IOWA
PRESIDENTIAL WATCH
Iowa...
Where Presidents Begin
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on each candidate to see today's news stories
(caricatures by
Linda Eddy)
Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2008
GENERAL NEWS HEADLINES with excerpts
Zogby Tracking: Obama 47, McCain 45
Debate quotes from McCain, Obama
Place the gravity of the moment next to the blah-blah-blah artifice of the rhetoric and overall insubstantiality of the evening, and this is what you get: The worst presidential debate ever.
The day after leaves behind a puzzle: How the hell did candidates manage to be so timid and uninspiring at a time when American troops are in two problematic wars, the world financial markets are in scary free fall and the Dow has lost 1,400 points since Oct. 1? This is a moment history rarely sees — and both men blew it.
The 90-minute town hall session contained no major gaffes or game-changing moments by either candidate. With both Obama and McCain looking confident and staying cool, the contest included no fireworks or intensely negative gloves-off attacks...
Ninety minutes later, there had been no big flubs or knockout punches by either man...
Not so much a town hall meeting as a standard Tom Brokaw interview: the second presidential debate simply permitted the candidates to recite favourite bits of their stump speeches in random order. Instead of allowing the idiosyncratic character of a live audience asking original questions, the debate was over-managed by its moderator, the NBC news anchor, and covered only predictable campaigning ground. As a result, there were no real surprises or psychologically gripping moments...
McCain, Obama clash over financial crisis
Barack Obama and John McCain clashed repeatedly over the causes and cures for the worst economic crisis in 80 years Tuesday night in a debate in which Republican McCain called for a sweeping new program to keep homeowners from foreclosure...
McCain proposes bailout for homeowners
The McCain Resurgence Plan would purchase mortgages directly from homeowners and mortgage servicers, and replace them with manageable, fixed-rate mortgages that will keep families in their homes. By purchasing the existing, failing mortgages, the McCain Resurgence Plan will eliminate uncertainty over defaults, support the value of mortgage-backed derivatives and alleviate risks that are freezing financial markets.
The McCain Resurgence Plan would be available to mortgage holders that:
• live in the home (primary residence only).
• can prove their creditworthiness at the time of the original loan
(no falsifications and provided a down payment).
The new mortgage would be an FHA-guaranteed fixed-rate mortgage at terms manageable for the homeowner...
McCain refers to Obama as 'that one' during debate
Dick Morris:
The Obama-Ayers connection
... The records of the administration of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC), released last week by the University of Illinois, show that the Ayers-Obama connection was, in fact, an intimate collaboration and that it led to the only executive or administrative experience in Obama’s life.
After Walter Annenberg’s foundation offered several hundred million dollars to American public schools in the mid-’90s, William Ayers applied for $50 million for Chicago. The purpose of his application was to secure funds to “raise political consciousness” in Chicago’s public schools.
After he won the grant, Ayers’s group chose Barack Obama to distribute the money.
Between 1995 and 1999, Obama distributed the $50 million and raised another $60 million from other civic groups to augment it. In doing so, he was following Ayers’s admonition to grant the funds to “external” organizations, like American Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) to pair with schools and conduct programs to radicalize the students and politicize them.
Reading, math and science achievement tests counted for little in the CAC grants, but the school’s success in preaching a radical political agenda determined how much money they got....
CNN Report shows Obama's lying
about William Ayers
You’ll want to double-check the logo at the bottom left corner during this report. It really is CNN and Anderson Cooper fact-checking Barack Obama’s claims to have barely known William Ayers — and calling it dishonest.
UPDATE: Corsi
deported from Kenya
sendoff official tells Corsi: "See you in hell!"
Kenya detains Corsi during Obama probe
Officials scuttle Corsi's news conference on investigation
The
government of Kenya is holding WorldNetDaily 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.
... 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."
... 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...
John McCain & Sarah Palin... today's headlines with excerpts
On a two-day, five-rally campaign swing through Florida,
Ms. Palin was met by an enthusiastic response from
audiences who devoured every word of her anti-Democratic
pitch.
From Jacksonville in the northeast to Pensacola in the Panhandle, the fiery crowds gathered to jeer at any hint of liberalism, boo loudly at the mere mention of Senator Barack Obama’s name and heckle the traveling press corps...
Palin visits the back of the plane
The GOP vice-presidential candidate made her way past the curtain that divides her campaign staff from reporters to introduce herself and answer a few questions for the first time during the flight from Florida to North Carolina.
Palin, who has been largely shielded by the campaign from the media, was at ease among the small group. She talked about everything from her recent attacks on Democrat Barack Obama to the economy and said she would “love” to go on Saturday Night Live with Tina Fey. Palin predicted a “game changer” in the debate tonight and called Troopergate a “goat rope,” a term for a disorganized or chaotic situation...
Palin's family ties include FDR, Princess Diana
Barack Obama and Dick Cheney are not the only political odd couple who share a family tree. Sarah Palin is linked in her lineage to Franklin Roosevelt. She also has a connection with Princess Diana.
Roosevelt, the Depression-era Democratic president, is a distant cousin of Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, according to genealogists at Ancestry.com.
Roosevelt is Palin's ninth cousin once removed. Their common ancestor is Rev. John Lothrop, who came to Massachusetts in 1634.
Palin also has ties to the late British princess, the Web site's researchers found. The Alaska governor is a 10th cousin of the former royal.
Oh, Darn!... Madonna says Palin can't come to her show
During the U.S. kickoff of her "Sticky and Sweet" tour at the Meadowlands in New Jersey on Saturday night, she shouted: "Sarah Palin can't come to my party. Sarah Palin can't come to my show. It's nothing personal," according to the New York Post's Page Six gossip column...
Palin handles heckler at rally
"Bless your heart, sir, my son is in Iraq fighting for your right to protest"
Palin to appear on Saturday Night Live?
...the
Chicago Sun-Times
reports that Palin may appear on Saturday Night Live
herself, potentially to make fun of Fey's American
Express commercials.
Bill Zwecker reports that while some McCain staffers want Palin to simply keep joking about Fey's impression on the campaign trail – she wrote "I'm not Tina Fey" on one backer's cell phone – others believe it is important that she appear on the show herself...
Barack Obama & Joe Biden... today's headlines with excerpts'
Obama admits he still smokes cigs
Barack
Obama says he wishes he had more time for staying fit - and admits
that he still occasionally smokes a cigarette.
"Most of my workouts have to come before my day starts," Obama told the magazine Men's Health for its November issue.
"There's always a trade-off between sleep and working out," he said. "Usually, I get in about 45 minutes, six days a week. I'll lift one day, do cardio the next."
Obama said he's bummed a few cigarettes during the campaign...
Gores host post-debate fundraiser for Obama
Democrat Barack Obama wasn’t quite ready to call it a night after his debate on Tuesday night with Republican John McCain.
Obama stopped by the home Al and Tipper Gore in Belle Meade, just outside of Nashville, where the former vice president and his wife were holding a fundraiser on his behalf.
The soiree raised more than $900,000 for Obama’s campaign coffers.
Obama money from abroad could total $3.3 million
Barack Obama has raised about $3.3 million
from contributors who did not list a home state or who designated
their state with an abbreviation that did not match one of the 50
states or U.S. territories, according to records provided by the
Federal Election Commission.
Most of those contributors did identify themselves as living abroad in foreign cities. Under federal law, foreign citizens cannot make political contributions, but U.S. citizens living abroad can.
The Republican National Committee filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission on Monday asking for an investigation of Obama's foreign contributions, among other things.
RNC unloads its William Ayers file against Obama
"The Relationship Between Barack Obama And Bill Ayers Is Much More Extensive Than Obama's Campaign Is Willing To Admit"
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