Obama Administration Sharply Rebukes Israeli Housing Project
On October 1, 2014, the Obama Administration -- in what ABC News
described as "a striking public rebuke" -- condemned Israel's plan to
build a new, 2,500-unit housing project in east Jerusalem. "This
development will only draw condemnation from the international community,"
said White House spokesman Josh Earnest. "It also would call into question
Israel's ultimate commitment to a peaceful negotiated settlement with the
Palestinians." Morever, the Administration condemned what it called the
"provocative" occupation in recent years, by several hundred Israeli
settlers, of residential buildings in Silwan, an Arab neighborhood in east
Jerusalem. Earnest warned that this occupation would "escalate tensions at
a moment when those tensions have already been high."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he was
"baffled" by the Obama Administration's rebuke. "It's against
the American values," stated Netanyahu. "And it doesn't bode well for
peace. The idea that we'd have this ethnic purification as a condition for
peace, I think it's anti-peace."
Obama Administration Expresses Condolences over Death of Hamas
Terrorist; Refuses to Call Him a Terrorist
On October 24, 2014, a Palestinian teenager was shot and killed
by an IDF soldier while attempting to throw a Molotov cocktail at Israeli
civilians. The youth was subsequently buried wearing a green Hamas headband,
and the Obama administration quickly released a statement (that same day)
expressing its "deepest condolences to the family." Three days later,
at an October 27, 2014 State Department briefing, Associated Press reporter
Matt Lee asked spokesperson Jen Psaki the following: “There are reports … that
[the Palestinian teenager] was throwing Molotov cocktails at cars on a highway,
and I’m wondering, if that is the case, would you still have been so speedy in
putting out a statement and offering your condolences to the family? The
argument that is being made by some in Israel is that this kid was essentially
a terrorist, and you don’t agree with that, I assume.”
Psaki replied: “Correct, we don’t. I don't have any more details
on the circumstances, though.”
Lee then asked whether the fact that the teenager was buried
wearing a Hamas headband was “of concern at all.”
Psaki responded, “I just don’t have any more on this particular
case,” and then abruptly turned to take a question from another reporter.
Top Obama Official Calls Netanyahu "Chickenshit"
On October 28, 2014, The Atlantic reporter Jeffrey Goldberg
wrote that a senior Obama administration official had recently spoken to him in
the most disparaging manner about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
("Bibi") Netanyahu, saying: “The thing about Bibi is, he’s a
chickenshit.... [H]e won’t do anything to reach an accommodation with the
Palestinians or with the Sunni Arab states. The only thing he’s interested in
is protecting himself from political defeat. He’s not [Yitzhak] Rabin, he’s not
[Ariel] Sharon, he’s certainly no [Menachem] Begin. He’s got no guts.”
"I ran this notion by another senior official who deals
with the Israel file regularly," added Goldberg. "This official
agreed that Netanyahu is a 'chickenshit' on matters related to the comatose peace
process, but added that he’s also a 'coward' on the issue of Iran’s nuclear
threat." "Over the years," Goldberg wrote as well, "Obama
administration officials have described Netanyahu to me as recalcitrant,
myopic, reactionary, obtuse, blustering, pompous, and 'Aspergery.' (These are
verbatim descriptions; I keep a running list.)"
Moreover, Goldberg spelled out the dire implications of such
rhetoric vis a vis U.S.-Israeli relations: "This comment is representative
of the gloves-off manner in which American and Israeli officials now talk about
each other behind closed doors, and is yet another sign that relations between
the Obama and Netanyahu governments have moved toward a full-blown crisis. The
relationship between these two administrations— dual guarantors of the
putatively 'unbreakable' bond between the U.S. and Israel—is now the worst it's
ever been, and it stands to get significantly worse after the November midterm
elections. By next year, the Obama administration may actually withdraw diplomatic
cover for Israel at the United Nations, but even before that, both sides are
expecting a showdown over Iran, should an agreement be reached about the future
of its nuclear program."
Israeli officials reacted angrily to the remarks of the
anonymous Obama senior official. Economy Minister Naftali Bennett said that
“severe curse words against the Israeli prime minister are harmful to millions
of Israeli citizens and Jews worldwide.” Former Israeli United Nations
Ambassador Dan Gillerman described such name calling as “shameful,” “abusive,”
and “counter-productive.”
Netanyahu, for his part, said: "I have been on the
battlefield many times. I have risked my life for the country and I am not
prepared to make concessions that will endanger our state.... It must be
understood that our supreme interests, with security and the unity of Jerusalem
first and foremost, are not among the top concerns of those anonymous elements
that are attacking us and me personally, because the attack on me comes only
because I am defending the State of Israel.... If I did not defend the State of
Israel, if I did not vigorously uphold our national and security interests,
they would not attack me. And despite all the attacks against me, I will
continue to defend our state."
When a reporter asked State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki
whether Obama administration officials were trying to learn who had made the
comments quoted in Goldberg's article, she said simply, “No,” and then abruptly
turned toward another questioner. But the aforementioned reporter immediately
followed up by asking, "Why not?" To this, Psaki replied: “There are
anonymous sources in all of your stories every single day. If we spent all of
our time focused on that effort, we wouldn’t be working on diplomacy.” (Click here
for video of the exchange.) Rejecting also the notion that the U.S. should
apologize to Israel for the smear against Netanyahu, Psaki added: “If this
issue comes up, [Secretary of State John Kerry] would make clear this isn’t the
position of the administration.”
State Department Spokeswoman Says Israel Should Have Done More
to Limit Palestinian Civilian Casualties
At a November 8, 2014 press conference, an Associated Press
reporter asked State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki to comment on the International
Criminal Court's decision that Israel could not be charged with having
committed war crimes during its seven-week war against Hamas during the
preceding summer. In her reply, Psaki issued the following remarks: "As we
made clear throughout the summer’s conflict, we supported Israel’s right to
self-defense and strongly condemned Hamas’s rocket attacks that deliberately
targeted civilians, and the use of tunnels, of course, of attacks into Israel.
However, we also expressed deep concern and heartbreak for the civilian death
toll in Gaza and made clear ... that we believed that Israel could have done
more to prevent civilian casualties, and it was important that they held their
selves to a high standard. So that remains our view and position about this summer’s
events.... [I]t remains the broad view of the entire Administration that they
[the Israelis] could have done more and they should have taken more -- all
feasible precautions to prevent civilian casualties."
After Palestinian Terror Attack, Obama Draws a Moral Equivalence
Between the Two Sides
After a November 18, 2014 attack where two Palestinian
terrorists -- wielding meat cleavers, an ax, and a gun -- murdered five people
(including three U.S.-born rabbis) who were praying in a Jerusalem synagogue,
President Obama said: "Too many Israelis have died; too many Palestinians
have died. At this difficult time I think it's important for both Palestinians
and Israelis to try to work together to lower tensions and reject violence. We
have to remind ourselves that the majority of Palestinians and Israelis
overwhelmingly want peace."
Reports That the Obama Administration Is Considering Sanctions
Against Israel
In early December 2014, the Israeli daily newspaper Ha’aretz
reported that the Obama administration, which was vigorously pushing Congress
to refrain from imposing any new sanctions against Iran, had recently held
secret internal meetings to discuss the possibility of imposing sanctions on
Israel as punishment for the continuing construction of Jewish homes in East
Jerusalem. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf dodged several questions
from reporters regarding the matter. “I’m obviously not going to comment one
way or another on reported internal deliberations,” she said. “We’ve made clear
our position on settlement activity publicly and that hasn’t changed.” When
pressed further to comment, Harf said she would not “address hypotheticals.”
Obama Administration Leaks to the Press About Israel
* 2010: The Obama administration leaked information of a covert
deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia, whereby the Saudis would allow Israel to
use their airspace in order to wage an attack against Iran and its nuclear
facilities.
* March 22, 2012: the Obama administration leaked to the New
York Times the results of a classified war game which predicted that an Israeli
strike against Iran's nuclear facilities could lead to a wider regional war and
result in hundreds of American deaths.
* March 29, 2012: An ABC News story said: "Two reports
today about Iran’s nuclear program and the possibility of an Israeli military
strike have analysts in Israel accusing the Obama administration leaking
information to pressure Israel not to bomb Iran and for Iran to reach a
compromise in upcoming nuclear talks. The first report in Foreign Policy quotes
anonymous American officials saying that Israel has been given access to
airbases by Iran’s northern neighbor Azerbaijan from which Israel could launch
air strikes or at least drones and search and rescue aircraft. The second
report from Bloomberg, based on a leaked congressional report, said that Iran’s
nuclear facilities are so dispersed that it is 'unclear what the ultimate
effect of a strike would be…'"
The Foreign Policy report quoted an intelligence officer saying,
“We’re watching what Iran does closely…But we’re now watching what Israel is
doing in Azerbaijan. And we’re not happy about it.”
Institute for National Security Studies analyst Yoel Guzansky
explained that the deal with Azerbaijan “totally changes the whole picture,”
making it far easier for Israel to strike Iran quickly and forcefully, rather
than having to fly more than 1,000 miles over Iraqi airspace.
Guzansky interpreted the motives behind the Obama leaks as
follows: “It seems like a big campaign to prevent Israel from attacking. I
think the [Obama] administration is really worried Jerusalem will attack and
attack soon. They’re trying hard to prevent it in so many ways.”
In a May 29, 2012 Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper column titled
“Obama Betraying Israel?”, longtime defense commentator Ron Ben-Yishai condemned
the leaks, writing: “In recent weeks the administration shifted from persuasion
efforts vis-Ã -vis decision-makers and Israel’s public opinion to a practical,
targeted assassination of potential Israeli operations in Iran. The campaign’s
aims are fully operational: To make it more difficult for Israeli
decision-makers to order the IDF [Israeli Defense Forces] to carry out a
strike, and what’s even graver, to erode the IDF’s capacity to launch such
strike with minimal casualties.”
* April 8, 2012: The New Yorker reported that according to
information leaked by Obama administration officials, the Israeli intelligence
ageny Mossad was helping to fund and train the Iranian opposition group
Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK).
Breitbart.com analyzed the motives behind the leak as follows:
"So what would be the purpose of the leak this time? The same as the last
time: it’s supposed to tip off the Iranians to efforts against them, and it’s
supposed to dissuade the Israelis from doing anything to stop the Iranian nuclear
program.... This leak is just the latest in a pattern of leaks from the Obama
administration ... The Obama administration is desperate to prevent any sort of
aggressive Israeli action on Iran before the election. That’s because Obama
knows it would put him between a rock and a hard place – his leftist base hates
Israel, and yet the American people love Israel overall."
* Early May 2013: Two unnamed Obama administration officials
leaked classified information to the media indicating that Israel was behind a May
3rd airstrike against a shipment of advanced surface-to-surface missiles at the
airport in Damascus, Syria. Israeli security analysts suggested that the leak
could not only endanger any Israeli agents still on the ground in Syria, but
would also increase the likelihood that Syrian President Bashar Assad would
retaliate against Israel. As Global Research in International Affairs Center
director Barry Rubin explained, “It requires the Syrians to react officially
rather than deny that it happened or that it was an accident. It forces Syria
and Hezbollah and Iran to react officially and say they want to seek revenge,
which makes things more dangerous for Israel. Can you imagine if things were
reversed and somebody did that to the U.S.?”
* Early November 2013: An Obama administration official leaked
to CNN that Israeli warplanes had attacked a Syrian base (in the port of
Latakia). The planes were targeting “missiles and related equipment” --
specifically, Russian-made SA-8 Gecko Dgreen mobile missiles -- to prevent
their delivery to Hezbollah.
* January 2015: the Obama administration -- which opposed the
notion of imposing any new sanctions against the Iranian regime -- leaked
information indicating that a Mossad official had recently stated that such
sanctions would surely cause negotiations with the Islamic Republic to collapse
entirely. Secretary of State John Kerry elaborated: “One of the top
intelligence personnel within the Israeli intelligence field – I won't name
names, but this person was asked directly by a congressional delegation that
visited there over the weekend, what the effect of sanctions would be, and this
person answered, that would be like throwing a grenade into the process.”
Approximately 12 hours later, however, that unnamed official
stepped forth to publicly identify himself. It was the head of the Mossad,
Tamir Pardo, whose office released the following statement: “On January 19,
2015, the head of the Mossad, Tamir Pardo, met with a delegation of U.S.
senators at their request and with the approval of the prime minister. Contrary
to what has been reported, the head of the Mossad did not say that he opposes
imposing additional sanctions on Iran.... Regarding the reported reference to
'throwing a grenade,' the head of the Mossad did not use this expression
regarding the imposition of sanctions, which he believes to be the sticks
necessary for reaching a good deal with Iran. He used this expression as a
metaphor to describe the possibility of creating a temporary crisis in the
negotiations, at the end of which talks would resume under improved
conditions.”
Obama Is Enraged by Benjamin Netanyahu's Acceptance of John
Boehner's Invitation to Address Congress
On January 21, 2015, House Speaker John Boehner invited Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was strongly oposed to the emerging U.S.
agreement with Iran regarding the latter's nuclear program, to speak on
February 11 to a joint session of Congress about the security threat posed by
Iran. (The date of the speech was subsequently changed to March 3.) Boehner
reportedly did not consult with President Obama before extending the
invitation.
In response to Boehner's action, an outraged Obama
administration accused the House Speaker of having violated “protocol” by
extending the invitation on his own initiative instead of asking the executive
branch to extend an invitation. A senior administration official also derided
Netanyahu, saying: “We thought we’ve seen everything. But Bibi managed to
surprise even us. There are things you simply don’t do.... He spat in our face
publicly and that’s no way to behave. Netanyahu ought to remember that
President Obama has a year and a half [actually two years] left to his
presidency, and that there will be a price.”
When it was subsequently announced that Obama would not be
meeting personally with Netanyahu during the March 3 visit, the president
offered this explanation: “We don’t meet with any world leader two weeks before
their election. I think that’s inappropriate.” "As a matter of
long-standing practice and principle,” added White House officials, “we do not
see heads of state or candidates in close proximity to their elections,” so as
to “avoid the appearance of influencing a democratic election in a foreign
country.”
The Obama administration also instructed members of the
Congressional Black Caucus not to attend Netanyahu's speech, and to speak out
against it publicly as well. Vice President Joe Biden, for his part, vowed to
skip the speech.
In early February 2015, it was learned that the White House's
tale of having been blindsided by Boehner and Netanyahu was a lie. This was
made evident by a correction added to a New York Times article that stated:
"Correction: An earlier version of this article misstated when Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel accepted Speaker John A. Boehner’s invitation to
address Congress. He accepted after the administration had been informed of the
invitation, not before."
On February 8, 2015, it was learned that the Obama
administration's claim that its decision not to meet with Netanyahu in
Washington was based on its desire to avoid "inappropriate[ly]"
influencing the upcoming Israeli election, was also a lie. This was evidenced
by the fact that during the weekend of February 7-8, Vice President Joe Biden
and Secretary of State John Kerry went to Munich, Germany to meet with Israeli
Labor leader Isaac Herzog, Netanyahu's opponent in the election.
The One Voice Movement Sends 5 Former Obama Campaign Operatives
to Israel, to Work on Defeating Prime Minister Netanyahu's Re-election Bid
In early 2015, the One Voice Movement (OVM), which held Israeli
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in extreme contempt, bankrolled the Israeli
group V-2015 and its effort to defeat Netanyahu’s bid for reelection. Toward
that end, OVM flew a team of five former campaign operatives of Barack
Obama—including Jeremy Bird, who served as a national field director for
Obama's 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns—to help run V-2015's activities
out of a Tel Aviv office building. As part of this anti-Netanyahu effort, OVM
paid for hundreds of people to go door-to-door and try to influence voters
throughout Israel. Notably, OVM had received funding not only from private
donors and charitable foundations, but also from the U.S. State Department.
As the Daily Caller observed at the time: “There’s lots of
evidence that Obama wants Netanyahu defeated, in part, because Obama thinks
Netanyahu is making it difficult for him to strike a peace deal between Israel
and the Jew-hating Islamist dictators and theocrats that surround Israel. …
Obama’s aides were sharply critical when Netanyahu recently accepted an invite
to speak to a joint House and Senate session just prior to the March election.”
Obama Says Islamic Attack on Kosher Deli Was "Random"
Violence
In a February 2015 interview with Vox, President Obama said the
following about the four Jews who had been killed the previous month by
Islamist gunmen who attacked a kosher deli in France:
“It is entirely legitimate for the American people to be deeply
concerned when you’ve got a bunch of violent, vicious zealots who behead people
or randomly shoot a bunch of folks in a deli in Paris.... [I]t is right and
appropriate for us to be vigilant and aggressive in trying to deal with that —
the same way a big city mayor’s got to cut the crime rate down if he wants that
city to thrive. But we also have to attend to a lot of other issues, and we’ve
got to make sure we’re right-sizing our approach so that what we do isn’t
counterproductive. I would argue that our invasion of Iraq was
counterproductive to the goal of keeping our country safe.”
Obama said this even though one of the killers had called a
French television station and stated emphatically that the deli was targeted
because it was a Jewish establishment.
Obama spokesman Josh Earnest, in a press conference, stuck to
the notion that the murders in the kosher deli were random acts:
Question: They weren’t killed because they were in a Jewish deli
though, they were in a kosher deli?
Earnest: John, these individuals were not targeted by name. This
is the point.
Question: Not by name, but by religion, were they not?
Earnest: Well, John, there were people other than just Jews who
were in that deli.
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki advanced a similar
narrative:
Psaki: Well, as you know, I believe if I remember the victims
specifically there were not all victims of one background or one nationality so
I think what they mean by that is, I don’t know that they spoke to the
targeting of the grocery store or that specifically but the individuals who
were impacted. (Psaki was wrong; all four of the victims were Jewish.)
Question: Does the administration believe this was an
anti-Jewish or an attack on the Jewish community in Paris?
Psaki: I don’t think we’re going to speak on behalf of French
authorities and what they believe was the situation at play here.
Question: Yeah, but if a guy goes into a kosher market and
starts shooting it up, you don’t – he’s not looking for Buddhists is he?
Psaki: Well again, Matt, I think it’s relevant that obviously
the individuals in there who were shopping and working at the store….
Question: Who does the administration expect shops at a kosher
deli? I mean I might but you know… an attacker going into a store that is
clearly identified as being one of, as identified with one specific faith, I’m
not sure I can understand how it is that you can’t say this was a targeted
attack.
Psaki: I just don’t have more for you, Matt. It’s an issue for
the French government to address.
Later that afternoon, in response to public criticism of the
administration's "random violence" theme, both Psaki and Earnest
completely reversed their position and pretended that they had been
characterizing the attacks as targeted, anti-Semitic actions all along. Psaki
tweeted: "We have always been clear that the attack on the kosher grocery
store was an anti-semitic attack that took the lives of innocent people."
Forty-one minutes after that, Earnest tweeted: "Our view has not changed.
Terror attack at Paris Kosher market was motivated by anti-Semitism. POTUS
didn't intend to suggest otherwise."
Netanyahu Cites "Profound Disagreement" with the U.S.
on Iran Deal
On February 10, 2015, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
said: “I am going to the United States not because I seek a confrontation with
the President, but because I must fulfill my obligation to speak up on a matter
that affects the very survival of my country.” He added: “…[W]e do have today a
profound disagreement with the United States administration and the rest of the
P5+1 over the offer that has been made to Iran. This offer would enable Iran to
threaten Israel’s survival. …It would be able, under this deal, to break out to
a nuclear weapon in a short time, and within a few years, to have the
industrial capability to produce many nuclear bombs for the goal of our
destruction.”
Netanyahu Accuses U.S. of Abandoning Its Pledge to Prevent Iran
from Acquiring Nuclear Weapons
On February 25, 2015, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
rebuffed criticism in Washington of his plans to speak to a joint session of
Congress on March 3, saying: "I respect the White House and the President
of the United States but on such a fateful matter, that can determine whether
or not we survive, I must do everything to prevent such a great danger for
Israel." Noting that the U.S. and its fellow P5+1 negotiating partners had
pledged to prevent Iran from going nuclear, Netanyahu said that "from the
agreement coming together it appears they have given up on this
commitment."
OBAMA THE DIVIDER
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During the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama pledged to
end the type of politics that “breeds division and conflict and cynicism,” and
to help Americans “rediscover our bonds to each other and to get out of this
constant petty bickering that’s come to characterize our politics.” He then
proceeded to become the most divisive president in American history. Not only
has he emphasized the need to enact his agendas swiftly and with a great sense
of urgency, but he has depicted his political opponents as essentially
obstructionists whose ideological absolutism is at odds with the common good.
During his second inaugural address on January 21, 2013, for instance, the
newly re-elected Obama said: “For now, decisions are upon us and we cannot
afford delay. We cannot mistake absolutism for principle or substitute
spectacle for politics, or treat name-calling as reasoned debate.”
This section documents how Obama has based both his activist and
political careers on fomenting group-based resentments designed to energize his
political base. “Hope and Change” has become, in practice, “Divide and Conquer.”
Obama's propensity to pit populations and “interests” against each other is an
outgrowth of the socialist worldview that sees all human interactions in terms
of “class struggles.” The divisions that Obama seeks to promote, as the
following material shows, are not only those of class, but also of race,
ethnicity, and sex.
DIVIDING AMERICANS BY CLASS
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Obama the Chicago Community Organizer
From the mid- to late 1980s, Barack Obama worked as a community
organizer in Chicago. Thomas Sowell, the eminent Hoover Institution Fellow,
offers this concise explanation of what community organizers do: “For
'community organizers' ... racial resentments are a stock in trade.... What
[they] organiz[e] are the resentments and paranoia within a community,
directing those feelings against other communities, from whom either benefits
or revenge are to be gotten, using whatever rhetoric or tactics will accomplish
that purpose.”
The godfather of community organizing, Saul Alinsky, put it this
way: “[The community organizer] must first rub raw the resentments of the
people; fan the latent hostilities to the point of overt expression. He must
search out controversy and issues, rather than avoid them, for unless there is
controversy people are not concerned enough to act.... [His function is] to
agitate to the point of conflict.... Pick the target, freeze it, personalize
it, and polarize it…. [T]here is no point to tactics unless one has a target
upon which to center the attacks.”
Obama's Ties to Saul Alinsky's Tactics for Fomenting Class
Resentments
Three of Barack Obama's mentors in Chicago were trained at the
Industrial Areas Foundation, founded by the famed godfather of community
organizing, Saul Alinsky. In the Alinsky model, the goal is to foment, in a
gradual and persistent manner, enough public discontent, moral confusion, and
outright chaos to spark social upheaval, for which Obama uses the term
“transformation.” Obama himself taught workshops on the Alinsky method for
several years.
Obama's Introduction to ACORN and Project Vote, Groups That Pit
the Poor and Nonwhite Minorities Against the Rest of Society
In the early to mid-1990s, Obama worked with the (now defunct)
community organization ACORN and its voter-mobilization arm, Project Vote. In
2003, Manhattan Institute scholar Sol Stern wrote that ACORN, professing a
dedication to “the poor and powerless,” in fact “promotes a 1960s-bred agenda
of anti-capitalism, central planning, victimology, and government handouts to
the poor.” ACORN, Stern elaborated, organized people “to push for ever more
government control of the economy” and to pursue “the ultra-Left’s familiar
anti-capitalist redistributionism.”
Obama Calls for Massive Government Spending Hikes on Education,
and the Enactment of “Living Wage” Laws
In an October 28, 1994 NPR interview, Obama said it would be
“just plain stupid”—and would reflect “a moral deficit”—for anyone to oppose
making a taxpayer-funded “investment” in the expansion of government programs
for children and low-income workers: “Real opportunity would mean quality
prenatal care for all women and well-funded and innovative public schools for
all children … a job at a living wage for everyone who was willing to work ...”
Obama Emphasizes Inter-Group Conflict
In a 1995 interview, Obama said: “[M]any of the problems that
Africa faces, whether it's poverty or political suppression or ethnic conflict
is just as prominent there and can't all be blamed on the effects of
colonialism. What it can be blamed on is some of the common factors that affect
Bosnia or Los Angeles or all kinds of places on this earth, and that is the
tendency for one group to try to suppress another group in the interest of
power or greed or resources or what have you.”
Obama Scapegoats the “Top 5 Percent”
In a December 28, 1995 interview published in the Hyde Park
Citizen newspaper, Obama explained his views on income inequality in the United
States: “In an environment of scarcity, where the cost of living is rising,
folks begin to get angry and bitter and look for scapegoats. Historically,
instead of looking at the top 5% of this country that controls all the wealth,
we turn towards each other, and the Republicans have added to the fire.”
In that same interview, Obama said that his perspective on the
“top 5%” had been shaped by his experiences abroad: “It's about power. My
travels made me sensitive to the plight of those without power and the issues
of class and inequalities as it relates to wealth and power. Anytime you have
been overseas in these so-called third world countries, one thing you see is
the vast disparity of wealth of those who are part of power structure and those
outside of it.”
Bill Ayers, Bernardine Dohrn, and Obama's Entry into Politics
In the mid-1990s, Obama entered electoral politics, setting his
sights initially on a state senate seat in Illinois. He launched his political
career in the home of two well-connected Chicagoans, longtime activists who
would help him make important contacts and enlarge his public profile. These
two allies were Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, lifelong Marxists who in the
1960s and '70s had been revolutionary leaders of the Weather Underground
Organization, a domestic terror group that aspired to transform the U.S. into a
Communist country.
Obama Views the Poor As a Potential “Voting Bloc”
At an October 19, 1998 conference at Loyola University, Barack
Obama stated that the “working poor” on welfare constituted a political voting
bloc that could be harnessed to the advantage of Democrats. Specifically, he
said that:
“To the extent that we are doing research figuring out what
kinds of government action would successfully make their [the working poor's]
lives better, we are then putting together a potential majority coalition to
move those agendas forward.”
The “one good thing that comes out of [the welfare-reform bill
of 1996] is that it essentially desegregates the welfare population,” merging
urban blacks with “the working poor, which are the other people.”
Such a coalition becomes “one batch of folks ... that is
increasingly a majority population” whose policy needs would grow to encompass
health care, job training, education, and a system where government would
“provide effective child care.”
“Rich People Are All for Nonviolence.... They Want to Make Sure
Folks Don't Take Their Stuff”
On January 21, 2002—Martin Luther King Day—then-Illinois state
senator Obama appeared at a Chicago church and delivered an emotionally charged
speech drenched in the rhetoric of class warfare. He said: “The philosophy of
nonviolence only makes sense if the powerful can be made to recognize
themselves in the powerless. It only makes sense if the powerless can be made
to recognize themselves in the powerful.... I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but
rich people are all for nonviolence. Why wouldn’t they be? They’ve got what
they want. They want to make sure folks don’t take their stuff.”
Obama Equates Conservatism with Greed, and Free Markets with
“Social Darwinism”
In a 2005 commencement address, Obama described conservatism as
a philosophy that promises “to give everyone one big refund on their
government, divvy it up by individual portions, in the form of tax breaks, hand
it out, and encourage everyone to use their share to go buy their own health
care, their own retirement plan, their own child care, their own education, and
so on.” “In Washington,” said Obama, “they call this the Ownership Society. But
in our past there has been another term for it, Social Darwinism, every man or
woman for him or her self. It's a tempting idea, because it doesn't require
much thought or ingenuity.”
“Tax Breaks to Paris Hilton Instead of Providing Child Care and
Education”
Blacks in the areas devastated by Hurricane Katrina were poor,
Obama charged, because of the Bush administration’s “decision to give tax
breaks to Paris Hilton instead of providing child care and education.”
The “Rich” Should Pay More Taxes
During a June 28, 2007 primary debate at Howard University,
candidate Obama was asked, “Do you agree that the rich aren't paying their fair
share of taxes?” He replied, “There’s no doubt that the tax system has been
skewed. And the Bush tax cuts—people didn’t need them, and they weren't even
asking for them, and that’s why they need to be less, so that we can pay for
universal health care and other initiatives.”
Calling for a Capital Gains Tax Hike
In an April 2008 Democratic primary debate, Obama was asked, by
journalist Charlie Gibson, about his proposal to nearly double the capital
gains tax (from 15 percent to 28 percent). Said Gibson: “In each instance when
the rate dropped [in the 1990s], revenues from the tax increased. The
government took in more money. And in the 1980s, when the [capital gains] tax
was increased to 28 percent, the revenues went down. So why raise it at all,
especially given the fact that 100 million people in this country own stock and
would be affected?” Obama replied that he wished to raise the tax “for purposes
of fairness.... [T]hose who are able to work the stock market and amass huge
fortunes on capital gains are paying a lower tax rate than their secretaries.
That’s not fair.”
Higher Taxes for the Wealthy
In a September 2008 Fox News Channel interview, Obama pledged to
cut taxes for 95 percent of Americans, while raising taxes on those who earn
more than $250,000: “Teddy Roosevelt supported a progressive income tax…. If I
am sitting pretty and you've got a waitress who is making minimum wage plus
tips, and I can afford it and she can't, what's the big deal for me to say,
'I'm going to pay a little bit more'? That is neighborliness.”
Telling “Joe the Plumber” about “Spreading the Wealth Around”
At an October 2008 campaign appearance in Ohio, Obama was
approached by a man named Joe Wurzelbacher (“Joe the Plumber”). Obama said that
a tax increase on businesses like Wurzelbacher's was justified because it would
enable the government to give tax breaks to people earning considerably less
than $250,000. “I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for
everybody,” said Obama.
“Fat-Cat Bankers”
During a December 2009 interview broadcast on CBS' 60 Minutes,
Obama said: “I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of, you know,
fat-cat bankers on Wall Street.”
“At Some Point, You've Made Enough Money”
On April 28, 2010, President Obama was in Illinois making a
speech about a proposed Wall Street reform bill. He criticized Wall Street
lobbyists for trying to dilute the bill's most stringent provisions, saying:
“We're not trying to push financial reform because we begrudge success that's
fairly earned. I mean, I do think at a certain point you've made enough money,
but you know, part of the American way is, you can just keep on making it if
you're providing a good product or you're providing a good service.”
Obama Opposes Tax Cuts for Top Earners
In September 2010, Obama strongly reiterated his opposition to
extending Bush-era tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans, depicting such a
measure as an outgrowth of “the same philosophy that led to this [fiscal] mess
in the first place.”
