08/24/2008
The Obama /Biden Announcement
In case you missed yesterday's live announcement, here are the speeches, from Springfield, Illinois.
Posted 12:27 PM EST by Andy Towle in Barack Obama, Democratic National Convention, Democratic Party, Illinois, Joseph Biden | Permalink
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o BAMBI den are so boring........
Posted by: Biden time | Aug 24, 2008 1:00:51 PM
SO boring. If MCCain picks someone exciting like Palin, he'll win in a landslide.
Posted by: Gosouth | Aug 24, 2008 1:23:59 PM
Biden may not be "exciting", but his record as it relates to LGBT issues is one that i can support. could it be better? sure. is it a much better record than Bush/McCain's? hell-to-the-yeah.
check it.
http://www.lgbtforobama.com/448
Posted by: buzz | Aug 24, 2008 2:10:33 PM
Good choice! Biden and Obama will KICK ASS
Posted by: KFLO | Aug 24, 2008 2:57:23 PM
So who the heck is Palin?
Many americans have heard of Biden in the past, but does palin's mother even know who he/she/it is?
Going to go look up said being and find out more about the repub creature . :-) Hard to be exciting if nobody has heard of you
Posted by: Jimmyboyo | Aug 24, 2008 3:22:42 PM
OK
ROFLMAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!
paulin female repub gov of alaska.
This 1 fact makes her a no go from day 1 or at least if mccain is "that stupid" then makes his loss the more certain
Her husband, Todd, works for BP at an oil field on the North Slope
British Petroleum originaly but a crack PR team turned that to Beyond Petroleum!!!!!!!!!!! LOL With the majority of america upset at oil companies and already thinking the repubs are too close to and or in the back pockets of oil companies. LOL
Palin will never happen or at least will ensure mccains loss.
Repubs can be so delusional some times
Posted by: Jimmyboyo | Aug 24, 2008 3:28:19 PM
I hope he keeps attacking McBush!
Palin? He's pretty good, one of those funny Monty Python guys -- but he's a British citizen! ;-)
Posted by: Kevinvt | Aug 24, 2008 3:31:33 PM
So where can I buy my t-shirt that says "When McCain left one of his 10 houses in a 9-car motorcade to get a capuccino at Starbucks yesterday, was he wearing his $520 shoes? And was his $273,000 a year butler with him?"
Posted by: Hephaestion | Aug 24, 2008 4:32:38 PM
After my mom saw the announcement on CNN, her first reaction was: "Obama/Biden"? Doesn't that appears a whole lot like... Osama Bin Laden (if you look at it too quickly)?
Posted by: Dan | Aug 24, 2008 4:56:25 PM
"So where can I buy my t-shirt that says "When McCain left one of his 10 houses in a 9-car motorcade to get a capuccino at Starbucks yesterday, was he wearing his $520 shoes? And was his $273,000 a year butler with him?""
Did you see him pull out the, "But I was a POW!" this morning in response to such a question? He's becoming a parody of himself.
Posted by: MAJeff | Aug 24, 2008 4:59:22 PM
Majeff
yeah, because he didn't have a kitchen table for 5 yrs it is ok that he has 7-12 kitchen tables now. Though many P.O.W.s who did NOT make anti-america vids for the enemy (unlike mccain) are lucky to have 1 kitchen table now
sad and pathetic
noun...verb....POW
DAN
Do you mean the bin laden brother to the bin laden bush jr had as a business partner? The bin laden whose family sits on the board of the carlyle group along with Bush SR??? Carlyle group as in weapons manufacturers who have benefited from the Iraq war. profits on both sides
Posted by: Jimmyboyo | Aug 24, 2008 6:09:20 PM
PS
Osama Bin laden who during the yrs Bush SR was VP was trained by the CIA on how to fight armies and countries (USSR)
The CIA who was headed by Bush SR at one time.
The bushs have actual and multiple connections to Bin laden (less than 6 degrees)
Posted by: Jimmyboyo | Aug 24, 2008 6:14:16 PM
As the media and the GOP begin their inevitable scrutiny of Joe Biden, the newly-named running-mate of Barack Obama, he’ll undoubtedly find himself answering questions about his past. Among those questions could be one that falls squarely within LB jurisdiction: Biden’s connection to famed plaintiffs lawyer Dickie Scruggs and others in Mississippi’s legal community.
Last month, as we did clean-up on the Scruggs story, a couple things happened: Dickie, who pleaded guilty in March to conspiring to bribe a state-court judge, discovered he would serve out his five-year sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution in Ashland, Kentucky. Meanwhile, Judge Neal Biggers surprised Dickie’s son, Zach, who pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of misprision — knowing, concealing and failing to tell — by hitting him with a 14-month sentence.
Meanwhile, Joe Biden spent part of July paying down his campaign debt, which entailed giving back campaign donations from both Dickie and Zach.
First, some background: When the Scruggs news broke in December, the LB reported that Steve Patterson (pictured, left) and Tim Balducci (pictured, right), who were both charged alongside Scruggs (pictured, below), had grand ambitions to turn their firm, Patterson Balducci in New Albany, Miss., into a Democratic lobbying shop and law firm. Patterson (not a lawyer) and Balducci (a lawyer) had opened an office in D.C. and lured a number of influential Mississippi Democrats to affiliate with their firm.
Balducci and Patterson, as we’ve noted, once had high hopes for Biden. According to people familiar with their thinking, their bet on Biden (Syracuse law) was that he wouldn’t win the presidency but would become Secretary of State under a Hillary Clinton administration. In August, Balducci, Patterson, Scruggs and others hosted an Oxford. Miss., fundraising event for Biden. By December, employees of Patterson Balducci had contributed about $26,000 to the Biden campaign, according to fundraising records. According to the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal, Patterson, Balducci, Dickie and Zach had contributed $2,300 each to Biden’s campaign.
Last week, the L.A. Times Top of the Ticket blog reported that in July Biden slashed his campaign debt to $173,999 from $1.15 million the previous month, according to Federal Election Commission records. (Biden spent $13.8 million on his candidacy and dropped out of the race after a poor showing in Iowa.) His July expenses included giving refunds of $2,300 to both Dickie and Zach.
UPDATE: In an August 25 WSJ story entitled “Scrutiny of Biden Focuses on Lobbyist Ties, Family,” a Biden spokesman tells the WSJ that all contributions from anyone implicated in the Mississippi bribery case were donated to a charity.
Posted by: HOGB a/k/a THATSRICH a/k/a ANOTHERDEMOCRATICIDIOT | Aug 25, 2008 8:34:52 AM
WASHINGTON -- Sen. Joe Biden brings more than three decades of service and statesmanship to the Democratic ticket. He also brings some baggage gathered along the way.
Sen. Barack Obama's choice of Sen. Biden as his running mate, cheered by Democrats because of Sen. Biden's foreign-policy expertise, is coming under fire from Republicans who are painting him as an old-style insider. They cite his longstanding ties to trial lawyers and lobbyists and a taste for pork-barrel spending, which their likely presidential nominee, Sen. John McCain, has opposed.
Sen. Biden, who proudly cites his working-class roots in Scranton, Pa., is one of the least-wealthy members of the Senate, meaning he has fewer potential conflicts of interest on that front than other candidates might have had. But he has collected $6.5 million in campaign contributions from lobbyists, lawyers and law firms since 1989, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.
Trial lawyers in Mississippi, including plaintiffs attorney Dickie Scruggs, who pleaded guilty in May to attempting to bribe a judge, raised $70,000 for Sen. Biden last year, records show. A Biden spokesman said that all contributions from anyone implicated in the bribery case were donated to a charity.
Sen. Biden has received $214,000 from employees and executives of credit-card giant MBNA, now a unit of Bank of America Corp., the Center for Responsive Politics said. He has been a strong supporter of the Delaware bank, backing a tough bankruptcy bill in 2005 that was one of MBNA's top legislative priorities. Sen. Obama opposed the bill and criticized Sen. McCain's support for it in the campaign.
Sen. Biden's candidacy also is bringing new scrutiny to his family's business dealings, especially those of his son Hunter, 38 years old, and brother James, 59.
Hunter Biden -- hired out of law school as a consultant by MBNA -- has more recently worked as a lobbyist for two Washington firms that represent biotech firms, hospitals and colleges, including a Delaware university that got earmarks backed by Sen. Biden. Hunter Biden's firm earned $143,000 from his father's presidential campaign for "legal services," according to federal election filings.
Hunter and James Biden are involved in a New York court battle over their $8 million purchase of a hedge-fund company in 2006, a messy fight in which both sides say they were defrauded. Anthony Lotito Jr., once a partner in the purchase, says the two Bidens owed him money, according to court records. Hunter Biden and James Biden have countersued, and are appealing the judge's recent dismissal of their claims.
Mr. Lotito has said in court papers that James Biden was seeking to find work for Hunter Biden because of concern over how the son's lobbying might affect his father's presidential campaign -- an assertion that the Bidens' lawyer Nicholas Gravante Jr. denied Sunday. James Biden has tax liens and civil judgments of his own, records show.
Sen. Biden's campaign says Hunter Biden didn't lobby his father. But Hunter's firm, Oldaker, Biden & Belair, led by William Oldaker, a former Biden campaign treasurer, and another firm that Hunter has worked for, the National Group, have sought congressional appropriations for a wide variety of clients, including colleges and universities in Delaware and Pennsylvania.
Calls to Oldaker, Biden & Belair and to the National Group weren't returned.
The Obama-Biden campaign spokesman, David Wade, said that Hunter Biden "has never lobbied Sen. Biden's office or committees, period."
Republicans are taking aim, too, at Mr. Biden's record on taxpayer funding for pet projects. Mr. Biden backed $85 million in congressional earmarks to pay for 71 projects in 2008, according to the nonpartisan Taxpayers for Common Sense.
Posted by: HOGB a/k/a THATSRICH a/k/a ANOTHERDEMOCRATICIDIOT | Aug 25, 2008 8:41:20 AM
HOGB A/KA/....whatever,
Well, we've got 3 months to make some sense out your last two comments.
BIDEN guarantees Pennsylvania. They may come out of the Philadelphia area with maybe 80% of the vote. The conservative parts of PA can't overcome such a margin. Barak can spend that money in Michigan (which worries me).
Posted by: Derrick from Philly | Aug 25, 2008 9:41:24 AM
Derrick, Biden guarantees three electoral votes from Delaware. Pennsylvania just like Delaware was already a blue state and Biden brings NOTHING to the table for Obama beyond traditional blue states! Obama did the very best thing he could have done to ensure McCain's election. Obama is so arrogant that he could not choose Hillary.
Trust me, every repub in the country was holding their breath hoping that he would not choose her, and he did not. I will be the first to admit that had he chosen Hillary McCain would not have won. However, his message of "hope and change" including a Washington entrenched old dem that brings nothing new to the table dies on the vine!
Thanks Obama, your arrogance just cost you the race. And I will be the first to admit that I was wrong if he wins, but I cannot see how. Jimmyboyo, you are stretching your faith if you honestly believe that he can win with Biden. You know that if he had chosen Clinton, your first choice, he would have won the white house. You have to admit that it is now an uphill battle. Biden is not received well in middle America or he would have won the primary. Or even any where close to the top 8! Boring choice that adds nothing to the ticket...
Posted by: RB | Aug 25, 2008 10:46:05 AM
Sorry, RB. Derrick (who lives in Philly) is absolutely correct. Biden's selection almost certainly pushes PA from leaning blue to solid blue. And it will mean Obama can spend money elsewhere.
Posted by: 24play | Aug 25, 2008 10:54:10 AM
Why on earth would Democrats care about "advice" from Republicans? it's not as though they have our--or anyone other than their own--interests at heart.
Posted by: MAJeff | Aug 25, 2008 11:13:47 AM
I am terribly disappointed by the choice of Biden. For me, his name will always be stained by that silly plagiarism incident twenty years ago, and I know many Republicans will think the same thing. Obama could have chosen someone who would lure more moderate conservatives.
Biden is also the ultimate Washington insider. Half the point of supporting Obama is that he's not too entrenched in special interests and lobbyists the way old-time DC insiders are. Biden just seems like a politics-as-usual choice to me.
Posted by: Bakeley | Aug 25, 2008 12:20:37 PM
"Thanks Obama, your arrogance just cost you the race."
Oh, please. I know you're quivering at the prospect of a White House filled with people who believe your family means nothing and that you are unsuited for parenthood, but spare us the Republican talking points hyperbole. Obama's choice of Biden is neither going to win nor cost the election for Obama. (Same with McCain's choice, when it comes. Is Cheney still available? I'm sure he won the election for Bush Jr.!) It's but one variable, and It's a long way till Nov. I would have welcomed Hillary as a choice, but her talents will be better used elsewhere. She (and, inevitably, Bill) wasn't meant to play second fiddle, Biden is. He isn't an exciting choice, but he's a very useful one. He'll be an excellent attack dog during the campaign and an excellent VP after the election. Change and experience can actually go hand in hand, shocking.
Posted by: Ernie | Aug 25, 2008 12:31:14 PM
Derrick
I would think that Biden's super pro union background and working class background helps in michigan. Add to that mcshame's 7-12 houses and Michigan might not be anything to worry about.
A big issue with biden would be his also being a Northerner. Though Obama's background = Hawaii before chicago isn't a typical northerner, he is equated with being a Northerner. 2 Northerners might cause trouble in the stubborn south.
I admit i was pissy about the choice of Biden, but I find myself circling the wagons the more repubs say stuff and try to stir up stuff.
Posted by: jimmyboyo | Aug 25, 2008 1:30:56 PM
Yawn.
Posted by: Bill Perdue, RainbowRED | Aug 25, 2008 5:33:35 PM
Gallup poll tied at 45%. No Biden bump. No bump from the convention, yet. All the money that Obama has spent, and no bump. The media golden child and no bump. Don't count you chickens until they have hatched.
Posted by: RB | Aug 25, 2008 9:47:44 PM
The convention has just begun, so it's unlikely there would be a bump yet. And of course bumps are just that, ultimately irrelevant. It's also incorrect at this point to call Obama the "media golden child" (I agree coverage favored him during the primary season) since his coverage has been harsher than McCain's thus far in the general election, as was reported in the LA Times and elsewhere over the weekend. (That old POW refrain keeps on getting McCain breaks.) But that's all horse race stuff: I support the Obama/Biden ticket on their policies. And one can be certain the Democratic convention--bump or no--will be a far friendlier place for gay people than the Republican one.
Posted by: Ernie | Aug 25, 2008 10:14:04 PM
Ernie, I PROMISE YOU THAT I WOULD TURN DEM IN A MINUTE IF I THOUGHT THEY WERE "BETTER" FOR ME! Lip service is all we get. NONE of the nominees believe in gay marriage! NONE of them. Bottom line....NONE of them. If I KNOW that Obama will not give me rights then I cannot accept our differences.
I have taken so much heat here for being a gay repub, but I promise you that I am open minded on many subjects. That is something that many here cannot say! However, I refuse to believe that my future is better off with Obama. HE DOES NOT BELIEVE IN GAY MARRIAGE PERIOD. Neither does McCain. I refuse to be a stereotype, I refuse to believe in his "hope" and I refuse to support his lack of details in his message. He is not ready. He is not experienced. He does NOT support gay marriage. He does not represent me, my gay family nor our three kids. He does not believe we are a family any more than McCain. I get that! Many here do not.
Posted by: RB | Aug 25, 2008 10:26:40 PM