Obama versus Obama - 31 Flips and counting

31 Major Flip Flopps -
reason for serious concern

• The Surge: "It's fascinating to watch Barack Obama change his opinions on the U.S. troop surge in Iraq... Here's a combo -- a Los Angeles Times report on deletions of Obama's previous anti-surge position on his Web site plus a YouTube video showing his flip-flops on the issue."

• Gay Marriage: "Obama before the election: States should decide gay marriage. Obama during the election: California’s attempt to decide gay marriage for itself is 'divisive and discriminatory.' "

• FISA: "Like everything Barack Obama says, that pledge was operative only as long as it was in Obama's political interest."

• NAFTA: "OK, this is pathetic: Obama now says that his anti-NAFTA rhetoric during the campaign was a bit 'overheated.'"

• Publicly financed campaigns: "If I am the Democratic nominee, I will aggressively pursue an agreement with the Republican nominee to preserve a publicly financed general election."

• DC Handgun Ban: "After a day spent paying lip service to both sides of the debate while studiously avoiding the issue of whether the actual statute at stake in Heller was unconstitutional, he finally bites the bullet (no pun intended) and addresses it.."

• School Vouchers: "Barack Obama told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel in February that he was open to voucher programs, but just last week announced his intentions to squash the DC pilot program."

• Guantanamo Bay: "I’m curious as to what’s motivating this [new] compromise. Is there any logic behind it or is it a simple something-for-both-sides political solution?"

• Illegal Immigration - [In March 2004], Obama was asked if the government should "crack down on businesses that hire illegal immigrants." He replied "Oppose." In a Jan. 31, 2008, televised debate, he said that "we do have to crack down on those employers that are taking advantage of the situation."

• Marijuana - "[In] January 2004, Obama [said] he supported eliminating criminal penalties for marijuana use. In the Oct. 30, 2007, presidential debate, he joined other Democratic candidates in opposing the decriminalization of marijuana."

• Abortion - "Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama says “mental distress” should not qualify as a health exception for late term-abortions, a key distinction not embraced by many supporters of abortion rights."

• Iraq: "At a time when [the Surge appears to be working], is that the right time to try and set time tables for withdrawing all American troops? [Kroft asked. Obama replied,] “Yeah, absolutely. I think now is precisely the time..." [Kroft:] “And you pull out according to that time table, regardless of the situation? Even if there’s serious sectarian violence?” Kroft asked.“No, I always reserve as commander in chief, the right to assess the situation,” Obama replied."

• Death Penalty: "Ten years ago, when Obama was running for statewide office in an [exclusive] Chicago district, he opposed the death penalty. He now supports the ultimate penalty."

• Faith-based initiatives - "During the recent Obama pander tour... the presumptive Democratic nominee unnecessarily endorsed President Bush's faith-based initiative, a sort of patronage program that rewards religious activists for their political support with public grants."

• Wearing a U.S. Flag Pin - "You'll notice Barack Obama is now wearing a flag pin. Again. During the primary campaign, he refused to, explaining that he'd worn one after 9/11 but then stopped because it "became a substitute for, I think, true patriotism." So why is he back to sporting pseudo-patriotism on his chest? Need you ask? The primaries are over."

• Reverend Jeremiah Wright - "'I can no more disown (Jeremiah Wright) than I can disown my white grandmother' - then wiped away a tear and hailed him as the second coming of Abraham Lincoln. Three months later, with Wright disowned, grandma embraced and the great "race speech" now inoperative, not a word of reconsideration is heard from his media acolytes."

• Welfare Reform: "Barack Obama aligned himself with welfare reform on Monday, launching a television ad which touts the way the overhaul "slashed the rolls by 80 percent." Obama leaves out, however, that he was against the 1996 federal legislation which precipitated the caseload reduction."

• The Cuba Embargo: "In January 2004, Obama said it was time "to end the embargo with Cuba" because it had "utterly failed..." ...in August 2007, he said he would not "take off the embargo" as president because it is "an important inducement for change.""

• Single-payer Healthcare - "Contradicting what Obama said at the debate, the old footage shows the senator saying, “I happen to be a proponent of single-payer universal healthcare coverage. That’s what I’d like to see.”At the debate, Obama stated: “I never said that we should try to go ahead and get single-payer... Single-payer healthcare is an euphemism for socialized medicine."

• Special Interest Contributions: "In January, the Obama campaign described union contributions ...as "special interest" money. Obama changed his tune as he began gathering his own union endorsements... [referring] respectfully to unions as the representatives of "working people" and ...he is "thrilled" by their support."

• Divided Jerusalem: "Many on the right of the political spectrum... welcomed Obama’s remarks at AIPAC, but the clarification of his position left several cold."

• Meeting with Iran's leaders without preconditions - "Barack Obama has returned to the no-preconditions policy for meeting with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, according to Obama foreign-policy adviser Anthony Lake. Financial Times also discovered in its interview with Lake that Obama has reversed himself on Iraq, now saying that the withdrawal is off."

• Palestinian elections - "[In 2006,] Obama [said]: “There is no room at the negotiating table for terrorist organizations. That is why I opposed holding elections in 2006 with Hamas on the ballot.... But During His 2006 Trip To The Middle East, Obama Met With Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas And Said The Election Represented An “Opportunity…To Consolidate Behind A Single Government.”

• The threat posed by Iran: "Yesterday [in Oregon, Obama said], "I mean think about it. Iran, Cuba, Venezuela, these countries are tiny compared to the Soviet Union. They don't pose a serious threat to us the way the Soviet Union posed a threat to us....You know, Iran, they spend one-one hundredth of what we spend on the military. If Iran ever tried to pose a serious threat to us, they wouldn't stand a chance." Today in Montana, Obama changed his tune: " Iran is a grave threat. It has an illicit nuclear program. It supports terrorism across the region and militias in Iraq. It threatens Israel's existence. It denies the Holocaust..."

• The Patriot Act: " In 2003, he said he was against the Patriot Act, but voted for it in 2006."

• Gays in the Military: ""In 2003, he said he was against the repeal of DOMA, but now he's for it in 2007. In 2003, he said he'd have to "examine specific legislation" dealing with LGBT discrimination in the military, now he's completely for ending "don't ask/don't tell".""

• Coal: "Although summer hasn’t officially begun, flip-flop season is well underway and it appears Senator Obama has joined the club... On Tuesday Obama, whose support for coal-to-liquid has been widely criticized by environmentalists, sent out a press release clarifying his position on liquid coal."

• Wiretapping: "Netroots activists who helped Barack Obama to become the Democratic party's presumptive presidential nominee are unmoved by the senator's explanation of his change of heart on a pending bill regarding warrantless wiretapping."

Drilling Video of Obama changing his position on offshore drilling ...obviously only a compromise not a flip flip per the Messiah

Payroll Taxes

From the Penn debate: As a minimum he's flip-flopped on his original idea of sticking it to the top 5% or 6% that make too much money for Comrade Obama's liking and taxing everything over $97000Tonight the first flip flop when attacked by his opponent who points out that many Pennsylvanian teachers, firefighters who typically support Democrats make slightly more than $97000...he addresses their likely salary range saying " I'd be willing to look at exempting people who are making slightly above that."Then when pressed further by Charlie who reminds him there's a heck of a lot of people making more than $97,000 and less than $200,000 Obama changes his position again and literally stammers an untruth "And that's -- and that's -- and that's why I've said, Charlie, that I would look at potentially exempting those who are in between."

31 Obama did a flip-flop on the construction of a security fencein 2006 Obama voted for the counstruction of a border fence with Mexico. He reversed his position during the Democrat primary
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Obama vs. Obama
A Commentary By Dick Morris
Thursday, September 11, 2008


Now that the conventions are over, it is evident that the battle of John McCain is over (McCain won) and the battle of Barack Obama will determine the outcome of the election.Now that McCain has definitively, and I suspect irreversibly, separated himself from Bush, he has become an acceptable alternative to Obama for voters seeking change.
The question now is whether Obama’s extra quotient of change — or the different direction that change will take — is worth the risk of electing him.
Obama was wrong to invest so much in the Bush-McCain linkage. Any candidate can define himself at his convention. And if McCain chose, as he did, to use the gathering to distance himself from Washington and from the Bush administration, there was really nothing that Obama could do to stop him. He should have focused very specifically on McCain himself and taken shots at specific votes and bills that he introduced.
Now, after the massive exposure McCain got at his convention and the demonstrable commitment to change embodied in the selection of Sarah Palin, it is too late.

The Obama campaign doesn’t seem to get that it is running against McCain, not Sarah Palin. They spent the entire Republican convention and the week since attacking the vice presidential candidate. That’s like stabbing the capillaries instead of the arteries.

Nobody is going to vote for or against McCain because they want Sarah Palin to be vice president of the United States, or don’t. But Palin has served, and will serve, a key purpose in illustrating and demonstrating what kind of a man John McCain is. She stands as a tribute to his desire to bring change, his willingness to cut loose from the past, and his courage in attempting innovation. No amount of criticism of Palin is going to stop that process. Obama needs to remember who his opponent is.

Now the election will hinge on a referendum on Obama. Is the extra healthcare coverage he would pass worth the huge tax increases he will impose? Nobody buys his claim that he will only increase taxes on a few rich people and give the rest of us tax cuts. Voters can add, and they realize that his spending plans and tax-cut promises come to a trillion dollars and that his tax increases represent only one-tenth as much. They know that everyone who pays taxes will end up paying more if Obama is elected. The question will be: Is it worth it?Is his commitment to income redistribution and increasing tax “fairness” worth the risk his tax plans pose for the economy?

Is his plan to pull out of Iraq and his commitment to multilateralism in foreign policy worth the risk of putting someone with virtually no foreign policy experience in charge of our international relations in the middle of a war?

Is his promise to respect the Constitution and ratchet back the intrusions of the Bush homeland security measures worth the extra risk of terror attack?

The answer to these questions will only partially depend on what Obama is proposing and on how sound we think his judgment is. They will also depend on the events that will transpire between now and Election Day. If Iran moves closer to getting nuclear weapons or Israel attacks Iran to forestall that development, things could change in a hurry. If the current atmosphere of economic uncertainty and impending possible crisis — signaled by the federal takeover of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae — deepens, it may make voters less willing to risk the high taxes and big spending that Obama will bring in his wake. If Russia continues to assert its imperial right to dominate Eastern Europe and restore a Soviet-style satellite empire, voters will wonder if they can take a chance on Obama.But if things are relatively peaceful and uneventful, voters may bristle at the stagnation and turn to Obama in the hopes of change.

The key point is that this race is now not about Bush or McCain or Clinton or Palin. It’s all about Obama.
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Obama's Race to Lose - And He Might
by Charles Krauthammer
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But Palin is not just a problem for Obama. She is also a symptom of what ails him. Before Palin, Obama was the ultimate celebrity candidate. For no presidential nominee in living memory had the gap between adulation and achievement been so great. Which is why McCain's Paris Hilton ads struck such a nerve. Obama's meteoric rise was based not on issues -- there was not a dime's worth of difference between him and Hillary on issues -- but on narrative, on eloquence, on charisma.
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