Joe Biden's son leaves for Iraq

Democratic vice presidential candidate and Delaware senator Joe Biden sent his son off to war Friday.

Joseph Biden III, 39, is a captain in the Delaware Army National Guard's 261st Signal Brigade. He is also the Delaware attorney general.

Biden said goodbye to his son and the rest of the national guard in a ceremony outside the state capitol.

"We take comfort in the knowledge that you are the best-trained, best-prepared group of citizen soldiers that our country to this day has ever sent into harm's way," Biden said.

Biden's unit leaves Sunday for Fort Bliss, Texas. There they will train for six weeks before heading to Iraq.

Love Child of Joe Biden and Sarah Palin

Avi Muchnick, while commenting on intense sexual chemistry between Joe "Six-Pack" Biden and Sarah "Nukeyoolar" Palin, went ahead and had a closer look at alleged love child of Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.

Have a laugh!







From Aviary

Joe Biden's Fantasy World

In the popular media wisdom, Sarah Palin is the neophyte who knows nothing about foreign policy while Joe Biden is the savvy diplomatic pro. Then what are we to make of Mr. Biden's fantastic debate voyage last week when he made factual claims that would have got Mrs. Palin mocked from New York to Los Angeles?


APStart with Lebanon, where Mr. Biden asserted that "When we kicked -- along with France, we kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon, I said and Barack said, 'Move NATO forces in there. Fill the vacuum, because if you don't know -- if you don't, Hezbollah will control it.' Now what's happened? Hezbollah is a legitimate part of the government in the country immediately to the north of Israel."

The U.S. never kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon, and no one else has either. Perhaps Mr. Biden meant to say Syria, except that the U.S. also didn't do that. The Lebanese ousted Syria's military in 2005. As for NATO, Messrs. Biden and Obama may have proposed sending alliance troops in, but if they did that was also a fantasy. The U.S. has had all it can handle trying to convince NATO countries to deploy to Afghanistan.

Speaking of which, Mr. Biden also averred that "Our commanding general in Afghanistan said the surge principle in Iraq will not work in Afghanistan." In trying to correct him, Mrs. Palin mispronounced the general's name -- saying "General McClellan" instead of General David McKiernan. But Mr. Biden's claim was the bigger error, because General McKiernan said that while "Afghanistan is not Iraq," he also said a "sustained commitment" to counterinsurgency would be required. That is consistent with Mr. McCain's point that the "surge principles" of Iraq could work in Afghanistan.

Then there's the Senator's astonishing claim that Mr. Obama "did not say he'd sit down with Ahmadinejad" without preconditions. Yet Mr. Biden himself criticized Mr. Obama on this point in 2007 at the National Press Club: "Would I make a blanket commitment to meet unconditionally with the leaders of each of those countries within the first year I was elected President? Absolutely, positively no."

Or how about his rewriting of Bosnia history to assert that John McCain didn't support President Clinton in the 1990s. "My recommendations on Bosnia, I admit I was the first one to recommend it. They saved tens of thousands of lives. And initially John McCain opposed it along with a lot of other people. But the end result was it worked." Mr. Biden's immodesty aside, Mr. McCain supported Mr. Clinton on Bosnia, as did Bob Dole even as he was running against him for President in 1996 -- in contrast to the way Mr. Biden and Democratic leaders have tried to undermine President Bush on Iraq.

Closer to home, the Delaware blarney stone also invited Americans to join him at "Katie's restaurant" in Wilmington to witness middle-class struggles. Just one problem: Katie's closed in the 1980s. The mistake is more than a memory lapse because it exposes how phony is Mr. Biden's attempt to pose for this campaign as Lunchbucket Joe.

We think the word "lie" is overused in politics today, having become a favorite of the blogosphere and at the New York Times. So we won't say Mr. Biden was deliberately making events up when he made these and other false statements. Perhaps he merely misspoke. In any case, Mrs. Palin may not know as much about the world as Mr. Biden does, but at least most of what she knows is true.

From Wall Street Journal

Bidens owe SimmonsCooper $1 million in hedge fund deal

Vice presidential candidate Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden and brother James Biden owe $1 million to SimmonsCooper law firm of East Alton from a hedge fund buyout that fell apart in 2006.

SimmonsCooper attorneys have contributed hundreds of thousands to campaigns of Senator Biden, his other son Beau Biden, and John Markell, current candidate for governor, while turning Delaware into a national magnet for asbestos lawsuits.

In the hedge fund case, Hunter Biden and James Biden seek to shift their debt to former partner Joseph Lotito through counterclaims in a fraud suit he filed against them.

New York State Supreme Court Justice Bernard Fried rejected their bid in May, ruling that they should have checked out the fund more carefully.

"These counterclaims, conditionally pleaded, do not rest on a justiciable controversy, but seek only to foment uncertainty and chaos between the parties in the event that plaintiff is successful in presenting the main claims," Fried wrote.

"Such pleading will not be countenanced," he wrote.

He held that Hunter Biden and James Biden can't allege misrepresentation when they failed to allege their own due diligence.

In June, Hunter Biden and James Biden appealed Fried's decision.

SimmonsCooper committed $2 million but withheld the second million after seeing how Lotito wasted the first million, according to Hunter Biden and James Biden.

SimmonsCooper invested in Hunter Biden and James Biden after teaming with Beau Biden's firm in Wilmington, Del.

In 2005, SimmonsCooper shifted its focus away from Madison County, Illinois, after Chief Judge Edward Ferguson transferred the mammoth asbestos docket from Circuit Judge Nicholas Byron to Circuit Judge Daniel Stack.

The firm targeted Delaware because many businesses incorporate there and the firm's roster of defendants always includes Delaware corporations.

No one at SimmonsCooper held a Delaware law license, so Beau Biden's firm filed the suits and SimmonsCooper identified itself as, "of counsel."

Beau Biden dropped an asbestos defense client to accommodate SimmonsCooper.

At the same time, Joe Biden resisted asbestos litigation reform in the Senate judiciary committee.

On New Year's Eve 2005, SimmonsCooper attorneys, staff and spouses contributed at least $52,250 to Biden's campaign for a seventh Senate term.

In the following five weeks the firm contributed at least $56,100.

Campaign reports don't allow full accounting from any source because contributors ignore employment information requests or many channel cash through others.

While SimmonsCooper backed Joe Biden's reelection, he prepared to run for president.

Hunter Biden meanwhile earned his living as a lobbyist, but not for long.

According to court records filed by Lotito, Joe Biden wanted Hunter Biden to find a different line of work because he couldn't afford to run for president as father of a lobbyist.

Lotito claims he and James Biden discussed Hunter Biden's job prospects.

Lotito met James Biden in 2002 and they invested together in 2005, according to Lotito.

Lotito introduced James Biden and Hunter Biden to lawyer John Fasciano, and the four began planning to buy Paradigm Capital Management.

Majority owner James Parks had started Paradigm in 1991 and successfully promoted it as less volatile than most hedge funds.

Everyone agreed that the Bidens and Lotito would form a corporation to buy 54 percent of Paradigm for $21.3 million in cash.

They would install Hunter Biden as chief executive officer at a salary of $1.2 million.

In April 2006, they formed LBB Limited Liability Corporation.

In May 2006, SimmonsCooper invested $1 million.

In June 2006, according to Lotito, the Bidens told him to stay away.

In August 2006, according to Lotito, the Bidens formed a corporation, executed a promissory note for $8.1 million, and purchased Paradigm's assets.

In September 2006, Lotito signed an agreement relinquishing his third of LBB.

He sued the Bidens in January 2007, alleging fraud and breach of fiduciary duty.

Attorney Brian Wille claimed the Bidens made a secret side deal, terminated Lotito's rights, and fraudulently induced him to sign away his interest in LBB.

Willie wrote that Lotito found investors and the Bidens rejected them.

He wrote that the Bidens intimidated Lotito and accused him of receiving kickbacks from Fasciano.

"Ultimately, the Bidens threatened to use their alleged connections with a former U.S. Senator to retaliate against counsel for insisting that his bill be paid, claiming that the former Senator was prepared to use his influence with a federal judge to disadvantage counsel in a proceeding then pending before that court," Willie wrote.

For the Bidens, Nicholas Gravante answered that Lotito failed to tell them that Fasciano would soon go to federal prison on a fraud conviction.

Gravante alleged that Lotito exaggerated Paradigm's value.

He alleged that Lotito failed to tell the Bidens that Parks had acted for years as absentee owner of Paradigm due to substance abuse.

Gravante filed a counterclaim and brought it to a hearing before Fried in June 2007.

Gravante called Lotito a criminal, and Fried asked where his pleadings called him that.

Gravante stammered and Fried said, "In my courtroom I would like you to restrict yourself to acting civilly."

Fried said, "You have accused him of being a criminal in this courtroom and it's not in these papers."

Gravante said, "He is accused of crimes. I don't call him a criminal, correct."

Fried rejected the counterclaim last September but ruled that the Bidens could amend it.

Gravante amended it to allege that LBB "specifically recruited SimmonsCooper as a result of Lotito's and Fasciano's misstatements and omissions."

SimmonsCooper withdrew, he wrote, and its investment converted to debt.

At a hearing this January, Gravante said the Bidens had "an uncheckered history."

He said, "These are reputable people - discovery will bear that out - who wouldn't have agreed to have that kind of an attorney do this work for them."

In May, for the second time, Fried rejected the counterclaim.

"Certainly defendants do not claim that the law permits sophisticated investors to rely on whatever representations a potential advisor makes without the need for a diligent inquiry by defendants, and that such representations are actionable if they wind up to have been faulty," Fried wrote.

Although the dispute hinges on the SimmonsCooper investment, neither side has alleged that Lotito knew or didn't know that SimmonsCooper would invest.

From Madison County Record

Joe Biden asked Sister's help to defeat Sarah Palin

As Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. puzzles out the perfect tone to take with Gov. Sarah Palin in Thursday night’s debate, he is getting advice from a woman who has been an intimate since he was a grade school student with a stutter and a paper route.

“He’s been my best friend all my life,” said that person, Mr. Biden’s sister, Valerie Biden Owens, in an interview in August. “I opened my eyes and he was there and he said, ‘Let’s go.’ I was his sidekick.”

She has managed every one of his campaigns, from high school class president to his New Castle County Council race to his first Senate bid, a 1972 upset victory, to his minefield of a presidential run in 1988.

The tightly controlled Obama operation has been the first time she has had no official position on her brother’s campaigns. That does not mean, however, that she is sitting this one out.

“She is absolutely his political alter-ego and confidante,” said David Wade, Mr. Biden’s press secretary. “She talks with the campaign every day.”

Their talks include advice on how Mr. Biden should handle himself during Thursday night’s debate, a showdown where many will be watching whether Mr. Biden can temper his oversized personality so he does not appear to be overpowering his female opponent. It was Mrs. Biden Owens who endorsed the plan to have him practice with Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm of Michigan, another dynamic female governor with a quick take.

As Mr. Biden has written in his autobiography, his trust in his sister is complete.

Mrs. Biden Owens, like Bay Buchanan before her, could be part of a small group called Sister Strategists. (Bay is the sister of Patrick J. Buchanan, who ran for president in 1992, 1996 and 2000.)

Mrs. Biden Owens said her family — along with Mr. Biden, there are two other brothers — does not know how to do it any other way. “It’s just how we grew up,” she said.

Having his family closely involved with his life has worked both politically and personally for Mr. Biden.


Claire DeMatteis, who worked as Mr. Biden’s senior counsel for 10 years, said of Mrs. Biden Owens, “I wouldn’t call it weakness, but when people criticize Senator Biden, she takes it understandably very personally.”

When he was hit with charges of plagiarism in his 1988 run, it was “just terrible” for his sister, Mr. Kaufman said. “Senator Biden’s career has been an incredible roller coaster, and that makes it even harder.”

Mrs. Biden Owens was reminded of that flame-out in August, while sitting in a Denver hotel room a few hours before her brother made his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention.

“You make a mistake and you pay for it,” she said. “He paid for it. When we left the presidential campaign in ’88, he turned and walked down the corridor of the Senate and he sat down and chaired the Bork confirmation.” She paused and looked off, as if she could still see him walking down that long hall.

Shortly after, there was the aneurism that almost killed him. Mrs. Biden Owens noted the positive side: Had he stayed in the race, he very well might be dead.

“Oh, if we had continued,” she said, “and if he had told me three months down the road, right before the Iowa caucuses, that he had a headache and he couldn’t do it that day, I would have said, ‘You don’t know what a headache is.’ ”

After Mr. Biden’s first wife and infant daughter were killed in a car crash in 1972, just after he was first elected to the Senate, his sister quit her teaching job, moved in and cared for his two young sons. “Aunt Val” lived with her brother for four years — through her divorce, remarriage and even the birth of her oldest daughter — before finally moving out.

She is married to Jack Owens, one of Mr. Biden’s closest friends from law school, and they now live only 15 minutes away.

“Valerie Biden was the cornerstone that allowed me to sustain and then rebuild my family,” Mr. Biden wrote in his autobiography, “Promises to Keep: On Life and Politics.”

“It was a gift,” Mrs. Biden Owens said, more lightly, all these years later. “I got to practice on Beau and Hunter before I screwed up my own kids.”

She said that people tried to make what she had done, dropping everything and moving in with her brother, into something heroic, but she insisted it had not been.

Her 91-year-old mother, Jean Finnegan Biden, said it was natural for her daughter. “There’s nothing but family, nothing in the world,” she said. “As they were growing up, they did what she told them to do. She was the only girl.”

When they were children, Mr. Biden was a member of the safety patrol, but he turned in his shiny blue badge rather than report his sister for her bad behavior on the bus one day.

At the University of Delaware, he vetted all of her suitors.

“If there was any guy he knew, I couldn’t go out with him because he knew the son of a gun, and any guy he didn’t know, I couldn’t go out with because he didn’t know the son of the gun,” Mrs. Biden Owens recalled.

After her brother’s 1996 Senate race, Mrs. Biden Owens joined the consulting firm Joe Slade White & Company, marketing candidates in dozens of national races. Her clients include Governor Granholm, as well as Representative Chet Edwards of Texas, who had been discussed as a possible Democratic running mate this year before Mr. Biden was chosen.

These days, she said, her role “is to be the sister of the vice-presidential nominee.”

Thinking ahead to Thursday night, right before her brother takes the stage in St. Louis for the debate, Mrs. Biden Owens said: “I don’t have to tell Joe anything. I’ll just give him a hug and tell him I love him.”

Source: NYTimes

Joe Biden endorses John McCain for President

Not much is said about Joe Biden these day. We know his first wife and an infant daughter died in a horrible automobile accident in 1972. He married his present wife in 1977. He has been in the Senate since he was twenty-nine years old. So he is a stick-to-it kind of guy. But…does that make him a good choice for being Vice President?

Well, apparently the American people in Iowa didn’t think so. In fact, he received less than 1% of the vote in the Iowa primaries along with Chris Dodd. Both candidates dropped out of the run for President of the United States after that first primary vote. Now that sort of dings him when it comes to his stick-to-itiveness. But at least he keeps his wives…unlike other politicians. I think the Republican Vice-Presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, had more people vote for her for governor of Alaska than Joe Biden supporters in Iowa.

He has said, “you cannot go to a 7-Eleven or a Dunkin’ Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent.”

He has said, “My wife Jill, who you’ll meet soon, is drop dead gorgeous,” Biden said and then joked, “My wife Jill, who you’ll meet soon, she also has her doctorate degree, which is a problem.”

He has said that he and Obama, if elected in November, “”will not be stopped from pursuing any criminal offence that’s occurred,” in reference to the President Bush and his administration.

And, he has in the past few weeks eluded to the fact that maybe he wasn’t even the right choice for Obama to pick for Vice President; that Hillary Clinton was the better man for the job. However, let’s not forget that as Barack Obama’s Vice-Presidential running mate, he said to a large crowd “I am running for the President of the United States.” Opps. I think he meant Vice-President.

Source

Joe Biden stepping down as Barack Obama's VP?

There is no doubt that the Democrats who voted for Hillary Clinton in the primariers are still fuming mad that she didn’t win the nomination…but they were angered even further when Barack Obama didn’t have the guts or fortitude to choose Clinton as his running mate for this year’s election.

So when Sarah Palin was selected by the Republican Party…it seemed as though a lot of women fled to McCain because they liked him better than Barack Obama and they admired The Maverick for choosing a female running mate…no matter how idiotic the decision actually appears to be.

So what better way for the Democrats to regain their plummeting momentum than to get back a lot of the pro-abortion women’s vote and some of that white, working middle class vote throughout the United States than to place Hillary Rodham Clinton back on the ticket?

I really cannot see this scenario taking place…with Biden stepping down…unless there really is something very wrong with Joe Biden’s health.

But wouldn’t this have been examined long before he was chosen by Barack Obama to be his running mate? I mean in the vetting process?

Joe Biden is saying a lot of things that are just plain stupid and kind of annoying to those to whom he is directing his comments…but this is normal, typical Joe Biden! So I say that these rumors of Hillary Clinton coming in to replace him as VP are just ridiculous rumors and that Barack Obama will probably be muzzling Joe Biden until the October 2, 2008 Veep debate with Sarah Palin.

At any rate, I am not very sure that even Hillary Clinton could stop the spiraling poll numbers for the Democrats at this point in the game.

The Democrats may just have to admit that they lost the election to someone who played their image and pandering game better than they did…John McCain, when he chose Sarah Palin as his running mate (please don’t say he picked her because she, too, is a Maverick)…utter nonsense.

Joe Biden refusing to pay $150,000 campaign debt

Family, I feel an obligation to honesty and truth to share with you some facts. My Father and Mother instilled in me the values and morals of treating people fairly and always being honest. If you purchase something, you pay for it. If you borrow something, you give it back.

I have been "stiffed" three times in my 30 year professional career by someone who I rendered services to, gave a finished product to, but who refused to pay for those services even though they acknowledged the services and products were correct, were what they asked for, and were never challenged for not being correct. I am lucky in having only three, but those three hurt badly.

Joe Biden was one of those people. I worked on his 1988 Presidential campaign financial disclosure engagement. I busted it for him and got everything right. He stiffed me for over $15,000 worth of work. He refused to pay once he dropped out of th e race. I did similar Capitol Hill campaign financial disclosure work for Bob Dole, Pat Buchanan, and a Democratic candidate for Ambassador to New Zealand. All of those folks paid even though they lost the election or did not get the appointment. That type of work is very demanding and very tedious because your efforts are scrutinized by Congress. Biden did not care.

I am on the Board of Directors of a company that owns a majority position in a private jet management company in Northern Virginia. They manage jets for businesses and rich folks. They also charter planes to the public. This past winter John Thompson chartered over $250,000 worth of air time. He paid every penny.

Joe Biden, in his latest unsuccessful run for President, chartered over $150,000 worth of air time. He PAID ZERO.

He continues to refuse to pay stating his race is over and he is out of money. He never once complained about his flights. Joe Biden is a rich man. He could pay.

Joe Biden is a liar and a cheat. I know it first hand.

Character is what life is all about. Joe Biden is a man of bad character and sets a bad example for America.

I feel compelled to share this dark side of a man who asks for your vote and trust.

Best Regards, B ruce D. Riddle, CPA, CFP

(Received in Email)

Sarah Palin: The New Face of Religious Right

Sarah Palin, a working mother-of-five whose down-to-earth appeal has electrified the Republican Party's bid to retain the U.S. presidency, reflects a new attitude toward women in America's religious right.

Analysts say Palin, the nominee for vice president who has galvanized the party's conservative Christian base, highlights how the movement has evolved from its staunchly anti-feminist roots in the 1970s as it tries to broaden its appeal.

The movement, which has no formal structure but includes a number of prominent Christian groups, has a big influence on Republican politics. It has become younger, more female and less white-dominated and extended beyond its Southern roots.

Polls suggest Alaska Governor Palin's starring role as Sen. John McCain's running mate for the November 4 election against Democrats Barack Obama and Joe Biden has helped the Republican ticket make inroads with female voters.

Some women have been put off by her strong opposition to abortion, to gay rights and her lack of experience and expertise in national or international affairs.

But she has generated a new enthusiasm among the conservative evangelicals who comprise the Republican Party's most important constituency. McCain, who was lagging Obama in national polls before selecting Palin, is now running even or slightly ahead in opinion polls.

About one in four U.S. adults are evangelical and while the religious right hardly speaks for all of them it does represent the views of many.

Palin represents one way it has redefined itself in the 21st century while sticking to its guns on its red meat issues like opposing abortion rights and gay marriage.

The movement also has reached out to non-whites, seeing ground to be gained among socially conservative blacks and Hispanics, though gains for the Republican Party especially among African Americans have been limited.

Some analysts said Palin was not such a mold-breaker.

"She does not in any way challenge the traditional conceptions of men and women that are present among conservative evangelicals. She is a mother of five, she talks about God as having a plan for people's lives," said David Domke, a professor of communication at the University of Washington in Seattle.

"Her role on the ticket is to support the presidential candidate and this fits very much what would be the expectations for the woman," Domke said.

Critics of the anti-feminist plank of the religious right's platform remains entrenched in its unyielding opposition to abortion rights -- a position that polls consistently show a majority of American women oppose.

(By David Storey)