The World According to Me

Since the last Obama vs. McCain debate, Joe [not] the Plumber has gotten more face time for the Republican party than Hillary Duff shilling for her lates Hannah Montana concert.  In a previous blog entry I outlined what Joe was NOT.  He’s not a licensed plumber.  He’s not planning on buying the plumbing business for which he works, or any business for that matter.  He does not make nearly enough to buy said business even if he wanted to. His plumbing buisness does not make anywhere near the $250k threshold for Obama’s tax plan.

Since that entry we’ve found that Joe has hired himself a publicist to manage his many appearances as the latest shill (mascot, gimmick, whatever) for the McCain campaign.  He’s also working on a country music record deal, and has hired a lawyer to try and get himself a publishing deal (probably a TIME-LIFE do-it-yourself guide on how to become a media whore in 15 easy steps), and is contemplating a run for congress in 2010.  So added to the list of the things he’s not, he’s not the “average working every-man” that the McCain camp is trying to pimp him out to be.

So what is he?  A liar, yes.  A fraud, quite possibly.  An opportunist, most definitely.  Scariest of all, however, he is the representation of every “no-information” voter who’s ever believed the viral e-mail rantings and 527 attack ads that routinely swarm through the internet.  He represents an America where intelligence and logic are ridiculed, while ignorance, isolationism, paranoia, and fear are cherished and celebrated.  He represents an America where fear-induced patriotism, and bible-thumping pseudo-Christianity are used as excuses for blind hatred and bigotry, and where guns and religion are used to ostracize those who think or act or love or believe differently.  He represents the same “us vs. them”, “we vs. they”, “pro-America vs. anti-America” rhetoric that has been used to divide this country for the past 8 years.  Should this philosophy that he represents, and those who enforce it, be allowed to remain in power, I fear that it will not take another 9/11 terrorist attack to destroy this country.  We, in blind factionalized loyalty to dogma and idiology, will destroy ourselves.  And it will be people like Joe the Plumber, like an “average working every-man” version of Osama Bin-Ladin, leading the charge.

If the polls are anywhere near correct, and barring any major “October surprise”, America will in all likelyhood elect its first African-American president.  Given that we are dealing in uncharted territory, it is understandable that some may approach the prospect with a certain degree of apprehension, and perhaps even fear.  So here is my attempt to some of that fear by dispelling some assumptions that people may be carrying.  Please keep in mind that these are things that people actually believe will happen under a Black president, and it is my hope that in reading this they will see how pointless their fears are.

1. Barrack Obama will not legalize White Slavery as revenge.
2. “Lift Every Voice and Sing” will not replace “The Star Spangled Banner” as the National Anthem.  Though, to be honest, it is far more inspirational.  Face it, “The Star Spangled Banner” depicts a battle that we lost.
3. White Women will not be force to carry the illegitimate children of Black Men in order to make Blacks the majority.
4. The White House will not be painted Black (though a lovely shade of fuschia would be nice).
5. Snoop Dogg, Ludacris, Missy Elliott, and Kanye West will not be a part of the Presidential cabinet.
6. The Annual Easter Egg Hunt on the White House lawn will not be replaced by a chicken, ribs, and watermellon barbecue.
7. The national colors will not be Red, Black, and Green (they’re already taken).
8. Your children will not be required to learn Ebonics as a second language.
9. Pig feet and chitlins will not be added to the FDA food pyramid.
10. Hekyl and Jekyl will not replace the Bald Eagle as our national symbol.
11. The presidents on Mt. Rushmore will not be replaced by James Brown, Barry White, Luther Vandross, and Jackie Wilson. 

Hopefully these assurances will give you some peace as we look toward what may be a new era in American politics.

Prior to the first debate, John McCain made the startling announcement that he was suspending his campaign in order to deal with the growing financial crisis that was gripping the country.  He had even gone so far as to request that the debate be postponed until the crisis had abated.  Needless to say, the crisis hasn’t abated, and McCain was force to backpeddle on his campaign “suspension” (if there ever was one to begin with) and attend the first debate.  A debate that most pundits claim he lost.

Earlier this week Barack Obama announced that he was suspending his campaign schedule (not the campaign itself) for an entirely different reason, to be at the side of his gravely ill grandmother, Tutu, in Hawaii.  This morning on ABC’s Good Morning America he indicated that she may not make it to the election.  Needless to say, the prayers of his supporters, mine included, are with him and his family.

This reminds me of a similar family crisis that I had to go through two years ago with the passing of my father, Felix Davis, Sr.  I was attending a training conference in Reston, VA when I began receiving increasingly frantic calls from my family.  My father, who had been suffering from diabetes for years, had taken a turn for the worse.  He was, at this point, already a double amputee, and sudden renal failure landed him in the hospital.  I had to cut short my training and rush back home to Philadelphia to be with the family.  This was on a Monday.  My father passed away on October 7, 2006, a Friday.  The same day my younger brother, Felix Davis, Jr., was married.  I was there at my father’s bedside when he passed away, and in that moment I felt closer to him than I ever had.  I also felt an amazing sense of peace having been there.  Knowing that my father is now in a better place.

While one would shudder to think of it, given the desparation of the McCain campaign it is very likely that someone there would ascribe political motives to Obama’s sudden unexpected sojourn to Hawaii.  The extreme right-wing group FreedomsWatch.org have already lobbed critizisim about the fact that he took a campaign jet to HI, and no doubt it, or something similar, will come up in the ensuing days leading up to the election.  Therein lies the fundamental flaw in the McCain campaign.  The cynicism and hubris of the campaign has blinded them to the point where they see sinister motives everywhere.  Where everyone who is not a part of their “movement” is a sworn enemy, hellbent on destroying everything that they stand for.  And every action of the “enemy” is part of a larger scheme toward that destruction.  To the end that the McCain campaign must take any means necessary to obtain their goal, they would take what is probably the most painful moment in a persons life, the loss of a cherished loved one, and salt the wound with political aspirations.  It is in this that John McCain, whatever happens to him after November 4th, will doubtless suffer his ultimate shame.

Our prayers go out to the Obama family.

From the instant that Bill Clinton was elected President in 1992, and through both terms of his presidency, he was dogged by one overriding and overreaching investigation that cost
US taxpayers millions of dollars and a good bit of embarrassment: Whitewater.  Now we are about two weeks from an election which may very well see the first African-American elected President of the United States.

 

As you know, the rumor mill surrounding Barack Obama has been swirling stronger than usual, mostly regarding his race.  You’ve heard them, or probably received the e-mails: he’s a Muslim, he “pals around” with terrorists, and probably the most persistent, he’s not a US citizen.  This is probably the one that the GOP (what’s left of them) in congress, and their supporters, will seize upon.  And, like Whitewater, they will drag the rest of the country through the mud and slime, all for the benefit of their own embattled party ego.  In the Whitewater investigation, all that was discovered was an extra-marital affair.  Nothing illegal was done regarding the whole Whitewater deal (though he was cited for perjury regarding his affair with “that woman”), but the embarrassment to his family and the country was sickening enough.

 

Now I somehow wouldn’t expect that Barack Obama has some chickenhead ghetto intern on the side, but I’d hate for some petty GOP vengeance investigation to end up hurting his family, particularly his children.  So to spare them, and us, the drama, not to mention the cost, of 4 to 8 years of digging through the DC political underbelly, I’m going to put the facts that I’ve been able to find out there in this blog.  This is all based on my own research, but I do believe the sources to be credible.

 

Let’s start with the rumor itself.  The rumor is that Barack Obama is not a US citizen.  The reasons for this range from him having a duel-citizenship, to him not being born in America.  Part of this stems from a newspaper article written in 2007 that incorrectly stated that he held both Kenyan and American citizenship (a no-no for running for president according to the Constitution).  The truth is that when he was born in Honolulu, HI, Kenya was a part of the United Kingdom.  His father, being a Kenyan native, was considered a British subject, which at the time extended to the children of Kenyan natives, regardless of where they were physically born.  As a result, technically Obama did hold citizenship in both the US and the United Kingdom.  When Kenya formally gained its independence in 1963, Obama’s father automatically became a Kenyan citizen.  Again, that status was passed down to Barack Obama.

 

However, Kenyan law does not allow dual citizenship for adults.  According to the Kenyan constitution:

A person who, upon the attainment of the age of twenty-one years, is a citizen of Kenya and also a citizen of some country other than Kenya shall, subject to subsection (7), cease to be a citizen of Kenya upon the specified date unless he has renounced his citizenship of that other country, taken the oath of allegiance and, in the case of a person who was born outside Kenya. made and registered such declaration of his intentions concerning residence as may be prescribed by or under an Act of Parliament.

In other words, upon turning 21, a Kenyan holding duel citizenship must either renounce his foreign citizenship, or cease being a citizen of Kenya.  Barack Obama has never renounced his US citizenship, and therefore ceased to be a Kenyan citizen and has since held only one citizenship, that of a United States citizen.

The second part of this rumor, that Obama was not born in the United States, is easy to disprove.  That is, for those willing to accept the facts.  Factcheck.org obtained a copy of Obama’s birth certificate, which states that he was born in Hololulu, HI on August 4, 1961.  The original certificate resides at Obama’s Chicago headquarters, and according to factcheck contains all of the markings, including the raised seal, and is stamped by the Hawaii state registrar.

Now I’m well aware that the “no-information” voter is probably incapable of allowing themselves to accept anything that runs contrary to what they have brainwashed themselves to believe as fact.  But the proof is here, and is readily available for anyone willing to examine it.  I leave it to you to take it as you will.

Sources:

FactCheck.org: Born in the USA - http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/born_in_the_usa.html

FactCheck.org: Has Obama’s Birth Certificate Been Disclosed - http://www.factcheck.org/askfactcheck/has_obamas_birth_certificate_been_disclosed.html

PolitiFact: Obama’s Birth Certificate: Final Chapter - http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2008/jun/27/obamas-birth-certificate-part-ii/

The Constitution of Kenya: Chapter 2 – The Executive - http://kenya.rcbowen.com/constitution/chap6.html#97

 

 

You know I just love reading blogs, particularly my own.  Not necessarily for the information that they impart, which are admittedly biased on the part of the author, but mostly for the comments from the readers.  I especially like the right-wing leaning commentaries.  While my politics are left leaning and I identify much more with liberal policies, I find the right-wingers to be somewhat more colorful and imaginative.  For example, the buzz du jour for the righties is the recent endorsement by Colin Powell for Barack Obama.  The conventional knee-jerk opinion on the extreme right is that this is a racially based endorsement, and the only reason Powell endorsed Obama is because he is African-American.  In a much more general sense, they choose to believe that all blacks are voting for Obama based solely on race.

This brings up a couple of interesting questions for me as an African-American.  Ignoring the fact that this accusation is racist in and of itself, the real question is what does it say about Whites who have endorsed John McCain.  Is he winning these endorsements because of his race?  Are all whites voting for McCain for this same reason?  If this is the case, then it should stand to reason that McCain should be leading by a very wide margin in the polls.  Given that he is not (the latest polls show him 10pts behind), I would say the above logic is rather flawed, wouldn’t you?  There’s also the question of those Whites who choose to endorse and vote for Obama.  What’s their reasoning?  Certainly it can’t be because of race.  Are these Whites more enlightened and intelligent than the Blacks who are voting for Obama?  Do you see how utterly racist that sounds on the face of it?  That Obama’s Black support is somehow less significant, less intelligent than the support he gets from Whites.

And let’s just say for the sake of argument that Blacks actually are supporting Obama based solely on his race.  I defy you, then, to explain why neither Jesse Jackson nor Al Sharpton have ever obtained the Democratic nomination despite having run numerous times.  If Blacks only support Black candidates because they’re Black, as has been implied, then one would think that they or the number of other African-Americans who have run would have gotten the nod at least once.  Of course it could be because the more “enlightened” Whites decided that the White candidate at the time was better suited for the office.  That being the case, I’ll bring this thing full circle and ask you to explain Barack Obama.  Surely you do not suggest that the Black vote is so powerful as to be solely responsible for Obama’s lead in the polls.  Do you?

I would not begin to deny that there are Blacks who are supporting Obama based on his race, just as there are Whites who are supporting McCain (or more precisely, are against Obama) based on racial motivations.  But to imply that this is a majority, or even a significant minority, is just as patently racist as the action itself.  And the knee-jerk reaction by the “no-information” faction of the right-wing underscores just how important Powell’s endorsement is in this campaign season.  Perhaps the question that the far right should be asking itself is this.  Would you be accusing Powell of being racist (which is exactly what you are doing) if he had supported McCain? 

 

By now you’ve no doubt heard the tale of Joe the Plumber, the real star of Obama vs. McCain III, and the anointed hero of the McCain campaign.  However, it appears that their hero has feet of clay.  As it turns out, Joe the Plumber…isn’t.  He’s actually a contractor, and not even licensed (as required by
Ohio state law).  A few other tidbits dripping from the leaky faucet that is the legend of Joe the Plumber:

 

• His real name is Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher and he works for Newell Plumbing and Heating Company of Toledo, OH.
• He does not have a plumbing license (neither does his boss, for that matter) and claims he doesn’t need one (since he works for someone else).  State law disagrees and requires all plumbers to have a journeyman’s or apprentice’s license.
• He doesn’t have any real plans for purchasing the business that he works for, contrary to what was implied in his conversation with Barack Obama.
• Joe doesn’t make nearly enough money to even consider purchasing Newell Plumbing (he makes about $40,000/yr, in which case he actually benefits from Obama’s tax plan).
• The plumbing business he works for doesn’t pull in anywhere near $250,000/yr (unless they’re selling crack on the side, in which case taxes are the least of their problems).
• He’s a staunch supporter of McCain and his policies and wouldn’t vote for Obama anyway.
• He currently owes about $1,100 in back taxes himself.

 

Furthermore, even if he did purchase Newell Plumbing, and was somehow able to pull in over $250,000, according to Obama’s tax plan he would only pay the higher taxes on any amount over the $250,000.  For example, if he were to pull in $280,000, he would only pay the higher tax amount on the $30,000 over the $250,000.  The original $250,000 wouldn’t be touched, and with some minor accounting adjustments, he could actually wind up paying less in taxes than he would be paying now.

 

The sad thing is that Joe (at least on the surface) doesn’t seem like a bad person.  He’s simply a person who got innocently caught up in a political campaign by a candidate desperately trying to score brownie points with the voters.  Now he has to face the glare of the spotlight and everything that comes with it.  It was Warhol who said everyone is famous for 15 minutes.  Unfortunately for Joe the Plumber, it would seem that infamy may last quite a bit longer.

 

 

One thing about rating debates on the spot is that they’re based on the gut feeling of the moment.  Now that I’ve had some time to sleep on it (and bask in the Phillies getting into the World Series), I think I can be a bit more objective, though my original review still stands.

On style I reluctantly score this one for McCain.  This was the McCain that people have been looking for since the beginning of the campaign (the one that was suppressed by Rick Davis and Tucker Bounds).  I felt that he was able to get more of his message across.  I also have to admit that he scored big points with “…if you wanted to run against Bush, you should have run 4 years ago.”  Though Obama’s comeback to that was well played.

On substance, Obama was the clear winner here.  Obama was able to roll with the punches, but he didn’t really need to do much more than that.  He stuck to the script and offered solutions, whereas McCain just went on the attack.  I do like the way that he goaded McCain into bringing up Ayers and ACORN, and he answered the charges eloquently so that no one has any excuses now to believe then other than their own prejudices.  Once that bit of “housekeeping” was out of the way, Obama was able to hammer home his proposals and the contrasts with McCain.

This was the best of the three (four if you count the VP) debates.  The participants were able to get down and dirty, which is what I was looking for throughout the debate season.  Though McCain was clearly at his best tonight, it was not the game changer that McCain needed.  I don’t see too many independents and undecideds flocking over to his camp, especially if he keeps up the negativity and the DOW contuinues to tank.  However, if this McCain had shown up two debates ago, I think we’d be talking about a McCain presidency right now.  For now, however, allow me to introduce to you President Barack Obama.

BTW, LET’S GO PHILLIES! CONGRATULATIONS ON MAKING THE WORLD SERIES!  JUST 4 MORE WINS!

Tonight we’ve seen something that we haven’t seen the entire campaign.  Introducing, ladies and gentlemen, John Sydney McCain.  Welcome to the campaign, senator.

This is the McCain that the moderates were looking for, and the liberals were afraid would show up.  The problem for him is that he should have showed up months ago.  For that, I would blame Rick Davis, Tucker Bounds, and the rest of his campaign team.  He’s let them run his campaign into the ground from the time they walked into the door.  It started with the stupid Paris/Britney commercials, then the disasterous pick of Sarah Palin for VP, and the “all sleeze all the time” campaign.  All of this served only to diminish McCain to little more than a figurehead in his own campaign.  Tonight the real Senator McCain showed up.  He went after Obama, and actually threw him off his stride a bit.  Make no mistake, Obama was the usual “too cool for school” customer he’s always been.  But you saw a couple of cracks, and for me being an Obama supporter it was strangely refreshing.  Its no fun watching your presidential candidates have an air of omnipotence, and I prefer a little more humanity.  (As an aside, I do believe Obama handled the Ayers/ACORN/terrorism deal quite well.)

This McCain was more than the white haired old dude that showed up at the previous two debates.  I’m going to, reluctantly, give him this one.  Call it a ‘pity score’, or maybe a ‘gimme’, but I believe in giving props.  It may not do much for his campaign, but it does allow him to leave the field with his head held high.

The McCain/Palin camp is 0 for 3 on the debate circuit.  Conventional wisdom dictates that  this is John McCain’s last chance to make an impression and pull this thing out of the crapper.  However, the sad truth is that that ship sailed into the sunset quite some time ago.  About the time they decided on their “all smear all the time” schorched earth campaign against Obama.  That campaign went nuclear this past Friday when McCain was forced to reverse course in the face of the increasing vitriol from his rally crowds.  It didn’t help that the Troopergate findings were made public soon after, stating that Sarah Palin abused her power as governor when she applied pressure to have her ex. brother in law fired from the Alaska State Trooper department.  At this point the only thing that McCain has left is to try and go out with some shred of dignity and grace.  Unfortunately, if his handlers have their way, he’ll continue to do in the debate what he’s been doing for the past several weeks, attack wildly and hope that something takes hold that will change the game.  It would seem, however, that the only thing likely to take hold after tonights debate is his own undoing.

It’s been a while since I’ve been able to post.  During that time the DOW has taken an nosedive, and the McCain campaign’s poll numbers have tanked even faster.  However, what seems to have taken the hardest fall is McCain’s integrity.  Over the past week he as flailed around wildly, throwing haymakers and hoping that he could hit something that would make any difference.  Yet like an angry schoolgirl, the only thing he seems to be hitting is air.  Failing that, in desparation, he turns to his base.  Hoping to stoke and enrage the most despicable aspect of human nature, racisim and racial hatred.  Using coded language like “[He] doesn’t see America like you and I see America” along with insuations of terrorisim (Bill Ayers) and racial cronyism (ACORN), his campaign is hoping to tap into latent prejudices in a last ditch effort to save his campaign.  While it is sad that his campaign has descended into such chaos, the sadder fact is that he seems to be willing to take the country with him.

During a number of his campaign rallies, which have more and more come to resemble the “two minutes of hate” sessions in George Orwell’s “1984″, participants have been heard shouting words like “terrorist”, “traitor”, and “kill him”.  Further, at one Palin rally, an African-American cameraman who was filming the event for a local news station was assulted by members of the crowd, called a racial slur, and told to “sit down, boy”.  Also, this past weekend at an Obama campaign office in Philadelphia, a threatening note was found with a brown substance in the envelope.  Fortunately, the substance turned out to be brown sugar.  But the implication here is that it could have been worse and innocent people could have been harmed.  Thoughout all of this, the attitude of the McCain campaign ranged from ignorance (“we have no proof this is happening”), to denial, to outright encouragement.  If there is one ray of redemption for McCain, it came this past Friday when he had to quickly snatch the microphone away from a woman at one of his rallies who said that she believed that Obama was an Arab.  To that McCain responded that Obama was a “citizen” and a “good family man” with whom he happens to disagree.

The problem with his sudden mia-culpas is that he seems to be the only one with any semblence of a concious.  The rest of his campaign has thus far given no indication that they intend to let up, and he doesn’t seem to have the balls to stop them.  It seems that not only have his opponents lost all respect for him, but his own campaign as well, along with his supporters.  If he is to turn this around and be able to come out of this campaign with any shred of dignity (forget about winning, that ship sailed when he picked Palin), then he needs to come out and address the nation, much as Obama did during the Rev. Wright controversy, and forcefully denounce these incidents.  He should also take FULL responsibility for them as the nominee and announce the firing of those in his campaign who began this strategy (that includes his VP pick).  Finally, he should begin to talk about the issues, not as a man who thinks he has all of the answers, but as a man who is willing to look for them to people who are better versed than he is.  One of Obama’s strengths is not that he knows everything, but he is willing to surround himself with people who do in areas of expertise where he is lacking.  McCain seems to be willing to copy everything else from Obama, this may be a strategy worth copying.  Otherwise, the free-fall of his campaign, and his dignity, will continue until he hits bottom, which will likely be on November 4th.