In The Tank

They’re not even embarrassed about how obviously they’re in the tank for Obama. Rather, they seem to feel righteous about it. Our media elite are so smug and insular in their world view, they don’t realize or care about how out of touch they’ve become with ordinary Americans - how we live or how we think. Paradoxically, our media elite see themselves as champions of the oppressed, of “minorities,” and other “victims” of “American oppression.” They’re embarrassed when ordinary Americans express our patriotism or our faith in God, considering it childlike and unsophisticated. Their friends are far too sophisticated to look at the world that way.

They know Obama goes to church and professes love of country, but they figure he does those things because he has to in order to get elected. And they want to see him elected because he’s one of them. He pronounces words as they do and he went to Ivy League school as they did. And like them, he sees the world from a hard left perspective. If we wonder why they don’t go after Obama’s William Ayers connection, that’s why. It doesn’t alarm them. Ayers fits with mainstream Democrat politics in Chicago. And why not expose racism in the Reverend Jeremiah Wright? Because they’re not alarmed by him either. He fits in with their world view too - way better than Justice Clarence Thomas does. Wright and Obama profess a belief in God, but it looks as if Thomas actually has one and lives his life accordingly. To our elitist media, that qualifies him as an intellectual lightweight and not qualified to serve on the US Supreme Court.

Seldom, if ever, do they question Barack Obama’s qualifications to be president, though his is the thinnest of resumes. Most of his career was as a “community organizer.” What the heck is that? And he served in the state senate? Big deal. He avoided nearly every controversial vote that came up when he was there, voting “present” instead of yes or no. US Senate? If ever there was a club for political prima donnas, it would be the US Senate and Obama did only two years there before running for president full-time.

Obama wants to be our chief executive, but his only executive experience was as Chairman of the Annenberg Challenge - a position Bill Ayers secured for him. Obama cited his Annenberg tenure in an unsuccessful congressional campaign, but has hidden it since and no wonder - it was a $50 million boondoggle which purported to raise standards for Chicago schools, which showed no measurable change when the money was all spent. Most of the money was authorized by Obama and spent by Ayers and his radical friends to push Chicago’s educational establishment further to the left than it already was. I remember getting $25,000 of Annenberg Challenge Grant money here in Fryeburg around the same time. A few other teachers and I trained students in the use of digital imaging technology and local history. I’m proud of what we did with just a tiny fraction of what Obama spent. The Chicago Democratic establishment, however, is trying to block reporters from investigating records of where Obama’s and Ayers’ $50 million went.

Then there’s Obama’s purchase of his Chicago mansion with convicted felon Tony Rezco - possibly using money from Iraqi/British billionaire Nadhmi Auchi, implicated in the infamous Iraqi “Oil For Food” debacle, the biggest financial scandal in world history until the sub-prime mortgage crisis. Obama is tangled up in that one too through his close associations with infamous Fannie Mae executives James Johnson and Franklin Raines (who, as CEO, took $90 million in bonuses). Johnson headed Obama’s vice presidential search committee and Raines advised his campaign on housing issues.

Since McCain selected Sarah Palin for his VP running mate, however, investigative reporters have swarmed over Alaska looking for dirt. Palin’s got at least as much experience as Obama, but all we hear about is her lack of it. She epitomizes ordinary Americans and the elite media’s contempt for her is sickeningly obvious. When she galvanized the GOP’s conservative base, they declared relentless, all-out war on her. They dug into her private life and even hung out her seventeen-year-old daughter to dry. They seemed to have Palin on the ropes until the debate with Biden last week. They were expecting Biden to knock her out, but instead, she took control and spoke directly to the American people, even looking into the camera and winking.

I’ve been watching presidential politics a long time from both sides of the spectrum and I’ve never seen the media go as softly on a candidate as they have on Obama. Nor have I ever seen them attack anyone as vociferously as they have gone after Palin. The elite media’s power is waning, but possibly still powerful enough to deliver a radical leftist into the oval office in January.