Our President, in "Preacher Mode"

President Obama, in preacher mode before he returns to professor mode...

Roland Burris throws Pres. Obama 'under the bus'

It has long been obvious, at least to him, that Roland Burris is more important than President Obama. Now he's got someone to play along.

Burris' latest media strategy is to associate Rod Blagojevich with President Obama in the attempt to lessen the attention paid to the fact that he didn't do what he promised to do (disclosure fully and truthfully the contacts he had with the Blagojevich people before his appointment to the U.S. Senate). Burris' media consultant writes in a recent email (which was originally published on the Chatham/Avalon Park Community Council blog but the offending portion has since been removed -- undoubtedly due to its inflammatory nature):

The two biggest beneficiaries of Tony Rezko were Rod Blagojevich and Barack Obama, so no one can afford to be self-righteous.

Now this is a line that you'd expect from Rush Limbaugh or even Michael Steele, but not from someone who claims to be a Democrat. While Roland is reduced to waving at the President and trying to get some of that Obama glow, Delmarie Cobb was setting up the conditions for Obama's defeat in 2012.

I've already been told in conversations with Southern Republicans that linking President Obama with William Jefferson and Roland Burris is their best chance at re-taking the White House next time. Clearly, Roland is eager to play along and they've got Delmarie Cobb singing their song.

For Roland Burris -- and Delmarie Cobb -- keeping a "black seat" in the U.S. Senate is clearly more important than re-electing Barack Obama. What are they thinking?

What Burris is thinking is obvious. This is all about him. Freddrenna Lyle makes that obvious:

Roland Burris wanted the Senatorial seat and talked to everyone who would listen once it became obvious that Sen. Obama had a chance to win the Presidency. In fact when he would hear discussions about possible replacements he would get upset when he did not hear himself mentioned.

Cobb continues the assault on the President:

Many black elected officials didn't like Barack, but they stayed quiet and got on board and they need to do the same for Roland.

Understand, Delmarie Cobb is undoubtedly talking about herself. Whether she can find "many" black elected officials who didn't like the president remains to be seen, but there is no question that *she* doesn't like him.

And now she seems eager to tear down the first African American elected to office. Cobb has never made a secret of the fact that she preferred Hillary Clinton over the first black president, but her argument that we have to protect the only black senator and be willing to sacrifice the only black president is more than a tautology. It defines hypocrisy. It is the perfect example of self-destruction.

That Roland Burris' public face is someone who is best known for her opposition of the president, someone eager to sow controversy, shows a lack of political judgment that will neither serve him -- or Illinois -- well. Delmarie Cobb may be eager to throw Barack Obama under the bus, but I haven't found a black voter who is willing to do so. By accepting this appointment from such a fatally flawed figure had already put Burris' political skills and judgment in doubt. Surrounding himself with people who clearly oppose this president only cements it. Roland Burris is too naive to be our senator.

Roland Burris needs to decide if he is standing with our new president or fighting against him. Delmarie Cobb's email suggests to me that she is using Burris as a means for tearing down Barack Obama. We have no indication that Burris is willing to stand with the president or his agenda, but we do have indicators that he and his campaign are eager to sacrifice Barack Obama for their own benefit. It seems to me that those very "black elected officials" who "stayed quiet and got on board" for Barack Obama are now basking in his limelight. Roland Burris faces an uphill battle to divide them from the president but it appears Delmarie Cobb is eager for the challenge. I'd say 'good luck with that,' but I don't really wish her luck. I -- and many others -- worked too hard to get Obama elected president to sacrifice him for Roland Burris. I'd much rather have a good man in the White House. I strongly suspect I'm not alone in that sentiment...

Indicted IL Governor pairs another 1000 Jobs in Southland

Four years ago, it was Barack Obama who led a hearing in the Southland on the (indicted) Governor's effort to close the Tinley Park Mental Health Center and Howe Developmental Center. When Barack came out of that meeting, he remarked (per memory): "We'll have to take it easy on the Governor now. We've whacked him enough today."

Yesterday, it was the people of the Southland who came out to take a few whacks at the Governor's proposal to close the southside and south suburbs' only public providers of intensive, in-patient care for individuals with severe mental illness and profound developmental disabilities. Boy, did they come.

Among the first people I met at this hearing of the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability were active Obama volunteers in our efforts in Indiana. I wouldn't venture a guess as to how many people showed up without knowing the capacity of the room, but the parking lot was full and the space fairly full. 2000?

One of the Governor's officials started the proceedings by saying that they needed to shut down these facilities because they wanted to replace them with new facilities. What a crock! Did the Chicago Bears stop playing when we replaced Soldier Field with the spaceship? Did the Sox stop playing when they replaced Comisky Park? Hell, no! They built the new facilities first before they moved out of the old ones.

But this isn't what the Governor is proposing to do. He will shut down Tinley Park/Howe, shave a thousand jobs off the government payroll and build new facilities when the budget is under control. Which, in Illinois, means never.

If you're wondering if this has anything to do with the (indicted) Governor's proclivity towards "pay to play," you might have a point. The thousand workers who will lose their jobs can't afford to contribute to the Governor's extravagant lifestyle. And I doubt you will see any builder in the Southland stepping forward to "pay up" to build the new facilities. With lines of credit frozen everywhere, what bank is going to want to help out here? Nope, these thousand jobs will be lost to Illinois' practice of corruption. The people, both workers and clients, will be sacrificed so that the Governor and his political cronies can continue in the lifestyle to which they've become accustomed.

We voted for real change at the federal level. Probably time to vote for change at the state and local level, as well. How many more jobs can we afford to lose here?

In Honor of Martin Luther King

there's a picture of me and jesse jackson jr hanging in the halls of bethune cookman college in daytona beach, florida. we were playing in our swimming pool, and my parents didn't even know the picture existed until the college was looking for the names of the people in the picture.

i don't remember it. i can't say that i remember anything about that day, when john lewis, andrew young and jackson, sr (among others) came to our house to relax and strategize. i was just a kid. and, to be honest, lots of african americans came to our house in the late 60s and early 70s. if my parents had not mentioned it, i would never know.

what i do know is that the civil rights movement is in my dna. my parents were leaders in the cross-cultural, cross-denomination effort called bridge builders. today, we celebrate the efforts of martin luther king, jr, and those who have followed him, to bring equality into our society, economy and political system. it is good for us to remember. it is important to realize that the battle has yet to be won. we have come a long way, but that doesn't mean there aren't miles left to go. equality may be more than a dream today, but it is less than a reality for many. lest we forget...

Impressions from the Clinton Speech

this is the seventh presidential cycle in which i've spent time in iowa and/or new hampshire. the first couple of times were fun. now it's just familiar. but this was the first time i was *invited.*

so you'll forgive me if i preface this diary with observations about corn fields (saw one field where the field corn was being harvested, and two others where it had just been harvested), driving by the mississippi river and a plethora of small towns. it's how i know that i'm in iowa. by the time we got to clinton, we were half a million strong and everywhere there was song and celebration -- wait, that's not right. but the arrival around ashford university did make me think of joni mitchell's song. the roads were blocked off, lanes reserved for parking, and the long line of cars let you know that someone special was in town. images from the movie rocked around my brain.

the speech itself was in the school gymnasium. everybody else seemed to know where they were going -- i appeared to be the only lost soul out of place -- so i just followed the line of people. at the door of the building, they asked for the essentials, and, if you were an obama supporter, had you filled out their commitment card? it was all students manning the stations, and probably there were more volunteers then they actually needed. everybody, including the local press, seem excited.

i arrived before obama did. the secret service-like personnel (you know, the guys in dark suits with ear pieces looking like they were in 24 or something) were standing up two parked police cars clearly making a space for the obama entourage. i asked at the front door how many people they expected. no idea. well, how many chairs have been set up (usually someone knows *that* answer). i asked a couple of times before i was told that they had set up 400 chairs. took up about half the space. basically, they filled up the area in front of the cameras. there were approximately a dozen or so television cameras there, and to their right, there were six rows of tables set up for print media.

the doors were supposed to open at 1pm. i got there about twenty before 1 -- and the gynasium was pretty full. before one o'clock, there were definitely more than 400 people there. got to say that in the walk in, i looked for bumber stickers and other identifying items of support of a presidential candidate. i only saw one bumper sticker (besides the two on my car; my wife and i support different candidates), that was for john edwards. but by about ten after, they were already putting up more seats. by the time barack took the podium, there were people in the bleachers, perhaps a hundred or so people standing up, and the room was basically packed.

the crowd was definitely all ages. i'd guess that it was half students and half local iowans. as you see in all these crowds with presidential candidates, there was a large portion of senior citizens, and some of them strained to find seats. there was a smattering of illinois plates parked along the side of the road, but none with obama stickers. they could easily have been students from illinois. but at least one national media source found an illinois obama backer.

the first person to come out was a local soldier, john malcolm, who supports barack. he gave a spirited talk about his experience in iraq (fallujah), how he would return if called back. but he made it very clear that he supported pulling the troops out now. what i didn't realize, though, is that he was there to introduce zbigniew brzezinski. zbig started out with a gracious thanks for john's service to our country. then he gave a very eloquent speech about why our presence in iraq was counterproductive, "it has discredited america as a whole." even without the benefit of intelligence briefings, zbig observed, barack made the right choice, the moral choice.

if you read my diary from tuesday (9-11), you know that i strongly believe in a fresh approach to u.s. foreign policy, especially as it relates to our national security policy. brzezinski is thinking in the same direction -- and so is barack -- noting that this election has the possibility of shaping a new international system. zbig observed that with the emergence of the united states as the sole superpower in the world, we had an opportunity to reshape the international system, but that opportunity was "squandered by the self-destructive war in iraq," a war that "has discredited america worldwide." he ended with an observation of the stakes, "the war in iraq is nothing less than the central test of good political judgment, of real political leadership," that one political leader has shown just that.

for zbigniew brzezinski, that political leader is barack obama.

you could hear clinton's agreement by their rousing reception they gave barack. barack began the speech by thanking the young iowan who introduced him, a candidate in the making -- and making a joke. no doubt, it was a high moment in malcolm's life. barack's speech began with his normal (at least, in my experience) tempered style that one could almost call professorish. after a few jokes, the audience took the seriousness of the subject to heart. but, as barack always does, he won over the audience to his view, that the u.s. must withdraw from iraq if it is to regain the initiative against the distributed network of terrorists that continues to threaten us and hold the next american century hostage.

president bush and the republicans have given us a false choice: their failed strategy or complete withdrawal to america's shores. a president obama offers us an alternative, re-engagement in the war on the terrorists, re-emergence of american leadership in the world, and re-energizing the promise that america has stood for for the 226 years before we recklessly and wrongly invaded iraq.

it begins with our withdrawal from iraq. and barack obama is the leader who can take us there. if the democrats are "on trial on television," barack gives us not only the opportunity, but the moral imperative, to win...

We are stardust
We are golden
And we've got to get ourselves
Back to the garden

Northshore Drama

if you haven't heard yet, jay footlik is moving back to illinois to run for congress. there are plenty of rumors about that his ambition was encouraged by hillary clinton's campaign. that may or may not be true -- i certainly could not verify it -- but i have been able to track down rumors that were not true. footlik's supporters have long been saying that former congressman abner mikva was supporting jay, which is not true. they have also said that congressman rahm emanuel was supporting footlik, something else that has been denied.

dissent over footlik's primary challenge to the very strong candidacy of dan seals has boiled over in the new trier democrats, which had united around seals's campaign against iraq war supporter mark kirk. one prominent member of the new trier dems left the organization after trying to convince the group to support footlik. she moved over to the obama for president campaign, which is where the drama began.

our former new trier dem was organizing house parties for barack obama on the north shore. a number of hosts had signed up. one party had gotten dan seals to introduce obama. when other hosts heard of this, they asked to fold their separate house parties into the obama-seals house party. everybody, they figured, would prefer to attend the party where their two favorite candidates showed up!

our dissenter attempted to talk the party's hostess out of using dan as the introducer for obama. several scurrilous things were said, including the false rumors discussed above. we hear the house party was very successful, that dan did a wonderful job introducing barack, and that the obama campaign raised a hefty sum. no word on whether the footlik supporter who arranged this house party for barack was in attendence, though...