-By Warner Todd Huston
There is little doubt that Barack Hussein Obama is an empty suit. You know it and I know it. In fact, I know it even better because I am from Illinois. I’ve watched Barack do practically nothing for an entire political career in State government, save vote on the extreme left every time he bothered to — which wasn’t too often. He has the worst absentee and “present” vote record of any Illinois politician.
But, when he did vote it was usually for two purposes. The first one was to follow the hard-left line, and the second to gather influential friends that would give him money.
He is well known, for instance, for his vote to withhold emergency care to babies who suffered the failed attempts of an abortion but were born anyway. The legislation called the “Born-Alive Act” in Illinois would have made it illegal to allow babies born in such horrid conditions to die of neglect. He did this because he felt there was a long-shot chance that the bill might be used to undermine abortion. This bipartisan bill had a lot of supporters, but Obama was not one of them. He has been a strong abortion advocate since day one. The man has a 100% rating from Planned Parenthood.
But, in the end Obama did little of note in the Illinois State House, just as he’s done little of note in the Senate of the United States. He sponsors little legislation and votes as few times as he can get away with, mostly so that he doesn’t have to take a stand in public on any particular issue. He wants as little record as possible so that people have as little history from which to judge him.
And yet, not a single bit of this will matter. His legion of fans — and they can more rightfully be considered fans, not political followers — don’t give a donkey’s rear about what he does or does not really stand for. All they see is the “magic man” they love, the man who is for “change.” They haven’t a clue what that means, but they love it unconditionally. This man seems to have the singular ability to make slobbering nitwits of everyone he meets.
As each day passes and we learn of Barack Obama’s past the more unsavory his associates get. As a young man Obama was enamored with a man named Frank Marshall Davis, an old line communist that lived in Hawaii near Barack. When he chose Chicago to serve as his power base, he became a close associate of aging domestic terrorists William Ayers and his wife Bernadine Dohrn, later claiming he had no idea that they were once members of the murderous Weathermen – a fact that all of Chicago knew. He sought out a church and became fast friends with Reverend Jeremiah Wright. He came to call Wright his “spiritual mentor” even though Wright preached from his pulpit that America deserved 9/11 and that the US Government created AIDS to kill black people. Obama joined the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now (ACORN), a group that works hard for left-wing causes and union activism. He served as council for the fraud wracked activist organization, helped raise money and train its people. Obama even courted and garnered the support of a group called the New Party, a group with avowed socialist goals.
Any one of these things alone, should they have come from the right and not the left, would have been enough to sink a Republican candidate.
Remember how McCain had to disavow Rev. John Hagee when it became more widely known that he may have made an anti-Catholic comment or two over the years? Hagee was deemed by the media as the white version of Jeremiah Wright and McCain branded a hater for having Hagee as “his” preacher. Only, McCain had never met Hagee before the campaign and had never attended his Church making the media’s comparison with Wright as farcical as it could be. Comparing Hageee, a man that McCain had just met, to Wright, a man that was Obama’s “spiritual mentor” and member of the family by Barack’s own admission, was as illegitimate as it could get.
Yet, there we have it anyway. As absurd as it is, Hagee was claimed to nullify the Wright issue by the media and Obama’s sycophants alike.
Both Obama and Biden have made gaffs the likes of which would have been used to destroy any other candidate. This list of gaffes is legion. In fact, Biden has put his foot in his mouth so much that they’ve taken him from the stump and hidden him away to contain the damage he does.
Yet again, none of this matters. When any random Barack supporter is asked why they support Obama, they can only say that they just DO. That’s the beginning and end of the thought process. They don’t know what he’s done, with whom he’s associated, or what he really wants to do. They just know they are for him.
Even worse, they don’t want to know.
This all makes Obama the hardest political foe to beat. McCain has obviously tried a lot of different tactics and hasn’t found the perfect mix even yet. Yet, all is still not lost. Recently McCain has begun to make in-roads into Obama’s easy coverage.
With Joe the Plumber, for instance, McCain has finally found a way to get an economic message to resonate. Obama made a major mistake with his “spread the wealth” reply to Joe and McCain has made excellent use of that in these tough times.
The second issue that is resonating, though a little less so, is the ACORN vote fraud issue. And with this one it is up to the GOP itself, both national and state parties, to drive this one home.
For years as a Cook County native I’ve watched the Illinois Republican Party turn a blind eye to Democrat vote fraud. As a result, most people are uninformed about just how bad it really is. If the state party does not highlight this issue it will pass without notice as it always does.
Americans are attuned to the idea that elections are shot-through with fraud, but the Democrats have succeeded in making most people blame it on the GOP.
But the massive fraud that ACORN has been involved in has handed the GOP the ideal way to turn this around. This can only resonate if the state parties jump on this matter with both feet. If they do not the opportunity will be lost and voters will continue to have a vague feeling that it is the Republicans that are responsible for all the vote fraud in this country.
John Boehner has been leading on this issue. Boehner has urged President Bush to direct Attorney General Michael Mukasey to investigate AACORN’s massively fraudulent voter registration efforts in Ohio. This effort to highlight ACORN’s fraud and, therefore Obama’s, must be replicated by every state GOP Party.
With just over a week to go, there are still a few ways for the Republicans to gain the ear of the voters on issues that worry them. They only have but to seize the day.
Not all voters can be swayed. Many of Barack’s most ardent fans won’t be swayed by any facts, figures or issues regardless. But, all McCain needs is just enough to swing it all his way.
Remember, despite the media’s slobbering over Obama, the electorate is still fairly closely split in half.
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Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer, has been writing opinion editorials and social criticism since early 2001 and is featured on many websites such as newsbusters.org, townhall.com, New Media Journal, Men’s News Daily and the New Media Alliance among many, many others. Additionally, he has been a frequent guest on talk-radio programs to discuss his opinion editorials and current events. He has also written for several history magazines and appears in the new book “Americans on Politics, Policy and Pop Culture” which can be purchased on amazon.com. He is also the owner and operator of publiusforum.com. Feel free to contact him with any comments or questions : EMAIL Warner Todd Huston