NAFTA SHAFTA

Ever worked in government? One good piece of advice I got from an old hand was "volunteer to take the minutes". No-one wants that grunt work, but at the end of the meeting the minute taker gets to 'paraphrase' the discussion and conclusions reached, and to record them for posterity. Remember this when you use the minutes of a meeting (or a memo serving that purpose) to try to establish just who said what, and what the context was, and what it all _means_.

Why has CTV disrupted the link to the FIRST page of their original story?

On that page there was one small paragraph stating that the Clinton campaign had ALSO contacted the Canadian Embassy.

Since most legitimate news organizations are well aware that the present Canadian Government wants Hillary to win the Nomination, it does seem a bit odd that that paragraph didn't catch the eye of even one Reporter.

Well, it probably did. She just scared everyone off with her, "The media is being unfair. They have no right to tell the American Public the truth about me."

The Canadian government refutes the Clinton allegations.

“In the recent report produced by the Consulate General in Chicago, there was no intention to convey, in any way, that Senator Obama and his campaign team were taking a different position in public from views expressed in private, including about NAFTA,” the statement said. “We deeply regret any inference that may have been drawn to that effect.”

Obama says he's going to bring people both sides together but where is the evidence of that in his past behavior?

What stands out in his brief Senate career is his 100% "most liberal" voting record, not a history of fighting across party lines to get legislation passed as he implies in speech after speech. He wasn't part of the 2005 "Gang of 14" bipartisan coalition that sought to break the logjam on judicial nominations, though the other freshman Illinois senator and John McCain (who led them) both were. He did support the bipartisan effort to get an immigration bill last year, winning a minor plaudit from McCain, but that wasn't something the 'other side' supported at all, and unlike uber partisan, divisive Sen. Edward Kennedy, he didn't work closely with the White House.

Where's the beef? Where's the proof that Obama will finally begin to DO what McCain has been doing for 25 years? John McCain and Russ Feingold used to joke that they were the only ones who ate alone in the senate cafateria. I doubt Barak Obama has ever been anywhere but at the middle of the pack.

Here are a few points for Americans to ponder from an interested Canadian:
1. The day before the New Hampshire primary, CNN ran Hillary’s cry-baby routine repeatedly to the exclusion of everything else on the campaign. Barack was barely on the CNN radar. That Hillary won against the odds was not surprising.
2. Why is Barack’s connection to Tony Rezco such a big deal and does CNN keep so shamelessly harping on the falsehood that Rezco is a fund-raiser for Barack when Barack has disavowed Rezco and has delivered all of Rezco’s contributions to charity? Why are McCain’s connections to lobbysts and McCain’s and the Clintons’ connections to Savings and Loans fiasco of the mid nineties swept under the rug? Why did CNN and other news media allow the news item on McCain in the New York Times die off so quickly and avoid any further reference to it? Are these matters not relevant anymore to the candidacies of McCain and Hillary?
3. Being a Canadian, I wouldn’t exactly vouch for what a Canadian official said about Barack’s ambiguous position on Nafta. As Donovan Bailey, the Canadian Olympic Gold medalist, said while training for the Olympics in Atlanta, Canada doesn’t exactly measure up to the US as far as providing equal opportunities for the minorities. I am living proof of that. So, what a Canadian official says about Obama camp waffling on the Nafta issue can be attributed to a bigoted, vested interest, and should be taken with a bucket of salt.
4. In Hillary’s purported 35 years of experience, she must be counting her entire professional life. That kind of yardstick would qualify many to be the President of the USA, especially when the most significant years of those 35 years, the 8 years in the White House, she had no clue what was going on under her own nose.
5. Why has CNN and other media caved in to complaints from Hillary and her cohorts that she is not getting equal coverage in the news media and now run Hillary’s stuff 60% of the time. I am an independent observer from another country. I should know the difference.
6. Why are personal attacks on Barack from Hillary’s camp, some Republicans and many journalists, such as distributing a picture of Barack in Somali garb (it is a Somali garb, for goodness sake, and not a Muslim garb per se), having to disavow Farakhan for something that Farakhan said (what happened to democracy and the free-speech rights of Farakhan enshrined in the US constitution, for crying out loud), and having to defend Michelle Obama’s statement that she’s never been more proud of America as she is now (a sentiment held by many, many interested people around the world after the abyss that the current administration has led the US to) are fair game when any personal attacks on Hillary or McCain are taboo?
7. I have known many nice people from the USA, more than nationals of any other country that I know of. The normal American that I know is a kindly, genial person. I’d like to think that he/she has also enough intelligence not to be blindsided by gutter politics. America, this is your time. Pick up that sceptre that your forbears so painstakingly earned and that your current leaders have so disdainfully discarded. Let your mettle show once again to the rest of the world. Allow the world to look up to you again with awe and respect.
8. To me, it is clear that there is a concerted effort by the same old, same old Washington-types and their cohorts (that includes CNN, in spades) to discredit the only phenomenon in more than two generations to grace our landscape, offering hope for the entire human kind. As Christ said, a prophet is not without honour except in his own land, among his own people.

GoHillary: I don't know a single Obama supporter who won't go for McCain. Let's give it to the American press corps: in the Bush/Gore election years they reported on trivia and chased after scandals, so they could claim to be first on the story. In this primary season, we've seen nothing but the same. Another 100 years in Iraq? No problem. A human rights record slightly below Syria's? No problem. A deficit built up in 8 years that our grandchildren will be paying off, instead of going to college? No problem. People dying the wealthiest nation in the world because they can't get health care? No problem. A memo already discredited by the Canadian government, now that's BIG news.

Obama has been running on judgement. What kind of judgement allows a guy to hang out with Rezko? What kind of judgement allows a guy to be friendly with anti-American Bill Ayers. I fear there is more corruption behind the scenes than we have ever seen.

On top of that, if we can't trust Obama on NAFTA and he fails to tell the truth, what else is he hiding?

After reading all of these responses, I'm now convinced all of you Obamabots have drank the koolaid b/c you sound like mindless idiots.

I was considering voting for Obama, although I found the "yes we can" slogans disconcerting & fainting women at his rallies creepy. I went to his rally in Houston but I did not hear anything of substance come out of his mouth. I felt like I was at a pop concert with screaming dreamy eyed adolescents.

Then came the smears against Senator Clinton, the race baiting, the many close ties he has to extremists, the fiction in his autobiography, his shady dealings with Rezko & now, he' caught red handed in a blatant lie.

As others have pointed out, what makes this SO significant is the fact that he is touting himself as the new kind of politician; he promises a change to the status qou blah blah blah. But in reality, he's just another smooth talking politician who will say anything he thinks people want to hear.

Personally, I think he's dangerous. He has caused strife & division within the Democratic party, yet claims he will unify the country? HA HA HA

He has arrogantly proclaimed that his supporters won't vote for Hilary, but thinks that hers wil vote for him in the general election. I have voted Democrat since Bill Clinton's first term.

Tomorrow I'm going to vote for Hilary. If he ends up with the nomination, I will have to follow my conscience and vote for Mccain in November. Much to his (and the rest of the Democratic party's), dismay, I think most Hilary supporters will do the same.

Stay tuned b/c he'll be swiftboated by the GOP before the first debate. They will expose everything that most of the media is ignoring.

David Axlerod= Karl Rove
Trust Obama?????????????????
Vote Hillary!

So much for a new chapter in American history.

Barack is gone.

Go Hillary!

Obama was proud to say how many great intelligent people were behind his campaign. He is ready to be the president etc.

Today CNN asked obama about this story and he said "Austan Goolsbee acted on his own, I was not aware of this"

So basically Obama is blaming his Chief Economic Advisor for acting on his own....Just displays the incompetent nature of the Obama campaign. If we do well ALL PRAISES TO OBAMA, but if we have a scandal in our hand: RAT OUT THE PERSON AND DEFLECT IT ON MY ADVISORS NEVER ON OBAMA!.

Going from being hailed as Messiah to being referred to as a used car sales man, shows how it goes when the MSM starts to turn on their golden boy. Its not going to get any easier for Obama the future "president of USA" keep blaming all your advisor's for your inability to handle NAFTA and for all your extremist friends FARRAKHAN and REZKO.

Of course Obama had nothing to do with anything, he is just a message of HOPE, UNITY and YES WE CAN. Obama takes no responsibility for any wrong doings and shady deals. Remember only praises to Obama.

I am getting plenty sick and tired of Obama one speech. His greatest line is he did not support the war. Oh well, that is in the past and can't be changed. What is he going to do in the future? That is the question. Obama get out.

GO HILLARY you are the WOMAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Finally, someone in media is trying to get to the bottom of this story.
BTW, It was not just "someone" from Obama's campaign, it was his Chief Economic Advisor, senior Obama campaign official, Austan Goolsbee, who met the Canadian consul-general in Chicago, Georges Rioux on Feb 8th. Goolsbee acknowledged telling the Canadian that Obama's position on NAFTA "is less about fundamentally changing the agreement"

I posted this comment and question earlier and have not yet seen a non-frivolous response:

"I'm not sure why those latching onto this story assume that Barack Obama is 'lying.' Is it not equally possible, or even probable, that the author of the memo in question is himself lying, exaggerating, or simply inaccurately reporting the conversation between Austan Goolsbee and the Canadian consulate official in Chicago?"

Now, don't get me wrong: I've seen enough of this blog to realize that it's a right-wing blog masquerading as objective commentary on a "mainstream media" website. But for just a moment, take a step back from the talking points most of you parrot and seriously consider the question I have posed.

I'd wager that, at this point, this "story" carries no more water than even the NYT's McCain-Iseman story.

This quote summarizes the very shady characters Obama has been affiliated with.

"Be as careful of the books you read, as of the company you keep; for your habits and character will be as much influenced by the former as by the latter."
By: Paxton Hood

Obama reminds me of Walt Whitman,

"Whitman called ''Leaves of Grass" ''the new Bible." He had a messianic view of himself as poetic Answerer come to heal American society. By absorbing and magnifying his culture's best aspects, he believed his poetry could help unify a nation fractured by class conflicts, shady politics, and racial tensions. The poet, he wrote in his preface, ''is the equalizer of his age and land. . . he supplies what wants supplying and checks what wants checking." He offered a recipe for healing: ''This is what you shall do . . . read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life."

The more we discover the incompetence and lack of MATURITY from the Obama camp, the more people are questioning how this guys became the front runner for the democrats.
I blame the media and all the hype they buzzed around him w/out showing all of us what type of candidate this man was.

Rezko, NAFTA, Farrakhan, Wright, Odinga, Soros, all have in common, they are RADICAL THINKERS in their BELIEFS
If I am to believe Obama is a UNITER, then where are his CENTRIST friends, and RITHG wing FRIENDS to show us he has CAPABILITIES to TIE and UNITE this NATION together. All I have seen so far are serious radical people who have INFLUENCED OBAMA's foggy thinking.

Obama is a hoax and thinking he will bring healing to our nation is laughable. I would like to see how...

Jeff wrote: "Obama is not Jesus."

Thanks for the insight Jeff.

This just in . . .

Hillary Clinton is not Mother Teresa either.

David Axelrod ran the Deval Patrick campaign in Massachusetts that got Patrick elected. They used a very similar slogan: Yes, We Will! instead of Yes, We Can!

Axelrod is running the Obama campaign as well. Massachusetts Dems voted for Clinton over Obama in the primary because they had already seen the hot air campaign from Deval Patrick and that when he got in office he didn't do much differently from any other politician. Obama is not Jesus. He's just another slick salesman.

It is comical to watch this concerted effort to change the subject from Hillary Clinton's FLIP FLOP on NAFTA to whether or not an Obama aide had talks with someone from Canada.

None of this changes the fact that when Senator Clinton was co-president the first time, she was for NAFTA. And now she conveniently says she was always against it. THAT is the story of NAFTA . . . everything else is just carefully orchestrated smoke and mirrors.