark, to get someone upset. Apparently he gotcha. It was a weird joke as somewhat worse things are said here often (usually with humor).You know what, dave? Fuck you, too. He made a racist remark, and here you are, excusing it. It wasn’t a “weird joke,” you stupid asshole.

    Again, imagine if anyone here had made anything near/I> as hateful a remark about Michelle Obama. You’d be shitting a brick, you dishonest fucking hack. But since it’s the wife of somebody you disagree with, well, I guess it’s just a little chuckle.

    Fuck you, dave.

  88. Sean M. says:

    Oops. looks like I messed up my tags. That’ll happen when you’re dealing with dishonest fuckwit hacks.

  89. Obstreperous Infidel says:

    Sean H. Dave’s a retard. I’m not shitting you. I bet the IQ is close. He NEEDS the state! The state surely doesn’t need him. Skip over the little guy’s comments. It works wonders. Believe me, you’re not missing anything.

  90. Education Guy says:

    Sdferr

    Thanks, I’ll check it out.

  91. Sean M. says:

    Believe me, OI, I’m a big advocate for starving trolls, but this thing has me pissed off. These people fancy themselves our betters, after all.

  92. Obstreperous Infidel says:

    I hear ya, Sean. I think dave is just a loon, though. Possibly diagnosed.

  93. Rob Crawford says:

    I wonder if dave’s “construction job” involves one of these.

  94. The Lost Dog says:

    “Comment by kelly on 6/9 @ 4:32 pm #

    Uh, Patrick? Tom Tomorrow is a pretty hard core lefty, iirc, and it seems to me that the cartoon you linked is parodying the right.”

    It may have been intended to be a parody of the right, but as far as I can see, it fits right in with all lefty “humor”. I see lefty cartoons all the time, and they are as far from “amusing” as it gets. You can’t be intentionally funny when you are a moron and trying to make “funny” with doctrinal idiocy.

  95. The Lost Dog says:

    datadave,

    “Citation needed”. Citation needed”. “Citation needed”

Comments are closed.