We all know that Barack Obama was a "community organizer" in Chicago before he was elected to the Illinois State legislature. How exactly did Obama manage to get elected to office in the first place. In his second book Obama credits the message he brought but how important is your message when you don't have an opponent?
In Illinois candidate collect voters signatures on petitions to qualify to appear on the ballot. Obama's main opponent in the 1996 election was Alice Palmer, the incumbent and a state senator since 1991. Ms Palmer had collected 1,580 signatures, more than twice the 757 needed to qualify to be on the ballot. However Ms Palmer in the end was not on the ballot. A paid consultant for Obama went over the list of signatures with a fine-tooth comb and managed to disqualify enough of those signatures to get Ms Palmer disqualified. Just a little bit of hard-ball politics Chicago style. Some of the signatures were truly not valid but many were eliminated on technicalities, some as small a thing as printing ones name instead of writing it.
Obama's consultant, Ronald Davis was so good at this that they went ahead and got the other three candidates disqualified as well. So, whatever Obama's message to the people of the 13th district was and however well he delivered that message or how well it was received there is something we will never know. When those voters entered the booths to cast their ballots would they have elected Barack Obama if they had had more than one candidate to choose from.
Obama was asked years later about the apparent unfairness of these tactics and this was his response. "If you can win you should win and get to work doing the people's business." By all means Senator, these are important decisions, why would you let the people whose business you plan to do have any say in the selection of their representative?
1 comment:
I believe that playing by the rules is necessary. You know the rules - make sure your petition signers (and your own helpers) know what's necessary. I don't think he did anything wrong in THAT particular instance.
I believe it applies to Mr. Obama now, as well.
He's been presented with evidence and arguments that he is not a natural-born citizen. He refuses to respond to those arguments in any legitimate way.
Even some conservatives have said, "The election's over. Deal with it." It's not over (not till Dec. 15, when the electoral college votes), and even if it was, this is a pretty big deal to "deal with." If the President of the United States, who takes an oath or affirmation to defend and uphold the Constitution, knows that his very Presidency is illegal according to the Constitution, where does that put us? And how could we take his word seriously if his initial oath of office is a lie?
I wish he would present proof of his natural-born citizenship status and get it over with already.
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