THE AGE OF DESPOTISM
July 10, 2009
Another great article and video from Chuck Baldwin. His guest and friend he references, Lt. Commander Cunningham was the author of the famous 29 Palms Survey in 1995 that asked Marines if they would serve under U.N. Command and also if they would fire on American citizens who resisted attempts to disarm them.
THE AGE OF DESPOTISM
This past Independence Day weekend, my friend, LCDR (Retired) Guy Cunningham, delivered an outstanding address here in Pensacola, Florida, in which he said that America is now in “The Age of Perfidy.” He went on to say that our country is soon to enter “The Age of Despotism.” I candidly confess that I believe the retired Naval officer could be more right than we might want to admit.
Speaking of the UN, Commander Cunningham rightly assessed the international body to be a sinister organization that threatened the sovereignty and independence of the United States, and from which the US needed to withdraw. He also boldly stated that any and all treaties made with the UN should be immediately annulled.
It was Commander Cunningham’s statement that the United States is on the verge of despotism, however, that really grabbed my attention. If anyone should know the ins and outs of the science of freedom and oppression, it is Commander Cunningham. His research and analysis of history, both American and military, gives him a keen insight into the subject.
In supporting his ominous conclusion, Cunningham noted former President Bill Clinton’s introduction of PDD 25 (a Presidential Directive that is still in place), which reportedly authorizes the President to use and declare martial law at any time, for any reason. He reminded us of how the US military has been used several times for action on US soil.
The US military was used directly in the government attack against the Branch Davidians at the private residence of Mount Carmel outside Waco, Texas. The military was stationed outside Los Angeles, California, during the LA riots. The military was used in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. The military even patrolled the streets of the tiny town of Geneva, Alabama, after a man went on a short, albeit bloody, shooting spree.
Commander Cunningham also reminded us of how President George W. Bush virtually expunged Posse Comitatus and set the table for despotism and martial law by signing the USA Patriot Act into existence. As a result, we now have an entire Army division assigned to the American homeland, a first in US history. He noted that even FEMA has the authority to declare martial law.
The commander said further that his intelligence tells him that there are Muslim terrorists already in the United States who are planning to stage multi-city attacks, perhaps as early as this summer. He also expressed incredulity at the fact that our federal government certainly knows that these Muslim terrorists have been slipping across the southern border of the US for some time and there has been almost no attempt by any Presidential administration to stop them.
Commander Cunningham also expressed the fear that, should another attack occur within our country, the current administration would not hesitate to declare martial law, which would almost certainly include the confiscation of firearms. At that point, he said, America will have entered “The Age of Despotism.”
I think it prudent, at this point, to make note of the fact that it was the attempted confiscation of firearms by the British Crown that precipitated the “shot heard ’round the world” and the advent of America’s War for Independence. Until then, America’s founders were content to use peaceful means to petition British injuries and injustices. But when the Crown moved against their guns, the colonists resisted with violence, and there was no remedy but complete and permanent separation.
Obama Taking Up Where Bush Left Off
April 28, 2009
As you read this you must ask yourself………….I thought we had a Constitution with a 4th amendment that states:
| “ | The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. | ” |
A CULTURE OF SURVEILLANCE
By Chuck Baldwin
Obama Taking Up Where Bush Left Off
It is truly amazing how much news the American news media chooses to ignore. If one wants to discover what is actually going on in the world, he or she often has to go to the foreign press. This has again been the case with a story that every American should be extremely interested in, but which has been totally ignored by the American news media. I found this story in Russia Today.
According to RussiaToday.com, “The personal computer may soon be not-so-private, with the U.S. and some European nations working on laws allowing them access to search the content held on a person’s hard drive.
“President Obama’s administration is keeping unusually tight-lipped on the details, which is raising concerns among computer users and liberty activists.”
The report also states, “In extreme secrecy from the public, the United States is hammering out an international copyright treaty with several other countries and the European Union. Under the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (or ACTA), governments will get sweeping new powers to search and seize material thought to be in breach of copyright. But why all the secrecy?”
Russia Today quotes Richard Stallman, prominent American software freedom activist, as saying, “Democracy gets bypassed and they can do to us whatever they want. I can only guess that it’s going to be nasty, because if it weren’t going to be nasty, they wouldn’t need to keep it a secret.”
The report also said, “Up until now, the breach of copyright has been a civil matter. The Obama administration seems to now want to criminalize it.”
The report continued saying, “Some say modern America is being overtaken by a culture of surveillance.”
A culture of surveillance indeed. What began in earnest under former President George W. Bush is now sharply escalating under President Barack Obama.
According to Ecommerce Journal, President Obama and his Big Brother fellow travelers in Congress are seeking power to “cut the whole world off the Internet.“ The report says, “Senators John Rockefeller and Olympia Snowe proposed the Cybersecurity Act that would create the Office of the National Cybersecurity Advisor. Its powers are detailed in the The Cybersecurity Act of 2009.
“If the President so chooses, he can call a ‘cybersecurity emergency’ and shut down or limit any ‘net traffic or a ‘critical’ network ‘in the name of national security,’ though the bill fails to provide concrete definitions on what is ‘critical’ or what constitutes an ‘emergency.’“
The report goes on to say, “This new legislation seeks to give even more power to the government to regulate the Internet and, in future, the possibility to regulate content and usage. (I must ask, why are we turning over so much authority to the president, the internet, firing CEOs of public companies,control of the census, stakes in banks, what is wrong with us?)
What begins as a method of defeating terrorism and protecting telecommunications, can quickly become a method to regulate ‘hate speech’ to assign ‘motive’ or ‘intent’ to harm and even to regulate and legislate the flow of information that is deemed by the ‘thought police’ to be inflammatory or counter-productive to their cause.”
The report says that the new cybersecurity legislation can be a “framework for future, more invasive legislation. It is a first step to the loss of internet privacy, free speech and the free flow of information.”
So, once again, the passing of a Republican Presidential administration and the advent of a Democratic Presidential administration have resulted in zero change in the overall direction of the ship of state. In the name of “national security,” the federal government of this country continues to deepen its commitment to what can only be described as a police-state mentality. And, once again, the national news media in America chooses to ignore the story, and by so doing, shows willful compliance with this disturbing phenomenon.
I wonder how many Obama supporters are paying attention?
During the Bush years, my “conservative” brethren (especially the ones calling themselves Christians) repeatedly turned a blind eye and deaf ear to the myriad foibles and falsehoods, and frequent fraudulence of President Bush because he was a Republican. Now we will see how many Obama supporters will look the other way in order to protect President Obama because he is a Democrat. I suspect most of them will show themselves of no better character than the Bush supporters.
Entire article at Newswithviews.com
In all fairness I’m going to post this article by the WSJ today. They looked into the controversial DHS “rightwing extremist” report that upset so many this week. Believe it or not, it appears this report originated with George W. Bush shortly before he left office. When the report is downloaded here and the properties tab is open, it says, “created 1/23/07 1:32:54 PM”. Then I have to ask myself, why would Bush profile the right wing when that was who supported him most? In other words, the document is not only a reflection of the supposed sinister political side of the Obama administration, said by many “conservatives” to be socialist or Marxist. Is it a document produced specifically as part of a larger effort to demonize and eliminate all opposition to government policies regardless of political persuasion?
Strange !
Veterans a Focus of FBI Extremist Probe
WASHINGTON — The Federal Bureau of Investigation earlier this year launched a nationwide operation targeting white supremacists and “militia/sovereign-citizen extremist groups,” including a focus on veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan, according to memos sent from bureau headquarters to field offices.
The initiative, dubbed Operation Vigilant Eagle, was outlined in February, two months before a memo giving a similar warning was issued on April 7 by the Department of Homeland Security.
Disclosure of the DHS memo this week has sparked controversy among some conservatives and veterans groups. Appearing on television talk shows Thursday, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano defended the assessment, but apologized to veterans who saw it as an accusation.
“This is an assessment of things just to be wary of, not to infringe on constitutional rights, certainly not to malign our veterans,” she said on NBC’s Today Show.
The documents outlining Operation Vigilant Eagle cite a surge in activity by such groups. The memos say the FBI’s focus on veterans began as far back as December, during the final weeks of the Bush administration, when the bureau’s domestic counterterrorism division formed a special joint working group with the Defense Department.
A Feb. 23 draft memo from FBI domestic counterterrorism leaders, obtained by The Wall Street Journal, cited an “increase in recruitment, threatening communications and weapons procurement by white supremacy extremist and militia/sovereign-citizen extremist groups.”
The FBI said in the memo that its conclusion about a surge in such activities was based on confidential sources, undercover operations, reporting from other law-enforcement agencies and publicly available information. The memo said the main goal of the multipronged operation was to get a better handle on “the scope of this emerging threat.” The operation also seeks to identify gaps in intelligence efforts surrounding these groups and their leaders.
The aim of the FBI’s effort with the Defense Department, which was rolled into the Vigilant Eagle program, is to “share information regarding Iraqi and Afghanistan war veterans whose involvement in white supremacy and/or militia sovereign citizen extremist groups poses a domestic terrorism threat,” according to the Feb. 23 FBI memo.
Michael Ward, FBI deputy assistant director for counterterrorism, said in an interview Thursday that the portion of the operation focusing on the military related only to veterans who draw the attention of Defense Department officials for joining white-supremacist or other extremist groups.
“We’re not doing an investigation into the military, we’re not looking at former military members,” he said. “It would have to be something they were concerned about, or someone they’re concerned is involved” with extremist groups.
Mr. Ward said that the FBI’s general counsel reviewed the operation before it began, “to make sure any tripwires we set do not violate any civil liberties.”
Some Republican lawmakers, talk-show hosts and veterans groups complained this week after the internal DHS assessment cited the potential for the same extremists groups to target returning combat veterans for recruitment. The Democratic chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, also echoed the concerns.
The separate DHS assessment, leaked this week after being sent to law-enforcement agencies, said the “willingness of a small percentage of military personnel to join extremist groups during the 1990s because they were disgruntled, disillusioned or suffering from the psychological effects of war is being replicated today.” Veterans could draw special attention, the report said, because of their advanced training.
Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, the House Republican leader, said Wednesday he was offended that veterans were characterized as potential domestic terrorists.
Amy Kudwa, a DHS spokeswoman, said Thursday the report was issued before an objection about one part of the document raised by the agency’s civil-rights division was resolved. She called it a “breakdown of an internal process” that would be fixed.
The FBI documents show the bureau was working with investigators inside the nation’s uniformed services “in an effort to identify those current or former soldiers who pose a domestic terrorism threat.” The other agencies working with the FBI are the U.S. Army Criminal Investigative Division, the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations and the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.
Documents detailing the operation are unclassified, but were meant for internal distribution only.
Obama Defends:NSA Found Improperly Spying on Americans
April 16, 2009
Wow what a shock…..like we already didn’t know this, just not offically acknowledged….With all the stonewalling and requests for dismissal, you know they are hiding something.
President Obama promised the American people a new era of transparency, accountability, and respect for civil liberties. But with the Obama Justice Department continuing the Bush administration’s cover-up of the National Security Agency’s dragnet surveillance of millions of Americans, and insisting that the much-publicized warrantless wiretapping program is still a “secret” that cannot be reviewed by the courts, it feels like deja vu all over again.
From Fox News:
NSA Found Improperly Spying on Americans
The National Security Agency intercepted Americans’ e-mails and phone calls in recent months on a scale that went beyond limits set by Congress last year,(what a shock!) The New York Times reported on Wednesday.
The problems were discovered during a review of the intelligence activities, the Justice Department said in a statement Wednesday night, and said they had been resolved.
Citing unnamed intelligence officials, the Times said the NSA had engaged in “‘over-collection’ of domestic communications of Americans.” Sources reportedly described the practice as varying from significant to systemic to unintentional.
The agency also tried to wiretap a member of Congress without a warrant, an intelligence official told the Times.
The NSA believed that the congressman, whose identity was not revealed, was in contact with an extremist who had possible ties to terror and was already under surveillance. The NSA then tried to eavesdrop on the congressman’s conversations, the Times said.(without a warrant?)
A bill passed by Congress in July 2008 authorizes U.S. intelligence agencies to eavesdrop without court approval on foreign targets believed to be outside the United States.
In its statement, the Justice Department said it has taken “comprehensive steps to correct the situation and bring the program into compliance.”
The Justice Department did not elaborate on what problems it found.(why would they not elaborate, oh I forgot, that elusive “state secret” thing to keep us from finding out exactly what violations occured.)
Once corrective measures were taken, Attorney General Eric Holder sought authorization for renewing the surveillance program, officials said.
“It is not clear to what extent the agency may have actively listened in on conversations or read e-mails of Americans without proper court authority, rather than simply obtain access to them,” the Times said.
Domestic eavesdropping has been a contentious issue since 2005, when the Times revealed that for years following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the NSA intercepted international phone conversations and e-mails involving U.S. citizens without a warrant.(as the Constitution call for before a search can be done and a wiretap is a search according to the Supreme Court.)
That program ended in 2007, and the following year Congress passed legislation requiring the NSA to get court approval to monitor the purely domestic communications of Americans who came under suspicion.(which they didn’t need since the Constitution already prohibits this without a warrant)
Obama DOJ Invokes State-Secrets Privilege and Patriot Act To Justify Continued Bush Warrantless Wiretaps
04/09/2009 A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS
by Christine Bowman
Illegal wiretapping cases could spell trouble for President Obama. What can the Obama Administration be thinking?
At the Obama presidential campaign website, barackobama.com, a page titled “Plan to Change Washington” describes problems in government and then presents “The Obama/Biden Plan” to correct such problems. Here’s the section on the problem of government secrecy:
Secrecy Dominates Government Actions: The Bush administration has ignored public disclosure rules and has invoked a legal tool known as the “state secrets” privilege more than any other previous administration to get cases thrown out of civil court.
But then in the section on Obama’s planned solutions, the state-secrets legal tool doesn’t come up again. Was that an oversight or a deliberate omission? Was there actually no Obama/Biden plan to challenge or curtail the state-secrets claim that the Bush administration used so often? It seems so.
The fact that Keith Olbermann, an intense Obama supporter, spent the first ten minutes of his show attacking Obama for replicating (and, in this instance, actually surpassing) some of the worst Bush/Cheney abuses of executive power and secrecy claims reflects just how extreme the conduct of the Obama DOJ here.
President Obama’s DOJ last week filed a request for dismissal of an electronic surveillance case, Jewel v. NSA, brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) on behalf of AT&T clients before U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn R. Walker in San Francisco. Their arguments? State secrets must be protected, and on top of that, the government should be immune from prosecution for spying on citizens unless they willfully leak the secret information they have gathered. (yeah, like anyone is ever going to leak information that they have violated the law or Constitution….how stupid do they think we are?) They cite the Patriot Act for that part, which the Bush administration had never done. EFF Attorney Kevin Bankston told BuzzFlash Thursday the DOJ’s arguments in the case are “plainly wrong.” He also said the Justice Department’s “chances of success on that point are not very high.”
To summarize, the DOJ wants to allow the NSA to keep doing unrestricted electronic surveillance; the DOJ wants to keep the NSA’s secret documents from being used in court; and they want the Jewel v. NSA case thrown out. The EFF wants Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable invasion of privacy upheld for American citizens. They want the case to be heard. They seek to stop what they call the government’s “illegal, unconstitutional, and ongoing dragnet surveillance … of millions of Americans.” As Kevin Bankston told BuzzFlash, the EFF “believes and alleges based on widespread news reports and whistleblower evidence” that the NSA is intercepting not only the transactional information but also the contents of “practically everyone’” emails and phone calls illegally.
The EFF must respond in writing to the DOJ filing, and then Judge Walker, who has resisted Justice Department attempts to claim the state-secrets privilege before, will hear oral arguments from both sides June 25 (assuming no calendar changes).
Tim Jones explains the DOJ’s arguments in the case further at the EFF website:
Previously, the Bush Administration has argued that the U.S. possesses “sovereign immunity” from suit for conducting electronic surveillance that violates the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). However, FISA is only one of several laws that restrict the government’s ability to wiretap. (yeah,one important law is in the Constitution, it’s called the 4th amendment)The Obama Administration goes two steps further than Bush did, and claims that the US PATRIOT Act also renders the U.S. immune from suit under the two remaining key federal surveillance laws: the Wiretap Act and the Stored Communications Act. Essentially, the Obama Adminstration has claimed that the government cannot be held accountable for illegal surveillance under any federal statutes.(duh…what about that thing called the Constitution?)
Regrettably, this is not the first electronic wiretapping case where Eric Holder’s DOJ has tried to claim the state-secrets privilege. Another involves the al-Haramain Islamic Foundation.
More legal arguments will be made in writing and in court in the coming months, but what of the political side to this story? Many Obama supporters are losing faith. The President they helped to elect on a platform of change and transparency, and the one who was an expert on constitutional law, no less, now seems ready to usurp essential citizens’ rights that are enshrined in the Bill of Rights. As a candidate, he had decried governmental overreach.
Will President Obama be able to restore that loss of faith, or even try? Doesn’t he realize his base is boiling mad about domestic spying and warrantless wiretaps? The disconnect between campaign rhetoric and courtroom maneuvering is a problem the President must confront — on this issue as well as on others.
Domestic spying is not a progressive value, or even a centrist or conservative value. It’s a breach of the inalienable 4th Amendment rights of all Americans.
One of Obama’s most supportive boosters in the liberal blogosphere – Booman – emphatically condemns Obama for what his DOJ is doing in this case, and says “it is extremely disappointing, it is unjustifiable, and it is dangerous.”
by BooMan
Wed Apr 8th, 2009 at 01:38:30 AM EST
Just as a lot of us suspected….after 9/11 the Constitution and Bill of Rights were ignored in order to fight the “war on terror” domestically.Now we see why most everything this administration did eventually was classified as “top secret”, “national security” or “executive priviledge“, it would hide the fact that a lot of it was unConstitutional. Saying it doesn’t apply to the military! Well excuse me,but the Bill of Rights was written specically to the Federal government, which includes the military since it’s federal. The bad thing is that Obama will continue most of it himself and most likely worse. Obama is talking a good talk, but bet he doesn’t walk the talk. No matter what the problem is, the Constitution still applies to the federal government.
Even tho I’m not that fond of Keith Olbermann…his assessment is right on this time.
AG Office of Legal Counsel AUTHORIZED PENTAGON TO IGNORE BILL OF RIGHTS ON U.S. SOIL
In an October 2001 memo released today, then-Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel John Yoo advised the Pentagon’s top lawyer that the president may not only deploy the military within the United States, but it may ignore the Bill of Rights in the process of doing so. Yoo and special counsel Robert Delahunty wrote to Defense Department general counsel William Haynes that the president has “ample constitutional and statutory authority to deploy the military against international or foreign terrorists operating within the United States,” and that the use of military force “need not follow the exact procedures that govern law enforcement operations.”
Although the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures on U.S. soil, Yoo concluded that “[a]lthough the situation is novel … we think that the better view is that the Fourth Amendment would not apply in these circumstances. Thus, for example, we do not think that a military commander carrying out a raid on a terrorist cell would be required to demonstrate probably cause or to obtain a warrant.”
This memo appears to have formed the legal basis for the Bush administration’s domestic warrantless wiretapping program, which at least one federal judge has since concluded was unconstitutional.
Jameel Jaffer, Director of the ACLU National Security Project, reads it as extending beyond the Fourth Amendment, however.
“This takes the position that the Bill of Rights does not constrain the military in its operations inside the United States,” Jaffer told me this afternoon. “The president can disregard the constitution during wartime, not just on foreign battlefields, but inside the United States. We had not seen a memo saying that before.”
Of the nine memos released today, at least two — this October one written by Yoo, and another written by Bybee regarding extraordinary rendition — were responsive to earlier ACLU requests for OLC memos in the context of ongoing FOIA cases.
But many more memos the ACLU has requested still have not been released.
“There are still dozens of memos being withheld,” said Jaffer. “We’re hoping that this is a first installment.”
While the memos reveal the legal groundwork that was laid for the Bush administration’s conduct in its “war on terror”, much of which appears to have been illegal (and unConstitutional), they still don’t answer the critical question that many Bush critics want to know.
“The obvious question that’s raised by these memos is, what conduct did the administration authorize on the basis of the legal reasoning in these memos?” Jaffer said. “That’s a question that has not been adequately answered.”
Fourth Amendment Doesn’t Apply to U.S. Military
February 4, 2009
Now we have 12 previously classified Bush memos explaining his thoughts on torture,detention and warantless wiretapping which is a violation of the 4th amendment no matter how you twist it.
“For example, the effects of the secret Fourth Amendment memo could be stunning. Former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said in another memo that the White House’s lawyers had concluded that the Fourth Amendment’s protections against warrantless search and seizure don’t apply to the US military — even when the operations take place on U.S. soil.” (For everyone’s information the first 10 amendments were specifically written directly at the Federal government and was intended to limit it and if I’m not badly mistaken the US Military is part of the Federal Government. So the 4th amendment does apply to the military also!)
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| Dozens of secret Bush surveillance, executive power memos found; Could be made public
Details about more than three dozen secret memoranda written by Bush Administration officials now sit atop a chart created by a public interest reporting group. The memos track new details about dozens of secret Bush Administration legal positions on torture, detention and warrantless wiretapping. Meanwhile, Obama’s freshly-confirmed Attorney General Eric Holder told senators that he was open to declassifying White House legal memos if no support for their original classification could be found, signaling a likely showdown with former President George W. Bush over executive privilege. “The Bush administration’s controversial policies on detentions, interrogations and warrantless wiretapping were underpinned by legal memoranda,” Pro Publica’s Dan Nguyen and Christopher Weaver write. “While some of those memos have been released (primarily as a result of ACLU lawsuits), the former administration kept far more memos secret than has been previously understood. At least three dozen by our count.” Nguyen and Weaver produced the chart. Propublica was founded in 2007 as a non-profit driven investigative news outlet and is run by a former managing editor from the Wall Street Journal. The chart lists 40 memos that remain secret, along with identifying the 12 that have been made public. Given the chart, one can find the exact date a memo was written, its author and sometimes short details the authors have gleaned from other sources. Among the memos’ titles: “Criminal Charges against U.S. terrorists”; “Options for Interpreting the Geneva Convention” and “Fourth Amendment doesn’t apply to military operations abroad or in U.S.” Little is known about the specifics or the resulting effect of the other clandestine briefs. For example, the effects of the secret Fourth Amendment memo could be stunning. Former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said in another memo that the White House’s lawyers had concluded that the Fourth Amendment’s protections against warrantless search and seizure don’t apply to the US military — even when the operations take place on U.S. soil. Holder told senators in response to questions sent to him before his confirmation hearings that he’d take an aggressive stance with regard to releasing the White House legal opinions his predecessors’ had labeled as secret. “Once the new Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel is confirmed, I plan to instruct that official to review the OLC’s policies relating to publication of its opinions with the [objective] of making its opinions available to the maximum extent consistent with sound practice and competing concerns,” Holder wrote. Holder’s comments were first noted by Secrecy News‘ Steven Aftergood.
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Barack Obama’s Royal Roots
January 16, 2009
I thought many might be interested in the fact that Barack Obama is related to George Bush and others:
| President-Elect Barack Obama Is Related to President Bush |
| by J. R. Church |
Today many in America and around the world are rejoicing over the election of Barack Hussein Obama to the highest political office in the United States. He is the ultimate dream-come-true of African Americans who have long fought to be recognized as free co-equal citizens after early America’s terribly shameful stigma of slavery was forced upon them. The old spiritual song, “We Shall Overcome,” has been realized at last.
Oprah Winfrey said, “…I’ve sort of been, like, pulsating all day, and now I feel like I’m, like, in full-vibrational-mode … It feels like there’s a shift in consciousness. It feels like something really big and bold has happened here…”
I’m afraid the world will not automatically find mankind’s elusive utopia with the installment of the new American president. When Barack Obama was elected, I thought, “At least, we will have a president who is not related to European royalty!” But, alas, there seems to be no light at the end of this world’s darkening tunnel, because Barack Obama is related to President George W. Bush!
Barack Obama and President Bush are 10th cousins, once removed, linked by Samuel Hinckley of Cape Cod, who died in 1662. Does that name, Hinckley, sound familiar?
When John Warnock Hinckley, Jr., attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagan in Washington, D.C. on March 30, 1981, the Houston Post reported that Hinckley is the son of one of George H. W. Bush’s political and financial supporters in his 1980 presidential primary campaign against Ronald Reagan. His elder brother, Scott Hinckley, and Vice President Bush’s son, Neil Bush, had a dinner appointment scheduled for the next day.
Now we learn that the Hinckley family are more than friends — they may be cousins — cousins to both the Bush family and Barack Obama’s family on his mother’s side.
Obama’s distant presidential cousins include President George W. Bush and his father, George H. W. Bush, Gerald Ford, Lyndon Johnson, Harry S. Truman and James Madison.
The New England Historic Genealogical Society released their genealogy report after tracing the family trees of the presidential candidates. It is a fact that Barack Obama, the son of a white woman from Kansas and a black man from Kenya, is related to several presidents across both party lines. Founded in 1845, the New England Historic Genealogical Society is the oldest and largest nonprofit genealogical organization in the country.
Obama is also related to other politicians, such as Vice President Dick Cheney, British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill and Civil War General Robert E. Lee. The vice president’s wife, Lynne Cheney, announced her discovery while discussing her new book, Blue Skies, No Fences, on MSNBC.
When asked if she would support Hillary Rodham Clinton because she is a woman, Lynne Cheney said, “I have to admit to a certain bias here … Dick and Barack Obama are eighth cousins.”
Mrs. Cheney said that it was “an amazing American story that one ancestor … could be responsible down the family line for lives that have taken such different and varied paths.”
Then asked if she supported Obama she quickly said, “No.”
According to Chicago Sun-Times, “The Obama camp made light of the family ties. ‘Every family has a black sheep,’ said spokeswoman Jen Psaki, with tongue firmly planted in cheek.”
Michelle Obama’s Jewish Roots
Some in Israel are worried that Barack Obama may forsake the Jews in favor of the Palestinians, or that he is somehow a secret Muslim. But, there is a bright note to consider.
Obama’s wife is related to Rabbi Capers Funnye (pronounced “Fuh-NAY”), one of the nation’s most prominent black rabbis. He and Michelle Obama are cousins. Funnye’s mother, Verdelle Robinson Funnye, and Michelle Obama’s paternal grandfather, Frasier Robinson, Jr., were brother and sister.
Rabbi Funnye is the chief rabbi of the Beth Shalom B’nai Zaken Ethiopian Hebrew Congregation in southwest Chicago. He is well known in Jewish circles for acting as a bridge between mainstream Jewry and the much smaller, and largely separate, world of black Jewish congregations, sometimes known as black Hebrews, or Israelites. He has often urged the larger Jewish community to be more accepting of Jews who are not white.
In this presidential campaign, Funnye’s famous relative gives an unexpected twist to the relationship between Barack Obama and the Jewish community. On the one hand, Jewish political organizers, voters and donors — including some of the city’s wealthiest and most prominent families — played an essential role in Obama’s rise to power in Chicago.
Rabbi Funnye told the Jewish publication, Forward, “I know that her grandfather and her father and my mom and all of our relatives that are now deceased would be so very, very proud of both of them.” Funnye, 56, has known Michelle Obama (born Michelle Robinson), 44, since she was born. Both grew up on the South Side of Chicago, and Funnye’s mother and Obama’s father enjoyed a close relationship.
The two fell out of touch when they grew older, but they reconnected years later when Obama was working for the University of Chicago and Funnye was leading a local social service organization called The Blue Gargoyle. Funnye also worked with Barack Obama, who, as a state senator, came and spoke at events for the organization. When Barack and Michelle Obama married, Funnye and his family attended the wedding. Funnye said that he and the Obamas have not been in touch since the presidential campaign began.”
Read the entire article at Prophecy in the News.com
Obama’s unusual transition: Already a co-president
November 25, 2008
Boy what crazy times we live in or what?……………
Obama’s unusual transition: Already a co-president
By David Lightman | McClatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON — America has never seen anything quite like this: The president and president-elect acting like co-presidents, consulting and cooperating on the day’s biggest crises.
“It’s pretty unusual,” said George Edwards, a presidential expert at Texas A&M University, in College Station.
What Princeton University professor Julian Zelizer calls “the split-screen presidency” is the result of several historic forces converging this fall:
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The 24-7 nature of the global economy, which demands timely reaction.
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Incoming and outgoing presidents who have personal and political reasons to show that they can manage a crisis.
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A president-elect, Barack Obama, who “believes in strong government and wants to get things under way immediately,” said William Leuchtenburg, a University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill professor who’s written extensively about the presidency.
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A lame-duck president, George W. Bush, who’s leaving office voluntarily. “Bush was not defeated. That makes for an easier relationship,” Leutchtenburg said.
Monday gave a vivid illustration of the comity that’s characterized the Bush-Obama minuet. Bush’s statement took only two minutes, but it included this paean to his successor: “I talked to Obama about the decision we made. I told the American people, and I told the president-elect when I first met him, that anytime we were to make a big decision during this transition, he will be informed, as will his team.”
About an hour and a half later, Obama unveiled his economic team at a Chicago news conference and mentioned that he’d spoken to Bush and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke earlier Monday.
It’s not unusual for presidents and successors to talk and consult each other, particularly about crises, though the shared spotlight this time takes that to a whole new level. In December 1992, the George H.W. Bush White House briefed CIinton on its plan to send American troops on a humanitarian mission to Somalia, and the president-elect issued a statement commending Bush for his “leadership.” That’s more typical.
“People feel a need for immediate action,” Edwards said. “In the past, you could usually wait.”
Obama, analysts argue, needs to appear in control not only to reassure markets but also to establish his credibility. The former Illinois U.S. senator has no record of economic management and was barely known outside his home state until he ran for president.
“It’s not unusual for the president-elect to have news conferences, but in an economic crisis, it’s particularly important that you give people confidence,” George Edwards said.
Bush has his own motivations.
“To a large degree, Bush’s legacy is in the hands of Barack Obama,” said Tim Blessing, the director of the presidential performance study at Alvernia University in Reading, Pa. The more they’re seen working together, the more Bush could get some credit for any Obama successes next year.
Bush Hands Over Reins of U.S. Economy to EU
November 22, 2008
Well like a good little globalist, Bush hands over our economy to the European Union……..Thanks a lot and without our approval….but what does he care?
Wednesday, November 19, 2008 2:28 PM
By: Dick Morris & Eileen McGann
The results of the G-20 economic summit amount to nothing less than the seamless integration of the United States into the European economy.
In one month of legislation and one diplomatic meeting, the United States has unilaterally abdicated all the gains for the concept of free markets won by the Reagan administration and surrendered, in total, to the Western European model of socialism, stagnation, and excessive government regulation.
Sovereignty is out the window. Without a vote, we are suddenly members of the European Union. Given the dismal record of those nations at creating jobs and sustaining growth, merging with the Europeans is like a partnership with death.
At the G-20 meeting, Bush agreed to subject the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and our other regulatory agencies to the supervision of a global entity that would critique its regulatory standards and demand changes if it felt they were necessary. Bush agreed to create a College of Supervisors.
According to The Washington Post, it would “examine the books of major financial institutions that operate across national borders so regulators could begin to have a more complete picture of banks’ operations.”
Their scrutiny would extend to hedge funds and to various “exotic” financial instruments. The International Monetary Fund (IMF), a European-dominated operation, would conduct “regular vigorous reviews” of American financial institutions and practices.
The European-dominated College of Supervisors would also weigh in on issues like executive compensation and investment practices.
There is nothing wrong with the substance of this regulation.
Experience is showing it is needed. But it is very wrong to delegate these powers to unelected, international institutions with no political accountability.
We have a Securities and Exchange Commission appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, both of whom are elected by the American people. It is with the SEC, the Treasury, and the Federal Reserve that financial accountability must take place.
The European Union achieved this massive subrogation of American sovereignty the way it usually does, by negotiation, gradual bureaucratic encroachment, and without asking the voters if they approve.
What’s more, Bush appears to have gone down without a fight, saving his debating time for arguing against the protectionism that France’s Nicolas Sarkozy was pushing.
By giving Bush a seeming victory on a moratorium against protectionism for one year, Sarkozy was able to slip over his massive scheme for taking over the supervision of the U.S. economy.
All kinds of political agendas are advancing under the cover of responding to the global financial crisis.
Where Franklin Roosevelt saved capitalism by regulating it, Bush, to say nothing of Obama, has given the government control over our major financial and insurance institutions. And it isn’t even our government!
The power has now been transferred to the international community, led by the socialists in the European Union.
Will Obama govern from the left? He doesn’t have to.
George W. Bush has done all the heavy lifting for him. It was under Bush that the government basically took over as the chief stockholder of our financial institutions and under Bush that we ceded our financial controls to the European Union.
In doing so, he has done nothing to preserve what differentiates the vibrant American economy from those dying economies in Europe.
Why have 80 percent of the jobs that have been created since 1980 in the industrialized world been created in the United States? How has America managed to retain its leading 24 percent share of global manufacturing even in the face of the Chinese surge?
How has the U.S. GDP risen so high that it essentially equals that of the European Union, whose population is 50 percent greater?
It has done so by an absence of stifling regulation, a liberation of capital to flow to innovative businesses, low taxes, and by a low level of unionization that has given business the flexibility to grow and prosper.
Europe, stagnated by taxation and regulation, has grown by a pittance while we have roared ahead. But now Bush — not Obama — Bush has given that all up and caved in to European socialists.
The Bush legacy? European socialism. Who needs enemies with friends like Bush?
© 2008 Dick Morris & Eileen McGann
Steve Hilton
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Mike