What a difference a year makes. It seemed last time this season, Obama-mania was at fever pitch. Progressives felt they finally had a person in the White House they could rely on--or at least push in their preferred direction. Both houses of Congress were in the hands of the Democrats. The GOP was in defeat; President George W. Bush was a lameduck; by January, Vice President Dick Cheney would be in a wheelchair. Dissent or criticism of President Obama was not tolerated, even as some looked on nervously at the team of advisors he was selecting--who seemed much more conservative than expected. Still, all was well. Everyone settled into a "wait and see," expecting great things. After a tumultous 12 months however, Obama's starpower has been reduced to a glimmer. And even some of his most avid supporters are voicing dissent. From the Congressional Black Caucus to Joe Conason, to even members of the Democratic Senate, there are critical words for the Obama administration as it wraps up its first year. Unlike the inane teabaggers, who in their frothing racial animus cheer on failure, this dissent is borne of frustration and disappointment--from a base that feels neglected and demoralized. And it doesn't help when the president sends out his attack dogs to bite those very people--the ones who worked hardest to get him elected. Of course, there's still time to turn this around. I don't think it's necessarily that supporters are "abandoning" they president, as one article puts it. Rather, Obama's critics on the left are just looking for a fighter and a leader, the kind they thought they elected. They'd rather see him succeed than fail, realizing the alternative to having him in the White House is simply too terrible to contemplate.
Below are a few articles on this very topic. I hope somehow, they reach the eyes of the one guy who needs to read them most.
Leadership, Obama Style, and the Looming Losses in 2010: Pretty Speeches, Compromised Values, and the Quest for the Lowest Common Denominator
By Drew Western- 12-21-09
Somehow the president has managed to turn a base of new and progressive voters he himself energized like no one else could in 2008 into the likely stay-at-home voters of 2010, souring an entire generation of young people to the political process. It isn't hard for them to see that the winners seem to be the same no matter who the voters select (Wall Street, big oil, big Pharma, the insurance industry).
Black Caucus tells Obama you've done too little for African-Americans
By Silla Brush - 12/02/09
Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) members on Wednesday criticized the Obama administration for not doing enough to help African-Americans through the bleak economy.
Feingold: Obama Responsible For Loss Of Public Option
Sam Stein 12-20-09
Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.) formally announced on Sunday that he would support the Senate's final version of health care reform. But in doing so he cast blame for the loss of a public option for insurance coverage partially on the president's shoulders and urged House and Senate negotiators to re-insert the government-run plan back into the legislation during conference committee.
Are Blacks Abandoning Obama?
By Lloyd Grove- 12/15/09
Danny Glover, Jesse Jackson, and other activists talk to Lloyd Grove about disappointment in the African-American community with the president’s first year.
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Monday, December 21, 2009
The Fury of the Left
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Disgruntled in Obamaland
All is not well in Obamaland. Nevermind the tea-baggers, FOX News and the continuing sad comedy that is the GOP, there is dissatisfaction growing in the base. Just over a year ago, it seemed that Obama and the forces he had marshalled were on top of the world. There was energy. There was hope. There was relief that the last 8 years had finally come to and end. But today, for many who worked hardest towards that goal, there's a growing apathy. As the base watches a watered-down health care bill wind its way slowly through Congress; as they watch many of the architects of the current financial crisis give away billions to bankers; as they watch a rise in unemployment; as they watch a President seemingly intent on continuing an unpopular war in Afghanistan, there is a feeling of discontent. There is still hope. Those who voted for this president are still happy with the ballot they cast. Many of these same people however, just aren't inspired. Of course, it's only been a year in--and most are waiting to see what comes next.
For many, Robert Scheer's question hits home: "Who Are You and What Have You Done With the Community Organizer We Elected President?"
Read more after the jump.
Who Are You and What Have You Done With the Community Organizer We Elected President?
Posted on Nov 18, 2009
By Robert Scheer
What’s up with Barack Obama? The candidate for change once promised to take on the powerful banking interests but is now doing their bidding. Finally, a leading Democrat, in this case Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, has a good idea for monitoring the Wall Street fat cats who all but destroyed the American economy, and the Obama administration condemns it.
Dodd wants to take supervisory power from the Federal Reserve, which is controlled by the banks it pretends to monitor, and put it in the hands of a new independent agency. That makes sense given the Fed’s abject failure to properly monitor the financial sector over the past decade as that industry got drunk on greed. As Dodd’s spokeswoman Kirstin Brost put it: “The Federal Reserve flat out failed at supervising the largest, most complex firms.” But White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee frets that taking power from the Fed would cause financial industry “nervousness.” Isn’t that the whole point of government regulation—to make the bandits look over their shoulders before they launch their next destructive scam?
Not so in the view of Deputy Treasury Secretary Neal Wolin, who blithely insists that the Fed “is the best agency equipped for the task of supervising the largest, most complex firms,” despite the mountain of evidence to the contrary. There is some irony in the fact that the largest of those complex firms got to be “too big to fail” because of the radical deregulatory legislation that Wolin drafted during his previous incarnation as the Treasury Department’s general counsel in the Clinton administration. Wolin is now deputy to Timothy Geithner, who as head of the New York Fed in the five years preceding the banking meltdown looked the other way as the disaster began to unfold.
Why is Barack Obama allowing these retreads from the Clinton era who went on to great riches on Wall Street to set economic policy for his administration?
Read more here.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Monday, December 8, 2008
Uncle Tom-Foolery
I'm not one to casually toss around the term "Uncle Tom." For one, it's actually an insult to the main protagonist of Harriet Beecher Stowe's work. Though a product of Stowe's own white religious "maternalism," Uncle Tom was certainly not what his name has come to signify in modern times. Second, I understand there are complexities in black thought--even when I strongly and vehemently disagree. Third, it's one of those terms that is such a "word-bomb" it tends to shut down any larger conversation. Same goes for "Sell-out" or "Oreo." I'd rather get into more complex discussions about people who act as surrogates for white patriarchy, etc.
Then I read the following. According to news reports:
Two prominent black conservatives are fighting to keep the Oval Office reserved for whites only by attempting to block the seating of Barack Obama as the nation's first African-American president. Justice Clarence Thomas placed the lawsuit challenging Obama's U.S. citizenship on the court calendar for a hearing.
The New Jersey case, Donofrio v. Wells...petitions that the Electoral College delay its ruling on seating Obama until his U.S. citizenship has been verified. An earlier Pennsylvania case, Berg v. Obama, sought to prevent the Democratic Party from nominating the Illinois senator on similar "citizenship" grounds.
Are. You. Frackin. Kidding. Me.
I'm officially going to break my own rules and declare:
"Somebody get me a glass of milk because here comes a big OREO!"--Cosmic Slop, adaptation of Space Traders by Derrick Bell.
(Updated 12/09/08)
Keeping the Oval Office for Whites Only
Les Payne
December 8, 2008
Two prominent black conservatives are fighting to keep the Oval Office reserved for whites only by attempting to block the seating of Barack Obama as the nation's first African-American president.
Justice Clarence Thomas placed the lawsuit challenging Obama's U.S. citizenship on the court calendar for a hearing. Sen. Obama and his campaign say that the president-elect has an authentic birth certificate showing that he was born in Hawaii, on Aug. 4, 1961, and is thus a "natural-born" U.S. citizen. Hawaiian officials agree.
The New Jersey case, Donofrio v. Wells, however, petitions that the Electoral College delay its ruling on seating Obama until his U.S. citizenship has been verified. An earlier Pennsylvania case, Berg v. Obama, sought to prevent the Democratic Party from nominating the Illinois senator on similar "citizenship" grounds.
Whereas Justice David Souter, acting for the court, dismissed the Berg case, Thomas distributed the Donofrio case to the other justices. The court was not expected to take the case.
Scholars of the court claimed Donofrio never stood much of a chance of getting a hearing. Of the 782 such cases justices distributed over the past eight years, the full court heard only 60. It is impossible to discern the workings of what passes for Justice Thomas' legal mind. He seldom asks questions from the bench and shows little judicial curiosity.
Thomas' eyes do light up, however, when a case involving race is argued. At such times, whether it's affirmative action or urban policing issues, the justice can be counted on unfailingly to stake a position in stark opposition to what most African-Americans would consider their best interests. This pattern renders the most powerful, black U.S. official a comedic figure of ridicule in the African-American community.
When idling for a lighthearted moment during Sunday sermons, for example, black ministers across America need only mention "Clarence Thomas" to trigger guffaws of shame among their congregations.
This burlesque image of Thomas emerged during his '91 Senate confirmation hearings where, in an ofttimes circus atmosphere, he survived attempts to block his nomination with Anita Hill's charges of bizarre, sexual harassment. The self-declared victim of a "high-tech" lynching withdrew within a tight knot of black conservatives and powerful right-wing, white zealots such as Rush Limbaugh.
The bitter Justice Thomas is seemingly bent these days on exacting revenge on the larger black community. It is perhaps in this light that we catch a glimpse of him stoking the Donofrio case as much for Limbaugh laughs as for the backhand it applies to the aspirations of African-Americans.
The case of Alan Keyes on the "stop Obama" campaign is a bit more personal but no less a matter of race and politics.
Keyes, who ran for president as a candidate of the American Independent Party, has filed a California lawsuit petitioning state electors to withhold certification pending verification of Obama's citizenship. Keyes argues that Obama must prove that he "does not hold citizenship of Indonesia, Kenya or Great Britain." His 18-page brief lays out scenarios where either could be possible.
In '04, conservatives rushed in the fiercely competitive Keyes from Maryland to challenge Obama's run for the Illinois Senate seat. After suffering a crushing defeat, Keyes avoided Obama, proclaiming that he would not "extend false congratulations to the triumph of what we have declared to be across the line."
Although claiming the slight was "not anything personal, his political animosity surfaced in the petition of "Ambassador Dr. Alan Keyes." Beyond the strictly personal, Keyes, not unlike Justice Thomas, has long shown a bitter disregard for what African-Americans take to be their best interests. Keyes served as an adviser to South Africa's propaganda machine during the apartheid era, and later as a token black in the Reagan State Department, where he vigorously opposed sanctions against that racist, white minority regime.
The "stop Obama" two-step by Keyes and Thomas is being played against a more sinister backdrop of powerful, right-wing interests seeking to override the will of the 66.8 million Americans who voted for the president-elect.
The tinkering that short-circuited the democratic process in 2000 appears to be at it again. Stay tuned.
*Update I* (12/08/08) Some people I sent this to went into freak-out mode. Calm down and take deep breaths people. This case isn't going anywhere. If it had any legs, McCain-Palin would have jumped on it and exposed this a long time ago. Even wackjobs like Michelle Malkin find the allegations ridiculous. The only thing this will hurt is Justice Clarence Thomas's chance to ever live peacefully in a black neighborhood...anywhere.
*Update II* (12/08/08) In Justice Thomas' defense, some have claimed he placed the matter on the Supreme Court docket simply to have it dismissed. However it had *already* been dismissed by Justice Souter, so what exactly would a second dismissal serve?
*Update III* 12/09/08
In the best dosage of good sense since Brown v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court has declined to hear Justice Clarence Thomas.
There is however one case remaining, thus far, by a Pennsylvania lawyer named Phi Berg who challenges Barack Obama's citizenship on a claim that his Hawaii-birth certificate is a fraud. State officials have repeatedly dismissed such claims, but they persist. For a look at some of these die-hards who insist Barack Obama is some kind of "5th Columnist," see The Born Conspiracy by Mike Madden at Salon.com.
Friday, December 5, 2008
Obama, Slavery & the White House- "Bottom Rail on Top"
Slaves helped build the White House, both when it was built and later after it was burned down by the British during the War of 1812. Slaves helped build the US Capitol. One slave, Philip Reid, helped in the creation of the 12,000 lb bronze statue that now adorns the dome of the legislative building--the ironically enough named, Statue of Freedom. Slaves were sold and labored all throughout Washington DC. Some 12 American presidents owned slaves. Slavery was not abolished in Washington DC until 1862. And at one time, the mere inviting of a black man to the White House--from fiery abolitionists like Frederick Douglas to accomadationists like Booker T. Washington--was a source of controversy. President Woodrow Wilson not only had a private screening of D.W. Griffith's infamous Birth of a Nation in the White House--which depicted blacks as bestial rapists and the Ku Klux Klan as gallant heroes--but declared the film to be "like writing history with lightning....And my only regret is that it is all so terribly true."
Now, in just over a month, a black family is set to call the White House home. Even a cynic like me has to admit, that's probably a bit more than just symbolic. That's historic.
It was one of the first thoughts I had when I dwelt on the many meanings behind the triumph of Barack Obama. I first heard it mentioned publicly by Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano in a Democracy Now! interview the day following the election. "The White House will be his house in the time coming," said. "But this White House was built by black slaves. And I’d like, I hope, that he never, never forgets this." And it wasn't the only symbolic meaning that could be gleaned from history. Bill Moyers that Friday after the election pointed to a St. Louis rally Obama had held weeks earlier, that had drew a record 100,000 people. Lost in all of the election coverage, was that the rally was held on the steps of an old building that was once a courthouse--where slaves were auctioned and sold. In 1846, a slave named Dred Scott and his wife Harriett would appear on those courthouse steps to appeal their bondage. And though they would lose, their later Supreme Court appeal--Dred Scott decision--would become a part of history, fueling abolitionist sentiment towards a looming Civil War, eventual Emancipation, a century more of Jim Crow repression and the many acts of resistance that would shape the meaning of liberty, equality and democracy in America.
Barack Obama is interesting in that the only part of his lineage that experienced this drama was white. The other part, while dealing with the repression of British colonialism, can't point to a long history of American bondage, lynching, Jim Crow segregation and the dark sufferings of the Black Atlantic. Yet Obama chose to identify with that culture at an early age: partly by choice, and possibly partly by necessity--as America tends to baptize everyone into its racial landscape. And he chose to marry into that legacy through Michelle Obama, and consequently gave birth to children who are descended from it. And it is this complex drama of blackness that will call the White House home on Jan. 20th.
There's a memorable incident during the Civil War, where a black runaway slave who joined up with the Union army, catches sight of his former master--now a captured Confederate soldier. The slave saunters up to his previous owner, who sits stunned at this seeming reversal of fortune. "Hello massa," the ex-slave greets cheerfully, "Bottom rail on top this time."
Full article on topic below:
Slaves helped build White House, U.S. Capitol
By Susan Roesgen and Aaron Cooper
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/US/12/02/slaves.white.house/
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- In January, President-elect Barack Obama and his family will make history, becoming the first African-American first family to move into the White House -- a house with a history of slavery. In fact, the legacy of American presidents owning slaves goes all the way back to George Washington.
Twelve American presidents owned slaves and eight of them, starting with Washington, owned slaves while in office. Almost from the very start, slaves were a common sight in the executive mansion. A list of construction workers building the White House in 1795 includes five slaves - named Tom, Peter, Ben, Harry and Daniel -- all put to work as carpenters. Other slaves worked as masons in the government quarries, cutting the stone for early government buildings, including the White House and U.S. Capitol. According to records kept by the White House Historical Association, slaves often worked seven days a week -- even in the hot and humid Washington summers.
In 1800, John Adams was the first president to live in the White House, moving in before it was finished. Adams was a staunch opponent of slavery, and kept no slaves. Future presidents, however, didn't follow his lead. Thomas Jefferson, who succeeded Adams, wrote that slavery was an "assemblage of horrors" and yet he brought his slaves with him. Early presidents were expected to pay their household expenses themselves, and many who came from the so-called "slave states" simply brought their slaves with them.
Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, Andrew Johnson and Ulysses S. Grant all owned slaves but not during their time in office. James Madison, Jefferson's successor, held slaves all of his life including while he was in office. During the war of 1812 Madison's slaves helped remove material from the White House shortly before the British burned the building. Michelle Obama uncovers slaves in her family .
In 1865 one of Madison's former slaves, Paul Jennings, wrote the first White House memoir: "A Colored Man's Reminiscences of Life in the White House." In the book, Jennings called Madison "one of the best men that ever lived" and said Madison "never would strike a slave, although he had over one hundred; neither would he allow an overseer to do it."
There were other presidents who treated their slaves less kindly.
James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, John Tyler, James K. Polk and Zachary Taylor all owned slaves while they were in office. The last of these, President Taylor, said owning slaves was a Constitutional right and he said slave-owners like himself would "appeal to the sword if necessary" to keep them. The Civil War, of course, put that opinion to the test.
Now, the Obamas are moving into the White House.
"The apple cart has been turned over here when you have the Obamas -- the first African-American couple -- now actually management and you are having in some cases white Americans serving them," says presidential historian Doug Brinkley.
Michelle Obama learned this year that one of her great-great grandfathers was a slave who worked on a rice plantation in South Carolina. She says finding that part of her past uncovered both shame and pride and what she calls the tangled history of this country.
For many, the historic election on November 4 marked a new beginning.
Though Michelle Obama's ancestors had to come through the ordeal of slavery, "Her children are sleeping in the room of presidents," said Brinkley. "It's a very great and hopeful sign."
Friday, November 7, 2008
Simple and Important Victories
In all the celebrating and the shock… I'd forgotten about the many simple but crucially important victories this election would mean. And then I went to The Nation, and read this peice by Barbara Crosette:
In the Senate, Obama and Joe Biden have been supportive of programs for women--Biden co-authored the Violence Against Women legislation--and the ban on UNFPA is expected to be lifted early, along with what is known as the "global gag rule" introduced at a population conference in Mexico City in the Reagan administration that prevents US aid to any organization worldwide that condones abortion.
Just this past April, I wrote a blog about the Global Gag Rule, how it is leading to maiming and death, and what a change away from right wing reactionary politics in the White House could mean to millions of poor women worldwide. Nope, Obama ain't perfect. And there'll be a lot of pushing to get him on the progressive track, but the repealing of the GGR is a definite victory.
And for that alone, we can be thankful.
Below the fold, Barabra Crossette takes a look at a few more.
UN: Hope that America Rejoins the World
The World Reacts
By Barbara Crossette
November 5, 2008
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20081117/crossette3
Jubilation should be the order of the day at the United Nations when an American who is also a son of Kenya and a child of Indonesia is elected president of the most powerful country in a world in need of healing. But while there is quiet joy and relief at the victory of Barack Obama, there is also a strong undercurrent of caution. Is the end of an unfriendly Republican era enough in itself to bring the United States back? Or have the Democrats, the heirs of the UN's founders, drifted too far from internationalism?
Much has been written in recent years about America "rejoining the world." Nowhere more than at the UN have Washington's bullying tactics and stunted, provincial vision of global challenges cast such a pall over international cooperation. Here, the United States is close-up and personal. After the naming in Washington of a new secretary of state, the appointment most eagerly awaited at the UN is that of the next American ambassador.
Peter Maurer, Switzerland's ambassador to the UN, says that what he hears among his diplomatic colleagues is a plea for trust to be restored between the US and the UN. There are the wounds of the Iraq war, and there is skepticism about the motives of Washington when politicians talk about UN reform. "The new administration will find a kind of window of opportunity because there is enormous goodwill around the UN to see and to hear some new voices" Maurer said. But the UN as well as the US will have to work on closing the rift, he added.
The world of the United Nations is divided into two distinct camps. The people of the headquarters Secretariat and the various agencies are recruited or appointed international civil servants who are expected to leave their nationalities behind and work for a global constituency. Many of them fail to meet that test, but that's another story. Separate from them are the diplomats who represent the 192 member nations. Their missions are in essence embassies to the UN and their views, at least formally, would reflect those of their governments.
To the foreign diplomats based in New York, perhaps surprisingly, the ambassadors sent to the UN by the Bush administration have generally been respected and liked, from John Negroponte and John Danforth to Zalmay Khalilzad, the first Muslim to represent the US in New York. John Bolton was the exception, but his period as ambassador was relatively brief and he was regarded as competent even by some who found him undiplomatically abrasive and driven blindly by his distrust of internationalism and rigid defense of American sovereignty.
Samir Sanbar, a former UN under secretary general for communications who now publishes a gossipy newsletter, unforum.com, describes the mood in the Secretariat this week as "caught between hope and apprehension." He says that the organization remembers the Clinton years, when the White House backed away from some important international commitments and crudely dumped a secretary general, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, out of what appeared to be domestic political skittishness.
Middle Easterners (Sanbar is from Lebanon) also see no real possibility of change in regional policy in the Mideast, he said. Not long ago, before the election, a Brazilian diplomat remarked that there is concern about the Democrats' aversion to free trade. A lot of Indians liked the Republicans because they gave New Delhi a nuclear supply deal that may have killed the nonproliferation treaty.
Maurer, an expert in international law, said that a hoped-for thaw in US-UN relations would need to translate into action. "We all know what some of the concrete issues are, where many delegations would hope that a new administration would eventually set some priorities," he said. "This goes from climate change to engagement on a balanced nuclear disarmament, nonproliferation, policy. It goes to a new engagement for multilateral human rights, approaches which we certainly missed. New ideas, new approaches might be extremely welcome."
A list of international agreements rebuffed by the US awaits the Obama-Biden administration, beginning with the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty against nuclear weapons development, which the Clinton Administration shrank from sending to a hostile Congress. Also under Clinton, the US signed but never ratified the 1998 treaty creating the International Criminal Court, the first permanent tribunal designed to deal with perpetrators of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. In 2001, the Bush administration rescinded even the US signature and set out to undermine the court. Now, without standing in the court, Washington is in the awkward position of wanting the president of Sudan to be tried there for the horrors of Darfur.
The United States also opted out of joining the Human Rights Council, created in 2006 to replace the discredited Human Rights Commission. An early decision will have to be made on whether to vie for a seat in the new year.
On climate change, the US has not joined the Kyoto Protocol, which sets binding targets for reducing greenhouse gases in industrialized countries. The agreement, due to expire in 2012, is scheduled to be renegotiated next year at a global conference in Copenhagen. Strong leadership and active American participation will be needed to draw in major developing nations that have so far refused to be bound by internationally agreed limits.
The UN seems to have been a bone thrown by Washington to the ideological right. After the Security Council refused to endorse the American invasion of Iraq, Republicans excoriated the UN and Secretary General Kofi Annan for his opposition to the war and on whom, with more than a hint of revenge, they tried to pin responsibility for corruption in the Iraqi "oil for food" program a few years later. That the secretary general had no authority over the Security Council and that almost all the corruption turned out to have been found in corporations operating outside the formal system, whose rules Council members failed to enforce, were conveniently overlooked.
Sanbar says that the current secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, whom the US (and particularly Bolton) propelled into office in 2007, may be wondering what will happen when and if he seeks a second five-year term. He will have to open channels to the Democrats.
The UN Population Fund may have the most to gain in the short term from the Democratic victory. Since 2002, the Bush administration has barred American contributions to the fund, known as UNFPA, on specious claims that it was involved in programs in China that included forced abortions--claims the State Department argued were not true. The cumulative loss to UNFPA neared $300 million this year, at a time when maternal mortality remains high and family planning programs, in great demand in poor nations, are falling well behind funding campaigns for fighting HIV-AIDS.
In the Senate, Obama and Joe Biden have been supportive of programs for women--Biden co-authored the Violence Against Women legislation--and the ban on UNFPA is expected to be lifted early, along with what is known as the "global gag rule" introduced at a population conference in Mexico City in the Reagan administration that prevents US aid to any organization worldwide that condones abortion.
With the new administration, the broader American opposition to social programs in the UN system may end or be greatly diminished. The US has been in league with the Vatican and conservative Islamic countries on women's reproductive rights. It has failed to ratify the 1979 Convention on All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (along with nations such as North Korea and Iran) and is only one of two countries (Somalia is the other) not to have ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Maurer said diplomats who watched the presidential debates this year with great interest noticed that the UN did not figure in the candidates' foreign policy messages. Ignoring the UN has become bipartisan. Reluctance to make commitments "went far beyond the President Bush administration," he said. "There has to be something in the American political fabric which produces these opinions."
Advances in universal human rights, international criminal law and accountability in the UN system all depend on American involvement, Maurer said. "There is no doubt that if you want to have functioning multilateralism you have to have the United States engaged and on board. If this is not happening, you are immediately in the vicious circle because then the results of negotiations will always be weaker if the US is not pushing within the institution, at the table."
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Global Newspapers Cheer on Obama
The Courier-Mail Brisbane, Australia
One for the ages...
More newspaper headlines below the fold.
Kleine Zetung Graz, Austria
De Standaard Brussels, Belgium
O Povo Fortaleza, Brazil
EXTRA Rio de Janiero, Brazil
Dnevnik Daily Sofia, Bulgaria
Corriere Canadese Toronto, Canada
The Beijing News Beijing, China
Lidove Noviny Prague, Czech Republic
Die Tageszeitung Berlin, Germany
Hajdu Bihari Naplo Debrecen, Hungary
Morgunbladid Reykjavik, Iceland
Anandabazar Patrika Calcutta, India
Indonesia celebrates
Jam-e-Jam Tehran,Iran
Irish Examiner Cork, Ireland
Yedioth, Ahronoth Tel Aviv, Israel
La Repubblica Rome, Italy
An-Nahar Beirut, Lebanon
Liechtensteiner Volksblatt Schaan, Liechtenstein
Verslo Zinios Vilnius, Lithuania
Star Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
The Namibian Windhoek, Namibia
AD Amsterdam, Netherlands
The New Zealand Herald Auckland, New Zealand
Dziennik Polski Krakow, Poland
Publico- Lisbon Edition Lisbon, Portugal
Jurnal Bihorean Oradea, Romania
Al-Riyadh Riyadh, Saudia Arabia
Politka Belgrade, Serbia
SME Bratislava, Slovakia
The Times Johannesburg, South Africa
The Dong-a Ilbo Seoul, South Korea
El Periódico de Catalunya Barcelona, Spain
Dagens Nyheter Stockholm, Sweden
Basler Zeitung Basel, Switzerland
Apple Daily Taipei, Taiwan
Olay Bursa, Turkey
The Guardian London, UK
Gulf News Dubai, United Arab Emirates
El Universal Caracas, Venezuela
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
OBAMA- The World Reacts
A nun and a child walk past a poster of U.S. President-elect Barack Obama, which says "The World Changes" in Italian, in downtown Rome
Turns out this election was one that featured the global citizen--as the world followed, watched and reacted with elation. In locales as diverse as Paris and Jakarta, locals and ex-pats gathered to watch and then celebrate with unbridled enthusiasm at the win of Barack Obama. And for many, it wasn't because they haven't been able to survive without the US, or that they are looking for someone to lead them, but rather because America's sheer might affects so many, they need to know we can do better than we have in the past 8 years.
After Sen. John Kerry lost the election in 2004, a site called sorryeverybody popped up online. According to its proprietor, it was created because of the following:
Most people who think carefully understand that Americans are not really any more jingoistic or xenophobic than people in other countries, but it never hurts to reinforce, especially considering what happened on November 2nd, 2004. What must it have looked like to the world outside our borders? America proudly re-appointed its reckless, incompetent and corrupt government. How much of America? Fifty-two percent. The rest of us are aghast and dismayed.
Today, the site is creating an epilogue--or a sequel--called Helloeverybody and asking Americans to express new sentiments to the world. It's going to be an uphill battle, but let's hope we can someday become decent members of the global community once again.
See the world react below the fold.
Kenya, the homeland of Obama's father, celebrates.
Black Iraqis in the port city of Basra
celebrate Obama's victory
Athens, Greece
Beijing, China applauds Obama's win
A cabdriver in Dakar, Senegal shows his preference
Australia goes wild
Denmark
The school in Jakarta, Indonesia, which
Obama attended as a child, reacts
Israel
Kuwait
Switzerland
Monks in Bhutan watch the election
Japan Cheers on Obama
New Dehli, India Celebrates
Disbelief in the Philippines
Paris Celebrates
After enough celebrating,
London--like the rest of us--takes a much needed rest
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