Kenya detains Corsi during Obama probe
Officials scuttle WND reporter's news conference on investigation
Posted: October 07, 2008
7:26 am Eastern
© 2008 WorldNetDaily
WND senior staff writer Jerry Corsi
NAIROBI, Kenya – The government of Kenya is holding WND senior staff reporter Jerome Corsi in custody at immigration headquarters after police picked him up at his hotel just prior to a scheduled news conference in which he planned to announce the findings of his investigation into Barack Obama's connections in the country.
Corsi, the author of the No. 1 best-selling book "The Obama Nation," was picked up by authorities at his hotel at 9:45 a.m. and is being detained at Nyayo House, the provincial headquarters for Nairobi.
"Just as we were about to start the 10 a.m. press conference at the Grand Regency Hotel in Nairobi, Kenyan immigration approached us and detained us," Corsi told WND by telephone this morning. "Tim Bueler, my publicist, and I are now in the immigration offices, with our passports taken. The immigration officer told the press, 'There is no problem, and Dr. Corsi is a friend of Kenya.'"
Corsi had extensive meetings with top Kenyan officials upon his arrival. His visit and his activities during his stay have been well-known to authorities at the highest levels.
A senior immigration official in charge of investigations, Carlos Maluta was quoted by the Associated Press as saying: "We still haven't decided what to do with him."
Despite reports elsewhere to the contrary, Corsi has not been arrested or charged with any offense.
Corsi remains in continual contact with WND editors by telephone and text messaging.
Obama has a long history of connections in Kenya, where his father worked as a government economist. Corsi documented this history in his book and went to Kenya to find answers to lingering questions – particularly about the links between the presidential candidate and Kenya Prime Minister Raila Odinga.
Corsi had promised a news conference today that would "expose details of deep secret ties between U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and a section of Kenya government leaders, their connection to certain sectoral groups in Kenya and subsequent plot to be executed in Kenya should Senator Obama win the American presidency."
Meanwhile, the management of the hotel where Corsi was scheduled to hold the press conference has repudiated its plans to provide the facility.
In a press release, the hotel said: "We would like to assure our business partners and the public at large that Laico Regency Hotel is a law-abiding institution and does not condone any smear campaigns. The management cannot allow such activities to take place."
Corsi told WND he has been assured he will be released soon. He had planned to leave the country tomorrow, arriving in London first and the U.S. Friday.
A hotel worker in Nairobi told Reuters Corsi was picked up as soon as he walked into the hotel for the scheduled press conference: "He was walking in and then some immigration officers who were following him snatched him. It happened so fast, they just vanished with him."
"Obama is revered in Kenya for his paternal roots here and as a flagbearer for Africa on the international stage," explained the Reuters dispatch.
Kenyan TV station KTN said Corsi may be sent home due to lack of a work permit. However, Corsi met with top officials in Nairobi earlier this week explaining in detail the purpose of his visit and sharing copies of his news releases and books.
Corsi told WND Editor Joseph Farah by telephone that Kenyan authorities claimed they were holding him because the immigration forms his party filled out for customs had been lost.
Corsi was set to show Obama and Odinga have been in direct contact since the senator's visit to Kenya in 2006. He was to claim Obama advised Odinga on campaign strategy and helped him raise money in the U.S. for the Kenya presidential campaign.
Corsi was to report Odinga's 2007 presidential campaign strategy called for exploiting anti-Kikuyu tribal sentiments, claiming victory and charging voter fraud even if the campaign knew the election had been legitimately lost. Odinga, Corsi said, also was willing to fan the flames of ethnic tribal tensions and use violence as a last resort by calling for mass action that led to the destruction of properties, injuries, loss of life and the displacement of over 500,000 Kenyans. The purpose was to compel the Electoral Commission of Kenya to declare him the winner or enable him to declare himself the winner by force.
Even though Odinga has not fulfilled his campaign promises to the Muslims who voted for him, he continues to cause concern among Kenyans because he has not declared his position on Shariah law, Corsi said.
Corsi said Obama remained in active phone contact with Odinga through the New Hampshire Democratic Party primary in January. The Illinois senator continued to support Odinga, he said, turning a blind eye to an agreement signed with Muslims and the post-election violence instigated as part of the campaign strategy.
I can't get over this. They put Corsi, no matter what you think of him, in the slammer. I'm boiling, broiling, steaming.
ReplyDeleteThis is a sign of things to come.
Look to your guns.
What's the charge?
ReplyDeleteGood question.
ReplyDeleteGreat question.
Looking into the One's background, it seems.
So Kenya doesn't have a US embassy?
ReplyDeleteHe won't do it tonight, but McCain ought to bring this up. Damn well ought to bring this up.
ReplyDeleteYes, I think so, Mat. If it hasn't been bombed.
ReplyDeleteIt's sad, Kenya's going to shit.
You are anti-imperial.
I think Habu might well be right, they were better off under the English.
All empires aren't the same. And some are the better of poor choices.
Kenya is going the way of Zimbabwe.
Bob, they don't have to charge you with anything to detain you, and are not required to notify the US embassy of your detention for 48 hrs. FYI.
ReplyDeleteBuffett powers into electric cars, buying 10% of BYD
ReplyDeleteBy Robert Daniel, MarketWatch
Last update: 6:10 a.m. EDT Sept. 28, 2008
TEL AVIV (MarketWatch) - A Berkshire Hathaway Inc. subsidiary agreed to buy 10% of BYD Co., a Chinese producer of rechargeable batteries, electric cars, and car parts, for US$230 million, the companies said late on Friday.
MidAmerican Energy Holdings Co. said in a statement that it would buy 225 million shares of Shenzen-based BYD (BYDDF: 1.75, -0.19, -9.8%)(HK:1211: news, chart, profile) for HK$1.8 billion.
BYD's Website says the company's 130,000 workers produce information-technology products including nickel-cadmium and lithium-ion rechargeable batteries, mobile-phone displays, keypads and housings; laptop-computer keypads, and more.
On the vehicle side, the company produces electric cars, ranging from economy to luxury models, as well as car molds and car parts.
From the posted World Net Daily article he has not been arrested and he's not in prison rather he is being detained at the head office of immigration. I heard on my local news this morning that he had been detained for not having a work permit.
ReplyDeleteHow, and why, do you think that McCain should "bring this up" with Obama tonight Bobal? What would you expect Obama to do that Bush and the US government would or could not?
Right, Trish.
ReplyDeleteThey were better off under the English.
If that makes me a racist, so be it.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteBob, they don't have to charge you with anything to detain you
ReplyDeleteThat is exactly the problem.
I can just whisk Trish off the street if I don't like what I think she is going to say.
Bullshit, I call it Bullshit.
Yet you are so keen of the US government doing just that with the folks at Guantanamo.
ReplyDeleteCorsi wasn't a threat to the state of Kenya, if you can call it a state now, rather than the more appropriate designation of mob.
ReplyDeleteCorsi wasn't running drugs, or guns, Corsi wasn't a terrorist planning an attack.
Corsi was planning a press conference.
BULLSHIT
Well, there is a slight difference between being picked up on the battlefield, and in your hotel preparing for a press conference.
ReplyDeleteTry as I might, I just can't refrain from calling you a moron, Ash.
ReplyDeleteYou smary little piece of crap.
Bob, that's the rule everywhere.
ReplyDeleteKnow before you go, especially if your plan is to embarrass a politically prickly government in a high profile way. Which I'm assuming was the reason for the pick-up and whatever custodial harassment might ensue.
smary
ReplyDeletesmarmy
I think Habu might well be right, they were better off under the English.
ReplyDelete==
If the Jihadis can win for themselves half of that continent, so can the English.
If they want to be creative, that 48 hours is the opportunity to get you to say all kinds of shit. Which can and will be used against you.
ReplyDeleteThat's always good to know, too.
Sounds like Corsi mis-titled his book....should be ObamaWorld instead of ObamaNation....Welcome to the new World Order. Getting stranger by the day. Read on PJM of his history with the Joyce Foundation:
ReplyDeletehttp://pajamasmedia.com/blog/obama-and-the-attempt-to-destroy-the-second-amendment/
Although rereading this, there's no need for them to get creative:
ReplyDeleteCorsi had promised a news conference today that would "expose details of deep secret ties between U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and a section of Kenya government leaders, their connection to certain sectoral groups in Kenya and subsequent plot to be executed in Kenya should Senator Obama win the American presidency."
Yeah, I'm gonna say it, because no one else will: You stoopid American.
Wolcott sure doesn't mince his words:
ReplyDelete"Which brings me to the 'sweet' part of my bittersweet hysteria. Even as I wave a farewell hankie at my investment holdings as they sink into the briny deep, I draw spiritual comfort from seeing the McCain-McWinky campaign unceremoniously drown with them. McCain could still win, but the advance signs of rapid decay are everywhere in his campaign, a death mask forming with rictus sneer that resembles a silent snarl. I harbor no grand illusions about Obama, he isn't my messiah (I don't have a messiah, the writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson supplying more than enough transcendence to last a lifetime), and I'm still not sure how much he comprehends how gravely this country has been gutted over the last decade. My rooting interest is less about Obama himself than about how big a hurt he can put to the Republican Party. I don't want the Republican Party simply defeated in November, I want to see it smashed beyond all recognition, in such wriggling, writhing, anguished disarray that it can barely reconstitute itself, so desperate for answers that it looks to Newt Gingrich for visionary guidance, his wisdom and insight providing the perfect cup of hemlock to finish off the conservative movement for good so that it can rot in the salted earth of memory unmissed and unmourned in toxic obscurity.
I really don't think that's too much to ask, even in these frugal times. "
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/wolcott/
Ash-Like most liberals, never a thought of his own. Has to cut and paste someone else's thoughts.
ReplyDeleteTrish, you're right, who in their right mind would have a press conf. in Kenya to expose Kenyans doing bad things....Stoopid American is right.
Wolcott's a pillow biter, just like Steve Cohen (and Ash).
ReplyDeleteI've never seen Bob lose it with anyone. Ashley, you really are a piece of work.
ReplyDeleteA stranger in a strange land, bob, should walk lightly.
ReplyDeleteSo the Kenyans are upset Mr Corsi did not get a work visa, while he was working in Kenya. They are holding him, most likely, prior to deportation.
If that deportation takes more than thirty days to process, then you'll know the "Fix" may have been in. They can easily hold that fellow incommunicado for that long, if they wish.
Or send him on his way, today.
As to Obama's citizenship, his passport is all the proof the world requires.
That's Federalism, for you.
ash said...
ReplyDeleteYet you are so keen of the US government doing just that with the folks at Guantanamo.
what utter bullshit....
ash,
your reminding me of a parrot...
The idea that this entire episode is a power grab, illustrated by Larry Kudlow's writing:
ReplyDeleteFrom the beginning of 2007 to the middle of 2008 the monetary base controlled by the Fed has grown only 1.6 percent at an annual rate. The basic M1 money supply has been flat. This amounts to a long-run liquidity squeeze. The credit-crunched economy desperately needs cash. But the Fed is not providing it.
Why was that?
Some of you are feeling a little uncomfortable with my post I see. Look, it is real simple:
ReplyDelete"Blogger bobal said...
Bob, they don't have to charge you with anything to detain you
That is exactly the problem."
ahhhh, geeee, where have you heard that before? No charges, just detention. It shouldn't take a rocket scientist to see the similarities.
ahhhh, geeee, where have you heard that before? No charges, just detention. It shouldn't take a rocket scientist to see the similarities.
ReplyDelete==
Is there a war going on Kenya that we haven't heard of? Is Mr Corsi a Jihadi radical caught in the company of other Jihadi fighters? What's the similarity?
The similarity is arbitrary detention simply on the word of a government official.
ReplyDeleteThe similarity is arbitrary detention simply on the word of a government official.
ReplyDelete==
The Jihadis now sitting in Cuba should have been shot and killed on sight. The arbitrary detention only applies to that of Mr Corsi.
How do you know those folks who have been detained are guilty of anything?
ReplyDeleteSimply you don't but you are a fool mat.
Tell me about the guilt of those released? Shoot 'em anyway I guess would be your motto. I presume you think Maher Arar should have been shot simply because he was detained.
How do you know those folks who have been detained are guilty of anything?
ReplyDelete==
Simple. If they're not one of ours they're the enemy. I don't fight fake wars. When you're my enemy, you die.
And I guess Corsi is Kenya's enemy so where's your beef?
ReplyDeleteAnd I guess Corsi is Kenya's enemy so where's your beef?
ReplyDelete==
So a war was declared that we haven't heard of?
The Banned SNL Skit Of Bush,Pelosi Press Conference–
ReplyDeletehttp://patdollard.com/2008/10/it-is-here-the-banned-snl-skit-cannot-hide-from-louie/
Re: The money supply
ReplyDeleteI suggest you read this, Rat.
http://www.financialsense.com/
editorials/williams_j/
2008/0114.html
You stoopid American.
ReplyDeleteNo question about it. Stupid or crazy. Crazy like a fox.
What if Corsi waited to get to Athens, Rome, London, Washington? Held a presser. The world would yawn.
What if Corsi boldly beards the lion in its den, gets scooped up with the world watching? Becomes the innocent victim. Incites Bob's righteous wrath. Which gets bigger play? Who needs the big plays right now?
Gettim' Bob!
Corsi detainment Caption Contest
ReplyDeleteImage from Drudge just now.
My entry:
BHO: "Goddamned Corsi!"
Maverick: "Way to go, Jerome!"
Whoever left the Wolcott turds on the bar should clean up the mess. There's rags and scouring powder in the broom closet.
ReplyDeleteVoting Early Not Often
ReplyDeleteIt seems like early voting in Ohio is not meeting expectations.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A weeklong period in which Ohioans could register to vote and immediately cast a ballot ended Monday with turnout that didn't quite match the expectations of election officials — or the campaign predictions that preceded it.
Early returns showed about 3,000 voters in Ohio's four largest counties took advantage of the disputed policy, a surprisingly low turnout to some elections officials.
The window was expected to benefit Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama, as his campaign and advocacy groups pushed Democratic-leaning groups such as college students and low-income voters to the polls...
m. simon at Power and Control
I'm new to this.
ReplyDeleteBut, I want to say 'thanks' to Mat.
He was the first to point out Ash is a stupid piece of shit.
Don't thank him til he moves that damned pawn.
ReplyDeleteThere is a big story coming out of Las Vegas about massive voter fraud with the name of ACORN all over it.
ReplyDeleteDon't have the details yet.
Mat is slow, thoughtfull, and a damned good chess player:)
ReplyDelete"We were extremely busy. Just lines and lines of people all day long," said Johnson County Clerk Jill Jackson.
ReplyDeleteOfficials say it will take weeks to sort through the hundreds of voter registration applications sent or brought to their office in the past few days.
"I've never seen the volume of registrations we're seeing. I've not seen the volume of absentee ballots that we're seeing, we've not had the volume of phone calls," Jackson said.
Early Voting
Polls.
ReplyDeleteFigures lie and liars figure.
LL Arnold, Consulting Engineer
DJ Drummond on weighting.
Before you reach for the Maalox, it's always a good idea to see what DJ has to say.
More on the subject at M. Simon.
Never trust a network poll without checking the weighting. I'm always suspicious of Zogby, btw, even if he seems to give more favorable results to McCain.
Mat is slow, thought full, and a damned good chess player:)
ReplyDelete==
LOL. Bob, that's cause I tend to knock the chess pieces off the board. :D
Federal Judge Orders Release of Chinese Muslims -
ReplyDeleteRCP - Obama - +190 in delegates
ReplyDeleteI'm gettin' so tired of that sitting pawn, I'm ready to put a barrel to that white head, and say, MOVE SUCKER OR DIE!
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteAnd, like Jack Benny, Mat would say, I'm thinking about it!.
ReplyDeleteHuh, but you see, that [white] pawn is really waiting for his [black] army to follow. :)
ReplyDeleteTrish's link re: the coming inflation. "Pump it up!" Anything to avoid a repeat of the Great Depression.
ReplyDeleteHoping the inflation will be mitigated by a sober buying public.
Who does Jack Benny think he is.
ReplyDeleteThe Kansas City Star reports:
ReplyDeleteAn e-mail sent to Kenyan journalists before Tuesday's book launch said that Corsi would "expose details of deep secret ties" between Obama and certain Kenyan government officials as well as a "subsequent plot to be executed in Kenya" if Obama is elected president.
Kenyan newspaper The Standard called Corsi "the author of a smear crusade," adding, "A statement inviting the Press to the launch today makes no secret of the intention to hurl dirt at Obama and undermine his campaign from his ancestral home."
Out of Kenya
You remember the old skit, the robber comes up to Benny and says, "Your money, or your life!"
ReplyDeleteBenny folds arms, considers, and says,
"I'm thinking about it."
hehehe
I was blessed growing up in the 'Golden Age of TV'.
DJ Drummond
ReplyDeleteTuesday, October 07, 2008
Bwa Ha Ha
...
This allows me to reverse their calculations and see how they got their results.
...
OK, now let’s keep it simple and start with page 14, the last page. Let’s read together the last two sentences in that poll:
”Every registered voter is included in the likely voter model, and is assigned a probability of voting, which is used to calculate the likely voter results. The sum of these probabilities is the effective number of likely voters.”
Pfft-pfft-bfft-bwaaaahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!
In those two sentences, the folks at CBS are admitting that they MADE UP THEIR STATISTICS ON LIKELY VOTERS!!! There are no real voters who were asked if they were likely to vote in this poll – not even one! Remember, these polls are how the media tells us what they claim we are thinking, and here at the end is a disclaimer saying that at least a portion of their major findings is fabricated. Just something to keep in mind as we move along, nothing to see here, move along.
I saw that, or something very similar, Sam. Got me thinking.
ReplyDeleteLuxury tourist getaway the Maldives votes in its first democratic presidential elections Wednesday that could see Asia's longest-serving president ousted by a former political prisoner.
ReplyDeleteThe polls on the Indian ocean archipelago pit incumbent President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, aged 71 and the islands' strongman for the past 30 years, against five bitter rivals.
They will also be a a key test for the Muslim nation's often tense transition to democracy, which Gayoom agreed to start two years ago after violent protests.
Democratic Test
That is certainly correct, lineman, each pollster weigh the respondents, that is part of the science or magic of polling, getting the right weighting.
ReplyDeleteThat is why some pollsters are better than others. Rasmussen has, over the cycles we've been watching, first at the BC and now at the EB, seems to be one of the better judges of who is likely to vote and who is not.
FOX News sponsers him, now. Mr Murdock and the management of News Corp, not major Obama fans, by any means.
Bwa Ha Ha poll...CBS
ReplyDeleteNo argument here, rat.
ReplyDeleteI've been following Drummond's take on the polls since 2004, and find him one of the best critics.
October 07, 2008
ReplyDeleteACORN office in Vegas raided in voter-fraud probe
Oskar Garcia
Nevada state authorities are raiding the Las Vegas headquarters of an organization that works to get low-income people to vote.
A Nevada secretary of state's office spokesman said Tuesday that investigators are looking for evidence of voter fraud at the office of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, also called ACORN.
No one was at the ACORN office when state agents arrived with a search warrant and began carting records and documents away.
Secretary of State spokesman Bob Walsh says ACORN is accused of submitting multiple voter registrations with false and duplicate names.
The raid comes two months after state and federal authorities formed a task force to pursue election-fraud allegations in Nevada.
In an interview with the CBC's Peter Mansbridge, Harper appeared to concede that a majority may now be out of reach and that he would be happy with a second minority.
ReplyDelete"I think history would indicate when you get two minorities in a row, especially minority for the same party, that that is a pretty strong mandate in and of itself," he said.
"I think a second minority is a stronger mandate than one minority."
Lacking Empathy
Raid on ACORN offices in
ReplyDeleteVegas by FBI for voter fraud going down now.
Lars Larsen
ACORN--the folks Ash likes.
ReplyDeleteThe money is starting to matter, more to McCain than Obamasan. Since Obabasan has deeper pockets.
ReplyDeleteMcCain had to abandon MI, even while he could have been competitive, as per the link to that MI article the other day.
McCain's socialized $85 million no match as Obasan's freemarket fundraising machine has continued to churn in recent months -- bringing in $67.5 million in August alone and ending that month with more than $77 million on hand.
Now, really, I am a believer is mass marketing. Television and the INet reach so, so many folk, impressionable eyeballs.
These next set of numbers tell the tale of the tape, in the McCain v Obama slugfest
A look at advertising in the last week in Michigan showed Obama dropping nearly $2.2 million as compared to $642,000 for McCain and just over $1 million by the RNC -- a difference of nearly $600,000 in favor of the Illinois senator.
A detailed look at campaign spending on ads over the last week shows clearly how Obama is using his financial edge over McCain. In 13 of the 15 states where both candidates were on television, Obama outspent McCain -- in some states, drastically.
In Florida, where recent polling suggests an Obama surge, the Illinois senator disbursed more than $2.8 million for television ads in the last week while McCain spent $623,000 -- a massive $2.17 million spending gap.
In North Carolina, Obama dropped approximately $1.5 million on television commercials last week while McCain spent only $137,000. Such a wide spending disparity explains why a series of polls has shown Obama trending upward in the Tarheel State of late.
Even in Pennsylvania, the state where McCain is now focusing much of his time and energy in the final month of the campaign, Obama's spending advantage is massive. Obama disbursed a little more than $3 million in the Keystone State last month as compared to $1.2 million in ad spending by McCain and another $807,000 by the RNC. It adds up to a million-dollar edge for Obama on television -- meaning that he outspending Republican by roughly 33 percent in Pennsylvania.
In Virginia, a state that has gone Republican in every presidential election since 1964, Obama's pronounced spending advantage is also being felt. Obama spent $1.6 million on ads in the Commonwealth last week while the combined forces of McCain and the RNC spent $909,000 -- giving Obama a $700,000 spending lead.
A Bad Moon Rising
I know the end is coming soon
I hear the voice of rage and ruin
14 SEP 08
ReplyDeleteNYTimes
CHICAGO — Senator Barack Obama raised more money in August than any presidential candidate has ever recorded in a one-month period, with his campaign disclosing on Sunday that it collected $66 million and drew 500,000 first-time donors to his candidacy.
500,000 first time donors.
Those are huge numbers, amigos.
"The risk of oversupply in the solar market will soon become a reality as considerably less generous demand subsidies take hold just as a wave of supply and tight financing hit the market,"
ReplyDelete==
LOL! Oversupply! Just think about this. The percentage of solar electricity produced in the US, is what, two digits behind the dot.
Goldman Sachs was shorting these stocks for the past 4 months. Today they downgraded the sector from a Buy to a Sell. I say the bottom's in and it's time short squeeze Goldman Sucks.
"Who is the real Barack Obama?" McCain asked supporters at a rally in Albuquerque, N.M.
ReplyDelete"My friends, you ask such questions and all you get in response is another angry barrage of angry insults."
McCain and Obama are to meet Tuesday night at Nashville's Belmont University for a town hall-style debate that features questions from the audience and is meant to be less confrontational than typical presidential showdowns.
Exchange Attacks
Whooooweeeeeeeeeeeeee!
ReplyDeleteGentleman, we could be entering the most exciting era of our lives.
Breathe that air! Live, brothers! Drink deeply of the excitement of life!
Fear not! Shrink not! Opportunity calls.
Mount up!
Thanks for the financial link, Trish. I wish I understood these matters better, but I suppose I have time to learn.
ReplyDeleteJonah Goldberg:
"Recall, if you will, that going into the debate, the conventional wisdom was that Gov. Sarah Palin would be woefully outgunned by Sen. Joe Biden. A self-touted foreign policy expert and constitutional law professor, Biden joined the Senate some time after the Cretaceous period but well before bell bottoms went out of style.
...
But what about Biden? Overwhelmingly, the professional political class proclaimed that he blew her away on "specifics" and "knowledge" and "seriousness." The New York Times said Biden avoided making any gaffes, "while showing a clear grasp of the big picture and the details." The Wall Street Journal's Gerald Seib proclaimed on ABC's "This Week" that Biden avoided any "verbal excesses or rhetorical flourishes."
The Associated Press called Biden the "master senator ... rattling off foreign policy details with ease."
And that's true in a sense. Biden was at ease; he easily rattled off a string of falsehoods and gasbaggeries.
According to the master senator, the U.S. and France "kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon." Afterward, according to Biden, "I said and Barack said, 'Move NATO forces in there. Fill the vacuum, because if you don't know -- if you don't, Hezbollah will control it.' " Perhaps Biden meant to say the U.S. and France kicked Syria out of Lebanon. But even this is woefully glib. Syria never fully abandoned Lebanon. And there was no "vacuum" for Hezbollah to fill. The terrorist group was already firmly in control of southern Lebanon and part of the government. No one remembers Biden and Obama fighting for the stupidly impossible NATO move either.
Biden insisted it's "just simply not true" that Obama has said he'd "sit down with [Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad," even though in the primaries Biden criticized Obama for exactly that. (ed. And Obama's website still claims he will do so.)
Biden bragged about how he and Obama have focused on Pakistan, insisting that "Pakistan's weapons can already hit Israel and the Mediterranean." Um, no. Their missiles don't get halfway there.
The constitutional law professor scornfully mocked Dick Cheney because the vice president "doesn't realize that Article I of the Constitution defines the role of the vice president. That's the executive branch." Wrong. Article I defines the Legislature, Article II the executive branch. Both define the role of the VP.
He flatly said that McCain voted with Obama on a tax hike. He didn't. He said McCain's healthcare plan amounted to a tax hike. It doesn't. Biden said we "must" drill for oil, but that ain't how he's voted. He said he's for clean coal, but just this month he passionately insisted to a voter that "we're not supporting clean coal" and vowed "no coal plants here in America." The scrapper from Scranton boasted about bonding with the common folks at a restaurant that's been closed for two decades.
Now, Palin had her own problems. She failed to answer direct questions directly. She offered up some obviously canned one-liners.
But here's the difference. Palin is supposed to be everything Biden isn't, according to liberal pundits and mainstream reporters alike. For weeks they've been saying she's ill-prepared, uninformed and lacks the requisite experience. But that criticism is also an excuse of sorts.
Biden has no excuse. He's been in the majors for nearly 40 years, and yet he sounds like a bizarro-world Chauncey Gardner. The famous simpleton from Jerzy Kosinski's "Being There" (played by Peter Sellers in the film) offered terse aphorisms that were utterly devoid of specific content but nonetheless seemed to describe reality accurately. Biden is the reverse: He offers a logorrheic farrago of "specifics" that have no connection to our corner of the space-time continuum.
In short, he just makes stuff up. But he does it with passionate, self-important intensity. He's like a politician in a movie with a perfect grasp of a world that doesn't exist. He's not an expert, he just plays one on TV.
No one seems to care. He convinced the focus groups he's an expert. The media, with a few exceptions, let it all slide. But imagine if Palin had made any of these gaffes. It would be incontrovertible proof that her critics are right.
Palin "lost" because she's bad at being a dishonest politician. Biden won because he is, after all, a "master senator."
ReplyDeleteI know the end is coming soon
I hear the voice of rage and ruin
Sounds pretty damn exciting to me.
The Sordid Business of Opinion Polls, DJ Drummond, 10-5-08
ReplyDelete[Snips]
As I was riding the Park n Ride to work one morning last week, the bus passed a fortune-teller’s store, which had gone out of business. The place had been doing poorly for a very long time. As I pondered the painted word ‘psychic’ on the side of the building, I wondered why the medium did not know this was going to happen...
...
There are two major authoritative poll accreditation bodies; The National Council on Public Polling (NCPP), and the American Association for Public Opinion Research(AAPOR). Any valid poll should include a disclosure that it complies with NCPP or AAPOR standards of methodology, but most do not do so.
[Good nuts and bolts information...see at the link.]
This brings me to Rasmussen. In an earlier article, I rather harshly said that Rasmussen was in it for the money. I have always asked the questions recommended by the NPCC/AAPOR, and in doing so I have noticed how some major polls refuse to answer important questions.
...
I found Gallup, AP-Ipsos, and CBS News very open about their methodology and the internal data of their polls. But I have always been disappointed in the secretive and sometimes disingenuous behavior of Zogby, NBC, ABC, and Rasmussen. As it happens, Scott Rasmussen has enjoyed a lot of success at his business, but if you want internals it will cost you, and if you want to reverse-engineer his polls to test for bias, he simply won’t allow you a way to have all the information needed. That, again being blunt, strikes me as both mercenary and essentially dishonest. And therefore, no matter what his polls say I will always see a little red flag next to his published claims. My rule of thumb is very simple – it does not matter whether the poll says what I’d like to hear, it matters whether all the supporting data is available.
DJ Drummond
...
Ride to the sound of the guns!
ReplyDeleteSheridan's Ride
by Thomas Buchanan Read
Up from the South, at break of day,
Bringing to Winchester fresh dismay,
The affrighted air with a shudder bore,
Like a herald in haste to the chieftain's door,
The terrible grumble, and rumble, and roar,
Telling the battle was on once more,
And Sheridan twenty miles away.
And wider still those billows of war
Thundered along the horizon's bar;
And louder yet into Winchester rolled
The roar of that red sea uncontrolled,
Making the blood of the listener cold,
As he thought of the stake in that fiery fray,
With Sheridan twenty miles away.
But there is a road from Winchester town,
A good, broad highway leading down:
And there, through the flush of the morning light,
A steed as black as the steeds of night
Was seen to pass, as with eagle flight;
As if he knew the terrible need,
He stretched away with his utmost speed.
Hills rose and fell, but his heart was gay,
With Sheridan fifteen miles away.
Still sprang from those swift hoofs, thundering south,
The dust like smoke from the cannon's mouth,
Or the trail of a comet, sweeping faster and faster,
Foreboding to traitors the doom of disaster.
The heart of the steed and the heart of the master
Were beating like prisoners assaulting their walls,
Impatient to be where the battle-field calls;
Every nerve of the charger was strained to full play,
With Sheridan only ten miles away.
Under his spurning feet, the road
Like an arrowy Alpine river flowed,
And the landscape sped away behind
Like an ocean flying before the wind;
And the steed, like a barque fed with furnace ire,
Swept on, with his wild eye full of fire;
But, lo! he is nearing his heart's desire;
He is snuffing the smoke of the roaring fray,
With Sheridan only five miles away.
The first that the general saw were the groups
Of stragglers, and then the retreating troops;
What was to be done? what to do?--a glance told him both.
Then striking his spurs with a terrible oath,
He dashed down the line, 'mid a storm of huzzas,
And the wave of retreat checked its course there, because
The sight of the master compelled it to pause.
With foam and with dust the black charger was gray;
By the flash of his eye, and his red nostril's play,
He seemed to the whole great army to say:
"I have brought you Sheridan all the way
From Winchester down to save the day."
Hurrah! hurrah for Sheridan!
Hurrah! hurrah for horse and man!
And when their statues are placed on high
Under the dome of the Union sky,
The American soldier's Temple of Fame,
There, with the glorious general's name,
Be it said, in letters both bold and bright:
"Here is the steed that saved the day
By carrying Sheridan into the fight,
From Winchester--twenty miles away!"
Mr Drummond wants to get the raw data and then interpert it, himself.
ReplyDeleteThat is not the business that Scott Rasmussen seems to be in. Rasmussen sells his analysis of his data. And has been successful, financially, the market responding to his accuracy of forecast, over time.
Whether one "likes" his results, or not.
When figures lie, liars figure.
ReplyDeleteLL Arnold
Mr Rasmussen won't give up his "Trade Secrets" to reverse engineering and Mr Drummund thinks that is proof of bias.
ReplyDeleteThat is not the business that Scott Rasmussen seems to be in. Rasmussen sells his analysis of his data.
ReplyDeleteBut not to the standards of his own industry. Drummond likes to see what's in the black box is all. Go ahead and buy a pig in poke, if it makes you comfortable.
Good poem there, on Sheridan. Thanks.
All those famous quotes are that, quotable.
ReplyDeleteBut market research and statistical polling are as much art as science. Easily manipulated to get the vague result requested.
If that is what you are selling.
But that is not what FOX News is buying, biased polling putting Obama +7 in Florida.
Murdock and Ailes, spinning left?
I do not believe it, not for a second.
Just as mat's metal recycler used accounting practices not acceptable for publication in Canada.
ReplyDeleteUse a historical record of accuracy, and then decide whether there are obvious client biases. Is Murdock trying to "make" news and Rasmussen aiding and abetting?
Could be. But Rasmussen has always been kinda the accepted standard bearer of accuracy, especially when he favored the GOP, against the popular polling tide of those times.
RCP has a link to this source and these numbers
ReplyDeleteFlorida Chamber (R) 09/30 - 10/01
619 RV Obama 42, McCain 45
McCain +3
Murdock and Ailes, spinning left?
ReplyDeleteI do not believe it, not for a second.
It is interesting that Hannity's two favorite pollsters, based on what my little radio brings me, happen to be two that Drummond singles out for the harshest criticism.
Maybe it just makes good media.
I'll stay with the analysis of the data that can be tested against their own industry standards, rather than buy a pig in a poke, even from Murdock, Ailes and Hannity. Rasmussen and Zogby fail the smell test on that score, whether you like it or not.
"Incites Bob's righteous wrath."
ReplyDeleteHad bob been planning on voting for somebody else? Undecided, maybe?
The Left has its Corsis, too. They exist to reinforce what everyone on the Left already "knows."
I call these people dumbasses.
Corsi will probably be on his way in the morn, and will hold his press conference in the US. Will he change the election? Be a late breaking factor?
No.
From Mr Murdocks, "TimesOnline"
ReplyDeleteLandsbanki is one of a handful of European banks operating in Britain which has the so-called passport exemption - meaning that when the bank fails, the first €20,000 (around £16,000) needs to be reclaimed from the Icelandic compensation system, not the UK system.
If Iceland's scheme lacks the money to fulfil its obligations, the Icelandic Government steps in, and if it lacks the cash then other Nordic countries are supposed to meet the shortfall, under a reciprocal arrangement.
Iceland has been battling to stave off national bankruptcy after its banks took on massive debts in expanding overseas, far exceeding the country's gross domestic product.
In a surprise move, this morning the Icelandic central bank announced that it hoped to arrange a €4 billion loan from Russia to stave off financial meltdown. Officials will travel to Moscow tomorrow for talks.
At Bloomberg:
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling said Britain is ``ready to do whatever it takes'' to help its banks.
The developments yesterday came a day after a summit in Paris where leaders of Europe's four biggest economies stopped short of a plan mirroring the $700 billion rescue in the U.S. to counter the worst financial crisis since World War II. Instead, they agreed to work together to limit the economic fallout, ease accounting rules, and seek tougher financial regulations.
``Until now the solutions have appeared to be uncoordinated, so perhaps it's time for a more coordinated approach globally,'' said Torsten Slok, an economist at Deutsche Bank AG in New York. ``It's not just the U.S. and Europe, it's banks in every part of the world.''
WCBS.COM which is their NYCity station Online reports:
Bloomberg: Brown Has Tough Job Righting UK Economy
NYC Mayor Says 'Problems So Grave No One Country Can Solve Them Alone'
One step closer, indeed,
to the tri-lateralists dream.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThat true, that Rasmussen does not do polling the way the other fellows in the Lodge do, and he will not share his recipe.
ReplyDeleteDoes his +7 Obama, in FL, induce a greater McCain turnout?
Or does it discourage those last udecided independents from going against the Obamasan tide?