What Powell wants in a 2012 presidential candidate
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell, a Republican, endorsed Democrat Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential race.
But the former top U.S. military officer, who once considered a presidential run of his own, tells NPR’s “Morning Edition” he’s undecided about which candidate to vote for in the 2012 election.
“I’m always undecided in every election,” he said in excerpts of an interview taped for Friday. “I always measure each candidate against what I think the country needs at that time and I will vote for the person I think who is most qualified to serve the nation at that time.”
Powell said he could support a Republican in the 2012 campaign — if someone emerges who is like the Republicans he voted for in the past.
“I’ve voted for Republicans who were strong on defense, who believed in a free and open economy, but who also understood that there’s a place for government in our lives, that government has a responsibility to those of our citizens who are in need and those of our citizens who are needy of health care,” Powell said.
“I’ll be looking for those candidates that make the most sense with respect to resolving these issues as opposed to some of the more far-out positions that I sometimes hear expressed by some of them,” Powell added
The 2012 field of Republican White House hopefuls is dominated by conservatives — both fiscal and social.
Ghosts of Christmas past haunt State Department
Ghosts of Christmas past are hovering in the halls of Foggy Bottom this week.
Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was among those who materialized at the State Department on Monday for the unveiling of the official portrait of former Secretary of State Colin Powell, a swank affair that also drew former German and Russian foreign ministers, former network anchors and a former White House chief of staff (not to mention a former First Lady in the person of current Secretary of State Hillary Clinton).
On Tuesday, it was time for former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, now reincarnated as the special envoy of the “Quartet on the Middle East” – the United Nations, the European Union, the United States and Russia.
“It’s a pleasure to be back here in the State Department, I’d like to thank Secretary Clinton for welcoming me,” Blair told reporters before starting discussions with Clinton.
Despite the season, neither Clinton nor Blair appeared inclined to discuss the Holy Land — or the European Union call on Tuesday for Jerusalem to be made the capital of both Israel and a future Palestinian state, something Israeli leaders reject.
“It’s a difficult moment right now — but then it always is,” Blair said — as succinct a summary of the Middle East situation as one could ask for, Christmas past present or future.
After their brief appearance, the current secretary and the former prime minister vanished behind closed doors and Tuesday’s State Department apparition was over.
Powell’s official portrait as secretary of state unveiled
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton unveiled the official portrait of former Secretary of State Colin Powell on Monday, noting there were few Americans as admired and celebrated.
“There’s an elementary school named after him in Virginia, there’s a couple more named after him in Texas,” Clinton told a crowd in the State Department’s Benjamin Franklin Room.
“A middle school in Illinois. A street in Gelnhausen, Germany, where Second Lieutenant Colin Powell reported for duty 50 years ago,” she said.
Powell, the son of Jamaican immigrants who served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the first Gulf War, said the large oil painting done for the State Department was not the first portrait of him to adorn a government building.
“I have an official portrait at the Pentagon in the Hall of Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,” he said, noting it was done during the Clinton administration when Vice President Al Gore was doing a reinventing government program.
“And so it is an 8-by-10 glossy that has been blown up,” he said to laughter. “So help me, it’s an 8-by-10 glossy that I do like, and it was blown up to full size, put in a frame, and hung on a wall.”
“Well, that’s how we balanced the budget,” Clinton responded.
Powell weighs in on Harvard case
Colin Powell says some “adult supervision” could have kept an altercation between Henry Louis Gates, a black Harvard University professor, and Sgt. James Crowley, a white policeman, from blowing up into a “federal case” about race in America.
The former U.S secretary of state, who says he has been racially profiled “many times,” weighed in on the arrest of his friend “Skip” Gates on Tuesday evening, telling CNN’s Larry King that it was a fascinating story that unfolded in several acts.
Gates was arrested at his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and charged with disorderly conduct. Crowley had responded to the call when a neighbor reported a possible break-in at Gates’ home. Gates had just returned home from a trip to China and found his door jammed. This is how the two men came face-to-face.
“This is where act two begins. We’re not quite sure what the nature of their conversation was, but apparently it disturbed Sgt. Crowley and apparently Dr. Gates was disturbed by being challenged in his own home,” Powell said.
“Then it becomes a federal case when the president feels obliged to say something about it, ” Powell said.
The charges against Gates were quickly dropped, but Powell says the incident might have been resolved in a different manner had cooler heads prevailed.
The blacks serving in congress were very fast to get together and side with Obama, I would think that some whites were not impressed, at this unnessary act, and will cast a no vote on Obama health care in revenge, It becomming clear that Obama has split the USA, much more then Bush.
Cheney wanted GM in bankruptcy sooner
With General Motors expected to file for bankruptcy next week, former Vice President Dick Cheney said on Wednesday that he wanted the company to take that step months ago when George W. Bush was still president.
“Some of us at the time wanted GM to go bankrupt, go to Chapter 11,” Cheney said in an interview with CNBC’s “The Kudlow Report”. But Cheney apparently was in the minority with that view at the time.
“The decision was made that, in the final analysis, since our administration was almost over and a brand-new team was about to take over that the president wanted, in effect, not to take a step that wasn’t necessarily going to be followed by his successor, but rather to set up a situation which the new guys could address that issue and make a decision about what the long-term policy was going to be,” he said.
Cheney, who has been in a very public fight with President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden over national security policies, took on the Obama administration’s economic policies in the interview with CNBC’s Larry Kudlow.
Asked whether he agreed with criticism that Obama was pursuing some kind of socialist agenda, Cheney said he would not use that label but did not like what he was seeing.
“I agree with the criticism without using the labels. I don’t want to get into trying to label President Obama. He’s our president. At this point, he’s the only one we’ve got. He won the election, and he obviously is entitled to pursue those policies that he wants to pursue,” Cheney said.
“What we’ve been seeing, though, and what’s been advocated by the president and what looks to be in store if he’s successful is that we’re seeing a vast expansion, not only the power of the federal government over the private sector but also in terms of spending,” he said.
Not so fast, Dick. Last night on Fox News, Cheney admitted that the Bush administration deliberately decided to pass the buck on GM and let President Obama deal with the problem. Cheney admitted that he thought the “right outcome was going to be bankruptcy,” but that President Bush didn’t want to “be the one who pulled the plug.” Instead, the Bush administration put together a costly auto bailout to stem the tide until President Obama took office:
CHENEY: Well, I thought that, eventually, the right outcome was going to be bankruptcy. … And the president decided that he did not want to be the one who pulled the plug just before he left office.
VAN SUSTEREN: Why?
CHENEY: Well, I think he felt, you know, these are big issues and he wouldn’t be there through the process of managing it, but in effect, would have sort of pulled the plug on GM and that was one of the first crises the new administration would have to deal with. So he put together a package that tided GM over until the new administration had a chance to look at it, decide what they wanted to do.
VAN SUSTEREN: But it’s cost us billions to get — I mean, you know —
CHENEY: It has. … And now the government owns a big chunk of General Motors. That bothers me. I don’t like having government own those kinds of major financial enterprises. I think it’s — it does damage to our long-term economic prospects when we get government involved in making those kinds of decisions.
When announcing his $17.4 billion auto bailout in December 2008, Bush said that “bankruptcy now would lead to a disorderly liquidation of American auto companies.” Cheney is now saying that they were thinking about bankruptcy all along, but instead used billions of dollars of taxpayer money to push their problems onto the Obama administration.
Even former Republican senator Rick Santorum last week went on Greta’s show and chastised the Bush administration, saying that officials “blew it” for punting the problems onto Obama.
Cheney just confirmed what many have suspected all along. They sat back and let the economy slide off a cliff, so they could spend the next eight years trying to pin it on the Obama administration.
Powell urges volunteering, says no role in Obama administration
Colin Powell wants you to help out more.
The former Secretary of State and Joint Chiefs chairman urged Americans on Friday to help out their country by volunteering, and pointed to a Web site set up by Barack Obama’s inaugural committee where they can find opportunities in their communities.
Powell said ordinary Americans could help Obama dig the country out of its economic rut by helping out in nearby schools or nursing homes.
“I think there’s a fervor for the new administration coming in, and I think the new president can tap into this fervor through this program,” Powell said at a news conference.
Powell, 71, served as Secretary of State for Republican President George W. Bush but endorsed Obama, a Democrat, shortly before the Nov. 4 election.
He said he had no interest in taking on a formal role in the Obama administration.
“I have not been offered a job and I’ve kind of made it clear that I’m not looking for a position,” he said.
I have the utmost respect for Colin Powell’s choice and the courage it takes to choose conscience over party. I do not see his endorsement of Barack Obama as turning his back on his party. I see it as Colin Powell using his brain. We have to admit that while he has done a couple good things, George W. Bush has failed the American People with his performance as President. And I think that is being pretty generous. And John McCain, while perhaps being one of our greatest living Americans and an exceptional Senator, would have been a horrible president due to his temperament, lack of intellect and awareness of American culture and society. I hope and believe that we have entered a new era of Politics where fear-mongering, paranoia and jingoism are replaced with integrity, fairness and rationality. But I can see by the messages left by Gypsy that we still have a ways to go before those values take hold. To suggest that just because we support Obama we have not gotten all the facts is intellectually weak and sleazy. I think Gypsy has been surfing the internets too much. The one where all the conspiracy freaks hang out, on the fringe.
American Muslims quick to congratulate Obama
WASHINGTON – The largest U.S. Islamic civil rights group was among the first to congratulate President-Elect Democrat Barack Obama, a man who some opponents tried to portray as a Muslim because of the childhood years he spent in Indonesia.
“President-elect Obama’s victory sends the unmistakable message that America is a nation that offers equal opportunity to people of all backgrounds,” the Council on American Islamic Relations said in a statement just minutes after Obama’s victory speech in Chicago.
Nihad Awad, executive director of the group, said they hoped to offer the Obama administration some support and advice.
“We look forward to having the opportunity to work with the Obama administration in protecting the civil rights of all Americans, projecting an accurate image of America in the Muslim world and playing a positive role in securing our nation,” Awad said.
Obama, who will be the first black U.S. president and whose middle name is Hussein, is a Christian. But throughout the campaign, false rumors circulated on the Internet that he was Muslim and therefore not a suitable candidate for the White House.
Son of a Kenyan father and white American mother, Obama spent part of his childhood in largely Muslim Indonesia.
More than 20 million copies of a film called “Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West” were included as advertising supplements in newspapers across the country, many in battleground states.
Today, the world is dire need of great leaders irrespective of the religion/faith they adhere to. The world is in turmoil because of religion and there is no way we can prove superiority of one religion over other. Every religion teaches faith and peace. Whether Muslim, Hindu or Christian we all have same aspirations. We all want peace and prosperity. We should applaud American citizen for not being driven by religious or racial sentiments.
Colin Powell criticizes fellow Republicans, backs Obama
WASHINGTON – Colin Powell, a retired U.S. Army general and former secretary of state in the Bush administration, criticized fellow Republicans on Sunday and endorsed Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.
The Republican Party “has moved more to the right than I would like to see it,” Powell told NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Powell described Obama as an inspirational figure and denounced some efforts by White House contender John McCain and other Republicans to defeat him.
He ripped into McCain for trying to tie Obama to Bill Ayers, a one-time violent anti-Vietnam War activist who decades later served with Obama on a charity board.
“What they’re trying to connect him to is some kind of terrorist feelings,” Powell said. “This goes too far and I think it has made the McCain campaign look a little narrow.”
Powell said he was also troubled that some members of the Republican Party — not McCain — have said, “‘Well you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.’”
“He is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian,” Powell said. “But the really right answer is ‘what if he is?’ Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no.”
Obama is no Christian. True Christians don’t hate white or black people. He sat in a white hating church for 20 years. He advocates abortion in every form no matter how gruesome. He calls himself a uniter and he is more devisive than anyone. He never answers his critics he only blame shifts and so do his serrogates. They call the conservative right bigotted and hateful, yet there has been 100 times more hate coming from the left. People like Sandra Bernhard talking about her black brothers gang raping Sarah Pahlin. Hollywood loves Senator Obama because he’s an actor too. We need to remember everyone is entitled to an opinion but with Obama and his followers only if you agree with him. They want to silence any and all opposition. That should scare the heck out of all of us.
As for Drew’s criticism of Christians, he doesn’t have a clue what real Christians do for the poor, naked, hungry, and sick. Over 40 million unborn fetus gone so far. They don’t need shoes, cars,books, school, doctors, lawyers, teachers. Who knows who they may have been or what they may have invented.
Obama doesn’t know about Powell endorsement
ROANOKE, Va. – Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama said he has “no idea” if former Secretary of State Colin Powell, a Republican, is about to endorse him.
Powell, a four-star Army general who has advised three presidents including current President George W. Bush, is scheduled to appear on the NBC Sunday talk show, “Meet the Press”.
That has sparked speculation that he could throw his support to Obama during that appearance. Earlier this year Powell had been mentioned as a possible running mate to Obama’s rival, John McCain.
Asked on Friday at the Total Elegance hair salon whether he would win the retired general’s endorsement, Obama replied, “I have no idea.”
During the Democratic primary, Powell offered some praise for Obama in a discussion on ABC’s “Good Morning America”, saying at the time that while the first-term Illinois senator did not have a long foreign policy resume, he was probably someone who could “learn quickly.”
Obama said afterwards that the former Secretary of State was someone he consulted on occasion and someone whose advice he valued. The campaign was keeping mum on whether the two had had more recent contact.
Powell, who like Obama is African American, also had kind words for the speech on race that the candidate delivered in March.
I wonder about the hipocracy of the obama campaign. first off i am undecided, of which candidate is best . the powell endorsement by obama just through some more confussion with obama, why, hes been preaching against the
bush administration and linking his opponent to bush, however, he supports bushs’ biggest advisor , and possibly one of the biggest supporters for the war and push for the so called WMDs. Now, I think Powell is an outstanding american and thank him for his service, Believe me Bush is not smart enough to be the master mind. Powell sold his soul for a job, I believe and Obama should of thought his approval out.
Powell not necessarily in McCain’s corner
Colin Powell was President George W. Bush’s first secretary of state, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s supporting the presidential bid of fellow Republican John McCain.
“I’m looking at all three candidates, I know them all very, very well, I consider myself a friend of each and every one of them, and I have not decided who I will vote for yet,” Powell said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
Powell, like McCain, is a military veteran who publicly supported the invasion of Iraq in 2003, and he served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the first Gulf War in 1991.
But while McCain wants a continued U.S. military presence there, Powell said the armed forces will simply be unable to maintain 140,000 troops in Iraq beyond next year.
Whoever is president next year, “they will face a military force, a United States military force, that cannot sustain, continue to sustain, 140,000 people deployed in Iraq,” Powell said. “They will have to continue to draw down at some pace.”
Powell said he was impressed with fellow African-American Barack Obama, despite the Democratic Illinois senator’s relative lack of experience.
“Sen. Obama, he didn’t have a lot of experience in running a presidential campaign, did he, but he seems to know how to organize a task and he seems to know how to apply resources to a problem at hand,” Powell said.
Dave….Excellent post. I admire and thank you. I’m just afraid that the people that read that….. that don’t agree will not even give it any thought and consideration. Sort of like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. But it was perfectly stated. Perhaps you can write letters to the editor of all the PA papers.
It sounds as if Powell has no other choice than to vote for Obama.