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“I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base.” — Hillary Clinton, 17 March, 2008

After Clinton’s speech on her heroic entrance into Bosnia in 1996, news footage surfaced showing that it was, in fact, a very peaceful visit, with not a sniper in sight. Clinton’s daughter, Chelsea, accompanied her on the trip, and footage shows Clinton hugging children and participating in a concert with Sheryl Crow.

Hillary’s response to being caught in such a bold-faced lie? “You know, I think that, a minor blip, you know, if I said something that, you know, I say a lot of things—millions of words a day—so if I misspoke, that was just a misstatement.”

To honor the would-be President Clinton’s “minor blip,” The Patriot Shop now offers a tribute to Hillary’s “Sniper Fire Tour.” Our exclusive T-shirt is made of 100% combed jersey cotton and features a 4″ x 4″ Sniper Fire Tour crest on the front left of the shirt, and a large graphic (10″ x 12″) on the back.

Well it looks like the potential of a lot of drunken Republicans inside the Beltway watching John McCain accept the nomination at the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis has increased significantly.

From the Politico:

The NFL announced today that the 2008 season will kick-off on Thursday, Sep. 4th — the same night McCain is set to accept the GOP nomination at the convention in the Twin Cities.

Per ESPN, the game will start 90 minutes earlier because of the convention.

But given that it pits the world champion New York Giants versus America’s team, the Washington Redskins, Republicans can’t be happy about what will inevitably distract attention from the penultimate night of their convention.

I personally think that this could create an interesting dynamic at the bars on Capitol Hill and inside the Beltway. Get everyone liquored up and then put on the Republican National Convention. How else would one want to spend a Thursday night?

For many, apparently not.

According to the poll below, it looks like a lot of voters on both sides are unclear as to where the candidates they are supporting really stand on immigration.

This is very interesting to me, because I truly believe that immigration is going to be a major issue in this campaign cycle, for Democrats, Republicans and everything in between.

From the Center for Immigration Studies:

WASHINGTON (March 31, 2007) –A new poll using neutral language finds that primary and caucus voters have little knowledge of candidates’ immigration positions. The results also show that voters often do not share their candidate’s position.

Among the findings:

 

• Only 34 percent of McCain voters, 42 percent of Clinton voters, and 52 percent of Obama voters correctly identified their candidate as favoring eventual citizenship for illegal immigrants who meet certain requirements.
• Of McCain voters, 35 percent mistakenly thought he favored enforcement that would cause illegals to return home, another 10 percent thought he wanted mass deportations, and 21 percent didn’t know his position.
• Voters often held different positions from the candidate they supported. Only 31 percent of McCain voters had the same immigration position as he does. For Clinton voters, 45 percent shared her position; 61 percent of Obama voters shared his position.
• This lack of knowledge, coupled with disagreements with their candidates’ positions, makes it very difficult to draw any conclusions about the fact that all three remaining candidates favor legalization for illegal immigrants.
• Whoever wins the presidency will face significant opposition to giving eventual citizenship to illegal immigrants. Just 25 percent of Republican and 50 percent of Democratic primary/caucus voters said they would support such an effort.
• Pro-enforcement voters have a greater intensity of views than supporters of legalization. Among Republicans, almost nine out ten who favored causing illegals to return home said they strongly supported that view; on the other hand, fewer than half of Republicans who backed legalization strongly supported that view.
• This greater intensity also exists among Democrats. Of Democrats who favored causing illegals to return home, more than seven out of ten strongly supported that view; on the other hand, fewer than six out of ten who favored legalization strongly supported that view.

Methodology: The survey of 1,276 persons who voted in a primary or caucus was conducted March 12-13. The survey was conducted by Pulse Opinion Research.

Even though this study shows that there are some uninformed McCain voters, the fact of the matter is that McCain is the presumptive GOP nominee. Basically, those who are going to vote for him are doing so on more issues than immigration.

However, these findings are extremely problematic for Hillary Clinton, whose campaign has been on a downward spiral for weeks, despite leading in polls in upcoming primaries.

The fact of the matter is that she is avoiding answering questions in a straightforward manner which leaves her supporters in a position where they have to guess, or naturally assume Hillary Clinton is on the same page as them.

Obama on the other hand, seems to be much more straightforward on the issues and doesn’t beat around the bush when he is asked questions.

Is this going to be an election of straight talk? We’ll see.

A few days ago I made a post about a Hamas video and discussed how many people think American politics is ugly, when in reality compared to many parts of the world, our politics is quite civil.

A great deal of my political interests (in the foreign realm) lay in the politics of the Middle East, so I’ll probably tend to keep most of my international political discussions on those topics, however if you have something you’d like to submit, I’d be more than willing to post it.

Today’s video comes from Lebanon. This is by no means a new video, but it is extremely powerful in showing how a little propaganda can make such a destructive organization like Hezbollah seem like it is only protecting the best interest of the Lebanese people.

There are some things that have to be pointed out about this video.

First, this video was featured on Al-Manar (translation: The Beacon), which is one of the Hezbollah propaganda networks (the other being Al-Nour, which is their radio arm).

This is important to note, because this isn’t just an internet video. Following the 34-day fight with Israel, this video was an extremely important tool for boosting Hezbollah’s credibility, making them appear to be the party that will stand up for the Lebanese people and take on the Israelis.

Second, take note of the Katyusha rockets displayed throughout their video. It’s quite interesting how they can take such a primitive piece of Iranian weaponry and make it appear to be the tool that under Hezbollah leadership, can protect them from anything.

There are a lot of messages within this video that could be elaborated on further, including the music, the location in Lebanon and even the people in the video. However, if people want to give their takes on those items, I’ll leave that to the message board.

However, the one thing I want anyone who watched this video to take away is an understanding of how terrorist organizations like Hezbollah are using these sugar-coated propaganda videos to promote their cause and gain credibility amongst their people.

Whenever I watch videos like these (I have watched well over 300 different propaganda videos from the Middle East alone) I cant help but reflect on how thankful I am that we have media that will challenge other media sources, without having to worry about getting killed.

But more importantly, this video should serve as a reminder of how dangerous Iran (who funds Hezbollah) already is. Just imagine how powerful Hezbollah will be, should Iran fully develop a nuclear weapon. Not only would our key ally in the region (Israel) be in danger, but I have no doubt that our ties with the more friendly Arab nations would be put in serious jeopardy.

I welcome your thoughts on this.

One of the real treats about living in DC is the fact that there is always something new opening up around the city. Whether that be a new exhibit, or even a new museum, there is almost always something to do and/or check out.

Unfortunately, since I moved here in February of 2007, I haven’t taken as much advantage of the “touristy” attractions in the city as I would have liked, however this past weekend I was invited to check out the new Newseum, located on 5th and Pennsylvania a few weeks before it officially opened.

Right off the back, I strongly urge any and every blogger who is interested in learning more about how the media has progressed over the years and where it is going, to make the Newseum a stop the next time they are in DC.

The Newseum has 6 floors packed with hands-on exhibits, incredible archives and a handful of theaters, including a 4-D theater that in less than 10 minutes gives an extremely impressive depiction of how important the media has been in shaping our lives and more importantly, our country. The additional dimension makes it even more enjoyable for even those who are usually hard to please (like myself).

Even though the theaters were impressive, the one exhibit that I enjoyed the most was News Corporation’s “News History Gallery,” which had original copies of newspapers chronicling some of the most important events to happen in the history of the United States, dating all the way back to the 1700’s. It’s quite impressive to see how even in the last 10 years, newspapers have significantly evolved, but it’s even more impressive to see the evolution over the last 300 years.

Another exciting feature that the Newseum has is an incredibly large series of sections from the Berlin Wall. Unlike most museums, you could actually get up close to the wall, take pictures and examine the messages, which were surprisingly all in English. Aside from the Berlin Wall, the Newseum also has a 3 story guard tower that visitors can step into.

Finally, one of the more somber parts of the Newseum was their 9/11 gallery, which includes what appeared to be a large sculpture which was originally a 40? section of the broadcast antenna that was atop World Trade Center Tower 1 (thanks to DHH for the clarification), and along the walls are hundreds of newspapers from across the globe with their headlines from that day. Even though I’ve seen most of those front pages online previously, seeing them again takes you back in time to wherever you were when you first heard about the attacks. It’s definitely a powerful exhibit. Rightfully so, there is no photography allowed in this part of the Newseum.

I definitely recommend the Newseum to anyone who is interested in the media, it’s history and more importantly, its future.

The links below are some additional pictures I took at the Newseum (on each page, click image to view full-size image).

View from the top of the Newseum

Famous Typos from the Newseum

Hanging Chad’s!

News Corp.’s News History Gallery

Direct Quote from Atlah Worldwide:

Obama is a mac daddy, Obama pimps black women and white women… you didn’t notice him till he brought out those big chested white women with their tight t-shirts and their short pants, that’s what a pimp does.

C’mon, you don’t get your campaign started with a big chested white woman, she must be a 54-D…. double D’s…. he put his name on two big 54-DD’s.

Obama… that’s the first place you saw it…. on two great big ole’ tits.

I could go all day.

If you haven’t seen this yet, I urge you to check it out. I’ll have some other words of wisdom from Atlah soon I’m sure.

I know that I continually talk about this election being ugly, however at no point am I suggesting that our elections are anywhere near the ugliest in world. Sure, they might be the most expensive, but in following some of the campaign approaches in the Middle East (particularly in Lebanon and PA), our elections seem pristine.

Check out this Hamas propaganda video that I came across today. You don’t need to speak Arabic to get the jist of it, but for those of you who don’t follow politics in the Palestinian Authority (it definitely gets crazy), the rats are Fatah and the Lion is Hamas. FYI: Hamas = funded by Iran.

Update: The original video was removed by YouTube, but I found a version from MEMRItv that has the subtitles. Even better! 

In no way is this me showing my support for either of these parties, however I think that its extremely interesting and beneficial to study the politics and campaign techniques of those in other countries to bring perspective to what is happening here in the United States. Furthermore, I think it really illustrates the barbaric mentality that some have in the Middle East. I know that Islam is suppose a religion of peace, however I have a hard time seeing that when this is a common production for Hamas.

Personally, I enjoy the civility, yet competitiveness and passion that goes into Israeli elections and as the time draws near, I’ll post much more on how they do things. Of all the countries in the world who have open elections, Israel is by far a case study that more Americans should examine. If you think the US is political, just take a trip to Jerusalem before a big campaign.

It looks like another fine US export is making its way to the shores of Puerto Rico. No, it’s not food, oil, or machinery, but instead is one of the Nation’s oldest pastimes, campaign corruption!

Even though Puerto Rico isn’t a state (it’s an non incorporated territory), it sure seems that their political problems are reflecting those commonly seen here on the mainland.

Here is some of the brief article from CNN.com:

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Puerto Rican Gov. Anibal Acevedo Vila and 12 associates face charges related to the financing of three of Acevedo’s campaigns, according to a federal indictment unsealed Thursday.

Acevdeo faces 19 charges, including conspiracy, making false statements and wire fraud.

Acevedo, 48, and legal adviser Inclan Bird are accused of soliciting, accepting and reimbursing illegal “conduit contributions” from Acevedo’s family and staff. Conduit contributions are those made by one person in the name of another.

In addition, “a group of Philadelphia-area businessmen solicited, accepted, and then reimbursed illegal conduit contributions from their own Philadelphia-area family members and staff” on behalf of Acevedo, a Justice Department news release said.

While this alone is juicy news for us politicos, I don’t think that this story will really have wheels until this guy can top hiding money in freezer, like Congressman William Jefferson from Louisiana.

What is juicy, however, is the fact that Acevedo is in fact, an Obama supporter who has raised money for Obama. This presents a unique challenge for Obama, who has been trying hard to capture votes from various groups of Latinos. Does he condemn the Governor? Ignore it? Or talk his way around it?

We’ll see…

Looks like the people at BarelyPolitical have come up with a new Obama Girl video, however this time there is actually some substance, as opposed to the previously released, overly-sexualized video (though that was extremely effective and I have no complaints).

There aren’t many times that I would say that Obama Girl is making a good point, nor did I ever think that I would say she has a great quote, but how can you argue with this:

“He’s got the delegates locked down, so let him Barack this, cause he ain’t no Mondale, John Kerry or Dukakis.”

Up until the general election at least…

and another one you might not have seen…

I stumbled across this video on YouTube from a speech that Barack Obama gave today in Greesoboro, North Carolina, regarding the economy and how John McCain is no better on the economy or internation issues than George W. Bush.

This is a bit humorous to me, simply because I cant think of one economic plan that Barack Obama has presented that would carry the economy in an even more positive direction.

I guess when both the Democrats have their own political problems their caught up in, they might as well start going after the Republican who hasn’t really had to deal with the same “back and fourth” politics the Democrats have been engaged in.