“We need a leader who will fight for what he believes in”

It’s good I suppose that the liberal media and those euphoric lefties from 08 are coming to their senses as 2012 approaches and realizing the stuff they projected onto the Obama Rorshach test was mostly fantasy. Hence, Joan Walsh concluded on behalf of Democrats in her post at Salon the other day, “We need a leader who will fight for what he believes in.”

Walsh examines the latest poll numbers:

President Obama's post-Bin Laden poll bounce has predictably disappeared. Gallup's weekly tracking poll shows his approval rating down to 46 percent, with 44 percent disapproving,  from a recent high of 50. Wednesday's NBC/Wall St. Journal poll found a similar drop. That poll also looked at voters' opinions about the economy, and found overall, voters' disapproval of Obama's handling of the economy rose to 54 percent. The number of people who think the economy will get worse or stay the same over the next year climbed, and the number who think things will get better dropped. May's unemployment jump, combined with the inability to push another stimulus bill at a time when the focus is on cutting the deficit, gives Democrats reason to worry things won't get appreciably better any time soon.

It's against this backdrop that AP yesterday zeroed in on a so-called "intensity gap" between Democrats and Republicans heading into 2012. It quoted a recent Pew Research Center survey that found 84 percent of staunch conservatives strongly disapprove of the president, but only 64 percent of solid liberals strongly approve of him. But those numbers are different from what Gallup finds in its weekly polls, where Obama's approval rating with liberal Democrats is pretty stable, at a respectable 87 percent. Lately, though, he's suffered several dips with black and Latino voters: African Americans have mostly given Obama approval ratings in the 90s; they've been down in the low 80s several times in the last few months, including this week. Latino support also dropped from highs in the mid-60s to 54 percent this week.

Yes, Walsh’s analysis of the challenges the Dems are facing in 2012 brings back memories like how the Obama camp boasted their incredible funds represented primarily small donations from many donors. Come to find out Obama outpaced the Republicans in emptying Wall Street pockets. No wonder he was so easily persuaded to bail out those tycoons (I hear he gives them access, too):

Finally, it doesn't help that the president raised more money from Wall Street in 2008 than John McCain did, or that overall, Democrats got far more contributions from Wall Street than Republicans did that year ($88 million to $67 million). Of course, Wall Street tycoons are furious with Obama for even moderate attempts at financial regulatory reform: The New York Times revealed energetic efforts by the president and his campaign team to woo back petulant Wall Street donors with lavish dinners and special meetings. In a case of bad timing, the next day the campaign sent emails to its small-donor list coming "from" Barack Obama himself, with the subject "Dinner?" The president announced a lottery for donors who give as little as $5 to win a small dinner with him. It was a nice populist touch, but it contrasted sharply with his outreach to the wealthy, and by comparison, it might have sounded stingy. (Also, the line "I want to spend time with a few of you," given coverage of the Wall Street campaign, might not get people fired up. "A few" isn't inspiring. Dreaming of meeting "as many of you as possible during this campaign" would sound more like the old Obama.)

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“The Disgusting Trashing Of Sarah Palin by Blabbermouth McCain Aides”

It’s all over the blogosphere lately. If it’s not the online left-wing attack minions going after Palin, it’s McCain aides trying to scapegoat her for losing the election. Kudos to conservative blogger Michelle Malkin for standing up for Palin against the McCain campaign’s “classless cowards.”

Malkin writes:

“The anonymous trashing of Sarah Palin by blabbermouth McCain aides who are leaking to Fox News is disgusting. Absolutely disgusting.

‘“Allah’s got the vid clip of a report citing unnamed McCain staffers accusing Palin of lacking, in Carl Cameron’s words, ‘knowledgeability.’ More slime here. And here.

“At least all the Hollywood and Manhattan Palin-haters were willing to sign their names and put their faces on their attacks.

“Let’s assume the rumor-mongers are telling the truth for a moment. Who does it damn more: Sarah Palin or McCain and his vetters who green-lighted her for the vice presidential nomination? Don’t need an Ivy League degree to figure that one out.

“Sarah Palin worked her heart out. She energized tens of thousands to come out who would have otherwise stayed home. She touched countless families. I didn’t agree with everything she said on the campaign trail. But two fundamental conservative stands she took mattered greatly to me: She vigorously defended the Second Amendment and the sanctity of life more eloquently in practice than any of the educated conservative aristocracy.

“And she did it all with a tirelessness and infectious optimism that defied the shameless, bottomless attempts by elites in both parties to bring her and her family down.

“Shame on the smearers who don’t have the balls to show their faces.

“Thank you, Sarah Palin. Thank you for stepping up the plate and serving your country.”

Obama’s Netroots Supporters Defend Hacking Sarah Palin’s Email

It shouldn’t surprise me. After all, I’m a person who began the 2008 campaign as a liberal Democrat, but after that fraudulent primary and the trashing of Hillary Clinton by party bigwigs and their media allies, I re-registered as non-affiliated. And Lord knows, I’ve read enough sordid, misogynous comments by Obama’s online supporters to keep me firmly planted at the center of the political spectrum for the rest of my life – no lunatic fringe for me on either the left or the right.

So why am I shocked this morning to read the comments by Obamaphiles across the Web defending the criminals who hacked Sarah Palin’s personal email and brazenly posted family photos and other personal information on a public Web site? The Washington Post’s coverage of the flagrant invasion of Palin’s privacy is followed by over 300, mostly abusive remarks by those, er, upscale, well-educated liberal Democrats that I abandoned in disgust a couple of months ago.

Wapo's Michael Shear and Karl Vick write:

“A group of computer hackers said yesterday that they had accessed a Yahoo e-mail account of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, publishing some of her private communications to expose what appeared to be her use of a personal account for government business.

‘“The hackers posted what they said were personal photos, the contents of several messages, the subject lines of dozens of e-mails and Palin's e-mail contact list on a site called Wikileaks.org. That site said it received the electronic files from a group identifying itself only as ‘Anonymous.’

‘“At around midnight last night some members affiliated with the group gained access to governor Palin's email account, 'gov.palin@yahoo.com' and handed over the contents to the government sunshine site Wikileaks.org,’ said a message on the site.

“Rick Davis, the campaign manager for Republican presidential nominee John McCain, issued a statement yesterday afternoon condemning the incident.


“This is a shocking invasion of the Governor's privacy and a violation of law,’ he said. ‘The matter has been turned over to the appropriate authorities and we hope that anyone in possession of these e-mails will destroy them. We will have no further comment.”


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