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Neil Cavuto had a guest on his business program today, and Cavuto asked him what he thought about the bailout plan. His guest replied, “Apart from the fact that it isn’t working, I thought it was a fine idea.”

O’Reilly interviews Karl Rove about the Republican party and about how Republican voters should deal with Obama. If you view Karl Rove as some force of evil, you do not have a clue; hopefully, you will watch this with an open mind.

Both Saturday and Sunday night, on the FoxNews Channel, Mike Huckabee has a show (he only does one each week and it is re-broadcast several times). It is occasionally hokey, but then he has some interesting guests like Bill Mahr and Richard Dreyfus. He also pushes the flat tax, which is best new (semi-new) idea to come along.

Neil Cavuto has a business show on FoxNews throughout the week, and even if you have only a slight interest in business, he is intelligent, insightful and even humorous.

This woman is excited that Obama is her new president, because now she will no longer have to worry about putting gas in her car or paying her mortgage (or, as one conservative put it, it is the new era of rainbows and uniforms):

Liberals will not receive a myriad of emails deriding blue states, extolling the virtues of blue states, nor will there be several weekly emails viciously insulting Obama, filled with anger, sexual content and lame songs over the next 4 years. Every time that Obama makes a decision or there is some rumor about Obama, your email box will not be filled with emails of anger or innuendo, as mine was when Bush was president. There will be no movies or books about how Obama was assassinated. Conservatism is about ideas, and these ideas are right or wrong, whether done by a conservative or by a liberal, by a Democrat or a Republican. True conservatism should have nothing to do with character defamation (yes, I saw Dole’s ad, and it was despicable).

In other words, I do not expect conservatives to use the same tactics as some liberals have used over the past 7+ years.

True conservative and moderate journalists will not be shills for the Obama administration, nor will they knock him for everything that he does (I am talking about a small handful of journalists here; 5% or so).

FoxNews, as determined by at least two independent organizations, gave the more fair and balanced election coverage to Obama, McCain and Clinton; they will continue to cover his transition and his presidency in the same fashion.

Obama will not fill his cabinet with people like Ayers or Wright; at least 3/4ths of his cabinet are going to be old Democrat cronies (probably more). Not much of a change. I don’t see him choosing someone out of left field (so to speak) which knocks the news media back on their heals.

Move to repeal FISA. I got so many emails bemoaning Bush wiretapping all of our citizens and how terrible this was. If memory serves, Obama spoke out against this as well, but he signed the bill. He is not going to change his mind about this, especially now.

Remove all of the troops from Iraq. If you have noticed, he has qualified and changed his position on Iraq. During one speech he said, “I have always said that removing troops will be dependent upon conditions on the ground.” (Not an exact quote). He will leave the troops there; he will listen to David Petraeus, we will win in Iraq (despite the fact that Obama never used the word victory when speaking about Iraq), and when conditions on the ground are secure, he will pull some of the troops out. Obama will not pull all out of troops out and he will establish several air bases in Iraq.

Now, the news and Obama may make a big deal out of pulling troops out, and pull a few out, but they will essentially be similar to what Bush would have done. The news media will cover for Obama by not reporting very much of what is going on in Iraq, so we will forget about it (as we did in most of the final few weeks of this election).

I could be wrong on this, but I don’t think that Obama will close down Club Gitmo either. This was also a big deal to many liberals which I knew. You will notice how quiet the news has been about Gitmo? It will stay that way.

Obama is not going to personally meet with those 4 or 5 enemy leaders named that he claimed he would meet with no preconditions, despite the fact that Ahmadinejad is calling for a BBQ at his house.

One more thing Obama is not going to do: tax cuts for 95% of Americans (nor will tax rates be equivalent to or below those under Reagan). Once the Bush tax cuts expire, everyone is going to see higher taxes than in 2007. He may send out checks to the bottom 30–50%. Dems love to send out checks to their constituents; it tells them that the money comes from Washington.

[A disclaimer: I do not have the gift of prophecy—no one does at this time—but these are reasonable predictions based upon the political climate and being able to read the historical trends of the day]

Hey, I was wrong about the election—I admit. I never thought in a million years that a man without any discernable experience and radical ideas could ever get elected president, but it happened. Along the same lines, I never thought that McCain could have made so many mistakes in his campaign.

However, and I credit Biden with this, we already have three international crises on the horizon: Putin has decided he wants to be president of Russia opposite Obama. I think that he has already taken a measure of who Obama is.

Russia is going to set up some missiles near Poland. Russian wants to take in some of the nations who got away, include the Ukraine and Georgia. Now they are going to see if Bush or Obama will blink.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sent congrats to Obama and it looks like he is ready to have that meeting that Obama promised.

Obama, at his news conference, looked like a different man; sort of like a guy with the weight of the world on his shoulders. Was that my imagination or did someone else see this as well?

Bear in mind, all of this is brand new to Obama. He has a winning smile, soaring rhetoric, personal economic and political philosophies, and thousands of adoring fans mobbed in around him, but he has never done anything like this before. He knows about things you and I will never know about. He is just beginning to find out just how many dams Bush has his fingers in, all over the world.

As an aside, if you are a liberal, you may think that we liberals are just waiting for Obama to do something wrong, and we will be ecstatic. Most conservatives do not think that way. If Obama does something wrong, that will harm our country, and most conservatives would rather have Obama for 8 successful years as opposed to newbie who screws everything up and is voted out in a landslide election in 4. Ideology aside, if Obama succeeds, we as a country succeed. It is unfortunate that the press and the hard-left liberals did not see it that way with regards to President Bush, but that is one of the fundamental differences in how most conservatives think and how too many liberals think. We love our country, and we want our country to continue to be great, whether under a Democrat or a Republican. So that you understand this, the military voted for McCain at 2 or 3 to 1. However, their loyalty to their Commander-in-Chief will remain just as strong, and, if Obama gives the order, they will be willing to die for their country. That he is a Democrat or a Republican will never be an issue.

In the same fashion, there may be one or two goofy conservatives who bemoan Obama’s being elected and say they are going to move out of the United States. However, it is not going to be a huge group like all of the liberals who threatened to move out of the US if Bush was elected president. Heck, my own mother said that, and I could not get her to move 1 mile away to a different neighborhood.

Dennis Kucinich showed up on Bill O’Reilly’s program, and, for the first time, he was not calling for Bush and Rove’s impeachments. He was also against the bail-out. I was worried that I had entered into a parallel universe where Kucinich and I agree on everything, until he started talking about keeping people in their homes by putting some of the taxpayer’s money into paying for their mortgages.

The New Kucinich (I found myself agreeing with Kucinich for the first minute or so):

Fred Barnes pointed this out: during Obama’s Press Conference, he had a big plaque: Barrack Obama, President Elect. It fits in well with his new presidential seal, the columns, etc.

Black Voters Defeat Gay Marriage Amendment in California! [who knows, maybe that was a major news story in California?]

Election Turnout—Not that Impressive! [yeah, really; percentage-wise, it was not out of the ordinary; 40.8% of the US population voted for Bush or Kerry in 2006; 40.7% voted for Obama or McCain 2008; if you don’t believe me, do the math yourself. Now, ask anyone about the election turnout—they will tell you we smashed all voting records. If we cannot depend upon the press to give us simple statistics, what can we trust them for?]

Obama deals with Economy in Record time: 10 minutes! [okay, sorry, I could not help this one]

From the beginning of Bush’s first term in office, I began to receive emails, several a week, both indicating dislike and even hatred for Bush as well as emails which touted the superiority of Blue States and blue state voters over Red States and red state voters. Even after the Obama victory, I got one of those Blue State superiority emails, a retread from at least 7 years ago.

The themes of these emails are often along the lines of Bush is stupid, he is incompetent, he is the worst president we have ever had; Karl Rove and Dick Cheney are the evil masterminds who actually run the show, pimping, of course, for big oil.

When it comes to the blue state/red state contrast, being a member of a red state, I am stupider, less educated, probably a religious fanatic than the average blue state voter.

Since I began spending more time responding to these forwards and then writing this ezeen, I have had 3 friends and 1 close relative tells me they never wanted to hear from me again ever. And, what I mean by friends are people I have known for decades, not someone I chat with or exchange emails with on the internet.

I have talked to people directly who express anger and hatred toward George W. Bush, believing that he has ruined us economically and internationally. This is not just political rhetoric, this is very emotional.

If you go to any leftist website (particularly the dailykos), you will find anger and hatred which is palpable. Tony Snow dies and they celebrate this. They wish and hope for the death of other conservatives.

Don’t get me wrong—I am not saying that all liberals are this way. I have had respectful discussions and disagreements and email exchanges with liberals who do not mind an occasional debate, and have reasons for their point of view as well as basic fundamental assumptions which are different from mind, which assumptions account for our political differences.

Hatred, anger and intolerance can eventually dissipate, but it will not do so overnight. It has to go somewhere. Dailykos and Moveon.org and other far left organizations have gotten their candidate elected, and now, even though this will become a better world, where even the oceans will begin to recede, I do not think that their hatred will. It is unclear as to whom this emotion will be directed to. I think that there will still be anger and hatred toward Bush and conservatives, and, no matter how carefully the economic crisis is explained to them (which I outlined in a previous issue), I think that for years, they will continue to blame Bush for the stock market crash (and whatever else is related to that) while never once giving him any credit when the stock market for 7 years was steadily going up.

If Obama and the Democrats attempt to prosecute people from the Bush administration, if they go after Big Oil, FoxNews or TalkRadio, for awhile, those who are angry on the left will be able to focus their anger against these villains.

There will be some—particularly from the far left—who will turn their anger toward a President Obama, if he does not govern from the far left (as of this point in time, it is hard to figure out what Obama will actually do).

However, no matter how you slice it, hatred and anger, although it was part of what got Obama elected, will have to go in some direction. I believe that these emotions have hurt America as a country and will continue to do so.

I have several observations about Obama giving his first press conference. If you have not seen this yet, it is quite striking that, working without a prompter, he looks down at his notes for every thought. He is almost reading this statement rather than presenting his general position. He spent 6 minutes of this conference reading from his prepared statement.

Secondly, this was a short conference on the economy—less than 19 minutes. Glad that he is able to wrap things up in such a short amount of time. Less than 10 minutes was spent on Obama’s economic plan, including his 6 minute statement and questions from the press.

One of his top priorities is bailing out GM, with GM executive looking over his shoulder. Remember the GM is hit from several sides: hundreds of government mandates, loads of federal and state taxes, and unionization. These are exactly the things which will ruin a business.

As Fred Barnes observed the other day, letting GM go under does not mean the end of GM Motors. It means they go bankrupt, they deal with their debts, and they reorganize in part or in full.

Obama’s second approach is another stimulus package (as the last one went so well).

Obama got an eyeful of intelligence briefing the day before. I think that this may have knocked him back a bit, as well as the idea that, in less than three months he will become the President of the United States.

When it comes to the dog he might buy, Obama was able to give great specifics. It is obviously an issue that Obama had given great thought to. 2 minutes.

As far as I know, this is the first actual press conference which Obama has had. He did open himself up to press questions here in Texas, but made a run for it when the questions were not the ones he expected.

There have been several stories coming out this week where several unnamed McCain staffers are pointing toward Sarah Palin as unprepared and unequipped to be VP and, therefore, in part at fault for the McCain loss.

Given the media and what it is, I am sure that you have heard that Palin acted unprofessionally after receiving daily media information and that she refused preparation for the Couric interview, even though she had serious deficits when it came to civics and world geography.

People in a campaign want to be in another campaign. It is good money, it is energizing, and one feels as if he is doing good. So, what may be happening here is, in order for this or that behind-the-scenes person not to get blamed for the McCain defeat, they have to put this defeat on someone else, and who better than Sarah Palin, who will not be coming back to Washington DC anytime soon.

Are any of these accusations true? We have no clue, although there are other staffers who have fundamentally contradicted some of the accusations. For instance, one staffer remarked about how passionate Palin was about Darfur, and the details which she was aware of. It seems unlikely that a person with this view would not understand that Africa is a continent. There were newsmen around Palin almost constantly. Once, the report was, she went into Wal-mart for diapers (no idea if this was true). If she went on a shopping spree, it seems like this would have been known a long time ago (the clothes purchased for her, the object of all those foolish media attacks, was done by the Republican committee, and several sizes of each outfit were purchased so that they had the correct fit—that is not a crazy shopping spree by Palin). Were these stories exaggerations? Possibly, but we do not really know. However, when Obama first became a candidate, I am certain that he had a serious knowledge deficit as well. When it came to having a good overall knowledge of Washington and of the world in general, McCain was probably the only person who was extensively prepared from the beginning. With regards to Biden, it is hard to tell, given all of the factual mistakes that he made during the VP debate.

The problem here is, those in McCain’s camp who are sending out this information (which will stain Palin forever, given the media bias) are revealing a complete lack of integrity on their part. The man at the top of the ticket, John McCain, has to assume any and all responsibility for his loss. Even if he shares some of the blame with his campaign manager, 90% of the blame belongs to McCain, as the man in charge and 9.9% can be put upon his campaign manager. The other 0.1% should be spread around, with the lion’s share belonging to whomever is leaking this Palin information.

All this being said, bear in mind, this all comes from an unknown source inside the McCain camp. To whom did that source speak to in the first place? Did he or she make several phone calls? Did he or she meet anyone in person? Is there any newsman who will go on the record and say that, “He will not allow me to reveal his name, but I can verify that he is a member of the McCain campaign.” Remember, all over the news a week or so ago was the person at a McCain/Palin rally who screamed out “Kill him” when Obama’s name was said. It turns out that no one heard this except for one newsman. The secret service followed up, people were questioned, but there is no one who can substantiate this story. Yet, you saw it in every newspaper and on every news station. Did any of these news outlets tell you that this was the testimony of one person, who also broke the story?

In this highly politicized news environment, you need to ask yourself, who is really the source of this or that news story. For all we know, an Obama loyalist (or two) could have called up a couple of newsmen and given them this scoop about Palin over the phone. They may have even identified themselves as Charley Brown of the Palin attachment, but warned, “If you attribute me as the source, I will deny this story.” They may have known one or two minor details (the actual story of Palin and the towel) and, having watched the first two Palin interviews, just made up a lot of stuff, which the pro-Obama press is more than willing to print.

Bear in mind, since Palin brought in crowds equal to Obama’s, and yet talked substance much of the time, she is a serious threat to Obama in 4 years. The Obama camp needs to destroy her now.

From hereon in, every time you hear a strongly negative Palin story (or any story which trashes the Republicans), you need to pay attention to the original source and ot the original reporter. It is not outside the realm of the media bias to print stories which are distorted to have an anti-Conservative viewpoint.

McCain’s biggest mistake, in my opinion, was his support for the bailout package. Now did Obama do anything in this arena? He just showed up, and apparently, only after some prodding to expect him to take some sort of a leadership position. He showed up with talking points—big deal. However, few people were convinced of the need for government to intrude in such a big way into the credit crisis, brought on principally by the FNMA/FHLMC debacle (explained in great deal in previous issues). There was a much less expensive Republican version of this bill (there usually is), and it never appeared as though anyone even gave this bill a hearing. The media told us virtually nothing about this bill (and some of you who are reading this do not even know that there was an alternative). This alone would have put McCain over the top—Reid, Pelosi, Obama and Bush would be seen standing on one side, with the maverick McCain on the other. Almost every Senator and Congressman who voted against this bail out was reelected to office, regardless of party affiliation.

Second big mistakes was a two-fer: McCain needed to explain to the public, giving several interviews, how the credit crunch came about; and then he needed to promise to go after those responsible for this economic crisis. Unfortunately, it is likely that Phil Gramm would have been one of those caught up in the investigation and McCain I don’t believe would have followed through against his old friend. If such an investigation would have resulted in jailtime for his old friend, I can understand him not taking a strong stand here. Had such an approach resulted in ruining Gramm’s political career, then McCain should have done it. Expect the most anemic investigation by Congress on this issue. We may never even hear about it (given the record number of go-nowhere investigations this past Congress launched).

There is one issue which was ignored by both the McCain and Obama camps: programs and groups who receive money from government and then turn around and give some of this money to political candidates. This is just wrong. ACORN, FNMA, FHLMC, the ACLU and who knows what else receive taxpayer dollars and then they send some of this money back into the pockets of various politicians. Most people are not even aware that this is going on, but it is far more insidious than lobbyists, and would have given McCain just as much traction of Obama’s anti-lobbyist stance.

McCain never had a clear agenda where the average voter could point to McCain and be able to elucidate McCain’s stands on the issues. At the very end of the campaign, Joe the Plumber was a God-send to McCain, and this should have been McCain’s focus all along—at least when the economy became the foremost issue. With this issue, he could have distinguished himself from George Bush (who spent far too much money) and from Obama (who will probably tax like a Democrat and spend more than Bush). Along the same lines, McCain needed to explain how his conservative approach would have impacted the lives and aspirations of the Middle Class. Face it, Obama received millions of votes from those making under $200,000 ($250,000? $150,000?) a year who really believe that they will get a tax break under Obama.

Bill O’Reilly offered John McCain 30 minutes of air time the same night as Obama’s infomercial. McCain passed on this offer. That was 7–10,000,000 viewers which McCain passed on (neither he nor Palin went on O’Reilly’s show). Chris Wallace had an open invite to Sarah Palin, and she did not go on his show either. Both of them would have asked tough questions, but neither would have been unfair nor would FoxNews have edited the interview in such a way to make either person look bad.

Palin needed to be handled better. She was excellent when it came to drawing crowds and giving stump speeches, almost matching Obama in these two areas. She was weak in certain specifics, and she needed to be educated in these specifics. She should have not given a long interview with a hostile interviewer which could be then cut and spliced to show her at her worst. She should have publically said, “I will go and speak to Gibson or Couric if Obama, at the same time, speaks to Hume, O’Reilly, or Wallace with the same ground rules.” She should have been given several friendly interviews first with Rush, Hannity, Ingraham in order to get warmed up for the interview process. Whenever stumped, she should have said, “I will get back to you on that question” as that, while not looking good, would be better than making a mistake. If the rumors are actually true that she refused interview prep, then someone else should have been brought in to oversee her part of the campaign who could convince her of the importance of such preparation (I have serious doubts about the allegations which have been anonymously made about Palin). A trial interview could have been set up in such a way as to show her how much a bad interview could damage her (which the Couric and Gibson interviews did).

I can guarantee you that, prior to Chris Wallace and Bill O’Reilly, Obama received intensive interview prep which included likely questions as well as measured and brief responses. The limitations which Obama placed upon time in these interviews kept Wallace and O’Reilly from asking too many follow-up questions (they had a set number of topics they wanted to visit and a time limit meant that each topic would be limited). At the end of the campaign, Palin was the most press-accessible of all candidates, which is why you saw very little of her in those last days, as she began to acquit herself quite well (something a pro-Obama press really did not want to report on).

McCain should not have tried to out-Obama Obama. When it came to giving a populist message and a populist approach, Obama could do it better, it was more in line with his liberal viewpoint, and McCain should have, instead, distinguished himself from Obama with conservative economic solutions, revealing how they are best for all involved. Criticizing Obama for wanting to spread the wealth around, and then, in the same breath, talk about bailing out mortgage borrowers, which is spreading the wealth around, does not make sense. Furthermore, the number of mortgagers who are bailed out is quite insignificant, and involves an overall greater cost to bail such mortgagers out in administrative costs than simply paying off that mortgage and giving them their house for free.

The second area in which McCain should not have attempted to out-Obama Obama is in soaring rhetoric. At the Republican Convention, McCain gave a reasonably dramatic speech with a reasonably powerful ending. Unfortunately, what he tried to do during the final week or two of the campaign, is to replay this “Fight with me” refrain. It did not work. Democrats are an emotional group and they need to get ginned up emotionally. This is why, at their conventions, it is soaring rhetoric interspersed with crowd rants or loud music. There were no intervals of silence. You don’t have time to think, you just emote. It is a mistake for Republicans to attempt to duplicate this. Now and again, Palin and McCain ought to give a rousing, emotional speech—like Palin’s first two speeches and McCain’s convention speech. However, after that, what is actually going to be done needs to be emphasized. In the final two weeks of the McCain/Palin speeches, I must admit to being quite disappointed, particularly with McCain’s. I don’t expect soaring, emotionally-charged rhetoric, because I know McCain rarely can get into that groove, and, besides, that approach is meaningless. The emphasis should have been on positive policy agendas, explained again and again.

A tough sell, but one that McCain should have made, is this phoney “make college affordable for everyone” nonsense which liberals spew. After all, who can be against education? When the government makes more money available to students, colleges raise their rates. At this point in time, colleges in general are doing far better than they were 20 years ago. A college is a business and, if Texas College, say, does not have enough students, then they will do what they can to get more students, which includes lowering student tuition fees if necessary. Furthermore, it is not my job or my responsibility to pay for Charlie Brown’s kids to go to college. Furthermore, only about half of the young people in the United States go to college, which is fine—people are successful in American without a college education. It is unfair and elitism to say that citizens of the United States ought to subsidize one group of kids and their future, but not to do so with the other 50% of American

youth. There are hundreds of affordable state colleges and affordable community and junior colleges out there. Being born an American does not give you the right to go to any college you want to go to. I personally know college students who spent college loan money on televisions and stereos and other non-educational expenses. Obama is being an elitist when he supports taxpayer-funded college education.

McCain and Palin needed to speak to more minority audiences in as many different formats as possible and pushed choice in education. McCain should have been willing to speak even for an all-Spanish format, bringing along his own translator (a local political figure supporting McCain would be ideal). Obama’s approach to education is the same as Bush’s—more of the same—more tax money for less results. Education needs to be flexible, student-oriented, and competitive. 50% of our kids need a so-called college prep education and the rest need an education which is more appropriate to them. Changed laws, more flexible standards and competition among educational institutions to get the tax dollars of these kids, are the things which are needed. McCain had it all over Obama in this arena, and this should have been his focus with respect to minority voters, who want the same thing for their own children.

Speaking of minority voters and minority audiences, McCain needed to stress the pro-life issue as well. Blacks and Hispanics are not big liberals when it comes to the education of their children or the makeup of a family.

McCain could have ended a meeting of minority voters with, “I know that this is an historic campaign for many of you, and I do not blame you if you vote for Mr. Obama because of the historical nature of his campaign. However, I am asking for you to vote for me because my values are closer to your values and my approach will be better for your family and for the education of your children.” With this approach, McCain could have siphoned off as much as 10% of the Hispanic vote and 5% of the African-American vote.

Iran's military has warned the US Army in Iraq that the Islamic Republic will give a crushing response to any violation of its airspace.

"It has been observed that helicopters of the US Army were flying at a short distance from the Iran-Iraq border. There is the danger of violation of Iran's airspace because of their proximity to the border," said the Headquarters of Iran's Armed Forces in a statement on Wednesday, Presstv reported.

"Iran's armed forces will forcefully respond to any attempt to violate the Islamic Republic of Iran's airspace," it added.

The statement comes after US forces attacked Syria last month, a move condemned by both Damascus and Tehran.

US commandoes on board four helicopters attacked the Syrian border region of Sukkariyeh, killing eight people.

On Friday, the US military also carried out two more strikes against houses inside Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Agencies (FATA), killing at least 27 people.

Meanwhile, a senior military official said Iran is equipped with unique new weapons and ready to ward off any attack.

"We are in possession of unique new weapons, all domestically designed, which enable our naval forces to deliver a crushing response to invaders within moments of an attack," said the naval commander of the Islamic Revolution's Guards Corps (IRGC), Admiral Morteza Saffari, on Tuesday.

"The IRGC naval forces can repel any offensive with their effective strategies," he said.

Saffari added that the weapons, including missiles, introduced in various wargames were only part of the country's latest military developments, adding that Iran has successfully manufactured state-of-the-art vessels and cartridges that can penetrate bulletproof jackets.

The top commander's remarks come as Iran has been facing threats over its civilian nuclear program.

My comments: again, remember Biden’s warnings? Russia’s missiles, Ahmadinejad wants to have that meeting now, and Iran is warning the US to watch its step. International problems have only just begun.

A yearlong investigation into whether Clinton administration aides left the White House in fraternity-party disarray as they vacated the presidential premises has turned up about $15,000 in damage, according to a government report released Tuesday.

Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.) asked the General Accounting Office last June to look into allegations that Clinton staffers had ripped phone cords from walls, left obscene voicemail messages, defaced bathrooms and vandalized computer keyboards by removing the "W" keys when they left the White House. A number of items, including a 12-inch presidential seal and several antique doorknobs, were assumed stolen.

Although, in the article, the Clinton people chalk this up to normal wear and tear, it is hard to imagine that all of the “W’s” got taken off the keyboards in the White House by normal wear and tear.

Needless to say, the transition from Bush to Obama will be orderly and respectful of the office of presidency. You will not read a story like this a few months from now about Bush trashing the White House.

At www.change.gov we can write to President-elect Obama and offer him suggestions. So I did:

The smartest thing you can do in the realm of unity is to publicly praise Joe Lieberman, to promise that there will be no retributions for his taking a stand to support his friend, John McCain. You ought to consider him for Secretary of State, which McCain would have done.

There are many in the Democratic party who want to punish Joe and that asshole Harry Reid is calling him into to his office like a principal deciding what sort of punishment to mete out.

A public statement from you directly would (1) exert your authority over Harry Reid (which you need to do) and (2) this would gain you great favor and trust from moderates and conservatives (like myself).

Did you notice how Reverend Wright and Bill Ayers and other tangential relationships of Barack Obama were strangely silent during the last 3 months of Obama’s campaign. These are people with strong opinions who speak before crowds and are authors. Any one of those related to Obama could have come forward with a press conference, a tell-all interview, a book, and they would have pocketed either a lot of money or been able to have had the biggest audience in their careers—and yet they were silent.

Now that Obama has been elected, I saw Wright on television yesterday and Bill Ayers, coincidentally, published a story here about the campaign:

What is fascinating is how Ayers references a Palin crowd chanting kill him when Obama and Ayers were mentioned as palling around. Secret service were at that rally, as were thousands of people, yet no one heard this chant. One newsman apparently claimed to have heard one person say kill him, but no one will back him up on this (and the secret service investigated this, as it is a death threat). But, in Ayer’s article, the Palin crowds are chanting.

Ayers is a fascinating guy. I saw him refer to himself as maybe a Marxist and maybe an anarchist.

This is hilarious for several reasons. First, Marxism and Anarchism are antithetical. All forms of Marxism have involved a very controlling repressive government. Anarchy is no government. So, I am not sure how an intelligent man can see himself as both of these things, or sort of drifting between the two ideologies. Marxism is the far, far left, and anarchy is the far, far right.

When FoxNews approached him for a comment, where he could have cleared everything up; instead, he warned them that they were on his property (a Marxist who believes in private property—how quaint!); and then anarchist Bill calls up the police (how quaint once again!). But desperate times (FoxNews asking you questions) apparently call for desperate measures.

Rahm Emanuel is Obama’s first cabinet selection, his chief-of-staff, and the chief-of-staff essentially functions as a buffer zone. He knows everything that is going on with Obama and he knows everyone on the outside who wants to talk to Obama and he makes the decision on who gets through.

On the negative side (to me, a conservative), Rahm is quite partisan. However, in order to engineer the 2006 Democratic takeover of Congress, he ran a bunch of moderate Democrats, many of whom are veterans. This indicates to me that Rahm is a pragmatist rather than an ideologue. As a conservative, I like ideologues in office if they are conservatives; and I like realists in office if they are Democrats. Conservatism is extremely realistic whereas liberalism is not. If the person who is closest to Obama in not a conservative, then a realist would be my second choice. How can you be a realist and a Democrat at the same time? I haven’t a clue.

Now, even though one CNN panel this week took up to calling Obama, Barrack Hussein Obama, I wonder if they are going to talk about Rahm Israel Emanuel, who is Jewish, whose middle and last names come right out of the Bible. Emanuel was also a member of the Israel Defense Forces in 1991. Although he was not a combatant, all armies need support. My guess is, Arabs who know anything about Rahm are not going to be particularly thrilled with Obama’s choice here.

One more thing: even though Rahm is from Chicago, his ties are closer to David Axelrod (who co-ran Obama’s campaign) than they are to Obama. Axelrod signed the Jewish marriage contract between Rahm and his wife, something only a close friend or relative does. In other words, Rahm Emanuel is Axelrod’s choice, not Obama’s. That being said, it is going to be interesting to see how many of Obama’s staff are close to Obama and how many are close to Axelrod. Obama has only been a political figure for a very short time; despite the fact that he says he knows thousands of people, I wonder just how many of these he will put in cabinet positions?

While walking down the street one day a US senator is tragically hit by a truck and dies.

'Welcome to heaven,' says St. Peter. 'Before you settle in, it seems there is a problem. We seldom see a high official around these parts, you see, so we're not sure what to do with you.'

'Well, I'd like to, but I have orders from higher up. What we'll do is have you spend one day in hell and one in heaven. Then you can choose where to spend eternity.'

And with that, St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to hell. The doors open and he finds himself in the middle of a green golf course. In the distance is a clubhouse and standing in front of it are all his friends and other politicians who had worked with him.

Everyone is very happy and in evening dress. They run to greet him, shake his hand, and reminisce about the good times they had while getting rich at the expense of the people.

They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster, caviar and champagne.

Also present is the devil, who really is a very friendly guy who has a good time dancing and telling jokes. They are having such a good time that before he realizes it, it is time to go.

The elevator goes up, up, up and the door reopens on heaven where St. Peter is waiting for him.

So, 24 hours pass with the senator joining a group of contented souls moving from cloud to cloud, playing the harp and singing. They have a good time and, before he realizes it, the 24 hours have gone by and St. Peter returns.

'Well, then, you've spent a day in hell and another in heaven. Now choose your eternity.'

The senator reflects for a minute, then he answers: 'Well, I would never have said it before, I mean heaven has been delightful, but I think I would be better off in hell.'

Now the doors of the elevator open and he's in the middle of a barren land covered with waste and garbage. He sees all his friends, dressed in rags, picking up the trash and putting it in black bags as more trash falls from above.

The devil comes over to him and puts his arm around his shoulder. 'I don't understand,' stammers the senator. 'Yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and clubhouse, and we ate lobster and caviar, drank champagne, and danced and had a great time. Now there's just a wasteland full of garbage and my friends look miserable. What happened?'

I emailed a number of people, most of whom I believed to be Democrats and liberals, and asked fo their input as to what they expected Obama to do; I received some very practical, logical expectations and one, at least, which read like the Obama talking points. I will let you decide. I have not edited or commented on any of these:

I do a weekly ezeen from a conservative viewpoint and I would love to hear what you expect that Obama will do upon becoming president. I would prefer not to hear that he will bring change or hope or that he will undo the last 8 years of the failed Bush policies, or other political campaign slogans, but some actual specifics--the things which caused you to vote for Obama (if, in fact you did):

E.g., he will keep pro-choice judges on the Supreme Court; he will pull the troops out of Iraq in 16 months, he will repeal the FISA legislation, he will send me a check or reduce my taxes, he will reduce federal spending, etc. If you know the names of any specific legislation which he will probably support (The Fairness Doctrine, the Employee Free Choice Act, etc.), even better.

Let me know if I can use your name and I will print whatever you send me, unedited and without my comment inserted within your text.

Gary, As a conservative I voted against Obama. His religious background scares me. I didn't support either candidate. However, I have faith that it is a part of God's plan for him to be president. I only pray that he will not be assassinated. I have no idea what to expect from him. I'm definately taking a wait and see attitude. In all this, I can be proud of our country for electing an African American. I'd like to believe it means we have healed from our past history. I'm afraid, though, that most voted as I did...the lesser of two evils. I doubt you'll be very interested in using this opinion, but feel free to put my name to it, if you do. Mary Anne Bufkin-Baisley.

[included with this was a small photo of Obama’s next to Reagan’s and a headline “Obama, the New Reagan.” I think that it was supposed to be a link to a story, but it was not; so I did a search on the web and found this:]

Those 20 million illegals deserved to have amnesty. Bush messed up immigration laws.

People have stopped opening businesses and striving for success because of Bush and the Reservist going to war, not because of the distribution of wealth Obama "Socialized".

Obama's idea of Spanish as the National language is "brilliant". English is soooo different than the other languages of the world. (Besides, Bush speaks English)

Isn't it just wonderful to have someone in office that thinks that Nancy Pelosi is a very good choice for Speaker of the House. She is almost too conservative for Obama, but that is Bush's fault.

Obama just met with leaders of the Middle East and showed his Foreign Policy prowess. He suggested an "Upper" and "Lower" East. That way they wouldn't have to fight over the "middle" East that Bush was involved with.

I really do hope for the best, but expect very little because there is no watchdog group for this individual.

The public cannot comment on Obama's mistakes unless you treat him like the six year old child in T-ball. "It's OK, you tried, and that is what counts. If that umpire (Bush) was better, that could have been a strike. If the groundskeepers (Republicans) had done a better job, that could have been a hit.

Don't worry there Barky, it's important that Unky feels good that he got you on the team. It doesn't matter that you haven't shown anyone that you can throw, or catch, or even hit. You cheered pretty good the last few games, so I got everyone to let you play so they could all tell everyone how open mined they were. And, if anything goes wrong, don't worry. I'm the main announcer, and everyone else in the booth decided that it is much easier to say that the umpire was mistaken rather than actually call the game and comment when our team makes an error.

When terrorism strikes the US (Let's down-size the military, they are soooo not "Viewish"))

When insurance is more than your property (We want non-documented Democratic voters)

When gasoline is $7.50/Gallon (Oil rigs won't produce for ten years, so lets not start)

When all those evil business owners deposit their profits directly into the welfare system (Of course

the business owners will use what savings they amassed BO (before obama) and expand their

businesses to create jobs - wait, there is no reason to create jobs, nobody has to work

When you are asked "Apiete uno para ingles" when you call information (English is sooo

I will give Barky a chance, But I honestly see no light at the end of this media-made facade.

I am of course thrilled that he will put pro-choice judges on the Supreme Court. I hope he gets to put some in other courts as well.

Sorry I haven't written for so long; have been very busy. Yes, I voted for Obama, and am proud to say that I managed to educate at least 7 other people to change their votes from McCain to Obama. I worked at Obama campaign headquarters in Oregon and helped to put another Democrat in the Senate (Merkely beat Gordon Smith). I also visited a friend in Arizona and wore my Obama shirt everywhere; I had many compliments. I was really hoping he would win AZ.

1) I believe that he will be honest with us, for instance he didn't lie to the American people about the mess we are in right now or that it will be easy to dig out of the hole our country is in

2) I like his calm demeanor and the fact that he thinks before making decisions - "he doesn't base his decisions on his gut"

4) I believe he will stop giving tax breaks to corporations that take our jobs over seas.

5) I believe that he will drastically change our medical system, so that everyone has medical insurance. I'm hoping that in this process, our medical system becomes a one payer system, and no one makes a profit on another's illness, misery, and pain. Good by private insurance companies!

6) I believe he will encourage laws to regulate Wall street and the banking industry. Good by deregulation!

8) I like that he has worked hard and studied hard his entire life, and I'm proud we finally have a smart president (not someone who was at the bottom of their class). You do know that Obama was head of Harvard law review?

9) I like that his past actions confirm that he is who he says he is, i.e. instead of taking high $ jobs, he has worked to enhance the lives of persons (communities) who needed help and has given many people hope, which I believe is an essential need we all have.

10) I love the fact that he is of color. I think this fact alone says a lot to people who are racist in this country and to the world who never thought Americans would elect a black man.

Gary, I will tell you that I, like many Americans had become apathetic and hopeless regarding politics and what was going on in our country. But, I began paying more attention to politics with Bush/Cheney; and I have to say that Bush has done a lot of things that caused me to not be proud to be an American. But, election day this year, I am again proud to be an American. I will continue to keep myself informed, to demonstrate when necessary and to demand that my government actually work for all Americans, not just the rich and powerful!

Forgive all my typos - I look forward to hearing from you. And yes, you can use my name. I am a very proud Obama supporter. —Angie Odell

Gary, I became an Independent (formerly a Democrat), due to my Conservative leanings BUT my "openmindedness"----I don't walk "lockstep" with the far left or right. I am further from the Republican Party of today than the Democratic Party on most issues. The Republicans are not Conservative, just biased and narrowminded, in my judgment. This is why they lost---they couldn't see it. They advised McCain (a good man) to take down Obama, rather than to take down Geo. Bush and his lack of leadership.....this cost him the Presidency. Karl Rove politics will not work again (although he is a bright man, he is the "deep throat" of this administration w/the WMD). McCain should have denounced the Wars "roots" and supported Colin Powell, who was betrayed by Cheney/Rumsfeld.....but supported the troops once the lie had been exposed. He should have pursued pursuing Osama bin Laden, but once he joined Bush, it was over for him. Locked-in Right Republicans and Locked-in Democrats voted exactly like we knew they would---the Independents and "flexible" Dems and Republicans elected Obama. I suggest that if you are a died-in-the-wool Republican you focus on re-inventing a party that more represents the younger idealists of America, not the stodgy old or the evangelicals--which drove Christian non-evangelicals to different churches and away from the Republican Party. Don't go after Obama, he's already looking at Hagel-R, Buffett-R, Powell-R, Gates-R for his Cabinet & advisors......HE got it!!! Thanks for listening, now I'm happy with watching to see IF Obama can turn some of this mess around. Vote out, in 2 years, your incumbents, regardless of party. Give new minds a chance, since the old ones are full of themselves.

(Have you noticed that some of the best stories about Obama or certain areas of our economy are found first in the UK?).

RUSH: The Obama recession is in full swing, ladies and gentlemen. Stocks are dying, which is a precursor of things to come. This is an Obama recession. Might turn into a depression. He hasn't done anything yet but his ideas are killing the economy. His ideas are killing Wall Street. They need some certainty, and now everybody in the Drive-By, "We don't know who Obama is." We got a story from Jennifer Loven, the Associated Press today: we don't know who Obama is. All of a sudden now on Charlie Rose, they're starting to talk about his ties to Saul Alinsky. I'm not joking at all. It's all coming up on the program. We've also got a Reuters story, here's the headline: "Will Democrats Tinker With Mutual Funds, 401k Plans?" So now they do the story after the election. And they get it right and they tell you what the Democrats plan to do with your 401(k) is, confirming what I told you, a bunch of people did, prior to the election.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 780 points since Obama won the election, and he hasn't passed anything yet. The seas have not parted; the sea levels have not declined. And guess what we learned today? Vladimir Putin wants to return as the president of Russia. Now, let me give you this in a football analogy. Putin returning to power is like a successful head coach coming out of retirement after learning the schedule for the next four years will be a cakewalk. Imagine Chuck Noll of the Pittsburgh Steelers, Vladimir Putin now becomes Chuck Noll, who has been retired from the Steelers for a long time. Chuck Noll learns that his team will have a series of all home games for the next four years, and the teams he's going to play are the Detroit Lions, the Oakland Raiders, and the Kansas City Chiefs. He's going to be playing the patsies in the league. They talk about putting missiles in Europe yesterday aimed at Poland. Now today the KGB comes back, Putin wants power. This stuff is not coincidental, ladies and gentlemen. I actually think the Obama campaign likes this economic chaos, just as they did during the campaign. The more economic chaos there is the greater opportunity for expanded government.

By the way, the news media today, they're spinning for this. They're spinning all over the place, what is it, Chris Cuomo today on Good Morning America, (paraphrasing) "This market drop had nothing to do with Obama. This market drop is because of bad economic news." I even saw, I'm not sure where because I was hustling here this morning, there's some news agency that reported that Obama is not facing a sinking economy. He's not facing a sinking economy. That's exactly right. He's causing it! He is causing the sinking economy.

RUSH: It was CNN. CNN Money said that there will be no recession and no depression now because Obama won -- and that took, what 24 hours? We predicted it. We predicted it right here on the EIB Network. Amazing, how the economy all of a sudden, "Oh, it's not that big a deal, not that big a problem." Well, it is. The Dow Jones Industrial Average down over 790 points since Obama won.

He hasn't even passed anything yet. The truth about this is, the markets work six to nine months ahead. Everybody in the market is trying to figure out where we're going to be six to nine months ahead. They're selling and they're getting out. That 4,000-point drop, that was also due to Obama. In fact, let's go sound bite number one before we get to Carl Cameron here. This was on CNBC this morning in the Squawk Box show and something they call The Bond Report. Andrew Sorkin from the New York Times, UBS Financial Services director Art Cashin spoke about the Obama transition. The New York Times guy says, "Why wasn't Obama's attitude toward Wall Street vs. Main Street already baked into the cake? I mean, there's an expectation Obama was going to win. There's an compensation he's talking about Main Street and Wall Street as though they're two separate things for a very, very long time."

CASHIN: It's one thing to be campaign rhetoric; you can understand that. Both of them were talking on a populist vein. But now we're getting in there; we're going to be talk about specific packages. I think the market said, "Holy smoke! The campaign's over and we're still talking like that, so what does that mean as far as opinions and ideology where it's going?" Nothing was baked into that cake.

RUSH: So basically here, the market sell-off is Obama fear-based. There's no question. I know some of the economic numbers continue to be bad, but CNN money says, "No, no, no. There's no recession. There's no depression! Everything's fine."

RUSH: I tell you, folks, we are looking at the largest stock sell-off after an election in American history. The largest stock sell-off in American history! The market is down right now almost 10% since Election Day. (For those of you in Rio Linda, that was two days ago.) This is tracking to be the worst post-presidential election three-day period since at least 1900, the worst so far. The market was down 6% in November of 1948. We're right now tracking to be much worse than that. However, ladies and gentlemen, the Drive-Bys are not suggesting that Obama has anything to do with this. The stock market still falling, what is it, down now 324; down 486 yesterday. Now, let's connect the dots. On Tuesday we elected a new president. The new president promised to increase corporate taxes, increase capital gains by a third, increase the top marginal tax rate on income, impose a massive new energy tax that would bankrupt the coal industry.

Did you hear that, Rachel? He wants to bankrupt the coal industry. His party is now talking about a government takeover of 401(k)s. In addition to you losing your 401(k), can I make a point to you about this? Imagine every 401(k) and SEP/Keogh Plan in the country, and the government takes 'em over. They're going to pull 'em out of the stock market. Your investments are in the markets or wherever else you have them. They're going to take your 401(k). The way they're going to "sweeten" this for you is to take your 401(k) back to its August levels before the market decline. They're going to say to you, "We're going to restore the full value of your 401(k)," and you're supposed to have your tongue on the floor panting going (panting), "Really? Really? Oh, wow! I love Obama! I love the Democrats."

Right. Then they take your 401(k) away from you after they "restore the value," and they put it in your so-called Social Security fund, which is bankrupt, and they're going to grow it by 3% each year with government bonds, and they're going to adjust that for inflation. Well, whoopee-doo. If we enter a deflationary period, which a lot of people think we might now -- which is not good, by the way. Deflation is bad for producers because they can't sell the things they produce for a profit. It can drive businesses out of business if we go deflationary. Inflation is bad, too. But deflationary is a horribly bad cycle. They're going to take your 401(k), put it in the Social Security trust fund, whatever the hell that is. Trust fund, my rear end. Whatever they're calling it, going to put it there, guaranteeing you 3% interest a year, and the most that you're going to be able to contribute to it, Rachel, every year is 5%.

It's not whatever you choose adjusted off the top. But then what nobody's talking about, ladies and gentlemen, is this. It's particularly troubling out there. Massive amounts of investment capital will be taken out of the market and given to the government. Imagine all of the millions, hundreds of millions of dollars -- your 401(k) and everybody else's invested wherever you have it invested -- taken out of those companies, out of those instruments and put in the government. Can you imagine the recessionary pressure of that? The de-capitalization of the markets? One of the things that happens when you buy stock is the companies in which you buy stock use that money for investment and so forth; borrowing, building, whatever. That's going to go, if this happens.

So, in addition to you losing your 401(k) to the government at 3% a year for the rest of your life, adjusted for inflation, all that money comes out of the stock market. Okay. So let me start at the top here, connecting the dots. On Tuesday we elect a new president. The new president promised -- even before the election, by the way, when we had a 4,000-point drop. The president promised to increase corporate taxes, capital gains taxes, the top marginal income tax rate, a massive new energy tax that will bankrupt coal, and his party is talking about a government takeover of 401(k) plans. So on Wednesday the Dow drops about 486 points. It's down 346 points today, but of course, according to the Drive-Bys, these two events have nothing to do with each other. It's just a coincidence.

The market's down today because of the jobless numbers. That's how the Drive-Bys see it. Uhhhhh, we have the largest market plunge after an election in history. Thank you, man-child Barack Obama.

[To be fair, the stock market has historically done better under Democrats, but, apart from Carter, LBJ and FDR, most Democrats have been quite moderate. In some policies, like spending, Clinton was to the right of Bush (and, partially, because there was a Republican Congress with a good leader pushing in that direction)].

RUSH: Quin Hillyer today in the American Spectator: "Conservatives may not realize just how difficult it might be to recover from this week's elections. ... Too many conservatives think we've seen all this before -- in 1964 and 1974 and 1992 -- and that we know how to handle it. ... We're not dealing with the same sorts of opponents. These New Alinskyites who are taking over the White House, combined with the most leftist congressional leadership in memory, will not let us play by the same rules under which conservatives recovered from those earlier debacles. They will try to drastically tilt the playing field, seed our side of the field with land mines and, in short, rig the process to make it next to impossible for the political right, or Republicans, to recover. And they are likely to succeed in at least some of these designs. It will begin with their efforts to secure a filibuster-proof majority of 60 senators (including the two independents).

"We've seen this game before. They did it in Indiana's 'Bloody Eighth' congressional district in 1984. They almost succeeded in 2000 in Florida. They did succeed, outrageously so, in the Washington State governor's race in 2004," where a recount produced more votes for the governor than there were people who lived there. 'Those are just the most obvious of many similar examples. And now they are even more ruthless, more lawyered-up, and in a more powerful position to pull it off than they were in any of those instances,'" '64, '74, and '92. "Next, watch what happens if they regularly can't peel off enough Republicans (or hold their own semi-fairminded people like Nelson and Joe Lieberman) to overcome whatever filibuster attempts Republicans do mount. Watch for an assault on the filibuster itself. Watch how they use as precedent the GOP a nuclear/constitutional option' on judges in 2005 -- except instead of just using it for judges, watch them use it against all filibusters. It's easy: Make the ruling from the chair that the filibuster is out of order for some reason. Instruct the parliamentarian to rule in their favor. Win the appeal of the parliamentarian's ruling by simple majority vote. And watch the courts pronounce it an internal matter of the legislative branch and thus outside of courtroom purview," and, bam, they've got the filibuster.

"Watch a cheerleading establishment media -- the Fourth Estate as a veritable Fifth Column -- actually back these lefty maneuvers. It's all in the name of one-man/one-vote democracy, dontcha know? The filibuster once served its purpose, they'll say, but as a vestige of Southern 'massive resistance' to integration it is now being used for massive resistance to the first black president, which invalidates it (suddenly) as a legitimate tool. Watch the left use these tactics and others to pass even more liberalized voting laws -- an open invitation to even more fraud that is more creative, easier to hide, and less challengeable in court. ... Other ways the Obama axis will tilt the playing field: 'card check' legislation to eliminate secret ballots in unionizing and to force union victories in contract negotiations. Provision after provision giving favors to the trial bar so it can sue enemies into submission. ... only when the time is right and the ground (or air) has been well prepared, will come the grand-daddy of all fights, the re-enactment of the misnamed 'Fairness Doctrine.'

"Oh, they'll be clever. They'll pick their spot. They'll wait until Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity or Mark Levin says something innocent they can twist out of context and call 'hate speech' -- and then they'll highlight some schoolyard fight where a member of a 'victim group' gets the worst of it as if the 'attack' were caused by talk-rad.no, make that 'hate radio,' which will be the new moniker the Fifth Column/Fourth Estate hangs on the talkmeisters. (Even before imposing the Fairness Doctrine, they'll use the Federal Communications Commission in other ways to put a muffler on their opponents.)" By the way, speaking of that, Henry Waxman, who is a partisan leftist radical, apart from that, this guy holds more hearings and investigations than anybody in Congress, and he has entered into a battle now, he's asked Pelosi to give him oversight over the FCC and take it away from John Dingell, who's already had global warming taken away from him by Pelosi.

"The erosions of conservative rights will be incremental. Each one will have its own justification. Each one will be supported by the establishment media. Each one will be timed so as to allow the general public to become accustomed to it, to accept it as unremarkable, or even to come to regard it as a public good for the sake of keeping conservative 'troublemakers' from fomenting disorder. . These are the sorts of things Alinskyites do. These are the sorts of tactics used by ACORN, at whose conferences Obama himself regularly taught seminars on 'power.' These are the sorts of policies favored by the academic left, Obama's old milieu -- the policies that favor speech codes and stolen campus newspapers and the firing of faculty for 'offensive' remarks. Conservatives have fought things like this for years already, of course. But they've never fought it while the left controlled so many of the levers of power, and certainly not when the left was led by such a charismatic and near cult-inspiring leader who was so smart, so well steeped in these stratagems, and so fully supported by a Fourth Estate up whose legs warm feelings run every time he waxes eloquent. It will take very focused, very intelligent, very skillful action by conservatives to stop this creeping subversion of a free society. This is a whole different political battlefield than any on which we've fought before. And we haven't yet found our Omar Bradley." That's Quin Hillyer today in the American Spectator.

RUSH: Here is Frank Greve from McClatchy newspaper. This is the Drive-Bys. "'How Will President Obama Deploy his Internet Army?' -- A powerful new lobbying force is coming to town: Barack Obama's triumphant army of 3.1 million Internet-linked donors and volunteers." See, Snerdley, it's not just the 1.9 volunteers, it's the Internet donors. "In a mass e-mail thanking them, written moments before his Grant Park victory speech, Obama put them on notice. 'We have a lot to do to get our country back on track, and I'll be in touch soon about what comes next,' he wrote." This again aimed at all of you dunces out there who think that we're going to get a centrist government out of Obama. "How Obama will use his ardent laptop-armed cadres is unclear. So is the extent to which they'll rally behind his priorities, press him for their own or both. Joe Trippi, the Internet politics guru whose computer geeks made Howard Dean a contender in 2004 and who went on to design Obama's socially networked campaign machine, offers a provocative and educated guess.

"Trippi predicted that Obama would use his forces, first and foremost, to intimidate congressional foes of his agenda, rally his allies and forge 'one of the most powerful presidencies in American history.' ... because his Internet operation was miles ahead of Republican John McCain's, Obama's liberal-to-libertarian electronic activists are in a position to dominate the new political medium much as conservative Republicans dominate talk radio. ... 'We really know who Obama's community leaders are,' issue by issue, said Thomas Gensemer, the managing director of Blue State Digital, the Washington-based mobilizer of online communities." Trippi said this: "Obama will be able to say these are the 10 members of Congress standing in our way on health care. Basically, it'll be the president and the people united, with some members of Congress in between, which won't be a very comfortable place to be."

Let me translate this for you: 3.1 million volunteers and Internet donors all continuing to get blast e-mails from the Obama campaign. The Obama presidency will continue in campaign mode just as Clinton's did. What they're going to do is find somebody to send the e-mails out on whatever issue it is, Obama wants tax rate to 90%, Obama wants whatever he wants, if he runs into trouble, he tells these 3.1 million people we got these ten congressmen -- and it can be Democrats -- we got these ten congressmen, these two senators, they're providing us problems, we need you to really go after them. Here comes the Internet onslaught, and we've seen how Harry Reid and Pelosi bent over, grabbed the ankles for MoveOn.org and Daily Kos. So I mention all this, right now it's prediction and speculation. But I far believe most of this than I believe this silly notion that Obama's going to be a harmless little centrist 'cause he knows he can't go very far and the economy is so bad, he's not going to be able to raise taxes, there's nothing to tax, there's no capital gains to tax. This is why we spent two years learning who Obama is. It's why we spent years learning about his past and who his alliances are with, the things the Drive-Bys were not interested in, the things McCain was not interested in.

We know why he sought the office. He sought the office to accomplish all this radical stuff. He's not doing this singularly because of an ego like many people who run for office. This is serious, serious stuff. Quin Hillyer is right. We've not faced a playing field like this in these previous instances. Now, we can get geared up for it and we can give them a good game and contest this, but Obama and his team are going to get whatever they want. It doesn't matter if it's Democrats standing in the way. If they have to be intimidated, if they have to be thrown overboard, if they have to be told they're not getting any campaign money, including Pelosi, by the way. There is going to be one guy running this show in Washington, and it's not going to be Pelosi, it's not going to be Reid. They think, maybe, that they can roll this new guy, they think that they can maybe make sure that he gets some lessons taught, that these barons in Congress, they're the ones that really run the show. Let's wait and see. I don't think anybody has any idea what's ahead for them, other than us, who are watching.

RUSH: While you're absorbing that, "When the government took over mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac..." and, by the way, Rahm Emanuel was a counsel over there, now chief of staff to Obama. (laughing) It's going to be so much fun to watch all these Obama voters just find out what they've done. "When the government took over mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, taxpayers inherited more than just bad debts. [Taxpayers are] also potentially on the hook for tens of millions of dollars in legal fees for the executives at the center of the housing market's collapse." We are going to pay the legal fees to prosecute these people, and we're going to pay the legal fees for the lawyers the accused hire to defend themsleves.

"With the Justice Department investigating companies involved in the mortgage and financial meltdown, executives around the country are hiring defense lawyers. Like many large companies, Fannie and Freddie had contracts promising to cover legal bills for their executives. When the Treasury Department delivered a $200 billion bailout to Fannie and Freddie, that obligation passed to the government, which may find itself paying for the lawyers defending the executives against the government's own prosecutors. 'Who'd have thought we might be on the hook for paying the defense costs when we're also paying the prosecution costs?' said Doug Heller, executive director of Consumer Watchdog, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based group that has been critical of the financial bailout packages.

"'To defend the economy from the havoc that's been created, we're going to defend the havoc creators?'" There's one thing wrong with this. I mean, as far as it goes, it's reporting accurately, but these executives are not guilty. They may have a secondary, tertiary role. This mortgage crisis is at the feet of Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Franklin Raines, Jim Johnson. These are the executives that ran Fannie Mae. Now, if they're going after some of those people, fine and dandy. If these were Wall Street executives, banking executives, these people were under thug directive from Janet Reno and the Clinton administration to make these stupid loans that everybody knew at the time nobody could pay back. Obviously this is part of the deal to get Barney Frank and these clowns off the hook, as it were.

RUSH: Snerdley was telling me during the top-of-the-hour break, "I can't believe what I just learned. Obama had 1.3 million volunteers!" I said, "Snerdley, you're behind the times. It's not just 1.3 volunteers. It's all of the Internet network that he put together." Let me tell you what else is going to happen, all you people that think Obama is gonna govern from the center. To set this up, let me ask you if you remember Dingy Harry and Pelosi bending over and grabbing the ankles at every MoveOn.org meeting or at every Daily Kos convention or whatever. They bent over and grabbed the ankles for these left-wing extremist websites, these kook websites, 'cause they send a lot of money in. You're going to have this Obama volunteer network and this Obama Internet network. ACORN and all these people, if they're not already, they're going to be in Washington or outside.

They're going to be harassing every elected official they can who stands in Obama's way. If Obama wants to raise the top marginal tax rate to 90%, any Democrat in the Congress who opposes this is going to hear about it from Obama's network, and they're going to threaten. They're going to threaten the loss of funds. They're going to threaten being targeted at the next election. This is not... Why do we want to sit here and deny who this guy is? Why do people on our side want to deny his roots? Why do we want to deny what we know? There's a great article here by Quin Hillyar in the American Spectator, and you know what it's entitled? "Saul Alinsky Takes the White House," and that's exactly what has happened. The organize community organizer, Saul Alinsky, has taken the White House.

Now, not literally 'cause he has assumed room temperature, but his disciples have taken over. I'm going to give you the details of this after the break, but first, here is what I promised: four sound bites of the Drive-Bys trying to figure out who this guy is. I think it's amazing the CYA that's starting to effervesce here in the Drive-By Media. Let me start out by sharing with you what Jennifer Loven, who's part of the White House press corps who just hated Bush. I mean, she was just relentless in her pursuit of Bush and the press secretaries. "Great Expectations: Obama Will Have to Deliver," is the headline. "Over and over, Barack Obama told voters if they stuck with him 'we will change this country and change the world.' They did, and now their expectations for him to deliver are firmly planted on his shoulders. Many supporters greeted his victory with euphoria," and then, read down and read down and read down, and you get to this, from Jennifer Loven.

"Even after nearly two years in the spotlight, little is understood about the 47-year-old first-term senator's approach to leadership. His resume: community organizer, eight years as state legislator, and less than four as U.S. senator. As a lawmaker, he has displayed a knack for working with Republicans on a handful of favorite issues." That's a lie. "But he has devoted most of his time in the Senate to running for president. ...Personally, he's a bit of an enigma, too. ... One of the many revelers who spontaneously flocked to the White House after Obama's win [was] waving signs like, 'Why Wait? Evict Bush Now' ..." So here Jennifer Loven: He's really an enigma. We don't know who he is. We don't know much about him. He didn't do much. His resume is kind of thin.

Where was this beforehand? Friday night... Wanna laugh? Friday night, Charlie Rose Show, Tom Brokaw and Charlie Rose.

BROKAW: We don't know a lot about Barack Obama and the universe of his thinking about foreign policy.

ROSE: I don't really know. And do we know anything about the people who are advising him?

ROSE: He is principally known through his autobiography and through very aspirational (sic) speeches, two of them.

RUSH: That's Tom Brokaw. Grab number three real quick, Mike. Grab sound bite number three. Tom Brokaw and Charlie Rose admitting they don't know diddly-squat. All they had to do was assign a reporter! You had 18 months or two years to find out about the guy, just assign a reporter, Tom! You work at NBC News. Here's Brokaw, by the way, this is this morning on Scarborough's show. Mika Brzezinski says, "Potentially, this is a great opportunity for Republicans, 'cause that perception of fear versus hope I think in some ways is unfair, and there may be some time for some, I don't know, true Republicanism and new stars to be born."

BROKAW: Everybody is going to have to examine the instruments, if you will, of polarization. Talk radio is a piece of that. The -- it -- it -- it's in the interests of -- of some people out there to try to keep this going and it's in their narrow self-interest (crosstalk).

SCARBOROUGH: You -- you -- you talk about radio, which really was an instrument of the nineties. I must say: in this century, the Internet is so hateful.

RUSH: Fine and dandy. But did you hear what Brokaw said? We've got to do something. "We've gotta examine the instruments of polarization; talk radio is a piece of that"? You know who the greatest polarizers in this country are? The Drive-By Media! NBC, CBS, ABC, New York Times, Washington Post, LA Times, on down the line. They are the great polarizers, if you will. I just wanted to throw that in. All right, so we've played... See, I got out of order here. (interruption) Yeah, but I can't find number eight because I used number... Here are the other bites. Go ahead and play this one.

THOMAS: Saul Alinsky is, uh, really was a model from this, er, famous community organizer in Chicago, and this whole idea that Alinsky had that it's not gonna work if you offend large groups of people. You know, we think of community organizers as having their fist out and, you know? Ah, no, no, no, no, no. You have to win over the majority by being peaceful and nonthreatening. Saul Alinsky used the word "nonthreatening." This is key to Obama. There's no militancy involved. This is very important and -- and his chief strategist, Axelrod, really understood this. Especially if you're running a black guy for president, you cannot threaten the whites.

RUSH: Now, that was Evan Thomas of Newsweek magazine on the Charlie Rose Show; and Rose said, "Evan, given the early beginnings for Obama and his team? What kind of campaign did he want to run? Because I'm fascinated by the idea what he set the standard suggested going to be from the bottom up, community organizer might suggest as a way to achieve a result." So here's Evan Thomas at Newsweek telling us all about the Saul Alinsky way, after the election. They knew who this guy was; they know who this guy is. Saul Alinsky was a model for this community organizer in Chicago. This whole idea that Alinsky had, it's not gonna work if you offend large groups of people. Be nonthreatening. Here's Charlie Rose again who spoke to both Evan Thomas and Jon Meacham of Newsweek magazine. Meacham added this to what you just heard.

MEACHAM: He's very elusive, Obama, which is fascinating for a man who's written two memoirs. At Grant Park he walks out with the family, and then they go away.

MEACHAM: You know, they don't let him out. And have you ever seen a victory speech where there was no one else on stage?

THOMAS: There is a slightly creepy cult of personality about all this. I mean, he's such an admirable --

THOMAS: It -- it -- it just makes me a little uneasy that he's so singular. He's clearly managing his own spectacle. He's a deeply manipulative guy.

RUSH: Good grief, I can't... I mean, I believe it, but I can't believe it. They know all this! They knew all this before the election. I even made this point yesterday. I've never seen an acceptance speech where the family is not there, bring the wife and kids out in the weird looking dress; send her backstage, get rid of the kids and go out and make the speech, big crowds, manipulative. These are the people swooning all over this guy during the campaign. Now they're setting this up 'cause they don't know what he's going to do, or they're worried that they do know what he's going to do, and they're just concerned. There's one more here. This is the final exchange. Charlie Rose, Evan Thomas, Jon Meacham.

ROSE: -- and he sort of -- it's almost like he then ascends to look at the circumstance.

THOMAS: He writes about this metaphor being a screen upon which Americans will project. He said they want of Barack Obama; I'm not sure I am Barack Obama.

THOMAS: He had -- he has the self-awareness to know that this creature he's designed isn't necessarily a real person, and he's self-aware enough --

RUSH: This is just... (laughing) To listen to these Drive-Bys and these elitists now after the election describe their total lack of understanding of who Obama is, yet they do understand things about him that are not good. He's manipulative. He ascends after a speech to watch everybody watching him. He watches us watch him. He's "slightly creepy," and he has "the self-awareness to know that this creature he's designed isn't necessarily a real person"!

RUSH: All right, now that you have heard these sound bites of Jon Meacham and Evan Thomas at Newsweek discussing with Charlie Rose just who is Obama, I want to play 'em again, two of them. I want you to look at them in a little bit of a different light. You remember shortly after Bill Clinton's in office, maybe been in office a year, went out to Catalina Island off San Diego and some Washington Post reporter wrote this piece about the power crackling in his jeans. Well, this is better than that. But the difference is that power crackling in the jeans was envy, it was praise, it was idolatry, awe. This is fear. What they're saying about Obama, these Drive-Bys, this is fear. Now, these two bites confirm for all of us that they are irresponsible in doing their jobs. They know all this, they have these fears beforehand, they viewed it as their job to get Obama elected, burying what they feared, burying what they know. They really have lost their credibility. I don't see how they get it back. But I want you to listen to this, these two guys again, these next two bites, within the context that they are scared. Here's the first of the two, Jon Meacham talking with Evan Thomas and Charlie Rose about Obama.

MEACHAM: He's very elusive, Obama, which is fascinating for a man who's written two memoirs. At Grant Park he walks out with the family, and then they go away.

MEACHAM: You know, they don't let him out. And have you ever seen a victory speech where there was no one else on stage?

THOMAS: There is a slightly creepy cult of personality about all this. I mean, he's such an admirable --

THOMAS: It -- it -- it just makes me a little uneasy that he's so singular. He's clearly managing his own spectacle. He's a deeply manipulative guy.

RUSH: Now, let me tell you what they're saying that they're not saying. We've seen this before. We have seen this creepy cult of personality. We have seen this singular, managing his own spectacle. We've seen this deeply manipulative guy. We saw this before. They are scared. They are not saying that, but I hear fear. Here's the next bite. Charlie Rose continues here with a question.

ROSE: -- and he sort of -- it's almost like he then ascends to look at the circumstance.

THOMAS: He writes about this metaphor being a screen upon which Americans will project. He said they want of Barack Obama; I'm not sure I am Barack Obama.

THOMAS: He had -- he has the self-awareness to know that this creature he's designed isn't necessarily a real person, and he's self-aware enough --

RUSH: Ahhhh. Charlie Rose, light goes on, ahhhh. Self-aware enough to know that this creature he's designed isn't necessarily a real person. That is fear. These guys are looking at Obama and they've seen him the exact way we have, all of this time. They only now after they think they got him into office are now starting to talk about their fears about how nobody knows anything about him, his resume is thin, he's only written two books, and they're autobiographies, we don't know what other books he's read. Yes, we do. We don't know anything about him. It's creepy, never seen a victory speech with nobody on stage -- what is this making fun of Biden, by the way? Locking Biden in the bar so he doesn't come out? Look at all they hid. Look at all that they refused to report. They had plenty of chances to write editorials at Newsweek magazine, and they didn't write one reflective of what they really saw and know and fear about Obama.

RUSH: Pop quiz time. Pick the month, pick the day, pick the year when the teachers union pronounces that all classrooms must hang a portrait of President Obama. No answer. I don't know what the answer is; only time will tell. Okay, Snerdley is making his guess: January 20th, 2009. Pick the month or the day -- well, the month, day, and year when the teachers union pronounces all classrooms must hang a portrait of President Obama, The One. I think the last time this happened was FDR, when you had to do it.

Now, Snerdley told me an interesting story here at the top-of-the-hour break. He got a call from a very close friend of his last night, who was very, very alarmed at what he had heard on this program yesterday. And what he had heard on CNN last night. He was very, very concerned. One of Snerdley's best buds, who loves Snerdley, wants Snerdley to continue to have a place to work (laughing) is worried that they're going to come after me at the Obama campaign. Now, stop and think of that when you hear the rest of this. He's worried the Obama campaign's going to come after me because I happened to say that Rahm Emanuel and Obama are "Chicago thugs." Snerdley's buddy called him up and said, "Now, you understand, you've gotta tell Rush that the word 'thug' has racial connotations."

Snerdley, according to his version of the story, came flying out of his couch, phone-in-hand-at-ear and said, "Is every criticism racial these days? I'm getting sick and tired of all this political correctness and these speech codes and people trying to intimidate other people into shutting up. Every word is racially connoted. 'Thug,' when did it become racial? And when did Rahm Emanuel become black?" I called him a Chicago thug, too. I thought the word "thug" actually could be traced back to union thugs. You know, I have been talking about union thugs for the longest time I've been hosting this program. All of a sudden now "thug" has racial connotations? So here's a guy worried that Snerdley is going to lose his job because there isn't going to be a job because Obama's going to come after me, and that that's not thuggish.

What they did to Joe the Plumber, that he isn't thuggish. That is thuggish. When you use the power of the state to investigate and publicly humiliate and persecute a private citizen who can't do anything to you in the United States of America, that's thuggish. And once again, folks, I don't care about Barack Obama except for one thing: his ideas. I don't care about his age. I don't care about his sex. I don't care about his sexual orientation. I don't care about his gender. I don't care about his wife. I don't care about the kids. I don't care about what his middle name is. I don't care where he was born. I don't care what his birth certificate says or doesn't say; he is my president, and I don't like his ideas, and I don't have to wait until Inauguration Day to find out what they are. I already know, because I did what any other American can do and found out.

And so now I'm the thug. Snerdley's buddy said, "Well, I'm worried. CNN really targeted old Rush last night." Yeah, and the sound bite they played didn't show any anger or rage. So this is a sign of what's coming. I told you the race industry is only going to get bigger. It's only going to get more intense. Any criticism of The One and his ideas? You criticize his ideas, and you are going to be targeted. They've already made it clear that they're going to target people who don't like Obama's ideas 'cause they've already done it! They've already gone off on a number of people. Joe the Plumber is just one example. Now, I have been mentioning... By the way, let me remind you of something. The first person that I know of in this country who called Barack Obama a Chicago thug was Bill Clinton.

It was during the presidential primaries, Democrat primaries when Obama played the race card against Clinton. And it was Obama who played the race card against Clinton. In this one instance, Der Schlick Meister was right. He did have the race card played against him and he didn't know what to do about it because he's "the first black president," in his mind. Now Obama's going to destroy his legacy as well, by the way. He's going to do his best. It's what's coming. He has the political instincts of a Chicago thug. That's what Bill Clinton said. I'm just in agreement with President Clinton.

Even though I saw a story on FoxNews which said, “Don’t worry, the government will not take your 401K” I don’t buy that for an instant. If there is money there, if the government can leverage its position by legislation (which they will call regulation), then they will take the 401K’s in any way that they can.

Let me explain how this will work. Democrats think that their Congressmen are carefully crafting legislation to control greedy wall street and CEO types, to reign in their greed and evil. But here is how it will work. They will offer to buy your 401K using August or September values, they will pocket the money, and then pass legislation saying that they, the government, only has to have 5–10% on hand in order to control and distribute these 401K plans. So, even if they pay for these plans at 40% over what they are worth, they will have a huge net gain of money to work with.

Let me try an illustration. You have a dollar bill which is worth 60¢ all of a sudden. The government says, we will give you $1 real credit for this 60¢ asset, and then they will pass legislation saying, they only need to have 5¢ on hand which will stand for this actual 60¢ asset. They may have paid 40¢ too much for it, but now they have the use of 55¢, a 15¢ instant gain.

Obama’s tax cuts (it bothered me a great deal when no one in the news and no one on the McCain team ever questioned Obama’s promise to give tax cuts to 95% of Americans until the very end):

The people who helped get Obama elected are now talking about how creepy this cult of personality is (there is a video to click on):

Chuck Schumer: We regulate pornography, so we ought to reasonably regulate what radio stations broadcast:

Conservative Review
Issue #48	Kukis Digests and Opines on this Week’s News and Views	November 9, 2008