The Debunker!

LIE OF THE WEEK: 07-11-2008

2008-07-11T23:58:00.003-04:00

Rev. Jesse Jackson on his remarks about Senator Obama "talking down to black people":

"My error was responding to a question before a live mic."

THE TRUTH: Actually, his error was not that he spoke his actual views on a live microphone. His error is having those views at all. Rev. Jesse Jackson is a demagogue who is dealing with a couple of issues here: First, he's jealous that Senator Obama is the actual first African-American candidate who is actually has viable chance of becoming president, unlike Rev. Jackson's two presidential runs in the 1980s. Second, he needs to realize that blaming the problems of the African-American community on racism is self-defeating and is a major reason for the issues in that community. People who believe themselves to be without fault as their world crumbles will not do anything to repair that world as they wait for those "oppressing" them to be held accountable and fix their situation. Just because Rev. Jackson had a prominent role in the civil rights era of the 1960s when racism truly was the problem in America does not justify his continuation of the same fight 40 years later, long after the entire world has changed. Senator Obama should distance himself from Rev. Jackson and instead work with other leaders in the African-American community who are speaking the truth, such as Bill Cosby. The last thing we need is for their to be any role in an Obama administration for this type of demagogy politics.

COLUMN: 07-09-2008

2008-07-09T11:20:00.002-04:00

The death of long-time US Senator Jesse Helms should serve as a reminder of what is right and what is wrong with the conservative movement in America. Despite liberals' fondest hopes that America is turning in their direction, this couldn't be further from the truth. America is a moderate conservative country and the only times the electorate in the last 50 years has turned away from conservatives are due to two primary reasons: corruption and fascism. Corruption will always cause people to turn away from those in power to the opposition, even if that opposition has views that can only be tolerated for a few years until the corruption within the conservative ranks is cleared out. Fascism is a much bigger problem when some so-called conservatives actually reveal their true colors. Senator Helms was an unfortunate example in this regard as he attempted to use unconstitutional mechanisms on several occasions to enforce his racist views as they declined in society as a whole. The biggest example in recent years has, of course, been the fascist undertones of nearly every Bush Administration national security policy since 9/11. Rather than defending freedom by showcasing it in our society, these cowards claim to defend freedom by destroying every constitutional freedom. From investigating any anti-war protesters who were simply exercising their freedoms of speech and assembly to investigating several religious groups due to pure racism and no actual evidence whatsoever to cause any suspicions, the trend has disgusted the American people as it has proved itself to be counterproductive and actually strengthened the enemy around the world. Senator Helms can be remembered fondly for his opposition to abortion and other liberal policies imposed on Americans, but we should not forget his overall record in terms of driving America away from our core values of freedom and equality for all.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 07-04-2008

2008-07-04T20:18:00.006-04:00

White House Spokeswoman Dana Perino on the president's decision to attend the Olympics:

“This is a decision by the president that he really wanted to go in support of our athletes,” Asked if Mr. Bush was making a political statement, she said, “He does not look at it that way, but we recognize that others may.”

THE TRUTH: President Bush is going to the Olympic Games in Beijing because he wants to use every public opportunity to try to improve his horrible legacy. He's not fooling anyone with this political calculation. His influence in America and in the world is so minimal at this point that an honorable decision to boycott the games because of Chinese abuses around the world is perceived by him and his advisers as worthless, so he's going to go and attempt to use the opportunity to show himself as a leading figure in the world. Unfortunately for him, this will be in vain and the last 6 months of his term will be dominated by the 2 candidates to replace him doing as much as possible to differentiate themselves from his terrible performance on the job. He will always be remembered as the president who put self-interest ahead of the interests of the American people and took us through 8 years of failed policies in every area of government.

COLUMN: 07-02-2008

2008-07-02T23:44:00.001-04:00

It's a great day in the political scene in America as we watch the general election presidential campaign unfold with two candidates who were the outsiders at the beginning of the process. Both Senator Obama and Senator McCain are reaching out to the moderate conservative middle of America as they work towards the presidency. As long as neither one of them reaches too deeply into the extreme politics of the base of their parties during the campaign, then neither of them will be beholden to anyone but the American people at the end of the election and we can only hope that this will translate into an administration where the corrupt party insiders are kept out for the first time in many years. Perhaps this is too hopeful of a vision for the future, but one can at least take pride in the fact that the American people rejected the Washington insider favorites who were most corrupted by lobbyist money during the primary election process.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 06-27-2008

2008-06-27T22:01:00.001-04:00

President Bush on lifting some sanctions against North Korea:

"If North Korea continues to make the right choices, it can repair its relationship with the international community, much as Libya has done over the past few years. If North Korea makes the wrong choices, the United States and our partners in the six-party talks will respond accordingly."

THE TRUTH: Which right choices are these exactly? North Korea has significantly increased it's stockpile of nuclear weapons during the Bush Administration and has only taken superficial steps (such as this week's destruction of a famous nuclear facility) to appease the world's demand that it dismantle its arsenal. Libya is cited by the president as an example, but they are the most proven state sponsor of terrorism and have never truly repented. They did shutdown their nuclear program after being caught red-handed, but that was only because they hadn't reach any critical stage yet where they could wield their nuclear arms as a stick to mitigate international pressure (as North Korea did for many years) and the threat of a neoconservative-led attack on their country. President Bush has shown North Korea that there were no negative consequences for their years of deception and is trying to salvage his record as one of the worst presidents through last minute accomplishments such as this and we can only hope that he does not appease these dictators to any extent that will make it harder for his successor to stand up to them next year.

Special Column on the Supreme Court

2008-06-26T23:02:00.001-04:00

Yesterday's column was about the bad things that courts can do. Today was a good day in this area as the US Supreme Court finally established that the 2nd Amendment is the same as the rest of the Bill of Rights in that it is the establishment of an individual right to bear arms. Despite the objections of liberals who favor gun control under the ridiculous illusion that all people will somehow be protected by the police at all times from the illegal guns held by criminals, the majority of the court has struck a blow for the individual freedoms and liberties enshrined in our constitution and a blow against the socialist leanings of a small minority of Americans. If only the justices had lived up to their responsibilities to the American people equally well on all of their decisions during this year.

COLUMN: 06-25-2008

2008-06-25T11:42:00.001-04:00

There have been so many bad court decisions recently that reflect a sickening perversion of the role of the judiciary in our system of governmental checks and balances. First, the State Supreme Court of California made a decision that flies directly in the face of a law passed by popular referendum just a few years ago. Despite the public expressing their moral view of marriage by overwhelmingly passing a law in that regard, the liberal judges decided they knew better and reversed the will of the citizens of that state. They also refused to stay their decision for a few months while the people are given an opportunity to overturn their decision again with a referendum on an amendment to the state constitution. This is the ultimate arrogance for those who believe in an autocratic view that they know better than the people they are supposed to serve. There was a similar situation in the US Supreme Court's unfortunate decision that they knew better than the majority of Americans and decided that the rapists of children don't deserve to be put to death. The liberal judges in the majority decided that their view of the "evolving standards of decency" meant that they could go against the will of the American people and decide that this most heinous of crimes that destroys the innocent childhood of its young victim isn't worthy of the death penalty. It's yet another example of the arrogance of liberals who believe themselves to be the ultimate judges of morality based only on their personal views. The unfortunate truth is that the US Supreme Court is not in the least moderate and either passes judgments from the extreme left or the extreme right depending on a few swing votes. (This is despite the fact that conservatives have dominated the electoral choices of Americans for the past 40+ years except for a few minor instances where the corruption of Republicans led to them being ousted from office). We can only hope that the moderate conservative views of the American people will be reflected in the highest court in the land in their future decisions as opposed to the continuation of this disgusting trend.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 06-20-2008

2008-06-20T23:58:00.002-04:00

President Bush on the rights of Guantanamo Detainees:

"With this decision, hardened terrorists, hardened foreign terrorists, now enjoy certain legal rights previously reserved for American citizens. This is precisely the kind of judicial activism that frustrates the American people and the best way to change it is to put Republicans in charge in the Senate and John McCain in the White House."

THE TRUTH: Judicial activism is when judges rule on issues based on their own values against the wishes of the majority of Americans (such as abortion or same sex marriage). The only time this has ever been justified is during the civil rights era when the majority of Americans held biased racial views and the courts rightly overrode that. In this case, the judges are right to protect the civil rights of those detained by America, lest we turn into a despotic country that does not respect anyone's rights at all. The Bush Administration has been playing loosely with the law ever since 9/11 and using security as an excuse for that abuse. Guantanamo Bay is non-American territory that also does not fall under any other country's laws, which is exactly why they chose it to house the prison for those captured in the war on terror. If they were held in America, they would be subject to our laws and if they were held elsewhere, they would be subject to that locality's laws. The US Supreme Court was absolutely right in this case when they put Guantanamo under US Court jurisdiction because that is the only way around the corrupt activities promoted by this corrupt administration.

COLUMN: 06-18-2008

2008-06-18T15:10:00.000-04:00

Tim Russert was truly an American hero and it's unfortunate that it took his death to highlight this fact. He was an institution in Washington who was a model of the needed role of journalists in a free society. He held politicians to task for their word and deeds and did not let them get away with dishonest excuses for misbehavior. Though he began his career in the political world working for major Democratic politicians, he was truly unbiased when he moved to the world of television journalism. This is in stark contrast to his competitors: ABC's Sunday morning host was a former Clinton administration insider and that is still very clear in terms of the bias he demonstrates in his interviews. Fox News does not even qualify as a journalistic organization due to the blatant bias it demonstrates in every single aspect of its shows. It's hard to think of anyone who can fill Russert's shoes and that itself is a tribute to his legacy. Hopefully, someone of equal integrity will be given an opportunity to step in and play that role that our democracy so desperately needs.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 06-13-2008

2008-06-13T23:30:00.001-04:00

Vice President Cheney on NAFTA:

"Some politicians seem determined to unravel the bipartisan consensus on free trade -- a consensus epitomized by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). In a time when even NAFTA is being called into doubt -- when candidates can draw cheers by denouncing trade deals with our next-door neighbors -- then we're at risk of going down a very destructive path."

THE TRUTH: We are already on a very destructive path, thanks to the policies of President Clinton, President Bush and Vice-President Cheney. America is on the precipice of becoming a third-world country as middle class jobs are uncompetitively outsourced to non-democratic countries without any worker rights (or even civil or human rights). The middle class is left working at service jobs that can hardly pay for today's gas prices, let alone a living wage. No one is complaining about our trade with Canada other than one simple problem of taxypayer-provided healthcare being non-competitive with our obscenely high healthcare costs (thanks to the abuses of the insurance and drug companies) which can be easily fixed with enough political will. The problems are really on the Mexican side in terms of the flow of illegal labor causing an overall lowering of American wages, the lack of worker rights in Mexico leading to massive abuse in sweatshops, smuggling, and the lack of a proper civil society that is needed for appropriate trade protections. Vice President Cheney has been the single most influential vice president in American history and he has also been the worst vice president in American as he has driven this administration towards corporate-lobby corrupted policies that benefit his contributors and not the American people.

COLUMN: 06-11-2008

2008-06-11T14:38:00.000-04:00

President Bush's comments this week that he regrets some parts of his current historical legacy is still a showcase of the unfortunate arrogance that has dominated and ruined his entire tenure in office. His stubborn views of the past seven years of running the government demonstrate that he does not question his terrible policy decisions at all. Instead, all of his regrets are related to his belief that he did not "sell" his policies properly to America and it's allies. What he does not seem to understand is that the American people are against his bad policies themselves and would not have sold on them even if he and his top officials had done a better job in marketing. President Bush's main legacy will always be that of an arrogant leader who thought he was above dealing with the details of policymaking and who left those details to people in his administration who used unethical means to promote their corrupt agenda in the world. Even if the ultimate net result in Iraq and Afghanistan and the lousy American economy and every other major policy failure somehow turn around in the near future as President Bush desperately hopes, this will never salvage his reputation. He will always be remembered as one of the worst presidents ever, period.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 06-06-2008

2008-06-06T23:51:00.001-04:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on her continuing in the primary race until the very end:

"What does Hillary want - what I have always fought for. I want to end the war in Iraq, I want to turn this economy around. I want health care for every American. I want every child to live up to his or her God-given potential, and I want for the nearly 18 million Americans who voted for me to be respected and heard and to no longer be invisible."

THE TRUTH: Even after it was mathematically impossible for her to win, Senator Clinton stayed in the race for one reason: selfishness. She expressed this in her hopes for a catastrophe to hit Senator Obama's life or career when she mentioned the assassination of Senator Robert Kennedy in June of 1968. By staying in the race till the very end, Senator Clinton showed her disdain for her party and for her country. What she wants and has always fought for is money, power, and influence for herself. She probably does actually care about healthcare and American children having every possible opportunity, but those are obviously far below her own selfish interests in terms of priority as evidenced by her actions. Her last argument is the most ridiculous: why would the people who voted for her be invisible if she is not the president? Many of those people voted for her because of either gender bias (feminists who vote for any woman regardless of qualifications or ethics) or racial bias (white voters who would never vote for any minority). Their views have been a known component of the American electorate for many years and both of these positions need to be repudiated in order for America to become a more just and fair country, not encouraged through the politics of demagoguery. It's ironic that the Democratic Party which always talks about being in favor of women's rights and minority rights is the one where the most gender and racial bias is openly demonstrated.

COLUMN: 06-04-2008

2008-06-04T23:33:00.004-04:00

Now that Senator Obama has finally won the actual number of delegates in order to guarantee himself his party's presidential nomination, one would think that Senator Clinton would do the honorable thing and concede and congratulate him and endorse him for winning the nomination. Unfortunately, that is too much to expect from the dishonorable self-interested politics of the Clintons. The announcement late today that they would be making a major announcement on Saturday (in order to buy time to try to extract some more money from their foolish supporters to pay off their debts and also to try to gain influence over their party's convention and platform) is yet another indication that the Clintons are always working for their selfish needs and not for those of their party, let alone their country. We can only hope that Senator Obama does not make the foolish mistake of picking Senator Clinton as his running mate (or for any major role in his administration if he wins the presidency) because that will delay the much needed, long overdue final exit of the Clintons from the national political scene.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 05-30-2008

2008-05-30T23:38:00.003-04:00

White House Spokeswoman Dana Perino on President Bush and the 2008 election:

"President Bush isn't on the ticket... As the President said, he will do as much or as little as anyone needs him to do to help elect Republicans. But at the end of the day, any candidate who's running for office has to stand on their own two feet and they have to chart a course for themselves. Every election is about change -- go back through history and every single one is about how things are going to look in the future. "

THE TRUTH: Regardless of his name literally not being on the ballot, this election is all about the miserable failure of the Bush Administration and whether this conservative-leaning country will have to suffer through a liberal administration in order to remove the stench of the corruption brought by those who claimed conservative values while promoting only their self-interests against the interests of the American people. If President Bush had been a good or even decent president rather than one of the worst in history, he would have left coattails for those in his party to follow on and continue his legacy. Instead, Republicans not only do not have the benefit of any coattails, they have the opposite effect where they need to avoid any linkage to this failed leader. They not only have to stand up for themselves, they need to dig themselves out of a major hole to begin with. President Bush has wronged the trajectory of American government policies by allowing liberals to present themselves as a clean alternative to his corruption. He has thus allowed us to possibly have to suffer through socialist entitlement programs, unreasonable gun control, and continuation of court-imposed marriage and abortion laws rather than those supported by the morality of the majority of Americans.

COLUMN:05-28-2008

2008-05-28T23:15:00.005-04:00

Scott McClellan's new book this is week is a rare piece of truth from an insider wishing to save himself from being included in the history of the worst presidency in the history of America. Unfortunately for him, this tactic won't work to remove the stain from his legacy. Fortunately for the America people, history will record the contents of this book as further true evidence of the incompetence, corruption, and self-interested harmful form of government that has ruled our country for the past seven and a half years and this will hopefully help to prevent the election of future administrations of the same type.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 05-23-2008

2008-05-23T14:46:00.003-04:00

Former President Bill Clinton on press bias and playing the race card:

You've called the campaign press coverage biased against Hillary. Why do you think that is? I think most of the press people are in Obama's demographic. They need a feeling more than they perceive they need a President. There have been times when I thought I was literally lost in a fun house. How do you respond to those who charge that you and Hillary have played the race card? I'm not responsible for what other people say and what other people think. I have lived too long. All I can say is "You line up what you've done, I'll line up what I've done, and we'll see who's got a good life." I was really hurt about it at first. I am way over being hurt. This was cold-blooded, calculated, manipulated and a revolting strategy.

THE TRUTH: Much of the press had been overwhelmingly supporting Senator Clinton's "inevitability" as the nominee before the actual voting started and only started covering Senator Obama seriously after his ground-level efforts to organize and raise funds paid off. As usual, the Clintons are happy when the bias is in their favor and claim bias when it does not exist just because they lost. In terms of the race card, the Clintons' use of it is what is truly cold-blooded, calculated, manipulated, and revolting. They used that as their last desperate attempt to defeat Senator Obama's winning streak and their success in this disgusting tactic led to the extending the primary calendar until the very end two weeks from now. President Clinton can claim to be hurt all he wants, but no one with an ounce of brains will believe that any history of his working on civil rights issues (which is debatable anyway) is an automatic pass when racism is used as a electioneering tool.

COLUMN: 05-21-2008

2008-05-21T23:48:00.003-04:00

The latest ridiculous assertion by the Clinton presidential campaign is that Senator Clinton is losing because of sexism. The opposite is true - much of her support is because of sexism by feminists who will vote for any woman for president regardless of her lack of ethical standards or qualifications. If it weren't for the women who are supporting Clinton only because is a female, she would not even be a viable candidate because she has no other solid base of support. All of the assertions of blue-collar or union support are not specifically addressing the fact that many of these people would have preferred a different candidate (mostly former Senator John Edwards) and are only choosing her when the choice is between her and Senator Obama. It's nearly over for the Clinton campaign and this will hopefully also be the end of her dishonorable self-serving career.

An unintentional truth about the war in Iraq

2008-05-17T19:54:00.006-04:00

Patrick Kennedy, Undersecretary of State for Management on the decision to renew Blackwater's license, despite deaths and inquiries into the contractor's conduct: "We cannot operate without private security firms in Iraq. If the contractors were removed, we would have to leave Iraq."

I'm sure Secretary Kennedy did not mean to do this, but he has provided yet another piece of evidence regarding the underhanded method used to take America into the War in Iraq. Rather than telling the truth about the costs of the war, the administration provided a lot of fairy tale cost estimates and oil revenue projections. In addition, they intentionally did not provide sufficient troop levels to complete the mission as that would have required a greater amount of political will that they could not muster. They have attempted to make up for this by using private contractors in nearly every area of the war. The result has been a mercenary army that has run rampant without any legal consequences (since our interim Iraqi administration imposed laws granting these contractors immunity from both American and Iraqi laws). These same mercenaries also cause a lot of resentment for the troops they work with due to the huge disparity between the meager amount paid to soldiers and the extremely large amounts paid to contractors. Whenever American soldiers are counted in Iraq, they intentionally do not include the nearly 100,000 contractors (who are there cashing in on our grandchildren's tax dollars due to the huge budget deficits used to pay them) and this is yet another attempt to obfuscate the true cost of this war. Our military needs to be given the proper tools to do the job for any war that is necessary and we cannot allow dishonest politicians to destroy our standing in the world through the use of war-profiteering mercenaries who are not fighting for the best interests of America. If removing the contractors would lead to the end of this war, then that is proof in itself that the war needs to end.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 05-16-2008

2008-05-16T23:21:00.010-04:00

President Bush on the War on Terror:

"The fight against terror and extremism is the defining challenge of our time. It is more than a clash of arms. It is a clash of visions, a great ideological struggle. On the one side are those who defend the ideals of justice and dignity with the power of reason and truth. On the other side are those who pursue a narrow vision of cruelty and control by committing murder, inciting fear, and spreading lies."

THE TRUTH: While the president is right in his definition of the enemy, he is wrong about his definition of America and its allies based on his current policies. It would be ideal if he lived up to the definition of defending "the ideals of justice and dignity with the power of reason and truth" instead of being the fear-mongering violator of human and civil rights who claims no need for truth and liberty when fighting evil. The pure hypocrisy of this statement in the face of Guantanamo detainee trials, the PATRIOT Act, Abu Ghraib, the false reasons for the Iraq War, and so many other examples is why President Bush is specifically detested by both Americans and our allies around the world. He talks a good game, but his actions show that he does not really believe in American values and will circumvent all of them as needed to pursue his agenda. America will definitely be better off 8 months from now when he leaves office, regardless of who his successor will be.

COLUMN: 05-14-2008

2008-05-14T09:02:00.002-04:00

Saturday Night Live had it exactly right last weekend when they parodied Senator Clinton claiming why she should be the nominee despite there being no legitimate chance of her winning the Democratic Party presidential nomination and that message was reinforced by yesterday's election in West Virginia. In the sketch, the actress portraying Senator Clinton claimed she should be the nominee because she is "a sore loser" who has "racist supporters" and who has "no ethical standards whatsoever." In the West Virginia primary yesterday, we clearly saw Senator Clinton continue to play unethically to the racial sentiments of the least educated state in the nation (95% without college degrees) and these are obviously the actions of a sore loser who cannot admit defeat in an impossible-to-win situation and who will not step aside graciously to allow her party to unite towards a good campaign on the issues against the Republicans in the fall.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 05-09-2008

2008-05-09T23:36:00.001-04:00

Senator Clinton on Tuesday's election results:

"Tonight we've come from behind, we’ve broken the tie, and thanks to you, it's full speed on to the White House."

THE TRUTH: There is not a single shred of truth in this statement. Senator Clinton did not come from behind in North Carolina, where she lost overwhelmingly. She also did not come from behind in Indiana, where her large lead ended up in a victory of less than 1% more than Senator Obama. The election is not a tie as Senator Obama has been ahead for weeks in terms of the elected delegates (which is what really counts), the number of primaries and caucuses won, and the popular vote. And finally, since there is currently no path from where she is today to the White House, the only thing her campaign is speeding towards is off a cliff and she's apparently intent on taking Senator Obama, the Democratic Party, and even the whole country with her rather than admitting defeat. Both Senator McCain and Senator Obama don't have a history of the type of self-interested politics that both President Bush and especially President Clinton have shown and we can only hope that whichever of them wins the presidency will maintain this posture during their term in office.

COLUMN: 05-07-2008

2008-05-07T12:00:00.001-04:00

Yesterday's election results were not a "split-decision" despite what Senator Clinton's supporters are saying. Rather than admitting their overwhelming loss in North Carolina and that their extremely thin victory in Indiana was actually a loss after they started out with a large majority of working-class voters who were voting for her based on racial sentiments, they continue to claim that there is a good chance of her winning the nomination. At this point, that's like betting on a lottery ticket as a good chance of getting rich. It's obvious that Senator Clinton just cares about her own power, money, and influence and will not drop out despite the harm being done to her party and ultimately to the nation as she ruins what could have been a good campaign by party outsiders on both sides changing the direction of the nation from the corruption shown by the both the Clinton and Bush administrations.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 05-02-2008

2008-05-02T19:04:00.001-04:00

Senator Clinton on the high price of oil:

"I also want to take on OPEC. You know, OPEC is a cartel, it's a monopoly... Nine of the 13 biggest oil-producing countries that are in OPEC are also members of the WTO. I would file complaints. I would also change the law so that citizens and businesses could file anti-trust actions. We're going to begin to hold them accountable."

THE TRUTH: Senator Clinton is an obvious hypocrite who will make this kind of statement when appearing on the O'Reilly Factor while trying to appeal to working-class Americans (especially those racists who are a large part of the Fox News audience and who will never support a minority for president). The reality is that her campaign is the most heavily funded by industry lobbyists and her history of financial support has always been heavily tilted towards corporate PACs and away from the interests of ordinary Americans. We should be thankful that the odds of another Clinton presidency are absolutely miniscule at this point so that we don't continue to hear these lies while our government is sold to highest bidder (along with the Lincoln bedroom).

COLUMN: 04-30-2008

2008-04-30T23:48:00.001-04:00

Senator Obama is right to distance himself from his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. In the past few days, Rev. Wright has shown himself to be a demagogue in the same vein as Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson. Regardless of the fact that all three of these reverends did good work in the past, especially in their youth as part of the civil rights movement of the 1960s, they have all proven themselves to be desperate for public attention, resulting in their promotion of ludicrous conspiracy theories and even the most false cases of claimed oppression. Senator Obama shouldn't hesitate for the rest of this campaign to disown any and all remarks by Rev. Wright to avoid giving Senator Clinton's supporters the propaganda tools they are trying to find in their attempt to either destroy Senator Obama's entire career and allow Senator Clinton to win or at least destroy him enough to make him lose the presidency to Senator McCain, which would allow Senator Clinton to run again in four years in their view.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 04-25-2008

2008-04-25T20:40:00.004-04:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on the role of the President of the United States:

"We're stronger as a Democratic Party, we're stronger as a nation when our people understand that, in effect, the president works for you."

THE TRUTH: The president does not "in effect" work for the American people. The president absolutely works for the American people and any president who follows a path that benefits anyone other than the American people is shirking their duty. Senator Clinton has allowed this slip in her words to show that she does not believe in our fundamental system of democracy and would continue her husband's legacy of self-interested politics that primarily uses public office to gain and maintain power and money. If she were to win the November general election, her view of the role would have the net effect of continuing the slide in America's values that began in 1992 with her husband's administration and has accelerated for the past 16 years. Despite the greatness of our system of government, it ultimately does depend on electing people who believe in liberty and the rule of law and we should be thankful that the odds of a Hillary Clinton presidency are extremely low at this point, lest we follow Russia's lead in turning our country into an authoritarian pseudo-democracy.

COLUMN: 04-23-2008

2008-04-23T23:39:00.002-04:00

Yesterday was another sad day in America after Senator Clinton won the Pennsylvania primary based on every possible underhanded dishonest tactic. She won despite 67% of voters in that state saying that she attacks unfairly and equally large percentages saying that she is not honest. Her scare tactics about Senator Obama are no different than President Bush's scare tactics in 2004, which led to his re-election despite being one of the most unpopular presidents in modern history. We need a president who is honest and respects the will and values of the American people and either Senator McCain or Senator Obama fit that bill so much more than Senator Clinton ever will.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 04-18-2008

2008-04-18T18:26:00.005-04:00

Senator Clinton on her lies about her trip to Bosnia and sniper fire:

"I may be a lot of things. But I'm not dumb. And I wrote about going to Bosnia in my book in 2004. I laid it all out there. And you're right. On a couple of occasions in the last weeks, I just said some things that weren't in keeping with what I knew to be the case and what I had written about in my book. And, you know, I'm embarrassed by it. I have apologized for it. I've said it was a mistake. "

THE TRUTH: It wasn't a mistake - it was a bold-faced lie in an attempt to get votes. The only reason Senator Clinton is embarrassed and calling it is a mistake is because she was caught. She only finally told a half-truth when she said: "I'm going to do everything I possibly can to make sure that one of us takes the oath of office next January. I think that has to be the overriding goal, whatever we have to do." By any underhanded means necessary is exactly the tactic that Senator Clinton is using to try to achieve her goal of attaining the presidency and she cannot be trusted to tell the truth when she claims that she will put the needs of the American people or even her own party ahead of her own ambitions.

COLUMN: 04-16-2008

2008-04-16T09:05:00.004-04:00

Liberals' support of the Dalai Lama needs to be questioned as he tours America in support of Tibetan freedom from China. Just because it is right to stand against the oppression of the Chinese Communist Party does not mean that we should automatically support everyone who stands on that side. Let's look at the facts: The Dalai Lama was chosen for his position by elderly Tibetan Buddhist monks as a child and is automatically in that position for life. His position of "leader of the Tibetan government-in-exile" is scary because it would be a very bad situation if he ever gained power as a dictatorial autocrat, even if he was a so-called "beneficent dictator" (which would the best of many possible extremely bad scenarios). We need to support true democracies who support liberty and freedom for all their citizens and not follow celebrity-led fads towards an autocratic Buddhist theocracy or, even worse, celebrity-led fads toward brainwashing cults like Scientology.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 04-11-2008

2008-04-11T22:08:00.001-04:00

Chelsea Clinton on again being asked about the Lewinsky affair:

"I think that is something that is personal to my family. I'm sure there are things that are personal to your family that you don't think are anyone else's business, either. But also on a larger point, I don't think you should vote for or against my mother because of my father."

THE TRUTH: Sexual harassment of Arkansas state employees and federal government employees by the chief executive of both governments is not a personal matter for the family of the harasser. Perjury during a criminal investigation of sexual harassment and publicly lying to the American people about the content of the testimony is not a personal matter. More important is her second lie: Senator Clinton is claiming her "executive experience" as First Lady during her husband's administration as the main basis of her run for the presidency. If we should discount this "experience", then she is less qualified than any other candidate going back to when it was 20 candidates running in both parties. If we include this "experience", then we need to consider the fact that the entire administration was based on gaining and maintaining power without any consideration for integrity, the rule of law, or representing the American people. Either way, Senator Clinton would be a terrible self-serving president and we should be thankful that she has already lost her party's nomination to Senator Obama (unless one of her underhanded tactics to destroy Senator Obama's career succeeds, in which case she would lose the presidency to Senator McCain due to the blatant offensiveness of her current campaign tactics).

COLUMN: 04-09-2008

2008-04-09T23:55:00.002-04:00

In the passing of Charlton Heston this week, America lost a person who used his public fame for the good of his country. In recent years, Heston has been the victim of the anti-gun bias in the mainstream media who portrayed him as a conservative lunatic for defending the Second Amendment. This led to some people forgetting that he was also used his fame to promote civil rights in the 1960's, including being one of the the most influential people who stood by Martin Luther King, Jr. at the Lincoln Memorial for his famous "I have a dream" speech. Like most Hollywood stars, much of Heston's life was self-serving and we should not glorify him as any kind of hero just because he portrayed larger-than-life characters well as an actor. He was not a hero, but he did do good for America and the world, which is much more than can be said about the vast majority of his peers, and we should honor that work as we mark his passing.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 04-04-2008

2008-04-04T23:34:00.004-04:00

President Bush on nearing the end of his tenure as president and on Russian President Putin doing the same:

"You know we're two old warhorses and we're both getting ready to step down from our positions."

THE TRUTH: President Bush is already one of the worst presidents in American history and associating himself further with Putin is only making his historical legacy even worse. After claiming to have seen Putin's soul when they first met, President Bush has allowed Putin to roll back democracy in Russia and turn it into another energy-rich autocracy which is hurting freedom and liberty around the world. Also, as President Bush leaves office next January and loses what little influence he has left (since no one currently respects his administration anyway, here or internationally), Putin will be Prime Minister of his country and continue to rule indefinitely. President Bush will then become an extremely unpopular former president and Putin will continue his high level of popularity in Russia as he continues to control all mass media and public information, like all autocrats. Putin is a dangerous man who is harming American interests throughout the world and the sooner American foreign policy reflects this fact, the better off we will be.

COLUMN: 04-02-2008

2008-04-02T11:37:00.004-04:00

Poor Senator Clinton - she's such an oppressed woman who is only losing because of gender bias in America and the existence of a "glass ceiling" in the electoral process. At least, that's what she wants you to believe with her latest ridiculous tactic of gender-baiting in yet another desperate attempt to resurrect her already-failed campaign for her party's presidential nomination. Unfortunately, there are many single-issue feminist voters who will buy this political spin and vote for her. This will further her campaign to either get the nomination or cause Senator Obama to also lose any chance of winning the presidency in the process by continuously dragging him through the political mud and creating a negative feeling around his campaign throughout 2008 (which would then give her a chance to run against likely-President McCain in 2012). If the Democratic Party has any ethics whatsoever, they will rebuke the Clintons and punish them (possibly by banning them from their convention) for their selfish bad behavior which is hurting their party and hurting America by removing the possibility of a fair campaign between Obama and McCain during the summer and early fall before the election.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 03-28-2008

2008-03-28T20:15:00.002-04:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on continuing her impossible presidential campaign:

"I believe a spirited contest is good for the Democratic Party and will strengthen the eventual nominee. We will have a united party behind whomever that nominee is. ... I look forward to campaigning over the next several months."

THE TRUTH: Senator Clinton has already lost any chance of winning her party's nomination for the presidency and the only way she could still claim a victory is through one of her underhanded tactics becoming a death blow to Senator Obama's career. There is no way the Democratic Party will be united after her divisive tactics, especially the race-baiting she has done to lure some racists to vote for her as well as her constant positioning as the female candidate to motivate single issue feminists in her direction. These voters will never come back around to vote for Obama after all of the propaganda spread against him by the Clinton campaign (and also by the Republican 527's in the fall). The Clintons have stooped to a new low in this campaign, proving that all of their "values" are nothing but window dressing when they stand in the way of winning a campaign. They have also made sure that if they don't win, no other Democrat will win either, possibly as an attempt to allow for another run against an incumbent Republican in four years.

COLUMN: 03-26-2008

2008-03-26T19:21:00.002-04:00

As much as the Clintons would like it to be true, Chelsea's proclamation that the Lewinsky affair is "none of your business" is simply not true. Ignoring the sexual harassment part of the issue (for a moment anyway), personal immorality is part of a personal's overall moral character and someone who is immoral in their personal life should be judged as immoral by the public when deciding how to vote. Even if we buy their spin that personal morality has nothing to do with public office, let's not forget that President Clinton lied about his affair with his employee Monica Lewinsky when testifying in a sexual harassment lawsuit by a former employee Paula Jones. In establishing a long term pattern of abuse of power when dealing with sexual propositioning of employees, the plaintiffs were very justified in their actions and Senator Clinton's lies at the time about being the target of a "vast right-wing conspiracy" were proven to be completely untrue. It's sad to see that the Clinton's have passed on their lack of morality to the next generation of their family and we can only hope that it's not passed on to the next generation of Americans as a whole.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 03-21-2008

2008-03-21T09:06:00.006-04:00

President Bush on the 5th anniversary of the War in Iraq:

"War critics can no longer credibly argue that we are losing in Iraq, so now they argue the war costs too much."

THE TRUTH: We are no longer considered to be "losing" in Iraq because we are looking at it in relative terms - we cannot win militarily and have only reduced the amount of violence from the horrific levels of the past two years. The political steps needed to actually achieve a victory are extremely slow in coming and may not happen at all. Most importantly, although the American military is by-far the strongest force on the planet, the main factor affecting the war is the turnaround in the Sunni forces who decided that it made more sense to get what they could out of the political system rather than compromising all morality and aligning themselves with the maniacal killers of Al-Qaeda and fighting out a battle they will eventually lose. Thus, we are not losing, but we are also not winning. On the topic of war costs, President Bush should be called out by the media on his administration's complete dishonesty in this regard. They original provided an estimate of $60 billion for the entire war effort and it has already been 10 times that amount in terms of actual costs, without accounting for secondary costs for health issues for veterans, increased spending on failing military recruitment efforts, etc. The war does cost too much, it's hurt the current and future economy (since it's based mostly on unrestrained government borrowing) and was a mistake to begin with. No amount of spin will erase this ultimate example of the legacy of the Bush administration as being all about mistaken idealogical policies.

COLUMN: 03-19-2008

2008-03-19T23:02:00.003-04:00

Senator Obama is right to distance himself from his former pastor's remarks without completely disowning him. Too many demagogues get away with turning these types of situations into media circuses that force artificial contrition and resignations. But the fact is that it is the Clinton campaign's dirty tricks that are causing this media focus right now because they continue to desperately search for any way to sink Obama's rising ship. The Clintons would apparently prefer to cause Obama to lose the presidency to McCain rather than give up in the face of a mathematically impossible chance of winning. This is sad because, for the first time in many generations, the two parties appear to have supported candidates who are out-of-step with the corrupt insiders of each party and are instead following the will of the American people while adhering to their values. Rather than allowing an interesting McCain versus Obama general election debate to occur, the Clintons now appear ready to continue to use every dishonest and disgusting political tactic in their playbook in an attempt to salvage their obvious rejection by the majority of Democratic Party voters. America will surely see a brighter day when they are no longer a factor on the political scene.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 03-14-2008

2008-03-14T11:53:00.005-04:00

Former vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro on Senator Obama's lead in the Democratic Party primary race:

"If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman, he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is."

THE TRUTH: Senator Obama has succeeded in this election despite lingering racism in our society, not because of his race. What's most ironic is that Senator Clinton's supporters have been playing this race card repeatedly while she is, in fact, the person who has benefited most from her status as a woman and as the wife of a former governor and U.S. President. Would she have been elected to the Senate from New York (where she never lived until just before the election) had she not been married to Bill Clinton and stayed with him during his many infidelities? Would she be a contender for the presidency had she left him when he was Attorney General or Governor of Arkansas after so many affairs (as she should have done if she had any moral sense and not just a drive to gain power)? Senator Clinton has played up being the "female candidate" enormously and many single-issue people have unfortunately latched onto this despite her many negatives. Senator Obama has shied away from being the "black candidate" to avoid alienating most Americans and only gained the votes of the majority of African-Americans after he proved he could win in states without a sizable minority population. Senator Clinton should be repudiated for her tactics and will surely be punished by the majority of Americans in the general election should her underhanded ways garner her the Democratic Party nomination.

COLUMN: 03-12-2008

2008-03-12T22:13:00.004-04:00

It's a sad day for justice in America. Revelations of New York Governor Elliott Spitzer's involvement with a prostitution ring will unfortunately be his legacy unless a miraculous comeback occurs in the future. All of the good he did in terms of confronting monopolies and Wall Street corruption (and it was a lot of good) will be forgotten and propagandized by his enemies as the evil actions of a hypocrite. There doesn't appear to anyone waiting in the wings to take on this role and so the corruption will continue to reign as long as there is money to be gained and the only checks and balances will be the recessions that will occur when some large investors cash in their gains at the expense of many others (such as the current situation with the failure of bad mortgages).

LIE OF THE WEEK: 03-07-2008

2008-03-07T19:20:00.004-05:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on her victories in Ohio and Texas Democratic primaries:

"We're going on, we're going strong, and we're going all the way. Ohio has written a new chapter in the history of this campaign and we're just getting started."

THE TRUTH: Senator Clinton's very slight majorities in her primary victories on Tuesday gave her a tiny lead in the delegates awarded that night and eliminated her chance of catching up in the overall delegate count. The only thing getting started that night was the beginning of the end of her campaign. Despite using every underhanded tactic to try to sway the process in her favor, she has absolutely no chance of catching up, but it's doubtful that she will ever be honorable enough to bow out of the election and let the choice of the American people represent them in the fall election against the Republican nominee.

COLUMN: 03-05-2008

2008-03-05T23:20:00.005-05:00

It's good to see Governor Mike Huckabee finally dropped out of the race for the Republican Party nomination for president after Senator John McCain claimed enough delegates to guarantee himself the nomination. Unlike some of the other candidates who dropped out earlier (especially Giuiliani, Romney, and Fred Thompson), Huckabee would be a good president and has a proven track record of honest politics based on the needs of his constituents while sticking to his core values. He has, unfortunately, lost a lot of credibility (and probably any chance of getting the vice-presidential nomination) by staying in the race long after it was mathematically impossible for him to win. It's really hard to understand why he did this - some possibilities include an ego driven by public attention (not shown by his previous record) or (also unlikely) being pushed by the corrupt insiders who are so upset by McCain's victory that they wanted to continue to challenge him in the hopes that something unusual would happen to cause him to lose the nomination. In any case, Huckabee dropping out finally gives an opportunity for McCain to showcase his truly conservative record to the public without being challenged by ridiculous assertions that his not towing the party line makes him a liberal. Perhaps this will turn into some enthusiasm from the majority of Americans who are conservatives and this enthusiasm may yet translate into another defeat for liberalism in this fall's election.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 02-29-2008

2008-02-29T14:34:00.002-05:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on NAFTA:

"I have been a critic of NAFTA from the very beginning. I didn't have a public position on it, because I was part of the administration."

THE TRUTH: Senator Clinton continues to misrepresent her past positions in an attempt to pander her way to victory. This quote is especially ironic because she always claims her "experience" in the Clinton administration as a major qualification for her presidential bid, but doesn't want to take responsibility for anything that would hurt her chances of winning now. It's gratifying to see the American people are not fooled by these lies and are voting against her in the Democratic Party primary elections.

COLUMN: 02-27-2008

2008-02-27T23:19:00.003-05:00

Former Secretary of State Madeline Albright's new book is the worst advice anyone running for president could take. Just because the Bush Administration has an even worse foreign policy does not mean that the Clinton era was a good one in this regard. While the American economy was good during that period (with President Clinton deserving none of the credit for having the internet boom occur on his watch), every other policy was a miserable failure as the administration focused on political scandals and insider agendas and not anything that would benefit the American people. Secretary Albright inherited a solid cold war foreign policy from the Reagan and first Bush administrations and wallowed in it's wake for the entire Clinton administration, focusing more on showmanship than on any major policy initiative. The final straw was when President Clinton ordered the bombing of an innocent pharmaceutical plant in Sudan on the same day as his impeachment hearing for perjury. Albright is clearly trying to rewrite history in her favor, but contrasting yourself to one of the worst administrations in history will not erase the evidence that you were part of what was probably the second worst administration in history.

In other news, it's clear that the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign is desperate because they have not been able to convince the American people of their lies and have thus lost 11 primary elections in a row. From being "outraged" because of political mailings one day to being "upset" about media bias the next, it's clear they are floundering from one failed campaign strategy to the next and it's actually enjoyable to watch them sink under the weight of their failure to win through disreputable tactics. America will definitely have a brighter future when the Clintons have left the political scene and taken their lowest form of self-interest politics with them.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 02-22-2008

2008-02-22T23:26:00.002-05:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on comparing herself to Senator Obama:

"It's time that we move from good words to good works, from sound bites to sound solutions."

THE TRUTH: The Clintons have always been about spin and "good words" to gain and exploit power and not much else. They have basically no positive record to stand on, which is why they always focus on the surpluses of the Clinton era, which had much more to do with their luck of being in power when the internet boom occurred and nothing to do with their policies. (In fact, it was their policies that allowed the internet bust to occur after the unrestrained growth of IPOs of completely unprofitable companies based purely on hype). Although it is also true that Senator Obama also doesn't have much of a positive record to stand on either, he's not stuck with the Clintons' very large negative record. Any return of the Clintons to power would just continue the acceleration of decline of America's public integrity and values and the voters of America need to continue to defy their lies by voting against them in every case.

COLUMN: 02-20-2008

2008-02-20T22:20:00.002-05:00

The U.S. Supreme Court made a huge mistake yesterday by turning down an appeal by the ACLU in regards to the Bush Administration's warrantless wiretapping program. It's clear that the court is not fulfilling it's role of checking the power of the executive branch of government when it goes astray. Continuing to support President Bush's flaunting of so many laws and government rules in the name of national security should be recognized as the slippery slope it is. This is especially true when viewed in the light of every dictatorial regime in the world who invokes national security as the excuse for their oppression of their own people. We need strong conservative judges who upload the original libertarian aspects of the U.S. Constitution. Unfortunately, it may take several decades to correct this situation, considering the lifetime tenure of Supreme Court justices. In the meantime, we should rebalance government powers by only electing (both to the presidency and to congress) those will clearly stand up for individual liberties while defending us against our foreign and domestic enemies.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 02-15-2008

2008-02-15T23:44:00.001-05:00

U.S. House of Representatives Minority Leader John Boehner on walking out on a vote to hold members of the Bush Administration in contempt of congress for failing to respond to subpoenas:

"We will not stand here and watch this floor be abused for pure political grandstanding at the expense of our national security."

THE TRUTH: If anyone is grandstanding, it is the Republicans who walked out on a vote that they were going to lose anyway. They are foolishly defending a corrupt secretive administration whose mistakes are rightfully being exposed by congress. Unfortunately, any hope of the American public voting based on their conservative values are being thrown away by the actions of these Washington Republicans. This is because the public will always vote for the opposition party just to reduce the stench of corruption in Washington until the conservatives can bring them a new leader who stands for their values without the taint of past misdeeds.

COLUMN: 02-13-2008

2008-02-13T22:13:00.005-05:00

President George W. Bush's endorsement of Senator John McCain as a "true conservative" should be reported accurately by the media for what it actually stands for. It is President Bush telling his party's insiders that Senator McCain will be good for them and has nothing to do with conservatism. By any reasonable measure, Senator McCain has a very conservative record. The excuses used by some pundits to label his current and past positions as non-conservative or even liberal are focused on his political benefit to them and their cronies, not his actual values.

It's ironic that President Bush is somehow given credibility as a conservative by the media when he has been responsible for the biggest growth of the federal government in history along with a major increase in the irresponsible deficit spending once associated with the Democratic Party. Yes, he did cut taxes, but in an irresponsible manner creating more and more loopholes for special interests instead of an across the board cut for everyone equally. He has done very little on all other conservative issues as his administration has wasted five of its seven years in office on an unnecessary war, driven more by the ideology than any threat to American national security.

Senator McCain does, unfortunately, need the party insiders to help sell his message to the Republican grass roots. However, he should seek their support in such a fashion as to distance himself from any commitment to anyone who will continue the corrupt influence peddling that Senator McCain has stood against throughout his career in public office. He needs to clearly show that taking money out of politics is a conservative position that goes back to the intentions of the founding fathers and not let the corrupt party insiders continue their bogus claim that it is somehow a violation of First Amendment free speech rights.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 02-08-2008

2008-02-08T15:11:00.000-05:00

Former Governor Mitt Romney on ending his 2008 presidential campaign:

"I feel I must now stand aside, for our party and for our country. I will continue to stand for conservative principles. I will fight alongside you for all the things we believe in."

THE TRUTH: Romney never stood for conservative principles before running for president. In fact, he did quite the opposite when running both successfully for Governor of Massachusetts and unsuccessfully for U.S. Senator. He proclaimed his liberalism in those days as exceeding those of stalwart liberal Senator Ted Kennedy. Since deciding to run for the Republican nomination for president however, he has become an ultra-conservative who "realized his previous mistakes" and who feels so emboldened by his convictions that he is be able to criticize the conservative credentials of two lifelong conservatives (Senator McCain and Governor Huckabee) just because they don't always tow the party line. Romney is a hypocrite and no amount of standing for conservative principles now can make up for years of doing the opposite when it was politically expedient. No matter how much of his vast personal wealth he spends to fight for conservatism now, he will always be correctly perceived by the American people as the phony that he is and we should be hopeful that he never fools enough people to be put into a position of power in the future.

COLUMN: 02-06-2008

2008-02-06T22:16:00.001-05:00

Yesterday's "Super Tuesday" primaries were an extremely positive sign in the American political landscape. On the Republican side, Senator John McCain dominated the field with Governor Mike Huckabee making a strong showing as well. The fact that this "maverick" senator (so-called because he doesn't always tow the party line and actually does what he thinks is right in many cases) is winning shows that the American people are not deceived by the lies of the corrupt party insiders who are doing everything in their power to derail his candidacy. People of faith are flocking to Huckabee because he is one of their own and that is not a bad thing considering he is the genuine article and not a fraudulent panderer in that regard. Happily, the true panderer of this campaign, Governor Mitt Romney, has been rightly shown that he cannot buy the election. Other than winning Michigan (where his father was governor), Massachusetts (where he was governor), and a handful of states with large Mormon populations (who want to see one of their own as president), the only other states Romney has won have been caucus states where he paid for the buses and food to get people to go to caucus locations and that should be proof enough that this election method should be eliminated.

On the Democratic side, the corrupt party insiders are also being defeated with the swelling of popular support for the hopeful message of Senator Barack Obama. Though he is relatively young for the presidency, his record is long enough to show that he actually has worked for positive change in American politics. This is in stark contrast to the very disreputable record of Senator Hillary Clinton, who continues in the trend of her husband's presidency and both of their earlier lives in terms of dealing with the shadiest of characters for both the financing of campaigns and for personal investments. Though they are now statistically tied, Senator Obama has the momentum and will hopefully continue to carry the day until we can have a presidential election in November where both candidates are actually possible good outcomes for America (even if one is a liberal with a naive view of how the government should work) and not just a choice picking the lesser of two evils.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 02-01-2008

2008-02-01T23:56:00.001-05:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on being "an agent of change":

"So we [Obama and Clinton] have differences both at home and around the world, but, again, I would emphasize that what really is important here, because the Republicans were in California debating yesterday, they are more of the same.

Neither of us, just by looking at us, you can tell, we are not more of the same. We will change our country."

THE TRUTH: It's too early to tell whether Senator Obama is truly an agent of change or just hot air, but Senator Clinton has a clear history showing that she is not only a part of the corruption of Washington, but she is, in fact, a leader in most of the corrupt activities, such as illicit campaign fund-raising and influence peddling. Claiming that she is automatically not "more of the same" just because she is a woman and that Obama is that way because he is African-American is ridiculous gender- and race-bating. Democrats claim to be about equal justice and fairness in all things, but the truth is that the Clintons have not hesitated to play the race and gender cards in their favor when necessary. They always use despicable tactics when they perceive a threat to their return to power. The only change another Clinton presidency will cause is an acceleration of the decline of American values.

COLUMN: 01-30-2008

2008-01-30T21:34:00.000-05:00

Attorney General Michael Mukasey should never have been confirmed by the Senate because he shows the same lack of moral courage as his predecessor. The United States of America is a nation of laws. We pledge allegiance to the US Constitution as the basis of those laws and not to any sovereign, president, party or another other person or group of people. Being the chief law enforcement office in the country requires the Attorney General to clearly state what is within and what is outside the boundaries of those laws, whether they come from federal, state, or local governments or from international treaties and laws to which our government has agreed. Torture is clearly illegal for all American citizens to participate in everywhere in the world. Using the excuse that we would be "telling our enemies exactly what they can expect" if we capture them to negate announcing the clear illegality of torture is a cowardly answer. History has proven in every case that information gathered from torture is worthless and counter-productive (especially when it leads to unnecessary wars like the current War in Iraq). The entire Bush administration needs a lesson in the rule of law because they seem to try to find every excuse to skirt laws that they don't like (rights for POWs, warrant-less wiretapping, definitions of torture, etc) by invoking ridiculous statements such as the president having the right to bypass laws as the commander-in-chief of the military during a time of war. We need our government to reflect our values domestically and internationally especially during a time of war, otherwise we will become like every other authoritarian government in the world that invokes national security as the excuse for their inhuman behavior.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 01-25-2008

2008-01-25T23:59:00.000-05:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on Senator Obama's strategy of exposing their lies about him:

"I think what we saw last night was that he's very frustrated," she said. "I believe that the events of the last 10 or so days, the outcome of New Hampshire and Nevada, have apparently convinced him to adopt a different strategy."

THE TRUTH: New Hampshire clearly doesn't reflect the opinion of the rest of America. Nevada was the first indication of the Clintons stooping to the dirtiest tricks of politics as they were on the verge of losing the election. Yes, Senator Obama is frustrated, but he should have known better. President Clinton and Senator Clinton are not honorable enough to expect them to not resort to dirty politics and his campaign team should have planned better. It will be an interesting judgment of America's moral courage today when we see whether their underhandedness ultimately leads to their downfall or their return to power.

Separately, there was some truth coming out of the Clinton campaign for once. When questioned about President Clinton's disgraceful behavior, never before seen from a former president, Matt McKenna, President Clinton's press secretary, said "History will judge the impact on the Clinton legacy, not daily or weekly political reporters." History has already judged Clinton as one of the worst presidents ever and any attempt to recover any dignity by doing good work as a former president has now been rightfully wiped away forever.

COLUMN: 01-23-2008

2008-01-23T13:51:00.000-05:00

The Clintons will clearly stoop to the lowest possible level of disgusting political behavior in order to regain the power of the presidency. Despite many calls by Americans across the political spectrum, President Clinton refuses to stop denigrating his position of honor as a former president. His attacks on Senator Obama after his wife lost in Iowa have been mostly bold-faced lies that are meant to pull the race for the Democratic Party nomination into the gutter. Their goal is very clear: make most of the Americans who want to support Obama's message of hope for the future (although it is has misguided liberal basis) so disgusted with the political process that they no longer want to participate, even by voting. Unfortunately, it seems to have worked in Nevada and may yet derail Obama's clear superiority as a candidate and let Senator Clinton squeeze her dishonest way into the White House.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 01-18-2008

2008-01-18T18:29:00.000-05:00

National Organization for Women (NOW) President Kim Gandy on Chris Matthew's apology to Senator Hillary Clinton for saying that her career benefited from her status as a betrayed wife:

"Chris Matthews is a repeat offender when it comes to sexist attitudes toward women politicians. . . . I wasn't really looking for an apology. I was looking for a behavior change, and for him to treat female politicians the same way as male politicians."

THE TRUTH: Chris Matthews is an idiotic pundit who says a lot of dumb things without thinking, but in this case he was right. Hillary Clinton has clearly taken advantage of her husband's infidelities to further her political career and saying that NOW would like females to be treated in the same way as males is a lie. In an ideal society, men and women should be judged equally and paid equally, but this must apply in both directions. NOW is a biased organization that stands up for women when they are wronged but never does the same for men when women are the ones taking advantage of a situation. Thus, their opinion of justice is irrelevant and the truth should be told: Senator Clinton clearly works to benefit electorally from her status as a woman and as a betrayed wife and should be taken to task for doing so.

COLUMN: 01-16-2008

2008-01-16T20:19:00.000-05:00

Former Governor Mitt Romney's victory in the Michigan Republican primary sadly shows that many voters continue to vote based on an emotional response rather than based on a sound judgment of the qualifications of each candidate. Although he has been shown to have no real support in states where he was weighed equally against his competitors, his father's long shadow in Michigan carried the day for him yesterday. He will likely be similarly victorious in Nevada, Utah, and other states with a large Mormon population. However, he will not ultimately win because he has shown that he will sway to any position that he thinks will win him an election and because Americans are not yet ready to support a Mormon president.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 01-11-2008

2008-01-11T23:58:00.000-05:00

President Bush on his new push for Palestinian statehood:

"The establishment of the state of Palestine is long overdue. The Palestinian people deserve it. And it will enhance the stability of the region, and it will contribute to the security of the people of Israel. The peace agreement should happen, and can happen, by the end of this year. I know each leader shares that important goal, and I am committed to doing all I can to achieve it."

THE TRUTH: As great as it would be to finally solve the Israeli-Palestinian situation, this push by President Bush in the last year of his presidency (after effectively ignoring the issue for seven years) stinks of a desperate grab for a respectable legacy. President Bush knows that he will be judged based largely on the Iraq War, which is a failed policy even if it ultimately results in a decent democratic nation. This is because any successes will occur after he leaves office and will be credited to his successor, but all failures will be deservedly attributed back to him. Nonetheless, President Bush should be fully supported in this effort because leaving the problem festering will simply make it harder for anyone to solve at a later time.

COLUMN: 01-09-2008

2008-01-09T23:28:00.000-05:00

Senator Hillary Clinton's victory in New Hampshire should not be taken as a bellwether of her chances across the rest of America. Much like her election victories in New York, where she never lived before running for the US Senate there, New Hampshire's liberal elites support her based on her political connections and her status in the party rather than based on her being the best candidate to lead her party in the future. Although she may ultimately win her party's nomination, it will likely be based on her campaign's use of underhanded tactics, such as push polling or spreading of internet rumors about her opponents, rather than focusing on a positive message of leading America to a better place in the future. The Clintons have shown that they will do anything to gain and maintain power and no one should be fooled into thinking that they will run an honest campaign this time around.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 01-04-2008

2008-01-04T17:27:00.000-05:00

Former Governor Mitt Romney on his second place finish in the Iowa presidential caucuses:

"Well, well, we won the silver, but just as Dan Jansen pointed out - you win the silver in one event, it doesn't mean you're not going to come back and win the gold in the final event."

THE TRUTH: Romney is flawed candidate and he thinks he can make up for that by using his vast fortune to buy the election. However, his flaws are so deep (especially his significant flip-flops on so many issues when you compare his run for governor in very liberal Massachusetts and his run for president in the very conservative Republican primary process) that he will not be able to whitewash them and convince many of our fellow citizens. His early lead in the polls across multiple states were due purely to name recognition (after spending a lot of money to achieve that) and should never have been publicized by a responsible news media. As elections get closer and many more Americans pay close attention to the candidates, he will never actually get the percentages shown in the early polls. His only victories will likely be those where other factors play a major role, such as Utah and Nevada with a large number of Mormons or Michigan where his father was a popular governor for many years.

COLUMN: 01-02-2008

2008-01-02T12:26:00.000-05:00

It seems that British colonialism has taken hold once again, with American help. In Jordan, King Abdullah was spending most of his time in England (his mother's homeland) when he was called on to take the authoritarian reigns of his country as his father was nearing death and it became clear that his uncle, the former crown prince, would not be as subservient to the west as was his father. In Syria, President Bashar Assad was spending his life as an eye doctor in England when he was called back to Syria to learn to take over his father's dictatorial regime after his elder brother Basil was killed in a car accident. Most recently, Benazir Bhutto's son is being called "home" to Pakistan (where he's never really lived) from England to lead his mother's party after her assassination last week. However, he is currently planning to return to England to finish Bachelor's Degree before taking his role on formally and will lead only as a figurehead in the meantime. When will the American and British governments learn that supporting (with the exception of Syria) these western-educated despots will not increase the spread of our values and will instead lead to more anti-Americanism?

LIE OF THE WEEK: 12-28-2007

2007-12-28T18:09:00.000-05:00

Heritage Foundation research fellow Lisa Curtis on the assassination of Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto:

"Bhutto symbolizes everything that's anathema to the extremists. They want a Taliban-like theocratic state in Pakistan, and she stands for democracy, modernity and change.''

THE TRUTH: Bhutto was twice elected prime minister of her country and was then removed from office for corruption. She stood for democracy only in terms of gaining power and nothing else. It was a mistake for the Bush administration to back her as an alternative as Musharraf is losing his grip on power. Continuing to stand for her memory as her party resorts to propping up her son as the next leader of her party is yet another foreign policy blunder among the many of the current administration and it doesn't look they will learn their lesson before leaving office.

COLUMN: 12-26-2007

2007-12-26T12:05:00.000-05:00

The paragraph below is a reprise from the 10/31 column, but it's necessary because the media continues to accept Hillary Clinton's propaganda of being the "most experienced" candidate with "35 years" of political experience. This lie needs to be quashed once and for all.

She claims to be the candidate of experience, but her experience as First Lady of both America and Arkansas shouldn't count as true executive experience and so her only actual career experience is that of a lawyer for a very short period followed much later by 8 years in the US Senate. The lowest common denominator here is that she is the most experienced Washington insider politician, which explains why she is the front runner with party insiders and media across the country. That is exactly the wrong kind of person to run America at this critical point after having other insiders drive our country towards an extremely wrongheaded foreign policy and towards becoming a third world country in terms of our economy.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 12-21-2007

2007-12-21T16:09:00.000-05:00

Arizona Senator McCain on his history in Washington:

"I've never done any favors for anybody - lobbyist or special interest group - that's a clear, 24-year record."

THE TRUTH: Senator McCain is clearly much much cleaner than the vast majority of his colleagues in terms of campaign cash influencing policies. However, he has gone along with his party on many bills that are completely unacceptable in terms of their benefit to special interests and their harm to the interests of the American people. Hopefully, a McCain presidency will reflect his statements 100% of the time and not just most of the time when he is not going along with the corruption of his party.

COLUMN: 12-19-2007

2007-12-19T23:56:00.000-05:00

The controversy in the media about former Governor Mike Huckabee's television ad with the "floating cross" in the background is ridiculous at best and discriminatory if the worst interpretations are accepted. It's clear that Huckabee's campaign is focused on winning the Christian vote and symbolism such as this is an obvious ploy in that direction. Bringing it up in the media as an unacceptable hidden message is evidence that those media outlets believe that faith should not play a role in politics. Every American has the right to use their faith to aid in their decision-making process and that is not any kind of violation of the intended separation of church and state. These media outlets need to step away from their secular bias and allow Americans to practice all of their freedoms in the political process.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 12-14-2007

2007-12-14T14:10:00.000-05:00

Clinton spokesman Jay Carson on Senator Clinton apologizing to Senator Obama for members of her campaign claiming he was unfit due to his teenage drug use:

"Having been on the receiving end of unfair attacks for years, she doesn't think this is what the campaign should be about. She told him she wanted to win the presidency, but not through tactics like that."

THE TRUTH: The Clinton campaign machine is infamous for using every possible underhanded tactic to get elected (and especially to increase their campaign coffers) and Senator Obama should take them to task on this situation. A fake resignation by a campaign adviser who supposedly responsible for these attacks should not be accepted because it's clear that the Clintons will reward these people if and when they are back into power. This is further proof that a Hillary Clinton presidency would be one of the worst possible outcomes of the 2008 election.

COLUMN: 12-12-2007

2007-12-12T12:11:00.000-05:00

Vladimir Putin is an authoritarian dictator. His selection of a figurehead successor so that he can maintain power as prime minister should be the trigger for every decent nation to cut off all ties until he restores democracy and freedom to his country, especially the political freedoms of the opposition parties and the press freedoms of independent journalists. Unfortunately, the business interests in most countries don't want to risk their financial investments in Russia and will pressure their governments to tolerate Putin's abuses until we pass a point of no return and Russia returns to it's previous status as a superpower that promotes oppression.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 12-07-2007

2007-12-07T15:57:00.000-05:00

President Bush on the National Intelligence Estimate showing Iran discontinued their nuclear weapons program in 2003:

"The NIE provides an opportunity for us to rally the international community -- continue to rally the community to pressure the Iranian regime to suspend its program."

THE TRUTH: This NIE was nothing but a complete refutation of the Bush administration's recent policies towards Iran. It's clear that the US intelligence community stepped up in publishing this report as aggressively as possible to avoid being responsible for another misguided war being started by the members of the Bush administration who are doing everything in their power to rush to war before their time in office runs out. If they showed this amount of political courage on a regular basis, America as a whole would be much better off in the long run.

COLUMN: 12-05-2007

2007-12-05T22:08:00.000-05:00

Now that the National Intelligence Estimate has been released showing that Iran actually has no active nuclear weapons program (and hasn't for at least 4 years), we should ignore the babble from both sides of the political aisle and actually rethink our strategy towards them. Our history of foreign policy towards Iran over the last 55 years has been one short-sighted blunder after another. From our CIA-funded revolution in the 1950's to install the oppressive authoritarian rule of the Shah to the mismanagement of the hostage crisis and wrong-headed reaction to the popular revolution in 1979, we should actually deal with the situation at hand rather than focusing on historic propaganda. Iran has a more democratic form of government than almost all of our allies in the middle east and we should be encouraging them to move further towards democracy by reforming the non-democratic aspects of their society (especially the ultimate control of the supreme leader over the democratically-elected president and legislature). Unfortunately, our lobbyist-controlled members of congress and president appear to be moving towards the same types of policies that benefit a few influential groups at the expense of the American people and our values and there doesn't appear to be any chance of changing this until we finally remove the corruption of money from our legislative and election processes.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 11-30-2007

2007-11-30T22:30:00.000-05:00

Former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani on accusations of political corruption:

"I thought the way the story was presented was like a hit job. Coming two hours before this debate, I kind of got the idea that it was not a legitimate story."

THE TRUTH: Although the timing may have been politically motivated, it's clear that there is some truth behind these accusations. From the Bernard Kerik corruption case to the evidence showing Guiliani worked with his closest political allies in the same manner as a mafia don to these latest accusations saying that he abused official travel expenses in order to further his marital infidelities when he was mayor, Rudy Giuliani has shown that he believes that doing some good work for his constituents allows his to abuse his position for personal gain. He even says so in many debates when he states that the net effect of his mayorship was a good thing, so these issues of corruption don't really matter. This is an absolutely unacceptable position. Doing good does not justify the slightest amount of corruption - this is the same fallacy used in our foreign policy for the past century ("this dictator is a bastard, but he's OUR bastard") and the net result has been the weakening of America's values and reputation in the world. We need to elect someone who will represent our goodness as a country, not just our ability to get the job done and Rudy Giuliani has shown himself to be the wrong man for that job.

COLUMN: 11-28-2007

2007-11-28T20:02:00.000-05:00

Religion is in the news lately but, as usual, it's not coming up in good ways.

In the arena of the American presidential campaign, it's once again former Governor Mitt Romney telling everyone that he believes in God, Jesus, and Christian values. His continual repeating of these statements hasn't convinced the majority of Americans who recognize the cultist aspects of Mormonism that have not eroded despite it's enormous growth over the past century. Mormons still believe in God in ways that are not acceptable to anyone following the mainstream monotheistic faiths, such as believing that God was a human who "evolved" to become the god of this planet and that Mormons can similarly "evolve" to become gods of their own planets. They also try to whitewash all of the obvious "con-man" activities of their religion's founder by making statements like "if the fruit is good, that proves that root is good". I agree that most Mormons I've met are some of the best, clean-living people around, but that doesn't excuse their belief in a completely illogical system that is contrary to every bit of human reason and logic. The only way a Mormon will become the President of the USA is by America becoming a completely secular nation where it's citizens actions are not at all guided by their faiths and we are thankfully very far from that day.

In the arena of world politics, a dictatorial regime is once again abusing religion to distract people from their own failures as a government. Just as the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad were exaggerated and used to whip up public sentiment against Europe in the mostly tyrannical regimes in the Muslim world, the Sudanese government is trying to do the same thing with a ridiculous assertion that a British schoolteacher insulted Islam by naming a teddy bear Muhammad. It was actually her students who named the bear after one of their classmates and no western media source should repeat the propaganda of the authoritarian regime in Khartoum and allow them to distract people from the genocide in Darfur or any of the other horrible acts inflicted on their own people.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 11-23-2007

2007-11-23T22:10:00.000-05:00

President Bush on Pakistani Military Dictator Pervez Musharraf:

"I've found him to be a man of his word."

THE TRUTH: Unless Musharraf is secretly promising President Bush that he will maintain military rule as long as possible while allowing extremists rule large parts of his country, President Bush making this statement further proves that he doesn't care about his credibility with the American people or our allies. Musharraf has been promising to restore democracy to Pakistan since before President Bush came to office, not to mention promising to step down from his military post all along as well. None of these promises have come to fruition as he has instead broken down all of his country's democratic institutions in favor of his continued control. Although he was right to take power from a corrupt prime minister (Sharif) who attempted to assassinate him by not letting his almost-out-of-fuel plane land in 1999, he should have immediately held free and fair elections if he truly believed in freedom and democracy. Instead, he has followed President Bush's playbook by using the 9/11 attacks as an excuse for scaremongering and maintaining a hold on power. We need a major change in America's foreign policy of supporting friendly dictators because it truly is a major cause of terrorism, but it's sadly clear that this won't happen under President Bush or any of the currently leading 2008 contenders.

COLUMN: 11-21-2007

2007-11-21T23:59:00.000-05:00

This week's "Black Friday" sales will be lackluster because the American economy is on the brink of a precipice. The only growth in the economy over the past 6 years has been in the income of the extremely rich and that is insufficient to drive most Americans to shop when their mortgages are out of control, their gas and grocery spending has been forced to intolerable levels, and they haven't experienced any real income growth since the late 1990's. Both President Bush and former President Clinton are to blame for this situation as uncontrolled free trade with nations that don't have worker or human rights has eliminated all decent future prospects for America's working class. They are also responsible for the flood of illegal immigrants taking the lowest-end jobs, which has similarly driven down all middle class and working class income. We need a new president in 2008 who will dramatically change these policies if we want to have any chance of maintaining our economic superiority in the future. Unfortunately, all of the leading candidates seem to be cut from the same cloth as they continue to pander to every special interest who brings them a check at the expense of the American people. The only ultimate solution to this issue will be either the elimination of money from the political system or the rise of a strong third party based on the principles of true democratic representation, either of which sadly may take many years to occur

LIE OF THE WEEK: 11-16-2007

2007-11-16T21:43:00.000-05:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on being "attacked" by the other candidates:

"I don't mind taking hits on my record on issues, but when somebody starts throwing mud, at least we can hope that it's both accurate and not right out of the Republican playbook. Because what I believe is important is that we put forth what we stand for. I have been active for 35 years. The American people know where I stand."

THE TRUTH: This is an extremely big lie because Senator Clinton avoids all accountability for everything she's ever done which has had negative consequences. Has anyone actually ever heard her take responsibility for any of her actions? (The Iraq War vote? The failed 1993 healthcare initiative? etc) She deflects every issue into an attack on the Republicans, as if that is the same as having a solid position on an issue. It's ironic that she accuses her opponents of using the "Republican playbook" to attack her because it's exactly what she's been doing to both Senator Obama and former Senator Edwards. (Most recent example: she attacked Obama for not having foreign policy experience by stating that spending part of his childhood overseas does not count as foreign policy experience one day after several Republican groups started using this attack.) It's also ironic that she should claim 35 years of experience when it's clear that the majority of those years (1979-2000) were spent as a First Lady of Arkansas and of America and not in any policymaking position. Being "Slick Willy's" First Lady is also another indicator of not having any firm positions and instead just following public polls and campaign money. We need to hope and pray that circumstances do not line up to make her our first female president because that will be one of the worst possible outcomes of the 2008 election.

COLUMN: 11-14-2007

2007-11-14T23:31:00.000-05:00

The news that former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee is now running strongly in Iowa is a welcome sign that the Republicans may have a chance at a decent candidate after all. Although he is technically still second behind former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, it's clear that all of Romney's support is purely based on his enormous financing of his own campaign and that very little of the public will actually support him, mostly based on distrust of his flip-flopping or distrust of his religious beliefs. Unlike Romney and the national front-runners (former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuiliani and former Senator Fred Thompson), Huckabee is actually a Republican with a clear history of demonstrating the values that conservatives are supposed to be about. Giuliani is clearly an extreme liberal who has no conservative credentials whatsoever and Thompson is a Hollywood actor who occasionally uses those acting skills to pursue a political career whenever he doesn't have any other work. (He famously stated that politics is for actors too ugly for Hollywood - if that is his view, he clearly doesn't understand public service.) If we can perhaps get a real Republican race going between Huckabee, Senator John McCain, and Congressman Ron Paul, we might have a chance at having a decent candidate who can save American from having an ultraliberal president for at least the next four years.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 11-09-2007

2007-11-09T23:11:00.000-05:00

Former President Bill Clinton on his wife's failed health-care plan in 1993:

"She has taken the rap for some of the problems with health care the last time that were far more my fault than hers."

THE TRUTH: When President Clinton was running for office in 1992, he assured the majority of Americans (who are conservatives) that he was his own man and that Hillary wouldn't be his "co-president." When he later assigned her control of his administration's universal health care proposal, he very gladly disavowed any personal political responsibility for it's failure. Now that the shoe is on the other foot and Hillary is claiming her "executive experience" as First Lady as qualifying her for the presidency, Bill is rushing in to take responsibility for the complete failure of their proposal. As we all know the Clintons have no sense of any ethics in taking responsibility for their actions, no one should believe this attempt to take away the proper blame for the rightful failure of a policy that would have been disastrous if ever enacted.

COLUMN: 11-07-2007

2007-11-07T13:13:00.000-05:00

Pat Robertson is more interested in power than in following any moral beliefs, which is a completely unethical position to take. This has been previously shown, but is absolutely proven by his endorsement today of Rudy Giuliani's presidential campaign. Mr. Giuliani has demonstrated for years that he is a true big city liberal who has little regard or respect for the family values that most Americans hold dear. From supporting "alternative lifestyles" (far beyond just the issue of homosexual marriage) to preventing legal gun ownership for self-defense to imposing his liberal view of when life begins (at birth) by supporting abortion-on-demand, these are just a few examples of where his positions diverge wildly from true conservatives. In his endorsement statement, Mr. Robertson mentions only three issues: fighting crime, lowering taxes, and standing up against terrorism. Last time I checked, fighting crime and standing against terrorism were not conservative positions (though usually done much better by conservatives). In terms of taxes, New York City taxes were at all-time high when Mr. Giuliani became mayor and even a Democrat would probably have lowered them eventually as the national economy got much better, as Mr Giuliani was lucky to experience during his term. Rudy Giuliani became a Republican because he wanted to work in the Reagan Administration and continued as a Republican because it is much easier to win the New York primary system when you only have a few competitors instead of the hundreds of Democrats who run for every office. He espouses no actual conservative positions and is only being supported by Republicans who are power-hungry and see him as the best chance to win. Pat Robertson's already dwindling flock should give up on him as a lost cause and move on to support true conservatives rather than wasting their time and money on a misguided man leading them further and further astray.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 11-02-2007

2007-11-02T14:07:00.000-04:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on her "stand against special interests":

" You know, I have a long record of standing up and fighting, and I take on the special interests. I've been taking them on for many years. And I think all you have to do is go back and -- and read the media to know that."

THE TRUTH: A more important source to read is the Federal Election Commission, more specifically the reports on her campaign contributions. As was correctly pointed by her rivals for the Democratic nomination for president, she is the candidate who has accepted the most campaign contributions from special interests from both of the major political parties. In fact, she owes very little of her support to individual donors and relies heavily on campaign committees and donation "bundlers". If she thinks any of us buy her ridiculous assertion that this money does not influence her policy positions, then she must have a very low opinion of the intelligence of the American people. It will be a sad day for America if we have to suffer through another 4 or 8 years of a Clinton administration where policy will be decided either by reading polls (close to election seasons) or by selling to the highest bidder (as was done to the Lincoln bedroom).

COLUMN: 10-31-2007

2007-10-31T09:32:00.000-04:00

Based on last night's debate, it's really hard to understand why Hillary Clinton is the front-runner in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, unless you stoop to the lowest common denominator. Senator Clinton claims to be the candidate of change, but doesn't actually propose any policies that are significantly different than the past few years. She also ignores answering every real policy question by twisting the answer into a criticism for President Bush and the Republican Party. She obviously realizes that attacking someone else's policies is not the same thing as having a policy position of your own but is content is play politics on every issue. Finally, she claims to be the candidate of experience, but her experience as First Lady of both America and Arkansas shouldn't count as true executive experience and so her only actual career experience is that of a lawyer for a very short period followed much later by 8 years in the US Senate. The lowest common denominator here is that she is the most experienced Washington insider politician, which explains why she is the front runner with party insiders and media across the country. That is exactly the wrong kind of person to run America at this critical point after having other insiders drive our country towards an extremely wrongheaded foreign policy and towards becoming a third world country in terms of our economy.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 10-26-2007

2007-10-26T21:25:00.000-04:00

Senator Clinton on her vote to declare part of the Iranian government a terrorist organization:

President Bush shouldn’t think that "the 2001 resolution authorizing force after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 in any way, authorizes force against Iran. If the administration believes that any use of force against Iran is necessary, the President must come to Congress to seek that authority.'’

THE TRUTH: Senator Clinton is clearly more worried about being seen as weak on national security than in making sure that the Bush Administration does the right thing. The administration has shown a willingness to stretch every legal limit to achieve it's goals and giving them the opportunity to attack Iran as a terrorist regime is exactly what she has authorized them to do. If she can't show the political backbone to stand up for America when it matters, she does not deserve to be the president and it's as simple as that.

COLUMN: 10-24-2007

2007-10-24T11:54:00.000-04:00

The drumbeats of war can once again be heard in the distance under the auspices of very questionable circumstances. And once again, the regime in question exists as a direct result of the poor judgment of our leaders over the past 50 years.

Whereas we propped up the militaristic Saddam Hussein regime throughout the 1980's and then were "surprised" when he used his idle military to wage war on Kuwait (after we had supported his cruel war on Iran for 8 years), the Iranian regime is the direct result of the interventionist CIA policies of the 1950's. The Bush administration (and all other recent administrations) always neglects to mention this fact when they mention Iranian crimes dating back to the 1979 revolution and hostage-taking of Americans. They conveniently forget that it was our overthrow of their democratically-elected regime in order to install the Shah and get cheap oil that lead to decades of cruel dictatorship by the Shah and that the Americans in Tehran were only taken hostage after our government refused to turn over the fleeing Shah for prosecution for his crimes. (In fact, the rich elite who robbed Iran of all it's wealth from the 1950's until the 1979 revolution continue to live an extremely prosperous lifestyle in America and use this wealth to influence American policy.)

Even if you ignore the historical aspects of the entire situation, it's clear that the same ideologues who led us into Iraq under false pretenses are now rushing to do the same with Iran before time runs out on the Bush administration, whose insulated inner circle allows for easy manipulation by these warmongers. We must not allow them to cause us to lose all of our credibility as a nation, which will take decades to repair, especially in the face of the rising undemocratic powers in Russia and especially in China.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 10-19-2007

2007-10-19T23:16:00.000-04:00

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on her return from exile (before the massive terrorist attacks):

"I am not scared. I am thinking of my mission," she had told reporters on the plane. "This is a movement for democracy because we are under threat from extremists and militants."

THE TRUTH: Being against extremist militants does not automatically make you part of a movement for democracy. It's clear that she is being allowed to return from exile so that she can help whitewash the continuation of the presidency of the current military dictator, General Pervez Musharraf. Let's not forget that she went into exile after two separate terms as prime minister due to massive corruption, fraud, and exploitation of national resources for personal gain. She has never believed in actual democracy and America helping her return to power is yet another historic mistake of the Bush Administration. When will America's leaders finally understand that our support of world leaders that suppress the rights of their people is in fact a major source of the terrorism we are supposed to fighting?

COLUMN: 10-17-2007

2007-10-17T13:58:00.000-04:00

The housing slump in the USA is a good thing. I know that is a very controversial statement to make, but it's clear that home prices in many areas of America were rising obscenely due to speculators and this is the only way to correct this massive injustice. A similar example on much smaller scale was the selling of Sony PS3 gaming systems during last year's holiday season. The overpriced system (retail price of $599) was being sold for as much as ten times that price in the run up to the launch. After the launch, the price dropped like a rock as it became clear that as many as 60% of the buyers were just buying the system to resell for a profit. When it comes to people's homes, it's a little more difficult to swallow as you are essentially having to make people homeless to correct the market, but those people could never actually afford to live in those homes and so it's hard to find sympathy for those who let their greed put them in an unfortunate position. We should treat these people in the same manner as those who have gambling addictions that caused them to lose their homes and other assets, not any better and not any worse. Prices should be allowed to fall back a reasonable level and interest rates should be lowered, but not the extent of causing another bubble to form. This is the only reasonable course of action unless we want to be in the same bad economic situation a few years down the road.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 10-12-2007

2007-10-12T23:38:00.000-04:00

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Iran:

"There is an Iranian history of obfuscation and indeed lying to the IAEA. There is a history of Iran not answering important questions about what is going on."

THE TRUTH: Telling the world about Iranian deception is a futile effort for the Bush administration. After having proven to have been deceptive about the origins of the Iraq War (not to mention other areas of lacking credibility such as respect for the rule of American and international law in regards to military contractors, the status of Guantanamo prisoners and their trials, etc), the only way this administration can do anything about Iran is through our allies and international institutions. The fact that they do not do this either indicates that they are so self-insulated in their Washington bubble that they do not realize their status in world or that they are so stubborn to go their own way regardless of the rest of the world. A liar can only cry wolf a few times before no one believes them and I'm afraid a real wolf will attack us under the cover of the political failures of this administration.

COLUMN: 10-10-2007

2007-10-10T13:43:00.000-04:00

Based on the Republican debate yesterday, none of the leading three Republicans actually has any history that should make them the nominee of the GOP. Based on the latest poll numbers that show them leading, it's clear that most Republican voters are more interested in trying to win than in maintaining any core values. This is a recipe for allowing the Democrats to win, despite the American people's disagreement with the liberal positions they advocate.

Rudy Giuliani is clearly trying to use the 2002, 2004, and 2006 Republican strategy of fear-mongering to wash away his extreme liberal views on virtually every issue. While it worked in 2002 and 2004, the 2006 election showed that the American people were not going to be frightened into voting for corrupt officials who promised security and instead turned to the Democrats to clean up the government, despite the conservative views of the majority of Americans. Mitt Romney has showed himself to be a pandering candidate of convenience, following the Bill Clinton model. Swinging to the views of the current electorate is the opposite of what America needs to do right now - we need a strong leader to clean up the extremely messy situations of the economy, foreign trade, overgrown big government, illegal immigration, and our national debt. Fred Thompson has shown himself to have always been more interested in his Hollywood career than in public service. After starting his career as an unsuccessful actor, he used his acting skills to get elected and then used his position of influence to move right back to Hollywood after only 8 years in office. Although he has taken the advice of many who have suggested that he could follow the footsteps of Ronald Reagan towards the presidency, the differences between the two men are night and day. President Reagan had always expressed significant policy positions and interest in advancing America throughout his career. Senator Thompson has only shown an interest in his own acting career and has run for office as a secondary way of becoming more famous.

The Republicans are clearly lost and will lose the election with any of these nominees. Unless something unexpected happens (a different nominee or a strong third party candidate with an actual chance of winning), it looks like we're doomed to at least four years of a liberal Democratic administration until the true conservatives emerge (either as Republicans or outside the GOP, if necessary) with an agenda that will get Americans excited about their values again, like the Contract with America in 1994.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 10-05-2007

2007-10-05T13:42:00.000-04:00

President Bush on the latest Labor department payroll report:

"Last month our economy added 110,000 new jobs, and that's good news for people here in our country, indicator that this economy is a vibrant and strong economy... I'm really pleased with the economic news."

THE TRUTH: All of the new jobs created in the past 7 years (resulting from the policies of both the Clinton and Bush admistrations) are low wage service sector jobs. The people taking these jobs are those who have given up on finding decent middle class manufacturing or industrial jobs after their job sectors were off-shored to save on labor costs. Falsely claiming that this is an indicator of a vibrant and strong economy belies the fact that most Americans are struggling financially and the only good economic news in the past decade has been for the benefit of the tiny minority holding the vast majority of America's wealth. Don't misunderstand the previous statement to be advocacy for government redistribution of wealth because that would be a terrible socialist outcome. However, the extremely wealthy must not be allowed to control government policies that level the playing field and allow for a prosperous middle class based on hard work and entrepreneurship because that is exactly what is happening today in our environment of financial "campaign contributions" being the primary concern of nearly all elected officials. The America economy is in terrible shape and we need a major turnaround to reform the entire system before our freedom and democracy wither in the face of an economic depression.

COLUMN: 10-03-2007

2007-10-03T23:34:00.000-04:00

The economic policies of the Clinton Administration and the Bush Administration are turning America into a third world country. This is an absolute crisis that is happening before our eyes without a mention by anyone in the media or public office. The Bush Administration has been touting the economic growth of the past few years, but they fail to mention that the growth has only happened in the corporate sector and the absolute highest economic class. Everyone else from the upper middle class on down has had no positive income growth in nearly 15 years. In fact, many of them have actually experienced income degradation during this period. The middle class has actually shrunk with many people moving downwards to the lower classes after being unable to find comparable work when their labor sector has shifted to cheaper overseas offerings. One of the biggest indicators of a third world country is when the population is comprised of a tiny elite holding the vast majority of the wealth and the remaining population is kept in the absolute lowest economic conditions. We are headed in this direction as the middle class, which is the foundation of the true democratic process, continues to shrivel to nothing. Another indicator is that the number of uninsured Americans has grown tremendously as many Americans have moved from jobs offering health care to those that do not.

Unrestricted free trade is the major culprit here. Free trade is a good thing, but not when it happens with countries that have no human or worker rights or political freedom that allows for growth. The best two examples are India and China. India is the world's largest democracy and trading with that country has led to the development of a robust and growing middle class, which in turn has helped to reduce government corruption and increase democratic freedom. The result is an approaching equalization of income and rights as India grows to be on par with the world's large industrial democratic nations. The contrast is China's growing economy, which has no true worker or civil rights and wage growth for the bottom sectors of the economy has been kept artificially low, resulting in continual cheapening of world labor as they compete with what is essentially slave labor. This is also one of the causes of the recent massive recalls of so many different products (toys, toothpaste, pet food, etc) from China as they have proven to care little about developing the institutions necessary for democratic development while they have focused on maintaining their dictatorial regime while pushing for economic growth.

We need an absolute turnaround to save America's democratic freedom from the obscene greed of those in power who are destroying our fundamental societal structures in exchange for unrestricted income growth. We must not elect a president in 2008 who will continue to destructive policies of the past two administrations.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 09-28-2007

2007-09-28T23:14:00.000-04:00

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on building a border fence:

"I have been against the fence, I thought it's a bad idea even when it was just a matter of discussion," said Pelosi, D-Calif. "These are communities where you have a border going through them, they are not communities where you have a fence splitting them."

THE TRUTH: This is an absolutely ridiculous statement from one of the top leaders of a government that is supposed to espouse the rule of law. Unlike other nations who hold together based on a common culture or loyalty to a royal family, all American citizens (and especially the political leaders) swear to upload the US Constitution as the basis of our nation. If laws are being flouted with people crossing our border illegally, then the only logical response is to enforce the law through stricter means. Having a border going through a community does not negate the fact that each half of those communities exists in a different country with a different set of laws. If Speaker Pelosi cannot be trusted to enforce the laws, then she should resign or be removed from her position as a leader in a country based on the rule of law.

COLUMN: 09-26-2007

2007-09-26T10:47:00.000-04:00

The verbal assault inflicted upon the President of Iran by the President of Columbia University as he introduced him was justifiable, but unfortunately, it was filled with propaganda and half-truths which decreased the credibility of the entire exchange. Iran is clearly a dictatorship, but calling the Iranian President a dictator belies the fact that he was in fact elected in an election far freer and fairer than anything in the neighborhood. Most American allies in the region only have useless symbolic elections, if any, and claiming Iraqi and Afghani elections as free and fair ignores the extremely violent situation under which the elections were held, which made participation impossible for a large segment of the population. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also only holds a very limited amount of power and the true dictator in Iran is the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. He controls the military and internal security forces and ultimately holds the final say over all government matters. Furthermore, Columbia University Lee Bollinger kept associating the Iranian President's personal extremist views with the entire nation of Iran, which is an improper position to take, unless we also want the entire world to associate the Bush administration's extremist views on preemptive war and executive power with our entire nation. We need our national discussion to be based on truth and justice and not try to refute propaganda with propaganda of our own.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 09-21-2007

2007-09-21T23:24:00.000-04:00

Congressman Peter King on Muslim Americans:

"Unfortunately, we have too many mosques in this country. There's too many people who are sympathetic to radical Islam. We should be looking at them more carefully. We should be finding out how we can infiltrate. We should be much more aggressive in law enforcement."

THE TRUTH: It is absolutely true that we need to find out who is sympathetic to Islamic Extremists and monitor their activities to ensure that they don't support or conduct acts of terrorism. However, this ludicrous statement by an obvious racist will simply drive mainstream Muslims away from their needed role of monitoring and reporting any suspicious activities in their communities to law enforcement. "Too many mosques" sounds just like the Nazi propaganda against the Jews just before the the horrific activities of the Holocaust and World War II began and it should be condemned by all Americans to ensure that we don't move an inch down that absolutely wrong direction.

COLUMN: 09-19-2007

2007-09-19T22:14:00.000-04:00

Senator Clinton finally announced her "universal" health care plan this week. Just like all of the other Democrat plans, this is a very bad addition of more big government bureaucracy that tries to incorporate elements to benefit her corporate lobbyist contributors. It's the worst of the worst and should be avoided at all costs. If all Americans should have healthcare, it should be done in such a way to give them the most choices in the free market. The most recent expansion of government-operated health care, Medicare Part D drug coverage, proves that the worst possible outcome will result from our current lobbyist-controlled political environment. The lies and cover-up about cost projections, the forbidding of price negotiation (where the taxpayers are forced to pay well above retail price), and the infamous "donut" policy (where seniors pay a premium and receive no benefits) are all proof that our current legislative and executive branches will all ultimately develop something to the detriment of the American people that they are elected to represent.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 09-14-2007

2007-09-14T21:24:00.000-04:00

Senator Barack Obama on holding Iraq War hearings on September 11, 2007:

"I have to say, and this hasn't been commented on, I think that we should not have had this discussion on 9/11 or 9/10 or 9/12. Because I think it perpetuates this notion that, somehow, the original decision to go into Iraq was directly related to the attacks on 9/11."

THE TRUTH: This ridiculous assertion has no basis in reality. It is very true that the Bush Administration has abused the memory of the events of 9/11/2001 to achieve their poorly devised goals and continues to do so to this very day. However, delaying the critically needed discussions (which are finally showing that the "surge" has actually been totally useless in achieving any meaningful political changes in Iraq and that the Bush war strategy continues to be a complete failure) to avoid them happening on the 9/11 anniversary will just lead to the shedding of more blood and the wasting of more resources. Trying to show that the Bush Administration falsely links 9/11 to Iraq is not helped by using false connections like this. There is ample evidence of their deceptive behavior without having to resort to concocting linkages like this.

COLUMN: 09-12-2007

2007-09-12T23:46:00.000-04:00

After being asked to wait for months to see if the troop surge "change in strategy" (actually a tactical change, not a strategic one) will be successful, this week's reports by General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker do not tell us anything but the most obvious facts: adding more troops as a police force helps to stabilize a chaotic situation. This does not show any sign of changing the political realities or forcing anyone to do anything which will allow us to leave. Asking for more time is meaningless when absolutely nothing has been accomplished in the environment of reduced violence that has been bought through an enormous investment of Iraqi and American blood and funding. Unless the Bush Administration intends to keep our American soldiers as at least the semi-permanent police and national guard throughout Iraq for many years to come, continuing to "stabilize" Iraq in this fashion is not sustainable and will ultimately result in another huge spike in violence once we are forced to finally reduce our troop levels, due to the extreme strain of using so many national guard and reserve troops. It's time for a real change in strategy, but that is apparently waiting for the next administration because of the stubbornness of the Bush administration in not wanting to admit that they lost the war to begin with.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 09-07-2007

2007-09-07T23:08:00.000-04:00

President Bush on Bin Laden's new propaganda videotape:

"If al-Qaida bothers to mention Iraq it's because they want to achieve their objectives in Iraq, which is to drive us out and to develop a safe haven. And the reason they want a safe haven is to launch attacks against America, or any other ally," Bush said. "And therefore, it's important that we show resolve and determination, to protect ourselves, to deny al-Qaida safe haven, and to support young democracies, which will be a major defeat to their ambitions."

THE TRUTH: Al-Qaeda's objective in Iraq is very clear: keep us there so that they can continue to use our occupying presence as a major point of propaganda for recruitment and so that they can kill American soldiers on a daily basis without much risk to themselves. They have absolutely no need to drive out to form a safe haven because they already have the safe havens they need in Pakistan and Afghanistan (notably because we did not finish the job there after 9/11 due to the Bush Administration's obsession with Iraq and Saddam Hussein). President Bush's attempt to spin the Al-Qaeda propaganda to support his failed policies is not likely convince anyone who isn't already a member of the small minority of Americans who might still believe anything he says after so many years of deceptive politics.

COLUMN: 09-05-2007

2007-09-05T22:21:00.000-04:00

Does anyone actually hold out any hope that President Bush will stop being stubborn and actually do something right? It's clear that he is more concerned about his legacy than anything else and will keep us in Iraq until we actually win (which is nearly impossible at this stage) or someone else takes office as the next U.S. President. His continued claims that staying in Iraq helps defeat terrorism is nonsensical because it's clear that our presence in Iraq is actually creating more terrorism in the world. None of the reports or other milestones we keep hearing about will make any difference because he is intent on continuing to try to avoid being permanently labeled as a failed president and will use every last ounce of his authority to stall for time. It's a sad day when the leader of the most powerful nation on Earth has no credibility and no influence to take any useful actions and the entire world is just stuck in rut waiting for his term in office to expire.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 08-31-2007

2007-08-31T13:05:00.000-04:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on the crimes of one of her main fund-raisers:

...revelations of Mr. Hsu’s past criminal problems were “a big surprise to everybody. When you have as many contributors as I’m fortunate enough to have, we do the very best job we can based on the information available to us to make appropriate vetting decisions.”

THE TRUTH: Trying to play down his role as just another contributor will not save Senator Clinton from the fact that, just as during her husband's administration, she is being significantly influenced by money being brought in by people of questionable morality and ethics. The hundreds of thousands of dollars donated or "bundled" to her campaign by Mr. Hsu clearly has bought him the access he needed to influence her and other politicians and her continuous denials of the influence of money on her policy positions during debates is completely disingenuous and not believable. If Senator Clinton wants to win the trust of the American people to elect her president, she needs to break her old bad habits. Since that won't happen and she won't be elected president, we can only pray that the Republicans nominate someone decent to steer our country for the next four years.

COLUMN: 08-29-2007

2007-08-29T21:45:00.000-04:00

When will public figures ever learn? Lying about your mistakes and crimes only serves to intensify media and public attention, which nearly always leads to exposure of the truth. From President Clinton's repeated denials of adultery nine years ago (leading directly to his impeachment) to the most recent examples of NFL star Michael Vick's denial of dog-fighting crimes and U.S. Senator Larry Craig's denial of wrongdoing after already pleading guilty to a crime, it seems that none of these very smart people who have worked very hard to succeed in extremely competitive fields will ever learn the lessons of historical cover-ups.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 08-24-2007

2007-08-24T23:48:00.000-04:00

Former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani on his position on small government:

"I think I'd be a good fit for Idaho because I'm someone who has a very, very strong belief in a government that understands that most of the really good things and great things that we produce in this country come from the people, not from government, I'm someone who understands that you've got to devolve power and reduce the size of government."

THE TRUTH: Mr. Giuliani has shown his views on the size of government when he ran New York City. Just because he was to the right of the extreme liberal Democrats in the city does not mean that he is on the right side of this issue. He is a believer in big government and big government programs and that's the last thing we need in Washington right now, especially after the Bush administration's massive growth of the government despite many many promises to do the opposite.

COLUMN: 08-22-2007

2007-08-22T13:42:00.000-04:00

Michelle Obama is right: Hillary Clinton could not take care of her own household and this should disqualify her from running the nation. It's clear that she stayed with her husband during infidelity after infidelity for her own personal gain as the wife of the Arkansas Attorney General, then first lady of Arkansas, and then first lady of the US. Forgiveness is admirable, but forgiveness requires repentance and repentance requires not committing the same mistake again (and especially not repeatedly). When someone has cheated on you time after time, there is only one solution for anyone with any small amount of dignity: leaving the cheater. Any other move proves that you value something else (in this case, power and influence) more than integrity.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 08-17-2007

2007-08-17T23:04:00.000-04:00

US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on the conviction of Jose Padilla:

''The conviction of Jose Padilla -- an American who provided material support to terrorists and trained for violent jihad -- is a significant victory in our efforts to fight the threat posed by terrorists and their supporters"

THE TRUTH: This entire case has been botched from the beginning and the conviction is no different. Jose Padilla has been convicted of submitting an application to train at an Al-Qaeda camp and nothing more. Despite all of the rhetoric, the government's misbehavior will probably ultimately lead to more terrorism and the release of many of these would-be terrorists on technicalities. His illegal seizure on American soil, his illegal imprisonment as an enemy combatant for three and a half years in a military brig, his lack of an unbiased jury as the government spread his image as a radiation "dirty" bomber across the world without providing any evidence in either the public arena or in court, and his potential life sentence for submitting a piece of paper to a terrorist organization are among the very numerous areas that his defense team can exploit on appeal. Like so many other examples, this administration has shown their incompetent loyalists that are spread across the entire administration are incapable of doing a decent job in any area of governance. The sooner we are done with this administration, the better off America will be (even if it sadly results in a very liberal administration for a few years).

COLUMN: 08-15-2007

2007-08-15T22:59:00.000-04:00

The announcement that Karl Rove is leaving the White House requires a look back at his legacy. Far from being the genius indicated by his Republican supporters (or the evil genius indicated by his Democratic opponents), he is purely the lowest form of political exploiter: a demagogue. He used President Bush's faith to gain the support of America's faithful. Similarly, he played up the American people's fear of terrorism to re-elect President Bush in 2004. In both cases, the administration did little to actually support the positions of the groups they were appealing to: the religious groups' agenda was sidetracked behind that of the business interests and the security situation has been made immeasurably worse by the Iraq War (a war of choice inflicted upon America and the world by this administration). For all the talk of compassionate conservatism and the president being a uniter and not a divider, Karl Rove has shaped the politics of this administration that values personal loyalty above all else, including truth, integrity, or any of the other moral values that Republicans are supposed to espouse and derive from their position as the party of religious conservatives. He (and the rest of the Bush administration) will surely be remembered as among the worst leadership in the history of our nation.

LIE OF THE WEEK: 08-10-2007

2007-08-10T21:33:00.000-04:00

Senator Hillary Clinton on her "opposition" to NAFTA:

"This deal was negotiated by Washington insiders," he said. "It's cost us a million jobs." Clinton said the way NAFTA has been implemented "has hurt a lot of American workers" and called for a "trade prosecutor" to enforce such agreements. "For 15 years, I have stood up against the right-wing machine," Clinton said. "So if you want a winner who knows how to take them on, I'm your girl."

THE TRUTH: Senator Clinton's main supporters are the business interests who paid (with campaign contributions to her husband) for the creation of NAFTA during the Clinton Administration and continue to pay (with campaign contributions to her) to keep it going. She has absolutely been on the wrong side of this issue in every single vote on every single bill. This issue is one of the few where unions are actually on the right side of an issue. Free trade is a good thing only when trading with countries that have decent worker protections so that we are not trading our support of human rights and decent jobs in America in exchange for lower cost goods and higher corporate profits. This hypocritical pandering is not going to convince anyone and will surely contribute to Senator Clinton's rightful defeat in the election.

COLUMN: 08-08-2007

2007-08-08T23:50:00.000-04:00

The pandering going on in the various presidential debates is absolutely sickening. As each party's group of candidates have appeared in various locations in front of specific audiences, they have twisted their positions to suit the politics of the local population or the group they are appearing in front of. This was especially true in the two recent Democrat debates in front of the NAACP and the AFL-CIO. In both cases, the candidates bent over backwards in support of the most extreme positions of these groups, despite the fact that nearly all of these same candidates have always voted more in favor of lobbyist positions on legislation regarding the same issues. This electioneering hypocrisy needs to be exposed so that lobbyist money can finally be excluded from the process and the will of the American people can truly be represented in our state and federal legislatures.