Joe Biden Drops His October Suprize

In our long and storied history, the American voter has shunned electing sitting Senators directly to the presidency.   The last former Senator to serve was Richard Nixon, who gave us Watergate and paved the way for Jimmy Carter.   Before that we had Lyndon B. Johnson, former Senate majority leader.   Johnson’s Guns and Butter policy waged two wars, the War in Vietnam and the War on Poverty.   We lost both.

The last President to come directly from the Senate was John F. Kennedy.  He was young, and charsmatic, to mean young, naive and stupid.   Kennedy’s naiveté led directly to the Cuban Missile Crisis.  Two things about the Cuban Missile Crisis.   One is was utterly avoidable.   Two, we were lucky to have survived it.   We put a raw naive Senator in the Presidency, and darned near committed national suicide.

Then when compared to Barack Obama, Kennedy looks like a genius in comparison.   Kennedy had at least  made a show of studying foreign policy    The only think BO has appeared to have studied, but not very well, is Marxim.   In face of this history, the Strutting Delaware Blue Hen, a/k/a Joe Biden, is reported to have said, William Kristol, Weekly Standard:

It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking…. Watch, we’re gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy….

I can give you at least four or five scenarios from where it might originate… And he’s gonna need help. And the kind of help he’s gonna need is, he’s gonna need you – not financially to help him – we’re gonna need you to use your influence, your influence within the community, to stand with him. Because it’s not gonna be apparent initially, it’s not gonna be apparent that we’re right.

Oh those live microphones Joe.   I agree with the Strutting Hen that Obama will be tested and within six month.  I disagree that Obama’s response will be brillant.   If there is anything apparent about Obama it is that he has never had a brillant thought in his life.   BO’s decision making process, such as it is, is driven not by analysis but rather by dogma, socialist dogma at that.

No sane American wants to face a Twenty First Century version of the Cubam Missile Crisis with a weak and naive President.   It is a sure thing that whatever instinctive reaction Obama might have, it will be wrong.

AS for the other canidate, that old guy, anybody who has made carrier landings at night has been tested by crisis.

Addendum:

The Saracuda fleshs out the Strutting Hen’s scenarios.   View the video here.  My bet is that Camp Obama is most worried about Scenario Five.  Takers?

Over at OTB, Steve Verdon restates what I’ve been saying here for weeks:

An older article, but relevant.

It is important to understand that, as GSEs, Fannie and Freddie were viewed in the capital markets as government-backed buyers (a belief that has now been reduced to fact). Thus they were able to borrow as much as they wanted for the purpose of buying mortgages and mortgage-backed securities. Their buying patterns and interests were followed closely in the markets. If Fannie and Freddie wanted subprime or Alt-A loans, the mortgage markets would produce them. By late 2004, Fannie and Freddie very much wanted subprime and Alt-A loans. Their accounting had just been revealed as fraudulent, and they were under pressure from Congress to demonstrate that they deserved their considerable privileges. Among other problems, economists at the Federal Reserve and Congressional Budget Office had begun to study them in detail, and found that — despite their subsidized borrowing rates — they did not significantly reduce mortgage interest rates. In the wake of Freddie’s 2003 accounting scandal, Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan became a powerful opponent, and began to call for stricter regulation of the GSEs and limitations on the growth of their highly profitable, but risky, retained portfolios.

The continuing notion that the credit crisis is a result of free markets is just laughable when you have the CRA, Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac involved in the markets. The governments grubby paw prints are all over this mess. It isn’t the only contributing factor but to say, “Oh it is free markets,” is the liars position.

Which means, of course that McCain’s position that it’s all on ‘Wall Street Greed” is equally suspect to Obama’s calling for increased regulation.

Where Verdon starts straying, in my view, is where he considers that it’s even possible to get government involved in the market without eventual dire consequences:

So my beef isn’t that there is too much regulation or not enough regulation but that this idea that we can find just the right amount of regulation is not going to be possible in a discreationary policy regime. Such a regime is going to be subject to the problems of time inconsistency, rent seeking, and interest group pressures.

The problem, of course is that it’s always that way where the power of government is involved. Things get screwed up to the direct degree that government is involved in the market. Sometimes, involvement is indeed requred. But to the degree it pulls down the market? I don’t think so, Tim.

I keep hearing rumblings that the internal GOP polling which shows McCain up by double digits in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and other key battleground states. I caught a reference to it once again this morning on XM’s “The War Room”.  The stated reason for the huge difference in reported numbers is over-sampling by the commercial pollsters, in eastern PA, (say, I81/I476 and east,  such as Philly), and less in the way of sampling in places like the I79 corridor… (Erie, Pittsburgh and so on).

While there is a historical trend of over-sampling in such areas, and as such I have no reason to doubt that such skewing is hapening this time, I also have no confirmation it’s hapening this time, either….

Except: Obama’s internal polling. according to RedState, is also showing things are not nearly so rosy for Obama as the commercial pollsters are suggesting. As David Rasbold points out:

I know is that we’re being sold a bill of goods by the media. Why? Not to be conspiratorial, but they likely just want to dispirit us, precisely because Obama has yet to seal the deal. He should be way ahead this season, but he’s not.

I’ll close by saying that we have several weeks left. The Obama camp internally knows they haven’t wrapped this thing up.

Exactly why I pointed out over the weekend that Obama has yet to seal the deal, and has repeatedly shown an inability to do so.

Add to all this the figures that even the commercial pollsters are showing, where Obama is down by 3 points among independant voters and we have a situation that’s quite differernt from what the MSM is describing to us. Maybe that’s why Obama’s been sounding so nervous the last week or two, telling Democrats ‘don’t get cocky’, blaming the tight race on racism, and just generally trying to lower expectations.

Even Joe Biden… the walking trainwreck, is getting into the act;

“Mark my words, you’re going to see these polls drop this week,” Biden forecasted. “We got a bump. We’re going to be in good shape. You’re going to see them drop. There’s nothing automatic about this at all.”

You can forget that mental picture of Obama measuring the drapes in the Oval office. He’s gotta win the race first, and believe me when I tell you that’s by no means assured.

Welcome dear reader, to the most intense nightly read on the ‘sphere… BitsBlog’s Nightly Ramble.

• Yeah, yeah, yeah… I know, Colin Powell. All the rage over the weekend. I don’t think there’s much argument against the idea that there’s a decided attempt on the part of some to keep General Powell in the headlines. Liberals, mostly. Why?   Well, look, gang… We’ve known since before the Democrat Party convention… That was months ago, for those who have lost track… that he was going to do this. Don’t think for a moment that the timing on this ‘endorsement’ wasn’t chosen by the Obama people. Obama’s been slipping in the polls. He’s in trouble and knows it. This ‘endorsement’ and it’s timing, was in direct response to that.  George Will points up, race is the major motivator, there…. but it’s just now the ‘endorsement’ and all the hoopla shows up? Please. And yes, as an aside, I have my problems with Will. But when even he can see the obvious and has the guts to SAY so, well, I’ll give the boy credit. Limbaugh, too…
  

  “‘Secretary Powell says his endorsement is not about race,’ Limbaugh wrote in an email. ‘OK, fine. I am now researching his past endorsements to see if I can find all the inexperienced, very liberal, white candidates he has endorsed. I’ll let you know what I come up with.'”

  And there is that trend thing, as Limbaugh says, to consider.  Now, yes, race may not be the only motivator here, but it seems to me logical to ask if Powell’s  stated reasons would be enough to push him toward this endorsement, absent the racial factors.  I wonder too, what kind of position Powell would have  in a posulated Obama administration, (And Obama’s made clear, he’d have one) …and if such promises didn’t ‘encourage him’ to move toward this endorsement. Ask yourself, though… why is it now the left is signing his praises, and making a big deal of out his endorsement? And why, I ask, are the lefties taking it all so damned seriously?  This is, after all, the same Powell who the same lefties were screaming about having sold out, not so long ago, on Iraq, and about how Powell lied men died, etc. Funny how now all that’s forgotten, his credibility issues are not even subject fit for conversation, now that he’s signed on to mouth platitudes in favor of the Chosen One. You’ll forgive me if I fail to be impressed.

• The New York Post has figured Obama out, by the way. Worth a look.
• Popularity? Let’s examine this.
  • Obama is outspending McCain three to one…  (A goodly chunk of which is showing up from outside the country… ) and the best he can do is a virtual tie in the polls?
  • McCain shows on Letterman, and the show has the best night in terms of ratings, that it’s had in years.
  • Palin shows up on SNL, and it does the best night SNL has had since 1994. So, do you suppose there might be a popularity factor there, hmmmm?   Obama’s people can’t be happy. Obama himself isn’t, either, if I’m any student of body language. Look at him at any occasion you find him speaking. The man is annoyed, and scared. Annoyed he has to justify himself and angry he’s losing the fight.  The reactions he’s getting are shall we say, less than he’d like, too.
  • Can’t be very happy about this, either. Starting to look like it’s all just kinda slipping away on him.
• For those of you who need a refresher course on Chris Dodd and his brand of corruption, and the connection there to the current economy problems, read this.
• While we’re on such things, perhaps this refresher on Chuckles Schumer is worthwhile, too. In a sane world these two would be in jail.
• And let’s remember how Obama voted on this stuff, shall we? Fair is fair.
• Democrat vote fraud exists, people.
• Joe the Plumber strikes back. Of course the press will pretty much ignore this. Remember, gang, the MSM spent more time investigating Joe the Plumber than it did on the question of Terrrist Bill Ayers and his association with Barack Obama.
• I see American Thinker is looking into the idea that Bill Ayers co-wrote Obama’s Book. Frankly, I’m convinced.
• Does anyone remember Obama claiming at the third debate that he did’t launch his political career in Bill Ayers’ living room. There’s a word for people like that. LIAR.
• It seems Obama and Ayers shared an office, as well. It seems there’s a lot of internet scrubbing going on here. (Did Google take that post down, I wonder? Or was it just the left wing sensibilities of the blogger in question?) Glenn notes this, as well.
• Note to Rick Moran: You and I have had very stout disagreements in the past. this is another.  I’ll give you a warning that’s been given before:
  

  It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.

  The writer of course, is Hume. Apply this to your tirade, I beg you, and recalculate. Apply also, my recent comments on Joe the PLumber and the Stalinist reaction to him. This stuff is far worse than you’re letting on.

• Somebody do the world a favor and tell Matt Drudge that the 24*7 Madonna divorce bit is getting a little old. Then again, so is Madonna. Far as I’m concerned, the two deserve to be ignored, together. Face it; What little singing talent Madonna had went away on the early 90’s. The only reason she had hit records even in her prime was the collection of bloody geniuses such as Jellybean that she had producing and editing her stuff. Today? Well, look…a 50 year old Pop tart… however well preserved…. has all the appeal of a store-window proctology exam… which she would doubtless put in her newest music video masterpiece, given the chance.. assuming she’ not done that already. I’ve kinda lost track of her latest excesses, after “Like A Prayer”.  Bottom line: Spare us.
• ~I keep hearing about a GM/Chrysler merger. Does this mean I’ll finally be able to get a Chevy 20 series with a Cummins? Anyway, so much for Unions being able to protect your job. Just in case that lesson isn’t clear, the unions are the real reason the place is going under.
• A subtext to Bush’s trying to arrange an international  summit on the economy is a sex scandal involving Dominique Strauss-Kahn.
• I guess in Iowa, Chess is a contact sport.
• They finally released that Russian Ship.  In all seriousness, I’d love to see a dummy ship driven in, and watch the Pirates try to take over, while we call in an airstrike. Solve THAT problem in a real hurry.
• Cubans trying to get into the US, are now doing it through Mexico. You know, I wondered how long that would take them to figure that one out. Think, now; If Ellian Gonzalez had come into the country through Mexico, would the Clinton misadministration sent him back to Castro’s Cuba?
• Glaciers in Alaska are growing. It’s not even winter there, yet.  So much for Global Warming. I’m waiting for Al Gore to tell us this is all due to the policies he’s been pushing. Ignore, of course the dearth of sunspot activity. That big ball of fire at the center of the solar system has nothing to do with it. (Sound of tounge popping from cheek)
• I wonder if the Dyson folks could hire this guy? Can’t you just imagine the ads? “Dyson: It’s REALLY sucks…”
• So, Tampa Bay won the ALCS and is going on to the series. (Shrug) Boston would have been good, too. I have to admit being turned off by MLB for some years, now. Part of my problem in commenting on this stuff is they keep serving up reasons why I’m disgusted with the whole thing.
• That kidnapped boy, Cole Puffinburger stumbled home yesterday.  One wonders how many arrests, save that of the Grandfather, are going to result from this mess.  Most likely answer seems to be ‘none’.  Such has been our answer to Mexican druggies for some years. And can someone PLEASE come up with a better picture of this kid, if we’re going to be watching this story for any lnegth of time?
• That soldier we told you about the other day who saved the puppy… “Rachet”… from a pile of burning trash, is being allowed to take the dog home, after all.  Never figured on any other way, really.

Reports are that “Mr. Blackwell” has died at age 86… a poetic age to pass on at, I guess.

This is the guy that brought a little humility to hollywood types….

Madonna: “The Bare-Bottomed Bore of Babylon.”
Barbra Streisand: “She looks like a masculine Bride of Frankenstein.”

He”ll be missed.

Carol Platt Liebau nails it.    Wonder why we call them libtards?

Ummmmm…….    No.

Glenn points up this monring:

Lots of people are telling us McCain’s defeat is inevitable, but bear in mind that they’re mostly people who would prefer that pro-McCain voters stay home. Vote for McCain or not as you choose, but don’t stay home because people are telling you his defeat is inevitable. (The irony, of course, would be if Obama’s voters stayed home as a result of this line, but I assume his well-oiled vote-turnout machine will prevent that). Anyway, here’s what the David Bernstein has to say about inevitability. Wasn’t Hillary inevitable once, too?

(Emph is mine)  That’s an important point, people, don’t discount it.  Obama couldn’t close the deal on that one either,  remember. I look at the amount of money Obama is spending, and seeing that even with that money, he’s only able to buy himself a virtual tie?   Apparently, as before he’s not able to close the deal here, either.

There is at least one PUMA, and she is mad and not voting for the Chosen One, video:

Hat tip: Laura W. Ace of Spades.

Robert Stacy McCain:

Just a guy in my neighborhood’

Bill Ayers? Oh, you must mean the guy whose book Barack Obama favorably reviewed in 1997. The guy whom he joined in a University of Chicago panel discussion organized by Michelle Obama. The guy with whom he shared an office for three years.

Don’t you dare imply that they actually knew each other, you racist.

Two things are clear.  One Barack Obama will iie about anything to gain access to the White House.   Two, the MSM will turn a blind eye and deaf ear to Obama.    It is unarguable that Obama has not been open and honst about hts long and close association with the terrorist Bill Ayers.  What else is Obama hiding?

The downward spiral continues for BO:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrat Barack Obama‘s lead over Republican John McCain in the presidential race has dropped to 3 points, according to a Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll released on Sunday.

Obama leads McCain by 48 to 45 percent among likely U.S. voters, down 1 percentage point from Saturday. The four-day tracking poll, which has a margin of error of 2.9 points.

Pollster John Zogby said the numbers were good news for McCain, and probably reflected a bump following his appearance in the third and final presidential debate on Wednesday.

“For the first time in the polling McCain is up above 45 percent. There is no question something has happened,” Zogby said.

This is pretty much as I predicted, the other day.  The trend, I think, will continue.

And by the way, Obama’s people are thinking so, as well. Which explains the decidedly more nervous, hostile and downright angry attitude we see in Obama on the stump the last few days. It also explains the timing of Powell’s endorsement this monring. (Does anyone think this wasn’t coordinated with Obama’s people?)  I called it the other day “The Stench of Desperation” and I hold to that description.  Watch for the trend of Obama’s desperation to increase over the next days and weeks.

Look, gang, call this what you will. The bottom line here is there’s no way this was going to go down any other way.  Powell has been so long in getting averyone BUT liberals disgusted with him, that leaning left was the only way he would be relevant at all.  And you just know that’s what this is all about when he starts mouthing the Messianic plattitudes:

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell announced Sunday that he will be voting for Sen. Barack Obama, citing the Democrat’s “ability to inspire” and the “inclusive nature of his campaign.”

“I think he is a transformational figure, he is a new generation coming onto the world stage, onto the American stage, and for that reason I’ll be voting for Sen. Barack Obama,” Powell said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Powell said he was concerned about what he characterized as a recent negative turn of Republican candidate Sen. John McCain’s campaign, such as the campaign’s attempts to tie Obama to former 1960s radical Bill Ayers.

So, we’re not to point out the guys questionable values and the associations which point up those values?  One gets the idea that this is a choice Powell made for reasons other than the ones listed, and that he’s looking for an excuse. As I said a while ago, in these spaces, Powell’s loyalty to the right and it’s values was and remains questionable at best. So, when something like race comes along, guess which way he’s going?

You’ve disgraced yourself, General.

Well, I’ve been promising you I’d put these pics up for some time, now.

These are all from our annual fall run. Since we bought a camper some years ago, we make a habit of one last run of the season on Columbus day weekend. This year, the run took on some import, since every other time we took the trailer out it rained.  This time, however, the weather was wonderful, and we had a wonderful time.

Took me a while longer than I figured to put this together.  In my defense, I’ll say I had several hundred snaps to go through from four different sources. This is round one, whittled down to around 40 or so snaps. Each of them is commented. Drill once to get a slightly larger version of the pic, and a description. Drill twice to get the full sized pic.

Barack Obama as attributed by Toby Harnden. Telegraph(UK):

“I promise you. We won’t just win New Hampshire. We will win this election and, you and I together, we’re going to change the country and change the world.”

BO calls our economy the worst since the Great Depression.  Yet Obama wants to skip past fixing our domestic economy and go straight to changing the World,  How?   Is BO refering to a World without the State of Irrael?

Over at OTB, James notes Page Six:

Lisa Schiffren of NRO’s The Corner passes on a NY Post Page Six report that — brace yourself –  Michelle Obama ordered some expensive food!

While he was at a meeting at the Waldorf-Astoria at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Michelle Obama called room service and ordered lobster hors d’oeuvres, two whole steamed lobsters, Iranian caviar and champagne, a tipster told Page Six.

Schriffren reckons this set this ran $350 and laments the decline of the American political class.

And I think rightly so. At least, some of them… yes, even most. But the devil is in the details. One commenter there, in his usual sneer issues one of the more lame comments I’ve seen in a month of such from him.

Yay… gossip columns…

At this point, I dive in:

Note, please, that nobody has disputed the facts shown in the story.

Now, will they, I suppose. The problem of course is not the source of the story, but it’s rather clear implications.  Watch.

And, goodness, when did National Review, founded by the late unapologetic plutocrat William F. Buckley, Jr., start banging the faux populism drum?

About 2 seconds after Obama decided it was important to his image. What, after all, is Obama running on, but a populist appeal, when he stands up at the Al Smith dinner… a white tie affair…

Beyond the walls of this hotel, on the streets of one of the greatest cities in the wealthiest nation on earth, there are men and women and children who have fallen on hard times and hard luck, who can’t find work, or even a job that pays enough to keep a roof over their heads. Some are hanging on just by a thread.

And so the Obamas, expressing their love and concern, go back to the room and consume lobster hors d’oeuvres, two whole steamed lobsters, Iranian caviar and champagne. The concern of the Oabamas for the less fortunate, and their connection with everyman is obvious, ain’t it?

The point being of course, not that the folks at NR are about supporting the poor, this is no measurement of that. What it does measure rather well, though, is the hypocrisy inherent in the Obamas.

Not unlike the stories we keep hearing about ‘Dear Leader’ , or Fidel Castro, or, Stalin. All of whom lived like kings, while their people… the people they expressed all their concern and love for.,… that they claimed were all equals, all comrades in the ‘change’, the people upon whose hopes these dear leaders rose to power,  did without… The similarity is so striking, the warning bell so loud and clear, that nobody should be able to miss the message. This is the Obama’s ‘Let them eat cake’ moment. I wonder, though how many will see this for what it is. The one thing I can tell you about this is that nobody can ignore the obvious conclusions here, save by an act of will.

Bruce at Q&O, yesterday notes a question at Men’s News Daily:

Now that Barack Obama has received the endorsement of the Brady Campaign gun-control group, will the Supreme Court’s findings in the D.C. gun-ban “Heller” case matter?

I don’t know as that was the threshold, but certainly the answer is ‘no’.

Bruce points out that DC is in fact a federal district, and therefore when Democrats rule the roost, Heller, at least insofar as DC is concerned, is done. I tell him:

…consider the implications this thing drags along with it, taht are WAY beyond Heller. Is there any part of the constitution they won’t ignore, given that degree of power?

Consider the entire Corsi investigation/arrest/Odinga meme. Consider the Joe the Plumber deal. In each of those cases… and there’s certainly more, the level of intimidation employed takes on a Stalinist level of intensity. Butt those two situations and their implications, up against our current discussion, and do the math. Can you imagine what these thugs do when they get the power of government behind them?

This will sound extreme to some, I’m sure. However, I really believe that Obama, along with a veto-proof Democrat congress is that big a threat to America, people.