For Any That Missed This: ABC News scrambles to downplay Obama’s attendance at VP debate moderator’s wedding… Ethical? Fair?

The Daily Caller:

President Barack Obama was a guest at the 1991 wedding of ABC senior foreign correspondent and vice presidential debate moderator Martha Raddatz, The Daily Caller has learned. Obama and groom Julius Genachowski, whom Obama would later tap to head the Federal Communications Commission, were Harvard Law School classmates at the time and members of the Harvard Law Review.

After TheDC made preliminary inquiries Monday to confirm Obama’s attendance at the wedding, ABC leaked a pre-emptive statement to news outlets including Politico and The Daily Beast Tuesday, revealing what may have been internal network pressure felt just days before Raddatz was scheduled to moderate the one and only vice-presidential debate Thursday night.

Both Politico and The Daily Beast jumped to ABC and Raddatz’s defense. The Huffington Post, a liberal news outlet, joined them shortly thereafter, while calling “unusual” ABC’s attempt to kill the story before it gained wide circulation.

Genachowski — called “Jay” at the time of his wedding, sources told TheDC — and Raddatz would go on to have a son together before their divorce in 1997. They have both since remarried to other people.

A source who attended the 1991 wedding told TheDC that Obama was also a guest there, and remembered that a man by the name of “Barry Obama” was among the guests dancing at the reception.

In August, The Daily Caller first connected Genachowski, an Obama appointee, to Raddatz following her selection as the vice presidential debate moderator by the left-leaning Commission on Presidential Debates. That debate, between Congressman Paul Ryan and Vice President Joe Biden, will take place Thursday night at Centre College in Danville, Kentucky.

Carol Platt Liebau, a political commentator who was a Harvard Law Review colleague of Genachowski and Obama, wrote that “despite being a year below both men on the Review and not close personal friends with either of them,” she remembered Genachowski and Raddatz’s relationship as “quite public” during those days, and that “Raddatz visited Boston frequently.”

Genachowski’s friendship with Obama would continue through the campaign trail in 2008 and into the White House: He aggressively fundraised for Obama in 2008 as a campaign bundler, and served on the presidential transition team before winning his appointment to chair the FCC.

On Monday evening ABC spokesman David Ford grudgingly confirmed Obama’s attendance at the wedding, after shielding Raddatz in August by declining to comment when The Daily Caller first reported the story.

“This is absurd,” Ford said, in the same statement now circulated by ABC’s media allies on the left.

Obama, Ford wrote, “attended their wedding over two decades ago along with nearly the entire Law Review, many of whom went onto successful careers, including some in the Bush administration,” he said without providing a specific number of Harvard Law Review members to verify the statement.

When pressed further on Tuesday for a specific number of Harvard Law Review members in attendance at the wedding, Ford could offer none, despite circulating the same unverified approximation through sympathetic media outlets earlier that day in order to discredit The Daily Caller’s reporting.

Ford also could not provide The Daily Caller with a specific number of Harvard Law Review members who worked with Obama and Genachowski during that year. A photo taken of the Harvard Law Review during Obama and Genachowski’s final year of law school contains 70 people.

The ABC spokesman’s assertion that “nearly the entire Law Review” attended the wedding cast doubt on the significance of Obama’s attendance. But Ford’s unwillingness to document that claim now suggests that Obama was among a close circle of fewer Harvard classmates who were personal friends of Raddatz and Genachowski.

Instead, Ford maintained his ambiguity in subsequent statements to The Daily Caller, identifying only one other Harvard Law Review classmate of Obama and Genachowski who attended the wedding.

When TheDC asked Ford via email Tuesday night for further specifics on actual numbers, he did not respond with any.

The FCC, the Obama campaign and the Romney campaign also did not respond to The Daily Caller’s request for comment.

David Martosko contributed reporting.

UPDATE: Michael Steel, a spokesman for Paul Ryan, told Fox News’ Joy Lin that he has “no concerns” about Raddatz’s conflict of interest.

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Technorati Tags: media,media spin,MSM,liberal bias media,ethics,fairness,ABC News,veep,debates,VP debates,Election 2012,2012 Election,Joe Biden,Paul Ryan,The Choice,watch the other hand,rigging elections,Martha Raddatz,Obamaland,journolists,Team Obama,enemies within,Harvard Law Review,BHO,Julius Genachowski

Palin Derangement Syndrome Continues – A Must Read - Updated

By Marion Algier

It has been just about four years since I, and most Americans, were introduced to Governor Sarah Palin at the 2008 GOP Convention.  She rocked the house the night of her convention speech and quickly changed the face of the McCain campaign.  John McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska, as his running mate finally gave Republicans a reason to vote for him — a reason, that is, other than defeating Obama.  And for those who either don’t or choose not to remember that they were ahead in the polls after Palin joined the ticket, Greta Van Susteren just pulled out the old polls.

Many people fell in love with Sarah Palin instantly, some liked her and were excited at the prospect of a fresh,  inspiring, Reaganesque candidate that was a female to boot, some were wary and some hated her from day one because they saw her as a threat!  And that quickly Palin Derangement Syndrome was born.

Sarah Palin is smart, principled, accomplished, has a great family and husband, is able to speak extemporaneously (or with a few words jotted in her hand) and tells it as it is, she lights up a room or a country fair and is comfortable almost everywhere, loves the average American and can relate to them, and is pretty to boot.  As many said, she can bring home the bacon (even if she has to shoot or catch it herself), fry it up and then serve it looking like she is ready for her next interview as a house full of kids are running under her feet.  Palin inspired every day Americans whose values and ideals she shared as she scared the pants off of the Progressive no so relatable Left, the elitist Establishment of her own party and the left leaning women’s groups, who should have endorsed her, but who envied her and therefore hated her instead because she really had and could do it all and they just talked about it.

My husband and I were lucky enough to hear and see Sarah Palin speak live, at her first Rally in Cali , not long after she had been tapped as John McCain’s running mate. She was mesmerizing and both inspired and energized the crowd of about 23,000 people. She was introduced and supported by the Los Angeles President of NOW (the National Organization for Women), a lifetime Democrat and political convert as she introduced herself… until sometime later after the powers that be within her group convinced her otherwise. Many people have forgotten that soon after Sarah was chosen for VP that she and McCain were ahead until  McCain decided to suspend the campaign and trudged back to Washington, D.C. because of the financial crisis. Had that not happened or maybe even if McCain had just not headed back to D.C., he and Palin could very well have won! What a different America we would be living in, if that were the case! 

I was one who had done my homework on both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and although McCain was not my first choice, I knew what was coming if Barack or Hillary were elected so I saw Sarah Palin as a God send and after hearing her speak I knew she was the real deal.  The problem was so did the elites, the establishment, the haters and their media minions who quickly went to work destroying her, including the hack job by pretty faced CFR attack dog, Katie Couric.

From a Red State Review by Ben Howe of the movie Undefeated  – A must see film if you haven’t (The Undefeated Teaser Trailer ):

I pride myself on my ability to know when something is baloney, almost instinctively. On Sarah Palin, I was so incredibly hoodwinked that the one word that my wife and I agreed described how we felt after watching it, was shame. Yes of course invigoration, satisfaction and all the other things you experience when watching a good film, but about how we had handled our vetting of Mrs. Palin, shame was the word that best described it.

Shame for not bothering to look up her record. Shame for not reading her story. Shame for turning the channel when she came on the TV. Shame for not listening to people that we had a great deal of respect for like Andrew Breitbart, Tammy Bruce, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.

As Breitbart points out in the film, the greatest shame is that while this woman was savaged to degrees you may not even realize yet, some of us sat back and let it happen. For me to buy into the media template and not defend someone who’s only offense was being a conservative, is the absolute antithesis of what I stand for, and something that I shall never allow to happen again.

And the problem for a lot of people who were hoodwinked… they never did do their homework or figure out that they allowed themselves to be cheated of the opportunity of honestly checking out perhaps the best candidate for VP in 2008 or President in 2012.

In fact even after Palin had been marginalized, Quaylinized, lied about, had her children attacked… from her disabled son Trig to her daughter Bristol while on DWTS, was charged with enough ridiculous and fabricated suits that she resigned her office as Governor in respect for her constituents because she couldn’t fight them and effectively do her job and then was both belittled and martyred for it, was the focused target of a “journolist” plot and even had a journalist rent the house next to hers to spy on Sarah and her family, she has not only remained standing but she has won the suits, emerged victoriously after an investigation of her time in office in Alaska and has gone on to be one of the superstars of the conservative movement.  Sarah Palin is the darling of the tea party and has helped dozens of true fiscal conservatives and constitutionalist-style candidates win their elections. Ted Cruz of Texas being the most recent.

But still there are far too many Americans of all stripes who have counted Palin out without knowing the true facts or doing their homework, just because the main stream media, that might as well be the Progressive government media, demonized her… and they never questioned it or were willing to take a second look.

Yet just last week the Republican Elite™ concerned that Mitt Romney may give Sarah Palin a speaking role at the convention which she should absolutely have or, God forbid, he might actually be smart enough to consider her as his running mate  engaged Dick Cheney to go after Palin from the Republican side. After all, they don’t want Sarah messing up their good ole boys club either!

Cheney was on ABC News on Sunday. He did the old “she’s a nice girl … but …” insult. Cheney claims choosing Sarah Palin as VP was a mistake because she lacked experience.  Really?  Here’s Sarah Palin’s Impassioned Response To Dick Cheney’s Comment. 

Conservatives 4 Palin:

Sarah Palin. She has nearly two decades of public service, almost all of it at the Executive level. She was a Mayor, the state’s chief oil and gas regulator, and Governor.

Now some may poo-poo the Mayor thing, because Wasilla was, and is, very a small town. But as they say, it’s not the size that counts, it’s what you do with it that matters.

Wasilla was a small, mostly dirt road village. Under Sarah Palin’s management, the town became the fastest growing city in the state, and would become the trading hub for the entire Mat-Su Valley, an area roughly the size of the state of Delaware. Sarah improved the infrastructure, built roads, recruited businesses, and grew the economy. And she did all of this while lowering taxes. This sort of thing doesn’t happen by accident. It takes strong leadership skills and common sense.

In 2008 the Mayor of Wasilla credited Sarah’s 75 percent property tax cuts and infrastructure improvements with bringing “big-box stores” and 50,000 shoppers per day to Wasilla. She left office in 2002. That’s some serious and lasting impact for one person to have.

Last time I looked, Dick Cheney had never run a city. Certainly never turned a dirt road town into a highly successful one with a bustling economy.

Sarah’s time as the Chairman of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission is the stuff of legends. Not so much for what she did as a regulator, which by all accounts was top notch, but for what she did to unwind the massive corruption lawmakers and many oil company executives were engaged in. By the time she was done, the state’s Attorney General was forced to resign in disgrace, as was the Republican Party Chairman. [From his job as a fellow AOGCC commissioner] He was also forced to pay the largest civil fine in Alaska’s history.

Sarah was just getting started, as she would take down the sitting Republican Governor, in a landslide, and go on to pass sweeping reforms once in office, as the FBI was still raiding lawmakers’ offices and hauling people off to prison.

Washington may be one of the most corrupt places on earth, and I’ve never, EVER heard Dick Cheney address it’s corruption in any manner whatsoever.

Stacy Drake and Whitney Pitcher put together an extensive listing of Sarah Palin’s accomplishments as Governor. No one in Washington has accomplished anything near what she has. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find any elected official in the country who got as much done, has a better record on fiscal issues, or maintained a higher approval record among their voters. Sarah Palin had a sustained approval rating in the 90s as Governor of Alaska.

Sarah Palin has much more experience, including executive experience, than Barack Obama ever had when he ran for President, including: head of the PTA to City Council, Mayor of Wasilla and Governor of Alaska, and has been on a non-stop learning junket since tapped for VP in 2008. She is now a major force in the Republican Party and Tea Party Movement. And Sarah and her husband Todd have owned their own businesses as well as working a long list of blue collar jobs; and have raised 5 children, including a Down Syndrome son. Sarah has a degree in journalism, worked her own way through school… which is why she entered a ‘beauty’ contest; and can hunt, fish and then can cook it when she gets back home while always looking great. She electrifies a room or a rally of thousands when she speaks, but cleans her own house. She supports our military and has a son fighting for America; supports our allies like Israel and believes in securing our borders and protecting America first; she believes in the American Dream; and Sarah is willing to speak out like nobody else. Sarah Palin loves America and respects the American people (of which she is one) as well as their their will rather than wanting to fundamentally transform her, is a Constitutionalist, and believes in God… just like approximately 83% of Americans. So ask yourself… what is so wrong with Sarah Palin… especially after you strip away the lies told about her? So why do we allow the media to shun every new independent bright light that just might really change what is going on in Washington? And why wouldn’t you like her or want a real average American who loves our Country, the Constitution and God in the White House?

She’s the real deal.

Mark Levin 2008:

As a Reaganite pre-dating Reagan’s 1976 candidacy, the contempt for Palin does, in fact, reminds me of the contempt some had for Reagan, especially from the media and Republican establishment, although no comparison is exact. I’ve not settled on a favorite would-be presidential candidate, but I also know media hit-jobs when I see them. I am hopeful more conservatives will begin to speak out about this or, before we know it, we will wonder why we are holding our noses and voting for another Republican endorsed by “the intellectuals” but opposed by a majority of the people.

When times get tough there are always people who rise up, or are chosen to rise up, with the right message, the wake-up call, the inspiration and the leadership needed just for that time.  A few of the people who fit that bill right now are Glenn Beck, Ron Paul and Sarah Palin; all three have inspired the tea party and other grassroots groups and movements in different ways.  They are willing to speak out knowing they, and their families, will be attacked and criticized. if not worse.

It is our job to recognize those people and their strength and leadership.  It is also our job to stand-up with and for those people who are fighting for us, our families, our way of life, freedom and our country.

The power elite recognized Palin’s star power immediately and feared that she could actually get elected and would fight for real change for the American people and we let them destroy her and perhaps our best chance.

According to the Alaska Dispatch (August 6, 2012) Sarah Palin still hasn't received an invitation to speak at the 2012 Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla., and tea partiers aren't happy.  Palin told Newsweek that she hasn't even been asked to attend the convention yet. She said, "One must remember this isn't Sadie Hawkins and you don't invite yourself and a date to the big dance." Palin, who in March polled more popular than any GOP presidential candidate, has vexed Mitt Romney since his candidacy began. She stole the media show by appearing in New Hampshire on the same day that Romney formally announced his candidacy for president, brushing it off as "coincidence." Although her on-air rhetoric is supportive of Romney’s campaign, there's been no official endorsement. And the latest Palin-related offense? John McCain told Politico on Tuesday that Palin was a “better candidate” than Romney as a vice presidential pick in the 2008 race. What Palin brings to the table that Romney needs is gusto. He would be wise to cash in on some of hers!  So "It's time for Mitt Romney to man up, pick up the phone, and ask Sarah Palin to the dance."  That's a quote from a Daily Beast piece that argues Romney should invite Palin to speak at the Republican convention in Tampa, Florida, next month.  Word has it that Palin has already secured rooms at a hotel within walking distance of the GOP convention and if Romney does not invite her to attend let alone speak he may again find himself in the position of having Palin steal his thunder and the media show.  Eleanor Clift and ABC's Jonathan Karl have both recently said, "Sarah will be a force at the Republican Convention whether she does it from the floor or from the parking lot"  If I were advising Mitt Romney I would make sure that she was on my side!

Sarah Palin deserves a fair shot.  She definitely deserves a seat at the table at the Republican Convention and a prime speaking slot.  Mitt Romney would be smart to give her the opportunity.  And we’d be smart to make sure that our friends and family give Sarah Palin another honest look, if not for VP this time around then for a possible shot at the presidency in 2016 or 2020.

You can love Sarah or disagree with her, but if you are fair minded person who takes the time to do your homework, even just to read this piece, follow the links and think about it, you cannot disagree that Sarah Palin and her family have been unjustly attacked and scrutinized at a much higher level than anyone in Washington or any candidate out there because of Palin Derangement Syndrome caught and promoted by her enemies because they fear her for being a Conservative, a Christian, a person of Character and most scary of all for them she has the Charisma to possibly beat them and beat them honestly! 

You be the judge…   – AskMarion~

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Palin: 2012 is a Battle Between ‘Big Government’ and ‘Big Freedom’

Greta: About Those People Claiming Sarah Palin Cost John McCain the Election

Palin: 2012 is a Battle Between ‘Big Government’ and ‘Big Freedom’

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Journolists: The Truth of Media Fraud Confirmed

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The Real Truth About Sarah Palin — Ouch

Long Lost Sarah Palin Emerges From Released Emails Victoriously

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A Tale of Two Speeches: Sarah Palin and Barack Obama on the Tragedy in Tucson

‘Un-American Act’: Palin Slams Obama’s Contraceptive Mandate as Violating Constitutional Rights

The Audacity of American Exceptionalism

Greta Van Susteren: The Palin Effect – Taking a Look at Polls from 2008

Mark Levin talks about the Ted Cruz victory in Texas, the GOP establishment, the Tea Party and Governor Palin’s role in that race

Will Sarah Palin speak at GOP convention?

Sarah on the Cover of Newsweek… I Can Win!!

Sarah Joined Beck and Alveda King at Restore Honor Event

Must Reads Before Election 2012 Plus: America by Heart

08.08.12 Update: ** Since this piece was originally written the names of GOP convention speakers are slowly being rolled out including former Secretary of State Dr. Condoleezza Rice, 2008 GOP presidential nominee and Arizona Senator John McCain, Governor Mike Huckabee, New Mexico Governor Susanna Martinez, South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, Ohio Governor John Kasich were announced as speakers early Monday morning. Governor Chris Christy was previously already leaked as a speaker. This list was followed up with the additions of Senator Rand Paul, former Governor Jeb Bush, Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin, former 2012 primary opponent Rick Santorum, Governor Scott Walker, Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and Puerto Rican Governor Luis G. Fortuño, tea party favorite Texas Senate Candidate Ted Cruz… with more to come.

And as people are added to the speaker’s list, the potential VP list narrows. Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, Wisconsin Rep Paul Ryan, and Senator Marco Rubio of Florida as well as Senator Rob Portman of Ohio and former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty are all sure bets to speak at the convention, unless they get the VP nod. Another possible GOP veep shortlister that has surfaced that past few days is General David Patraeus. Course, after New Jersey Governor Chris Christie recently announced that he has had a change of heart and might be interested in running for President in 2016 or 2020, Greta Van Susteren commented that perhaps Jersey Governor Chris Christie might get the nod, and already knows it, and they are trying to throw us off track.

Both Sarah Palin and Allen West should be no-brainers to speak at the GOP convention and possibly could be on the short list for VP. Their supporters can certainly hope, so perhaps they will be among the last group announced before or when the VP announcement is made. And if they are on neither list then Team Romney is on the dumb bunny list!

And as for Cheney… He has finally explained his Palin VP ‘mistake’ remark (see video) - The former vice president now says his comments about Palin were aimed at John McCain’s selection process rather than an attack on Palin after his daughter Liz and John McCain stepped up to take Palin’s side.

I hope you will share this piece with people you know who hate Sarah Palin or wrinkle up their nose while putting up their hand before you can get a word in edge wise but who really don’t know the truth or why they feel that way. As Ann Coulter says, “The Liberals Secret Weapon is Republicans Who Don’t Read” so I would extend that to the great majority of Americana who don’t read or only read fiction and People Magazine. Many people who support Palin and other conservatives don’t really have the knowledge to explain why or to sway the uninformed either.

Technorati Tags: Palin,Sarah Palin,the Palins,Palin Derangement syndrome Syndrome,Bristol Palin,Palinized,fear,control,dirty politics,elitists,Democrat Establishment,Progressives,Republican Establishment,GOP,tea party,grassroots movements,Conservatism,Constitutionalists,truth,Fiscal Conservative,Reaganesque,Quaylinized,demonization,Chicago-style politics,watch the other hand,journolists,politics,John McCain,Palin Derrangement Syndrome,Election 2008,Election 2012,2012 Election,Mitt Romney,GOP convention,the Palin Effect,American Exceptionalism,Greta Van Susteren

Game Change - More Juicy Nuggets From Book That Has Dems Squirming

Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime is in the bookstores and ruffling feathers and evoking apologies and explanactions from all directions and camps.

The relationship between Barack Obama and Joe Biden grew so strained during the 2008 campaign, according to a new book, that the two rarely spoke and aides not only kept Biden off internal conference calls but refused to even tell him they existed.

Instead, a separate campaign call was regularly scheduled between the then-Delaware senator and two of Obama’s top campaign aides – “so that they could keep a tight rein on him,” write journalists Mark Halperin and John Heilemann in “Game Change,” a long-awaited account of the 2008 campaign.

The book, based on over 300 interviews, reveals a series of previously undisclosed stories about the epic race. POLITICO obtained it Saturday at a Washington bookstore.

In addition to the discord between the president and vice-president, the authors write:

–Before the 2004 Democratic presidential primary, party strategists Mark Penn and Mandy Grunwald, both then working for Sen. Joe Lieberman’s presidential candidacy, met secretly with then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and a group of her closest confidantes to consider a last-minute entry into the race – and even polled New Hampshire voters about the idea. Ultimately, though, Chelsea Clinton persuaded her mother to opt out of a run, arguing that voters wouldn’t forgive her for breaking a pledge to serve a full Senate term.

–Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), and a group of other senators who would back Hillary Clinton’s candidacy encouraged Obama to run for the White House as early as 2006. The concern over Clinton was that she would be a weak Democratic standard-bearer while Obama could energize the party. In late summer 2007, Schumer – using an Obama ally, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), as a back channel – pushed the candidate to “take a two-by-four to Hillary,” as the authors put it.

–In lobbying the late Sen. Edward Kennedy to endorse his wife, former President Clinton angered the liberal icon by belittling Obama. Telling a friend about the conversation, Kennedy recalled Clinton had said “a few years ago, this guy would have been getting us coffee,” the authors paraphrase. A spokesman for the former president declined to comment on the claim.

–Frustrated over the campaign following her disastrous interview with Katie Couric, Sarah Palin said she regretted accepting the Republican vice presidential nomination. “If I’d known everything I know now, I would not have done this,” she said. McCain’s high command, already worried about her lack of eating and drinking and fearing that she was suffering from post-partum depression, convened a conference call and discussed whether she was mentally unstable.

Palin spokeswoman Meg Stapleton issued a statement in response to "Game Change" touting the former governor's own insider account.
"The Governor's descriptions of these events are found in her book, 'Going Rogue,'” said Stapleton. “Her descriptions are accurate. She was there. These reporters were not.”

–There were apparently "two Americas" within the marriage between John and Elizabeth Edwards. The former North Carolina senator's wife viewed herself as a worldly intellectual and publicly called her husband "a hick" and his parents "rednecks," according to the authors.

"She was forever letting John know she regarded him as her intellectual inferior," they write, mocking her husband, the presidential hopeful, as somebody who "doesn't read books."

–Before she was tapped as the vice presidential nominee, McCain’s campaign team devoted only five days to vetting Palin and her seventy-four-part questionnaire. But Palin herself only spent a few hours filling it out – an act which had “consumed weeks for other short-listers.” Ultimately, a forty-two-page vetting report of Palin was crashed by McCain’s team in a matter of 40 hours.

–McCain never held a single practice session before the first debate of the general election, in September of 2008. Now-RNC Chairman Michael Steele had spent the entire summer preparing to play Obama in the practice sessions, but McCain wouldn’t spar with Steele out of fear that the sessions would leak and he’d be accused of racial insensitivity.

–Upon finding out that McCain had tapped Palin as his running mate, Vice President Dick Cheney called it a “reckless choice,” believing the Alaska governor was unprepared for high office.

–Members of what the authors call Clinton’s “war room within a war room” became convinced in 2006 that Bill Clinton was having a serious extramarital affair, prompting Hillary Clinton to instruct her aides to be prepared to combat the story.

–After Billy Shaheen, Clinton's New Hew Hampshire campaign chairmen and the husband of Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, told the Washington Post that Obama's youthful drug use made him unelectable, Clinton initially cheered him on and encouraged her staff to draw attention to the comment. "Good for him!" she told aides. "Let's push it out." Clinton subsequently personally apologized to Obama over the matter and Shaheen quit the campaign.

–Following the 2008 campaign, Hillary Clinton was shocked to have been offered the Secretary of State job and decided to reject the offer. She prepared a statement explaining why she would turn the new president down and remain in the Senate. But in an after-midnight call between Clinton and Obama, he persuaded her – only after Clinton expressed concerns about the problems posed by her husband, the former president.

“You know I can’t control him, and at some point he’ll be a problem” the authors paraphrase Clinton as saying. Obama indicated that he was willing to take that risk.

–Reid said Obama could fare well nationally as an African-American candidate because he was “light-skinned” and didn’t speak with a “Negro dialect unless he wanted to have one.” Saturday, the majority leader said he had used “poor choice of words” and called Obama to apologize; the White House issued a statement indicating that the president had forgiven Reid.

–Before formally deciding to enter the 2008 presidential race, Obama met secretly with former Secretary of State Colin Powell and Vice-President Al Gore, the latter of whom the authors report had privately consulted with Obama adviser David Axelrod on a potential 2004 presidential run of his own.

Of all the freshly revealed anecdotes, though, none may be as eye-opening as the previously-unknown friction between the president and vice-president – which on Saturday a Biden spokesman dismissed as “rumors.” The tensions began in September of 2008 word got back to Obama’s campaign headquarters that Biden had told reporters on his campaign plane that he was more qualified than his running mate to be president.

“A chill set in between Chicago and the Biden plane,” Halperin and Heilemann write in the book, to be released Monday. “Joe and Obama barely spoke by phone, rarely campaigned together.”

And when Obama campaign manager David Plouffe was asked about having Biden dial into the nightly campaign conference call, he responded: “Nah.” Instead, Biden had his own call with Plouffe and senior campaign adviser David Axelrod.

Obama himself was growing increasingly frustrated with his running mate after Biden let loose with a string of gaffes, including a statement that paying higher taxes amounted to patriotism and criticism of one of the campaign’s own ads poking fun at John McCain.

But when Biden, at an October fund-raiser in Seattle, famously predicted that Obama would be tested with an international crisis, the then-Illinois senator had had enough.

“How many times is Biden gonna say something stupid?” he demanded of his advisers on a conference call, a moment at which most people on the call said the candidate was as angry as they had ever heard him.

For his part, the authors write, Biden wasn’t pleased with the campaign’s direction.

After a prep session for a “Meet the Press” appearance following the Democratic convention, Biden was incredulous when he was briefed by campaign aides about the ticket’s tax policy. He told them: “Well, it’s your campaign. I’ll say what you want me to say. But after Election Day, all bets are off.”

Following his campaign plane braggadocio about being more qualified than the man who put him on the ticket, Biden’s access to the press was limited and he grilled new staffers that were assigned to him to try and determine if they were part of his team or loyal to Chicago.

When the ticketmates talked a few days after Biden’s prediction that Obama would be tested, Obama lit into his running mate. But Biden didn’t apologize – or even indicate he understood why his comments in Seattle were problematic, though McCain’s campaign had already cut an ad featuring the dark warning.

Speaking to his own staff, Biden insisted that it hadn’t really been a gaffe. And feeling a bit defensive, he invoked one of the worst memories of Obama’s primary campaign.

“I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t say anything about bitter people who cling to their guns and religion,” Biden cracked, the authors paraphrase.

Asked about the book, Biden spokesman Jay Carney said: "We aren't going to comment on rehashed rumors about the campaign. But I can say that if the authors were concerned with accuracy they might have checked their reporting with people on the Vice President's staff. They did not. I can also say that the President and Vice President have worked together very closely and successfully this past year."

© 2009 Capitol News Company, LLC

Source: The Fox Nation/Politico

Reporter: 'We Took Sides, Straight and Simple' Against Palin

As If Anyone With A Brain Didn’t Know This… Reporter Finally Admits: 'We Took Sides, Straight and Simple' Against Palin

On AOL Politics Daily, long-time White House reporter Carl Cannon bluntly declared that the political press gave Sarah Palin a raw deal in the 2008 campaign, and seriously failed to scrutinize Joe Biden, especially his fact-mangling and odd statements in the vice presidential debate. Cannon summed up:

In the 2008 election, we took sides, straight and simple, particularly with regard to the vice presidential race. I don't know that we played a decisive role in that campaign, and I'm not saying the better side lost. What I am saying is that we simply didn't hold Joe Biden to the same standard as Sarah Palin, and for me, the real loser in this sordid tale is my chosen profession.

Cannon suggested female journalists failed to make up for male sexism in Palin coverage because she didn’t match the kind of Hillary Clinton candidate they wanted to represent women in politics:

From the beginning, and for the ensuing 10 months, the coverage of this governor consisted of a steamy stew of cultural elitism and partisanship. The overt sexism of some male commentators wasn't countered, as one might have expected, by their female counterparts. Women columnists turned on Sarah Palin rather quickly. A plain-speaking, moose-hunting, Bible-thumping, pro-life, self-described "hockey mom" with five children and movie star looks with only a passing interest in foreign policy -- that wasn't the woman journalism's reigning feminists had envisioned for the glass ceiling-breaking role of First Female President (or Vice President). Hillary Rodham Clinton was more like what they had in mind – and Sarah, well, she was the un-Hillary.

But the most eye-opening part of Cannon’s piece looks at the vice-presidential debate. He chronicled some of Palin’s mistakes on that night, but then made a list of Biden’s egregious errors that were overlooked by a supportive media elite:

Sen. Biden, however, was in a place by himself when it came to bogus claims, absurd contentions, and flights of rhetorical fancy. He threw out several assertions that were so preposterous that – had Palin made them – they would have prompted immediate calls for McCain to dump her from the ticket.

The good senator from Delaware warmed up slowly, erroneously claiming that McCain voted with Obama on a budget resolution, and asserting wrongly that Obama wanted to return to the Reagan-era marginal income tax rates. He also embarked on an appallingly wrongheaded monologue about the constitutional history of the vice presidency. But when the talk turned to national security, presumably Biden's purported area of expertise, he went completely off the grid.

• "John McCain voted against a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty that every Republican has supported," Biden stated. (Actually, in a 1999 vote in Congress, McCain sided with 50 other Republicans to kill the treaty. Only four joined the Democrats.)

• "Pakistan already has deployed nuclear weapons," Biden said. "Pakistan's weapons can already hit Israel and the Mediterranean." (Pakistan has no known intercontinental missiles. The range of its weapons is thought to be 1,000 miles – halfway to Israel.)

• "When we kicked -- along with France -- we kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon, I said and Barack said, 'Move NATO forces in there. Fill the vacuum, because if you don't...Hezbollah will control it.'" Biden recalled. "Now what's happened? Hezbollah is a legitimate part of the government in the country immediately to the north of Israel." (Except that the U.S. never kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon or anywhere else. They've been entrenched in Lebanon since 1982. Actually, Hezbollah, insofar as it was responsible for the 1983 suicide bombing at the Marine barracks that killed 241 U.S. servicemen, kicked America out of Lebanon, not the other way around.)

• "The president...insisted on elections on the West Bank, when I said, and others said, and Barack Obama said, 'Big mistake. Hamas will win. You'll legitimize them.' What happened? Hamas won," Biden said. (Only the last two words of Biden's strange soliloquy are true. The rest are false. For one thing, Fatah controls the West Bank. Biden was thinking of Gaza. Secondly, neither Biden nor Obama predicted the 2006 victory for Hamas in Gaza's legislative elections. Third, McCain and Obama – but not Biden -- signed a letter urging the president to pressure Palestinians to require that candidates adhere to democratic principles before being allowed to run for office. Fourth, Biden served as an election observer and later wrote an article expressing high praise for Bush's actions. To sum up: One factual error and three fibs in only 31 words. Pretty impressive, in its way.)

• "With Afghanistan, facts matter...we spend more money in three weeks on combat in Iraq than we spend on the entirety of the last seven years that we have been in Afghanistan. Let me say that again..." (He did say it again, but that didn't make it true. It's wildly and weirdly off the mark. Yes, facts matter. The facts here were that at the time Biden was speaking, the U.S. had spent $172 billion in Afghanistan. The Iraq War consumes between $7 billion and $8 billion every three weeks. Biden's math was off by 2,000 percent.)

• "Can I clarify this? This is simply not true about Barack Obama. He did not say (he'd) sit down with Ahmadinejad." (He most certainly did. And among those who criticized him at the time for it was Joe Biden, who told Byron York of National Review that the idea of a president meeting with the likes of the Iranian president or Hugo Chavez was "naVve.")

Those were alarming mistakes. To me Biden's most discordant claims concerned his Animal House-like history lecture about the office of the vice president. It came while Biden was dressing down Dick Cheney, who was not present, for supposedly being unfamiliar with the Constitution. "The idea (that) he doesn't realize that Article I of the Constitution defines the role of the vice president of the United States – that's the executive branch – he works in the executive branch," Biden said. "He should understand that. Everyone should understand that. And the primary role of the vice president of the United States is to support the president of the United States of America, give that president his or her best judgment when sought, and, as vice president, to preside over the Senate, only in a time when in fact there's a tie vote. The Constitution is explicit....He has no authority relative to the Congress. The idea he's part of the legislative branch is a bizarre notion invented by Cheney to aggrandize the power of a unitary executive, and look where it has gotten us."

Lord, would Tina Fey have had fun with this jumble of misinformation – if only Palin had said it! Article I defines the legislative, not executive, branch. The vice president is, indeed, mentioned there. What Biden finds "explicit," hasn't been so to previous vice presidents or to most constitutional scholars. Prior to the 20th century, vice presidents didn't even have offices at the White House compound – they were housed in the Capitol. The notion that a veep's constitutional authority is to provide advice to a president springs from Biden's brow; it certainly isn't mentioned, or even contemplated, in the Constitution, which doesn't even say whether the vice president should receive a salary.

Should Joe Biden have known this stuff? Since he chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee, you'd hope so. But even if he didn't, you'd think it would be news when he unleashed a veritable fount of misinformation to impugn Palin's knowledge of the federal system while attacking a sitting vice president. It barely rated a mention in the collective mainstream media.

Facts matter, the man said. But they didn't in 2008, not when it came to Joe Biden (our guy) against Sarah Palin (odd outsider). The ladies and gentlemen of the press were more interested in her hair, her glasses, her wardrobe, he accent, her sex life, her kids' sex lives, and her hunting habits than in whether her opponent knew anything about foreign policy, the Constitution of the United States, or the job he was running for. They still are. The relentlessly negative coverage of Palin goes on unabated -- she's the subject of a much-ballyhooed hatchet job in Vanity Fair this month -- even as Biden makes minor news from time to time by continuing his penchant for gaffes, this time while serving as the second most powerful person in the federal government.

By Tim Graham - July 10, 2009 - 07:56 ET

—Tim Graham is Director of Media Analysis at the Media Research Center.

And Posted On Hannity.com – Carol (ah Carl) Cannon is a well Respected Journalist in Washington circles…

And he gave a STUNNING account of just how BIAS the MSM was in favor of Joe Biden during the election.

If there is no Media Bias why are SO MANY Journalists ADMITTING it lately?? On AOL Politics Daily, long-time White House reporter Carl Cannon bluntly declared that the political press gave Sarah Palin a raw deal in the 2008 campaign, and seriously failed to scrutinize Joe Biden, especially his fact-mangling and odd statements in the vice presidential debate. Cannon summed up:

In the 2008 election, we took sides, straight and simple, particularly with regard to the vice presidential race. I don't know that we played a decisive role in that campaign, and I'm not saying the better side lost. What I am saying is that we simply didn't hold Joe Biden to the same standard as Sarah Palin, and for me, the real loser in this sordid tale is my chosen profession.

Comments:

(1) Carl aint' tellin' the whole truth: "and seriously failed to scrutinize Joe Biden,"
Ummm, Carl, the LMSM seriously failed to scrutinize both Biden AND Obama at ANY point in the campaign.

(2) Looks like the luster is coming off their chosen Golden Boy and now they are suffering through a serious case of buyers remorse.

(3) Democrats : THEY LIE TO US!! THEY PLAY ON OUR FEARS!

(4) What's that I hear??...Liberal crickets??? Give it 5 minutes, the Libs are compiling attack info on this guy...Soon he will be called a hack, etc, etc... Could it be that little by little, the media is realizing how badly they've been made puppets??
I am hopeful, AND doubtful, at the same time.........Time will tell..

(5) "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable." – JFK

(6) The American people are the real losers in this story!

(7) If you are not watching Fox Cable News and reading… Fushion Magazine, and books like Catastrophe, American Progressivism, Glenn Beck's Common Sense, Liberty and Tyranny, Saving Freedom, Green Hell, etc etc you are in the dark!!

*Shame on NOW and the women journalists… Sarah Palin is the closest person I know of to the Woman’s Movement… You Can Have It All Model. They let themselves and their own Mantra down!

Checkout: Conservatives4Palin.com

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Posted: Knowledge Creates Power