Holy Toledo - is he allowed to SAY something like that?!?! I hope he has someone watching his back. At all times. Oh, but you’re not gonna believe some of the things our “media” have cooked up. Check this out:

Perhaps it was the announcement that NBC News is coming out with a DVD titled “Yes We Can: The Barack Obama Story.” Or that ABC and USA Today are rushing out a book on the election. Or that HBO has snapped up a documentary on Obama’s campaign.

Perhaps it was the Newsweek commemorative issue — “Obama’s American Dream” — filled with so many iconic images and such stirring prose that it could have been campaign literature. Or the Time cover depicting Obama as FDR, complete with jaunty cigarette holder.

Are the media capable of merchandizing the moment, packaging a president-elect for profit? Yes, they are.

Okay. NBC. ABC. Two of the major networks using OUR AIRWAVES have lost all semblance of journalistic integrity.

What the HELL is the matter with these people?!?!? Good grief, how in the world will they ever cover anything remotely challenging for The One??? Oh, right - what they care? They are clearly making a lot out of this:

What’s troubling here goes beyond the clanging of cash registers. Media outlets have always tried to make a few bucks off the next big thing. The endless campaign is over, and there’s nothing wrong with the country pulling together, however briefly, behind its new leader. But we seem to have crossed a cultural line into mythmaking.

“The Obamas’ New Life!” blares People’s cover, with a shot of the family. “New home, new friends, new puppy!” Us Weekly goes with a Barack quote: “I Think I’m a Pretty Cool Dad.” The Chicago Tribune trumpets that Michelle “is poised to be the new Oprah and the next Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis — combined!” for the fashion world.

Whew! Are journalists fostering the notion that Obama is invincible, the leader of what the New York Times dubbed “Generation O”?

I’m sorry - were you saying something? I couldn’t hear you through the grinding of my teeth. When did the MSM and the National Enquirer change places? If you will recall, this year, it was the latter that that actually broke some real news. The MSM? Not so much:

Each writer, each publication, seems to reach for more eye-popping superlatives. “OBAMAISM — It’s a Kind of Religion,” says New York magazine. “Those of us too young to have known JFK’s Camelot are going to have our own giddy Camelot II to enrapture and entertain us,” Kurt Andersen writes. The New York Post has already christened it “BAM-A-LOT.”

“Here we are,” writes Salon’s Rebecca Traister, “oohing and aahing over what they’ll be wearing, and what they’ll be eating, what kind of dog they’ll be getting, what bedrooms they’ll be living in, and what schools they’ll be attending. It feels better than good to sniff and snurfle through the Obamas’ tastes and habits. . . . Who knew we had in us the capacity to fall for this kind of idealized Americana again?”

I am seriously on the verge of being ill here. “It’s a Kind of Religion”??? Worshiping this lying, cheating, bamboozling, hoodwinking, race-baiting sham of a politician who hasn’t had an original idea I can discern, who got everywhere he is by stepping on the throats of others? THIS is a “kind of religion”? Okay, it is clear to me. We have gone to hell in a hand basket.

No doubt, Thomas Jefferson, who knew the importance of the Fourth Estate for maintaining a democracy, would be, check that, probably IS, rolling over in his grave right now. Kurtz asks the right question about this, well, INSANITY:

But aren’t media people supposed to resist this kind of hyperventilating?

“Obama is a figure, especially in pop culture, in a way that most new presidents are not,” historian Michael Beschloss says. “Young people who may not be interested in the details of NAFTA or foreign policy just think Obama is cool, and they’re interested in him. Being cool can really help a new president.”

So can a sense of optimism, reflected on USA Today’s front page. “Poll: Hopes soaring for Obama, administration,” the headline said, with 65 percent saying “the USA will be better off 4 years from now.”

Yeah, I saw that headline, too. I wondered who the hell they were talking to first, then realized it was probably an AP article. Sure enough, it was. Like they haven’t been in the tank all year long. Hahahaha.

And why, pray tell, would these young people think Obama is “cool,” yet know NOTHING for which he stands?? I mean, really - on what, exactly, are they making that determination? His listening to Ludacris? The misogyny? Reverend Wright’s racist ravings? What?? What a bunch of ridiculously uninformed children. And THEY are the future? Yikes. Sure will be interesting to see what happend if they ever get more than one brain cell to rub against another. Or as Kurtz puts it:

But what happens when adulation gives way to the messy, incremental process of governing? When Obama has to confront a deep-rooted financial crisis, two wars and a political system whose default setting is gridlock? When he makes decisions that inevitably disappoint some of his boosters?

“We’re celebrating a moment as much as a man, I think,” says Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham, whose new issue, out today, compares Obama to Lincoln. “Given our racial history, an hour or two of commemoration seems appropriate. But there is no doubt that the glow of the moment will fade, and I am sure the coverage will reflect that in due course.”

FDR?? LINCOLN?? Are they INSANE????? LINCOLN??? The ONLY thing Obama has in common with Lincoln is living in IL. FDR? What are you people SMOKING???

And, sure. You just know you can count on the media to reflect reality at SOME point, right? Because they have demonstrated time and again how willing they are to reveal the realities of who Obama really is, and what he has really done. Oh, yeah.

And not for nothing, but I sure as hell don’t remember the media being so glowing and positive about Hillary Clinton, who, since they were clearly unaware of this, was a “historical” figure by being a woman who received more votes than any other Democrat ever, as well as winning a primary, and a lot more than one. But hey, let’s bury THAT “moment” as quickly as possible so no one intrudes on The One’s ascension.

Thankfully (or despairingly), there is an itsy bitsy teensy weensy ray of light:

One of the few magazines to strike a skeptical tone is the London-based Economist, which endorsed Obama. “With such a victory come unreasonably great expectations,” its lead editorial says.

Naturally, it is European based, not US based. Big surprise. One could say that:

Web worship of Obama is nearly limitless. On YouTube alone, the Obama Girl song, “I’ve Got a Crush on Obama,” has been viewed 11.7 million times. Even an unadorned video of the candidate’s election night speech in Chicago has drawn 3.5 million views.

Can someone please tell me how it is that this virtual unknown with the thinnest resume I have ever seen, who couldn’t even get a full time job in any university or business on his lack of documentation, has manipulated the masses so masterfully with “words, just words” and no real deeds of which to speak? I mean, besides the characteristics he has demonstrated thus far besides those listed above?

Yes, this is a change:

I am not trying to diminish the sheer improbability of what this African American politician, a virtual unknown four years ago, has accomplished. Every one of us views his victory through a personal lens. I thought of growing up in a “Leave It to Beaver” era, when there were no blacks in leading television roles until Bill Cosby was tapped as the co-star of “I Spy” in 1965. When the Watts riots broke out that year, the Los Angeles Times sent an advertising salesman to cover it because the paper had no black reporters. The country has traveled light-years since then.

Is it nitpicky to point out that Obama is bi-racial, reared by his white and Indonesian family, not his African one at any time? But hey - why rain on (more of) their delusion? Those pesky facts, why am I bringing THOSE up? This is SPECIAL, you know:

It is hard to find a precedent in American history. Ronald Reagan was a marquee star because of his Hollywood career, but mainly among older voters, since he made his last movie 16 years before winning the White House in 1980. Jack Kennedy was a more formal figure after winning the 1960 election — “trying to look older than he was, because he thought youth was a handicap in running for president,” Beschloss says — but quickly took on larger-than-life dimensions.

“The Kennedy buildup goes on,” James MacGregor Burns wrote in the New Republic in the spring of 1961. “The adjectives tumble over one another. He is not only the handsomest, the best-dressed, the most articulate, and graceful as a gazelle. He is omniscient; he swallows and digests whole books in minutes; he confounds experts with his superior knowledge of their field. He is omnipotent.”

Soon afterward, Kennedy blundered into the Bay of Pigs debacle.

The media would be remiss if they didn’t reflect the sense of unadulterated joy that greeted Obama’s election, both here and around the world, and the pride even among those who opposed him. Newspapers were stunned and delighted at the voracious demand for post-election editions, prompting The Washington Post and other papers to print hundreds of thousands of extra copies and pocket the change. (When else have we felt so loved lately?) Demand for inaugural tickets has been unprecedented. Barack is suddenly a hot baby name. Record companies are releasing hip-hop songs, by the likes of Jay-Z and Will.I.Am, with such titles as “Pop Champagne for Barack.” Consumers, the Los Angeles Times reports, are buying up “Obama-themed T-shirts, buttons, bobblehead dolls, coffee mugs, wine bottles, magnets, greeting cards, neon signs, mobile phones and framed art prints.”

“Unadulterated joy”? That the MEDIA ITSELF created, and for which it fanned the flames?? Yeah, absolutely - don’t start having any kind of ethics now on our behalf! We might all fall over dead from the shock of it. So, please, just spare us and keep us in our little Happy Obama Place. Oh, yuck - making myself sick now…

Oh, and just in time for the holidays:

A barrage of Obama-related books are in the works. Newsweek’s quadrennial election volume is titled “A Long Time Coming: The Historic, Combative, Expensive and Inspiring 2008 Election and the Victory of Barack Obama.” Publishers obviously see a bull market.

Oh, JOY!!!! Another way for Americans to spend all of our hard earned, ever dwindling dollars! Yay!

And speaking of cheers:

MSNBC, which was accused of cheerleading for the Democratic nominee during the campaign, is running promos that say: “Barack Obama, America’s 44th president. Watch as a leader renews America’s promise.” What are viewers to make of that?

There is always a level of excitement when a new president is coming to town — new aides to profile, new policies to dissect, new family members to follow. But can anyone imagine this kind of media frenzy if John McCain had managed to win?

Obama’s days of walking on water won’t last indefinitely. His chroniclers will need a new story line. And sometime after Jan. 20, they will wade back into reality.

Do you PROMISE, Mr. Kurtz? Because I am WAY over all of this Messiah worship we have had to endure, even as the most qualified candidate in decades was kicking his butt in the primaries on a whole helluva lot less money (that untraceable mountain of Obama’s money. See Ani’s post, “Obama’s Questionable Internet Donations Raise Suspicion at WaPo.“). But hey - that never stopped the “media” from promoting their rapturous tale of who Obama was, how he was the One for whom we had been waiting, regardless of what the people said with their votes…I mean, really - how much reporting did they even do on the Michigan fiasco? How many people in this country really knew what happened there? How many people outside the states where there were caucuses actually knew about the vast amount of caucus fraud? Close friends in Baton Rouge had no idea about a lot of this because their state wasn’t contested, so how would THEY know what had really been going on? As one of them said, they sure didn’t see this on ABC News! No, indeed. And that is exactly the problem. So many of the issues that should have been covered about Obama simply were not, or left to the “News Briefs” section. Not so for anything the least bit suspect or negative about any of the other candidates (or if it was one of Obama’s BFFs, like John Edwards. In that case, the MSM buried critical information the voters deserved to know.). And on it goes…

You may have seen this new video already, but personally, I find this to be a glaring indictment of the Fourth Estate,as if the above was not enough (H/T to American Girl in Italy for the heads up on this):

Holy Toledo. Add these results of the Zogby Poll commissioned by John Ziegler of “How Obama Got Elected“, and bear in mind these were MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS:

512 Obama Voters 11/13/08-11/15/08 MOE +/- 4.4 points

97.1% High School Graduate or higher, 55% College Graduates

Results to 12 simple Multiple Choice Questions

57.4% could NOT correctly say which party controls congress (50/50 shot just by guessing)

81.8% could NOT correctly say Joe Biden quit a previous campaign because of plagiarism (25% chance by guessing)

82.6% could NOT correctly say that Barack Obama won his first election by getting opponents kicked off the ballot (25% chance by guessing)

88.4% could NOT correctly say that Obama said his policies would likely bankrupt the coal industry and make energy rates skyrocket (25% chance by guessing)

56.1% could NOT correctly say Obama started his political career at the home of two former members of the Weather Underground (25% chance by guessing).

And yet…..

Only 13.7% failed to identify Sarah Palin as the person on which their party spent $150,000 in clothes

Only 6.2% failed to identify Palin as the one with a pregnant teenage daughter

And 86.9 % thought that Palin said that she could see Russia from her “house,” even though that was Tina Fey who said that!!

Only 2.4% got at least 11 correct.

Only .5% got all of them correct. (And we “gave” one answer that was technically not Palin, but actually Tina Fey)

Just to be clear - Palin did not ask for the clothes the MSM made such a brouhaha about, and she did not keep them. They were given to, or will be auctioned off for, charity.

For an added bonus, you can watch this John Stoessel interview of voters:

YIKES. Are people not required to take Civics classes any longer?? Really??

What a sad, sad state of affairs, for our educational system, for the Fourth Estate, for democracy, and for this country. We reap what we sow…

What? No Ginsu Knives??????????!!1111!!!??

From my blog, Uppity Woman.

What else is going on?

Tonight Senator Obama starred in his own prime time special, about Senator Obama. Is it me or is Obama passé? I find his voice — artificially deep to project gravitas — to be just as grating as George W. Bush’s faux-Texas accent.

Obama the brand is wearing thin. He has his own hand sign, his own temple, music videos, Dish Channel, a fake presidential seal, coffee mugs, t-shirts, etc. But still Obama the man comes across as a caricature of his own creation. And whether we want to be or not, we’re witnesses to his ego-trip. So stale is Obama’s image, it’s reported that even the youth may not be showing up for The One. Obama fatigue is setting in.

Like George W. Bush, another megalomanic with whom he shares many personality traits, Obama is thin-skinned, irritable, paranoid, and in constant need of having his ego stroked. Bush made his chief of staff, Andy Card, greet him every morning with an obsequious, “Thank you for the privilege of serving today.” Would a President Obama command a hand salute and a recitation of passages from his bizzare “race” speech? I am not being facetious.

Obama knows well that the false image he’s projected to the public could crumble at any moment, exposing the man who has accomplished nothing. Both Richard Nixon and George W. Bush forced the nation to ride along on their exhausting megalomania-fueled train wrecks of ego-feed and self-destruction. Can the nation afford another president who sees himself as anointed?

Obama could possibly make a perfect candidate for Donald Trumps’ “The Apprentice,” but I doubt Trump would hire him. Instead this election feels like the reality show, “The Surreal Life,” with Obama in the mansion along with his sordid friends: Ayers, Wright, Khalidi and Rezko. The media force-feeds the nation this junk food. Just think, we could be listening to Hillary talk about the intricacies of health care or something else intellectually nutritious. Instead, it’s more Obama drama.

Early in the primaries, President Clinton told Charlie Rose that picking Obama would be a “risk” and suggested that nominating Obama would be like nominating a “a gifted television commentator.” How right you are, Mr. President. Although “gifted” appears to have been an overstatement.

But not in the United-Obama-Rezko-Ayers-Wright-Odinga 57 States of America!

Nope - in this country, at least one party dismisses the actual results and puts in who they want. I believe there’s a term for that…Oh, yes - that’s right. Banana Republic. I suppose it is racist to mention banana anywhere in the same paragraph as Obama. Heck, you can’t even mention the guy’s middle name anymore in the land of the “free.” Nosirree Bob - you’ll get the NAACP and the ACLU breathing down your neck. For mentioning his middle name. Nothing else, just his middle name in the context of saying his full name.

Yeah, Okay. (I’m thinking of taking a page from Soldier4Hillary, and calling McCain and Obama by their middle names.) Wow - he really must be The One to make everyone capitulate to his every little tantrum.

Anywho - I digress. So, there’s a mighty interesting ad out by the PAC, “Our Country Deserves Better.” And how. This one is particularly intriguing because it is a series of clips of Hillary Clinton at her rallies. Oh, what she said was good, as you’ll see in the video below. It just highlights what a travesty has occurred in this country by the DNC selecting Obama, and Clinton not just getting back to work,putting all of this behind her. No, she has been (forced to) stump for Obama more than any of the other front runners over the past 40 years combined (according to her husband when he appeared on The Daily Show recently). Yep. I know, I know - she has to do it to have any chance of getting anything accomplished for her state, and the people of this country (has the Senate always been a glorified junior high school?? I mean, really - where else do you have that kind of vindictiveness? Ok, high school, too.), and you know I love Hillary Clinton. But seeing this ad is a double-edged sword: she is the one who won this nomination, not only by the popular vote, but surely would have by delegates had Obama not committed caucus fraud (and you know he did - it has been widely documented - 2,000 cases in Texas ALONE). Had she not had her votes stolen by the DNC - wait, I mean the ODNC, she would be the one running for president right now. But, no. (And this isn’t sour grapes - it is flat out anger at the DNC for betraying 18,000,000 of us, dammit!)

So, without further ado, here is the video:

Good, isn’t it? I bet ol’ Barack will throw a hissy fit about it, too: “Stop showing her on tv! She’s showing me up (again)! Make them stop!!!!” like he always does. You’d sure never catch Johnny Mac making a spectacle of himself over things like this, or claiming that Fox News is being MEAN to him - I mean, really - grow a pair already, Barack. You already have ALL of the other networks behind you - propping you up every time you misspeak (which is, uncannily, as often as Bush), and pushing you across the line. Oh - and would it KILL you to tell the truth - just ONCE???

Ahem. The ad is a good one. Hillary is right on target. And she’s funny, too, I might add. Sigh. I sure miss seeing her, but there is some delight in seeing these tidbits resurrected to bring His Holiness down. Oh, yeah. Now that I think about it, this is pretty awesome. Let’s have some more, “Our Country Deserves Better!” Bring ‘em on! Can I have an “amen”??

First up, we have ACORN. Yes, ACORN has been in the news a good bit recently. Seems the organization Obama has paid $800,000 to register voters has been, um, shall we say, enthusiastic in fulfilling its task? Apparently, this alleged non-partisan organization has been overly zealous in registering voters, so that areas like Indianapolis now have 105% voter registration! Whoopie! One guy registered 72 times! This is not new for ACORN - they have been under investigation before for voter registration fraud, but the SCOPE of it this year is mighty telling, as the 2-part video below highlights. And bear this in mind: ACORN receives YOUR tax paying dollars. AND they are one of three organizations to which the Democrats, led by Chris Dodd, tried to get 20% of the $700 billion dollar bailout repayment funneled. Again, YOUR tax paying dollars going to fund this organization. And if you believe for one second they are non-partisan, just watch these videos from their meeting this summer (h/t to Katy, alert NQ reader). Again, YOUR taxpaying dollars:

Thomas Jefferson said:

To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

Amen to that.

While we are on the subject of voter fraud, there is the wife of Chuck Hagel, Lilibet Hagel. Guess who she is endorsing? Uh, yeah - Barack Obama. Yes, the wife of the man who is an owner of the Company-Formerly-Known-As-Diebold is endorsing Barack Obama. See, in Nebraska, the electoral votes are actually split up between 5 areas. Obama’s plan is to win Omaha, so he is actually campaigning there. But hey - when the wife of the man who owns the voting machines telegraphs for all to see who she wants to win, don’t be too surprised when it comes to pass. I am sure ACORN can help with that if there are any doubts by registering some dead people or re-registering people who can send in absentee ballots AND vote in person.

Last night, the “bipartisan” panel (which included a prominent Obama supporter. Larry Johnson had a great post on the makeup of the Committee HERE.) investigating Governor Palin on “Troopergate” declared she had abused her power in wanting her former brother-in-law removed from the State Troopers. The media is playing this off as if it is just bad blood because he and her sister were getting divorced. Apparently, so is this commission, which is framing this whole thing as her pushing a personal agenda. Here’s why this is NUTS: Trooper Wooten (who still has his job, by the way) ADMITTED to tasering his 10 yr old stepson. He was found GUILTY of “judgment failures,” like drinking and driving in a STATE TROOPER patrol car. This doesn’t sound like a PERSONAL issue. It sounds like a PERSONNEL issue. That the board completely overlooked these documented issues is very telling. Oh, they didn’t find anything unlawful in her behavior, in case you are keeping score (and you should be). This is just pathetic. And pathetic the way the media is now trying to play up Trooper Wooten’s behavior. Is this the kind of person YOU would want as a state trooper? Yeah, me neither.

And to finish up, I give a big H/T to Matthew Weaver at No Quarter for finding this extremely disturbing video of Minister Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam (and if you don’t know about the Nation of Islam, I’ll give you some tips after you watch this), who is closely associated with Obama’s church, TUCC:

Yes, he did just call Barack Obama The MESSIAH. Now for some information regarding the Nation of Islam, and Minister Louis Farrakhan from Islam Today:

Racist ideology also at odds with universal Islam
A third area of non-compliance with Islam, and the one which receives by far the greatest attention in the secular media, is the issue of race. The present “Nation of Islam” leader, Louis Farrakhan, is on record as having made objectionable anti-Jewish (as distinct from anti-Zionist) remarks. Among other unfortunate utterances, he is alleged to have referred to Judaism as a “gutter religion”.

Moreover, the NOI is a segregationalist organization exclusively for black people descended from slaves. Proper Islam is a universal religion open to people of every race. Muslims are supposed to differentiate between people on the basis not of ethnic origin but of piety and upright behavior. As the Quran makes clear:

“And mankind is naught but a single nation.” Holy Quran 2:213

“O Mankind! Most certainly, it is We (God almighty) who have Created you all from a single (pair) of a male and a female, And it is We who have made you into nations and tribes, that ye may recognize each other. Verily, the noblest of you in the sight of Allah is (he who is) the most righteous of you.” Holy Quran 49:13

And in his final sermon, Prophet Mohammed made clear that racism has no place in Islam:

“O people! Verily your Lord is one and your father is one. All of you belong to one ancestry of Adam and Adam was created out of clay. There is no superiority for an Arab over a non-Arab and for a non-Arab over an Arab; nor for white over the black nor for the black over the white except in piety. Verily the noblest among you is he who is the most pious.”

In contrast, the NOI has a pronounced anti-white bias. They refer to blacks as God’s chosen people and Caucasians as white devils. They call for a separate homeland for American blacks, for racially segregated education and for a ban on interracial marriage. To quote again from their website:

* We believe we are the people of God’s choice.

* WE BELIEVE this is the time in history for the separation of the so-called Negroes and the so-called white Americans.

* We want our people in America whose parents or grandparents were descendants from slaves, to be allowed to establish a separate state or territory of their own–either on this continent or elsewhere.

* We want all black children educated, taught and trained by their own teachers.

* We believe that intermarriage or race mixing should be prohibited.

Uh, yeah. I guess they don’t know about Obama’s mixed heritage. No matter - he is The One - Minister Louis Farrakhan has spoken. So glad my friends and family have found their Messiah. If only he wasn’t so flawed, so propped up by the media, so enmeshed with nefarious characters like, oh, I dunno, FARRAKHAN! But hey - as long as they can go to their happy Kool Aide drinking place following The One, as far away from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue as we can get them, that’s their choice. I don’t have to understand it, but I’ll have to learn to accept it. I sure don’t want this “Messiah” in the White House myself. I am an adamant supporter of the Separation of Church and State, so someone a little less celestial is my choice for president, but that’s just me.

All of Colorado is preparing itself for the Democratic National Convention. Denver is already filling up with anxious participants.  The Secret Service is said to be camped out on downtown rooftops.

Some Hillary supporters are arriving in hopes of seeing her name on the ballot, in one form or another. Other people, including the Just Say No Deal/Pumas, and other former Hillary supporters, are coming to protest the corruption we all witnessed at the top of the Democratic Party. Tensions are running high, and groups opposing the takeover of the Party are gearing up to make our voices heard, especially PUMAPAC and The Denver Group. 

Of course, supporters of the presumptuous nominee are arriving with their “Denver or Bust” bumper stickers. And there’s a report today in the Denver Post that tickets to the coronation are being sold for over three grand. 

As registration for free tickets available to see Sen. Barack Obama at Invesco Field at Mile High ends today, a pair of tickets are going for $3,650 at an online ticket-auction site, reports Chuck Plunkett.”There are another four days to go on the auction, and I expect to see people bid it up at the end,” Eric Baker, chief executive of the auction site, Viagogo, said Monday.

“It’s hard to imagine a political candidate generating that sort of excitement,” Baker said. “Never would it have occurred to me that a political speech would have a secondary market.”      

But Focus on the Family, the evangelical group based in Colorado Springs, is hoping to disrupt the Reichsparteitag at Invesco Field with the help of a “higher power.” The Denver Channel describes the video::

Focus on the Family Action has pulled a video from its Web site that had asked people to pray for “rain of biblical proportions” during Sen. Barack Obama’s acceptance speech at Invesco Field on Aug. 28.      

While the video has been pulled from their website due to protests it’s available on YouTube, and below, for your viewing pleasure. Politics does indeed make for strange bedfellows. Let it rain!  

In a tough year like this, Democrats could probably have defeated Republican John McCain with a flawed, but seasoned candidate like Hillary Clinton. But long-suffering liberals convinced their party to go with a messiah rather than a dependable nominee — and thereby they probably will get neither.

— The author, Victor Davis Hanson, is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a recipient of the 2007 National Humanities Medal and the 2008 Bradley Prize.

You can’t say that we didn’t ceaselessly WARN the party that this would happen. You, me, Larry Johnson, and many other brave bloggers. Why the party allowed the hard left — the “authoritarian leftists” — to have its way is beyond me. Most of them are very unreliable Democrats anyway. If their preferred candidate, for ANY position, isn’t nominated, they stew and grouse, preferring to stay in a snit and allow the Republican opponent to win. In 2004, I personally watched as the hard left’s preferred candidate lost the Washington state gubernatorial Democratic primary to Chris Gregoire. (He WAS a fine candidate, but he lost. That’s life.) The hard left did NOTHING to aid her general election campaign. What happened as a result? She won, by just over 100 votes and only following weeks and weeks of recounts. For the hard left, it’s “my way or the highway.” Now she’s in a tough reelection bid against the same Republican who is backed by a huge number of highly motivated Republicans still fueled by bitterness over the outcome they are certain was illegally won. Do you think the left will come to her aid this year? I seriously doubt it, even though she has pandered to them by endorsing Obama (a huge mistake she will rue when the GOP runs ad after ad showing her on stage with Obama).

SUPERDELEGATES: It is not too late to change course!

Read all of Hanson’s article: “Hillary’s Growing Shadow.”

The subtitle?

The Left convinced Democrats to go with a messiah rather than a dependable nominee — and now they have neither

The 200,000 souls who thronged to his speech in Berlin came not just for him, he told the enthralled audience of congressional representatives. “I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions,” he said, according to the source.

Holy Cow. Now, I should admit that I was GOING to write some more about Kaine and his BFF, Obama, as well as their joint BFF, Joe Lieberman, but honestly, how can I resist THIS??

“(T)his is the moment, as Nancy [Pelosi] noted, that the world is waiting for.”

And:

“I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions.”

Well, YEAH, if what the world has been waiting for, and what represents America returning to its “best Traditions” is an arrogant, narcissistic, sexist, thuggish, unethical, pandering, coercing, power-hungry Messiah-wannabe, then, yes - Obama is our guy!!!

I must be some kind of heathen, though, because I just don’t buy it (and before I go on, PLEASE, Oborgabots - PLEASE don’t waste “Comment” space going on and on about how that is not a full quote, and is taken out of context. Frankly, I don’t give a damn if what comes before it is, “somehow” and ends with, “but it should be CLINTON if it is ‘returning’ to its best traditions,” it is the absolute HEIGHT of arrogance and narcissism. Now, go away - let the grown ups talk.). Obama has made the classic mistake - he now believes his own Axelrovian hype. He really DOES think he is The One For Whom We Have Been Waiting! Wowie zowie!!

Last night, I was reading a book by Kathy Reichs, a professor at UNC-Charlotte. Her books are the basis for the show, “Bones.” In this particular book, Death Du Jour, the question of cults comes up. Now her main character, Tempe Brennan, is also a professor art UNCC, a forensic anthropologist. Because of a case on which she is working, she goes to a sociology professor at UNCC (and the information in this books on cults is legitimate - it comes from another UNCC professor of Religious Studies, James Tabor). Because I care, I am going to type out the dialogue for you. Once you read it, you will see why. Dr. Brennan’s comments will be in italics. Red, the Sociology professor’s, will be in regular typeface. Okey dokey - ready? Here we go:

“All right. What’s a cult?”

“Cults are not just groups of crazies who follow weird leaders. At least the way I use the term, they are organizations with a set of common features.” (On age 295, Red makes the point that cults can also be political parties.)

“Yes.” I leaned back in my chair.

“A cult forms around a charismatic individual who promises something. This individual professes some special knowledge. Sometimes the claim is access to ancient secrets, sometimes it’s an entirely new discovery to which he or she alone is privy. Sometimes it’s a combination of both. The leader offers to share the information with those who follow. Some leaders offer utopia. Or a way out. Just come along, follow me. I’ll make the decisions. All will be fine.”

“How does that differ from a priest or rabbi?”

“In a cult it’s this charismatic leader who eventually becomes the object of devotion; in some cases he’s actually deified. And as that happens, the leader comes to hold extraordinary control over the lives of his followers.

“Cults are totalistic, authoritarian. The leader is supreme and delegates power to very few. The leader’s morality becomes the only acceptable theology. The only acceptable behavior. And, as I said, veneration is eventually centered on him, not on supreme beings or abstract principles.

“And often there is a double set of ethics. Members are urged to be honest and loving to each other but to deceive and shun outsiders. (Emphasis mine.) Established religions tend to follow one set of rules for everybody.”

“How does a leader gain such control?”

“That’s another important element. Thought reform. Cult leaders use a variety of psychological processes to manipulate their members. Some leaders are fairly benign, but others are not and really exploit the idealism of their followers.

“The way I see it, there are two broad types of cults, both of which use thought reform. The commercially packaged ‘awareness programs’” - he gestured quotation marks - “use very intense persuasion techniques. These groups keep members by getting them to buy more and more courses.

“Then there are the cults that recruit followers for life. These groups use organized psychological and social persuasion to produce extreme attitudinal changes. As a result they come to exert enormous control over the lives of their members. They are manipulative, deceptive, and highly exploitative.”

Amy here - hmmm, let’s just guess which one I think Obama is?!?! Ahem. The discussion continues, but I thought this was significant:

“I still don’t see why anyone but a nutcase would fall for such crap.”

“Not at all.” He shook his head. “It’s not just marginal people who get sucked in. In some studies approximately two thirds of the respondents come from normal families and were demonstrating age-appropriate behavior when they entered a cult.”

“Has your research shed light on why people seek out these movements?”

“Often they don’t. These groups seek you. And as I’ve said, these leaders can be incredibly charming and persuasive.”

AMY here - the discussion continues, and then this question: “I just don’t get it, Red. How can people be so gullible?”

“It’s seductive to think that you’re elite. Chosen. Most cults teach their members that only they are enlightened and everyone else in the world is left out. Lesser in some way. It’s powerful stuff.” (Kathy Reichs, Death Du Jour, 1999, pp 295 - 300)

See what I mean?? Do you see it?!? To me it is crystal clear. Obama has been engaging in “thought reform,” as discussed in this book, and has taken it to a massive level. For him to come to the House of Representatives as The Anointed One, elevating himself to a height neither deserved or REAL, says a lot. And it says just as much about all of the House members who clapped themselves silly. They want to bask in the glow of The One, they want to show they, too, are in his employ. It is frightening stuff, and we cannot allow him to take over this country. There is no telling what will happen if he does. I thought Bush was bad, but I fear Obama more. He has demonstrated time and time again that he is beholden to no person, no position. He can dismiss even relatives with seeming ease, and change positions as the wind blows. He is a dangerous man, and his followers likewise. Not all of them, mind you, but enough of them seem to have this mentality, which is mighty scary. (The lengths to which some of them have gone is truly scary - hnging a dead rabbit on someone’s door and slashing their tires, for example. That is one extreme, but stealing caucus packets to ENSURE the victory of their One is in the same realm - they will stop at nothing to ensure their Master’s success.)

Again - Superdelegates - this man has flown off into incredibly heady flights of fancy, and cannot be trusted with the most important job on the face of the planet. A cult leader is not what we need to lead us out of our current climate. We need someone whose feet are on the ground, who is clear-headed, who stands with ALL Americans, not just her cultish gathering. There is time. Start now. Lay the groundwork. And come the end of August, protect us from this self-proclaimed Messiah. This heathen has no use for him.

GO TO IOwnMyVote.com and take the survey on Platform Reform for the Democratic Party. Let YOUR voice be counted (well, maybe - this IS the Democratic Party I’m talking about here, but have FAITH that it will matter!).

And you know who’s to blame for all these outrages being perpetrated on The Child, don’t you?

Of course! The Jews! They never learn, do they? They’re crucifying The Chosen One (in Jerusalem, no less!) just like they did to Jesus!

While everyone is busy gnashing their teeth and rending their garments, may I be so bold as to remind all the umbrage-takers that on July 9th, Obama voted for the FISA Amendments Act, which “expanded the president’s warrantless surveillance authority and unconstitutionally granted retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies that participated in the president’s illegal domestic wiretapping program.” So forgive me if I’m not heartbroken over Obama’s innermost thoughts being revealed to the world by nosy strangers.

And now’s as good a time as any to let everyone know I’ll be hosting another installment of Hour of Power on Tuesday, July 29th at 10 p.m. ET/7 p.m. PT. Formal announcement to follow.

UPDATE: Statement from Maariv: “Obama’s note was published in Maariv and other international publications following his authorization to make the content of the note public. Obama submitted a copy of the note to media outlets when he left his hotel in Jerusalem. Moreover, since he is not Jewish, there is no violation of privacy as there would be for a Jewish person who places a note in the wall.”

He ventured forth to bring light to the world

The anointed one’s pilgrimage to the Holy Land is a miracle in action - and a blessing to all his faithful followers

I can’t believe that Sean Hannity got the author of this fine writing to read it live on his Fox News program last evening.

To read the piece in its original, go to “He ventured forth to bring light to the world.”