Keating 5 and John McCain

John McCain is not Lilly white when it comes to fraud in the banking industry here in America. Did you know that the number “Five” in the "Keating 5" is the number of U.S. Senators including John McCain involved in the Savings and Loan crisis a few years back? John McCain was a close friend to Charles Keating of Lincoln Savings and Keating courted the Senator like a wolf on a hunt to protect his own ass. It turns out that John McCain did not have to be hunted, he went directly to the wolves den. Not just once but multiple times. That den was alpha male run by Charles Keating. Corruption, deception, and accounting fraud was something that John McCain not once spoke up against. John McCain participated on a fraud on the banking system in America and said nothing! Apparently bank fraud was not a problem for him when lavished and dotted over by Charles Keating.

This video is a bit long but full of information for you to think about. When Lincoln Savings went under it wasn’t the millionaires that lost their savings. It was regular folks in America that could not afford it. And still John McCain did NOTHING! Check out the video…

Video Link



So are we to trust John McCain when we have to bail out Wall Street today to the tune of $700 Billion after McCain’s $3.4 Billion dollar ignorance and refusal to stand up for America when he was in fact part of the Savings and Loan markets collapse just a few years back? John McCain was cited by the Congress for an ethics violation in the Keating case.

Voting your wallet or pocket book seem so much more important when you have a Senator that already has stolen the life savings of hundreds of thousands of Mid Westerners through Charles Keating and all that Senator John McCain got for it was a slap on the wrist! Trust is a very large part of American politics and how often do you leave your wallet out once you have been stolen from? Ya DON'T!

Vote your wallet!

Papamoka

Warning to Racists and Bigots

I’m taking a huge risk on writing this post but I think the American experiment as our fore fathers saw it, as the Presidency of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Kennedy, Johnson, Reagan and Clinton foresaw that it needs discussion. McCain and his campaign is blindly playing the race card and as just one American voter I don’t like it one bit! As an Irish, Catholic, White father of five daughters, a Democrat, a Moderate, and an Independent voter, I don't like it one bit. When they play the us against them card it tick's me off. Apparently, the McCain Palin campaign can not assimilate into the real America that exists all around us. We are a melting pot and that is the genuine reason why America is so great.

One of the greatest fears of most people in America is that your own thoughts will not be included in the current debate. Wall Street has a bailout plan so the mega rich and their investments are safe, what about you? This campaign for President is going to get ugly, the advertisements will go super nova with deceptions and lies based on context taken from wherever from each of the candidates. That is what politics is, it happens, it is the expected path when the stakes are this high. This is a Presidential election. Make no mistake about it, the man or woman in the executive office of the Presidency is the leader of the free world. So why would someone wanting that high office want to play the race card? Why would they do that other than fear?

Over at the LA Times they have this little tid bit that I need to discuss further…

By Peter Wallsten, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
October 5, 2008

WHITEWOOD, VA. -- The isolated towns of Virginia's Appalachian coal region are home to strong labor unions and Democratic political machines that date back generations. Yet voters here who eagerly pushed Democrats into the Senate and the governor's office are resisting Barack Obama.

Some Americans say Obama's race and uncommon background make them uncomfortable -- here those people include Democratic precinct chairmen and get-out-the-vote workers. Many Americans receive e-mails falsely calling Obama a Muslim -- here a local newspaper columnist has joked in print that Obama would have the White House painted black and would put Islamic symbols on the U.S. flag. - Los Angeles Times


You and I could use FactCheck.org to clarify and learn the truth but the mud hitting the fan is more important than the facts to most voters. They hear a sound bite and that is gospel truth! They hear the reply to the sound bite and they look at a dirty liar. Not the person that originated the sound bite but the one defending themselves.

I’m puzzled but I understand the politics of the desperation of the McCain campaign to do anything to win. John McCain and Sarah Palin will do anything short of using the “N” word when it comes to describing their political opponent Barack Obama for the Presidency. A word I personally despise. This is not 1958 or 1968! I’m offended already but I’m a political junkie and I have a rough clue as to how McCain will move his political campaign to try and win this race for President. In each video they come out with over the next thirty or so days they will dance around the word but not mention it directly. Thinking they are above board, above accusation, they will dance around the subject that a black man can not be President but a white woman with absolutely no clue in national politics is okay one heart beat away from John McCain? They have to travel this path simply because they can not win on the real issues that face all Americans! They can not match Obama on the issues so they have to go to dirty political tactics. When you have nothing left to offer then why not go extreme racist and show your true colors?

John McCain has begun to travel down that path in his political campaign that smells of racism and that is a path that America must never follow. Which leads to the question if McCain is not truly a racist? This is not the 1950’s, 1960’s or the 1970’s! A time period comfortable to John McCain but not so comfortable for today’s voters. That was thirty, fourty, and fifty years ago. That was then, this is now. And yes I read that book! America has grown up since the time of John McCain and his upbringing where racism was acceptable in the good old boys club in not just Washington but in many of our Governors offices that is frankly no longer acceptable all across America.

Brietbart has this opinion and thought to check out...

Dare John McCain talk about the issues as passionately as Barack Obama then we have a discussion on politics and reason to vote for one or the other for President. When the McCain campaign is grabbing at the edges of the cliff as the polls are falling they will use any tactic and count on you as an ignorant voter to fall for racism as a last ditch effort to survive. Let him go, he is not worth it. If he has to bash African Americans to win the vote then what will he do next to win? Is your nationality immune from ridicule?

When you take the time to really look at the issues and where each candidate for President stands, you see the real difference. One candidate is for Americans and the other is for protecting the status quo of corporate America. You get to decide and pick just one.

Obama is looking out for you, John McCain is looking out for the friends of George Bush and the gravy train to come if we elect McCain as President. It’s your vote ultimately that counts. Racism or a new America that finally includes all Americans?

So what do you think?

Papamoka

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Obama Family Made Big Bucks?

Let me first start out that this is an in the tank slam on the Obama campaign for President from MSNBC. While his tax filings are released, his opponent, the well respected foggy memory Senator from New York are not. I might also point out that out of all the Democrat candidates in the original field of candidates, Barack Obama was among the poorest of the mega millionaires.

Why is this even a story plays into the racial card that the Clinton campaign unleashed with the Reverend Wright matter. If black people are not supposed to make it in the big time roll of millionaires and politics then Oprah and Bill Cosby should just sit down and shut the hell up. I don't think so! Screw you MSNBC!

The beginning of this lead story on MSNBC should have read that the Clinton family has not as yet released their tax returns but the Obama family has. Yellow journalism is alive and well at this story over at MSNBC…

Obama's tax returns show leap in income
The family's best year came in 2005 with a combined income of $1.6 million

By Jim Popkin
Senior Investigative Producer, NBC News
updated 4:05 p.m. ET, Tues., March. 25, 2008

WASHINGTON - The tax returns for Sen. Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, offer new insights into the power couple's rising fortunes. They chronicle the candidate's rise from state legislator to U.S. senator and beyond.

The tax returns are dated between 2000 and 2006, showing a steep increase in family income.

For example, the first return indicates that the Obamas' combined income was $240,505. That included Obama's salary as a young state senator in Illinois, $16,500 in fees as a "foundation director/educational speaker," and his wife's salary as a hospital administrator.

But just six years later in 2006, the Obamas' combined income was $983,826, some $740,000 more. Obama had become a U.S. senator by then, making about $165,000 a year, and his wife's income from the University of Chicago Medical Center had sharply climbed to about $265,000 a year.

Obama's book-writing career had also become profitable, earning him $551,240 in author fees for 2006 alone.

Michelle Obama also made an additional $51,200 that year, as working as the director of TreeHouse Foods. According to the company's website, it's a "food manufacturer servicing primarily the retail grocery and foodservice chains."

The Obamas' best financial year came in 2005, when their total combined income was $1.6 million. That included $1.2 million in author fees for Obama's best-selling books. Michelle Obama's salary that year was $316,962 plus another $45,000 from TreeHouse Foods. - MSNBC

Maybe we need to be realistic and ask how much Bill Clinton as a former President of the United States of America gets for every speech he gives. Last I heard it was upward of $100,000 bucks for thirty to forty minutes worth of breath from Bill Clinton to spew his sense of reality to any organization with the check book big enough to pay him. Good for him to be able to take that kind of coin down!

Maybe we need to look at what Senator Clinton made off of her book deals. Not that having a book in print is a crime but that income is a play on politics just as Obama’s was so is Obama a bad person for making money off of a book deal?

Mud is flying and the press is just as guilty as the political campaigns of both candidates. What this story from MSNBC stunk, stank, and filled the back of my throat with bile was the simple fact that they do not think a Black African American should be making that kind of money? Baffles my mind!

What bothers me is not how the story was placing facts as much as it was the manner of the facts. He made X amount of dollars and his wife made X amount of dollars as if it was all ill gotten income and not deserved. Again, Screw you MSNBC!

Barack Obama and his wife Michelle earned their lot in life the hard way and overcame the many obstacles that our society threw at them. I give them full credit for a job well done and hope my children can be half as good in their life travels.

In this latest phase of the political campaign for President it seems that a black man is not allowed to have a life with financial gains even though his Harvard education and life mission is to be in public service. Hillary Clinton is somehow absolved of this guilt trip.

Hillary’s income is clean but Barack Obama’s is wrong? That is political stereo typing gone wrong and the Main Stream Media is playing it up as if the Obama’s do not deserve to have a life with rewards based on the same life mission.

Papamoka

Cross posted at MichaelLinnJones.com

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McCain Rove Connection

With all the hype about McCain being the only qualified GOP candidate you don’t hear much about former Governor Huckabee who is still in the race. That is till he starts winning states over McCain.

Over at GOP central they possibly manipulated this election with the Romney drop out but they never considered the Huckabee chip in this election. In the game of political chess the GOP was praying that Huckabee would follow Romney’s lead and just drop out of the process thus ensuring a unified GOP political machine. This is how the big boys play chess and sometimes the moves you make are missed when the player your are protecting is way over on the other side of the chess board.

Over at the Washington Post they have this on the current political state of the GOP. Somebody is moving the pieces on the board over at the GOP and it isn’t just John McCain…

Karl Rove, President Bush's former senior political adviser, did his best to shoot down Huckabee's chances. Rove said on CBS that it is far-fetched to presume that McCain will say or do something to doom his candidacy.

Huckabee "said he could win, provided that there were mistakes made by his opponent, and that some of these bound or pledged delegates would change their mind. Well, even if they change their mind, they're bound or pledged to vote for the candidate who won their primary," Rove said. "I find it very unlikely, completely implausible, that Governor Huckabee could win 83 percent of the delegates."

As Bush's adviser, Rove ran a brutal campaign against McCain as Bush and the senator dueled for the GOP nomination in 2000. But this week, Rove donated money to the McCain campaign. - Washington Post

Karl Rove should have been put in jail with the CIA identity agent leak scandal but that is another story for another day. If he is the background of the GOP then that is the type of folks they want in the White House once more. Make no mistake about it Karl Rove has his hand in this election process and the tactics he will use against any opponent will be far worse than you have ever seen.

Not to detract from the political record of John McCain, I’m wondering if he sent Karl Roves check back? Common sense would dictate that you do not want anything to do with the Bush crew of more lies, more deception, more smoke and mirrors and more screwing over of America. That isn’t the Straight Talk Express of McCain but I’m betting the farm that the check cleared and McCain is dirty with it.

Is it just me or is it just politics where a man could stab you in the back eight years ago but then he believes in your message today? Push poll and call you a coward and having a child unrecognized by the father eight years ago but he’s your guy for President in 2008? It’s up to the Huckabee Campaign to pick up on this and run with it but then again he’s running on a shoe string budget.

Any connection to any campaign by Karl Rove is a death sentence simply because everyone running for President is running against what Bush and Karl Rove did to America. Common sense dictates that you don’t touch the same burner on the stove once you have burned your fingers. You just don’t do it ever again.

That all being said, Obama or Clinton have an EZ Pass to the White House. Save this post, this was the undoing of John McCain in this Presidential election. That makes this Democrat happy.

Papamoka

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Huckabee Preacher or President?

Don’t get me wrong because for the most part I think Mike Huckabee is probably one of the more genuine candidates over on the Republican side of the election. His sense of humor is realistically enough suited to him when it comes to the non stop religious questions thrown at him. Being a Republican candidate for President you pretty much need to be wearing your religion on your sleeve and if you are not then you better be explaining yourself. Which brings me to the thought process of why Mike Huckabee is not giving a JFK speech like Mitt Romney did just a few days ago? After all, Mitt is only a Mormon faith member, he was never a religious leader of his flock like Mike Huckabee was.

Is Mike Huckabee not concerned about all the people of the Jewish faith that just might also be a Republican. How about all them Catholic Republican’s like Bill O‘Reilly? Skip the Catholic’s, we gave up on Bill O’Reilly when he signed his pact with the devil but don’t tell anyone. Everyone knows that being a Catholic and a Republican too is like taking scuba diving lessons by jumping out of a plane at ten thousand feet, those two things just do not go together.

Is it possible for a preacher to go from the religious pulpit to the Presidential podium? Granted Huckabee was Governor of Arkansas but that is in the midst of the bible belt and in those states having the right religion can be the gold card of politics.

Over at MotherJones.com they have this very interesting read on just this subject…

Huckabee Hides His Full Gospel?

Washington Dispatch: Is Mike Huckabee the presidential candidate shunning Mike Huckabee the preacher? Before entering politics, he was a pastor at two Baptist churches. Now his campaign tells Mother Jones it won't make his sermons available to the media and the public.

By David Corn and Jonathan Stein
December 10, 2007

Now that he has his moment in the political spotlight, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee does not want his days at the pulpit to be scrutinized.

As Huckabee has surged to the front of the Republican pack in Iowa, his religious views have drawn media and voter attention. After all, Huckabee, a former Baptist pastor, has been campaigning as a "Christian leader." But he has vacillated on how far to interject faith into politics. At an early debate, he indicated he does not believe in evolution, but at a more recent debate, when he was asked by Wolf Blitzer if the creation of the Earth occurred six thousand years ago and only took six days, as stated in the Old Testament, Huckabee said, "I don't know. I wasn't there." During a question-and-answer session with students at fundamentalist Liberty University last month, he asserted that his rise in the polls has an explanation that is "beyond human" and is due to the power of his supporters' prayers. Afterward, he backtracked slightly, adding, "I'm saying that when people pray, things happen.... I'm not saying that God wants me to be elected." (At a victory rally held after Huckabee won a 1993 special election for lieutenant governor, Huckabee told his supporters that he had only won because God had intervened, according to the Texarkana Gazette.) - MotherJones.com

It perplexes me why the topic of religion is so heavily debated among the Republican’s in the race for the Presidency and it never ends. Fractures in the political party of the current President are rampant from state to state and it will not end until the last vote is cast. If the thinking behind the votes cast is solely based on a candidates religious belief then the voters do not see what politics is really all about. Being President is not about what God you believe in or how many times you attend services. It’s about making decisions for the greater good of all of our people. Current President exception. There are decisions to be made that frankly, yes religion and your personal faith can and will have a bearing on but there is also the fact that as President you have to defend the Constitution of the United States of America to the best of your abilities over any other vow you have ever taken in your life. There is no exception written into the oath that you must take once elected President of this nation. Again, current President exception.

Thou shall not kill, one of the biggies of the ten commandments is pretty relevant if you are the Commander in Chief of our nations military. Can the preacher break this commandment by using military force where many lives could be lost as President of our country to defend our people? If not, then how does he defend our nation and prove that America is not to be messed with by all the little dictators that think they are the next toughest kid on the block? Could he direct the CIA to find and kill terrorist leaders around the world that are intent on the ultimate destruction of America? Could Huckabee put the bible down to make these kind of decisions and live with it or not?

There is a large difference between a Sunday sermon and the highest political office in the land. Sermons are easy enough, running a nation is not about words and phrases that can roll off the tongue. It’s about actions that President’s have to take and in some instances it runs counter to whatever religion you have under your belt. Once more the current President exception.

Papamoka

Cross posted over at Michael Linn Jones and Bring IT ON!

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Iowa and Bill Richardson

While many of the other candidates are going from rally to rally some of the candidates for President are going from Iowan to Iowan. Without the mega check books to buy dozens of commercials, candidates like Bill Richardson stop to meet and greet the people and actually talk to them. Millions of dollars in a war chest is good for the front running candidates but meeting the people is a gold mine of word of mouth. Having a brother in-law from Iowa I know word of mouth way over here in Massachusetts.

Here in New England we are being carpet bombed with political television and radio ads by the big three of each political party and being the third largest city in New England we have yet to see even one candidate. Romney was our former Governor but he didn’t spend much time here back then so I’m going to give him a pass. A full pass as a reputable candidate. Mitt spent his entire time as Governor running for President everywhere else but his home state that he was supposed to be governing.

I’m conducting a political survey here where you tell me if you have actually met and talked with one on one with anyone running for President of the United States. Post away in the comments section wherever you read this post. Iowans have an advantage over the rest of the nation in this respect. Going to a Barack Obama political superstar event where he is the next rock star does not count. You have to have actually sat in a room, a diner, a living room and talked with any of the candidates.

Bill Richardson is talking one on one with the people out in Iowa and I am a huge fan of that style of campaigning. Over at the LA Times they have this piece on real campaign work by the candidates other than shouting for “MAKE UP!”…

VINTON, IOWA -- Gov. Bill Richardson ends all his stump speeches with the story of a funeral:

After Franklin D. Roosevelt's death in 1945, the president's casket was moved by train from Georgia to New York, where he would be buried. Hundreds of thousands of people came out to pay their respects, lining the tracks as the funeral procession moved north. A reporter traveling on the train decided to interview people at one of the stops.

Among the crowd of mourners, he saw one particularly distraught man.

" 'You must have known the president?' the reporter asked. 'No,' said the man. 'But the president knew me.' "

Richardson pauses for effect.

"That," he says, "is the kind of president I would like to be."

Personal approach

It seems, at times, as if Richardson wants to get to know every Iowan in the state.

He has traveled thousands of miles, visiting 87 of the state's 99 counties. With shallow coffers and a long shot at the Democratic nomination for president, he is making a virtue of necessity.

He doesn't have the money for a large staff or extensive advertising, so he has no choice but to keep going from town to town, coffee shop to coffee shop, reaching out to as many Iowans as possible.

"I'm glad that Iowa is making the decision, not the pundits in Washington," the New Mexico governor told a crowd recently. "Iowans like underdogs . . . and I'm kind of counting on that." - LA Times

Governor Richardson has the people to people skills on a one on one environment but he sucks in political debate formats. He always appears angry and he has a right to be angry. The format bites! While the rest of the front runners are getting air time with campaign war chests that are overflowing with cash from special interest and the mega elitist that contribute to them, Bill Richardson is being just Bill. Talking to the folks one on one.

What I like about Bill Richardson is that he isn’t going to tell you what you want to hear to get nominated. He is telling you what you need to hear, not in sound bites but in full blown reasoned speeches and chats with the people of Iowa. If you looked at George Bush resume and compared it to Bill Richardson’s you would shake your head and wonder why the hell we elected Bush not once but twice! I won’t even go into the Gore/Bush debate Supreme Court thing and neither should you. That was then, this is now. Good book to read by the way.

What I want for a President is someone that is a true father figure to pull our collective heads out of our back sides. The current resident of the White House has chosen a divide and conquer path to leadership and that has isolated not only America from the world but also divided American’s amongst one another. That is not what I want in my next President. I want to know that he or she is not just looking out for the 50.1% of America but all of Americans.

No matter whom is running for the office, the history of our nation is united in the fact that across all party lines that we never want to see a 9/11 ever again. The dilemma we as voters face is separating the chafe from the wheat from the people that want to meet the people and the ones that believe television advertisement will win the election.

My current standing as a voter:

I’m favoring Richardson for his unbelievable experience and his sense of reality to tell the people what the real facts are concerning the war. He has the mentality of JFK but the fire of Teddy Roosevelt.

I’m favoring Biden as well because of his plans for bringing peace to the world and getting America out of Iraq. He has a plan for Social Security that might just work. Nobody else wants to touch this third rail issue with realistic plans. He flies coach on common carrier to his campaigning commitments across Iowa. Not well funded but definitely a real thinkers contender. If you want bull then don’t listen to Joe.

John Edwards, lost my vote when he failed to drop out when his wife’s cancer returned for the worse. Family is more important. I am sorry if you feel different but that is how I feel. She deserves her husband’s time more than ever than the people do.

Mitt Romney, he was governor? I truly didn’t notice while he was visiting every other state in the Union as Governor. Bringing health care to all of my states resident’s is not a good thing if you are a single working mother and it is mandatory for you to pay half your pay to make Mitt look good. Mitt leaves that little detail out of his MSM commercials for a reason. Let the MSM reporters dig that little detail out before the election. They will not spring that story any time soon. Lost my vote Mitt!

Rudi Giuliani, divorced three times as a Catholic? Those two things do not go together but Pat Robertson thinks it’s cool? I’m thinking Pat had a little bit of throw up in the back of his throat when he endorsed Rudi. Sell out was written all over that endorsement. Ask a New Yorker how Rudi dealt with homeless people and you get the dark side of this candidate.

Hillary Clinton… Umm, I think we need someone that will stand for our seniors and actually answer real questions about Social Security. Planted questioners? What was she thinking? All of the money is on her to actually be the winner of the next election because her campaign is spending the most dollars in the MSM! I’m not listening to the advertisements because they are crap. I think Steve Forbes proved that money does not buy an election. No offense to Steve Forbes intended.

John McCain, I admire his war record and service to our nation but he changed and went Bushism. New religion for him but it is not him. He is not the JM of seven years ago against Bush, against the mentality that Washington owns us all. Something went wrong there.

Denis Kucinich… Not going to happen. Great spot on Comedy Central but keep it real my friend and work the work you are best at.

Ron Paul, not going to happen either. Online support is not crossing party lines of the people that actually vote. I wish him luck though with finishing close.

Getting elected President is not won by the amount of money you have to run on, it is won by the ideas that the people will believe you can accomplish. Right now, ending the war in Iraq and Afghanistan is a priority. Taking care of the rest of America is a close second.

Show me a candidate that actually cares. I’m finding that candidate in Richardson and Biden. The rest are all running on what you want to hear. Maybe these two guys should converge campaigns and run as a total ticket? Just a thought.

Papamoka

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