a smart comment at NYT-- http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/...

It's hysterical that his speech last month was about starting to talk about talking about race in order to stop the talk about race--and now he's politically posturing in order to stop talk of him politicially posturing.

there's some deconstruction/postmodern theory phrase for this, i'm sure.

Maybe I'm superstitious, but I can't enjoy the schadenfreude until Hillary is the nominee. Otherwise, I fear they're just getting my hopes up only to dash them by going with a guy who isn't ready.

major lurker, sometime poster/commenter here

What is haka? I pride myself on figuring out or keeping with ABA (awesome blog acronyms) but I cannot get that one!

BTW your blog is really really great. I know u hear that all the time but it's true.

Lambert and the regular posters are absolutely topshelf. I figure it won't last long. You guys will soon be pulling in big bucks in some corner of the msm. I'm enjoying this while it lasts.

obsessing about the Clintons and always having them around like during their glory days? and never ever lacking content or drama because, hey, they're the Clintons after all?

or --

pitting the new young black guy they have a crush on and have built up against their longtime, devoted love McCain.

(it's not about the party or even the supers but how the media decides to portray it all which is what supers are watching--if their ratings are up, they'll keep it going til Denver, i think)

and millions.

but what I love is how the Obots were perfectly fine with everything that Wright had said yesterday. There were no Obots raising the red flag, saying that Obama had to get out in front of the Wright issue pronto.

And anyone who wasn't an Obot, and was looking at this thing objectively and said that it was a big problem for Obama was ridiculed, insulted, and treated like scum.

Of course, now that Obama has thrown Wright under the bus, no one remembers what they were saying yesterday. And anyone who looks at this objectively, and says that Wright is still a massive problem for Obama, is ridiculed, insulted, and treated like scum.

I mean, it really, REALLY is a cult.

a Maori ritual dance. It's used here to refer to a "war haka" which were originally performed by warriors before a battle, proclaiming their strength and prowess in order to intimidate the opposition.

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Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

Made famous by New Zealand's All Blacks rugby team. They do it before every match as a form of intimidation.

Paul, i and many others noticed--and also noticed the newspaper editorials who praised Obama for not throwing him away in "the best speech ever given--ever!" --- and today are praising him for throwing him away, and totally blaming Wright, as if he had said something new beyond just "Obama's a politician".

It doesn't always work. And the louder, the more intimidating the haka, the more the performers look like fools when they lose.

It's the same with blue collar workers. For weeks we were told Obama was right about what he said in San Francisco. Then, not every Obot, but a lot of them defended him for going on Fox news by saying he needed to reach out to blue collar workers. But why would he need to reach out to them if he was only telling the truth? And if he had a problem wouldn't an apology have been a better response than what he did? He either has a problem or he doesn't.

And it's causing me to question my own judgment. I have to think that recent events are causing SDs to question nominating Obama. It's not just about Wright, it's about Obama handling Wright, backing away from debates, and generally spinning like a top. And, yet, I find myself starting sentences that say, "while I still think Obama is likely to be the nominee..", even though I don't know that I still think that. But so many other people seem to think that, isn't it crazy to think otherwise? Not crazy to think Clinton has a chance, but crazy to think that chance is 45-55% (if not higher). Am I simply delusional because I'm so invested at this point in Clinton being the nominee that I'm not thinking clearly?

And then when I think I do see things clearly, I wonder if the Super Delegates do. Would they really go with a damaged Obama who barely limped across the finish line just because they are afraid of the screaming that would occur if they didn't? I like to think the party leaders are better than that, but these are the same people already undercutting UHC, so who knows?

I think that everyone really needs to look at what he said on March 18th (I lied...it was 5 weeks ago)

And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions - the good and the bad - of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.

Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.

You could spend another 5 weeks mining those words quoted from his 'major speech on race' and then comparing them to his statements today and simply be horrified by his judgment...whether it was his judgment today or that of 5 weeks ago.

Clearly today was all about trying to right a boat that is sinking - as in a LOT of super delegates saying sorry Charlie, only the best tuna...

But the clear takeaway I see is this...

That you can count on Obama to turn and run when the going gets tough. In the course of 5 weeks, he went from being completely unable to disown Reverend Wright to disowning Reverend Wright...and why? Fear!

Obama is a fraud, not the Wright stuff at all.

I would have respected him hanging tough for the man he loves but cannot possibly respect him for his continual acts of personal motivations.

Granny has been disowned

or is he lying now?

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Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

he's just a politician, and his anger today at the accusation, his denunciation, and the press conf itself, proved Wright right in multiple ways.

Wright feels used, i think. And that Obama shouldn't have explained him away as the old cranky uncle who rants and who's living in the past.

and continually. His story on Wright changes all the time, and now he's back to never having heard anything like this? At the big speech, he admitted hearing stuff. None of it adds up, and it never has.

And now he gave the networks himself to air instead of airing Wright--just like the big speech gave them before (also instead of Wright). We'll see if it works again.

that Wright is laughing all the way to the bank because his star keeps on rising and through it all, he got to pimp his upcoming book on the national stage for free.

Personally, I sort of like the guy (Wright). He's sort of an ass but he's quick witted and funny.

Obama on the other hand has shown a really ugly side that no one wants for their president...that he's weak and won't stand behind what he says.

If he won't stand up to his professed admiration and affection for this guy who was such a big influence in his life in just 5 weeks, how can anyone vote for the guy? Do they think that he's going to grow a pair between now and next January?

The real disaster is not only, as Wright pointed out, that Obama is a politician...it's that he is the worst kind of politician that will say anything, destroy all of his friends and abandon everything you have said if it has a personal cost.

His book is due to come out later this year. Before the general election, no doubt. Terrific.

I'll say this, Obama isn't wrong about Wright gunning for him. In that sense it is about Obama now.

you'll be seeing them again on the way back down.

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Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

and gives it to them--and he can't be hurt--only helped by the media access.

Getting hopes up,
heck I've been getting my hopes up since I knew Hillary was running, but yeah agreed hehe, it is hard to feel gracious towards the obamakins....I'm even stirring the Koolaid a bit.

"there’s some deconstruction/postmodern theory phrase for this, i’m sure." oh yes it's called Snake oil salesman Redux.

"I mean, it really, REALLY is a cult." It's not quite to FLDS but not quite as tame as BJU....I keep wondering what Michelle's take is on this. Would love to be the fly on the wall to listen to her rant and rave,then collect herself to say 'Trust Barrack, because we say to' then her eyes have that look like did she say that and did people get it, then she just smiles like, oh it must make sense they are all clapping.

Ok Rugby is my new favorite sport, those dudes are hot in the haka deal....how hasn't someone not snapped them up as a team to be personal assistants? Reminds me of Stomp the Yard. I bet foreplay is a hoot.

I do think that men like Wright are genuinely nice dudes, history is littered with well-intentioned nice dudes who did awful things because of their perverse ideologies. I don't think that Wright is a healthy person to watch, and I try not to. I do think that going to holy roller churches is fun, as long as they have balconies, and not every week unless you are a folk artist.

I do think it interesting that now obamakins are saying "oh well he didn't really know him". I just can't wrap my head around it. What happened to 'crazy uncle' and on par with his grandma the woman who raised him? What happened to his mentor, and one he regards as part of the family? Do his supporters truly not remember or is there a collective lie that occurs that creates a fog of memory loss when faced with the truth, the mirror disappears.

and agree with poster on this being a great blog. I go to three and this has its moments, but in general I find it the most consistently literate of any I have personally seen online. (See my I hate everyone post not blog where I say as much)

“Democrats have a habit of falling in love with candidates on the first date.”

>The real disaster is not only, as Wright pointed out, that Obama is a politician…it’s that he is the worst kind of politician that will say anything, destroy all of his friends and abandon everything you have said if it has a personal cost.

But that's the Clintons, not Obama. I know that because the OFB and the MSM keep telling me so.

And ponies!

Obama on the other hand has shown a really ugly side that no one wants for their president…that he’s weak and won’t stand behind what he says.

the ugly side isn't throwing people under the bus, its acting like the people you've thrown under the bus laid down on the road themselves.

So much as I'm happy about it happening NOW, and not October, which I'm sure the GOP is upset about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuhOj2dQTrk

god damn Obama and his arrogant rush to be president. He is either a fool himself or has surrounded himself so deeply by fools that the light of day cannot penetrate the fog of adulation.

Did they really think that opponents would just sort of not notice or care about figures like Wright and Rezko and Ayers?
Are they really that blind, or just stupid? Which is worse?

If he had taken a measured and disciplined route to be president, spent a term in the Senate, written and passed some important legislation, gone on a national listening tour to discuss race in America, put real and meaningful distance between himself and his less savory early backers, built a reputation for reaching out and coalition building on actions and accomplishments rather than words and feelings likehope, then for goodness sakes EVERYONE in America would have lined up to vote for him in 2016.

When he'd be all of 52 years old.

For crying out loud. What a shame and a waste of promise. Thrown away with arrogance and lying.

BDBlue and myiq2xu for the explanation of haka.

I love it! Perfect metaphor the krazy korange kult.

He claims he's not whining, perhaps he doesn't understand what "whining" is (he is an Obama supporter).