ABC's Brian Ross Exposes Utter Hypocrisy of Big Three Auto CEOs

A tip of the hat to ABC's Brian Ross for a righteous skewering of the three CEO hypocrites who run GM, Ford, and Chrysler.

Big Three CEOs Flew Private Jets to Plead for Public Funds

The CEOs of the big three automakers flew to the nation's capital yesterday in private luxurious jets to make their case to Washington that the auto industry is running out of cash and needs $25 billion in taxpayer money
to avoid bankruptcy.

Even as their companies fail, Ford and GM CEOs continue lavish lifestyles.

The CEOs of GM, Ford and Chrysler may have told Congress that they will likely go out of business without a bailout yet that has not stopped them from traveling in style, not even First Class is good enough.

All three CEOs - Rick Wagoner of GM, Alan Mulally of Ford, and Robert Nardelli of Chrysler - exercised their perks Tuesday by flying in corporate jets to DC. Wagoner flew in GM's $36 million luxury aircraft to tell members of Congress that the company is burning through cash, asking for $10-12 billion for GM alone.

"We want to continue the vital role we've played for Americans for the past 100 years, but we can't do it alone," Wagoner told the Senate Banking Committee.

While Wagoner testified, his G4 private jet was parked at Dulles airport. It is just one of a fleet of luxury jets owned by GM that continues to ferry executives around the world despite the company's dire financial straits...

Wagoner's private jet trip to Washington cost his ailing company an estimated $20,000roundtrip. In comparison, seats on Northwest Airlines flight 2364 from Detroit to Washington were going online for $288 coach and $837 first class.

After the hearing, Wagoner declined to answer questions about his travel.

Ford CEO Mulally's corporate jet is a perk included for both he and his wife as part of his employment contract along with a $28 million salary last year. Mulally actually lives in Seattle, not Detroit. The company jet takes him home and back on weekends.

Click here for the rest of the story.

My October 28 speech to the Tipton County Tennessee Republicans

Speaking to the Tipton County Republican Party


Book signing after the speech

Why Mitt Romney Was the Best 2008 Choice for President

We Republicans blew it in 2008.

We let non-Republicans vote in too many primaries, and the result was a nominee who was a RINKO (Republican in name kind-of) on a good day, and a RINO (Republican in name only) on a bad day.

Mitt Romney's op-ed piece in todays New York Times, Let Detroit Go Bankrupt, shows that of all the 2008 Presidential candidates, including the eventual winner, he was the candidate best prepared to handle our current economic crisis.

There's always 2012.

Come on, Mitt, run again !

A website that summarizes the Obama eligibity lawsuits

You can find a pretty good summary of all the Obama eligibility lawsuits here.

This is the best summary site I've seen, though it does not include at least one Federal lawsuit of which I am aware.

Alan Keyes v. Bowen (California Secretary of State)

Keyes v. Bowen was filed in California Superior Court in Sacramento, California on November 12, 2008.

Here's part of the filing:

74. A press release was issued on October 31, 2008, by the Hawaii Department of Health by its Director, Dr. Chiyome Fukino. Dr. Fukino said that she had “personally seen and verified that the Hawaii State Department of Health has Senator Obama’s original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures.” That statement failed to resolve any of the questions being raised by litigation and press accounts. Being “on record” could mean either that its contents are in the computer database of the department or there is an actual “vault” original.

75. Further, the report does not say whether the birth certificate in the “record” is a Certificate of Live Birth or a Certificate of Hawaiian Birth. In Hawaii, a Certificate of Live Birth resulting from hospital documentation, including a signature of an attending physician, is different from a Certificate of Hawaiian Birth. For births prior to 1972, a Certificate of Hawaiian Birth was the result of the uncorroborated testimony of one witness and was not generated by a hospital. Such a Certificate could be obtained up to one year from the date of the child’s birth. For that reason, its value as prima facie evidence is limited and could be overcome if any of the allegations of substantial evidence of birth outside Hawaii can be obtained. The vault (long Version) birth certificate, per Hawaiian Statute 883.176 allows the birth in another State or another country to be registered in Hawaii. Box 7C of the vault Certificate of Live Birth contains a question, whether the birth was in Hawaii or another State or Country. Therefore, the only way to verify the exact location of birth is to review a certified copy or the original vault Certificate of Live Birth and compare the name of the hospital and the name and the signature of the doctor against the birthing records on file at the hospital noted on the Certificate of the Live Birth.

You can read the complete complaint here.

Obama's Constitutionally Faithless Electors

The votes have been cast, and Barack Obama has won a resounding victory in the 2008 Presidential election. All that remains is for his 370 electors to cast their votes for him in the fifty state capitals on December 15, 2008, and for the joint session of Congress to verify the elector vote count on January 6, 2009. On January 21, 2009, Barack Obama will be inaugurated as the 44th President of the United States.

But not so fast.

For the rest of this article, go to Redcounty.com, where I am now one of the regular columnists.

UAW President Gettelfinger a Democrat Brain Dead Luddite

UAW President Ron Gettelfinger shows that Brain Dead Luddites are in both political parties. Even as Detroit's Big Three teeter on collapse, United Auto Workers President Ron Gettelfinger said Saturday that workers will not make any more concessions and that getting the automakers back on their feet means figuring out a way to turn around the slumping economy.

I say Let the Big Three Go Bankrupt.

Carly Fiorina, former CEO of HP and McCain backer, purportedly says, let the Federal Government buy $25 billion worth of cars.

What do you say ?

Rebuilding the Republican Party Despite the Brain Dead Luddites Who Run It - Book Summary

In his new book, Rebuilding the Republican Party Despite the Brain Dead Luddites Who Run It: A Blueprint for Success in 2010 and 2012, conservative author and Republican strategist Michael Patrick Leahy gives a clear eyed assessment of what went wrong in 2008, and what has to change for Republicans to succeed in 2010 and 2012.

Leahy begins by showing how George Bush lost his way when he abandoned policies of limited government and fiscal conservatism in a number of areas, ranging from the unprecedented pharmaceuticals entitlement program to No Child Left Behind. He then shows how John McCain lost the 2008 election by mismanaging Sarah Palin’s post-convention introduction to the American voter, supporting the ill advised, pork filled $700 billion financial services industry bail out, and most importantly, failing to convey a clear conservative message to under 30 voters using state of the art 21st century communications tools and the language of imagery and symbolism they understand.

Leahy demonstrates through a detailed analysis of the election results that it is the 8 million vote majority among under 30 voters, who chose Obama over McCain by more than a 2 to 1 margin, that gave Obama his overall 8 million vote majority and a 52% to 46% win. Projecting the demographic trends forward to 2012, Leahy shows that unless Republicans can win with these under 30 voters, Obama’s margin in 2012 will grow to 54% to 44%.

Leahy recommends a six step program that will lead to Republican success in 2010 and 2012.

(1) Return to conservative principles of limited government, lower taxes, and fiscal conservatism

(2) Frame this conservative message in the symbolism and imagery that will be persuasive to voters who are now between 15 and 29 years of age.

(3) Communicate this conservative message to all voters, but especially voters now between the ages of 15 and 29 using state of the art 21st Century technologies.

(4) Contest all 435 House of Representative elections and all local elections in 2010 and 2012.

(5) Kick the Rinos (Republicans in Name Only) out of the party, and rein in the Rinkos (Republicans in Name Kind Of).

(6) Engage every Republican of every age in growing the party through action, not talk. This will require the establishment of a technologically integrated web based communication network that connects every Republican County organization in real time with the State and National organizations. Young, forward looking, visionary leadership at the very top of the Republican National Committee is required for this. Technology and communication innovators like Patrick Ruffini and Erick Erickson should lead the way, not tired old Rinkos or Brain Dead Luddites.

Leahy goes on to describe the obstacles that must be overcome to succeed with this program. He begins by showing that we are still a Center-Right country, but that Republicans must acknowledge certain truths. The failure to do so will limit the effectiveness of his six part plan.

These truths are:

(1) The mainstream media is officially and permanently an arm of the Democratic Party.

(2) The nation is now comprised of a productive minority made up of small business owners and middle class and upper-middle class workers, who must constantly protect against the encroachment on their rights from the tyrannical majority, which consists of the half of all Americans who pay no income taxes, unions, bureaucrats, and Fortune 500 executives who benefit from public aid.

(3) There is no such thing as bi-partisan cooperation. Every political action taken by the left and the Democrat party is designed to defeat and humiliate the right and the Republican Party. Only vigilance, strength, and devotion to principle will yield any benefits for the productive minority.

The Republican Party needs to be a Big Tent, but the right kind of Big Tent. The "Big Tent Fallacy" which claims that shifting away from true conservatism will attract members of the tyrannical majority is a dangerous falsehood that should be rejected. The "Big Tent Maxim" should be that we welcome those from any group into the Republican Party who embrace the core principles of true conservativism.

(4) Only Republican leaders who are charismatic, adept at communicating symbolically using state of the art technologies, and unwaveringly committed to conservative principles will succeed.

Finally, Leahy lays out a detailed plan of action within these six steps that will give every Republican voter, elected leader, and aspiring leader a step by step blueprint that will lead to electoral success in their own sphere of influence.

In writing this book, Leahy interviewed numerous national leaders of the Republican Party (brain dead and non brain dead alike), the new generation of web 3.0 Republican internet activists, conservative leaders, and Republican County Chairmen around the country.

Rebuilding the Republican Party Despite the Brain Dead Luddites Who Run It: A Blueprint for Success in 2010 and 2012 will be published by Harpeth River Press in January, 2009.

Leslie Carbone Post Suggests Michael Steele is NOT a Brain Dead Luddite

Here's a positive post from Leslie Carbone about Michael Steele's campaign to become the new Chairman of the Republican National Committee.

Cousin Patrick Leahy Wants to Kick Lieberman Out

My third cousin, the personally admirable but politically misguided Senator Patrick Leahy from Vermont, wants to kick Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman out of his Senate Committee Chairmanship.

Senator Lieberman, if it's any consolation to you, this side of the Leahy family extends a warm invitation for you to join the Republican Party !

The Productive Minority and the Tyrannical Majority

Political writers seeking to make a point often do so through the apocryphal quotes of Alexis de Tocqueville, the great French writer and author of Democracy in America.

How often have we heard speeches that cite this apocryphal deTocqueville quote:

America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.

A wonderful sentiment, but one that cannot be found in any of deTocqueville’s writings.

Similarly, here are two common quotes, taken from http://www.brainyquote.com attributed to deTocqueville which I suspect are apocryphal. My cursory search of his works could not find the proper citation, though perhaps a more diligent blog reader may:

The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money

and

A democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it.

Despite their likely apocryphal origins, the idea behind these quotes aptly describe the circumstances to which our nation has fallen.

The Productive Minority today is small business owners and middle class Americans who work 40 to 60 hours a week at middle class and upper middle class jobs.

The Tyrannical Majority is the half of all Americans who pay no income tax, and the Fortune 500 executives and union workers who support their own overpaid income through a variety of public programs.

Our economy is an odd mix of brutal free market capitalism for small businesses and Corporate Socialism for many selected Fortune 500 companies. Borrowing a phrase from Reagan OMB Director David Stockman, the woes of our current economic system can be attributed to the triumph of politics over the common sense of free markets.

The only long term solution is to kick the onerous interference of the government into the workings of the free market out of the arena, and let the creative destructionism of capitalism restore the vibrance and growth to our economy.

First 4 Star Woman General Has Roots in My Hometown, Randolph, New York

Congratulations to Ann Dunwoody, 55, the first 4 star general in the history of the U.S. Army.

Ann's father, Harold E. Dunwoody, 89, was a brigadier general in the U.S. Army who retired to his home town of Randolph, New York in 1972. Dunwoody was severely injured in World War II, but survived and served another three decades in the U.S. Army after his injuries.

He lives in Florida today, and is understandably proud of his daughter.

Ann Dunwoody was a college student at the State University of New York in Cortland on an ROTC scholarship while I was in high school. I recall meeting her when several high school friends stopped by the Dunwoody house to talk with the retired general. Ann was friendly, straight forward, smart, and positive.

Thirty three years later, those character qualities have served her well.

Leo C. Donofrio v. Wells, New Jersey Secretary of State

Here's another interesting twist on the Barack Obama birth certificate saga.

On November 6, 2008 Supreme Court Justice David Souter denied a stay request in the matter of Leo C. Donofrio v. Wells, New Jersey Secretary of State. Donofrio had asked a stay in the electoral process until Wells, in her capacity as New Jersey Secretary of State, confirms the natural born status and eligibility for President of both Barack Obama and John McCain.

Donofrio claims that a procedural error by a clerk at the Supreme Court allows him to request another review of his request by Justice Clarence Thomas.

Stay tuned !

The Republican National Committee Does Not Need Another Brain Dead Luddite as Chairman

Erick Erickson, Editor of Redstate.com, is my nominee to become the new Chairman of the Republican National Committee. Erick is not a brain dead Luddite, unlike some of the other candidates.
Republicans around the country winced as current RNC Chairman Mike Duncan and McCain Campaign Manager Rick Davis brought "a knife to a gunfight with a Chicago political thug" in the 2008 Presidential Election. (With apologies to Sean Connery, who used a similar line in the classic 1989 movie The Untouchables, the story of crime fighter Eliot Ness and Chicago's own Al Capone).

Displaying a stunning combination of arrogance and technological incompetence, the McCain campaign and the Republican Party nationally ceded the 18-29 year old vote to a finely tuned Obama Campaign that took 21st Century internet based tools and technology to an extraordinarily high level of effectiveness. Meanwhile, the lazy Republican leadership sat back smugly admiring the intellectual tidiness of its marginally free market ideology while Obama and the Democrats, among other things, built a text message data base of over 3 million young users with whom they communicated daily over the last two weeks of the campaign.

By more than a 2 to 1 margin, 18 to 29 year old voters went for Obama over McCain.

Now comes the battle for the Chairmanship of the Republican National Committee, which Mr. Duncan inexplicably does not have the grace or intelligence to resign from immediately. We're left apparently with one acknowledged failure competing with an aging genius in Newt Gingrich and an ambitious up and comer in Michael Steele, the former Lieutenant Governor of Maryland and Fox News Contributor.

Michael Steele

Mr. Duncan's candidacy is laughable.

Mr. Gingrich, on the other hand, has proved that intellectual genius and a forward thinking embrace of technology can be combined with political successes. Who can not acknowledge the impressive accomplishment of gaining Republican control of the House of Representatives in 1994 after more than forty years of Democratic misrule ?

The only negatives associated with Mr. Gingrich are his age and Presidential ambitions.

Mr. Steele's candidacy has some merit, as well, but he has yet to demonstrate a blueprint for success in 2010 and 2012.

An engaging speaker, he gains credit for his marvelous Drill Baby, Drill speech at the Republican National Convention.

The concern about Mr. Steele, however, is that he may represent more of the same old same old when jaw dropping visionary change is required.

What, for instance, is his plan to win back the 18 to 29 year old voter ?

My vote, however, for Chairman of the Republican National Committee, goes to Erick Erickson, the Editor of http://www.redstate.com and founder of the Rebuild the Party web site. Erickson is the right age, has the right vision, and has the right energy to turn things around.

Erick Erickson, Editor of RedState.com and my nominee for Chairman of the Republican National Committee


Kick Duncan out of the job now, let Newt run for President, and let Michael Steele run again for Governor or Senator of Maryland. And let's breathe some innovative life and energy into the Republican National Committee.

Carl Leahy 1945-2008

My father's younger brother, Carl Leahy, passed away yesterday in Pensacola, Florida at the age of 63. For twenty years he was the General Manager of WEAR TV, the ABC affiliate in Pensacola, Florida.

A great athlete, father, and businessman, Carl was one of my personal heroes since my early childhood. My first memory of him was fifty years ago, in 1958, when he was thirteen years old and helped our family move from Ballston Spa, New York to Plattsburgh, New York in 1958.

Only a week earlier Carl had stood by one of his employees at WEAR TV who had run into some personal problems.

Here's the moving tribute to him from the WEAR TV website:

Words can't begin to describe what Carl meant to this TV station, to this community, to his family and friends.

All we can say is that we will miss Carl as our boss, but more than that as our friend.

Words of tribute are destined to be inadequate. Such was the measure of Carl Leahy. In his four decades at wear, the last twenty as general manager, he was unstintingly demanding and decisive... And deeply caring and compassionate. And always fair.

Carl managed a business. But worked with people. He guided with a firm hand. But he was relentlessly loyal. He had the rare quality of one who commands respect and the heartfelt devotion and love from those who worked for him worked with him. After Hurricane Ivan, Carl constantly saw to the wellbeing of his employees, and spearheaded relief efforts. Even though his own home had been swept away.

His enormous generosity of spirit extended to the community he loved. A Rotarian, and Board Member For Big Brothers And Big Sisters, United Cerebral Palsy, and the Pensacola Symphony, Carl was personally committed to making Pensacola a better place. And to helping those who need it most. He had no appetite for the spotlight, and when events did coax him into it, he quickly retreated, quietly, humbly. Always ready to help again when called upon.

No friend was more loyal. His golf partners could always count on his competitive fire. His opponents, on his slice. And all, on his good nature, his ready laugh, his friendship.

Carl leaves his wife, Roz, and a family he adored. He leaves a profound imprint on his community... On all who cherished his friendship... And on countless others who never knew the impact Carl Leahy had made on their lives

The world is a less joyful place for his passing.

Let the Big Three Automakers Go Bankrupt

Barely a month after President George W. Bush, the Democrats in Congress and most of the Republicans in Congress bailed out the financial services industry with a $700 billion handout, every other large industry in the country is standing like a pathetic beggar with a hand out, demanding that the Federal Government do the same for it that was done for the resort going AIG executives and the dopey mortgage lenders.

Now comes the American auto industry, whining for $50 billion to save it from four decades of stupid management decisions, greedy unions, and marketplace tone deafness.

Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and presumably Barack Obama can't wait to give these failures some of the money earned by average Americans and successful small businesses, sent to the Federal treasury because it is "fair."

What's fair about an economic system where UAW line workers have for decades been paid three or four times more than their market value ?

What's fair about you and I paying for the outrageous health care benefits given to these UAW line workers by cowardly auto executives ?

What's fair about propping up companies that make mediocre products that the marketplace doesn't seem to want ?

What's fair about you and I helping to pay arrogant executives hundreds of thousands, even millions of dollars a year as a reward for three decades of bad decisions ?

I say let General Motors, Ford, and Chrsyler go bankrupt.

Let those corporations sort out the consequences of their foolish commitments to financial obligations to workers they knew were not sustainable.

Let some capitalistic entrepreneur with a brain purchase the assets from these bankrupt corporations for pennies on the dollar, and let that entrepreneur figure out how to make products using those assets that the market place values.

What we need is the creative destructionism of capitalism, the kind of which the economist Joseph Schumpeter so ably described.

We don't need politically induced corporate socialism.

We have an economic structure today in which the politically connected are given outrageous and unfair benefits at the expense of the politically unconnected who do the most to actually create value -- the small businesses of America.

Time for conservative politicians of principle to show a little backbone, and not get rolled by the whiny politics of failure promotion.

Rebuilding the Republican Party Despite the Brain Dead Luddites Who Run It to be published by Harpeth River Press in January 2009

You can order an advance copy of it here.

Obama Takes a Shot at Nancy Reagan in First Press Conference. Nice.

"I have spoken to all of them [former Presidents] who are living," he says. "I didn’t want to get into a Nancy Reagan thing about doing any seances," he says.

How a True Conservative Will Beat Barack Obama in 2012

Rebuilding the Republican Party Despite the Brain Dead Luddites Who Run It

I will be speaking to one of the Lincoln Clubs in Southern California in January on the topic of Rebuilding the Republican Party Despite the Brain Dead Luddites Who Run It: A Blueprint for Success in 2010 and 2012.

More details of time and location to follow shortly.

Assembling the Obama Thugocracy: Rahm Emanuel

Barack Obama "reaches across the aisle" by offering the Chief of Staff position to the most viciously partisan Democrat in the House of Representatives, Rahm Emanuel.

Here's what Nina Easton of Fortune Magazine had to say about Emanuel in 2006:

Emanuel's in-your-face money demands make him stand out in a party that has sometimes been a little prissy about big-donor fundraising. He's expanded the DCCC's donor base, appealing both to like-minded young financiers and big-business donors with GOP ties who are hedging their bets this fall.

When it comes to slicing and dicing his Republican foes, Emanuel applies a Chicago pol's sensibility that recalls that famous "Untouchables" line: "He pulls a knife, you pull a gun; he sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue."

Consitutional Thugocracy Rating: 100%

UPDATE:

Blogger Getting Paid to Watch elaborates on the "political thug" theme:

Obama the uniter names political thug Rham Emanuel his Chief of Staff

ORIGIN OF THE TERM "THUGOCRACY"

Wordspy cites the first use of the term "thugocracy" back in 1982:

thugocracy (thug.AWK.ruh.see; th as in thin) n. Rule of a country or state by a group of thugs.

Example Citation:

"But can the United States in general, and the war on Osama bin Laden and the Taliban thugocracy in particular, somehow be mass-marketed to a vast and skeptical Muslim populace?"

—Tom Mashberg, "America promises to be a hard sell to many Muslims," The Boston Herald, November 11, 2001

Earliest Citation:

The cruise ship is another Pequod, or ship of fools: one of those large symbols with strings attached, by means of which the writer snarls at socialist thugocracy, the class warfare of crooks versus fools, third-world liberation movements, the United Nations and just about everything else.

—Paul Zweig, "Modest Proposals," The New York Times, June 20, 1982

George Will has used the term "thugocracy" in several columns since 2001, according to Wordspy, and may have used it as early as 1988.

Lee Cary of American Thinker first combined the term "thugocracy" with "Obama" in his May 16, 2008 article A President Obama's Neoliberal Thugocracy.

The term "thugocracy" was first combined with "Barack Obama" in the more traditional media, as best I can determine, by columnist Michael Barone on October 12, 2008: The Coming Obama Thugocracy by Michael Barone

COMMENTS SOUGHT:

I've heard some comments that using the term "New Thugocracy" to describe the Obama Administration may be unfair.

I would like to hear comments from readers on this topic.

In my usage of the term, I think of a "thugocracy" as governmental rule by "political thugs", as opposed to "thugs".

First Time Voters Gave Obama His Victory

A little preliminary number crunching on the final 2008 Presidential Election returns yields some fascinating results.

Overall voter turnout was DOWN one per cent from 2004. (From 121 million votes cast for the top two candidates to 119 million for the top two candidates. In each year, other candidates accounted for one per cent of the vote).

Update: Here's an article that says I may be wrong in that statement:
" It looks like about 133.3 million people voted for president, based on preliminary results from the country's precincts tallied and projections for absentee ballots, said Michael McDonald of George Mason University. Using his methods, that would give 2008 a 62.5% turnout rate, he said" (from November 5, 2008 Wall Street Journal online).

An ABC poll showed in October showed that first time voters (mostly age 18 to 29) broke 3 to 1 for Obama, but stayed at 13 per cent of all registered voters. That means 11.7 million new voters went for Obama, and 3.8 million went for McCain, an 8 million vote margin for Obama.

Among voters who also voted in 2004, McCain had about 52.4 million votes to Obama's 51.9 million. Adding the two together gave Obama 63.6 million votes to McCain's 56.2 million votes.

15.6% of Bush's 2004 votes either died or just didn't show up for McCain, in contrast to the lower 12% of Kerry's 2004 votes who either died or just didn't show up for Obama.

The moral of the story ?

Republicans need to focus on changing the minds of 2008 first time voters in the 2012 cycle AND need to focus on the upcoming 2012 first time voters. That's where the opportunity for improvement lies.

Grading the Pollsters - Rasmussen and Pew Research Win, ABC, CBS, NBC, Zogby Lose

Click on the image below to see how poorly ABC, CBS, NBC, and Zogby did.

Disclosure and Transparency by President-Elect Obama

One of six recommendations John Dickerson of Slate Magazine has for Barack Obama is to increase disclosure and transparency.

“Obama founded his campaign on removing the influence of special interests. "They have not funded my candidacy, and they will not run my White House," he has said repeatedly. To match this message immediately, Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, has a tidy little to-do list for the candidate who has promised unsurpassed ethical standards:

(1) Disclose donors who gave less than $200.
(2) Disclose the amounts and professions of bundlers who helped him raise gargantuan sums.
(3) Disclose donors to his Obama Transition Project.
(4) Disclose immediately online those who give to the inaugural committees.
(5) Promise not to raise funds anonymously for the presidential library until the end of his term.”

Dickerson’s right.

As part of this increased disclosure and transparency, I suggest that President-Elect Obama authorize the State of Hawaii’s Department of Health to make his original birth certificate public.

Two days and counting, by the way, since my email and phone call to Janice Okubo, spokesperson for the State of Hawaii Department of Health. Still no response to my thirteen questions concerning Dr. Chiyome Fukino’s October 31, 2008 Statement on Barack Obama’s Birth Certificate.

Resounding Obama Electoral Victory not as Big as George H.W. Bush 1988 Win

2008 Electoral College results

With North Carolina the only state in the balance, Barack Obama has won a resounding electoral victory in the 2008 Presidential Race.

Should he survive potential court challenges to his natural born status and Constitutional eligibility for the office, Barack Obama will enjoy large Democratic majorities in both the House and the Senate. Fortunately, Republicans eked out enough Senate victories to keep the Democratic majority there below 60 -- which means the Senate will not be filibuster proof.

John McCain carried only states that comprise the SEC, Big Twelve, and Mountain West Conferences. Everything else -- Big Ten, Big East, Pac 10, ACC, and all the others -- went for Barack Obama.

It's the largest electoral margin of victory since George H.W. Bush soundly defeated Michal Dukakis in 1988, when Bush won 421 Electoral College votes to 117 for Dukakis. But it's no landslide as was Ronald Reagan's 18 point victory over Walter Mondale in 1984 (Mondale managed to win only the Electoral College votes of Minnesota and the District of Columbia).

1988 Electoral College Results


McCain lost the election for three reasons:

1. He was not a true conservative.
2. His response to the September financial markets crisis was empty theatrics combined with a wimpy acceptance of a bad bailout deal filled with pork.
3. He failed to attack Obama's left wing, anti-American philosophies. He especially missed the opportunity to attack Obama for his twenty year association with Jeremiah Wright.

And so, from the ashes, the Republican party must now rebuild itself, returning to the true principles of conservatism.

Barack Obama and the New Thugocracy

Look for my new book, Barack Obama and the New Thugocracy, in 2009.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt had the New Deal.

John F. Kennedy had the New Frontier.

Now comes Barack Obama and the New Thugocracy. Look for his first one hundred days to be a landmark assault on individual liberties and the Constitution.

Four More Questions for Dr. Chiyome Fukino From One Lawyer

One Lawyer poses the following additional four questions for Dr. Chiyome Fukino, Director of the Health Department for the State of Hawaii, about her October 31, 2008 Statement on the Barack Obama Birth Certificate:

1. Based on the document you reviewed, do you affirm under penalties of perjury that Barack Obama was born in Hawaii?

(That question, on its own, does not solve the matter and leaves the door open to answers that leave the question unanwered still.)

2. Based on the document you reviewed, can you state under penalties of perjury that Barack Obama was not born somewhere other than in Hawaii?

3. Isn't it true, therefore, that the only fact to which you can attest is that there is a document recording the birth of Barack Obama in the Hawaiian records, which is not conclusive proof that he was born in Hawaii?

4. If in fact you cannot verify that Barack Obama was born in Hawaii, or that he was not born somewhere other than Hawaii, then what records do you believe would establish with 100% certitude where Barack Obama was or may have been born?

By the way, I've received no response from State of Hawaii Department of Health spokesperson Janice Okubo to my thirteen unanswered questions for Dr. Fukino. Adding One Lawyer's four questions, that brings us to seventeen unanswered questions about Dr. Fukino's October 31, 2008 statement concerning Barack Obama's birth certificate.

My Thirteen Unanswered Questions about Dr. Chiyome Fukino's October 31 Statement Concerning Barack Obama's Birth Certificate

Email

November 3, 2008
9:26 PM CST

To:janice.okubo@doh.hawaii.gov
From: mike@michaelpatrickleahy.com
Subject: My Thirteen Unanswered Questions about Dr. Chiyome Fukino's October 31 Statement Concerning Barack Obama's Birth Certificate

Ms. Janice Okubo
Communications Officer
Department of Health
State of Hawaii
Honolulu, Hawaii

Dear Ms. Okubo,

I phoned you today with a request that you call me back so that I could ask you some important questions about Dr. Chiyome Fukino’s October 31, 2008 Statement concerning the State of Hawaii’s Department of Health’s review of Barack Obama’s original birth certificate.

As you have not returned my call, and the Presidential Election will be held tomorrow, I thought it important to try once again to receive from you some answers to questions I have about Dr. Fukino’s statement.

There are many American voters, such as myself, who remain unconvinced that Barack Obama is a natural born citizen, and therefore eligible to serve as President of the United States. Dr. Fukino’s October 31, 2008 statement was so carefully parsed it served to raise more questions for us than it answered.

Here are my thirteen unanswered questions for Dr. Fukino. As you are listed as the official communication contact on the statement, I am hoping you will read and respond to each of my questions before the polls open on the East Coast tomorrow morning:


1. Did you review the content of your October 31, 2008 statement with the Hawaii Attorney General and receive a written opinion from him that such a statement would not violate Hawaii privacy laws before you released it ?

2. If you reviewed it with the Attorney General, and he responded to you in writing, can you share that response with us ? Did he give you a legal opinion that you could issue such a release and not be in violation of the State of Hawaii's privacy laws ?

3. Did you review the content of your October 31, 2008 statement with Governor Lingle and receive her approval of the statement before you released it ?

4. Did you personally view an actual physical copy of the long form original birth certificate from August 4, 1961 signed by the attending physician at a Honolulu hospital?

5. What was the name of the hospital ?

6. What was the name of the attending physician ?

7. Besides holding an actual hard copy of the original August 4, 1961 birth certificate signed by the attending physician at a specific hospital in Honolulu, are there any other means by which, as you say "the state of Hawaii can have Barack Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with the state's policies and procedures regarding maintaining "original birth certificates on record".

8. Was the original birth certificate on record submitted as part of the 1911 Hawaii Birth Certificate program, which allowed parents of children residing in Hawaii who were over one year of age to submit alternate birth dcoumentation to the Department of Health and still be called "an original birth certificate."?

9. On what date was the original birth certificate on file registered ?

10. Can an original birth certificate enterred as a record in the State of Hawaii birth certificate data base , but no longer on file in a physical sense, be described as an “original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures” and is this the case for Barack Obama’s original birth certificate ?

11. Did Senator Obama personally authorize Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka to personally view his "original birth certificate on record." ? If so, when and how ?

12. Did Senator Obama personally authorize Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka to issue the statement of October 31, 2008 ? If so, when and how ?

13. Have Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka had any communication with Senator Obama or did they meet with him in person on any occasion in the last 30 days or in the last year ? If so, were those communications or meetings negotiations related to statements to be made about his birth certificate ?

Thank you for your assistance.

Sincerely,

Michael Patrick Leahy

Official Statement of Dr. Chiyome Fukino October 31, 2008 and My Twelve Unanswered Questions

I've included the complete text of the statement below in larger font:

For Immediate Release: October 31, 2008 08-93

STATEMENT BY DR. CHIYOME FUKINO

“There have been numerous requests for Sen. Barack Hussein Obama’s official birth certificate. State law (Hawai‘i Revised Statutes §338-18) prohibits the release of a certified birth certificate to persons who do not have a tangible interest in the vital record.

“Therefore, I as Director of Health for the State of Hawai‘i, along with the Registrar of Vital Statistics who has statutory authority to oversee and maintain these type of vital records, have personally seen and verified that the Hawai‘i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama’s original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures.

“No state official, including Governor Linda Lingle, has ever instructed that this vital record be handled in a manner different from any other vital record in the possession of the State of Hawai‘i.”

###

My call to ask the questions outlined below to Janice Okubo, the Communications Office contact listed on the Department of Health Statement has not yet been returned.

My unanswered questions for Janice Okubo and Dr. Chiyome Fukino are as follows:

1. Did you review the content of your October 31, 2008 statement with the Hawaii Attorney General and receive a written opinion from him that such a statement would not violate Hawaii privacy laws before you released it ?

2. If you reviewed it with the Attorney General, and he responded to you in writing, can you share that response with us ? Did he give you a legal opinion that you could issue such a release and not be in violation of the State of Hawaii's privacy laws ?

3. Did you review the content of your October 31, 2008 statement with Governor Lingle and receive her approval of the statement before you released it ?

4. Did you personally view an actual physical copy of the long form original birth certificate from August 4, 1961 signed by the attending physician at a Honolulu hospital?

5. What was the name of the hospital ?

6. What was the name of the attending physician ?

7. Besides holding an actual hard copy of the original August 4, 1961 birth certificate signed by the attending physician at a specific hospital in Honolulu, are there any other means by which, as you say "the state of Hawaii can have Barack Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with the state's policies and procedures regarding maintaining "original birth certificates on record".

8. Was the original birth certificate on record submitted as part of the 1911 Hawaii Birth Certificate program, which allowed parents of children residing in Hawaii who were over one year of age to submit alternate birth dcoumentation to the Department of Health and still be called "an original birth certificate."?

9. On what date was the original birth certificate on file registered ?

10. Did Senator Obama personally authorize Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka to personally view his "original birth certificate on record." ? If so, when and how ?

11. Did Senator Obama personally authorize Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka to issue the statement of October 31, 2008 ? If so, when and how ?

12. Have Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka had any communication with Senator Obama or did they meet with him in person on any occasion in the last 30 days or in the last year ? If so, were those communications or meetings negotiations related to statements to be made about his birth certificate ?

We will see if I get a response before or after election day !

October 31, 2008 State of Hawaii Director of Health Department Statement Raises More Questions About Barack Obama Birth Certificate

The more I look into the statement apparently released to a small group of selected news agencies yesterday, October 31, 2008, by the State of Hawaii Director of Health Department Dr. Chiyome Fukino, the curiouser and curiouser it becomes.

1. I have been unable to discover the actual statement released by Dr. Fukino anywhere on the web.

It's not listed on the State of Hawaii Department of Health website:

http://healthuser.hawaii.gov/health/about/pr/pressdate.html which shows the most recent press release as being issued October 22, 2008.

Current Year 2008 News Releases

The following is a listing of press releases issued by the Department of Health's Communications Office during the current year. Earlier releases can be found in a separate master listing. For more information DOH press releases or other communication matters, call 586-4442.

October 22, 2008 DOH CITES COMPANIES FOR AIR POLLUTION VIOLATIONS

October 22, 2008 HAWAI'I RECEIVES $1.5 MILLION FOR YOUTH SUICIDE PREVENTION

2. The statement was released to only three sources, apparently: The Associated Press, Pacific Business News Service, and a local Hawaii television station.

3. I cannot determine if an actual press conference was held, or if a statement was merely released.

4. The statement was released on "election eve Friday" on a day when the Department of Health was apparently closed. (They moved to a trial 4 day work week earlier this month). It has the feel to me of the last act in a carefully staged political passion play designed to create the impression that a long form original birth certificate from 1961 signed by an attending physician at a Honolulu hospital exists in the vault of the State of Hawaii Department of Health. Maybe it does. But this statement by Dr. Fukino does not say that.

Take a close look at her actual words, as quoted in the AP, Pacific Business News, and the local Hawaii television station:

"Therefore, I as Director of Health for the State of Hawai'i, along with the Registrar of Vital Statistics who has statutory authority to oversee and maintain these type of vital records, have personally seen and verified that the Hawai'i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures."

I have attached below the transcript from the on air report at Honolulu television station (KGMB, Channel 9) that reported this story yesterday:

Hawaii's top health official is trying to stop a rumor about Barack Obama that says he was born in Kenya and therefore isn't allowed to run for President.

That claim has been spreading online but Hawaii officials say it's not true.

Obama was born in Honolulu and the proof is at the state Health Department.

To end the controversy, director Dr. Chiyome Fukino says she's seen the birth certificate herself. She just can't release it publicly.

After getting numerous requests for it, she explained again Friday, "state law prohibits the release of a certified birth certificate to persons who do not have a tangible interest in the vital record."

No state official, including Gov. Linda Lingle, has ever instructed that this vital record be handled in a manner different from any other vital record in the possession of the state.

If the only source for this on-air report is the statement I've seen from Dr. Fukino, it's yet another example of misleading reporting. The report says Dr. Fukino personally saw the birth certificate, but that's not what the statement says.

I would like to see a videotape of Dr. Fukino making that exact statement. I would like her to hold a press conference answering ALL the questions that her carefully parsed October 31 statement raises.

5. I cannot determine if the statement released was approved by the Governor of Hawaii and the Attorney General of Hawaii, or if it was released independently by Dr. Fukino.

6. Dr. Fukino does not state in her October 31, 2008 statement that she personally viewed an actual physical copy of the long form original birth certificate from 1961 signed by the attending physician at a Honolulu hospital.

7. In the AP report of her statement, Dr. Fukino says the State of Hawaii has the original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures. Since she raised the issue of state policies and procedures, I would like her to release the document describing the state's policies and procedures regarding maintaining "original birth certificates on record".

8. Did Senator Obama personally authorize Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka to personally view his "original birth certificate on record." ? If so, when and how ?

9. Did Senator Obama personally authorize Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka to issue the statement of October 31, 2008 ? If so, when and how ?

10. Have Dr. Fukino and Dr. Onaka had any communication with Senator Obama or did they meet with him in person on any occasion in the last 30 days or in the last year ? If so, were those communications or meetings negotiations related to statements to be made about his birth certificate ?

I will grant the Obama apologists this however.

While the statement released by Dr. Fukino does not prove with absolute certainty that Barack Obama was born in Hawaii, and therefore is natural born and eligible for the Presidency (which is the standard that must be met), it does increase the likelihood that he was born in Hawaii.

Or, as those of us who have been skeptical of this entire stonewalling process from the beginning will argue, it increases our suspicion that there is something about this purported original birth certificate that Barack Obama does not want to see the light of day . . . before the election, after the election, or ever.

Now that the officials of the State of Hawaii Department of Health have partially opened the door, I think it's only right and proper that they disclose everything, including the actual original birth certificate.

Most importantly, Senator Barack Obama should finally do the right thing and authorize the State of Hawaii Department of Health, the Kapioloini Medical Center in Honolulu, and Queens Medical Center in Honolulu to release ALL DOCUMENTS related to his birth.

It's time for a change all right.

It's time for Senator Obama to change his stonewalling and obstructionism on this very important issue and disclose everything necessary to prove with absolute certainty that he is, in fact, natural born, and therefore eligible to serve as President.

Show Us The Birth Certificate Hawaii !

Chiyome Fukino
Brandeis BS 1972
MD University of Hawaii 1976

State of Hawaii Director Department of Health


Dr. Alvin Onaka
State of Hawaii
Chief of Vital Records Office

Hot off the presses !

This story broke in Hawaii about 3 hours ago:

START STORY

Hawaii DOH Talks About Sen. Obama's Birth Certificate
Written by KGMB9 News - news@kgmb9.com
October 31, 2008 11:43 AM
The Department of Health has released a statement about Senator Barack Obama's official birth certificate.

There have been talk among some chat rooms that Senator Obama was not born in Hawaii, or even America for that matter, and therefore is ineligible to run for the office of President.
There have been various requests for copies of his Hawaii birth certificate to the Department of Health, all which have to be turned down.

"State law (Hawai'i Revised Statutes §338-18) prohibits the release of a certified birth certificate to persons who do not have a tangible interest in the vital record," said DOH Director Chiyome Fukino.

"Therefore, I as Director of Health for the State of Hawai'i, along with the Registrar of Vital Statistics who has statutory authority to oversee and maintain these type of vital records, have personally seen and verified that the Hawai'i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures."

Fukino adds that no state leaders, including Governor Lingle, has asked the certificate be handled in any way different from any one else's vital records in state possession.

END STORY

Does this confirm that Barack Obama is a natural born citizen ?
Is the question of his eligibility for the office of the Presidency finally settled ?

Not at all...

Note the careful language from the State Department of Health officials in this press release:

"[we] have personally seen and verified that the Hawai'i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures."

They did not say we have the long form copy of his birth certificate signed by his attending physician at Kapiolani Hospital on August 4, 1961.

It's an original birth certificate "in accordance with state policies and procedures."

One of those state policies and procedures was the acceptance of "after the fact" birth certificates under the 1911 Hawaii Birth Certificate program. This program was for residents of Hawaii over the age of one who did not register their birth with the state originally. The state accepted some "alternate form of documentation." This "alternate form of documentation", once accepted under this program that was in existence until 1972, becomes "an original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures."

How convenient that this press conference is held on the eve of the Presidential election just a couple weeks after Barack Obama went to visit his sick grandmother.

Here's the way Barack Obama can be straight forward and honest with the American people:

Authorize the release of this document that Dr. Chiyome and Dr. Onaka both say they've seen and verified.

If it's an August 4, 1961 long form birth certificate signed by an attending physician at a Honolulu hospital, then it's case closed. You've met the burden of proof.

But if it's some alternate document introduced later...depending on the contents of that document, we may still conclude you've not met the burden of proof.

But show us the document State of Hawaii and Barack Obama ! Let it see the light of day.

And by the way, while we're at it, here's a question for Dr. Chiyome and Dr. Onaka:
Can you please explain to me why you are violating state law by showing us the document, but not violating state law by telling us you've seen the document ? Did you receive authorization from Barack Obama to (1) look at the document and (2) tell us you've looked at the document ?

Another question on the original birth certificate Dr. Chiyome and Dr. Onaka verified:

Is it:

(1) A Certificate of Hawaiian Birth created under the 1911 "after the fact program ?

or

( 2) or is it a standard birth certificate created from the original document provided contemporaneously by the birth hospital ?

And yet another question on this carefully parsed statement:

"[we] have personally seen and verified that the Hawai'i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures."

What exactly does "original birth certificate on record" mean ?

Does it mean they physically viewed the hard copy of the original birth certificate ? Or does it mean they've reviewed the information technology procedures by which the abstracted data was placed into the State of Hawaii birth certificate data base?

And... why a released statement and not a press conference ?


Rush Limbaugh predicted this would happen.

Once more, El Rushbo is on target.

Definitions from Dictionary.com


On record

existing in a publication, document, file, etc.:


File

(1) a folder, cabinet, or other container in which papers, letters, etc., are arranged in convenient order for storage or reference.

(2) a collection of papers, records, etc., arranged in convenient order: to make a file for a new account.

(3) a collection of related data or program records stored on some input/output or auxiliary storage medium.

Obama Ineligible for the Presidency

Speaking tonight before a meeting of the Tipton County Tennessee Republicans at Gateway Baptist Church, conservative author Michael Patrick Leahy will outline his argument that Barack Obama has not proven he is a natural born citizen, and therefore is Constitutionally ineligible to serve as President of the United States.

“The Constitution is quite clear on this matter,” according to Leahy. “Article II, Section I of the Constitution states unequivocally that only a natural born citizen, older than thirty-five, who has resided in the United States for at least fourteen years is eligible for the Office of the Presidency. The courts have decided in the past that to be considered natural born, a candidate must have been born either in the United States or on an American military base outside the United States to parents who are American citizens. Any candidate born outside the United States, not on an American military base to American citizen parents is not natural born. For the first time in American political history, serious questions have been raised about the birth location of the nominee from a major party. In such instances, the burden of proof lies with the candidate. And clearly, Senator Obama has not met that burden of proof. Therefore, he is not eligible for the Office of the Presidency.”

The three types of proof offered by Obama to date are insufficient to establish that he is a natural born citizen. The proof offered includes:

(1) A digital image of the front of a State of Hawaii certified copy of Certificate of Live Birth posted on the “Fight the Smears” website in June, 2008.
(2) A physical inspection of the purported State of Hawaii certified copy of Certificate of Live Birth made in August, 2008 at Obama offices in Chicago by researchers from the Annenberg Political Fact Check organization, a unit of the Annenberg Public Policy Center.
(3) A digital image of an August 13, 1961 “notice of birth” in the Honolulu Advertiser newspaper.

None of the three pieces of evidence identified above have been verified by Dr. Alvin Onaka, the Registrar and Chief of the Vital Records Office for the State of Hawaii, as authentic. Even if the certified copy of the Certificate of Live Birth is determined to be an authentic document, it does not mean it verifies Obama was born in Hawaii. “That purported certified copy does not have the signature of Dr. Alvin Onaka on the back. It merely has the stamp of his signature. If it was generated by the State of Hawaii, it was generated by a clerk, who simply typed a certificate number into a computer data base, which contains abstract information supposedly generated at some time by viewing the long form vault copy Certificate of Live Birth submitted to the Department of Health by either the hospital of his birth, or at some time subsequent to his birth by his parents or grandparents. And Dr. Onaka himself has acknowledged in a 2005 speech that the integrity of birth certificate databases needs to be improved. It is within the range of the possible that the Hawaii birth certificate data base has been hacked into and compromised.”

“You can look at this evidence offered to date and a reasonable person might conclude it is more likely than not that Barack Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961 as he claims. Such a conclusion, however, does not meet the Constitutional requirement of absolute certainty. The Constitution does not say a person who more likely than not is a natural born citizen is eligible for the Office of the President. The Constitution says a person must be a natural born citizen to be eligible for the Office of the President.”

Leahy went on to echo the request of the non-partisan Annenberg Political Fact Check organization that conducted the physical inspection of the purported certified copy of the Certificate of Live Birth in the possession of the Obama campaign. “I agree with Brooks Jackson, Director of the Annenberg Political Fact Check organization, who I interviewed both yesterday and today,” Leahy said. “Here is a direct quote from Mr. Jackson, which he gave me this morning:”

"We asked the Obama campaign to consider asking Hawaii officials to release copies of his birth certificate to reporters, or at least to confirm publicly that the birth certificate he has produced is an official document. That way there could be absolutely no question of its authenticity. But they didn't think that was necessary."

“I am simply asking the Obama campaign to do as Mr. Jackson asks them. In my opinion, only the production of the long form vault copy of Barack Obama’s Certificate of Live Birth by the State of Hawaii and the verification of the authenticity of this document as it relates to Obama’s birth in Hawaii will establish that he is a natural born citizen and therefore eligible for the Office of the Presidency,” Leahy said. “I have already demonstrated in my book, What Does Barack Obama Believe?, that Senator Obama has the facts of his early life wrong. For over fifteen years he has been incorrectly claiming that his father left his mother when he was two years old. The facts are clear that his mother left his father, moving to Seattle from Honolulu, when he was seven months old. It’s possible that Senator Obama is as inaccurate in his statements about where he was born as he has been about when his parents separated, and the circumstances under which they separated.”

Click here for rest of press release.

The Lazy Writer's Guide to Sarah Palin: A Review of Joe Hilley's New Book

Having written What Does Sarah Palin Believe? I have a certain sympathy for Joe Hilley's efforts with his new book, Sarah Palin: A New Kind of Leader. It's a challenge to create a good book on an important political figure in a short period of time.

Mr. Hilley's book is a disappointing read, however, filled with factual errors and broad generalizations about Sarah Palin, all of which leads me to the conclusion that Mr. Hilley knows very little about Sarah Palin.

The slim volume of only 129 pages of actual text draws almost exclusively on secondary sources found through Google searches. Mr. Hilley conducted only four primary source interviews, and those interviews were with people only tangentially connected to Governor Palin (The Lt. Governor candidate who beat her in 2002, the wife of the man she filed an ethics complaint against, the pastor at the Wasilla, Alaska church she has attended a few times, the mayor who succeeded her).

Mr. Hilley's account of Sarah Palin's career is filled with factual errors, which is not surprising, given that one of his most significant and often cited sources was a September 4, 2008 broadcast of the Inside Edition television program.

Had Mr. Hilley taken the time to speak with her basketball coaches, her teammates, her pastors, and her mother, father, sister, and other family members, as I did, he would have discovered and corrected the long series of errors he made in his book.

I won't detail all the factual errors in his book, but as an example offer five specific inaccuracies related to his description of her basketball career:

1. He states incorrectly that the 1982 Alaska Girls High School Championship Game was held in Wasilla, Alaska. It was not. It was held in Anchorage, Alaska, about an hour's drive away.

2. He states incorrectly that Sarah Palin came into the 1982 State Championship game between Wasilla and Service High School in the second half when the score was tied. This is not factually true. Sarah's Wasilla team always had the lead in the second half.

3. He implies that the score was tied when Sarah stepped to the line with a few seconds remaining in the game. This is not true. The score was Wasilla 57, Service 53. The final score of the game was Wasilla 58, Service 53.

4. He describes Sarah's first foul shot as a swish. It was not. The ball hit the rim and bounced around the edge, then dropped through.

5. He inaccurately states that Sarah made the second foul shot. She did not. She missed it.

Like many of Governor Palin's critics on the left wing, Mr. Hilley attributes thoughts and feelings to Governor Palin without even the slightest clue as to whether or not they really are her thoughts or feelings.

Specifically, Mr. Hilley concludes that based on her worldview, Governor Palin believes in his trite "leadership principles" such as ... defeat means victory and less is more.

Based on my extensive research, which included over fifty interviews of people who actually know Sarah Palin well, this is not Sarah Palin's point of view.

Sarah Palin is a competitor, who always competes, and always tries to win, but accepts defeat graciously when it comes.

Finally, Mr. Hilley pontificates incorrectly that Governor Palin represents a new kind of leader, one who lacks experience but "connects with voters".

This is a back-handed compliment, at best, and quite frankly ignores her very strong record for six years as Mayor of Wasilla, her one year as a whistle blower as a member of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, and her year and a half as Governor of Alaska.

Mr. Hilley is a good writer, with a record of success writing novels. My suggestion is that he stick to fiction, at which he excels, and leave the arena of non-fiction to people who actually check the facts.

My Most Current Sarah Palin Booksigning Schedule

Here is the most current schedule (as of Thursday October 23) of my confirmed book signings for "What Does Sarah Palin Believe?":


Evansville, Indiana Borders Bookstore, Sunday October 26, 2 pm to 4 pm

Germantown, Tennessee Borders Bookstore, Tuesday October 28, 4 pm to 6 pm


Atoka, Tennessee Tipton County Republican Party Meeting, Gateway Baptist Church, Tuesday October 28, 7 pm to 9 pm

Louisville, Kentucky Borders Bookstore (Hurstbourne), Thursday October 30, 2008 7 pm to 9 pm

Indianapolis, Indiana Borders Bookstore (downtown store) , Friday October 31, noon to 2 pm

Carmel, Indiana (suburb of Indianapolis) Borders Bookstore , Friday October 31, 7 pm to 9 pm

Franklin, Tennessee Borders Bookstore, Saturday November 1, 2 pm to 4 pm

Knoxville, Tennessee Borders Bookstore at Turkey Creek, Sunday November 2, 2 pm to 5 pm


Knoxville, Tennessee Borders Bookstore at Dean Hill, Sunday November 2, 6 pm to 8 pm

Cincinatti, Ohio Borders Bookstore (Northgate), Monday, November 3, 6 pm to 8 pm

Joe the Plumber--The Turning Point for the 2008 Election

Joe Wurzelbacher, the Ohio plumber who wants to buy a plumbing business with over $250,000 in annual revenues, will pay more taxes under Barack Obama's tax plan.

Here's the issue John McCain can use to turn the 2008 Election around.

It Ain't Over Till It's Over

That great political philosopher and New York Yankees catcher Yogi Berra once said “It ain’t over till it’s over.”

His words are as relevant to the 2008 Presidential Election as they were to the 1960 World Series. The Yankees lost that series to the Pittsburgh Pirates in the last of the ninth innning of game seven when improbable hero, light hitting Pirate second baseman Bill Mazeroski, hit the only series ending walk off home run in history to seal a 10-9 Pirates victory. The Yankees had dominated the series, outscoring their rivals 55-27, but all their runs came in their three victories, not in their four losses.


Forty-eight years later, we’ve barely started the eighth inning of the 2008 Presidential Campaign, with twenty-two full days left before voters cast their ballots on November 4. Despite the eagerness of the mainstream media to start fitting Barack Obama for his coronation robes, a clear eyed analysis of the facts suggest that such displays of celebratory hubris are premature.

On September 17, the Zogby Poll gave Obama a two point lead (47 to 45) over John McCain. Today’s Zogby Poll gives Obama only a four point lead (48 to 44). Despite the great liquidity crisis of 2008, the off again on again $700 billion bailout of financial institutions finally passed by Congress and signed into law by President Bush, the unprecedented 22% decline in the Dow Jones Industrial Average over this twenty-six day period (declining from 10,886 on September 17th to 8,451 on October 10th , a historical decline matched only by the stock market crash of October 1929, and the Black Monday crash in October 1987), and the virtually universal mainstream media bias in favor of Obama, Obama has only gained two points over McCain during this tumultuous period.

A look at the electoral college shows that the game is still in doubt. We can all remember that in the 2000 Presidential Election George W. Bush lost the popular vote 47.9% to 48.4%, but won the election with an electoral college victory of 271 votes to 266 votes. Senator McCain could easily win the same electoral college victory, losing the popular vote by even more than the 0.5% Bush lost it by in 2000. Today, Zogby puts 234 electoral college votes in Obama’s camp, 179 in McCain’s with 125 undecided. If nothing changes in the states currently projected for either candidate, that means Obama needs to pick up just 36 electoral college votes to secure victory.

Of the nine states that comprise the 125 Zogby undecided, Florida, Ohio, and Indiana, all are likely to fall Republican. Of the six remaining states—Colorado, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina—any combination totalling 36 would give the election to Obama. Only Pennsylvania, however, seems to be leaning to Obama. That scenario still leaves Obama 15 electoral college votes short of victory.

The real question is this—why with all these advantages has Barack Obama been unable to close the deal with the American people ?

The answer is simple – the American people don’t trust Obama. This election has always been a referendum on Barack Obama—who is he and what is his vision for America ? The majority of Americans simply don’t support his radically left wing European socialist domestic agenda, and most importantly don’t support his defeatist, un-American foreign policy. Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin has it right when she describes his Iraq policy as one in which he “wants to show the white flag of surrender” just as we are on the verge of securing a hard earned victory there. Senator McCain is also right in characterizing Senator Obama’s recent boasts that he would invade Pakistan in order to kill Osama Bin Laden as an amateurish insult to a valued ally.

The recent anger over the vaunted $700 billion financial bailout deal (the one that preceded the recent one week 16% drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average) shows that Main Street is fed up with both Wall Street and K Street.

This is the argument John McCain and Sarah Palin need to make over the next twenty-two days. If they make it effectively enough, if the Republican rank and file don’t throw in the towel, intimidated by the main stream media prognostications, and if the international credit and financial markets stabilize, the McCain-Palin ticket will win.

Senator Obama is extraordinarily vulnerable to charges that his policies and his friends were the primary causes of the Home mortgage meltdown of 2008, and the resultant financial liquidity crisis. He himself took more money from the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac PACs in three years than any politician other than Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd, Chairman of the Senate Committee that regulated Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Dodd himself accepted a below market rate loan from Countrywide Financial, the failed mortgage company.

Former Obama adviser and current supporter Franklin Raines, who ran Fannie Mae into the ground over the four years he was in charge from 2000 to 2004, walked away with a cool $90 million. Democrat Barney Frank, a Barack Obama supporter and Chairman of the House Committee that oversaw Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, declared in 2004 that Fannie Mae was completely sound and solvent.. And of course, there are the strong ties between the corrupt politically active organization ACORN, which hired Barack Obama back in 1995, and was a significant player in forcing political pressure on banks to make bad loans. Obama’s Presidential campaign has also recently hired ACORN to conduct voter registration for his campaign.

Look for Senator McCain to launch the first salvos in this attack during the debate this Wednesday, but look for his running mate, Sarah Palin, to take the argument most forcefully to the electorate. Palin, even more than McCain can make this argument. Though McCain has been the “maverick” in the Senate, Palin is the only one of the four candidates on the two national tickets who really is Main Street, working as a city councilor, then for six years as mayor of the small city of Wasilla, Alaska, where she reduced business taxes and literally brought more jobs and businesses to Main Street.

Perhaps nothing describes the different visions of America offered by McCain-Palin campaigns and the Obama-Biden Campaign than the way Sarah Palin and Barack Obama played basketball in high school. Both played on state championship basketball teams, but there the similarities ended.

“Sarah Barracuda” was the captain and defensive specialist whose job on the 1982 Alaska State Championship Wasilla Warriors was to get the ball to the two high scorers on the team. She was an important part of a highly cohesive team, every member of which knew her role. “Barry O’Bomber” was a disgruntled second stringer who saw little action on the 1979 Hawaii State Champion Punahou High School team. His individualistic style didn’t fit well into his coach’s disciplined, team oriented, style of play.

Sarah Palin is the best of Main Street America, Ronald Reagan returned in a dress with five children. Barack Obama is an exotic, self absorbed unknown, who has a history of friendships with people who don’t think much of American traditions.

The Obama campaign and his many apologists in the mainstream media can whine all they want that these charges are merely “personal attacks,” but in fact, they are the core reason why he shouldn’t be President. I’m guessing on November 4 a lot of Bill Mazeroskis will be voting for John McCain. When the results start coming in that night, Barack Obama and the mainstream media pundits may be wishing they had paid more attention to the political wisdom of Yogi Berra.

It Ain't Over

Today, October 10, 2008, the Zogby Poll has Obama over McCain by four points, 47 to 43

Obama is up in the current electoral college count, 234 to 179, but there are still 125 electoral college votes in doubt.

Stay tuned for my op-ed piece on this topic, coming out on Monday.

The pure joy of sport in Alaska helped form Sarah Palin's character

Playing high school sports in Alaska in 1982 required a high level of commitment from families, schools, and coaches. Whereas in the lower 48, the distance between two competing schools can be covered in a half hour car or bus ride, the adventure of getting there becomes a far more significant part of the experience than the actual athletic event itself at times.

The pure joy of sport, the degree of commitment, harkened back to an earlier era of American youth sports where everyone played. The scale of sport there was different. In a state with a population barely greater than 500,000, there were about 20,000 kids in high school, spread across a little over fifty high schools. With the exception of a handful of “mega-schools” in the Anchorage area, most high schools were small, with anywhere from thirty to one hundred kids.

With so few kids to choose from, anyone who showed up for practice and said they wanted to play, could play. It was a stark contrast with the modern elitist type of youth sports, where most kids are winnowed out early. In Alaska, as in the America of several decades earlier, most kids played sports year round. They just changed uniforms, equipment, and coaches, depending on the season.

Excerpted from Chapter Four of What Does Sarah Palin Believe? published by Harpeth River Press, written by Michael Patrick Leahy, Copyright 2008

To read more from What Does Sarah Palin Believe? Click here

Sarah Palin's Irish Catholic Roots Parallel those of Ronald Reagan

It’s no accident Sarah Palin’s speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention drew comparison to the first Republican politician from central casting, Ronald Reagan. Indeed, Reagan’s own story parallels that of her own Irish Catholic grandfather, Clement James Sheeran, the man whose devout faith guided her mother’s faith journey, who in turn, guided hers.

The two men were born four years apart, Clement James Sheeran in 1907 in Douglas, Washington, Ronald Wilson Reagan in 1911 in Tampico, Illinois. They could easily have been cousins, would likely have been friends had they grown up in the same town.
Both were affable, athletic, and ambitious with Irish Catholic fathers. Both were third generation Irish Catholics who grew up in the small towns of the American Midwest and West.


Click here to read more from Chapter One of my new book What Does Sarah Palin Believe?

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"Red Market" and "Blue Market" book stores and the power of book signing electoral predictions

Jarret, the fantastic store manager at the Borders bookstore in Franklin, Tennessee, invited me to come by this Saturday to do a book signing for What Does Sarah Palin Believe?
It's what I am calling a "soft" book signing--there was no advance publicity, just put a table near the front entrance, show a dozen books, and see what happens.

In 2 hours this afternoon, I sold nine What Does Sarah Palin Believe? books and four What Does Barack Obama Believe? books.

An incredible showing for a book signing event with no advance publicity.

I have a theory about bookstores and book signings that I am going to test soon.

Book stores, like states are either red or blue. Swing book stores are purple. Perhaps more accurately, all book stores are either "red markets,", "blue markets", or "purple markets".

Franklin is a "red market" book store. That means most of the people who live within the book store's trade zone are Republicans. Roughly speaking, you could probably draw a circle with a 20 mile radius and call that the store's trade zone.

I believe I can walk into any "red market" book store in the country and hold a book signing where I sell 5 to 15 books within a 2 hour period.

Results would still be good, but less so in a "purple market" book store-- where the residents of the trade zone are roughly 50-50 Republicans and Democrats.

But a "blue market" book store -- where the trade zone is populated by Democrats-- will be a total waste of time. I doubt I would sell a single book in a "blue market" book store in an entire day.

This distinction has me thinking about trying a "swing state" book store book signing tour.... I believe I can probably predict how a swing state will vote by just showing up at all the major book stores in each swing state, sitting down for 2 hours, and seeing how many books I sell. If I average more than 5 books per store in a given state for each 2 hour book signing... the "swing state" will go for McCain-Palin. If I average less than 5 books per store, the "swing state" will go for Obama-Biden.

More later as I put the details of this tour together.

What Does Sarah Palin Believe? Book Launch Tomorrow at Barnes and Noble in St. Louis

My new book, What Does Sarah Palin Believe? will be launched tomorrow at a book signing at the Barnes and Noble Bookstore in Ladue, Missouri. That's 2 miles from the site of tomorrow night's Vice Presidential Debate between Sarah Palin and Joe Biden !

The signing will be from 4:30 pm to 6:00 pm. If you're in St. Louis, please stop by !