I hereby formally endorse Paul Burns for President of the United States

Paul Burns has proven himself to be an exceptional leader. He has devoted years of service to advancing the social state of this nation. He is a fighter for kitten rights.

Once in a generation a public servant appears in the spotlight. That time is now, and the servant is Paul Burns.

As he himself would say, “PB&J: Spread the word.”

Why Obama will win

1. 36 million people voted in the Democratic presidential primary. Eventually the shock of loss will wear off and most Hillary supporters will support the Democratic nominee. Just the thought of McCain should keep most in line with Obama.

2. Money. Obama has raised over $235 million during the course of his campaign. Money talks, especially when that money comes from more than a million and a half donors.

3. A majority of the country says we’re heading in the wrong direction. McCain and Obama claim they’re about change, but when you vote with Bush 95% of the time and go fundraising with him…it doesn’t help.

4. Fair media coverage. The media hasn’t attacked McCain too much since he got the nomination. The media also loves talking about Obama, whether in a good or bad tone. After the nasty primary race they’re not much more the media can accuse Obama of.

5. Different policies. One reason the primary was so nasty was because Clinton and Obama have nearly identical platforms. Obama and McCain have almost polar opposite platforms. The general election will seem a cake-walk when Obama doesn’t have to rely on personal attacks.

6. Volunteers. Obama has a national network of volunteers, the reason for his overwhelming caucus victories. With the nation in full primary swing, momentum has swung to Obama, and it’ll stay that way.

It’s finally over

The exhausting, drawn-out Democratic Presidential primary has come to an end. After 54 contests and 35,000,000 votes, we finally have an unofficial candidate.

I say unofficial because Clinton hasn’t dropped out yet. What do you expect? A candidate this stubborn and egotistical doesn’t admit defeat easily. Sure, she will. But it’ll take some time, just like it took her time to realize the primary election wasn’t going to be a cakewalk.

The funny thing is that Obama was mathematically guaranteed the nomination by early March. But it kept going. Reverend Wright was brought up. Hillary slammed him to talking about “guns and religion.” Of course, Hillary and her husband haven’t exactly been grassroots for the past sixteen years.

Well now it’s assured. Every time she lost a front, she changed it. First it depended on delegates, then superdelegates, then popular vote. Every time she lost, she changed the goal post. Now Obama has won every front, and there’s nothing she can do.

I don’t think he’ll pick her as vice-president. There are a lot of people that don’t like Hillary Clinton. The kind of people that don’t like Barack Obama wouldn’t vote for him just because he has Clinton on his ticket. During this season, when one candidate loses, his supporters say they won’t support the other candidate. They always do.

So Barack Obama, don’t pick Hillary. Pick Bill Richardson. He’s a governor of a Hispanic state and Hispanic himself, he’s older, and has been Governor, UN Ambassador, Energy Secretary and Representative.

No one can top a beard like that.

Another pick, I think, is Chuck Hagel. Obama could fulfill his promise of reaching across the aisle by picking this Vietnam vet, former VA secretary under Raegan and Nebraska Senator. Hagel has said this will be his last term as Senator.

I think I’ll also plot my candidate support.
Q2 2007: Obama (Thought he was cool)
Q3 2007: Kucinich (Starting Digging)
Q4 2007: Paul (Kucinich can’t win)
Q1 2008: Obama (Paul can’t win)

And here I am. As you can see, I don’t care if they’re Democrats or GOP. Iraq war opposition, good economic policy and stricter foreign policy is what I care about.

Now that all liberals have a common opponent it’s time to throw our weight around. For years pundits have been saying that only a Democrat can win this year. They’re right. He leads in every poll.

YES WE CAN.

Bush lies about lying

If two wrongs make a right, do two lies make a truth? Not only did Bush lie about Iraq and WMDs, he lied last week when he said the intelligence was faulty.

In an interview with the Politico and Yahoo! News, President Bush blamed faulty intelligence.

“I don’t think so. … Intelligence communities all across the world shared the same assessment. And so I was disappointed to see how flawed our intelligence was.”

“Do I think somebody lied to me?” he said. “No, I don’t. I think it was just, you know, they analyzed the situation and came up with the wrong conclusion.”

Yes, they did analyze the situation. They came to the right conclusion. You ignored it and now you’re blaming intelligence,

Let’s take a look at the intelligence the Bush administration ignored going into Iraq:

1. As early as September 12, 2001, Bush administration officials quietly questioned the claims. Richard Clarke, Bush’s then counterterrorism advisor, responded to Bush’s query whether Hussein was linked to the attacks.

“But you know, we have looked several times for state sponsorship of al Qaeda and not found any real linkages to Iraq.”

2. Beginning November of 2001, Defense Undersecretary Douglas Feith led a team to explore the relationship between Iraq and Al-Qaeda. Almost a year later, the team briefed Colin Powell and then-CIA director George Tenet on their findings. On September 25th 2002, Bush linked the two:

“They’re both risks, they’re both dangerous. The difference, of course, is that Al Qaeda likes to hijack governments. Saddam Hussein is a dictator of a government. Al Qaeda hides, Saddam doesn’t, but the danger is, is that they work in concert. The danger is, is that Al Qaeda becomes an extension of Saddam’s madness and his hatred and his capacity to extend weapons of mass destruction around the world.”

In July of the same year, the Defense Intelligence Agency found “compelling evidence demonstrating direct cooperation between the government of Iraq and Al Qaeda has not been established, despite a large body of anecdotal information.”

In April 2001, the CIA drafted a report called Iraqi Support for Terrorism, that found “no credible information that Baghdad had foreknowledge of the 11 September attacks or any other al-Qaeda strike.”

3. September 8th, 2002:

“We do know that he is actively pursuing a nuclear weapon. We do know there have been shipments going into . . . Iraq, for instance, of aluminum tubes that really are only suited to—high-quality aluminum tools that only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs.”

In April 2001, the Energy Department concluded that “while the gas centrifuge application cannot be ruled out, we assess that the procurement activity more likely supports a different application, such as conventional ordnance production.” In September of 2002 when the CIA was preparing the NIE, the Department reminded them of their findings. The CIA ignored them.

4. In his September 28 radio address, Bush claimed:

The Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons, is rebuilding the facilities to make more and, according to the British government, could launch a biological or chemical attack in as little as 45 minutes after the order is given. The regime has long-standing and continuing ties to terrorist groups, and there are al Qaeda terrorists inside Iraq. This regime is seeking a nuclear bomb, and with fissile material could build one within a year.”

Until three weeks ago, there was no National Intelligence Estimate regarding Iraq and WMDS. The CIA scrambled to complete one, later debunked by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence: “Postwar findings do not support the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) judgment that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program.”

5. His 2003 State of the Union addresses mentioned Iraq buying Uranium from African countries.

“The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.”

As early as March 2002, the intelligence community was divided about the link. During that month the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research published a report named “Niger: Sale of Uranium to Iraq Is Unlikely.”

During July of that year, the Energy Department found “no information indicating that any of the uranium shipments arrived in Iraq” and the “amount of uranium specified far exceeds what Iraq would need even for a robust nuclear weapons program.”

The 2006 Senate Select Committee on Intelligence confirmed this:
“Postwar findings do not support the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) assessment that Iraq was ‘vigorously trying to procure uranium ore and yellowcake’ from Africa. Postwar findings support the assessment in the NIE of the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) that claims of Iraqi pursuit of natural uranium in Africa are ‘highly dubious.”

6. On February 3, 2003 Colin Powell presented to the UN.

“My colleagues, every statement I make today is backed up by sources, solid sources. These are not assertions. What we’re giving you are facts and conclusions based on solid intelligence. I will cite some examples, and these are from human sources.”

He also claimed that “a senior terrorist operative telling how Iraq provided training in these weapons [of mass destruction] to Al Qaeda.”

Six days earlier, the CIA had concluded that the detainee “was not in a position to know if any training had taken place.”

No Mr. Bush, the intelligence was correct. What you took from that intelligence and told the American people is what’s flawed.

Thanks Center for Public Integrity!

var MyShoutItURL = “http://www.shoutwire.com/comments/162924″;

Is Hilary Rosen a sign of things to come?

We all love us some Huffpo. The #1 Technorati blog. I don’t even know if blog is the right term for this news site.

Buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut (That’s a long but) they just hired a new political director. No, not a politician or journalist. They hired a former CEO of the RIAA. Hilary Rosen, whose time at the RIAA included:

The dismantling of the Napster and Audiogalaxy Internet file-trading services.

Passage of the controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Initiating the Grokster lawsuit on which the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the record industry

Passage of the Performance Rights Act creating a public performance right for the first time for sound recordings

Passage of the Record Rental Act providing additional rental protection for sound recordings

Passage of numerous trade treaties providing increased protection for US intellectual property abroad

So now you can blame her for DRM AND watering down the Huffpo. Why do I think she’ll do that?

Well, does Rosen seem like the kind of person who sticks up for individuals? Or fights corporatism and for a free press? Not really.

Arianna Huffington said in a Wired interview that having Rosen on staff would help with political connections.

Now, back to the buuuuuuuuuuuuut. Isn’t that what CBS, NBC, CNN, ABC and FOX do? Trade in impartiality and fairness for contacts? Water down their coverage for easier leads? I hope the Huffpo remains an independent source for news. It would be a terrible thing to waste.

PS-email them at info@huffingtonpost.com