Barry Soetoro
Nov 6th, 2008, in Opinion, by Guest WriterBarry Soetoro aka Barack Obama’s Indonesian connection.
Former Menteng student now US President
Obama Barack has been democratically elected President of the US.
Quite an about face for the best democracy money can buy, in view of the Bush presidential se-lection.
But of course, corruption, collusion and nepotism is the sole monopoly of the Third World – or so the deluded denizens of the West repeat to themselves as they hug their knees, rocking back and forth – reminding themselves of how they uphold human rights equally across the board, entirely devoid of double-standards and totally oblivious to race, creed or religion.
Barrak Hussein Obama II was born to a white American Ann Dunham and Kenyan Barrak Hussein Obama Snr, in Nyang’oma Kogelo now in Kenya.
Here the Indonesian link starts.
Ann Dunham married in 1967 Lolo Soetoro, a Javanese, whose own father, in 1946 was killed along with his eldest brother were killed, after which the Dutch army burned down the family’s home. Soetoro fled with his mother into the countryside to survive. Incidentally yet more proof of Dutch war crimes – delibrate destruction of civilian property outside the scope of battle.
Pak Lolo Soetoro was an army geologist then later a government relations consultant for Mobil Oil. Obama describes Soetoro as well-mannered, even-tempered, and easy with people.
Barry Soetoro in Indonesia with mother Ann Dunham, step-father Lolo Soetoro, baby-sister Maya Soetoro-Ng.
From age 6 to 10, Obama lived in Jakarta. Age six, Obama attended the Catholic Primary St Francis di Assisi. Much was made of the lie he was educated in a Madrassa – or more accurately a pesantren – this of course was totally untrue. Obama Jnr later attended Model Primary School, Menteng and was registered as a Muslim – as his father was Muslim.
In the Muslim school, the teacher wrote to tell my mother that I made faces during Koranic studies. My mother wasn’t overly concerned. ‘Be respectful,’ she’d say. In the Catholic school, when it came time to pray, I would close my eyes, then peek around the room. Nothing happened. No angels descended. Just a parched old nun and 30 brown children, muttering words.
One of “Berry’s” childhood friends was Adi who often visited “Berry’s” 16 Jalan Haji Ramli house. Speaking volumes of Dutch “development” at the time the road was of this established middle-class neighbourhood was a dirt lane where Obama used to wile away the hours kicking a soccer ball.
Adi recalled Obama and his friends wore plastic bags over their shoes to walk through the muddy street during the rainy seasons.
Neighborhood Muslims worshiped in a nearby house, which has since been replaced by a larger mosque. Sometimes, when the muezzin sounded the call to prayer, Lolo and Barry would walk to the makeshift mosque together, Adi said.
His mother often went to the church, but Barry was Muslim. He went to the mosque,” Adi said. “I remember him wearing a sarong.”
Obama spent most his spare time hanging out with Adi and other friends at the home of Yunaldi Askiar, a classmate. They used to play a kind of fencing game using sticks, kick a ball up and down the narrow dirt lanes or go swimming in the river behind the school, said Askiar, 42, a car mechanic.
Obama was taller and better dressed than most kids in classes where shoes and socks were still luxuries, so he stood out from the start. As an African American, and the only foreigner, he suffered racial taunts and teasing but never turned to violence.
“At first, everybody felt it was weird to have him here,” Israella Dharmawan, his first grade teacher said. “But also they were curious about him, so wherever he went, the kids were following him.”
His friends enjoyed playing tricks on Berry: Harmon ASki recalled,
“Sometimes we’d say, ‘Barry, do you want a chocolate?’ And we’d give him a chocolate. The next day we’d give him a chocolate again. The third time we’d give him terasi (fermented shrimp paste) wrapped up like chocolate. Obama didn’t get mad. He would laugh it off.”
Ann Soetoro moved to Yogyakarta, while Obama Jnr studied in Jakarta. She was inspired by Jogja village industries, which became the basis of her 1992 doctoral dissertation.
“She loved living in Java,” said Dr. Dewey, who recalled accompanying Ms. Soetoro to a metalworking village. “People said: ‘Hi! How are you?’ She said: ‘How’s your wife? Did your daughter have the baby?’ They were friends. Then she’d whip out her notebook and she’d say: ‘How many of you have electricity? Are you having trouble getting iron?’ ”
Dunham-Soetoro became a consultant for the United States Agency for International Development on setting up a village credit program, then a Ford Foundation program officer in Jakarta specializing in women’s work. Later, she was a consultant in Pakistan, then joined Indonesia’s oldest bank to work on what is described as the world’s largest sustainable microfinance program, creating services like credit and savings for the poor.
Obama in Hawaii with Maya and Ann and maternal grand-father, shortly after leaving Indonesia.
In his tellingly-titled Memoir, Dreams from My Father, Obama describes his Indonesian interlude as “one long adventure, the bounty of a young boy’s life”. But he also recalls being troubled by the poverty around him: “the empty look on the faces of farmers the year the rains never came,” and the desperation of the disabled beggars who came to the family’s door.
“The world was violent, I was learning, unpredictable and often cruel,” he writes. Obama and his mother thus we were very well acquainted with the harsh realities of indigenous Indonesians.
Fermina Katarina Sinaga, recalled yojhng Obama in her class: in the common task of class to write an essay titled “My dream: What I want to be in the future.” Obama “wrote ‘I want to be a president,’ ” she said. During a later writing assignment on family, he wrote, “My father is my idol.
The Indonesian connection for Obama and all that shaped him proving once again all things Javanese and indigenous Indonesian the bedrock for the towering monuments built on the foundations of a great civilisation.
1,047 Comments on “Barry Soetoro”
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Stevo says:
Ok its a polite name for “crackpots” I will run with that, lets see then………………..
A quick search on Google will reveal the same media who created the phrase (birther), questioned McCain over his eligibility, for the presidency, based on the birth issue.
Those media sources now label people who question Obama on this issue as far right, racist, crackpot, birthers and so on……….Just as you have done dear Oigal.
It was an issue Obama raised in his campaign, so we know he is a birther and therefore a crackpot.
So why the double standard? (Hint, its because hes black)
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Lairedion says:
Seriously? You don’t understand what is a rather simple political concept? I suggest you google the term as well as “Frankfurt School” and “Gramsci”, you will find that both Barack and his wife and most of his mentors and political and academic associates would have subscribed to this line of teaching.
I understand this very well. My point was to demonstrate the laughable obsession of certain people with ideologies and labeling.
Judging him on his presidency and his current policies he’s just an average US president.
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Again really?? Where?
But as I said do keep it up, its amusing 🙂 -
berlian biru says:
My point was to demonstrate the laughable obsession of certain people with ideologies and labeling.
Is it a laughable obsession to examine the political ideologies of someone who holds political office? Seems to be rather sensible to me.
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Odinius says:
ET said:
Can you give some examples of what ‘real’ progressives want that isn’t on BO’s agenda already?
Sure, here’s a small sample:
*Closing Guantanamo (hasn’t happened, won’t by 2012)
*Putting terrorism suspects on civilian trial (he went back to military courts)
*Pulling troops out of Iraq (hasn’t happened, won’t by 2012)
*Ending the war in Afghanistan (hasn’t happened, won’t by 2012)
*Not getting involved in any other military conflicts (woops)
*Putting Bush admin officials who created and executed extraordinary rendition (aka “take them to countries that are okay with torture) on trial, or at least have an inquest (hasn’t happened, won’t ever happen)
*Bailing out homeowners (he bailed out the mortgage lenders instead)
*Bailing out those screwed by banks (he bailed out the banks instead)
*Expanding protections for the unemployed and poor (he’s extended unemployment benefits, but signed major cuts to programs aiding the poor)
*Repealing the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy (he extended them)
*Crafting and passing a single-payer universal health plan, or at least a mixed plan with a public option (he bailed on the public option and just reformed the current, corporate profiteering system)That’s just a small sampling.
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As for other nations having an issue, apparently Australia is not one. Prime Minister Julia Gillard was born in Wales and frankly her birthplace is an absolute non-issue as it should be.
If Gillard had based her political rise on her Britishness and had written books about herself centred around how she found personal enlightenment from understanding her British cultural roots and how her British background and upbringing in the UK provided her with some unique insight into how to govern Australia I would humbly submit that she would have been justifiably ripped to shreds by her political opponents and large sections of the Australian media.
The other US presidents you mention confirm what I said about how unusual it is for US presidents to have foreign fathers, most of them relate to earlier stages of American history and whether you like it or not having ancestry in the British Isles in those years was a common factor for about 90% of American voters whereas having a Kenyan parent is still not quite commonplace for American citizens even today.
To point such a blindingly obvious fact out is not racist no matter how many people may get upset by it.
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ET:
To answer the rest of your question, I do accept the concept of deficit spending in downturns, recessions and depressions as a way to stimulate the economy back to growth.
The problem is the missing other half of the equation. Keynes believed governments should stockpile revenue in times of growth, by cutting unecessary spending programs and raising taxes. Then they can spend this revenue in the bad times. It’s quite an ingenious idea, and until 2001, we were on that path. Unfortunately, the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy gutted revenue at the exact time his two wars and prescription drug plan for seniors made expenditures skyrocket. That meant that when it was time to use public funds to prop up the economy, we were deficit spending from a position of record high deficits.
Cutting the debt now is not what’s best for the economy in the short-term, but it’s getting close to crisis proportions, so we’re going to have to. Yes, letting the Bush tax cuts lapse AND cutting entitlement programs will BOTH have a moderate negative effect on growth in the short-term–according to most impartial analysts. But it has to happen. Another exogenous shock and we’re ****ed, because we can’t deficit spend unless we make up for it. Plus if our AAA rating does get downgraded, debt services will rise, as will interest rates. That will exert a far worse pressure on the economy than some fiscal responsibility…
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Stevo said:
A quick search on Google will reveal the same media who created the phrase (birther), questioned McCain over his eligibility, for the presidency, based on the birth issue.
Those media sources now label people who question Obama on this issue as far right, racist, crackpot, birthers and so on……….Just as you have done dear Oigal.
That’s just not true. There was almost no conspiracist scrutiny of McCain’s citizenship in the mainstream media, just as there was almost none for Obama. There were some questions, and easy answers. McCain born abroad, but to a military family living in what is legally considered US soil (even if it’s abroad). Obama was born in Hawaii. Cases closed.
…except for the silly people.
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Just to be clear then, we are moving away from the most countries would be concerned about the parentage of the political leader and now it’s parentage and if they wrote a book. Sorry paraphrased a bit there but it’s not worth going back to a fairly bold statement that moment challenged as factually inaccurate suddenly reappears with qualifications.
Same with what was it..something about centuries of traditions of being undeniably Americian? However now it’s a date qaulified issue? Its hard to keep up at times. As for it was ok because they were English, makes even less sense considering the two countries had been at war. If ever there was a reason to worry about parentage and loyalty then that was it. Of course, perhaps the founding fathers were just a bit more mature and practical than today’s conspiracy nuts.
Lastly just to confirm, so it was ok because 90% had English blood but the rules are and should be different because Kenyan blood is not so common? Actually went back and re read that bit yup it’s still bizarre logic. I really am not trying to be sarcastic for once but how on earth is that not racist in anyones language?
Although I do agree with you Australia is a strange example to use, after all this time she still accepts an inbred bunch of Royals (?) from a foriegn and increasing non relevent nation in the region as defacto heads of state..curious to say the least. Perhaps Australia should pinch some of the birther logic for a few years at least.
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BB,
Examining such thing is basically not a problem but we all know what’s the atmosphere on the right-wing fringe nowadays.
BO is a Marxist, a Muslim, a Communist, the Anti-Christ? Glenn Beck suggesting any church promoting “social justice” or “economic justice” merely was using code words for Nazism and communism. People defending the First Amendment to the United States Constitution in the “Ground Zero mosque case” are branded as anti-American.
A bunch of obsessed nutters…
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O&O, now I have two McCain birther denial crack pots on my case. Oigal asks where and Odinius just cant believe such a thing.
The answer to this riddle was carefully hidden within the message itself:
“A quick search on Google will reveal…..”
Don’t feel bad, it was very cryptic so I can forgive you both for missing it. I suspect that Oigal is like many racists from inclusive western democracies and is overcompensating.
I had seen another poster mention it on this very thread. I did a Google search and sure enough McCain’s place of birth was raised by the Obama camp. Prior to that, I had no interest in the matter. Actually I have no interest in where Obama was born either.
I do however have an interest in double standards and bias on the basis of skin colour. I have yet to meet an Obama supporter who can see past his skin tone to the man beneath. When enough people do that, it will be the end of his time in office.
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Sorry Stevo, to busy for the rest of the weekend to prod the nutters 🙂
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rustyprince says:
You’re now echoing my point Stevo that Obama’s blackness was used to get hin elected. So what’s goin happen when the realization hits his supporters that they defacto voted for Bush3 which has been QED’d by Odinius, Lar and Oigal, well then what? More alienation leading to radicalism or just the usual fatalism that now affects almost a majority in the west, that the system is rigged, so better to be passionate about football or celeb gossip. The really sad thing for all who love America is that the Black communities got enthused to the extent they momentarily believed a new era of inclusiveness had dawned. Whereas, instead, its clear the prejudices of the 50s are still deeply ingrained and again vociferous. If as I suggest this was possibly a design to stop Hiliary then the Manipulators really are evil geniuses!!!
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Look let’s get this clear, Thomas Jefferson didn’t get to be president of the United States by proudly proclaiming his British heritage, Woodrow Wilson did not base his life story around being the son of a Canadian. Both men unequivocally propounded their American citizenship. Obama has built his entire career around the fact that he is half Kenyan (let’s face it there’s damn all else in his resume so I suppose he needs some sort of unique selling point), do you see the difference here?
Even had the former presidents done so it would not have resulted in them being regarded as “foreign” by most US voters, although it would almost certainly have precluded them from winning an election. Like it or not people in eighteenth century America largely regarded the British as their kith and kin albeit divided fatally by political ideas about how the North American colonies/states should be administered. The people of the US even today whilst recognising Canada as a seperate nation hardly regard Canadians as exotic foreigners, most Americans however couldn’t find Kenya on a map let alone name a single Kenyan they had ever heard of. These are simple statements of fact.
Now you can scream and scream “RACIST!!!” until you are blue in the face (howling about racism is after all the default setting of Obama’s defenders) but that and fifty thousand Rupiah will buy you a coffee in Starbucks. I prefer to deal in honest evaluation of facts as they are and regard certain aspects of human nature as really rather fundamental and obvious.
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Stevo,
Your posts growing less tethered to reality as you go along. Sure, there are fringe types with cheap domains saying McCain was not born in the US and should be ineligible for the senate. But then again, there are more who think the illuminati are shape-shifting reptiloid aliens from the dark side of the moon. Why don’t you put that in google?
The problem is your rather silly argument that “the mainstream media” attacked Obama birthers while promoting McCain birthers. Let me reiterate: the mainstream media did bring the topics up, when they came up in 2008, but then didn’t linger on McCain’s citizenship, and didn’t linger on Obama’s. Crucially, it became a non-issue as soon as it became abundantly clear that the courts were going to consider him a natural-born citizen, rendering the tortured issue moot.
So now that we’ve established the mainstream media’s generally responsible and mild coverage of the issue, we can ask the most important question: how many of these silly people, who still claim Obama is a foreign-born secret Muslim Marxist Kenyan anticolonialist, can fit into a single car?
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ET says:
Odinius
*Closing Guantanamo (hasn’t happened, won’t by 2012)
*Putting terrorism suspects on civilian trial (he went back to military courts)
*Pulling troops out of Iraq (hasn’t happened, won’t by 2012)
*Ending the war in Afghanistan (hasn’t happened, won’t by 2012)
*Not getting involved in any other military conflicts (woops)
*Putting Bush admin officials who created and executed extraordinary rendition (aka “take them to countries that are okay with torture) on trial, or at least have an inquest (hasn’t happened, won’t ever happen)
*Bailing out homeowners (he bailed out the mortgage lenders instead)
*Bailing out those screwed by banks (he bailed out the banks instead)
*Expanding protections for the unemployed and poor (he’s extended unemployment benefits, but signed major cuts to programs aiding the poor)
*Repealing the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy (he extended them)
*Crafting and passing a single-payer universal health plan, or at least a mixed plan with a public option (he bailed on the public option and just reformed the current, corporate profiteering system)That’s just a small sampling.
Maybe he ‘s a closet Tea-partier. Or just plain realist.
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BB there is nothing clear about your position other than a base and factually incorrect set of opinions that somehow BO has legally dubious right to be president. You started with grossly inaccurate opinions stated as facts and when proven to be unstainable in a nanosecond you have become more and more shrill.
Reread my previous post, I am happy to withdraw any comment that fundamentally misrepresents your position,although granted it’s pretty fluid as each bold statement tends collapse under the weight of oit’s own omissions replaced by yet another qualifying
prop to the house of cardsAs for your last …offering.. BO was elected one foreign parent and kenyan blood, it’s legal, he made as you say no secret of his diverse upbringing so what on earth is your point. The US has a black president and a Democrat. Get over it.
Sorry I wasn’t going to post much today but sometimes the bizarre wins.
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Hehe, probably not a Tea Partier, but not a progressive either, and yes, pragmatic on policy.
I think the basic problem, for progressives, was a misreading on what kind of idealist he is. Both Obama and progressives see the New Deal era in sepia tones, but for different reasons. Progressives see an era when government put people to work, created social safety nets and generally tried to build back the economy from the bottom-up. Obama sees an era when everyone got together, rolled up their sleeves and worked together to bring the country out of its worst economic crisis. The distinction is vital: progressives want New Deal-like policies; Obama wants its “can-do” spirit. Progressives want the Works Progress Administration; Obama wants Roosevelt’s fireside chats.
Obama, like Bush I and Clinton, is a centrist. But a different kind of centrist.
Bush I was a ideology vs. reality centrist, whose calculus was:
(party position) – (reality) = policy
Clinton was a “pick-and-choose” centrist whose calculus was:
((party position) – (what the polls say is unpopular about the party position) + (what the polls say is popular about the other party position))/2 = policy
Obama is a “let’s meet in the middle” centrist, whose calculus is
((my party’s position) + (their party’s position))/2 = policy
I’m still waiting for my kind of centrist, which would be:
(((party 1 position) – (all the assumptions, fuzzy math and echo chamber gunk)) + ((party 2 position) – (all the assumptions, fuzzy math and echo chamber gunk))) – (reality) = policy
Personally, I think the Republican Party has more problematic assumptions, fuzzy math and echo chamber gunk at the moment, but this hasn’t always been the case and the formula can adjust for changes in these fields 🙂
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Oh sorry to inform you outside the dank corners of the US and our own piece of the web. The majority of People do not regard BO as foreign so why raise it in regard to others unless…
Oh I take it you are supporter of the Republician movement in Australia for the same reasons you reject BO?
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There seems to be a pattern emerging on this thread. The loony crackpots who think its ok to enquire into Obama’s eligibility provide reasons for their position.
The opposing side tends more towards ad hominem attacks and using labels like, birther, racist, crackpots and so on.
This is a sure sign they have adopted their stance because they believe it’s the socially acceptable one, amongst those they wish to identify with. It is really just an adopted morality for those who have not developed their own.
So when challenged they have little in the way of considered argument to fall back on. With no moral compass they resort to name calling and chanting various slogans like a mantra.
There is a danger in following such social fashions. At various times in recent history it has been politically correct to treat people like Mr Obama in a much less accommodating fashion. These followers of social fashion are fickle friends.
The other risk is that Obama will not be subject to the same level of scrutiny and critique as other presidents. As an example, he may be free to take poorly considered actions, because to question him is racist.
Like I said, I do not really care about the birth issue or even have anything against Obama. It’s the blatant double standard that annoys me.
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When challenged they have little to fall back on..well except for legal and historical precedent including former presidents, supreme courts rulings and established, verifiable facts instead of half arsed conspiracy theories combined with numpties quoting sections of the consitution that are just not there..Well other than that you have a point.
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A while back, I think it was the in the Guardian, I read an article that suggested that liberal/inclusive values were the result of a genetic deviation. So perhaps this is familial to Darwin’s ideas on evolution and point that hitherto Berlian Biru is correct in stating the forbearance of much of White America to Obama’s ‘otherness’ is natural. But if a relatively recent duality has fractured within our gene-pool resulting in the antecedental paradigm simplication of ‘survival of the fittest’ could this not indicate that the previous fraught relationship, between traditionalist and progressives, can only deepen to a dangerous abyss. It may also help explain why we Liberals try to understand the Islamic fundies while at the same time abhoring their actions and why we link the increasingly lunatic right in our own countries to the former reactionaries.
Hope I’m somehow coming across as clear – wink Oigal. But if that latter theory isn’t complete hokus-pokem, than does it necessitate that Liberals must be prepared to be much more ruthless in order to survive – so maybe than we mutate again? And I don’t want to be personal but it suggests it is oxymoronic to embrace otherness in relationships and then support those whoes gut instinct is to fear and crush such progressiviness. Hence why biracial relationships have always been frowned upon by traditionalists.
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BB there is nothing clear about your position other than a base and factually incorrect set of opinions that somehow BO has legally dubious right to be president.
Nonsense, I made no such claim about the dubiousness of Obama’s legal right to be president and you are an idiot for suggesting that I did. On the contrary I made it quite plain that I believe the man is indeed a natural born US citizen.
I merely pointed out why people might regard Obama as being somewhat more “foreign” than other presidents given that he himself has based his entire political ethos on his being half Kenyan.
If you can’t follow rather simple basic written English then I suggest you refrain from commenting on discussion forums until you learn how to do so.
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No you didn’t you just wrote post after post of on the foreign..ness of the President and bemoaned the fact of he was not forced by legislature to produce more documentation to feed the the loonies etc etc. It’s the tiresome but amusing “Psst, I don’t believe he is communist, wifebeater,pornographer (insert slur of you choice) but did you hear…” of aligning yourself with the worst whilst allowing yourself a backdoor of retreat when the half truths and omissions deliberate or otherwise make the position untenable as has happened here on so many occasions. Unfortunately fence sitting with your feet in the muck just makes one look foolish and dents the ego.
As for the name calling and uncalled advice but as one sanctimonious twit once said ” do keep it civil lads” :-).
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Rusty I note that inclusiveness, of the left, does not extend to inclusiveness of thought or opinion. It seems to be based on skin colour alone.
In their world, they celebrate difference on the basis of assumed race or appearance, while getting very shrill and upset about any divergent thinking. Nothing very inclusive about that!
Yet another indication that the self labeled “liberal” awards various attributes on the basis of race. Much the same as the KKK do.
It annoys me that these folk call themselves liberal while continuing to lobby government for more and more laws to enforce their adopted morality. They want the armed state to enforce their views and prevent people expressing differing opinions, labeling it “hate speech” (another label) and so on. Nothing very liberal about that!
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Like I say if you can’t read plain English mate and take the plain meaning of what is being said without twisting yourself into knots constructing nonsense that is precisely the opposite of what is written there seems little point in continuing to debate with you.
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Stevo said:
There seems to be a pattern emerging on this thread. The loony crackpots who think its ok to enquire into Obama’s eligibility provide reasons for their position.
The opposing side tends more towards ad hominem attacks and using labels like, birther, racist, crackpots and so on.
If you want more intellectual refutations of the many bald and unsubstantiated claims of birtherism, there’s one on page 21 of this very discussion, provided by yours truly. For the main one–whether Obama was born in Hawaii–this is been confirmed over and over again by the state he was born in. Honestly, the only people who can’t accept this are those who are unwilling to accept anything. Or, to put it another way, crackpots.
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Lairedion said:
Here is an interesting read on a blog I regularly visit:
To hell with the Democrats
That illustrates what I was talking about–that Obama is not a left wing democrat and the left wing in the US is completely disillusioned with and angry at him.
Comment on “Barry Soetoro”.
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Really when? Besides the normal dems are a better choice of course.
No its not it’s a polite name for crackpots..But hey keep it up alienates more more potential Republican voters every day 🙂
Nothing really needs to be said for this, speaks for itself.