More On That Colin Powell Endorsement

Colin Powell was George Bush’s most trusted advisor. He sold the war in Iraq to the American people and the U.N. Selling Barrack Obama should be a “slam dunk”.

Posted by: just thinking

I have no faith whatsoever in anything substantial about Obama other than his extraordinary ego.

... and I AM affected by his associations with Ayers and Rezko and especially his ineracation with ACORN.... all of which he first denies and then minimalizes.

McCain and Palin will get my vote this time around.
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Doesn't sound like you are thinking at ALL! Can you afford to have your health care taxed? Now if you don't know what that would be like why not ask your employer, how much does it cost them to insure you, and then try and buy the same coverage on the open insurance market.

Posted by: just thinking

I have no faith whatsoever in anything substantial about Obama other than his extraordinary ego.

... and I AM affected by his associations with Ayers and Rezko and especially his ineracation with ACORN.... all of which he first denies and then minimalizes.

McCain and Palin will get my vote this time around.
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Doesn't sound like to are thinking at ALL! Can you afford to have your health care taxed? Now if you don't know what that would be like why not ask your employer, how much does it cost them to insure you, and then try and buy the same coverage on the open insurance market.

Typicial of the republicians, instead of respecting a great americian's view or decision to vote for Obama, you try to tear him down just like all your other negative garbage. You can't stand for so many people on the band wagon and you are on the sinking ship of fools.

Perhaps Colin Powell should tell Obama to stop playing the race card.

Obama is the one who is "polarizing."

Colin Powell knows waht he is talking about, a great Hero. Mccain and Palin have brought shame to all decent Americans including republicans like me by their mean ness and myopia putting country second. Barack Obama/ Biden will get my vote.

Republican for Obama

This was a racist decision. You have a Republican Military Commander siding with the most Liberal Democrat since the ineffective bungler Jimmy Carter. Why? Blacks are racist but no one calls them on it for fear of political correctness backlash. It has nothing to do with being political correctness... if anything, the act of recognizing and calling Colin Powell a racist as well as others like Oprah who are ethnocentric should be considered politically correct because you're calling it for what it obviously is. It is a classical double standard.

Also, are we forgetting the worthlessness of Colin Powell's opinions? Remember, he was the guy who made the vehement case for going to war with Iraq based on bogus drawn up diagrams of mobile chemical weapons plants on trucks. If he is questioning McCain's judgement, then we need look farther than Colin's speech and lies at the UN that cost this country billions and sent our deficit into the toilet. It is Colin Powell's poor judgement that pushed us into war and again, he is being easily influenced until another poor judgement... he was hounded and harassed almost everyday by Obama as you can hear from the interview.

McCain or the Republican's need to keep playing that image of Collin pointing to the bogus diagram of the mobile units, that is what sticks with Americans as the biggest con that pushed Congress to vote for war.

Thank you, Colin Powell, for saying what many of us in the U.S. have been thinking since Palin joined McCain's ticket. You addressed Palin's narrow, mean, small, dangerous, xenophobic, bigoted, prejudicial, near-racist platform beautifully.

To Palin: I sincerely hope you do not make the mistake of trying to attack Colin Powell's character.

On second thought, maybe should make the attempt to attack Colin Powell and end this election sooner than later.

Go do that with my blessing.

The hipocrisy of the Obama lemmings is astonishing.
Hillary was "baaad" because she "voted for the war".
Powell's endorsement is "grrreat!" and will "play a role in Obama's administration" even though he was in the administration that executed the war, appeared in every TV network enthusiastically pimping for the war, even went to the UN to sell the war. Oh, but he was duped!

For months now I have been reading the political comments posted by readers online and I have noticed that the extreme conservative Republicans are especially hateful, and most of them fill their comments with Rush Limbaugh sound bites. Rush Limbaugh has had way too much "freedom of speech" during these last 8 years, encouraged and allowed to do so by the Republican administration. Limbaugh has poisoned a large bloc of Republican citizens, keeping them trapped in an attitude 25 years out of date. He stokes their fears and amplifies their worst characteristics, driving them to see an enemy in everything out of the conservative box. This prevents these people from accepting the changes and advances of 21st century America, isolating them and making it harder and harder for them to live productive and happy lives. It is my hope that the Obama administration will rein in the poison conservative talk show faction, which truly needs to be suppressed. Perhaps then, the good people who follow it and live by it can be healed of their unwarranted hate and bigotry.

To these people I say: there is no reason to be so hateful and fearful! Rush has it all wrong! This is a great country, full of good people, patriots all, and great possibilites for a happy and prosperous life. That neighbor whose views differ from yours is not a terrorist or a socialist or a communist, he's just the fellow American next door. Learn to feel love and hope and generousity. Stop fearing and hating. God bless America!

Hey Jake can we see a headline with the FOUR EX SECRETARIES OF STATE THAT ENDORSE McCAIN, OR IS IT NOT NEWSWORTHY BECAUSE THEY ARE WHITE?

Powell's career as fraudulent as ACORN.

HILLARY SUPPORTER FOR McCAIN!

I'm glad to see Barack continue to gain support among experienced qualified public servants, it reinforces my belief in his leadership.

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On a secondary note "Moderate" I don't think you understand Mr. Powell's statement. You said:

"He implied that part of the reason he chose not to endorse McCain was for this [because he is a Muslim] reason. But John McCain has NEVER EVER implied that Obama was a Muslim, and has even spoken out against anyone who does spread that rumor."

The polarization that Mr. Powell is speaking of is not whether or not Mr. McCain "implied Obama was a Muslim" it was the very idea that a Muslim or someone of Arabian descent should not be running for President. Whether he is or isn't wasn't Mr. Powell's concern, nor should it be ours. Rather Mr. Powell's concern was that ethnicity or religion were an issue at all.

Specifically he is speaking of an incident when an individual at one of Mr. McCain's speeches yelled out "Arab!" when Mr. McCain mentioned Mr. Obama's name. Mr. McCain (semi-admirably) decided he wouldn't have that kind of talk in his campaign and said "no, Mr. Obama is a good family man."

Put this in perspective. This person at the rally didn't shout out "Terrorist!" he shouted out Arab. An ethnicity, like an insult. And Mr. McCain replied "oh no, he's a good family man." So Mr. McCain is implying that the two are mutually exclusive, that you can't be "a good family man" and be an "Arab".

For example, if I called a person a drunk because that person is Irish, but someone corrected me not with "Irish aren't drunks, that's bigoted nonsense" but instead said "Oh no, he's not Irish." Mr. McCain took offense to the guy calling Mr. Obama "an arab", what Mr. McCain should have taken offense to is the shouting of a racial slur during his speech.

Now I'm sure Mr. McCain didn't mean to imply that people of a Middle Eastern Descent and "good family men" are mutually exclusive, but that's the way it came across. The fact that no one cringed at this (I'll be extra polite and simply call it a gaffe) is equally disturbing.

Things go drastically downhill when one takes a look at remarks made at events that have given Sarah Palin a chance to speak. Shouts of "terrorist" or "off with his head" were not even blinked at. That's not just irresponsible, it's appalling.

Democracy doesn't work if people aren't respectful of others ideas, if people don't concede that both sides want the country to prosper and are at the very worst misguided. Criticism is one thing, slander is another, and both are encouraged in a Democracy (that's the reality) but when people start tossing out racial slurs (like arab) or crazed delusions (like kill him or off with his head), lines must be drawn. To allow that kind of speech at an event you sponsor is to encourage not only bigotry, racism, and ignorance; but violence. Violence because of hate, because of ignorance, because of bigotry; is a threat far too real to ignore.

Obama needs all of the positive light and endorsements he can generate. Bravo for General Colin Powell!! Now I call that truly reaching across the aisle!

Obama has been besieged by all kind of attacks on his character. Now Obama supporters are being attacked by the GOP as they pull no punches and are using a court strategy in an attempt to disenfranchise voters in Ohio and Wisconsin.

In Ohio the Democratic Secretary of State, Brunner has been in court 8 times over her tenure fighting attacks on her state's voting operation against the Republicans. In the GOP's attempt to suppress voting by 200,000 newly regisered voter, Brunner took her plea to the US Supreme Court last week who ruled in her favor-- really in the voters favor.

But here we go again in Wisconsin...

At least in 2000 we went to court after the election.

http://www.madison.com/tct/news/310245

On Thursday, we wait for another court ruling.. 2nd court case I know of since last week's Supreme Court case re: Ohio's 200,000 new voter registrations.

Thursday we will listen for the verdict on a case in Wisconsin where the GOP is attempting to disenfranchise or suppress voter turn out for newly registered voters.

With the Wisconsin case, the GOP started this dirty attack right after their convention.

excerpt from the abovementioned article:

"THURSDAY'S MATCH-UP: The Democratic Nominee And Wisconsin's Attorney General Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, a McCain-Palin campaign co-chair, came back from the Republican National Convention in early September and filed a lawsuit that sought to force Wisconsin election officials to painstakingly cross-check every new voter registration."

When Obama wins there will be cause for GREAT celebration. He has been attacked relentlessly.

Here is a list of prominent Republicans and Conservatives that have endorsed Obama and their reasons why:
Jim Leach, Former Congressman from Iowa "For me, the national interest comes before party concerns, particularly internationally. We do need a new direction in American policy, and Obama has a sense of that."
Lincoln Chafee, Former United States Senator from Rhode Island "As I look at the candidates in order who to vote for, certainly my kind of conservatism was reflected with Senator Obama, and those points are that we're fiscally conservative, we care about revenues matching expenditures, we also care about the environment, I think it's a traditional conservative value to care about clean air and clean water."
Richard Riordan, Former Mayor of Los Angeles "I'm still a Republican, but I still will always vote for the person who I think will do the best job."
Lowell Weicker, Former Governor and Senator from Connecticut "At issue is not the partisan politics of two parties, rather the image we have of ourselves as Americans. Senator Obama brings wisdom, kindness, and common sense to what is both his and our quest for a better America."
Jim Whitaker, Fairbanks, Alaska Mayor "If we are as a nation concerned with energy, then our consideration should be a national energy policy that is not predicated on crude oil 50 years into the future. We need to get to it, and I think Barack Obama is very clear in that regard."
Linwood Holton, Former Governor of Virginia "Obama has a brain, and he isn't afraid to use it."
Government Officials:
Douglas Kmiec, Head of the Office of Legal Counsel under Reagan & Bush 41 "I was first attracted to government by Ronald Reagan, who lives in our national memory as a great leader and an inspiring communicator. Senator Obama has these gifts as well, but of course, more rhetorical flourish without substance would be worth little. Is there more to Senator Obama? I believe there is."
Jackson M. Andrews, Republican Counsel to the U.S. Senate "Barack Obama is a thoughtful visionary leader who as President will end the decline of American law, liberty, and fiscal responsibility that are the hallmarks of the extremist policies of the current Administration, now adopted by John McCain."
Susan Eisenhower, Granddaughter of President Eisenhower & President of the Eisenhower Group "Given Obama's support among young people, I believe that he will be most invested in defending the interests of these rising generations and, therefore, the long-term interests of this nation as a whole."
Francis Fukuyama, Advisor to President Reagan "...Obama probably has the greatest promise of delivering a different kind of politics."
Rita Hauser, Former White House intelligence advisor under George W. Bush "McCain will continue the wrong-headed foreign policy decisions of Bush, while Obama will take us in a new direction."
Larry Hunter, Former President Reagan Policy Advisor "I suspect Obama is more free-market friendly than he lets on. He taught at the University of Chicago, a hotbed of right-of-center thought. His economic advisers, notably Austan Goolsbee, recognize that ordinary citizens stand to gain more from open markets than from government meddling."
Bill Ruckelshaus, served in the Nixon and Reagan administrations "I'm not against McCain, I'm for Obama."
Lilibet Hagel, Wife of Republican Senator Chuck Hagel "This election is not about fighting phantom issues churned out by a top-notch slander machine. Most important, it is not about distracting the public-- you and me-- with whatever slurs someone thinks will stick."
Columnists and Academics:
Jeffrey Hart, National Review Senior Editor "It turns out that these political parties are not always either liberal or conservative, Democratic or Republican. The Democrat, under certain conditions, can be the conservative."
Andrew Bacevich, Professor of International Relations at Boston University "For conservatives, Obama represents a sliver of hope. McCain represents none at all. The choice turns out to be an easy one."
David Friedman, Economist and son of Milton and Rose Friedman "I hope Obama wins. President Bush has clearly been a disaster from the standpoint of libertarians and conservatives because he has presided over an astonishing rise in government spending."
Christopher Buckley, Son of National Review founder William F. Buckley & former NR columnist "Obama has in him-- I think, despite his sometimes airy-fairy 'We are the people we have been waiting for' silly rehtoric-- the potential to be a good, perhaps even great leader. He is, it seems clear enough, what the historical moment seems to be calling for."
Andrew Sullivan, Columnist for the Atlantic Monthly "Obama's legislative record, speeches, and the way he has run his campaign reveal, I think, a very even temperament, a very sound judgment, and an intelligent pragmatism. Prudence is a word that is not inappropriate to him."
Wick Alison, Former publisher of the National Review "I made the maximum donation to John McCain during the primaries, when there was still hope he might come to his senses. But I now see that Obama is almost the ideal candidate for this moment in American history."

The importance of General Powell's endorsement is the effect it will have on some of us who have investigated the rumors and found them false, who suspected that Senator McCain's choice of Gov. Palin was a serious lapse in judgment, but gave her time to prove us wrong, and who waited for the cheap shots and lies coming from the McCain campaign to give way to respectful discourse on the serious challenges facing this country. As a Republican, I made up my mind for good about a week ago. In the interim, I find myself in the good company of people like David Brooks, Chris Buckley, George Will, and now Colin Powell, and all of us for more or less the same reasons.

Belle Starr: I'm still waiting to hear why you are not voting for John McCain and Sarah Palin.

Powell himself answered in advance those who say he is only voting for Obama because he is black. He pointed out that if that were the case, he would have made the endorsement months ago. He took his time, because he really wanted to see how each candidate would run his campaign.

At this point, I think if the Jesus the Son of God Himself came down and endorsed Obama, McCain supporters would find some sort of suspect reasoning or questionable association.

Powell is an intelligent man that I have always admired. His measured, sensible reasons for supporting Obama make sense, and are similar to my own.

His doubts about McCain are also reasonable and sensible. Why can't McCain supporters just accept this at face value?

Wow what a rebuke of the evil that is the right wing by a man who saw it up close.

I admire Gen. Powell's military service and charitable work, but I will ignore his endorsement of Obama. It does not sway me, and I hope it does not sway very many moderates who may still be making up their minds.

One statement from Powell, frankly, bothered me a great deal. He said we must stop the polarization (I agree) but then said we should not be talking about AYers or "who is or isn't a Muslim." He implied that part of the reason he chose not to endorse McCain was for this reason. But John McCain has NEVER EVER implied that Obama was a Muslim, and has even spoken out against anyone who does spread that rumor. He has gone out of his way to keep racism out of the campaign, only to suffer from Obama's numerous statements, a month or so ago, warning that the McCain campaign would try to use racism against him-- remember "he'll tell you that I don't look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills... and by the way, did I mention he's black." Now even though McCain has gone out of his way to discourage those silly Muslim rumors, even taking issue with a woman who suggested at a town hall that Obama was "an Arab," Powell sniffs that McCain's campaign was talking about "who is and isn't a Muslim." That's unfair, and I am actually surprised that Powell said that.

I would have voted for Colin Powell as either a Democrat or a Republican in a heartbeat!

However, his choice does not affect mine,

I have no faith whatsoever in anything substantial about Obama other than his extraordinary ego.

... and I AM affected by his associations with Ayers and Rezko and especially his ineracation with ACORN.... all of which he first denies and then minimalizes.

McCain and Palin will get my vote this time around.