0722 by Jeff Hess
Further demonstrating his political genius, President Barack Hussein Obama spoke Friday on board Air Force One on the future of Afghanistan.
“The situation in Afghanistan is, if anything, more complex,” he said. “You have a less governed region, a history of fierce independence among tribes. Those tribes are multiple and sometimes operate at cross purposes, and so figuring all that out is going to be much more of a challenge.”
For American military planners, reaching out to some members of the Taliban is fraught with complexities. For one thing, officials would have to figure out which Taliban members might be within the reach of a reconciliation campaign, no easy task in a lawless country with feuding groups of insurgents.
And administration officials have criticized the Pakistani government for its own reconciliation deal with local Taliban leaders in the Swat Valley, where Islamic law has been imposed and radical figures hold sway. Pakistani officials have sought to reassure administration officials that their deal was not a surrender to the Taliban, but rather an attempt to drive a wedge between hard-core Taliban leaders and local Islamists.
The President, also showed his continued understanding of new media when he was asked to comment on blogs.
Mr. Obama rode to the White House partly on his savvy use of new technology, and he has a staff-written blog on his presidential Web site. Even so, he said he did not find blogs to be reliable, citing the economy as one example.
“Part of the reason we don”t spend a lot of time looking at blogs,” he said, “is because if you haven”t looked at it very carefully, then you may be under the impression that somehow there”s a clean answer one way or another – well, you just nationalize all the banks, or you just leave them alone and they”ll be fine.”
These two unrelated examples demonstrate why I have such great expectations for President Obama; he doesn’t live in a with-us-or-against-us world, and neither do we.
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0857 by Jeff Hess
I went to see Seussical The Musical last night at Beachwood Middle School. I have students in the production and they, as well as all the other participants did a great job. Produced by the Beachwood Recreation Community Theater, the musical wraps iconic Dr. Seuss characters and stories like the Cat In The Hat (with Things 1 & 2), the Grinch and others, around the story of Horton Hears a Who. The show runs through Sunday, 15 March.
I left the building troubled, however, by one choice made by the person in charge of costume design. In the story three monkeys — The Wickersham Brothers — torment Horton and steal the precious clover on which he has captured the tiny world of the Whos.
The three students, who all gave wonderful performances in their roles as monkeys, are costumed with distinctive African American hair. After a year of the Obama Monkey Doll and Little Hussein, the choice is a bad one.
I checked photos of other productions and the choice is not a unique one.
One of the the students is African American and I recognize that the hair — stylish and hip — may have been her own. And I further recognize that the a decision may have been made to carry the motif over to the two white students as a way of unifying the roles.
The decision was a bad one.
Posted in Social Justice & Advocacy | No Comments »
1219 by Jeff Hess
Andrew Sullivan writes:
Obama’s predecessor secretly invoked the power to suspend the First and Fourth Amendments for seven years, authorized the seizure and torture of American citizens, launched two decade-long wars of attrition, doubled the national debt, presided over the worst financial bubble since the 1930s, provided the weakest level of economic growth in decades, and left the US in the grip of the steepest depression since the 1930s. But after five weeks, it’s Obama who should be impeached? Ooookaaaay.
The disturbing bit is that there is, what, 20-30 percent of the population out there who will take Roger Kimball at his word.
Posted in Blogging, Economy, President Barack Hussein Obama | No Comments »
0736 by Jeff Hess
Geraldine Baum writes:
Sitting in a bare cubicle, with her reading glasses perched halfway down her nose and typing away on a laptop she’d brought from home, Lois Draegin looked a bit like the extra adult wedged in at the kids’ table at Thanksgiving.
This accomplished magazine editor lost her six-figure job at TV Guide last spring and is now, at 55, an unpaid intern at wowOwow.com, a fledgling website with columns and stories that target accomplished women older than 40.
To see how others see this shift, check out Live-blog: Journalism, Blogging and Social Media hosted by PVOW.
Posted in Rococo Media, Writing | No Comments »
1111 by Jeff Hess
Tim Russo writes:
But when you shine a light on the base of the GOP, what emerges is truly repulsive. Watching Rev. Wright bounce up and down at the National Press Club was mildly entertaining, and underlined just how out of touch he may have been. But watching Rush Limbaugh bounce up and down in front of CPAC, sweating, showing a little flesh, was just plain bizarre. At least Rev. Wright was wearing a tie.
This story is getting so bizarre that Diane Rehm devoted her first hour to it this morning.
Posted in Politics | 1 Comment »
0808 by Jeff Hess
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0711 by Jeff Hess
Listening to WCPN’s Dan Bobkoff’s Eric Wellman’s report on the the auto show gave me a skidmark moment this morning.
Attendance is down at this year’s Cleveland Auto Show — can you say bowling in the aisles? — and Dan Eric interviewed Margery Krevsky of Productions Plus in Detroit. Her agency hires models for car shows.
I’m working from memory here (I’ll make corrections later once I can listen to the archive corrections done), but this is what made me hit the brakes:
Dan Eric — How do you judge whether a particular model is successful at what they do?
Margery — Well, number one is do they have great communications skills?
Communication skills? Is that how they phrase it? Who does she think she is kidding? The follow-up question ought to have been:
How many flat-chested, 60-year-old models do you hire?
But Dan Eric took the response and with (I presume) a straight face proceeded with the rest of the interview. If he wasn’t willing to ask honest questions, he shouldn’t have done the interview in the first place.
If I wanted that kind of fluff reporting I’d listen to AM talk radio.
I expect much better from WCPN.
Posted in Radio, Skidmark Moment | 2 Comments »
0725 by Jeff Hess
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1412 by Jeff Hess
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1401 by Jeff Hess
This showed up in my inbox this afternoon from mac30tee_@msn.com:
Dear Friend ,
My name is MRS DENISE MCATEE I am from West Virgina USA,57yrs.I am a good merchant, I have several industrial companies and good share in various banks in the world .I spend all my life on investment and cop-orate business. All the way i lost my husband and two beautiful kids in fatal accident that occur in November 5th 2003. I am a very greedy woman with all cost i don’t know much and care about people, since when I have an experience of my it difficult to sleep and give rest .Later in the year 2004 February i was sent a letter of medical check up, as my personal Doctor testify that i have a lung cancer, which can easily take off my life soon. I found it uneasy to survive myself, because a lot of investment cannot be run and manage by me again.
I quickly call up a pastor / prophet to give me positive thinking on this solution, as my adviser.He ministered to me to share my properties ,wealth, to motherless baby/orphanage homes/people that need money for survivor both student that need money/ business men for their investment and for future rising. So i am writing this letter to people who really need help from me both student in college, to contact me urgently.So that i can make available preparation on that especially women of the day, who are divorced by their husband, why they cannot survive the mist of feeding theirs elf. Please contact me and stop weeping . Probably let me now what you really need the money for, and if you can still help me to distribute money to nearest orphanages homes near your town. Now am so much with God, am now born again.May you be blessed, as you reach me, I will give more information to you as i await your response immediately.
Best Regards ,
Mrs Denise Mcatee.
Mrs. Mcatee might benefit from some English as a second language courses before attempting to impersonate someone from West Virginia.
Posted in Humor | No Comments »
