President Obama actually linked more government spending with a possible cure for cancer in his 2010 State of the Union address.

Next, we need to encourage American innovation. Last year, we made the largest investment in basic research funding in history – an investment that could lead to the world’s cheapest solar cells or treatment that kills cancer cells but leaves healthy ones untouched. And no area is more ripe for such innovation than energy. You can see the results of last year’s investment in clean energy – in the North Carolina company that will create 1200 jobs nationwide helping to make advanced batteries; or in the California business that will put 1,000 people to work making solar panels.

Yes, folks if the government would just spend more of your tax dollars on pet projects inserted into legislation by Senators and Congressmen we may just cure cancer.

Interestingly (and disturbingly) this is not the first time a Democrat has made the claim of miraculous healing being the direct result of increased government spending.  Presidential hopeful and National Enquirer star John Edwards made the same claim at a rally in Iowa during the 2004 campaign.

If we do the work that we can do in this country, the work that we will do when John Kerry is president, people like Christopher Reeve are going to walk, get up out of that wheelchair and walk again.

I cannot imagine the media fallout if a Republican were to make either of those statements.  Politicians need to be held accountable for outrageous statements like these.  If accountability will not happen in the press then it needs to happen at the ballot box.

BUCHAREST, Romania – Was a top contender for the Romanian presidency zapped out of the race by a shadowy parapsychologist enlisted by his rival?

The claim might be dismissed as preposterous in most other European Union countries. But here in Romania, home of Dracula and other occult traditions, Mircea Geoana’s assertion that a “negative energy attack’’ led to his narrow loss to reelected President Traian Basescu has been the talk of the nation.

“The Evil Witch defeated Geoana,’’ wrote the daily Evenimentul Zilei in a recent commentary typical of the buzz. “Romanian politicians really believe that magic forces can make you president or can destroy you.

“May the Force be with us!’’

Like most former Soviet bloc nations, Romania is used to rough and tumble politics and the first claims and counterclaims after Basescu’s narrow Dec. 6 runoff victory were nothing out of the ordinary, with Geoana’s people complaining of massive fraud.

Then came the startling allegation: Geoana, in media interviews last week, asserted that he was targeted by waves of negative energy during a key debate just before the runoff that was won by Basescu.

“People who were working for Basescu in this domain were present to the right of the camera,’’ Geoana told Antena 3 Television. His wife, Mihaela said Geoana “was very badly attacked, he couldn’t concentrate.’’

At first Romanians mocked their former foreign minister saying he was a bad loser. Basescu himself jokingly dismissed the allegations. But the recent publication of photos showing well-known parapsychologist Aliodor Manolea close to Basescu during the campaign has caused Romanians to wonder whether the president really did put a hex on his rival.

The photos show Manolea, a slightly built, bearded man with a round face and cropped receding hair, walking yards behind Basescu ahead of the debate. Manolea’s specialties include deep mind control, clairvoyance, and hypnotic trance, according to the Romanian Association of Transpersonal Psychology.

For weeks, Basescu’s office declined to comment on Manolea, with officials referring inquiries to the Liberal Democratic Party that supported the president. Officials there gave evasive answers, but not outright denials.

Read the full story:

http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2010/01/24/occult_cited_in_romanian_election/

Hope and change.  These are the two words that candidate Barack Obama used to win the White House in 2008.  They are simple and elegant.  This mantra was the campaign’s biggest strength, but it will also prove to be its biggest weakness.

The words are simple, but they are hollow and meaningless.  You must define them for yourself to make them relevant in the context of the election.  People across the nation did just that.  I remember seeing a video clip during the campaign that showed a woman overjoyed with the thought of Obama being elected president.  She went on to give her definition of “hope and change” which included the new administration paying her mortgage.  Thus “hope and change” became a like a blank list for Santa Claus in the minds of many Americans and the sky was the limit.  Now the reality of “hope and change” is hitting them hard.  People are now realizing the emptiness of the words they vigorously chanted in 2008.  A once powerful phrase in which millions of Americans invested so much time, energy, and emotion for candidate Obama.  It was an eloquently delivered phrase that stirred the emotion and optimism of a nation.

This same phrase that was once a honey pot for the Democrats has now become a time bomb.  The fact that candidate Obama let people define “hope and change” for themselves will prove to be fatal.  It was terrific during the campaign.  It meant whatever you wanted it to mean.  Unfortunately for him this has been a disaster since he took office with statewide elections in New Jersey, Virginia, and now Massachusetts being handed to the GOP.  Obviously he is not meeting the stratospheric expectations of the independent and moderate Democrat voters who put him in the Oval Office.  How could he?  When people expect you to literally pay their bills for them and you have no way to deliver on that expectation you are in severe trouble.

Can Obama pull out of the political nose dive he finds himself in now?  Probably, but the damage has already been done.  His political capital runs lower and lower with each defeat at the ballot box and in the halls of Congress.  President Obama has pledged he will aggressively “double down” regarding his agenda after Scott Brown’s senate victory in Massachusetts and there is no doubt the news media will assist him as much as they can.  But, the emotional investment in “hope and change” by many was enormous and we are beginning to find out that Hell hath no fury like a voter scorned.

City council members in Marietta, Ga., will consider changing the oath of office that the city’s police officers take so that recruits can swear to uphold the law without saying the phrase “so help me God.”

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,576436,00.html?test=latestnews