Honestly, you cannot make this stuff up? Obama, the ping pong man promoter? Surely this is not how Don King got started on his career.  In a nutshell, Obama used his influence in the Illinois Senate to get a grant for a guy who paid Barack $112,000.  The cause in question?  PING PONG.  This piece in the Chicago Tribune offers the tasty details:

While the competition has been keen at the New York Times to secure the mantle as the most virulent Hillary hater, Frank Rich is in a class by himself. No other columnist now writing for the "Gray Lady" is more intellectually dishonest and lacking in basic integrity than Frank Rich, the bloviating former theater critic turned professional Hillary basher. Maureen Dowd? Alternating between catty and crazy, Dowd's nose is out of joint apparently because Hillary looks better in boots. How about Bob Herbert? You can't fault an African American who wants to give a brother a break and devotes his time to peddling moralizing conventional wisdom and cheer leading like there's no tomorrow for Obama. And William Kristol and David Brooks? They are just neocon party-liners. (Only one among the NY Times line up ever writes anything complimentary about Hillary-Paul Krugman, who has a day job at Princeton as an economist, actually knows something, and let's the chips fall where they may.)

The American people are getting a chance to see how unprepared Barack Obama's team of  advisors are to help lead this country through the minefield of foreign policy problems that await the next President.   Thank God Barack's advisors are not allowed to carry firearms.  They have spent the past week metaphorically shooting themselves in the feet and other delicate areas.  Just imagine the damage they would do with real bullets.

We started with the Austan Goolsbee flap.  You know, Barack's senior economics advisor who told the Canadians essentially that Senator Obama's public comments about NAFTA did not reflect his true feelings.  Poor Austan did not understand that foreign governments take notes and file reports with their counterparts back home.

I suppose it is too much to ask the new Messiah to get his facts right, especially on defense issues.  But then again, Barack is soooo special.  Check out Barack's comments posted last October.  He proposes three things that, on the surface, seem eminently reasonable--stop spending $9 billion a month in Iraq, cut the missile defense system, and set a goal of a world without nuclear weapons, which includes taking "ICBM's off hair trigger alert."  Watch it for yourself.

/p>

Most of this is your normal political boilerplate.  Devoid of specifics and unlikely to be implemented.  For example, if Obama wants to go into a general election and argue that a missile defense system should be cut, good luck.  That plays right into the hands of the Republican message machine that will portrary Democrats as cowards unwilling to protect America.

What is really troubling, at least to me, is the amateur advice Obama is relying on.  He asserts that U.S. ICBM's are on "hair trigger" alert.  Sorry Barack, not true.  But don't take my word:

DCMedia Girl told me the other day that this year the media is doing the worst job ever of providing honest, genuine investigative reporting. Damn is she right. Two examples. First, tonight's breaking news about John McCain and his alleged political sexual relationship with lobbyist Vicky Iseman. I learned of this story in December 2007. I know one of the sources for the story. And I know that both the New York Times and USA Today were sitting on the story. Do you think Republicans would have wanted to know this information in December before the primaries started? I think so. But the New York Times decided, hell, let's wait till McCain has it sewn up. Second, Obama's ties to a one time communist (Frank Marshall Davis see also) and self-confessed terrorist (William Ayers) (at least this is how the Republicans will be certain to play this info). This information has started to trickle out, finally, but no thanks to the news media. In fact, I was contacted Monday afternoon by the Washington Post's Michael Dobbs. He wrote:

At least Hillary and Barack appear to understand the damage that has been inflicted on our Army and Marines because of our continued presence in Iraq.  According to CNN:

The Iraq war has strained U.S. forces to the point where they could not fight another large-scale war, according to a survey of military officers.     

Of those surveyed, 88 percent believe the demands of the Iraq war have "stretched the U.S. military dangerously thin."

On the other hand, 56 percent of the officers disagree that the war has "broken" the military.

Eighty percent of officers believe it is unreasonable to expect the U.S. military to wage another major war successfully at present.

Foreign Policy magazine and the Center for a New American Security on Tuesday issued the U.S. Military Index, a survey of 3,400 present and former U.S. military officers.

"We asked the officers whether they thought the U.S. military was stronger or weaker than it was five years ago," said Michael Boyer, who helped write the report.

"Sixty percent said the U.S. military is weaker than it was five years ago," Boyer told reporters.

Obama's mantra, "Yes, We Can" is inspiring and heartwarming, but in the end is an empty phrase that will founder once the Republican political attack machine spins up. I realize that most Obamatons are so wedded to his vision of hope that any effort to point out the cracks in the foundation of the new Democratic Savior are met with fury and disdain.

If you think for a minute that the Republican party--who used Willie Horton on Michael Dukakis  to devastating effect, who portrayed triple amputee and veteran Max Cleland as a bosom buddy of Osama Bin Laden, and convinced many voters that decorated combat veteran John Kerry was a fraud--will give Obama a pass come the fall then you are in serious denial.

Update [2008-2-15 12:30:34 by Larr Johnson]: We used TinyUrl to make all of the links available to you because MyDD's software doesn't allow the ID tag within URLs.

As Democrats and Independents weigh who they want to run against John McCain in the fall, answer this question.  Can you support a candidate who is friends with terrorists?  Can you support a candidate who takes money from terrorists?  Well, if Obama is your man you have some problems.  Today's Bloomberg News drops this bombshell:

Besides Rezko and Giannoulias, Obama could face questions about his  relationship with William Ayers, a former member of the radical group the  Weather Underground who is now a professor of education at the University of  Illinois in Chicago. Ayers donated $200 in 2001 to Obama's Illinois state Senate  campaign and served with him from 1999 to 2002 on the board of the Woods Fund,  an anti-poverty group.

A Series of Bombings

The Weather Underground carried out a series of bombings in the early 1970s  -- including the U.S. Capitol and the Pentagon. While Ayers was never prosecuted  for those attacks, he told the New York Times in an interview published Sept.  11, 2001, that ``I don't regret setting bombs.''

Bill Burton, Obama's spokesman, said Ayers ``does not have a role on the  campaign.'' Ayers said he had no comment on his relationship with Obama.

Does not have a role on the campaign?   Well thank God for that.  Are you kidding me?