George Hussein Obama, centre, in Huruma shanty town, Nairobi, Kenya, where he lives unaided by his somewhat wealthier brother Barack.Questions like: was he actually born in Hawaii or was he born in Kenya, which would invalidate him from even running?
Questions like: what did he actually do during his years as a community activist and why have his employment records suddenly been made classified the minute journalists started asking to look at them?
But the most serious question about Barack Obama is the one about his character.
What sort of a man can run for high office, the highest on Earth, promising his vision of care for all, expressing his concern that no one be left behind and that the weakest be protected, while all the time he has abandoned his own brother to a diseased shanty town and Third World squalor?
Barack Hussein Obama is that man.
And George Hussein Obama is his brother, seen above being propped up by a journalist and friend due to either illness or drug use.
He lives in Huruma shanty town in Nairobi, next door to a low-rent brothel in an area where AIDS is endemic. He doesn't work, smokes dope all day, and lives with his aunt on a pittance he raises by begging. He also appears to be in poor health.
Barack has never given George any help. He's never even given George a penny to help himself. But he's written multi-million selling books boasting about his pride in family, in his heritage. Somehow, he's never seen fit to share the tiniest bit of that wealth with his own brother, who is forced to beg for a living in a Third World slum instead.
Despite that, poor George still supports Barack and has the whole neighbourhood backing him in the forthcoming presidential race.
I'm not American and I don't have a vote. Even if I did, I'd be a natural Democrat in US terms. But I cannot endorse such a man as Barack Obama.
I'm getting saddened at how so many otherwise intelligent people have fallen for the rhetoric here. Everyone seems to be sleepwalking into believing they've found the black JFK rather than actually questioning the candidate, and properly examining who they're seeking to elect.
John McCain has a thousand pages of medical records, was tortured in Nam and is running for this post four or eight years too late. John McCain, if elected, might die in office and leave Sarah Palin in charge, which is scary for many people.
John McCain has a lot of money, cars and houses. People pick on him for that. But Obama has a lot of wealth too. The difference, for me, is that John McCain hasn't left anyone in his family behind in a squalid gutter.
That's probably because John McCain was the person left behind in the squalor for years when he was a POW in Asia.
John McCain is demonstrably a man of integrity. A man who can't remember how many homes he has, perhaps. Let's say he's an old, occasionally forgetful man of integrity.
But any multi-millionaire man of power and influence who would leave his brother to fester in such a hellhole without even offering to help is no man of integrity.
And when that man then starts spouting about how he wants to care for everyone in his nation, I start thinking about his abandoned brother and wonder whether what I'm hearing is hypocrisy, psychosis or simply cynical lying to get elected at all costs.
Barack Obama is a man without character who left his poor brother to rot in a festering, Aids-ridden, malarial Third World shanty town, despite being himself a millionaire who boasts of his desire to help everyone he can.
Bear that in mind. Don't say I didn't warn you when he turns out not to be the black JFK after all.
P.S. Some Americans wish to help poor George even if his big brother the millionaire senator does not. Here's the link for Help George Obama, if you're interested in being a better human being than Barack Obama.
26 comments:
I agree that effectively abandoning a family member when you have more than adequate resources to help them out is reprehensible. I also believe in making any and all information available on a political candidate, and appreciate that's what you're doing here.
However, I can't support you calling Obama a cunt. He may not be the ideal candidate, if such a thing exists, but I still believe he's a far better alternative than McCain.
I'm also going to wade in and question the idea of critiquing a candidate's character. In a very different example, wasn't it Clinton's 'character' that came under fire when he was caught with Lewinsky? You could argue that playing around with you intern is far less of a crime than ignoring family members; yet Clinton's activities with Lewinsky effectively constituted a recurring abuse of power, deeply problematic in a national leader.
Ultimately, I think you have to assess a politician on his or her political practice and experience. Obama may indeed be cold-hearted, and if he is ignoring impoverished family members that is unforgivable, but on a personal level rather than a political one.
is this actually true?
Yes, Tina. It's totally true.
AL: If we assess Obama on the basis of his political practice then we see an extremely skewed and occasionally contradictory voting record.
The latter affects all politicians - it's known as realpolitik.
But while the hyper-liberalism of the former may appeal to European sensibilities, it flies less well in the US.
If we assess Obama on the basis of his experience, we find he has almost none, certainly less than Palin who also has almost none.
All we've got is his 'community activist' experience, and that's all been suddenly hidden by the organisation that employed him.
If we can't scrutinise it, then we can't assess it.
I take the French attitude on political sex scandals - if it doesn't interfere with government and they aren't being hypocrites, I don't care.
Clinton was witchhunted by that lunatic Starr and the Republican religious right.
Clinton also has a deadbeat brother, but he never denied him, never disowned him, never abandoned him and often did his best to help him, despite him being an embarrassment to Clinton's political career.
Bill Clinton had character in spades, and yes, was dodgy around chubby young women.
Obama is, as Fred Reed put it, a cypher in a suit with a good line in patter.
We don't know what his experience (if any) is. We don't know if he can follow through on the rhetoric.
But the omens are very bad, given his attitude towards his own flesh and blood.
JC - where did you get this original info from, are you sure its his actual brother?
It's his half-brother. Same father. Barack's known of his existence all his life.
Here's CNN on George Obama:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/08/22/bts.obama.brother/
And if anyone is interested in doing what Senator Obama has not, ie help George, I'm going to add a link onto the main article now.
Sorry JC, I had to stop reading this about halfway through. Have you ever had a friend or family member with a serious drug addiction? The one thing you want most, but absolutely cannot under any circumstances do, is to give them money.
Also, if that guy really is his brother why would he come forward and attempt to skuttle his own brothers dreams(Barack)? The fact that this guy has stumbled out of the woodwork alone may well be an indication of why Barrack hasn't helped him. Put simple-you don't find people in slums unless they really want to be found
Only a month late with this one, JC.
Did you even read the CNN article you linked?
'But reports surfaced in the past few days, springing from an Italian Vanity Fair article saying George Obama is living in a shack and "earning less than a dollar a day."
The reports left him angry.
"I was brought up well. I live well even now," he said. "The magazines, they have exaggerated everything.
"I think I kind of like it here. There are some challenges, but maybe it is just like where you come from, there are the same challenges," Obama said.'
More here:
http://mediamatters.org/items/200808260023
Sure I read it. He says he gets more than a dollar a day.
Did YOU read the link I provided, however? In it, it's made evident he lives by begging and is stoned much of the time.
Now, I'd have thought that a month after Italian Vanity Fair first highlighted the case of poor George, Barack might have done SOMETHING for him, if only to avoid the negative publicity of not doing so.
Yet when the Kenyan health hack went to visit him, he was worse than ever, and still has received no help from big brother, Mr Change.
Where's the change George can believe in? Even pocket change?
Rua, he's stoned all the time. He's not jacking up smack. It's not a serious drug addiction, it's a daily marijuana thing as is common in African slums among the unemployed.
Now, George is very easy to find. Journalists have been finding him regularly, and he lives off begging a few quid off them.
But he hasn't come out seeking to do his brother's campaign any damage, despite the indifference Barack has shown him.
In fact, if you look closely, he's wearing a Vote Obama hat in that pic, and apparently he has the entire district supporting Obama with pics of Mr Change on their cars and a mural painted.
And in the links I provided, he tells hacks of how proud he is of his brother.
Bless his tragic innocence, he's proud of Barack and wants him to win.
As deplorable a thing as this is, between Obama and McCain, I'd rather see Obama in office. McCain isn't simply a doddery old man of integrity. Right now he's an opportunist. Calling off his campaign when the financial turmoil in the US, only to turn around and basically ignore his previous decision when it became clear that not only was he not helping the situation but hindering the ridiculous process. Add to that he has Sarah Palin, a person he had only met for 15 minutes before endorsing her as his VP. It shows a shocking lack of judgment and foresight. It was only a blatant attempt to take advantage of the attention garnered by the US' first female presidential nominee. This woman should not be VP. She's far too close to being the President and that is bad news for us all. Even those of us outside the US. No, of the two really bad nominees, I'd go for Obama. Sure, he's shady. But then, it's really just like Bill Hicks said. Puppet on the left or puppet on the right. It makes no odds who you vote for.
Unless it was Ron Paul. Ah well...
A lot of sense spoken there, Peter.
I don't have a vote, but given the choice, I'd probably vote Nader in this one.
The Dems ought to have been home and dry by now, but they are very close to snatching defeat by running with the wrong candidate.
I don't like Obama - he has no experience, his background is shrouded in mystery that he refuses to clarify, his oration is cue-carded, his judgement is questionable (Georgia, Biden, his preacher) and he appears hypocritical in relation to his avowed position on poverty and his personal treatment of his own brother.
Is this still preferable to Palin being a heartbeat away from the throne? Probably.
But it's far from ideal.
You are really scraping the barrel JC Skinnner.
Blaming a politican for not being a nepotist. Amusing, considering that say someone like Sarah Palin has filled her cabinet positions with Wasilla high school classmates in Alaska.
Your stale and baseless report on Obama(re:mediamatters.com) is almost as bad as your absurdly rash predictions on richard delevans webboards saying Mccain has won the election just because Palin was put forward. Do you know what you are talking about?
http://www.richarddelevan.com/2008/08/29/what-he-said-that/#comment-6931
Hi Billy Ray.
There's a very big distinction between basic human charity (especially when you spend your time boasting about your propensity for it) and nepotism.
Now, you can keep crying foul if you like (though there was little fouler than the appalling smears on the Palin family that emanated from the Daily Kos), but there's nothing baseless about George Obama.
He exists, his life is as I've described and he has had absolutely NO assistance of any form from his multi-millionaire brother.
Did Obama's HALF-brother ask or expect assistance? Obama has had almost no relationship with his father thoughout his life since he was abandoned by him, so why do you and Rush Limbaugh expect Obama to have assisted his father's subsequent offspring? How absurd.
According to the interview with him, half-brother George is furious that his words were used out of context by Vanity Fair Italia and right-wing elements in order to undermine Obama's campaign. He also said he was a proud Kenyan studying to become a mechanic. The full transcripts of these interviews are available on mediamatters.
As for Sarah Palin - the born smearer. The Daily Kos is not a standard of journalism. However, the NY Times published a rather detailed account of her nepotism in an full-length investigate report two weeks ago. You can also read TIME magazine's inditement this week over her so-called energy success "fighting big oil interests" in Alaska.
Your uninformed accustations and outlandish predictions are in the gutter - much like the general tone of modern American political discourse.
See, Billy Ray, it's obviously important for the Dems to keep shrilly claiming to be above smear, even as they indulge in it.
That's why we're treated to the obvious hypocrisy of you personally insulting me even as you claim innocence.
I'll leave it on site on this occasion as demonstration of the hypocrisy of your own position.
You've no comment on the Dems spinning lies about Palin's downs syndrome kid? Doesn't surprise me, since that's been the most evil lie of this whole election so far.
Now, if you'd read the links I provided, you'd know that George only denied living on a dollar a month. He didn't deny living in abject poverty, in a shack in a slum, next to a brothel, unemployed and on drugs.
And while he hasn't asked Obama for help, his family have on his behalf a number of times, to no avail.
Those are the facts.
Maybe he just doesn't like the cunt and, like the rest of us in similar circumstances, is under no obligation to help him out if he doesn't want to.
Anyway, if George is so fed up with being poor he shouldn't have chosen to live in Kenya. And he should save his dollar a day and move to a country which can provide him with a better standard of living for doing fuck all.
Ireland, perhaps.
Hi 20. Good to see you haven't vanished entirely.
Barack described his brother (the one time they met) as a 'beautiful, round-headed boy.'
Perhaps he has a bizarre objection to round heads?
I'd have thought George could have done a bit better for himself than he has. But then again, maybe he likes living in a slum in Nairobi on drugs.
If you listen to the Obamaniacs, that's what they'd have you think.
you deleted my response?
really pathetic.
No I didn't, Billy Ray. It's three posts up, where you left it.
You don't read too good, do you?
I habitually delete personally offensive posts since it's my blog, and such posts add nothing to discussion.
But as I already made clear, I left yours in to highlight the hypocrisy of the Democratic smear machine.
Are you being sarcastic? Democratic smear machine? What Democrat authorised smears against Palin regarding her pregnancy? What Democratic media outlets covered it as fact, and what Dem. officials made those claims? Find one shred of evidence to back up your claims.
On the other hand, this George Obama HALF-brother story is a total smear. Right-wing pundits, media and even the Texan Republican Party have recycled false claims about George Obama and his relationship to Obama. Even CNN showed the interview where he says he is happy with life and proud to be a Kenyan.
Obama's grandmother lives in a bamboo hut with chickens running around out in the yard. So what? What paternalistic response do you recommend Obama should take? Save the Africans from themselves!!!
Even the punditocrats backed off carrying these destortions more than a month ago, but you continue to parrot them off as fact. What is your agenda?
You talk some serious bollocks.
The Daily Kos is an Obama attack dog. Everything they print comes from Obama's campaign, and I've had that FROM people in Obama's campaign.
The Palin child smears all emanated not from Alaska but from the Dem smear machine and the Kossacks.
George Obama, unlike Palin's imaginary child swap with her own daughter, is entirely real.
The facts about him are not disputed, not by him, not by Obama and not by his campaign, because they can't.
That is not the point and you know it. You are not discussing facts - just spinning opinions as fact.
You keep repeating that George is Obama's brother when he is actually his half-brother. By the time George was born, BHO was in his mid-20s - this a couple of decades after being abandoned by his father. Yet, you and others spin it like Obama somehow owes George some endowement - and you call into question the man's intergrity and morals and even call him a cunt.
Even when faced with the reality of George himself admiting he is healthy, and happy in Kenya and has access to education, you make the rather paterialistic response that this poor foolish African doesn't know he is saying, thinking or feeling. How could it be possible he could think like this? Bless him. Clearly, he doesn't know what he speaks! If only he knew what you knew. Typical Irish chauvinism.
BTW what insights did you garner from your contacts within the Obama campaign? Did it tell you it was sure the election was over just because a woman was named on the McCain ticket?
A half-brother is a brother. The clue is the second half of the phrase - the bit with 'brother' in it.
They share a father.
Now, you like facts? Undisputed facts? Here they are, once again, for the slow learners, Billy Ray:
George Obama lives in poverty - FACT
George Obama lives in squalor in a shanty town shack - FACT
George Obama has no work - FACT
George Obama is not in education - FACT
George Obama is taking drugs and appears in poor health - FACT
George Obama supports his millionaire brother in America - FACT
George Obama is too proud to ask his brother for help but his immediate family have done so on his behalf repeatedly - FACT
You can't spin that, Billy Ray. You can try to pretend it isn't happening, but it is. That's the reality of 'The one'.
As for insights from the Obama campaign, I'll throw you this bone - they're still shitting themselves that the American people are lying to the pollsters and that they'll not vote for a black man. Ugly if true, but might well turn out to be the case.
Well no. It's definitely spin to say George Obama hasn't asked his brother for help because he's "too proud". It may well be that he doesn't want or need help. He seems happy enough.
Besides, why should his brother care? It's not like they owe each other anything by merit of sharing a few genes.
If a long-lost little half-brother of mine showed up on my door cap in hand, I'd probably listen politely but I wouldn't feel obliged to give him anything. Similarly, if I discovered my dad had a secret love-child years before I was a twinkle in his eye, who then grew up to be a powerful billionaire, I don't think I'd have the cheek to ask him for anything. I don't know if even be bothered about meeting him.
It was the aunt who George lives with who said George was to proud to ask Barack for help. She has asked repeatedly on George's behalf, because she knows his living conditions better than anyone.
Is she spinning too?
I see we're back to the argument about what does Barack owe his brother, if anything.
The answer is nothing, as you correctly point out.
However, in that case, he has no business preaching to the world about his compassion for the poor, the destitute, the sick, the downtrodden and the underclass, because he clearly is a hypocrite to do so, given that he doesn't give a fuck about his own brother who falls into all of those categories.
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