Barack Obama's 'lost' brother found in Kenya



Senator Barack Obama's long lost brother has been tracked down for the first time living in a shanty town in Kenya, reports claimed. The Italian edition of Vanity Fair said that it had found George Hussein Onyango Obama living in a hut in a ramshackle town of Huruma on the outskirts of Nairobi.

Mr Obama, 26, the youngest of the presidential candidate's half-brothers, spoke for the first time about his life, which could not be more different than that of the Democratic contender. "No-one knows who I am," he told the magazine, before claiming: "I live here on less than a dollar a month."

According to Italy's Vanity Fair his two metre by three metre shack is decorated with football posters of the Italian football giants AC Milan and Inter, as well as a calendar showing exotic beaches of the world. Vanity Fair also noted that he had a front page newspaper picture of his famous brother - born of the same father as him, Barack Hussein Obama, but to a different mother, named only as Jael. He told the magazine: "I live like a recluse, no-one knows I exist."

Embarrassed by his penury, he said that he does not does not mention his famous half-brother in conversation. "If anyone says something about my surname, I say we are not related. I am ashamed," he said. For ten years George Obama lived rough. However he now hopes to try to sort his life out by starting a course at a local technical college. He has only met his famous older brother twice - once when he was just five and the last time in 2006 when Senator Obama was on a tour of East Africa and visited Nairobi.

The Illinois senator mentions his brother in his autobiography, describing him in just one passing paragraph as a "beautiful boy with a rounded head". Of their second meeting, George Obama said: "It was very brief, we spoke for just a few minutes. It was like meeting a complete stranger." George added he was no longer in contact with his mother and said:"I have had to learn to live and take what I need. "Huruma is a tough place, last January during the elections there was rioting and six people were hacked to death. The police don't even arrest you they just shoot you. "I have seen two of my friends killed. I have scars from defending myself with my fists. I am good with my fists."

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[I like Michelle Malkin's comment: "Much fun has been had with the story of Barack Obama's "lost" brother, George Hussein Onyango Obama, who lives in a hut in Kenya. It is said that Obama should have done more to help his impoverished sibling. Actually, this may be one of the few times Obama did taxpayers a favor - by not bringing his unemployed brother here to live off the welfare state"]






SURE SIGN THAT MCCAIN "WON" AT SADDLEBACK

Face it, Obamamaniacs ... your guy just isn't that good at thinking on his feet. McCain showed him up good last Saturday. Now we get this pathetic display from the Dems and the Obama camp. McCain must have cheated. He heard the questions before it was his turn. Why? Because it is so clear that he did a better job of handling those questions than The Chosen One did. That must mean he cheated, because after all Obama is so close to perfect that this just could not happen any other way.

This is almost as pathetic as Hillary having a plank inserted into the Democrat platform stating, in effect, that she lost the nomination because of sexism in the media. Oh! You didn't hear about that one? Yup. It's there. Check it out for yourself.

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BUYING AMERICAN

The latest Barack Obama radio ad is called "Motorcycle." The ad hits on McCain's comment that he would rather hear the roar of 50,000 Harley supporters than 200,000 Berliners. Barack Obama now wants you to believe that John McCain doesn't really care about Harleys ... the ad says, "But when it comes to his record, American-made motorcycles like Harleys don't matter to John McCain ... Back in Washington, McCain opposed a requirement that the government buy American -- made motorcycles ... And he said all Buy American provisions were quote 'disgraceful.' Surprised? You shouldn't be. This is the same John McCain who supported billions in tax breaks for companies who ship American jobs overseas."

A few points. Those people in Washington are spending my money. I don't spend money to subsidize American companies who can't compete globally - and I don't want my government to spend my money that way either. Get the best deal for the dollar. Simple as that. Oh .. and those jobs that American companies "ship" overseas? Those jobs belong to the companies that created them. They can "ship" them anywhere they want ... and the reason they are going overseas is precisely because of the high tax levels our government subjects them to if they stay here.

This "buy American" nonsense is nothing more than pandering to government-educated voters. It's Barack Obama's attempt at posturing as some sort of a patriot - because he supports American-made products. That's great, Barack, if you personally choose to buy American-made products. If an American product is better, then the government will buy it. But it if isn't the most cost effective choice, what you are saying is that you want government to spend tax dollars inefficiently, all in the name of "buying American." A normal business wouldn't do this. A consumer wouldn't do this ... so why should the government?

Back to shipping "our" jobs overseas. Make America a tax haven instead of a tax purgatory for these companies and things might change. I know of a really great plan that will do just that ... it's called the FairTax. When 500 European and Asian companies were asked what they would do if the FairTax was enacted in the United States, 400 of those companies said that they would build their next plant in America. The other 100 companies said that they would move their headquarters to America. The most "American" thing that we could do is to enact the FairTax because it will make our businesses more competitive to the point where we won't have to have stupid government laws forcing ourselves, against the free market system, to buy American.

But I guess Barack Obama couldn't fit that into a 30 second radio ad.

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Another summary of Obama's dishonesty about abortion

Showing how weak the excuses for him are

Every since Watergate it has been a truism that the coverup is worse than the crime. But I wonder if now we don't need an Obama/New York Times (ObamaTimes? The New York Tobama?) corollary: the coverup of the coverup is even worse than the coverup of the crime.

I use "crime" loosely here, although there are certainly many who regard Obama's role in killing Illinois legislation to protect accidentally born-alive survivors of failed abortions (a position taken by only 15 left-wing members of the U.S. House of Representatives) as criminal. As most of you have seen, this issue has recently been revived, and it has now even been sanctioned as an actually existing controversy by being recognized in yesterday's New York Times. I'll have more to say about the NYT article below, but first here's a cogent summary of the issue by Rick Lowry:

In 2000, Congress took up legislation to make it clear that infants born alive after abortions are persons under the law. The National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League opposed the bill as an assault on Roe, but it passed the House 380-15. Back in the Illinois state Senate in 2001, Obama spoke out against and voted "present" - effectively "no" - on a similar bill, aligning himself with the tiny pro-abortion rump of 15 congressmen.

In 2002, Congress considered the legislation again, this time adding a "neutrality clause" specifying that it didn't affect Roe one way or another. The bill passed without any dissenting votes in the House or the Senate and was signed into law. In 2003 in Illinois, Obama still opposed a state version of the law. He long claimed that he voted against it because it didn't have the same "neutrality clause" as the federal version. But the National Right to Life Committee has unearthed documents showing that the Illinois bill was amended to include such a clause, and Obama voted to kill it anyway.

Confronted about this on CBN, he said the pro-life group was lying. But his campaign has now admitted that he had the legislative history wrong. Obama either didn't know his own record, or was so accustomed to shrouding it in dishonesty that it had become second nature.

The New York Sun recently examined the controversy, quoting Obama's comments over this past weekend:

The presumptive Democratic nominee responded sharply in an interview Saturday night with the Christian Broadcast Network, saying anti-abortion groups were "lying" about his record. "They have not been telling the truth," Mr. Obama said. "And I hate to say that people are lying, but here's a situation where folks are lying."

He added that it was "ridiculous" to suggest he had ever supported withholding lifesaving treatment for an infant. "It defies common sense and it defies imagination, and for people to keep on pushing this is offensive," he said in the CBN interview.

But who is being ridiculous? Quoting the Roe-neutral language copied from the second federal statute that was included in the Illinois bill that Obama, while chairman of the Senate health committee, nevertheless killed, the New York Sun added:

The dispute flared again last week when a leading opponent of legalized abortion, the National Right to Life Committee, posted records from the Illinois Legislature showing that Mr. Obama, while chairman of a Senate committee, in 2003, voted against a "Born Alive" bill that contained nearly identical language to the federal bill that passed unanimously, including the provision limiting its scope. The group says the documents prove Mr. Obama misrepresented his record.

Indeed, Mr. Obama appeared to misstate his position in the CBN interview on Saturday when he said the federal version he supported "was not the bill that was presented at the state level." His campaign yesterday acknowledged that he had voted against an identical bill in the state Senate....

Thus it would appear that Obama was lying when he said his critics were lying about his record. Here is the complete text of S.B. 1082, the bill that Obama killed in 2003. It's short, and it includes this Roe-neutral provision that speaks to the current debate:

(c) Nothing in this Section [the bill] shall be construed to affirm, deny, expand, or contract any legal status or legal right applicable to any member of the species homo sapiens at any point prior to being born alive as defined in this Section.

The proposed bill thus did nothing to undermine Roe or any state abortion legislation.

By now you're wondering why I began by mentioning the New York Times. I did so because it reads like a strained and unpersuasive attempt to defend Obama's strained and unpersuasive attempt to explain why he killed legislation to protect survivors of botched abortions, especially in its closing paragraph:

A year later, after Mr. Obama had moved on to Washington, the Illinois legislature approved a "born alive" law. But that statute, as the result of a compromise meant to avoid the standoff that led Mr. Obama to oppose the 2003 version, added language specifically stating that it should not be construed "to affect existing federal or state law regarding abortion" or "to alter generally accepted medical standards."

That 2004 "compromise" did not appear to have added anything substantial to the 2003 version that Obama killed.

There are thus three issues here, and I think it useful not to conflate them: 1) The substance of Obama's position on protecting abortion survivors; 2) The nature of his various explanations of his position and attacks on his critics as liars; and 3) the way this controversy has been both ignored and covered in the Obama-supporting mainstream press such as the New York Times.

Whatever one thinks about any or all of these three, it is becoming increasingly hard for Obama to portray himself (or to be portrayed by his media supporters ) convincingly as a thoughtful, moderate, unifying, post-partisan candidate.

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McCain takes lead over Obama in poll

In a sharp turnaround, Republican John McCain has opened a 5-point lead on Democrat Barack Obama in the U.S. presidential race and is seen as a stronger manager of the economy, according to a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday. McCain leads Obama among likely U.S. voters by 46 percent to 41 percent, wiping out Obama's solid 7-point advantage in July and taking his first lead in the monthly Reuters/Zogby poll.

The reversal follows a month of attacks by McCain, who has questioned Obama's experience, criticized his opposition to most new offshore oil drilling and mocked his overseas trip.

The poll was taken Thursday through Saturday as Obama wrapped up a weeklong vacation in Hawaii that ceded the political spotlight to McCain, who seized on Russia's invasion of Georgia to emphasize his foreign policy views. "There is no doubt the campaign to discredit Obama is paying off for McCain right now," pollster John Zogby said. "This is a significant ebb for Obama."

McCain now has a 9-point edge, 49 percent to 40 percent, over Obama on the critical question of who would be the best manager of the economy -- an issue nearly half of voters said was their top concern in the November 4 presidential election.

That margin reversed Obama's 4-point edge last month on the economy over McCain, an Arizona senator and former Vietnam prisoner of war who has admitted a lack of economic expertise and shows far greater interest in foreign and military policy.

McCain has been on the offensive against Obama during the last month over energy concerns, with polls showing strong majorities supporting his call for an expansion of offshore oil drilling as gasoline prices hover near $4 a gallon. Obama had opposed new offshore drilling, but said recently he would support a limited expansion as part of a comprehensive energy program.

That was one of several recent policy shifts for Obama, as he positions himself for the general election battle. But Zogby said the changes could be taking a toll on Obama's support, particularly among Democrats and self-described liberals. "That hairline difference between nuance and what appears to be flip-flopping is hurting him with liberal voters," Zogby said.

Obama's support among Democrats fell 9 percentage points this month to 74 percent, while McCain has the backing of 81 percent of Republicans. Support for Obama, an Illinois senator, fell 12 percentage points among liberals, with 10 percent of liberals still undecided compared to 9 percent of conservatives.

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A crazy Green supporter for Obama

THIS is apparently the sort of loon from whom he will be taking advice

Gov. Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas, who remains on Barack Obama's vice-presidential short list, was in Detroit on Tuesday to launch a woman-voter-outreach program for Barack Obama's campaign. "I think many people in Michigan and Kansas and across the country really don't know much about John McCain's policies and how he has voted the last 25 years," Sebelius said.

But Michiganders - and the country - may not be ready to embrace Sebelius' radical green resume either. Sebelius has spearheaded Kansas efforts to ban new coal plants, becoming the first state to reject new energy generation on health (read global warming) grounds.

"Instead of building two new coal plants, which would produce 11 million new tons of carbon dioxide each year," Sebelius said earlier this year in defending the state's decision to nix new coal facilites in west Kansas. "We now know that carbon has a huge impact on the atmosphere, and global warming is very real. In a state like Kansas, where over 20 percent of our jobs and economy involves agriculture and the land, changes in the climate and atmosphere can be devastating. Kansas has great opportunities in clean energy and alternative fuels."

But as Planet Gore's own Sterling Burnett has reported, 13 potential Kansas wind-farm projects are endangered as a direct result of the state's rejection of the coal plants! "New transmission lines were to be part of the $3.6 billion Sunflower Electric Power Corp. project," reported Burnett. "But with the fate of that project in doubt, several western Kansas officials say their projects aren't feasible without the additional transmission capacity."

"I'd say this decision pretty much halts wind development in western Kansas," said David Snyder, economic development director in Ness County. "We need transmission lines, and we need the coal plants to get them." Snyder is simply reciting Renewable Power 101: It's not economically practical for transmission lines to be erected for wind alone due to the line expense and the erratic nature of wind power. Wind, in other words, can only supplement larger (and less intermittent) energy sources.

Such energy fundamentals are of no concern to zealots like Sebelius, however. Her administration's decision has enraged western Kansans who were counting on coal power for economic development. The legislature has tried repeatedly to overrule the state Department of Health and the Environment's ruling, only to meet three vetos from Governess No.

"Not only do we lose the $3.6 billion expansion investment (and) those hundreds of jobs won't happen," says Kansas House Speaker Melvin Neufeld, "(but) other companies considering expansion in Kansas may see us as an unfriendly place to do business and tens of thousands of Kansans now face the very real possibility of higher electric bills."

Washington is already top-heavy with green zealots like Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. An Obama/Sebelius ticket would fit right in.

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