hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-russnow/what-to-do-about-white-ho_b_372635.html

After hearing about Tareq and Michaele Salahi, the brazen pair who crashed the White House State Dinner, I was alternately intrigued and worried, especially the way the Media reported it.

In particular CNN, where Tom Foreman and Erica Hill, subbing for Anderson Cooper, kept harping at how horrible it was and that national security was clearly at stake.

Please, this is much ado about -- not exactly nothing, but not nearly as much as they were screaming about. And I say this as one who adores Erica Hill, in particular her eyebrow raised banter with Anderson Cooper. But I guess when she's actually hosting the show, she's determined at all costs to prove she's a serious journalist.

Okay, but when she ominously suggests what these folks did might get them into prison, fueled by Bush Homeland Security Advisor Frances Fragos Townsend, who said it was a federal offense to lie to a federal officer, I have to say, enough! Let's put it all into perspective, not to mention why Ms. Townsend wasn't outraged about the lies told to federal officials in the Bush administration concerning the so-called weapons of mass destruction that got us into a seemingly endless and deadly war in Iraq.

So, what did these masqueraders do that was so different from the Streaker who got into the Academy Awards or any other famed gate crasher of recent memory? Yes, it was the White House, but it's not as if they were found in the residential quarters hiding under the president's bed. Indeed, some of you may remember the unwelcome guest Queen Elizabeth woke up to in her Buckingham Palace bedroom in 1982. That was a national security breach. What happened at the State Dinner pales in comparison.

Did the Secret Service err? Absolutely. Was the president in apparent danger, absolutely not. No more than when he steps out of the White House and attends a county fair or similar dinners held in grand hotels.

The Salahis somehow talked their way through the initial entrance point, then went through metal detectors, as did all the guests. Some have said, "But they could have picked up a knife from a table." So could any of the other guests, and just because the others were "cleared" through social security cards and the like, were they all so well-known that they couldn't have been part of some sleeper cells living in America for years?

But someone might say, "When Michaela Salahi shook hands with the president, she could have kissed him with her poison lipstick," as if straight out of a James Bond thriller. And so could anyone on a receiving line at any of the hundreds of events the president attends during the year, where people are not screened in advance. He always has secret service bodyguard protection around him and certainly did at this reception. But it's impossible to totally protect the president from all situations, so it's silly to get hysterical about this happenstance, except to wonder how the uninvited got to mingle with the elites, who'd gotten official nods.

Are there background checks for the kids and parents who come onto the White House lawn for the Easter Egg Roll each year? The president and his family mingle with them as well. Not to mention the many, many tourists who visit the White House daily, whether the president is there or not. While there, they are watched. They do not have free rein of the mansion. Just as the Salahis and the other State Dinner guests (including the Indian Prime Minister and his wife) could not have walked anywhere they wanted and taken the elevator to the family residence.

I think there's amazement at what the Salahis did, and the Secret Service should take note, but what the Salahis accomplished didn't make Obama particularly unsafe if the basic protections surrounding the immediate area of the president are in place.

Crashing a party, even at The White House, does not rise to the level of a federal crime, so much as indicate dismay that the officials in charge were not able to keep the riff raff out. I'm not pooh-poohing the necessity to keep all of our First Families and thus the well being of our nation secure. However, I'm saying what the Salahis did was a rather remarkable achievement, but no more a cause for alarm than if they had achieved the same result at a dinner attended by President Obama at the Waldorf-Astoria.

I also find it intriguing that there were many who were willing to give the Balloon Family a pass, in particular the often smug Jeffrey Toobin, also of CNN, who essentially said that, while it was wrong, nothing horrible had been done.

No? In that instance, not only were millions of Americans gripped in terror worrying about a little boy's safety, but more significantly the Heenes had launched an aeronautical object that could have wreaked havoc on an airplane or caused severe damage to electrical or telephone wires. And don't forget thousands who combed the areas searching for the balloon and the supposedly lost boy, including professional safety people who might have been used elsewhere for a true emergency, which fortunately never occurred.

The Media, be they Brian Williams on NBC, Katie Couric on CBS, Diane Sawyer on ABC, or the cable outlets Fox News, MSNBC and the The New York Times and The Washington Post in their bid for competitive ad dollars, seem content to make news out of news that is only partially so. Or blow things out of proportion such as in the Michael Jackson non-stop coverage or Octomom. To suggest that the Salahis go to federal prison is nonsense. They should be thanked for exposing some flaws in the Secret Service System, though the flaws themselves led to no real danger to the president, and isn't that the real story?

Michael Russnow's website is www.ramproductionsinternational.com

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-remington/the-5000-fingers-of-dr-t_b_372628.html

Dr. Seuss wrote one screenplay in his long career as a writer: the cracked, magical, cult classic 1953 children's movie The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. It was a flop on release, and Dr. Seuss reportedly hated it, but it's actually a wonderfully weird, funny, charming musical, and everything I wish Where the Wild Things Are could have been.

The movie is about a boy, Bart Collins, whose single mother forces him to take piano lessons from the domineering Dr. Terwilliker. Most of the movie is set Bart's daydreams about a horrible Dr. Terwilliker-ruled prison camp for boy pianists, with his mother as Terwilliker's second-in-command and future wife. Dr. T's diabolical plan? Assembling 500 boys, with their 5,000 fingers, to play simultaneously at a gigantic two-story piano he built. Despite Seuss's dissatisfaction, the movie bears his stamp in every frame. The daydream sets bear the look of his illustrations, despite a low budget, and the book and lyrics both share his delight in mischievous wordplay. (The boy's name, Bart Collins, is of course reminiscent of Bartholomew Cubbins, titular protagonist of two prose works by Dr. Seuss, written in 1938 and 1949.)

I was inspired to check the movie out by a feature in The Onion A.V. Club about one of the film's loveliest setpieces, a shadowboxing dance between the evil Dr. T and the heroic plumber August Zabladowski, in which the two fight to a draw by making menacing expressions and pointing their fingers at one another. Dr. T is played by Hans Conried, who is perhaps best known as the voice of Snidely Whiplash, and he plays his role exactly like a cartoon villain, with contorted face, overarticulated diction and rrrrrrolled r's. Zabladowski is the straight man, and all he has to do is act normal, without being too surprised by all the absurdity around him. He later has a touching scene with Bart, who wants him for a father, as they pantomime going on a fishing trip. They watch another fantastic setpiece of a performance by all the musicians Dr. T has thrown into his dungeons, unfortunate souls who play instruments other than the piano.

As with most movies of its type, not all the songs are memorable, and the cute young boy who plays the protagonist is a bit blank as an actor. The low-budget sets are evocative, but not nearly as rich as Dr. Seuss's wonderful illustrations. And Conried pitches his performance to the rafters, so those who prefer subtle villains will find it a bit much. But these are trifles. It entirely succeeds on its own bizarre terms.

Rating: 80

Crossposted on Remingtonstein.

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-russnow/what-to-do-about-white-ho_b_372635.html

After hearing about Tareq and Michaele Salahi, the brazen pair who crashed the White House State Dinner, I was alternately intrigued and worried, especially the way the Media reported it.

In particular CNN, where Tom Foreman and Erica Hill, subbing for Anderson Cooper, kept harping at how horrible it was and that national security was clearly at stake.

Please, this is much ado about -- not exactly nothing, but not nearly as much as they were screaming about. And I say this as one who adores Erica Hill, in particular her eyebrow raised banter with Anderson Cooper. But I guess when she's actually hosting the show, she's determined at all costs to prove she's a serious journalist.

Okay, but when she ominously suggests what these folks did might get them into prison, fueled by Bush Homeland Security Advisor Frances Fragos Townsend, who said it was a federal offense to lie to a federal officer, I have to say, enough! Let's put it all into perspective, not to mention why Ms. Townsend wasn't outraged about the lies told to federal officials in the Bush administration concerning the so-called weapons of mass destruction that got us into a seemingly endless and deadly war in Iraq.

So, what did these masqueraders do that was so different from the Streaker who got into the Academy Awards or any other famed gate crasher of recent memory? Yes, it was the White House, but it's not as if they were found in the residential quarters hiding under the president's bed. Indeed, some of you may remember the unwelcome guest Queen Elizabeth woke up to in her Buckingham Palace bedroom in 1982. That was a national security breach. What happened at the State Dinner pales in comparison.

Did the Secret Service err? Absolutely. Was the president in apparent danger, absolutely not. No more than when he steps out of the White House and attends a county fair or similar dinners held in grand hotels.

The Salahis somehow talked their way through the initial entrance point, then went through metal detectors, as did all the guests. Some have said, "But they could have picked up a knife from a table." So could any of the other guests, and just because the others were "cleared" through social security cards and the like, were they all so well-known that they couldn't have been part of some sleeper cells living in America for years?

But someone might say, "When Michaela Salahi shook hands with the president, she could have kissed him with her poison lipstick," as if straight out of a James Bond thriller. And so could anyone on a receiving line at any of the hundreds of events the president attends during the year, where people are not screened in advance. He always has secret service bodyguard protection around him and certainly did at this reception. But it's impossible to totally protect the president from all situations, so it's silly to get hysterical about this happenstance, except to wonder how the uninvited got to mingle with the elites, who'd gotten official nods.

Are there background checks for the kids and parents who come onto the White House lawn for the Easter Egg Roll each year? The president and his family mingle with them as well. Not to mention the many, many tourists who visit the White House daily, whether the president is there or not. While there, they are watched. They do not have free rein of the mansion. Just as the Salahis and the other State Dinner guests (including the Indian Prime Minister and his wife) could not have walked anywhere they wanted and taken the elevator to the family residence.

I think there's amazement at what the Salahis did, and the Secret Service should take note, but what the Salahis accomplished didn't make Obama particularly unsafe if the basic protections surrounding the immediate area of the president are in place.

Crashing a party, even at The White House, does not rise to the level of a federal crime, so much as indicate dismay that the officials in charge were not able to keep the riff raff out. I'm not pooh-poohing the necessity to keep all of our First Families and thus the well being of our nation secure. However, I'm saying what the Salahis did was a rather remarkable achievement, but no more a cause for alarm than if they had achieved the same result at a dinner attended by President Obama at the Waldorf-Astoria.

I also find it intriguing that there were many who were willing to give the Balloon Family a pass, in particular the often smug Jeffrey Toobin, also of CNN, who essentially said that, while it was wrong, nothing horrible had been done.

No? In that instance, not only were millions of Americans gripped in terror worrying about a little boy's safety, but more significantly the Heenes had launched an aeronautical object that could have wreaked havoc on an airplane or caused severe damage to electrical or telephone wires. And don't forget thousands who combed the areas searching for the balloon and the supposedly lost boy, including professional safety people who might have been used elsewhere for a true emergency, which fortunately never occurred.

The Media, be they Brian Williams on NBC, Katie Couric on CBS, Diane Sawyer on ABC, or the cable outlets Fox News, MSNBC and the The New York Times and The Washington Post in their bid for competitive ad dollars, seem content to make news out of news that is only partially so. Or blow things out of proportion such as in the Michael Jackson non-stop coverage or Octomom. To suggest that the Salahis go to federal prison is nonsense. They should be thanked for exposing some flaws in the Secret Service System, though the flaws themselves led to no real danger to the president, and isn't that the real story?

Michael Russnow's website is www.ramproductionsinternational.com

parsimonia

"If our law and our culture are gradually finding their way toward these non-linear approaches, it must be said that in general our universities and schools are not doing their job. They have no problem delving into Greek mythology, Jung's archetypes or the Dalai Lama's ideas of happiness. But god forbid they should take seriously the nature of human relationships in our own indigenous tradition and how it has mixed into our collective unconscious and our actions. There are exceptions of course, but the central message of our education remains a derivative from the old and new imperial sources and so is provincially linear. The more they talk about meritocracy and world-class and measuring themselves against the best, the more provincial our universities become, destined to act like losers perpetually trying to catch up. When we look at our critical situations in almost every direction--from economics through the environment to social relations--what we need is a non-linear approach. In the words of James Dumont, Ojibwa elder and scholar, we need "an all-around vision" that can be inclusive, a circular approach to thinking, versus the "straight-ahead vision of modern thought."

All the ideas I have evoked--from the real meaning of nomadism to rethinking the nature of progress--are linked to our need to develop a vision of ourselves that is built upon our own foundations. At the heart of coming to terms with the Aboriginal nature of Canada is what Jeanette Armstrong calls "Indegenization: People reconciling themselves into the indigenous landscape." What does she mean? That we must try to hink of this place in another way. We must step away from the conquering, owning ways of thought and move toward seeing ourselves as part of the place. All of this is contained in the idea that you are reconciled to the place and thus to the other by widening the circle. Each place has a truth about it. Through reconicilation you find out what that is.

If you think about immigration and fresh citizenship in these terms you begin to see how the latest wave of newcomers from Somalia or Morocco are part of a continuous process dating back to before the first Europeans. The indigenous philosophy explains far better what we are inventing here than any imported and amended European idea of citizenship."

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-remington/the-5000-fingers-of-dr-t_b_372628.html

Dr. Seuss wrote one screenplay in his long career as a writer: the cracked, magical, cult classic 1953 children's movie The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. It was a flop on release, and Dr. Seuss reportedly hated it, but it's actually a wonderfully weird, funny, charming musical, and everything I wish Where the Wild Things Are could have been.

The movie is about a boy, Bart Collins, whose single mother forces him to take piano lessons from the domineering Dr. Terwilliker. Most of the movie is set Bart's daydreams about a horrible Dr. Terwilliker-ruled prison camp for boy pianists, with his mother as Terwilliker's second-in-command and future wife. Dr. T's diabolical plan? Assembling 500 boys, with their 5,000 fingers, to play simultaneously at a gigantic two-story piano he built. Despite Seuss's dissatisfaction, the movie bears his stamp in every frame. The daydream sets bear the look of his illustrations, despite a low budget, and the book and lyrics both share his delight in mischievous wordplay. (The boy's name, Bart Collins, is of course reminiscent of Bartholomew Cubbins, titular protagonist of two prose works by Dr. Seuss, written in 1938 and 1949.)

I was inspired to check the movie out by a feature in The Onion A.V. Club about one of the film's loveliest setpieces, a shadowboxing dance between the evil Dr. T and the heroic plumber August Zabladowski, in which the two fight to a draw by making menacing expressions and pointing their fingers at one another. Dr. T is played by Hans Conried, who is perhaps best known as the voice of Snidely Whiplash, and he plays his role exactly like a cartoon villain, with contorted face, overarticulated diction and rrrrrrolled r's. Zabladowski is the straight man, and all he has to do is act normal, without being too surprised by all the absurdity around him. He later has a touching scene with Bart, who wants him for a father, as they pantomime going on a fishing trip. They watch another fantastic setpiece of a performance by all the musicians Dr. T has thrown into his dungeons, unfortunate souls who play instruments other than the piano.

As with most movies of its type, not all the songs are memorable, and the cute young boy who plays the protagonist is a bit blank as an actor. The low-budget sets are evocative, but not nearly as rich as Dr. Seuss's wonderful illustrations. And Conried pitches his performance to the rafters, so those who prefer subtle villains will find it a bit much. But these are trifles. It entirely succeeds on its own bizarre terms.

Rating: 80

Crossposted on Remingtonstein.

leaky_cauldron

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/2009/11/28/exclusive-clip-from-hp-ultimate-dvds

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-parker/our-automotive-radio-show_b_372548.html

Join us LIVE Saturday at 11am Pacific/2pm Eastern (NEW TIME!) and Sunday at 5pm Pacific/8pm Eastern on www.TalkRadioOne.com for our exclusive LIVE motoring and motorsports talk shows!

Steve Parker's The Car Nut Show
NEW TIME! Join us LIVE every Saturday at 11am Pacific/2pm Eastern

Some major car news this week: Toyota has admitted a major mechanical problem with its 3.8 million recalled Toyota and Lexus vehicles, after denying it just a week ago. And the "acceleration incidents" are not because of the wrong-sized floor mats; it's the gas pedals and maybe the ECUs in all the vehicles, too. And this week Toyota also announced a 110,000 unit recall of their Tundra pickup. Also, the Euro company which was negotiating with GM to buy Saab has backed out of the deal ... and there was plenty more, too. Let's discuss! The call-in number is: 213-341-4353.
Toyota's Camry, America's best-selling car, may have deep-seated throttle problems

Steve Parker's World Racing Roundup
Sunday starting at 5pm

This morning I had my first drive in the Chevrolet Volt extended-range hybrid and I'll have my first report on this critical car for GM. Thanksgiving night I went to the Turkey Night Grand Prix at Irwindale Speedway and we'll have a full report on the great competition there. This week is NASCAR's "Champion's Week" and for the first time ever it's being held in Las Vegas ... and fans can pay to attend and see their favorite drivers reap their rewards. Plus plenty from racing's 'silly season'. The call-in number is: 213-341-4353. Join in!
Jeff Gordon finished third in NASCAR point standings this season

Podcasts of both shows are available one hour after the live shows conclude. That's our NEW TIME this Saturday at 11am Pacific/2pm eastern and Sunday at 5pm Pacific/8pm Eastern time every week on www.TalkRadioOne.com!

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/irene-s-levine/how-to-handle-a-fizzling_b_372545.html

QUESTION

Dear Irene,

I've been friends for three years with a guy at my office. We became friends after a really rough period in which I was demoted, isolated, and treated quite shabbily, though I couldn't afford to leave and wasn't in the best psychological state to do so (like, I was in need of health-insurance-paid therapy to restore myself). Only after laying a potential legal case before HR did I get the option of working in a different area at our office, with a different group, and things have stabilized. Our friendship helped me endure those dark days. We had spontaneous, one-on-one happy hours and bull sessions on the way home (since we live a few blocks from each other), dinners, etc. He's worked at our office a decade, in the somewhat protective bubble of our IT department, and has seen it all.

Just to clarify things: He is gay, and I am a heterosexual woman, so no crushes there. We are both moderate introverts who value our privacy and down time, though my friend acts way more outgoing than he really is. We tend to keep our "circles" of friends separate, and we prefer to keep our intimate (platonic) relationship at work quiet, as well as our outside interests. We work in a high-powered, hyper-aggressive, alpha male-dominated environment that is rife with sex, race, and age discrimination, and those who haven't been driven out by that know each other, though none of us really have much in common. My friend and I became friends because we did.

In any case, lately my friend has adopted this "I love you, now go away" persona that's testing my patience. Every few months I get the occasional drunk dial about how much he wants to be a good friend and sees me as a "little sister," but then, when I reach out and offer to do something nice for him, or just want to spend time, I get the wall of silence - like unreturned text messages and phone calls (like once a week), or avoidance at the office.

He said he wanted to travel to California with me for my birthday a few days, yet when it came time to commit the money a couple of weeks before, he "disappeared." Then he seemed offended after I returned, know that I took another good friend of mine with me. I didn't even give him any crap about it, though I certainly felt like it.

This back and forth has been going on for months. Still we see each other everyday, though there's more distance, but it remains cordial. It seems he's perfectly content to engage me when it's convenient for him, and while I enjoy his company when this happens, I feel kind of used. When we do talk, he dominates the conversation and listens little, either about me or about the advice that he asks me for about his own slightly frenetic life. He tends to complain that many, but not all, of his friends, some of whom are "in the life," are superficial, expect too much, and give too little. He says some judge him more harshly now because he's gained weight and is over 40.

Yet I see on Facebook and elsewhere that he has no problems "festing" with these same folks, or helping to save them from themselves in some way. Fine, that's his business, but here I am, a friend who accepts him for who he is, and I feel like I'm getting the short end of the stick. I'm trying to give him a chance, but I don't even feel like waiting around for his next "appearance" to tell him that this behavior is killing the vibe. As an introvert, it's not easy doing the emotional miner's work to cultivate rich, long-lasting friendships. I've had so-called friends treat me like this before, though some years ago, so I've developed surgical precision in cutting people off once I'm done. He's tap dancing on that edge of no-man's land, here. What would you recommend?

Signed,
Ella

ANSWER:

Dear Ella:

It sounds like you had a really close and easy relationship with your friend, which was especially important to you at a time when you were having so many difficulties at work. So I can understand your disappointment when such a satisfying and significant relationship suddenly changes and your friend becomes mercurial, distant, and not very reliable.

I suspect that something (or a series of things) has transpired in his life that he hasn't told you about; he, himself, may not even be consciously aware of what's happening. You mention that he's gained weight, is drinking too much, and is making inappropriate late-night calls. He's feeling judged by others and feels like the people around him are letting him down. He's just reached his 40th birthday, which may be a time when he's assessing what he's accomplished in his own life. He may be depressed.

You need to talk to him and communicate your concerns about him and your friendship. Let him know how these changes are affecting your relationship and that you feel badly about it. This will open the door for him to talk to you more openly if he chooses to---if not, at least he will think about what you have told him.

I know this has to hit you particularly hard because you have invested a lot of yourself in the relationship but it sounds like the issues have more to do with him than with you, per se. If you can't communicate, he may just need some time to struggle with what's bothering him and come out the other end.

Hope this is helpful.

Best,
Irene

Have a question about friendship? Send it to The Friendship Doctor.

Irene S. Levine, PhD is a freelance journalist and author. She holds an appointment as a professor of psychiatry at the New York University School of Medicine. Her new book about female friendships, Best Friends Forever: Surviving a Breakup with Your Best Friend, was recently published by Overlook Press. She also blogs about female friendships at The Friendship Blog and at PsychologyToday.com.

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-radio/left-right-center-is-amer_b_372531.html

Two big-think, deep evergreen topics are up for discussion: Is America ungovernable? Are moneyed and special interests so entrenched that we cannot govern of, for and by the people? Marx, Carlyle and Hegel are all raised in this discussion.

And the second deep question: Is history made by great men and women? Or is it the reverse: Does the moment make the man/woman? This show is a winner.

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/candy-spelling/times-decade-from-hell-vs_b_372527.html

The day after Thanksgiving is always a day of reflection. Yesterday, we thought about all the reasons we have to be thankful. Today, once we separated into the "I'm not going to fight the Black Friday crowds" or "I'm going shopping" factions, it was back to real life.

I was listening to the radio as I went through the mail.

Friends had been saying, "KGIL is back." That local radio station had changed formats so many times, I didn't know which one to expect. Happily, it turned out that KGIL had become "Retro 1260," and the next few minutes were filled with some of the best music ever.

That was fortunate because topping my mail stack was TIME Magazine, with the crying baby on the cover and the words, "The Decade From Hell."

I turned up the volume on the radio.

"The Best Is Yet To Come" was playing on the radio. That was encouraging. I wondered if TIME and Retro 1260 has somehow digitally arranged for this happy message to greet the pronouncement of what had happened the last 10 years. I know the technology today was amazing.

TIME, fortunately, added a line on the cover that read, "and why the next one will be better."

Whew. I was glad to read that. The radio played "The In Crowd." I remembered how important that used to be, many seemingly-heavenly decades ago.

As I read the story in TIME and remembered all the terrible events and circumstances (and people) that brought TIME to this conclusion, the radio played "The Fool on a Hill."

Was that more synergy, saying we should have done more about the wars, or said something about subprime mortgages, or demanded more aid for victims of Hurricane Katrina?

Maybe we would be wiser, and that's why the next decade will be better.

The next song was "There's No Place LIke Home for the Holidays." Yup.

Page after page, TIME's story wasn't convincing me that things would be better. I was just reminded about more things we'd all rather forget.

I blasted the radio, and heard,

"Take one fresh and tender kiss
And one stolen night of bliss,"

and remembered all the happy memories when I used to hear those lyrics in "Memories Are Made of This."

Does anyone use words like "tender" and "bliss" any longer? We should.

More bad news in the magazine was accompanied by more inspiration and happiness from the radio. The next song was "I Can't Give You Anything but Love."

Literally, that isn't the case. But, I know the next decade would be better with more love.

The next song was "More." It was about love, not possessions.

I reached the end of the article just as "It's a Most Unusual Day" started playing.

It is a most unusual day, and the decade was, hopefully, unusual.

Wouldn't it be ironic, I thought, if the next song would be "Eve of Destruction" or "Revolution"?

I'm ready for a medley of "Sound of Music," "Here Comes the Sun," "Twelfth of Never," "I Feel Pretty," "Strike Up the Band," "and "My Funny Valentine." How can the decade not improve if we're hearing those kinds of words?

The next song I heard was "Fever."

I'm voting for the fever that has infected our country and the world to break to begin the next decade.

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/roger-morris/matthew-hoh-speaks-grim-t_b_372528.html

The rare resignation on principle is always telling in American government. When Matthew Hoh recently left the State Department -- a Marine Captain in Iraq who became a diplomat in Afghanistan -- his act was significant far beyond the first reports.

Hoh speaks grim truth to power. His message is that to pursue the Afghan war policy in any guise -- regardless of the troop level President Obama now chooses -- will be utter folly, trapping America in an unwinnable civil war in the Hindu Kush, and only fueling terrorism.

An advisor in southern Afghanistan, Hoh knew the malignancy of want behind the war. Eight years after the U.S. invasion and a third of a trillion dollars spent, half the nation faces starvation on 45 cents a day, half the children die before five, and half the surviving young have no schools, part of a torment Afghans plead in poll after poll to be understood as the core of their conflict. He knew well the source of that scourge in the U.S.-installed Kabul regime, a kleptocracy of war- and drug-lords holed up amid American bodyguards in "poppy palaces," while clan-based "security forces" loot the countryside, sodomize its sons, and swell insurgent ranks. "We're propping up a government," Hoh said last week, "that isn't worth dying for." So pervasive and profound is that corruption, so entwined with the private exploitation and official graft of the U.S. occupation regime -- including kickbacks or extortion payments from both the American military and civilian aid programs to both the new Kabul plutocracy and the multi-layered Taliban -- that the morass makes every other issue of policy moot.

The 36-year-old diplomat brings unique authority to public debate. An insider confirming outside critics dispels the myth that classified information redeems a failed policy. He also speaks to and for many in government, infusing honesty where folly feeds on wary quiet and fraudulent unanimity. "There are a lot of guys, not just in the Foreign Service but in the military, who are looking at this thing and they don't understand what we are doing there," he told one audience. "I get mails all the time from junior and mid-level officers telling me, 'Keep it up. This makes no sense to us.'"

Whatever this protest says outwardly, its deeper meaning is devastating. The sheer contrast between Hoh and senior officials -- seeing the same reality, the same reports -- exposes some dirty little secrets of policy haunting the Obama presidency.

With the 8-year enormity of waste, venality and oppression since the invasion of 2001, ravages Hoh saw climaxed around him, went the knowing silence if not collusion of a succession of U.S. diplomats and officers responsible in the defiled occupation of Afghanistan. There is a troubling legacy, too, in the policy process. In the grip of experience irrelevant in Afghanistan, a generation of military commanders comes with a crudely recycled but promotion-rich creed of counter-insurgency, avenging what some as young officers in the 1970s saw as a false defeat if not home-front betrayal in Vietnam. They are allied with the lucrative in-and-out careerism of powerful if publicly faceless civilian Pentagon officials, what State Department rivals call the "COIN-heads" of counter-insurgency dogma. Those currents run like a murky subterranean river beneath the doomed policy Hoh silhouettes.

Most telling may be the disparity between Hoh -- the serious student of Afghan culture -- and Washington's decision-makers. To deal with one of the most complex settings on earth, the Obama administration relies on key figures -- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Af-Pak Special envoy Richard Holbrooke and NSC Advisor James Jones -- whose careers in politics or the bureaucracy (like those commanding generals David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal) are bereft of any substantive knowledge of a people they are supposed to master. It leaves them all dangerously dependent on staff, and prey to the absence of dissenters like Hoh among aides whose credentials are hardly more impressive than their own.

That intellectual vacuum, a mirror of Vietnam decision-making, explains the shock and hostility that greeted recent cables of US Ambassador Karl Eikenberry opposing added U.S. troops backing an irredeemable regime. As Hoh exemplifies, actual knowledge of Afghanistan is rare -- and the lack scarcely recognized -- in a war council prone to flippant lines like Clinton's recent "There are warlords and there are warlords," or Holbrooke's definition of success, "We'll know it when we see it."

At the heart of Washington's decision-making dysfunction, of course, is always a president in thrall to the hoary fears and myths of national security, the most important realm he governs and in which most take power least prepared. For Barack Obama, only historic courage and insight can surmount the multiple corruptions of policy he is heir to.

Hoh embodies that bravery. Implored by Eikenberry to stay, he chose to forgo a prized career to speak out. We know that agony. There is no easy course ahead in Afghanistan. US policies a half century before 2001 account for much of the politics now so deplored in Kabul, a breakdown inflicted as well as inherent, and a blood debt added to the toll of occupation and war.

The gruesome truth of that history is that our sacrifices so far have been largely in vain. It is Matthew Hoh's heroism to try to stop the inseparable casualties of lives and truth.

Roger Morris and George Kenney are both Foreign Service Officers who resigned on principle -- Morris at the 1970 invasion of Cambodia, Kenney in 1991 over policy in the Balkans -- both writers are award-winning authors. Morris's Between the Graves: America, Afghanistan and the Politics of Intervention, will be published by Knopf in 2010. Kenney produces and hosts a podcast at electricpolitics.com while on the Board of Editors at In These Times.

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lisa-derrick/salahis-met-obama-in-may_b_372524.html

A photo from May's Rockin' the Runway™ televised fashion event shows party crashers Tareq and Michaele Salahi posing with the Black Eyed Peas, Randy Jackson, and PRESIDENT OBAMA

The show was part of the America's Polo Cup DC Fashion & Polo Weekend, in which the Salahis play a major part--Tareq is the chairman of the America's Cup Polo and captain of the American team; Michaele, a former cheerleader, organizes the fashion show.

(originally posted on La Figa)

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/allison-kilkenny/jail-is-for-good-samarita_b_372522.html

People on my TV won't shut up about these two idiot party crashers. I know most of you have been trapped in the same room as your families for Thanksgiving, and probably have been forced to watch 24-hour news stations in lieu of interacting with distant cousins, so by now you probably know more details from this totally trumped-up story than you do about the ratification of the Constitution.

Nonetheless, a brief recap: Basically, two wannabe reality television nobodies wandered into President Obama's shindig, and now the media is inexplicably pursuing the story with bloodthirsty gusto.

There must be justice! The fact that these two hapless egomaniacs wandered into a party and posed for a few pictures with Rahm Emanuel (labeled "Ron Emanuel" on their Facebook page) is a "disgrace and symptomatic of lax standards at the Secret Service ever since it was absorbed by the Homeland Security Department in 2003," cries justice guardian, Ronald Kessler of NY Daily News.

Sure, Tareq And Michaele Salahi were both very naughty, and the Secret Service needs to get its act together, but here is yet another example of our bizarro media, which whips itself into a frenzy over fluff stories, while real criminals get away with the crimes of the century.

If only the media has expressed this much interest in Iraq during the lead-up to invasion, or the economic bailout when America's oligarchy robbed taxpayers. Perhaps Americans would have shown the appropriate amount of interest in these really big stories if their excellent media handled huge events as enthusiastically as, say, the Jon and Kate break up.

Perhaps a stiff fine is in order for the party crashers, and maybe a good talking to. Certainly, there's no need to prosecute these two individuals to the "full extent of Federal LAW," as one commenter furiously demanded over at Anderson Cooper's blog. They're stupid fame-chashers, not international spies.

Where would we put two confused socialites, anyway? Our jails are already stretched to their limits with people who don't belong there. For example, in California this week, a 66-year-old man was jailed after being accused of illegally housing homeless people on his ranch in San Luis Obispo. Dan De Vaul was offered probation but refused the terms. He said, "I'm proud to go to jail for housing the homeless." (Side-note: De Vaul was recently released after Mary Partin, juror number five in his trial, put up $500 for his $5,000 bail. Partin voted guilty, but now says she caved to judicial pressure even though she thought De Vaul was innocent all along.)

Then there're all the poor people in jail. America has 5 percent of the world's population, but 25 percent of the world's prisoners. More than 1 in 100 American adults were incarcerated at the start of 2008. One in every 31 American adults, or 7.3 million Americans, are in prison, on parole or probation. Approximately one in every 18 men in the United States is behind bars or being monitored.

So who goes to jail? Believe it or not, most aren't party crashers. Many are poor men of color who sold some drugs to survive.

One in 11 African-Americans, or 9.2 percent, are under correctional control, compared with one in 27 Latinos (3.7 percent) and one in 45 whites (2.2 percent). Only one out of 89 women is behind bars or monitored, compared with one out of 18 men.

These included a 1986 federal law (since revised) mandating prison terms for crack cocaine offenses that were up to eight times as long as for those involving powder cocaine. In the 1990s, many states adopted "three-strikes-you're-out" laws and curtailed the powers of parole boards.

[snip]

Because of these policy shifts, the nationwide prison population swelled by about 80 percent from 1990 to 2000, increasing by as much as 86,000 a year. By contrast, from 2007 to 2008, that population increased by 25,000, a 2 percent rise.

"There have been some modest shifts," says Robert Gangi, of the New York Correctional Association. "But people of color still make up a disproportionately large percentage."

That's led some analysts to argue that the racial shift in national incarceration rates does not reflect changing police and prosecution practices within states so much as the increase in methamphetamine use in many Western and Midwestern states.

When marijuana was outlawed, people, who have been known to go to great lengths to escape their shitty lives, started mixing chemicals to get high. Ironically, in their attempt to outlaw a drug that isn't dangerous, law enforcement created a new monster: a highly addictive drug that makes individuals hyper-sexual, aggressive, psychotic, and eventually depressed and suicidal.

All the while, the mainstream media refused to state the obvious: the War on Drugs isn't working. Drugs continue to enter the country, and the federal government has made locking up poor people of color, who have resorted to using and selling drugs, a full-time business. Instead of pointing out this very clear reality, the media ran stories about dogs in funny costumes, the occasional missing blonde girl, and celebrity stories.

Occasionally, a solo criminal story (like the party crashers) pops up, but larger injustice goes unexamined.

I have no idea why America loves to hate the little criminal, while the big criminal gets away. Maybe it's because Americans can easily imagine Tareq or Michaele, the smug crashers, waltzing into the White House like they own the place. It's fun to hate party crashers, or a Bernie Madoff, or a Martha Stewart because it's like rooting against the villain in a soap opera. It's easy to picture their face, or their single crime, and then watch as that one person gets put through the wringer.

Think: rubberneckers. Everyone wants to see the cop chew out the speeder on the side of the highway. Why? Because it's not me. It's not my shitty life for a few seconds. It's their shitty life. But it's scary and intimidating to think that the whole system is rotten, and it's not just a few bad apples who broke the law.

It's considerably more difficult to comprehend the hundreds of billions of dollars shelled out to the banks during Obama's TARP program, or picture the faces and back-stories of the 7.3 million American adults in prison, on parole or probation. It's hard to understand what 87,215 dead Iraqis look like. It's impossible to know what 87,215 violent deaths does to a country, and of course, these are the sterile and modest numbers. Many more have died and millions are suffering, but again, imagining such horror is demanding.

It's much simpler to envision a smug gent and a rail-thin blonde walking into a party they were not invited to. It's fun to hate the miserable bastard steering the Ponzi scheme that was called "the largest investment fraud in Wall Street history," while ignoring that America's whole version of Capitalism is a Ponzi scheme, and the oligarchy was raiding the Treasury while the media salivated over the paparazzi footage of Bernie dodging the cameras.

The media, as usual, distracts instead of educates. The people that drop bombs and steal taxpayer money can only get away with their crimes if the media collaborates among itself to provide the cover of silence to these epic heists.

After the failure of the WMDs-that-never-were, the media crossed itself and collectively swore "Never Again." Yet, here we are, with the media jangling a new set of shiny keys in front of us even while it was recently revealed that Blackwater is secretly at war with a third country, Pakistan, which is -- I know I don't have to tell you smart people -- kind of a big fucking deal.

But back to Planet Media. I don't think the party crashers should go to jail. Yes, they're insufferable idiots, but there are worse criminals in the world. For example: The Bush administration and Goldman Sachs executives. There's Blackwater CEO, Erik Prince. There's the fleet of business card-wielding assholes that sunk the economy, costing millions of people their jobs and homes. There are thousands of war profiteers, war criminals, corporate jackals, and Wall Street crooks running around killing people with bombs, resource privatization, and short-selling. Where is their 24-hour news shaming?

Of course, I really doubt Tareq or Michaele are going to prison. He's a polo-playing winemaker, and she's way too blonde to ever see the inside of a jail cell. Our jails are full of men like Dan De Vaul and millions of other poor men and women, who just don't have the time and privilege to pursue Oenology.

A savvy media viewer can always find the real story behind the media's superficial coverage by observing what isn't reported. A Black Friday news story will never examine the motives of desperate shoppers -- some who may be trying to find bargains because they're newly unemployed, or simply nickel and dimed by the minimum wage. A soup kitchen holiday fluff piece will rarely feature the biographies of the homeless, many of who may be war veterans and ex-convicts, who can't find work or proper medical care.

And that's just the most obvious negations. The media is always not teaching us in all kinds of ways.

Cross-posted from Allison Kilkenny's blog. Also available on Facebook and Twitter.

hufblog

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-marmel/memo-to-the-secret-servic_b_372498.html

Ever since the idiocy of “Balloon Boy,” I have been pining for the moment where fame-whores finally cross a line, and face serious repercussions for their stupidity.

Maybe here.  Maybe this.

AP - Tareq and Michaele Salahi, the couple who crashed the White House state dinner, may face criminal charges, the Secret Service announced today.

Jim Mackin, the agency's spokesman, said this is one reason the Secret Service has kept mum about what happened when the couple, who are auditioning for the Bravo reality show "The Real Housewives of DC", arrived at the security checkpoint Tuesday. They were not on the guest list for the dinner honoring Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh but managing to get into the party, where they posed for photos with Vice President Joe Biden and Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel.

"As this moves closer to a criminal investigation there's less that we can say," Mackin said. "I don't want to jeopardize what could be a criminal investigation. We're not leaving any option off the table at this point."

By now, you know the story.  A couple of empty-souled "socialites" desperately trying to get onto “The Real Housewives of DC” somehow managed to crash a state dinner.

You also know by now, they managed to come in contact with the President of the United States.

So – there’s fraud in this.  There’s a breakdown of security in this.  But for this couple -  there’s the hope of fame in this.   Their lawyer (Surprise!  An entertainment lawyer!) says this of anyone who might have disparaging comments about these bobbleheads: 

“"We will begin doing press and media next week providing exclusive interviews and press junkets. If you would like to be considered in our media circuit we request that you hold your proposed published profile until then."

Pass.  

Even if they WERE invited to this state dinner, something I highly doubt considering their car was turned away at the first checkpoint… who the hell uses it as a chance to dive into a reality TV dumpster?  

A-holes, that’s who.

Luckily, next Monday's visit to Larry King and his hour of suspendered softball questions will not be the last stop on the Salahi tour.  And thankfully, there’s more than just “The Insider’s” Lara Spencer letting us know how to wear Michaele’s look for twenty bucks. 

The Secret Service is involved and you can bet, they’re pissed.  It’s the President of the freakin’ United States, and a couple of grifters got close enough to him to shake his hand.   

However, they also could have gone at him with a butter knife, tossed a shoe at him, or opened up an envelope of anthrax.  

These are worst-case scenarios, but that’s what the Secret Service should be watching out for.  What could happen.  What could go wrong.  And examples need to be set.  

Not just of whoever dropped the ball here - although some agent will more than likely be guarding a Nordstroms over this.

No... the more important example should be made of the Salahis.   They are the high-profile face of this debacle, the smiling, vapid dolts who should be punished accordingly.  

Treat them as the threat they COULD have been, and make an example of them to anybody else who’d like to make a run at the President for any reason - be it personal gain, or baser motives. 

Let their misery be the cautionary tale for anyone who thinks the real world has endless patience for behavior unbecoming of a toothless carny. 

That’s the dose of reality I’d like to see come out of this.

edtechthoughts

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/shareski/~3/7AXhZiZPwXA/shareski

http://del.icio.us/shareski#2009-11-27

• FINAL REPORT | DIGITAL YOUTH RESEARCH
  "Today’s youth may be coming of age and struggling for autonomy and identity as did their predecessors, but they are doing so amid new worlds for communication, friendship, play, and self-expression. We include here the findings of three years of research on kids' informal learning with digital media. The two page summary incorporates a short, accessible version of our findings. The White Paper is a 30-page document prepared for the MacArthur Foundation’s Digital Media and Learning Series. The book is an online version of our forthcoming book with MIT Press and incorporates the insights from 800 youth and young adults and over 5000 hours of online observations"
• Woodson
  Ben Grey's story of Woodson

leaky_cauldron

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/2009/11/27/phelps-twins-talk-deathly-hallows-and-more-in-new-interview