The top five lies: Your choice for the OBI award

Remember when the progs all tried to pretend that Hillary's Bosnia comment constituted the MOST IMPORTANT LIE IN HUMAN HISTORY? Well, things have changed.

Nowadays, even the most Obamacized zealot has to admit that the Lightbringer has a penchant for serial fabrication. We could list, oh gosh, dozens and dozens of lies, as others have done -- see here and here.

But this post is about quality, not quantity. I want to know which fabrication constitutes OBAMA'S WORST LIE EVAH. That fib-to-top-all-other-fibs will win the prestigious Obi award for Deception in Politics.

Here are the top five contenders -- and feel free to suggest additional choices:

1. NAFTA! This is my personal favorite. In primary states where antipathy toward the treaty ran high, Obama distributed lavishly-produced publications featuring images of locked factories. In that official campaign literature, these words were attributed to the Lightbringer: "I don't think NAFTA has been good for America -- and I never have." Other ads falsely claimed that Hillary Clinton had declared NAFTA a "boon" to the ecnomy. (She never said it.)

Yet in 2004, Obama had said : “The United States benefits enormously from exports under the WTO and NAFTA.” After semi-securing the nomination, Obama shifted back to his 2004 position.

Not only that. After his economics guru Austen Goolsbee was caught giving back-door assurances on NAFTA to the Canadian government -- 'He doesn't really mean it!' -- Team Obama spread lies in order to shift the blame onto Hillary Clinton. Who, as it turns out, was utterly innocent.

NAFTA-gate was not just one lie. It was a Matryoshka doll filled with lies within lies.

2. Rezko! At one time, Barack Obama thought he could get away with telling the public that was a stranger to Chicago crime boss Tony Rezko.

“I barely know Tony Rezko. I did about 5 hours of billed work for him.”

Then we learned the truth. Barry and Tony have been likethis for the better part of two decades. An FBI informant in Rezko's office revealed that Obama and Fat Tony were in daily contact, and that the Lightbringer had visited the office on a regular basis.

While Obama was at Harvard, Rezko tapped him to join his team. Obama went straight to work for a small legal firm whose primary client was -- you guessed it -- Tony Rezko. The same Tony Rezko who arranged for Obi to buy a mansion who could not otherwise afford (even though Rezko was simultaneously crying poor).

The head of that legal firm, Allison Davis, became Tony's partner in the slum lord schemes which ripped off Illinois taxpayers to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. Obama's campaigns received a lot of money from Rezko (and a smaller amount from Davis); in return, he made sure that Tony got those contracts.

Obama directly lied when he said: "I have never been asked to do anything to advance his [Rezko's] business interests."

In case your eyes roll every time someone tries to explain Chi-town corruption to you, here's the abbreviated version:

Without the funding from political Godfathers like Tony Rezko, Obama’s career in politics would never have gotten off the ground. But without the aid of corrupt government officials, slumlords like Tony Rezko would never have made the money to contribute to politicians such Obama, Daley and Blagojevich in the first place.

3. FISA! Here's the official Obama statement on FISA from last January:

I strongly oppose retroactive immunity in the FISA bill.

The FISA court works. The separation of power works.

No one should get a free pass to violate the basic civil liberties of the American people - not the President of the United States, and not the telecommunications companies that fell in line with his warrantless surveillance program.

Think I've yanked quotes out of context? Go on. Double check.

Back then, he was running behind. Now that he has semi-won the nomination, he has different moves. He voted in favor of a bill that gives retroactive immunity to the telecom companies, and which allows warrantless surveillance without FISA court approval.

Hillary, incidentally, voted against the measure. The Cheeto still maintains that she is worse than Obi on FISA. She also causes pimples and warts.

Why did Obama switch? I suspect the someone explained to him the nature of the NSA's new toys, which (sayeth insiders) eavesdrop on pretty much everyone all the time.

4. Campaign Finance! In November 0f 2007, Obama told Common Cause that he would accept public financing.

As of last April, however, the ground started to shift. This NYT article from that period now possesses increased amusement value in light of subsequent events. The text makes it clear that Obama had hoped to have it both ways: He wanted the proggers to think that he would always maintain his pro-public finance stance, yet he also signaled his intention to change that stance.

Three days after telling contributors at a Washington fundraiser that he believed his campaign has created “a parallel public financing system,” Mr. Obama said today that he “wasn’t trying to send a signal” about whether he intended to opt-out of the public financing system if he wins the Democratic nomination.

Witness, here, the poetry of double-talk, as illustrated by e.e. cummings in his brilliant let's start a magazine:

"...lousy with pure
reeking with stark
and fearlessly obscene

but really clean
get what I mean

...graced with guts and gutted
with grace"

squeeze your nuts and open your face

Obama removed himself from the public financing system, claiming that he had to do so in order to preserve his high ethical standards. Or something like that. Clean but obscene, know what I mean?

"We face opponents who’ve become masters at gaming this broken system. John McCain’s campaign and the Republican National Committee are fueled by contributions from Washington lobbyists and special interest PACs. And we’ve already seen that he’s not going to stop the smears and attacks from his allies running so-called 527 groups, who will spend millions and millions of dollars in unlimited donations."

Hmm. Are we to presume that the Obots would not be free to set up their own 527s? Just which smears have prompted this decision? Can Obama say that he receives no money from lobbyists and special interests?

Well, yeah, he can say that...

5. Lobby lover! In a section of his website amusingly labelled "Ethics," Obama writes:

“I am in this race to tell the corporate lobbyists that their days of setting the agenda in Washington are over. I have done more than any other candidate in this race to take on lobbyists — and won. They have not funded my campaign..."

These words would be very stirring, if they were true. At least 38 inidividuals on Team Obama are or work for lobbyists. Here is one example of the quid pro quo at work:

But last year, at the request of a hired representative for an Australian-owned chemical corporation Nufarm, Obama introduced nine separate bills exempting the company from import fees on a range of chemical ingredients it uses in the manufacture of pesticides and herbicides. Nufarm's U.S. subsidiary is based in Illinois.

Here's another:

In early May of 2006, two Washington lobbyists registered to work on behalf of Astellas Pharma, a Japanese-owned drug company which also has offices in Illinois.

The lobbyists' task? "Introduce legislation to temporarily suspend customs duties for the importation of a pharmaceutical ingredient," they wrote on their lobbying forms. Less than three weeks later, the men had earned their $20,000 fee, thanks to Obama. On May 26, he introduced S. 3155, a bill specifically exempting Astellas' key ingredient from tariff payments.

There are plenty of other examples. Obama has said:

"I don’t have ‘bundlers’ and I don’t take PAC money.”

For the truth about his bundlers, go here.

In his television and radio ads, Obama carefully noted that he took no money from "Washington lobbyists," neglecting to mention the state-based variety. That distinction does not affect his website statement, quoted above.

Those are the nominations. And the winner is...

...to be determined by you. Let's hear your ideas: Which of the top five strikes you as the worst? Should the top five be a top six, or a top seven, or a top ten? How would you expand the list?

We may also send out a special Obi award to the Obot who offers the most creative rationalization for each and every one of these fibs:

"Obama doesn't really lie, y'see. He sees more than one side of each issue. He does nuance. He's graced with guts and gutted with grace."

Squeeze your nuts and open your face.