Obama Passport Breached: Two State Dept Officials Fired, Investigation Underway

Huffingtonpost.com:

**BREAKING**

Two State Department officials have been fired, and another suspended, over repeated unauthorized breaches of Sen. Barack Obama’s passport files, multiple sources are reporting. The State Department has launched an investigation.

NBC reports:

Two contract employees of the State Department were fired and a third person was disciplined for accessing passport records of Sen. Barack Obama “without a need to do so,” State Department officials confirmed to NBC News.

The three people who had access to Obama’s passport records were contract employees of the department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs, NBC News has learned. The unauthorized activity concerning Obama’s passport information occurred in January.

“A monitoring system was tripped when an employee accessed the records of a high-profile individual,” a department official told NBC News. “When the monitoring system is tripped, we immediately seek an explanation for the records access. If the explanation is not satisfactory, the supervisor is notified.”

Explaining why the contractors had access to the files, the official said: “The State Department uses cleared contractors to design, build and maintain our systems and cleared contract employees provide support to government employees and several steps of passport processing including data entry, file searches, customer service and quality control.

“Each time an employee logs on, he or she acknowledges the records are protected by the privacy act and that they are only available on a need-to-know basis,” the official added.

NBC’s Howard Fineman reports that “a State Department official called Obama’s Senate office to inform him in almost a routine, bureaucratic way that a breach had occurred.”

More from the Washington Times:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was notified of the security breach yesterday, and responded by saying security measures used to monitor records of high-profile Americans worked properly in detecting the breaches.

Mr. McCormack said the officials did not appear to be seeking information on behalf of any political candidate or party.

“As far as we can tell, in each of the three cases, it was imprudent curiosity,” Mr. McCormack told The Washington Times. …

One administration official said the FBI is conducting a preliminary inquiry into the officials involved in the unauthorized access incidents related to Mr. Obama, Illinois Democrat. An FBI spokesman could not be reached for comment. …

Asked whether a political candidate or party is behind the incidents, Mr. McCormack said: “None at this point in time that we have determined.”

Mr. McCormack declined to provide the names of the employees or the contract, but he said they were hired by the contractor involved in producing, processing and approving passports.

The dates of the breaches were January 9, February 21, and March 14 — last Friday.

Statement from Obama campaign:

“This is an outrageous breach of security and privacy, even from an Administration that has shown little regard for either over the last eight years. Our government’s duty is to protect the private information of the American people, not use it for political purposes. This is a serious matter that merits a complete investigation, and we demand to know who looked at Senator Obama’s passport file, for what purpose, and why it took so long for them to reveal this security breach.

FLASHBACK: A senior State Department official under George H. W. Bush breached Bill Clinton’s passport information and was forced to resign in 1992. Read about it here.

Favorite Quote of the Day

My favorite quote of the day about Sen. Barack Obama

If we choose now to relinquish the opportunity to embrace a leader who sees contradiction with such truth and tolerance we may be doing so at our peril. Because this kind of emotional and intellectual intelligence isn’t born from the kind of black and white way of looking at the world we have been living with for the past 8 years. This is a man who dreams in color, and we should seize the opportunity his candidacy offers all of us — together.

-Julie Bergman Sender

A More Perfect Union By: Barack Obama

Some will say that Barack Obama’s speech didn’t go far enough in denouncing Rev. Wright.

Some will say that he went too far in his critique of the African American community.

Some will say that he spent too much time defending Rev. Wright.

Some will say that he didn’t spend enough time making white America understand him.

My grandmother had a saying “If you try to please everyone, you will please no one and lose yourself in the process”.

My opinion is that Barack Obama did and said exactly what he needed to. He held an olive branch out to each and every community to work together and solve the problems that we face as a nation. We as a people have to realize that it’s not us against them. It’s us against the people in America that do not want to make this country better and only care about the special interests in this country. We have to educate one another and come to an understanding about our different cultures and backgrounds. We may have to even agree to disagree but we have to start somewhere and I feel that Obama is that start.

Barack Obama’s Speech in its Entirety:

Why is Obama being blamed for playing the “Race Card”?

Every since Rev. Wright’s sermons hit mainstream media, I’ve read accusation after accusation of Obama playing the race card. Everyone also seems to think that what Rev. Wright said was racist and wrong. I couldn’t disagree more.

First of all, Obama didn’t bring race into this campaign – the media and the HRC camp did.

Second, racism and slavery has been a part of the American DNA for 300 years. Do you really believe that all of that can be erased in 40 years? Tell someone that lived through the Civil Rights era like Rev. Wright to just “get over it”.

Third, I would like anyone to name one thing that he said that is racist. I bet I can tell you from a different prospective that it isn’t.

What people don’t understand is the role of the black church in the African American community. Every since slavery, the Black church has been a place where Africans Americans not only went to hear the word of God, but also to meet and discuss our social and political issues.

You see, church was the only place we were allowed to go so we had to use it as a tool to organize, meet, and find out what was going on in America. The Civil Rights Movement started in and was kept alive by the church. Even though its 2008, this hasn’t changed and a lot of the problems we faced then still apply now.

Another thing that white America doesn’t understand is that what Rev. Wright said is echoed by black preachers across America. This isn’t anything new or outrageous. In fact, my preacher has said things that would make Rev. Wright blush.

Also, just because Obama attends this church doesn’t mean that he agrees with everything that Rev. Wright says. I have been attending the same church since I was baptized at the age of 1 (I’m 29 now). Over the years, my pastor has said things that I don’t agree with and we have lively debates about it. For instance, we have different points of views about homosexuality but I’m not going to stop going to church because of it. Just like I’m sure that all Catholics don’t believe that women shouldn’t hold a high position in the Catholic Church.

If Americans just took the time to stand in someone else’s shoes or educated themselves on cultures other than theirs, stories like these wouldn’t last for five news cycles like this one has.

Please take a look at T. West’s views on this subject. Maybe it will offer a different prospective on this topic:

Obama Plans Major Race Speech Tomorrow

Politico.com:

Barack Obama will give a major speech on “the larger issue of race in this campaign,” he told reporters in Monaca, PA just now.

He was pressed there, as he has been at recent appearances, on statements by his former pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

“I am going to be talking about not just Reverend Wright, but the larger issue of race in this campaign,” he said.

He added that he would “talk about how some of these issues are perceived from within the black church issue for example,” he said.

He also briefly defended Wright from the image that has come through in a handful of repeatedly televised clips from recent Wright sermons.

“The caricature that’s being painted of him is not accurate,” he said.

The speech could offer Obama an opportunity to move past the controversy over his pastor, and to turn the conversation to a topic he’d rather focus on: his Christian faith. But the speech also guarantees that the Wright story will continue to dominate political headlines.

Mitt Romney’s attempt directly to address his Mormonism last year never decisively put the issue to rest for some voters.Obama’s schedule puts him in Philadelphia tomorrow.

I think it is imperative for America to have a truthful conversation about race. I don’t have a problem with anything that Rev. Wright said. The problem is that what people don’t understand, they denounce and ridicule. Why not try to understand and educate yourself?

Black America is so different from mainstream America. Mainly because every since slavery, we’ve had to establish a support system for ourselves because no one else was going to do so. This came in the form of the Black church. The Black church is the backbone of the African American community and all Rev. Wright was doing was speaking to his community.

If white people had traveled the same treacherous road that African Americans have, they would have the same community system in place for their community. Just because it’s different or you don’t understand it does not mean that it’s wrong.
 

African Americans have been forced to adapt to white America but the reverse is not so. That’s not even what is being asked… Why not just try to understand?

 

Obama Supporters Don’t Know Where he Stands on the Issues? Think Again!

The media continually makes one assumption about Obama supporters: They don’t know where he stands on the issues. I’ve always known that this isn’t the case but this dude confirmed it. I think he even made the reporter an Obama supporter by the end of the interview.

Obama Picks Up 10 More Elected Delegates in Iowa

HuffingPost.com:

DES MOINES, Iowa — Democrat Barack Obama expanded his fragile lead in delegates over rival Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday, picking up nine delegates as Iowa activists took the next step in picking delegates to the national convention.

More than half the 14 delegates allocated to John Edwards on the basis of caucus night projections switched Saturday to Obama.

Iowa Democratic Party officials said that with all of the delegates picked, Obama claimed 52 percent of the delegates elected at county conventions on Saturday, compared with 32 percent for Clinton. Some of the delegates picked at Saturday’s conventions were sticking with Edwards, even though he’s dropped from the race since Iowa held its caucuses in January.

Democratic Party projections said the results mean Obama increased by nine the number of delegates he collects from the state, getting a total of 25 compared with 14 for Clinton and six for Edwards.

Twelve automatic delegates bring the state’s total to 57. Obama has been endorsed by four of those and Clinton three, with the remainder uncommitted.

Also Saturday, California’s Democratic Party finalized the delegate counts from its Feb. 5 primary. Clinton picked up two more pledged delegates, raising her state total to 204; Obama gained five, raising his figure to 166.

Counting Saturday’s new figures from Iowa and California, an Associated Press delegate tally showed Obama with 1,617 delegates and Clinton with 1,498.

Obama won Iowa’s precinct caucuses in January with 39 percent of the vote, with Edwards narrowly edging Clinton to finish second. Projections on caucus night showed Obama getting 16 delegates, compared with 15 for Clinton and 14 for Edwards.

“It means the Obama people are very organized,” said Iowa Democratic Chairman Scott Brennan. “They have been working very hard for these conventions.”

Brennan said turnout was heavy, with more than 13,000 activists showing up at conventions in the state’s 99 counties.

“Today, Iowa Democrats again turned out in large numbers to reject the failed Bush-McCain campaign and its policies,” said Brennan.

Edwards finished second in the state’s leadoff precinct caucuses on Jan. 3, but those caucuses are only the first step in a complicated process of picking the state’s 45 pledged delegates to the Democratic National Convention in Denver in August.

The next step in that process was Saturday with selection of delegates to congressional district and state conventions. Party officials said the results Saturday marked the election of 2,173 of the 2,500 delegates who will go to those convention.

The epic presidential race between Clinton and Obama has been reshaped since Iowa’s caucuses, but is no less intense with every delegate carrying weight.

“Every single one counts and that’s why we’ve been here organizing,” said Teresa Vilmain, a field organizer for Clinton.

“We’ve filled all of our slots,” said Gordon Fischer, a former Iowa Democratic chairman who is organizing for Obama.

Rob Tully, a Des Moines lawyer and prominent Edwards backer, sent an e-mail to supporters urging them to remain neutral, but there was clear movement to Obama when the results were tallied.

“Barack Obama stands for a lot of the same things that John Edwards stood for,” said Ro Foege, a state legislator from Mount Vernon who switched to the Obama camp.

The county conventions are traditionally sleepy gatherings where party leaders have trouble gathering a quorum to conduct business, largely because the party usually has a nominee by this point. With the race still up for grabs, activists jammed school gymnasiums, auditoriums and meeting halls across the state.

Former Gov. Tom Vilsack, a Clinton backer, spoke to more than 1,200 delegates jammed into a suburban high school gym.

“The reality is we are united on one thing today, we are Democrats, we are proud Democrats and we are going to elect a Democratic president,” said Vilsack, who dropped his own bid for the nomination even before the voting began. “Let us pledge that we will unite behind our nominee _ be it he or she.”

It is obvious that Clinton cannot win the primaries “on the up and up”. Is she determined to destroy the Democratic Party? I believe that she is heading down a dangerous path that will injure the party for decades to come. Democrats signed away the south in the 60′s and the people that we signed away that vote for, African Americans are now being disenfranchised in 2008. I don’t know what people were thinking when they actually thought that they’re vote would count. At least Florida and Michigan knew theirs wouldn’t.