SOWELL: REPUBLICANS DESERVE TO LOSE...BUT AMERICA DOESN'T DESERVE THE OBAMA

Once again, Sowell nails it:

Fact Number One: It was liberal Democrats, led by Sen. Christopher Dodd and Congressman Barney Frank, who for years — including the present year — denied that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were taking big risks that could lead to a financial crisis.

It was Sen. Dodd, Congressman Frank, and other liberal Democrats who for years refused requests from the Bush administration to set up an agency to regulate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

It was liberal Democrats, again led by Dodd and Frank, who for years pushed for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to go even further in promoting subprime mortgage loans, which are at the heart of today’s financial crisis.

Yet, today, what are we hearing? That it was the Bush administration “right-wing ideology” of “de-regulation” that set the stage for the financial crisis. Do facts matter?

We also hear that it is the free market that is to blame. But the facts show that it was the government that pressured financial institutions in general to lend to subprime borrowers, with such things as the Community Reinvestment Act and, later, threats of legal action by then Attorney General Janet Reno if the feds did not like the statistics on who was getting loans and who wasn’t.

Is that the free market? Or do facts not matter?

Then there is the question of being against the “greed” of CEOs and for “the people.” Franklin Raines made $90 million while he was head of Fannie Mae and mismanaging that institution into crisis.

Who in Congress defended Franklin Raines? Liberal Democrats, including Maxine Waters and the Congressional Black Caucus, at least one of whom referred to the “lynching” of Raines, as if it was racist to hold him to the same standard as white CEOs.

Even after he was deposed as head of Fannie Mae, Franklin Raines was consulted this year by the Obama campaign for his advice on housing!

The Washington Post criticized the McCain campaign for calling Raines an adviser to Obama, even though that fact was reported in the Washington Post itself on July 16th. The technicality and the spin here is that Raines is not officially listed as an adviser. But someone who advises is an adviser, whether or not his name appears on a letterhead.

The tie between Barack Obama and Franklin Raines is not all one-way. Obama has been the second-largest recipient of Fannie Mae’s financial contributions, right after Sen. Christopher Dodd.

But ties between Obama and Raines? Not if you read the mainstream media.

Facts don’t matter much politically if they are not reported.

The media alone are not alone in keeping the facts from the public. Republicans, for reasons unknown, don’t seem to know what it is to counterattack. They deserve to lose.

But the country does not deserve to be put in the hands of a glib and cocky know-it-all, who has accomplished absolutely nothing beyond the advancement of his own career with rhetoric, and who has for years allied himself with a succession of people who have openly expressed their hatred of America.

Read the whole article here.

SOWELL BLASTS OBAMA OVER HIS POLITICAL OPPORTUNISM AND IGNORANCE OVER VETERAN SUICIDE RATES

The smartest black man on the planet tears the man pretending to be the smartest black man on the planet a new one.

Now that Sen. Barack Obama has become the Democrats’ nominee for president of the United States, to the cheers of the media at home and abroad, he has written a letter to the secretary of defense, in a tone as if he is already president, addressing one of his subordinates.

The letter ends: “I look forward to your swift response.”

With wars going on in both Iraq and Afghanistan, a secretary of defense might have some other things to look after, before making a “swift response” to a political candidate.

Because of the widely publicized statistic that suicide rates among American troops have gone up, Obama says he wants the secretary of defense to tell him, swiftly:

-- “What changes will you make to provide our soldiers in theater with real access to mental health care?”

-- “What training has the Pentagon provided our medical professionals in theater to recognize who might be at risk of committing suicide?”

-- “What assistance are you providing families here at home to recognize the risk factors for suicide, so that they may help our service members get the assistance they need?”

-- “What programs has the Pentagon implemented to help reduce the stigma attached to mental-health concerns so that service members are more likely to seek appropriate care?”

Does Obama know how the rate of suicides or homicides among military veterans compares to the rate of suicides or homicides among their civilian counterparts? Do the facts matter to him, as compared to an opportunity to score political points?

Perhaps even more important, do the media even care whether Obama knows what he is talking about? Or is the symbolism of “the first black president” paramount, even if that means a president with cocky ignorance at a time of national danger?

The media have been crucial to Obama’s whole candidacy. His only achievements of national significance in his entire career have been media achievements and rhetorical achievements.

Perhaps his greatest achievement has been running as a candidate with an image wholly incompatible with what he has actually been doing for decades. This man who is now supposedly going to “unite” us has for years worked hand in glove, and contributed both his own money and the taxpayers’ money, to people who have sought to divide us in the most crude demagogic ways.

Hope and change that jackass. You just got punked.