Republican Mayor Dean Grose of Los Alamitos California is set to resign from office after sending a racist email about the President. The email read “No Easter egg hunt this year,” beneath a photo of the White House with a huge watermelon patch right in front of it.
To the FORMER Mayor and his supporters, it’s important to remember that this is 2009, not 1939. We should be over racist ignorance like this.
Football in the Oval Office???
What would conservatives say if a photo of President Obama surfaced with him doing this?
My guess is that they would be horrified!! They would rant on and on about how un-Presidential, childish, “ghetto”, unprofessional, unbelievable, classless, immature, disrespectful and outrageous this is!
I can just hear it: “The President should show some RESPECT for the office!!! What does he think this is??”
“You know, even my 7 year old son knows better than this. He is not allowed to play ball inside, especially not inside of my office. Maybe we should have elected him for President.”
“Now we can see how stupid “liberals” are. They HATE America, and take every chance possible to disrespect it. What a joke!”
“This President is sending a disgraceful image around the world. Who is going to respect us, if they think our President believes his office is a playground?”
I surely hope this is a photoshopped image, and not a real photo, but my guess is it’s the real thing. I wonder where the backlash was? I wonder if this image made front page news.
BLASPHEMY!!!!!!!
They are replacing Jesus Christ with Ronald Reagan!!!!
http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=6937515
Click the link above to watch the story on this.
Someone should put this on youtube. Great to see a President that cares about the well being of average Americans enough to hear directly from them.
EDIT: Here’s more from a Washington Post article
Each morning when he arrives at the Oval Office, President Obama asks his staff to deliver him a package containing 10 letters. It is a mere sampling of the 40,000 or so that Americans send to the White House every day — a barrage of advice from students and teachers, small-business owners and the unemployed. In between his daily meetings with senior staff members and Cabinet secretaries, Obama has made a habit of sitting alone behind his desk and reading one letter at a time, friends and advisers said. The exercise is intended to help keep him grounded, but it also provides Obama with a glimpse beyond the White House walls and the Secret Service perimeter into what the president sometimes refers to as “the real world.”
You’ve got to check out some of these slide shows!
His photos almost have a cinematic quality to them, very very impressive!
Looks like John Gibson decided to play the role of a coward. Rather than listening to the substance of Attorney General Eric Holder’s message during Black History Month, Gibson chose to exchange maturity for racism. Even if he disagreed with the wording that Holder used when referring to our nations responses concerning race, it’s no justification for turning around and being racist. Sadly, Gibson seems much more comfortable being a racist coward than being a man and a mature American.
EDIT: It looks like this video above might have been a hoax. Here is another version of the video that claims to show what John Gibson ACTUALLY said.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEVzFDm4hTI
If this video I just posted in the update is true, as it appears to be, then I would like to issue an apology to John Gibson and Fox News for putting out the other video first. I did, however, see the first video on Huffingtonpost.com, so it looks like the video editor fooled them too with the “Blue Strotum” comment.
Unprofessional.
Today, CNN placed a cut out of Barack Obama’s head over an image of Hillary Clinton’s clothes (here’s the video). Why? They reported that the company that makes a number of Obama’s suits has gone bankrupt, but Obama’s Secretary of State’s clothing designer is still in business.
Even if the graphics editors and chief directors were all openly flaming homosexual crossdressers, this move is insulting and unprofessional. Whatever the staff members at CNN choose to do in their own personal lives is their business, but there should be some standards for work that they adhere to.
While CNN does have a habit of running stupid and completely purposeless segments routinely (ie: a Jeanne Moos report), there should still be some lines that are not crossed. Placing the first African American preisdent of the United States in women’s clothing is one of those lines.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/10/first-lady-obama-tells-te_n_165797.html
From Huffington Post:
FLOTUS POOL REPORT – VISIT TO MARY’S CENTER (February 10, 2009)
The First Lady made her first solo trip into the neighborhood. She visited Mary’s Center a community health organization in Adam’s Morgan. The most interesting part of the visit came in the last fifteen minutes of the nearly hour-long visit. She sat with a group of 9 teenagers ages 16-18 who attend after-school programs at the center. A transcript will be available, but here’s the best part. It came in response to the fifth and final question from one of the students who asked: “Why did you want to come out and meet us?”
“This is the best part of my day, short of being with my own kids. I was raised to believe that when you get you give back…We’ve been visitors but now we live here. This is our community now. We were taught you have to get to know your community you’re in, and you have to be a part of that community and you have to get to know it in order to be actively engaged in it. D.C. is our community now and it’s our home. Barack is real busy right now so I figured I’ve got the time on my hands and while the kids are in school, I figured I would come out and hear about programs and meet students.” She described all of this as if the man she called Barack were an ambitious accountant, not the man who on the previous evening had given the prime time press conference amid the fancy chandeliers.
“I was somewhat where you are. I didn’t come to this position with a lot of wealth and a lot of resources. I think it’s real important for young kids, particularly kids who come form communities without resources to see me. Not the First Lady but to see that there is no magic to me sitting here. There are no miracles that happen. There is no magic dust that was sprinkled on my head or Barack’s head. We were kids much like you who figured out one day that our fate was in our own hands. We made decisions to listen to our parents and work hard, and work even harder when somebody doubted us. When somebody told me I couldn’t do something, that gave me a greater challenge to prove them wrong. …Every little challenge like that and every little success I gained more confidence and life just sort of opened up. So I feel like it’s an obligation for me to share that with you.”
Before leaving, the First Lady posed for photographs and signed a poster for the center. She turned to the kids and said “Always think about where you came from and what you’re going to give back.” The kids, who were a slightly quiet bunch, didn’t immediately respond. “Sound right?” She asked them. They all then said yes.
Classy and generous. It’s good to see the first lady hasn’t forgotten where she came from.
image from Flickr
I saw this on a post recently.
Why not start up a website like goodcops.com or something. The site could be for communities to nominate and acknowledge the good police officers in their communities. There are some good cops out there, but too often they are overshadowed by the rotten ones like that guy at BART.
Truth be told, you only hear about police officers in the news when they do something racist or abusive so that leads to a certain stigma and negative feeling about police in general. A site like “goodcops” could work to counter that stereotype. Pastors in the community along with celebrities could hand out the awards and the site could have other features to drive traffic to it. I think it would work best if a strong effort was made to make being a police officer cool again. (sort of like how Obama made politics cool again).
We can’t just hear the bad about police officers, or it tempts people to think they’re all bad which isn’t true or fair.
I think it’s important for the public to see a balance, so I agree with the poster on that. Maybe a site like “goodcops.gov” or something would be a good and effective way to improve relationships between police and the communities they serve in.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/07/stimulus.cuts/index.html
(CNN) — A coalition of Democrats and some Republicans reached a compromise that trimmed billions in spending from an earlier version of the Senate economic stimulus bill.
Senators worked late into the night to trim billions from the original stimulus bill
Senators worked late into the night to trim billions from the original stimulus bill
CNN obtained, from a Democratic leadership aide, a list of some programs that have been cut — either entirely or partially:
Partially cut:
• $3.5 billion for energy-efficient federal buildings (original bill $7 billion)
• $75 million from Smithsonian (original bill $150 million)
• $200 million from Environmental Protection Agency Superfund (original bill $800 million)
• $100 million from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (original bill $427 million)
• $100 million from law enforcement wireless (original bill $200 million)
• $300 million from federal fleet of hybrid vehicles (original bill $600 million)
• $100 million from FBI construction (original bill $400 million)
Fully eliminated
• $55 million for historic preservation
• $122 million for new Coast Guard polar icebreaker/cutters
• $100 million for Farm Service Agency modernization
• $50 million for CSERES research
• $65 million for watershed rehabilitation
• $30 million for SD salaries
• $100 million for distance learning
• $98 million for school nutrition
• $50 million for aquaculture
• $2 billion for broadband
• $100 million for NIST
• $50 million for detention trustee
• $25 million for Marshalls Construction
• $300 million for federal prisons
• $300 million for BYRNE Formula
• $140 million for BYRNE Competitive
• $10 million state and local law enforcement
• $50 million for NASA
• $50 million for aeronautics
• $50 million for exploration
• $50 million for Cross Agency Support
• $200 million for National Science Foundation
• $100 million for science
• $1 billion for Energy Loan Guarantees
• $4.5 billion for GSA
• $89 million GSA operations
• $50 million from DHS
• $200 million TSA
• $122 million for Coast Guard Cutters, modifies use
• $25 million for Fish and Wildlife
• $55 million for historic preservation
• $20 million for working capital fund
• $165 million for Forest Service capital improvement
• $90 million for State and Private Wildlife Fire Management
• $1 billion for Head Start/Early Start
• $5.8 billion for Health Prevention Activity
• $2 billion for HIT Grants
• $600 million for Title I (NCLB)
• $16 billion for school construction
• $3.5 billion for higher education construction
• $1.25 billion for project based rental
• $2.25 billion for Neighborhood Stabilization
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• $1.2 billion for retrofitting Project 8 housing
• $40 billion for state fiscal stabilization (includes $7.5 billion of state incentive grants)
Original story: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/05/bush-chief-of-staff-to-ob_n_164286.html
Hey Andy, are you racist or are you just ignorant? (or both)
Bill Clinton showed up to the oval office in jogging shorts once.
UPDATE: Good video
video
I am writing this post in response to the new found legal troubles that street artist Shepard Fairey finds himself in with the AP. Shepard Fairey became a household name after creating his marvelous HOPE and Progress art pieces that went viral and played such a major role in this past election. Now they might cost him in court.
I should start by saying that I am not a lawyer. However, I have read up a little on copyright law (most notably from the book “Electronic Highway Robbery” by Mary E. Carter) and I have been in contact with lawyers about copyright, patents and trademarks. So with that background and what I consider to be common sense, I have reached the following conclusion.
News organizations such as Reuters and the AP (the press) should not be fully covered by US copyright law, at least when it comes to art.
Why? Well first, let’s examine the copyright law.
To quote Electronic Highway Robbery by Mary E. Carter:
What can be Protected by Copyright?
Section 102(a) of the Copyright Act states:
Copyright protection subsists…in original works of authorship fixed in any tangible medium of expression, now known or later developed, from which they can be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated, either directly or with the aid of a machine or device.
The basic requirements that a work of art must meet to qualify for copyright protection are that:
- It must be original. The artwork must be an original.
- It must be creative. The artwork must show at least a minimum amount of creativity.
- It must be fixed in a tangible medium.…
My argument hinges on the part of the law that says “mediums of expression“, which Ms. Carter refers to as “creative”.
Press photographers should be excluded from this category. They given special access to the President of the United States, not for “creative” purposes or a means to “express” themselves, but to inform the public.
In other words, the press acts as our eyes and ears receive information from the President because our real eyes and ears cannot legally be in attendance. Not every Joe blow with a camera has the privilege of gaining such close access to the President. In fact, it is my understanding that the press even accompanies the President on Air Force one.
The only reason that press photographers have the privilege of being so close to our politicians so that they can snap those close up shots, is because they are licensed for the purposes of serving and informing the American public. If that was not the case, then I and half the rest of the country could (and would) grab the Nikon or Canon, head to Washington, and take a front row seat at the next Obama press conference. In that context, I honestly could take “creative” pictures or use my photos as “expressions”. After all, they are my photos, my camera, so I can do with them as I please and I have no obligation to our nation at large.
But what’s not fair is to say only special licensed photographers can gain close up access to the President, and then turn around and treat their photos as art. These photographers are not there to make art. Again, if they are, then I should also be given access. I should have been there when the man shoes were thrown at Bush, so I can “express” how I saw it with my photos. I should have been there when Obama was meeting with all of the governors for the first time, so I could snap shots of Palin’s first facial expressions when meeting the President who “pals around with terrorists” and isn’t from “real America”.
I could take much more artsy photos than what comes out of the AP, guaranteed.
So do not tell me that the same copyright laws that protect Mickey Mouse (a true creative work), such that I cannot just draw up my own Mickey cartoons and sell them on DVD, also protects an AP photographer’s photos when they are only licensed to serve & inform the American public.
