Conservativa

I have a story to tell. Please read and think about it. So I was in college, working, and one day I walked into the workplace, and my co-workers were all wide-eyed. “We’ve been trying to reach you! There are [government agency] security men in your office and they want to talk to you NOW!” I had no idea what for, so I walked in my office and sure enough, there were two G-men in there. Turns out they wanted to know about a former roommate. She had graduated in [science field] and gone on to get a cool job with [government agency]. Now she was about to get a job physically working on [extremely valuable project] but they had to clear her.

You would not believe the questions they asked me about her. She was one of several roommates I had, and we were in the same apartment for about two years. They wanted to know everything - friends, family, boyfriends, any drinking or drugs; associations, where she spent her weekends… it was personal and thorough. Fortunately she was a very quiet-living, family-oriented, down-to-earth person, so I was able to assure them that there was nothing remotely shady about her or anyone she hung out with. After many,  many questions, they thanked me politely and left.

That’s the kind of going-over a person gets, to be cleared to work on [one valuable thing, sorry to be so vague] - former roommates are hunted down and closely questioned to find any hint of anything dodgy.

Which makes me wonder… could Sen. Obama withstand that process and get any kind of security clearance? Please read this American Spectator article.
http://www.spectator.org/archives/2008/10/17/obama-couldnt-be-cleared

Holding the presidency is not like being a state senator, or a U.S. Senator. The president can order a nuclear attack. It is right for us all to demand to know who he lets into the circle of people who influence him. It is right for us to reject him if we see that those influences are actively hostile to this country.

Leslie Carbone has the clip of Obama plainly showing his socialist wishes in a discussion with a man he walked up to, one Joe, a plumber. Now see this great clip, including Obama laughing at the guy (technically, knocking McCain for sympathizing with him) and hear Obama’s supporters laughing. The contempt on display is ugly to see.

Now it looks like Obama followers have swung into action and dug into the life of this plumber to find anything on him, so they can destroy him for daring to ask the Chosen One a couple of questions on his views on taxes. NRO publishes some letters from readers who find the savaging of Joe, this regular kind of American guy, appalling.

Great roundup on this from The Anchoress. And this from Zombie - super post on all of us, polling, the media, engineered perceptions, etc. Please go read.

I recently talked to someone who didn’t believe there was a photo of Ayers trampling an American flag. Well, here you go, from the article in Chicago Mag. from 2001. Photo by Jeff Sciortino.

http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/August-2001/No-Regrets/

Here’s Ayers from 2006.

That’s one of the things that’s actually annoyed me for about 40 years of being a progressive educator: the separation of the concept of progressive education from the concept of politics and political change. You can’t separate them…

If you don’t find that alarming, them please go read  Witness . (Yes, if you buy from that link I might get a couple of cents. Which is okay, ’cause I’m a capitalist. But read it for yourself - it is riveting and more relevant than ever today).

Obama must answer this:

“Why in the world was Barack Obama still communicating on the phone or via email with Bill Ayers up until 2005 — when in 2001 Ayers gave widely publicized interviews claiming he had no regrets about the bombing, indeed regretted that he had not done enough, and did not necessarily have any remorse either about his Weathermen career?”

(From Victor Davis Hanson). This is not a “distraction.” This is not about something from Sen. Obama’s  childhood. This was going on only three years ago. Please read the whole thing.

What might this mean? When a man keeps company with men like that, it means so many things on so many fronts. Here’s one front, one Obama likes to talk about: Afghanistan.

“The real position of these latter-day traitors is to stop the War on Terror completely, humiliate the United States, and lull the country back into a September 10th state of mind. Neither Obama or anyone else in his sniveling cohort give a tinker’s damn about Afghanistan. What they do know is that if they can get the War in Iraq shut down to “send more desperately needed resources” to Afghanistan, then shutting down and surrendering in Afghanistan will be child’s play.”

Think that’s too strong? Again, read the whole thing (from American Digest).

And why if this is so serious, aren’t you hearing more about it? Many reasons. Here are some, from Roger L. Simon.

You will probably watch the evening news today, for 1/2 hour at least. Why not spend 10 minutes reading the articles I have linked? There’s much more out there. Just start with these and ask if you really want Sen. Obama to be President of the United States. He would be making decisions that will influence our entire world, and he will be making them from a mind formed, informed, and conditioned by long-time associations with Ayers, Dohrn, Wright, et al.

You may have your questions about John McCain, but they are nothing like the kinds of questions that are out there, UNANSWERED, about Barack Obama.

Elections matter. Mark Warner, who wants to be in the Senate, has now been endorsed by Jason Alexander. That’s right, an actor best known for playing a feckless Yankee in an old TV show, a show proud to be described as “about nothing,” is trying to tell us that Warner is the guy to vote for. Really? In times like this? When Harry Reid, with whom Warner will be voting in lockstep, is surely trying to stuff who knows what into this bailout, a vote for Warner is a vote for more of that.

Meanwhile, House Republicans including Eric Cantor, are proposing something more like this.

Elections matter. If don’t you want this country’s government to look more and more like something out of the EU, then do something. How about volunteering? In central Virginia:
Richmond Victory Headquarters
2819 N. Parham Rd. Suite 210
Richmond, VA 23294
(804) 248-6981
(note - this phone number is from http://www.henricogop.com/gopevents.html) and is the correct one, I believe)

Elsewhere in Virginia, you can look here: http://www.gop.com/victorycenters.htm
and find:
Yorktown
632 Hampton Hwy
Yorktown, VA 23693

City of Norfolk
6204 N. Military Hwy., Suite G
Norfolk, VA 23518
Norfolk

Norfolk/Virginia Beach (County GOP)
512 S. Independence Blvd., Suite 200
Virginia Beach, VA 23452
757-305-9175

Chesapeake
124 Battlefield Blvd S
Chesapeake, VA 23322

Plenty of places in DC/NoVa as well.

(Cross-posted, though without the volunteer center info, at Bearing Drift).

• Bush’s Inaugural Address
• Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People
• Declaration of Independence

Good all-around roundup from Malkin.

Good tribute here (warning - 7MB file). H/T - Instapundit. Be prepared to be angry all over again.

Multiple sources saying, it’s Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. YESSSS!!!

And don’t anyone underestimate McCain for being old, out of it, too much of a maverick, etc.  Not after this choice. Well-played, McCain!

I have posted a roundup of articles on the Georgia conflict over at Bearing Drift.

America gets ready for its birthday party. This photo was taken last week on the steps of the U. S. Capitol, looking down the Mall at the Washington monument. You can see tents going up in preparation for the huge concert and fireworks festivities celebrating Independence Day.

The concert will be televised on the 4th, 8-9:30 p.m. Eastern.

Photo details: Nikon D4o, ISO 800 (dope slap - should have put it back to 200), 55mm, 1/800 at f/14, which happens when you have the ISO set up way too high…

Here are some people looking at names etched in the glass at the Virginia War Memorial. I’m glad they have brought their children. We cannot all serve, but we should all remember at what price our freedom was bought.

Here are two articles worth reading: The Name in the Stone, by Gerard Van Der Leun, and Do Flowers Grow on Pork Chop Hill? from the Sippican Cottage blog.