*And what our president shouldn’t have done. I’ll admit this could be a very long list. But I’m thinking specifically of his decision to renege on a commitment to attend ceremonies in Germany next week, marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. This was one of the greatest symbolic victories of freedom over communism in my lifetime. I’m sorry and a bit ashamed that our president thought going to Copenhagen to lobby for the Olympics in Chicago was more worthy of his time.

*The biggest deficit in 60 years. The U.S. Treasury Department reported that the budget deficit for fiscal 2009, which ended Sept. 30, hit the astronomical total of $1.4 trillion. The number is the most red ink we’ve incurred since World War II and represents 10 percent of the gross domestic product of this country. That’s our money they’re using to buy those votes, friends.

*The “Mouth of the South” on getting by. Ted Turner says things just aren’t the same for him anymore. He’s lost CNN, the Atlanta Braves, Jane Fonda and much of his money. But he adds, “You know, if you economize and don’t buy new airplanes or long-range jets, or that sort of thing, you can get by on a billion or two.” Thanks for the inspiring advice, Ted.

—Chip Wood

Thank you for reminding us that it’s not just Barack Obama’s policies that are often wrong; it is the people who surround him that are a large part of the problem.

Thank you for writing the bestselling book, Culture of Corruption, to give us the documented proof, as you put it, of the “tax cheats, crooks and cronies” with whom he has chosen to associate.

And thank you for granting an exclusive interview to Personal Liberty Digest, so we can remind our 500,000 subscribers of just how dangerous many of those people and programs are.

One of the first things Michelle and I discussed when we spoke was the mainstream media’s fawning favoritism toward Barack Obama and his administration and their relentless bias against anyone and anything to the right of Nancy Pelosi.

As just one example, Michelle described how the New York Times sold millions of dollars worth of Obama memorabilia during and after the campaign. I asked her, “Isn’t it a little unusual for a major media to profit so directly from a candidate?”

“You would think so,” was her sardonic reply. “But if you’ll take a look at my blog ( www.michellemalkin.com ), you’ll be able to see some of the actual merchandise, which really, literally deifies Barack Obama. There are glorious, glowing photos of the president with halos behind him. All sorts of political swag promoting his campaign and then the inauguration.”

And then she made this very telling point: “Imagine if a newspaper out there had been doing this during the Bush years—selling merchandise that glorified George W. and his candidacy. Why, the New York Times would have been all over it.”

By the way, one of the things the Times has not been all over is Michelle Malkin’s book. When we spoke, Culture of Corruption had been riding atop the NYT’s own bestseller list for almost two months. But the paper itself has never published a review of it. Imagine that. The newspaper’s own survey ranked her book No. 1 in sales across the country yet refused to even review it!

We talked for a while about the incredible bias and intellectual dishonesty of the left. Then I asked her if she detected a growing tone of desperation in their attacks on conservatives.

“I certainly do,” she said. “The left simply cannot help itself. They degenerate into ad hominem attacks and very ugly language, bigotry and intolerance. Even with their control of the White House and both branches of Congress they can’t contain themselves.

“We’ve seen this in their attacks and their rhetoric against the townhall protestors and the TEA Party movement. Their knee-jerk resort to things like the race card. It belies the promise that under Obama we were heading into a post-racial era in this country. We certainly are not. The first thing they do is accuse us of racism, whether it’s our criticism of healthcare legislation or Joe Wilson’s calling out of the president during his speech to a joint session of Congress. There is more than a smidge of desperation in their tactics.”

There are nine chapters in Culture of Corruption and every one of them is loaded with facts and anecdotes that need to be more widely known. But if there is one chapter that, by itself, is worth the price of the book and then some, it’s the second one, which she calls “First Crony Michelle Obama.”

As author Michelle puts it, “Star-struck liberal journalists swoon over Michelle O.’s bare arms, but it’s her bare-knuckles they should be watching.”

Here’s how the bestselling author put it during our discussion: “The mainstream media pays a lot of attention to Michelle Obama’s toned arms and what shoes she’s wearing. I pay a lot more attention to the political muscle she has flexed over the years. There’s been a lot of white-washing of her own political history. But what she does is marry a lot of the hard-left ideology—the class warfare, the politics of racial resentment—with the Chicago way of hardball tactics, cracking heads and cracking knuckles.”

Her book is loaded with carefully documented exposés of activities by both Obamas that will shock even the most cynical observer. If you doubt that, just turn to page 52 of Culture of Corruption and read the section that begins “Mrs. O. Screws the Poor.” I have to confess, even I didn’t realize what a sordid history the First Lady has.

Bring any of this up publicly, of course, and you can count on Obama’s defenders to smear you mercilessly. As Michelle Malkin put it when we talked, “These are the folks who called their opponents ‘political terrorists.’ That phrase was used not just by Democrat leaders, but of course by all their satellite organizations as well.”

One of the most powerful and dangerous of those satellites is the Service Employees International Union (SEIU)—a group that poured $60 million to $80 million into Democrat coffers to get Barack Obama elected. Their investment is paying off handsomely, as their legislative agenda is on the front burner of the White House. In fact, we just learned that SEIU president Andy Stern has been the most frequent visitor to the White House thus far this year.

“The SEIU not only uses these bully tactics,” Michelle told me, “they specialize in them. It wasn’t until some of their henchmen showed up at various town hall meetings that we saw actual violence.”

She then continued: “The SEIU, which calls itself the purple shirts of the purple army, has a long and proud history of thug tactics. Their president is quoted in my book about his organizing philosophy, where he says they prefer to use the power of persuasion. But if that doesn’t work, they will use the persuasion of power. That’s not just an idle threat, that’s a guarantee.

“It’s not just healthcare they want. Their holy grail is the card-check bill. If they get it, it will radically transform the political landscape. They now have 1.8 million members and they see card check as the way to vastly inflate their membership rolls and subsequently, of course, their campaign coffers.”

Bad as it has been, Michelle expects the use of terror and intimidation to get worse.

“Team Obama is notorious for that,” she explained, “going back to the campaign days of trying to stifle dissent through shear intimidation. Now they are using the power of government to try to silence their opponents as well.”

As we came near the end of our interview, I asked Michelle about the dedication of her book. “The book is dedicated to the whistleblowers,” she explained. “Many of them worked in the trenches for Barack Obama’s satellite organizations. They saw the raft of broken promises that he’s left over the past several months on transparency, ethics and accountability; core issues that transcend partisanship and ideology.”

And then she concluded, “If Barack Obama can’t deliver on these, what does it tell you about the era of hope and change? It tells you that it was a complete farce. That is what my book documents, extensively and comprehensively.”

As I said, there’s lots of scary stuff between the covers of Culture of Corruption. Michelle Malkin has done us all a huge service in compiling the sorry, shoddy record of the Obamas and those they have invited into their inner circle.

Since we spoke, her book has slipped a bit on the bestseller lists. If you don’t already own a copy, do yourself and your country a favor and order one. In fact, order several and loan the extras to some less-alarmed friends. Believe me, if they’ll read it, Culture of Corruption will act like a very loud alarm bell going off alongside their head.

Go wake them up! And until next time, keep some powder dry.

—Chip Wood

Among various special editions that have been issued, Neiman Marcus offered one in their 1978 Christmas Wish Book where every element—board, tokens, cards, dice and money—was made of chocolate. Then in 2000, F.A.O. Schwartz toy company produced a “One of a Kind” Monopoly set. The department store topped the hotels and houses with emeralds and sapphires. It also made the tokens of solid gold, and the money was real currency. For $100,000, you could take it home.

Before the collapse of communism you could buy a version of Monopoly in Russian, which strikes me as pretty ironic. And Mad Magazine once created an anti-Monopoly game, where the objective was to lose all of your money as quickly as possible.

The best-known edition of Monopoly is the original “Atlantic City” version. The city’s streets, railroads and utilities were chosen by Charles Darrow, the game’s inventor, long before Donald Trump and numerous casinos transformed the town. Boardwalk and Park Place were the most valuable properties, with Baltic and Mediterranean Avenues the least desirable.

If you managed to buy up all properties of one color (or all railroads, or utilities), you had a monopoly and could jack up the rents. The goal of the game, after all, was to bankrupt your opponents and grab all of their money. (Bet you never thought about the anti-capitalist philosophy behind the game, did you?)

One of the problems with Monopoly is that the game can take forever to play. (Hasbro, the game’s current owner, says the longest one on record lasted 1,680 hours.) Most contests today have a time limit—two hours at the national championships.

—Chip Wood

It was on Oct. 30, 1938 that Orson Welles produced a radio drama for CBS called The War of the Worlds. The studio duplication of a live newscast was so realistic that thousands of people did not realize the program was a play. Instead, they honestly believed that Martians had landed in a field in northern New Jersey and were dispatching everything the U.S. military sent against them.

Recordings of that original broadcast (available through most public libraries) sound convincing to this day. Check one out and see if you don’t agree.

And here’s some less frightening news: Statisticians tell us that Nov. 1 is the best day of the year to purchase stocks. This is probably because September and October are historically the worst two months of the year for the stock market.

Thus, they form a bottom from which the following six months, starting with November, have got to be better. Will that be true again this year? Time will tell.

—Chip Wood

In his address to the nation, Kennedy said that the United States would implement a blockade of Cuba until the missiles were removed. The next day, the Organization of American States passed a resolution unanimously approving the U.S. quarantine of Cuba—something that would never happen today. The measure authorized the U.S. to use military force to prevent the shipment of more offensive weapons to Cuba.

When a Soviet ship challenged the blockade on Oct. 24, all U.S. military forces went to DEFCON 2, the highest military alert ever reached in the postwar era. The U.S. and the USSR appeared poised for full-scale war.

Two days later, on Oct. 26, a deal was struck between the two powers. The Soviet Union agreed to remove its missiles from Cuba. Castro pledged not to accept any more offensive weapons. And in turn, the U.S. promised to stop any efforts to overthrow Castro or to invade Cuba. Forty-seven years later, the Castro brothers are still in power. And the Cuban people are still enslaved.

—Chip Wood

His very own Nobel Peace Prize. Imagine that!

And what has our president done to deserve this lofty honor? Why, in the words of an infamous “Saturday Night Live” sketch, nothing, absolutely nothing. I’ll come back to that hilarious skit in a moment. But first, let’s look a little closer at the curious timing of Obama’s award.

Did you know that the Nobel Committee’s own regulations require that all nominations be postmarked by Feb. 1? This means that—if the rules were followed—Barack Obama was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize a mere 12 days after he was sworn into office.

Twelve days in office and he’s already being considered for a Nobel Peace Prize? Give me a break! Does anyone anywhere really believe that this is how it actually happened?

Let me suggest something that strikes me as incredibly obvious: The Nobel Committee broke its own rules to give Obama the award. Can’t you imagine a committee meeting with someone shouting the Norwegian equivalent of “Rules? Rules? We don’t need no stinkin’ rules.”

And of course it’s true. When it comes to honoring one of their own, and advancing the cause of their dubious socialist schemes, the elitists of the international left don’t need no stinkin’ rules. They can do whatever they want. That’s why they hate the very idea of being bound down by the chains of a constitution. These power-hungry sycophants always and everywhere love monopolies and dictatorships, so long as it’s one of their own who is in charge. That’s why they are so enraptured with the United Nations.

But I digress. The plain and simple fact is that this year’s selection was rigged. This is far from the first time that the noble idea of a “peace prize” was prostituted to serve the ignoble ambitions of the left.

Do you remember in 1994, when the Nobel Committee gave the honor to a thief and murderer named Yasser Arafat? It’s true that Arafat shared the award with the then-prime minister and foreign minister of Israel. But still, giving a “peace” prize to the father of modern terrorism? Arafat gloated about using the most heinous murder of innocent civilians to advance his aims.

Oh, by the way, he also stole tens of millions of dollars from the very Palestinians he supposedly led to finance a life of luxury on the French Riviera and various world capitals. In a sane world, he would have been tried for murder and executed.

Instead, he was the most frequent visitor to Bill Clinton’s White House among all so-called world leaders. What a travesty.

If that wasn’t enough to make you rush to the nearest vomitorium, how about the winners in 1973? In case you’ve forgotten, that’s when Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and North Vietnam’s Lu Duc Tho shared the award for negotiating the Vietnam peace accords. If you remember that Communists describe “peace” as “when all opposition has been eliminated,” then you’ll have to admit the committee got it right: Kissinger and gang made sure all opposition to a communist takeover of South Vietnam got slaughtered. Way to go, Mr. Secretary.

But you don’t have to be a mass murderer, or even open the door to it, to be honored by the Nobel Committee. Slavish devotion to the left’s latest cause is often enough. How else would you explain the selection two years ago of former Vice President Al Gore? Even if you bought into all the skewed science and deliberate deceptions in “An Inconvenient Truth,” can you really contend with a straight face that he deserved a Nobel Peace Prize?

Well, okay, I’ll grant you. He has done more to earn it than our Teleprompter-in-Chief. But that’s not saying much.

By an extraordinary coincidence, two days before the award was announced, “Saturday Night Live” opened its Oct. 3 show with a skit skewering Barack Obama for accomplishing “nothing, absolutely nothing” since Inauguration Day.

In case you missed it, the sketch featured actor Fred Armisen portraying the president and delivering a very sober speech to the American public. Here’s just part of that delicious put-down:

“There are those on the right who are angry. They think that I’m turning this great country into something that resembles the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany. But that’s just not the case. When you look at my record, it’s very clear what I’ve done so far—and that is nothing. Nada. Almost one year and nothing to show for it.”

As he spoke, a checklist of promises appeared on the screen—global warming, immigration reform, gays in the military, limits on executive power, torture prosecutions, closing Guantanamo Bay, withdrawing from Iraq, healthcare reform, and so on. Armisen, as Obama, admitted very honestly how little his administration had accomplished.

“Remember,” he said. “I can do whatever I want. I have a majority in both houses of Congress. I could make it mandatory for all gays to marry, and require all cars to run on marijuana. But do I? NO!”

He then closed with this wonderful admission: “So looking at this list, I’m seeing two big accomplishments: JACK and SQUAT!”

You’ve got to admit, sometimes the liberals get it right.

Until next time, keep some powder dry.

—Chip Wood

*If you’re known by your friends… Although it didn’t get much publicity, I thought you’d like to know about the tirade Libya’s Muammar Qadhafi delivered at the United Nations last month. He was allotted 15 minutes to speak but ranted on for over an hour and a half. Among the highlights: Israel plotted the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the U.S. military produced the AIDS virus and other diseases to help wipe out minorities. Oh yes, and that he hopes Barack Obama—whom he called “my son”—remains president for life.

*More examples of friends helping friends. A start-up car company backed by former Vice President Al Gore has been awarded a $529 million U.S. government loan to help build a hybrid gas-electric sports car. And here’s the kicker: the vehicle will be built in Finland, not the U.S. Fisker Automotive, which has yet to build a single vehicle, says the car will retail for around $90,000 if it ever goes into production.

*Now, this is the way to do term limits. I saw a put-down of politicians a few days ago that I really liked. Here it is: “Limit all U.S. politicians to two terms. The first in office, the second in prison. Illinois already does this.”

—Chip Wood

But the real cavalcade of stars appeared not on stage, but under it, where George Gershwin conducted an orchestra that included such future greats as Benny Goodman (then 21) on clarinet, Jimmy Dorsey (26) on sax, Gene Krupa (21) on drums, and Tommy Dorsey (24) and Glenn Miller (26) on trombone.

“Girl Crazy” would run for 272 performances. It contained more hit songs than any other Gershwin musical. Other hits from the stage show and movie included “Bidin’ My Time,” “But Not for Me,” and such forgotten gems as “Goldfarb, That’s I’m!” and “(When It’s) Cactus Time in Arizona.”

“Girl Crazy” was also the only Gershwin musical comedy to be turned into a movie three times, including 1992’s “Crazy for You.” Best of the bunch was a 1943 version starring Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland. In the 1943 movie, Garland’s role combined the parts—and songs—performed by Rogers and Merman on Broadway.

To show you how much things have changed, back then you could have gotten a balcony seat for a Saturday matinee for 50 cents. Today, a decent seat on Broadway can set you back one hundred bucks or more.

—Chip Wood

McDonald’s has some 15,000 restaurants in this country with 85 percent of them owned by franchisees. And listen to what those outlets have accomplished: More than half of the workers in America today got their very first job at a McDonald’s somewhere. The company has made more millionaires—and especially more black and Hispanic millionaires—than any other entity ever.

Kroc died in January 1984, just 10 months before McDonald’s sold its 50 billionth hamburger. That’s eight burgers for every man, woman, and child on earth today. Today, of the 90 meals a month we consume, the average American eats three of them at McDonald’s. Or at least they get their food there; most customers pick up their order at the drive-up window.

But we’re not all dining on Big Macs. Today McDonald’s sells as much chicken as it does beef. And here’s another fun factoid: Years ago, the Washington, D.C.-area McDonald’s sponsored a television show called "Bozo’s Circus." On it, the company spokesman, Ronald McDonald, was played by a 25-year-old Willard Scott. You’ll know him better as the Today show weatherman who celebrates centenarians’ birthdays.

—Chip Wood

The radical agitators who run this so-called “association of community organizers” are finally being exposed as the criminals and swindlers they’ve always been. As a result, it looks almost certain that they will lose the billions of dollars in federal subsidies they were promised by their good friend and generous benefactor, Barack Hussein Obama.

First, the background. I know you’ve probably heard all of this before, but please bear with me while I repeat the story of ACORN’s support of a pimp, a prostitute and a child sex-slave ring. Seldom have I taken such pleasure in seeing some Marxist revolutionaries get their come-uppance.

ACORN’s exposure started when two independent filmmakers visited their offices in Brooklyn, N.Y., Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, Md. In each case, they posed as a pimp and a prostitute who wanted advice on how they could obtain a federal housing loan (they wanted their own brothel) and how they could avoid taxes on their ill-gotten gains (they planned to be extremely profitable, don’t you know).

And oh, by the way, they also planned to import 13-year-old girls from El Salvador and turn them into prostitutes. Did ACORN have any advice on how they could get away with all of this?

Time after time, ACORN officials were only too glad to help. And thanks to some hidden recording equipment, it was all caught on tape. As you might guess, Fox News had a field day with the footage.

ACORN reacted by claiming that the videos had been “doctored.” It also accused its critics of “racist coverage” and running a smear campaign. And oh, by the way, it also fired four of the employees who were caught on the incriminating videos.

Before you could say “oh my,” the Senate voted 83 to 7 to deny ACORN some $1.6 million in federal housing subsidies it was supposed to receive. And the U.S. Census Bureau announced that it was cancelling a contract it had with the community organizing group to assist in next year’s census. Let us hope this is just the first of many setbacks ACORN will receive, as its friends in Congress and the White House scurry for cover.

(Let me note in passing that the seven senators who voted against the measure included both leftist legislators from Illinois, Roland Burris and Dick Durbin; the outright socialist from Vermont, Bernie Sanders; and Hillary Clinton’s replacement from New York, Kirsten Gillebrand. Completing the sorry seven were Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, Pat Leahy of Vermont, and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island. May their constituents vote to retire all of them at the next available opportunity.)

Yes, the publicity has hurt ACORN. But what’s really going to frost their petunias is what will happen next. ACORN was in line to receive a staggering $8.5 billion in stimulus funds from the Obama Administration. Color that money gone.

And the bad news for ACORN just keeps pouring in. Last month 11 ACORN workers in Florida were accused by prosecutors of falsifying information on 888 voter registration forms. The month before, ACORN’s former field director in Las Vegas agreed to testify against the group’s activities there. Las Vegas election officials say that up to 48 percent of the voter registration forms the group submitted were “clearly fraudulent.” Although it has barely been mentioned by the mainstream media, to date some 70 ACORN employees in 12 states have been convicted of voter-registration fraud. Expect those numbers to grow.

Earlier this summer, Rep. Darrell Issa, the ranking Republican on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, released an 88-page staff report on ACORN’s activities. Here’s how that damning document began:

“The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) has repeatedly and deliberately engaged in systemic fraud. Both structurally and operationally, ACORN hides behind a paper wall of nonprofit corporate protections to conceal a criminal conspiracy on the part of its directors, to launder federal money in order to pursue a partisan political agenda and to manipulate the American public.”

The report goes on to note that “since 1994, more than $53 million in Federal funds have been pumped into ACORN, and under the Obama Administration, ACORN stands to receive a whopping $8.5 billion in stimulus funds.”

Not any more, I’m very happy to report.

Republicans in Congress are urging the Department of Housing and Urban Development to investigate ACORN. Nonsense! The agency that should be conducting an investigation is the Justice Department. ACORN is not merely a bunch of liberal do-gooders run amuck. They are criminal conspirators with a blatant disregard for the laws of this country.

Back in March, Rep. John Conyers, the liberal congressman from Michigan who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, recommended that a hearing be held on ACORN’s abuses. His suggestion was immediately shot down by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Conyers was later heard to mutter that “the powers that be decided against it.”

President Obama has already proven, in his cold-blooded dismissal of many former friends (remember Rev. Jeremiah Wright?), that he won’t hesitate to toss an ally under the bus if it becomes politically necessary. I’ll know we’ve won this battle when ACORN’s former attorney turns his back on these radical friends.

Don’t hold your breath waiting for this to happen. But don’t let your congressman give these professional agitators another dime of your money, either.

Until next time, keep some powder dry.

—Chip Wood