National Review has an awesome quote from one of Obama’s advisors on his unpreparedness: 

 In it, Susan Rice, a foreign policy adviser to Senator Barack Obama, discusses the foreign policy credentials of both Democrats against the tableau of Mrs. Clinton’s 3 a.m. phone call advertisement about who would be best prepared for an international crisis. (While your children are safely asleep.)

“Clinton hasn’t had to answer the phone at three o’clock in the morning and yet she attacked Barack Obama for not being ready,’’ Ms. Rice said. “They’re both not ready to have that 3 a.m. phone call.”

Check out the full article 

Well this whole superdelegate problem is taking an interesting turn.

Apparently, some Ohio superdelegates have banded together to force a plan of specifics from each Democrat to address local economic issues before they endorse either candidates….HAHAHA! I love it!

Yes, that’s right - official Democratic elites are now engaging in institutionalized pandering…something normally just left to each individual Democratic candidate to pursue.

Holding their presidential candidates for ransom is surely the way to bring a clean and quick end to their nomination process. I’m sure none of the other states (some with opposing economic needs from Ohio) will now start forming their own superdelegate militias. Good luck guys!

Ahh the media is finally beginning to pay some attention to this Rezko mess that around Barack Obama.

Here’s a new blog from the Chicago Tribune following the day-by-day Rezko trial updates.

Add it to your daily reading list.

From: Barak Obama

To: Supporters

Subject: What Happened Today

We may not know the final outcome of today’s voting until morning, but the results so far make one thing clear.When the dust settles from today’s contests, we will maintain our substantial lead in delegates. And thanks to millions of people standing for change, we will keep adding delegates and capture the Democratic nomination. (more…)

We don’t generally do a segment like this on our blog, but this quote from Louisiana Democrat State Representative Charmaine L. Marchand struck me as particularly noteworthy. First some context from a NYT article about Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal and his new ethics reform package:

The new requirements will force all state legislators, as well as most other elected and appointed officials around the state, to disclose all sources of income, real estate holdings and debts over $10,000. (Judges are exempted.) Lawmakers and executive branch officials will no longer be able to get contracts for state-financed or disaster-related work. Lobbyists will also have to disclose their sources of income and will be limited to spending no more than $50 per elected official, per meal; splitting the tab, say among other lobbyists or legislators, will also be prohibited. (…)

The governor, ignoring cries of pain and going against the unswerving devotion to Louisiana’s food culture, pushed for the $50-a-meal cap, at any restaurant. No more unlimited spending.

In a town where legislators have been known to proclaim paid-for meals a principal draw to public service, this was an especially unpopular move. Last week, State Representative Charmaine L. Marchand of the Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans said the limit would force her and her colleagues to dine at Taco Bell, and urged that it be pushed to $75 per person, to give them “wiggle room.”

No public groundswell took up her cause, and the $50 limit held.

Poor gal, only $50 per meal.

Here’s a link to to Marchand’s website that talks about her commitment to rebuilding her home district that was devastated by Hurricane Katrina. I wonder how many of her constituents could use a little “wiggle room” to make ends meet. This blog and this writer offer no sympathy to this oppressed legislator.

However, I do offer a hearty “atta boy” to Gov. Jindall and the reforms passed in Louisiana.

From the USA Today piece

 WASHINGTON — Both Democratic presidential candidates, who promise to curb the influence of corporate lobbyists inWashington, helped enact narrowly tailored tax breaks sought by major campaign contributors.

Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign has accepted $54,350 from members of a law firm that in 2006 lobbied him to introduce a tax provision for a Japanese drug company with operations in Illinois, according to public records and interviews. The government estimates the provision, which became law in December 2006, will cost the treasury $800,000.

 As always, democrat’s hypocrisy abounds. 

Obama = 47%

Clinton = 45%

http://www.gallup.com/poll/104530/Gallup-Daily-Tracking-Election-2008.aspx

Rasmussen Reports – Clinton leads in Rhode Island, Texas race neck-and-neck

Rhode Island

Clinton = 53%

Obama = 38%

http://rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/rhode_island/rhode_island_democratic_presidential_primary

Texas

Clinton = 46%

Obama = 45%

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/texas/texas_democratic_presidential_primary

I think this SNL skit sums it up pretty well:

The O’Drama plot finally begins to thicken…

The left and the Democratic Party (but I repeat myself), have had this nasty habit of being very out-of-touch with the American mainstream. President Jimmy Carter won office by faking an average-guy persona, but ended up being a squishy liberal more concerned about international opinion than America’s interests. John Kerry fit the stereotype of Ivy League snob (no offense to our great Ivy League chapters who are full of great Republican who understand how our country works) and could never really connect with Americans working hard for a better life for their families.

Barack Obama, despite his change-oriented rhetoric attempting to convince people otherwise, is just as out of touch with Americans as these prior two leading Democrats - and I think people are starting to take notice.

Peggy Noonan poses some very interesting questions that she believes many voters are starting to or are about to ask:

Are the Obamas, at bottom, snobs? Do they understand America? Are they of it? Did anyone at their Ivy League universities school them in why one should love America? Do they confuse patriotism with nationalism, or nativism? Are they more inspired by abstractions like “international justice” than by old visions of America as the city on a hill, which is how John Winthrop saw it, and Ronald Reagan and JFK spoke of it?

…

Why is all this actually not a distraction but a real issue? Because Americans have common sense and are bottom line. They think like this. If the president and his first lady are not loyal first to America and its interests, who will be? The president of France? But it’s his job to love France, and protect its interests. If America’s leaders don’t love America tenderly, who will?

Pretty valid questions considering where Barack Obama got his political beginnings.

In 1995, State Senator Alice Palmer introduced her chosen successor, Barack Obama, to a few of the district’s influential liberals at the home of two well known figures on the local left: William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn.

While Ayers and Dohrn may be thought of in Hyde Park as local activists, they’re better known nationally as two of the most notorious — and unrepentant — figures from the violent fringe of the 1960s anti-war movement.

In fact, Ayers and Dohrn are both known quite well for planting bombs in places like the United States Capitol, the Pentagon, and the State Department, and for their leadership in the Weather Underground - one of the most radical domestic terror groups in American history.

The point here is that O’Drama is nothing new, nothing fresh, nothing revolutionary in American politics. While he espouses some vague sort of post-partisan change, he remains of the same far-left, radical political bloodline that has dominated Democratic politics for decades.

Barack Obama is out of touch with America, as America and Barack are about to find out.