Obama screwed it up yesterday at the White House, says Rush Limbaugh.  All four Democrat leaders handed him the ball at meeting start, and he took off after the House Republicans in quite obstreperous manner.  That’s when meeting blew up.

More later . . .  

Later: Rush cited American Spectator, which is so busy a site it was hard to get to it.  It has this:

When Sen. Barack Obama was given the floor to speak during White House negotiations, according to White House aides, he did so raising concerns about a House Republican alternative to the Paulson/Bernanke $700 billion bailout. But those concerns weren’t necessarily his, as he was not aware of the GOP plan before reviewing notes provided him by Paulson loyalists in Treasury prior to entering the meeting.

How else does AmSpec (it’s Prowler blog) know this?

According to an Obama campaign source, the notes were passed to Obama via senior aides traveling with him, who had been emailed the document via a current Goldman Sachs employee and Wall Street fundraiser for the Obama campaign. “It was made clear that the memo was from ‘friends’ and was reliable,” says the campaign source.

And what the effect of this impromptu blast across the aisle?

The memo allowed Obama and his fellow Democrats to box in Republican attendees and essentially took what President Bush had billed as a negotiating meeting off the rails.

And where does Paulson come in?

“Paulson and his team have not acted in good faith for this President or the administration for which they serve,” says a House Republican leader who was not present at the White House meeting, but who instead is part of the team hammering out the House GOP alternative.

He suspects skullduggery:

“We keep hearing about how Secretary Paulson is working with Democrats on this or that, yet he never seems to consider working with the party that essentially hired him. Perhaps he’s auditioning for a Democratic administration job. Our proposal didn’t just spring forth fully formed; we’ve been working on this for several days, and Treasury staff has known about it.”

And O. had a chance to do away with politics as usual.  This be what he does without a TelePrompter?

Other points by Rush:

* Dems have votes for this but want House Repubs to repudiate their principles and want cover if it doesn’t work out.  (Pelosi has specified the need for 100 Repubs in favor of this bill.) 

* Dems including O. have known where House Repubs stand but act surprised and indignant.

An FDR baby, no less:

Franklin Delano Raines, the former chairman of Fannie Mae, repeatedly moved through a revolving door of high-power political positions in Washington and the financial industry until he was forced to resign amid an accounting scandal.

But there was life after Fannie, Wash Post reported last July:

[T]he post-scandal Raines “has been quietly constructing a new life for himself” and had recently “taken calls from Barack Obama’s presidential campaign seeking his advice on mortgage and housing policy matters.”

On what not to do?

It starts with “Dem-“ and it’s Democrat, right? 

Partly.  Try “demagogue.”

In Daytona Beach, Obama said that “if my opponent had his way, the millions of Floridians who rely on it would’ve had their Social Security tied up in the stock market this week.” He referred to “elderly women” at risk of poverty, and said families would be scrambling to support “grandmothers and grandfathers.”

Remember when he talked about rejecting old-style politics?

Actually,

The plan proposed by President Bush and supported by McCain in 2005 would not have allowed anyone born before 1950 to invest any part of their Social Security taxes in private accounts. All current retirees would be covered by the same benefits they are now.

“In our “Scaring Seniors” article posted Sept. 19,” says Fact Check, 

we took apart a claim in an Obama-Biden ad that McCain somehow supported a 50 percent cut in Social Security benefits, which is simply false. Then, on Saturday Sept. 20, Sen. Barack Obama personally fed senior citizens another whopper, this one a highly distorted claim about the private Social Security accounts that McCain supports.

It’s what the teleprompter had written on it, apparently.

O. explaining to celebs at the Streisand fund-raiser:

“The reason I’m calm … is I’ve got confidence in the American people,” he said. “I really think they want to see us do better.”

Oh no.  They want to see us do worse.

Off cuff remark, crafted for effect.  He elides.  What he means is:

He thinks people think the nation will do better if he’s in charge. 

Typical political shorthand, but it does get tedious for the non-believers.

Someone else with a bead on Cocky Locky:

she thinks Democratic nominee Barack Obama is arrogant and has a problem connecting with average Americans.

That’s Lynn Forester de Rothschild, big Hillary fund-raiser (and hot, hot entrepreneur who married well), jumping ship while the jumping is good.

Well that’s it, isn’t it?  He’s got this arch demeanor, stiffness most of the time — though not when he’s dancing with Generes in, frankly, a vulgar manner — and grossly roundabout speaking manner.

Go, Lynn F. deR., and bring all your in-laws with you!

Another who hit nail on head — for unofficial “Clinton Democrats: We will not be silenced” — said it well just the other day:

Believe it or not, the first time I laid eyes on Senator Obama in a debate and watched his ‘body English’: the up-tilt of his head, looking down the nose, leaning away from his audience, the you-come-to-me-I-don’t-go-to-you-demeanor, his halting speech, one thing rang in my ears loud and clear: His arrogance would be his undoing.

Cocky Locky (will) teach you dancing in a hurry and will befuddle, alienate, and/or lead you down a primrose path of managed life in America — if you don’t watch out!

More bully-boy tactics from the gang with hope to believe in, etc.  Is this any way for a Messiah to behave?

David Freddoso attempted to appear on Milt Rosenberg’s WGN radio show last night, and just as when Stanley Kurtz tried to talk on the same show, the Barack Obama campaign organized a disruption of the show. The campaign sent out an e-mail to supporters in the area sliming Freddoso as an “extreme” hate monger, a “smear merchant”, and attempted to silence him despite Rosenberg having an Obama surrogate on the show:

Details from Chi Trib:

Chicago radio station WGN-AM is again coming under attack from the presidential campaign of Sen. Barack Obama for offering airtime to a controversial author. It is the second time in recent weeks the station has been the target of an “Obama Action Wire” alert to supporters of the Illinois Democrat.

Monday night’s target was David Freddoso, who the campaign said was scheduled to be on the station from 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. Chicago time.

. . . saying O’s supporters’ help was “urgently needed,” lest the guest’s “baseless lies don’t gain credibility.”  Not the first time, either.

The Tribune-owned station was flooded with calls and e-mails about an hour before an Aug. 27 interview with Stanley Kurtz, a conservative writer who examined Obama’s ties to former 1960s radical William Ayers.

A WGN producer said Monday night’s response was about the same as when Kurtz was on the station.

Same yahoos, hurling shit from trees, as in Gulliver’s Travels.