An argument against Obama's tax plan

By GROVER G. NORQUIST | 7/11/08 4:58 AM EDT Text Size:

The Tax Policy Center and the Barack Obama

campaign used some sleight of hand this week in

Politico. To quote Eric Tolder of the TPC, “Most

small-business people, like most everyone else, are

not really high-income.” While this is true, it

completely and totally misses the point.

Let’s start with the definition of a “small business.”

The writer argues that Obama’s plan to raise taxes
on households making more than $250,000 will
raise taxes on most small-business profits in
America.
Photo: AP
Most will tell you that small-business income
constitutes income derived from sole proprietorships,
partnerships and Subchapter S corporations.

The conservative argument (and that of the John

McCain campaign) is that Obama’s stated plan to

raise taxes on households making $250,000 or more

in income is a tax increase on small business. The simple answer to this dilemma can be found in the IRS

Statistics of Income Bulletin (Table 1.4, for those who are interested).

So what do the data say?

In 2006 (the latest year available), $706 billion of such income was reported to the Internal Revenue

Service. Of this, about half was reported by households in the top marginal income tax rate. Interestingly,

two-thirds of this income was reported by households making $250,000 per year or more — the very same

households that Obama wants to increase taxes on.

See also

• VP prospects move to fix flaws

• Controversy precedes Obama Germany visit

• McCain camp reassures GOP of finances

The Obama campaign maintains that the number of small-business owners is what’s important. Economists
know what matters is the tax rate that’s applied to the bulk of small-business income. Make no mistake

about it: Obama’s plan to raise taxes on households making more than $250,000 will raise taxes on most

small-business profits in America.

What type of tax rate are we talking about? Currently, S corporations face a top tax rate of 35 percent, while

sole proprietors and general partners face a tax rate of 37.9 percent (since they’re responsible for paying

both income tax and the Medicare component of the payroll tax).

Under Obama’s plan to let the scheduled 2011 tax rate hikes occur, and his plan to raise the self-

employment tax on those making more than $250,000, the S corporation rate would rise from 35 percent to

39.6 percent. The sole proprietor and partner rate would rise from 37.9 percent all the way up to a

staggering 50.3 percent. Many Democrats in Congress have proposed making all small businesses

(including S corporations) pay this 50-plus percent rate. A small business tax rate that high would be the

highest marginal rate faced by them in nearly a quarter-century.

1 | 2 | Next Page >>

Page 2

What would a world look like where two-thirds of all small-business income would be taxed at a 50 percent

rate? The economic law that “taxing something more and getting less of it” would apply. Fewer Americans

would be interested in opening or expanding small businesses. Tax evasion and legal tax avoidance would

spike, as tax shelters would once again become a booming industry. Since small businesses create a

majority of jobs in America, Main Street closing up shop will have a direct impact on the family budget, as

well. Plants and equipment will go unused. Despite the misguided opinions of static scorers in Washington,

federal tax revenues will likely decline as the economy staggers into a full-on recession.

What’s the alternative? One place to look is the optional alternate tax system originally proposed by

Congressman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and now endorsed by McCain. It would give households (including those

with small business income) a choice between the current tax code and one with a top rate of 25 percent on

all income over $100,000. This would have the beneficial effect of lowering the tax rate on most small-

business income by 10 percentage points. Small businesses haven’t faced a tax rate that low in quite some

time and would be likely to respond with the creation of new businesses and more investment in existing
businesses.

The McCain small business tax plan doesn’t end there. For those businesses that are organized as

conventional corporations, the top tax rate would fall from 35 percent to 25 percent, the European average.

For all businesses, technology and equipment — which now must be slowly “depreciated” over many years

— would be immediately expensed in year one.

Stepping back, voters and policymakers should ask themselves whether they want two-thirds of small

business income taxed at a 50 percent tax rate or if they want nearly all small-business income taxed at a 25

percent tax rate. They should ask themselves whether it’s healthier for small businesses to write off a

computer over six calendar years or to simply write it off in year one. To America’s small business sector, the

answer is obvious.

Grover Norquist is president of Americans for Tax Reform and author of "Leave Us Alone — Getting the

Government’s Hands Off Our Money, Our Guns, Our Lives."

<< Previous | 1 | 2 |

Anatomy of a Scandal

Posted by Jeffrey Lord on 10.14.08 @ 6:09AM

There is only one word for it.

That word is "scandal."

That scandal is rapidly metastasizing, too. Overtaking you, your family, your
business, your kid's education and, last but certainly not least, the entire global
economy.

Begin with the scarlet philosophical thread that takes expression from the
following people in their own distinctive styles.

William Ayers: "I am a radical, Leftist, small 'c' communist ... Maybe I'm the last
communist who is willing to admit it….The ethics of Communism still appeal to
me."

Jeremiah Wright: "God damn America, for treating our citizens as less than
human."
Jimmy Carter: In a June 16, 1976 presentation to the Democrats' platform
committee, Carter promised that America under a Carter administration would
help the poor by putting "Greater effort to direct mortgage money into the
financing of private housing ."

Bill Clinton and Al Gore: Writing in their 1992 campaign book Putting People
First, the two promised if elected they would: "Ease the credit crunch in our inner
cities…to prevent redlining (and) require financial institutions to invest in homes
in their communities."

Franklin Raines: Like Carter, on this subject Clinton and Gore were as good as
their word, installing Clinton Budget Director Franklin Raines to run Fannie Mae
and get the job done. Raines did just what he was asked to do. As the New York
Times reported on September 30, 1999:

''Fannie Mae has expanded home ownership for millions of families in the 1990's
by reducing down payment requirements,'' said Franklin D. Raines, Fannie Mae's
chairman and chief executive officer. ''Yet there remain too many borrowers
whose credit is just a notch below what our underwriting has required who have
been relegated to paying significantly higher mortgage rates in the so-called
subprime market."

Barack Obama: "I've been fighting alongside ACORN on issues you care about my
entire career."

And last but not least…

ACORN: As Stanley Kurtz over at NRO and Sol Stern of City Journal have both
uncovered, a driving force of ACORN -- quite aside from accusations that it has
engaged in massive fraud in registering voters -- has been to exert political
pressure on banks to give loans to those otherwise unqualified. In the name, of
course, of fairness. Reported Stern on ACORN back in 2003:

ACORN's anti-capitalism leads it to deep distrust of capitalism's central

instruments -- the banks and other financial institutions that ACORN would class
high among those "irresponsible… largest businesses." ACORN loudly campaigns
against "predatory lending," "redlining," and other forms of presumed abuse by
financial institutions that supposedly hinder the minority poor from getting the
capital needed for home buying and business start-ups. As an antidote, ACORN
has latched on to a 1977 federal law, the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA),
which was aimed at ensuring that banks do not discriminate against poor
minority communities. Under its rules, banks must go through a costly process of
reporting where and to whom they lend money, to show that they don't
discriminate. There are no official penalties for banks that get less than
satisfactory ratings from the regulators on this issue. But when banks need
approval for mergers or acquisitions, the CRA gives "community groups" the
opportunity to lodge complaints against them, alleging suspect lending practices.
If there's even the appearance of discrimination, the regulators may put the
bank's deal on hold.

How did the banks respond to this political pressure from ACORN to lend money
to financially unqualified applicants? Says Stern:

ACORN has developed a lucrative niche as an "advisor" to banks seeking

regulatory approvals. Thus we have J. P. Morgan & Company, the legatee of the
man who once symbolized for many all that was supposedly evil about American
capitalism, suddenly donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to ACORN. This
act of generosity and civic-mindedness came, interestingly, just as Morgan was
asking bank regulators for approval of a merger with Chase Manhattan. Not to be
outdone, Chase also decided to grant more than $200,000 to ACORN.

Stern concludes by quoting one "prominent consultant to the financial industry,

who preferred to remain anonymous" as saying this: "The banks know they are
being held up, but they are not going to fight over this. They look at it as a cost of
doing business."

The cost of doing business. Wow. Remember that the next time you look at what's
left of your portfolio.

Paying what amounts to blackmail money to appease the political pressures from
ACORN -- while letting ACORN have their way with banks and financial
institutions -- has now, incredibly, helped bring millions of Americans -- perhaps
you, dear reader -- to the brink of bankruptcy. Stocks, mutual funds, 401k's,
pensions, credit -- the financial guts of a family, a business, and in turn the
underlying financial foundation of the U.S. government itself -- are now in
serious, serious trouble. Entire Wall Street institutions are utterly collapsed.
Somewhere Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright are surely laughing hysterically.

This is in real part because of ACORN, the self-same organization that is now
being investigated for massive voter fraud in key electoral states from
Pennsylvania to Nevada. The same organization which Barack Obama himself
once counseled in his role as a "community organizer." (You wanted to know
what a community organizer does? Look at the condition of your 401k and you
will now get it immediately.) And, not to be forgotten, ACORN shares some shade
of the philosophical thread that runs in varying hues from the blood red fuses of
Bill Ayers bombs to the purple prose of Jeremiah Wright's sermons to the
housing policies advocated and implemented by Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and
Al Gore and defended by Barney Frank and Chris Dodd and an army of
Democrats captured on videotape.

DO YOU GET the picture here? Do you see the thread? William Ayers thought
America was so unfair he became a self-described "radical Leftist" who expressed
his views on American capitalism by bombing the U.S. Capitol and the Pentagon.
Jeremiah Wright his pulpit to preach that America was so unfair because it
treated our own citizens as "less than human." Jimmy Carter was so disturbed at
the lack of fairness in the free market he vowed that if he were elected president
in 1976 he would put "greater effort" into making sure the government could
"direct mortgage money" to housing for the poor. He was as good as his word,
getting the Community Reinvestment Act passed in 1977. The purpose of the
Carter legislation was to reduce "discriminatory" credit practices affecting the
poor. Like clockwork, this in turn opened the door for ACORN. Fannie Mae boss
Franklin Raines, the Clinton appointee who walked away from the agency with
$90 million, was so intent on making things fair for those "millions of families"
unable to buy homes (as Clinton and Gore had promised in 1992) that he reduced
"down payment requirements," a key tenet of ACORN.

Here's Stanley Kurtz -- way back in May -- on the findings of his investigation
into Barack Obama and ACORN: "Obama's ties to Acorn -- arguably the most
politically radical large-scale activist group in the country -- are wide, deep, and
longstanding."

In other words, working with ACORN was part of Obama's self-appointed role as
a "community organizer." Long before having any association with ACORN had
the serious potential, as it now suddenly very much does, of being a political
liability, Obama sought and received the endorsement of its political arm for his
presidential campaign. These were his old buddies, so, of course, he got it. Why
not? After all, in his own words at the time:

"I come out of a grassroots organizing background. That's what I did for three
and half years before I went to law school. That's the reason I moved to Chicago
was to organize. So this is something that I know personally, the work you do, the
importance of it. I've been fighting alongside ACORN on issues you care about my
entire career. Even before I was an elected official, when I ran Project Vote voter
registration drive in Illinois, ACORN was smack dab in the middle of it, and we
appreciate your work."

Are we clear here? Barack Obama not only was the counsel for ACORN as part of
his "community organizer" role he considered "the work you do" important. Said
he: "We appreciate your work." He was proud to be "fighting alongside ACORN
on issues" it cared about. And what do we now know the results of ACORN's work
and its issues to be? Starkly and very simply put they have:

1. Undermined the financial stability of you, your family, your business and your
government with a financial collapse unrivaled since the Great Depression.

2. Flooded battleground states in this election with a massive attempt at

fraudulent voter registration that is on the verge of stealing the presidency of the
United States for Obama.

One question.
WHERE IS JOHN McCAIN?????????

This is a blossoming scandal that will make Watergate look like a piker. And
someone has the …pardon me, but the word that comes to mind is "stupidity"….
to say that Ayers and Wright and the ideology of what and why they did what they
did have no connection to where we are right this minute? Are they kidding? That
bright, scarlet philosophical thread that runs straight from the bombs of Bill
Ayers to the sermons of Jeremiah Wright to the political shenanigans of Jimmy
Carter, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Barney Frank and Chris Dodd has gradually
revealed itself to be a very long fuse to a spectacular explosion of financial and
political scandal. An explosion linking everything from the political blackmail of
institutions like J.P. Morgan to the financial manipulations of Franklin Raines
and Fannie Mae and stunningly connects to ACORN and Obama himself. Last
and certainly not least, this same fuse led directly to the destruction of your
personal wealth -- your money -- and is even now poised to steal your votes and
destroy the possibility of an honest election.

Two points:

* If the McCain campaign cannot connect all these dots for voters -- in the last
debate, on the stump, in its commercials and with its surrogates -- this will go
down in history as a spectacular example of political malpractice.

* Second, and without question of more importance. If in fact this election

produces a majority for Obama from voters who do not yet see the connection
between ACORN, Obama, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Fannie Mae and the
resulting status of their own personal financial well-being and that of, quite
literally, the entire global economy, there are two words for the day after an
Obama election. With a tip of the hat to Ben Stein they are these:

Special Prosecutor.

Letter to the Editor

Ayers Brothers Led Annenberg Grantees and Contributed to Obama

Friday, October 17, 2008
By Fred Lucas, Staff Writer
 Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama exits his campaign plane, Oct. 17, 2008. (AP Photo)
(CNSNews.com) – Both William Ayers and his brother, John Ayers, ran organizations that
received grants from the Chicago Annenberg Challenge run by Barack Obama, and both
also contributed to at least one of Obama’s political campaigns.

William Ayers is a one-time leader of the Weather Underground domestic terrorist group that
in the 1970s took credit for bombing the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol. “I don’t regret setting
bombs,” Ayers told the New York Times in 2001 about his experience with the Weathermen.
“I feel we didn’t do enough.”

In 1995, Obama, then a Chicago lawyer, received an early boost in his initial bid for the
Illinois State Senate, when he went to a political meeting at Ayers’ home.

From 1995 through 2001, Obama was chairman of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge
(CAC), a foundation that gave away $49.2 million to promote improvement in Chicago’s
public school. At the same time, Ayers served as chairman of the Chicago Schools
Collaborative, an arm of the CAC that set its education policy.

From 1992 through 2002, Ayers was also the co-director of a group called the Small Schools
Workshop, which promoted public schools that advanced themes such as peace studies,
multiculturalism and environmentalism.

From 1998-2002, the CAC gave the Small Schools Workshop at least $800,000 in grants,
according to publicly available IRS 990 forms filed by the CAC.

In 2001, according to the records of the Illinois State Board of Elections, Ayers made a $200
contribution to Obama’s state senate campaign.

Ayers’ brother, John, has made a total of $2,445 in contributions to Obama’s U.S. Senate
campaign and presidential campaign.
On May 5, 2003, John Ayers contributed $250 to the Senate race. On May 14, 2003, he
contributed $1,000 to the Senate campaign. On January 24, 2004, he gave $200 to the
Senate race. On Feb. 24, 2004, he gave $200 to the Senate race. On March 2, 2004, he
contributed $250 to the Senate race. On Dec. 20, 2007, he gave $245 to the presidential
race. On July 31, 2008, he contributed $300 to the presidential campaign.

John Ayers served for 10 years as executive director of Leadership for Quality Education, a
Chicago group that promotes charter schools and small public schools. In 1998, when John
Ayers was there, the Obama-led CAC gave Leadership for Quality Education an $85,000
grant.

William Ayers’ $200 donation to Obama’s state senate campaign in 2001 is the only
campaign contribution he made to Obama.

Neither John Ayers nor William Ayers could be reached for comment on this story despite
numerous phone messages and e-mails sent to them by CNSNews.com.

John Ayers is no longer with the Leadership for Quality Education. He is now with the
National Association of Charter School Authorities.

The Ayers brothers are the sons of Thomas Ayers, who served as chairman and CEO of
Commonwealth Edison in the 1970s. The elder Ayers died on June 8, 2007 at age 92 from
congestive heart failure.

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Home » AIM Column » Was a Communist Obama’s Sex Teacher?

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Was a Communist Obama’s Sex Teacher?

October 14, 2008
Why Doesn’t McCain Fight Back?
October 12, 2008
McCain Follows Obama Down Socialist Road
October 8, 2008
The Rise and Fall of Fox News
October 5, 2008
The Audacity of Tenure
October 2, 2008

Visit the complete AIM Column archives.

Was a Communist Obama’s Sex Teacher?

AIM Column | By Cliff Kincaid | October 14, 2008

While Rush Limbaugh mentioned this matter on the air on his Tuesday show,
some others in the conservative media are unwilling to cover it.

Senator John McCain won’t talk about Barack Obama’s racist Reverend Jeremiah Wright, an adviser to
Obama for 20 years. This may be a factor in McCain losing the election. But the McCain campaign has done
a few ads about Obama associate Bill Ayers. These ads, as well as the media coverage of the “radical”
Ayers, fail to tell the human story of the carnage and suffering that Ayers and his wife, Bernardine Dohrn,
inflicted on innocent people.

But even more scandalous than the relationship with Ayers and Dohrn, members of the communist terrorist
Weather Underground, was Obama’s association as a young man with a Communist sex pervert, Frank
Marshall Davis. Rush Limbaugh mentioned this on the air on his Tuesday radio show. It is a story that has
the potential to change the course of the presidential campaign.

In terms of the Bill Ayers controversy, Police Sergeant Brian V. McDonnell was one of the victims of the
Weather Underground, a group that took direction from Castro’s intelligence service, the DGI.
McDonnell was only 45 years old and it took two days for him to die from the injuries caused by the shrapnel
in the bomb that was reportedly planted by Dohrn.

Now, one of the officers under the command of Sgt. McDonnell has come forward to describe what
happened on the terrible day that the bomb went off.

“On February 16, 1970, my partner and I were on the 1700 block of Haight St., in San Francisco,
Calif., when a bomb went off at Park Police Station, where I was assigned,” says retired San Francisco
Police Department Sergeant James R. Pera. “My partner and I were the first car on the scene and the first
sight that we saw, upon arrival in the parking lot of the station, was a friend of ours getting up off the ground.
His partner was still on the ground, propped up on one arm and dazed. They had been blown to the ground
by the concussion of the bomb that had been placed on the window sill of the station…”

He goes on, “Sergeant McDonnell’s Police Car, which was placed between the window sill, where the bomb
was, and the car that my two fellow policemen were preparing to get into, took the brunt of the blast and
saved them from death. The inside of the station looked like it had been hit by a couple of hand grenades,
windows shattered, blood on the pock-marked walls and dazed cops wandering around disoriented. The
bomb was so powerful that fragments, which consisted of barbed wire fence post staples, were found on the
roof of Polytechnic High School which was located across Kezar Stadium and Frederick St., approximately
two blocks away. Polytechnic High School was three stories high. It has since been replaced by a housing
complex.”

Pera points out that the evidence, which has been covered extensively by Accuracy in Media, implicates
Dohrn directly in placing the bomb and Ayers in knowledge of the bombing. Still, they have never been
charged.

Ayers and Dohrn, you see, are husband and wife and can’t be compelled to testify against one another. The
evidence of their involvement came from an FBI informant in the Weather Underground. His testimony, given
before Congress, would be dismissed by clever Marxist lawyers as “hearsay.” Murder charges would have to
be based on other, possibly forensic, evidence. It is never too late to bring murder charges in this case.

McDonnell spent two days in the hospital trying to recover. In the end, he died from the injuries.

Meanwhile, as Pera points out, “Ayers and his wife Dohrn enjoy a comfortable life in Chicago and he is
employed as a college professor. They are beneficiaries of a lifestyle afforded to them and made possible by
the same government that they sought to destroy. How ironic. Furthermore, Ayers has been a highly visible
figure in community organizing in Chicago. He has been an ally and indeed a friend of political figures. One
such figure, Barack Obama, even had his first campaign for public office, to the Illinois State Legislature,
launched in Ayers living room.”

Pera believes that Barack Obama owes the public a full and complete explanation of his association with
Ayers and Dohrn. He’s clearly not interested in stories about Ayers doing charitable work in the field of
“education reform” and being a “citizen of the year” in Chicago.

At the same time, in another major scandal involving Obama, the tabloid National Enquirer has seized upon
the Frank Marshall Davis story in its October 20 issue. It glosses over his Communist Party membership and
focuses instead on his role as sex pervert, pedophile, pornographer and mentor to Obama. This
“exclusive” was actually broken wide open by my group America’s Survival, Inc. weeks ago. Andrew
Walden of the Hawaii Free Press, an expert on the history and influence of the Communist Party in Hawaii,
obtained and examined Davis’s Sex Rebel book. Before that, Toby Harnden of the London Daily Telegraph
had written a story about the book and Davis. “Mr. Davis would cruise in Hawaii parks looking for couples or
female tourists to have sex with. He derived sexual gratification from bondage, simulated rape and being
flogged and urinated on,” Harnden reported.

You have to wonder, of course, whether an Enquirer story is true or not. This one is definitely true. There is
no question that Davis wrote Sex Rebel under a pseudonym. Some excerpts of the Sex Rebel book are
available on my website. Caution: the material is for adults only.

While Rush Limbaugh mentioned this matter on the air on his Tuesday show, some others in the
conservative media are unwilling to cover it. Bill O’Reilly in particular seems fearful of getting into it. On other
occasions, however, Fox News is eager and willing to cover sex scandals.

Obama, of course, can’t be held responsible for the fact that his grandfather, Stanley Dunham, turned him
over to an admitted child molester at the tender age of 10 for guidance. But it is a fact that Davis was his
mentor. Not even Obama supporters dispute this anymore. Basic journalism would dictate, therefore, asking
why Obama only referred to Davis in one of his books as “Frank” and what influence he had over Obama
during eight formative years of his life in Hawaii. Was Davis Obama’s sex teacher? Did he influence Obama
to take liberal views on such matters as homosexuality and abortion? This possibility makes the Davis-
Obama relationship one of national political importance.

What exactly happened in Davis’s home? We know from the record that Davis and Dunham drank alcohol
and smoked pot together. Obama admits drinking with Davis as well and going on to smoke marijuana and
use cocaine. What else happened between them besides listening to Davis’s poetry?

In terms of shaping Obama’s world view, Davis may have had as much influence as Wright. Indeed, both
Davis and Wright expressed anti-white views and sentiments, and that linkage is significant. It connects
Hawaii to Chicago.

The sex part makes some people squirm. We don’t want to consider the implications. But Obama is running
for the office of president of the United States. We are supposed to have the right to know.

Davis led “a secret double life,” the online version of the Enquirer story notes. True. But the story also notes
that “Obama has been extremely secretive about the true nature of his experience with the self-admitted
deviant.” This is also true. And this is why this terribly troubling story just won’t go away. There are too many
questions that deserve answers.

One has to wonder if there is anything in Obama’s medical records that may shed light on any of this. But
while McCain made available to selected press people more than one thousand pages of his medical
records, in order to reassure the public about the effects of his age, war injuries, and battle with cancer,
Obama hasn’t released a single page. Instead, a sympathetic doctor merely released a 276-word
“summary,” claiming he was in excellent health. This came after the Boston Globe reported that the Obama
campaign had announced “plans to release his medical records” at the end of May. So much for truth and
candor.

Obama appears to be vigorous and in good health. But others say that he appears frail and thin. He has
admittedly fought a nicotine addiction and been a secret smoker and says he quit illegal drugs when he was
20. In terms of family history, Obama’s mother died at the age of 52 because of ovarian cancer.

A one-page summary, of course, has been enough to satisfy the pro-Obama media, despite the broken
campaign promise to release the records themselves.

If the truth about Obama and his associates is ever going to come out, it will have to come in response to
increasing demands for the facts from the American people. The problem is that, as more is known and
discovered, more questions emerge.

GOP rep on Obama's 'anti-American views’

By ANDY BARR | 10/17/08 6:45 PM EDT Text Size:

Republican Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann (Minn.) accused Barack Obama Friday of holding “anti-

American” sentiments.

“I'm very concerned that he may have anti-American views,” Bachmann said on MSNBC’s Hardball. “That's

what the American people are concerned about. That’s why they want to know what his answers are.”

“In his book, Barack Obama had pointed to Jeremiah Wright as one of his mentors and also Father Pfleger

as one of his mentors. Two of the three mentors are Father Pfleger and Jeremiah Wright. Now, these are

very strange, anti-American mentors,” Bachmann continued.

“Barack Obama has been associating with anti-Americans, by and large -- the people who are radical

leftists. That's the real question about Barack Obama.”

Bachmann said that Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s assertion that Obama has been

“palling around with terrorists” was a “fair comment.”

The Minnesota Republican also insisted that several members of Congress have an “anti-American nature”

though declined to name any.