Wednesday, December 20, 2006

A headline Barack Obama doesn't want to see....

Iraqi with ties to Rezko escapes Baghdad jail

Now of course, Sen. Barack Obama probably hasn't even heard of Aiham Alsammarae, the escapee who is the former Iraqi electricity minister. Alsammarae was being held in an Iraqi jail on corruption charges.

Here's the problem for Barack Obama. Tony Rezko, an indicted Democratic fundraiser and real estate developer, has tentacles seemingly everywhere. So there won't be any shortage of new Tony Rezko material.

Here's a rough run-down of Obama's controversial land deal with Tony Rezko.

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"The Nativity Story" preview now playing in Chicago

As I noted on Marathon Pundit a couple of times this month, a German-American group organized its annual Christkindlmarket, a Christmas celebration, in downtown Chicago.

One of the sponsors of this year's event is the film "The Nativity Story."
A trailer of the film was being shown at Christkindlmarket, until the City of Chicago Department of Special Events told the festival organizers to stop playing it. First, the department said the trailer was "insensitive to the many people of different faiths." Its explanation shifted to this retort: the film is "too commercial." The latter stand didn't prevent the McDonalds Thanksgiving Parade from taking place in Chicago last month.

But at today 11:00 am Chicago time, the trailer will return.

From a TC Public Relations press release.

City Reverses Position on Showing of Religious Movie Trailer at Annual Christmas Market

(Chicago...Media reports around the world have covered statements by Jim Law, Chicago’s executive director of special events, where he said that a trailer for the movie The Nativity Story could not be shown at a Christmas festival in downtown Chicago. Law stated that the trailer would be "insensitive to the many people of different faiths." Now to show that the cinematic version of Jesus’ birth is welcomed in Chicago, a group of Christians that see the trailer as religious expression have convinced the City of Chicago to allow them to show the trailer. The Christian supporters are Jim Finnegan, one of the sponsors of the manger on Daley Plaza , and Civil Liberties for Urban Believers (CLUB) an association of Chicago churches. The trailer will run from 11 am Wednesday, December 20 through Christmas Day on Daley Plaza located at 50 West Washington Street in Chicago. Press conference at 11 am on Wednesday, December 20th.

"For years I’ve had the privilege of being involved in presentation of Chicago nativity scene that displayed at Daley Plaza. Showing The Nativity Story trailer after Chicago officials had first declared that there was no room at "Daley Plaza Inn" represents a victory for all civil liberties and a welcomed accommodation that brings the message of the Messiah’s birth to life," said Jim Finnegan.

"While the City of Chicago certainly should not endorse religious speech, the Constitution and a number of Supreme Court decisions make clear that citizens and private organizations have a right to religious expression in the public square," said John Mauck with Mauck & Baker, whose firm worked with Finnegan, CLUB, and the Chicago-based Thomas More Society to file for the permits to show the trailer, "Ironically, this past summer, despite many people being offended by the governmental endorsement of the Gay Games, the City of Chicago promoted that event enthusiastically. In contrast we had to work hard and threaten litigation to overcome the City's initial prohibition against a private group showing people the Savior of the world in a public place. Hopefully Chicago will stop discriminating against religious speech."

The right to show this trailer was settled in 1989 when Jennifer Neubauer, then a private lawyer and now chairman of Thomas More Society, filed a federal lawsuit and won a temporary restraining order and permanent injunction from Chief Judge James B. Parsons of the U.S.District Court in Chicago, prohibiting any discrimination against private religious expression on Daley Center Plaza, a traditional public forum. The court granted permission to erect religious displays on public property without discrimination against expression on account of religious content. "The reason we can now see a manger with Jesus, an Islamic Crescent and a Jewish Menorah is because of that court case back in the 1980's. Freedom of religious expression in the public square is protected as one of our most fundamental rights under the First Amendment," said Tom Brejcha, Chief Counsel, Thomas More Society of Chicago.

Earlier posts: City of Chicago statement on Christkindlmarket and The Nativity Story film

Christmas Scrooges in Chicago

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Only in Chicago: Four convicted felons seek to regain their aldermanic seats

In most places, politicians run for office and then get convicted on corruption charges, never to be heard from, politically at least, ever again.

(Yes, I'm aware of Marion Barry's achievement.)

Four former Chicago alderman, Percy Giles, Ambrosio Medrano, Wallace Davis, and Virgil Jones, have filed petitions to reclaim their council seats. As former felons, Illinois law is unclear if they have forfeited the right to run for public office.

However, as part of their platform, the four men can tell voters, "I've served my time already."

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Tuesday, December 19, 2006

2008: Gilmore set to explore

I was thinking the cupboard of Republican candidates for president, especially on the conservative end of the table, was getting a bit empty. But out of the Old Dominion, former Virginia Governor Jim Gilmore is forming a presidential exploratory committee.

The November mid-term elections sank the presidential prospects of Gilmore's fellow Virginian George Allen and his Senate colleague Bill Frist. Both men were viewed as strong contenders to win the 2008 Republican nomination for president and could both boast of strong conservative credentials.

They're out, but Gilmore may be in.

From AP:

"There is not a committed conservative in the field who can put together a national campaign. I am and I can. I have people on the ground right now in Iowa and in South Carolina," Gilmore, 57, said in a telephone interview from New York.

His comments were directed not only at others preparing for a GOP presidential run, including Sen. John McCain of Arizona, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and departing Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. It's also yet another of his many slaps at lavish federal spending by the current Republican administration and Congress.

"I am not someone who has to evolve as a conservative. I don't have to evolve my position," he said.

Just like that other self-described "true-conservative" Sam Brownback, Gilmore has little name recognition outside of the population of political junkies.

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"Jewish cabal" comment from O.J. publisher draws ire

O.J. Simpson, not Jewish.... Adam Sandler, The Hanukkah Song.

Judith Regan, became the former publisher at HarperCollins after she claimed that a "Jewish cabal" was out to get her.

Regan was the "brainchild" behind the almost-publication of the book, "written" by the semi-literate O.J. Simpson, "If I Did It."

"It" of course being the murders of his former wife Nicole Simpson and Ron Goldman.

From AP:

If Ms. Regan did make the charge that a Jewish cabal was conspiring against her, she clearly stepped over the line by employing the age-old anti-Semitic canard that Jews conspire against non-Jews," ADL (Anti-Defamation League) National Director Abraham H. Foxman said. "She also gives credence to the conspiracy theory that Jews control the media.

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More Obama and Rezko

Friend of the blog, Republican strategist, and former newspaper reporter Dan Curry of Reverse Spin has a take on Obama-Rezko controversy.

From his blog, Reverse Spin:

First, it's a bit silly to suggest that he didn't know Tony Rezko was in the crosshairs of newspapers and investigators. Rezko was front page news throughout 2005, even in the early months. It is part of a larger pattern of Obama not speaking out about corruption in his own party. He endorsed the ethically challenged Alexi Giannoulias for state treasurer and stuck by him after it was revealed he was responsible for bank loans to mobsters. Then he stood silently by at the Illinois State Fair in August, refusing to say a word about nine state and federal corruption investigations of Governor Rod Blagojevich. Then, a few weeks later, he had the Audacity to lecture Kenya about corruption.

I'm getting really local here, but I think it's important to bring up Obama's endorsement of Democrat Todd Stroger for President of the Cook County Board. (Cook has a population larger than most states.)

From Eric Zorn's Chicago Tribune blog:

Obama's staff released a profoundly disheartening letter to voters this week in which Obama, joined by Sen. Dick Durbin, endorsed Cook County Board presidential candidate Todd Stroger.

The letter, which puffs lots of hot air into the saggy balloon of Stroger's legislative resume, refers to him as "a good progressive Democrat" who will "lead us into a new era of Cook County government."

Todd Stroger was a "strong voice" in Springfield, the letter says. He has "worked assiduously" for the poor as an alderman. Yet, of course, the record reveals that Stroger is an unimaginative legislative drone whose reform credentials are wholly imaginary--an unlikely trailblazer to a new era.

In a back room deal that shocked even Illinois residents, Stroger was foisted on Cook County voters after his father, who created the mess that is known as Cook County government, suffered a stroke shortly before the senior Stroger's primary victory.

Sadly, Todd Stroger was victorious in November.

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Jesse Jackson Jr's wife running for alderman in Chicago

The nepotism practices of the Rev. Jesse Jackson are well documented. Now his son, Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., is helping out the family. His wife is running for alderman in Chicago.

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Monday, December 18, 2006

Persian Gulf may get a little more crowded

The mullahs and Holocaust-deniers in Iran may have some new folks prowling their neighborhood.

From The Australian:

The US will position an aircraft carrier group in the Gulf after the new year as a warning to Iran, CBS news has reported.

The US TV network said the Pentagon was deploying "a major buildup of naval forces in and around the Persian Gulf" in response to what the US considered "increasingly provocative acts".

CBS noted Iranian naval exercises, support of Shiite militias in Iraq and its enrichment of nuclear fuel as reasons for US concern.

The network stressed, however, that the US does not intend to attack Iran but rather, "discourage its leaders from spreading their Shiite revolution."

Quick, send David Duke back to Tehran!

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Tehran Times interviews madman and Holocaust denier Robert Faurisson

One of the vilest people on the planet is Robert Faurisson, a French Holocaust denier. He was one of the speakers at last week's shameless "Holocaust Conference."

Here are is an excerpt of some recent spewings, courtesy of the Tehran Times:

This conference is a big and nice surprise. I had never thought that there could be such a thing. I was really pessimistic. When for the first time I heard that President Ahmadinejad said that the Holocaust was a myth, I was so surprised. I wondered if Iran would exist anymore. I thought that the U.S. or Western countries would try to destroy this country because the belief in the Holocaust is the central pillar of the West and the world. To say that it is a myth is something extremely dangerous. I, as a researcher, might say that it is a myth, but for the head of a state it is extremely dangerous. But he did it.

Can I say something more?

I think that the year 2006 will be counted in history as a very important year because a country called Iran said no to Bush and yes to revisionists. It is marvelous.

He goes on to say...

President Ahmadinejad has used the right word. The alleged Holocaust of the Jews is a myth. That is a belief maintained by credulity or ignorance. It does not mean that the people who believe it are liars. They are not liars, but they are believers.

Prior to 9/11, Noam Chomsky's involvement in defending Faurisson was helpful in achieving the almost-happy ending of marginalizing Chomsky into a 1960s relic. (Chomsky's rosy views on post-Vietnam War Indo-China were admittedly a bigger factor in the linguist's temporary fall from grace.) But Faurisson is still vomiting nonsense, and Chomsky's relevance is once again a burden upon humanity.

What a sick world we live in.

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Hillary and Obama like each other

The two Democratic candidates with Illinois connections--one grew up here, the other lives here, have come out and declared they like each other--at least publicly.

This is what Sen. Hillary Clinton said today about Sen. Barack Obama on NBC's today show, according to AP:

She sidestepped an opinion on whether Obama would make a good president. But the former first lady praised him as an exciting personality with "a lot to contribute to the national dialogue."

And from Newsweek, here's Obama:

I have tremendous respect for Hillary Clinton. She's an outstanding leader in the Democratic Party. She's earned her stripes.

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