December 2008

  • The Obama/Warren Complex, Part I

    By tyroneslothrop on 12/25/08 11:03pm
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    In two separate posts I will discuss Obama's choice to invite minister Rick Warren to speak at the inauguration.

    Already Obama has angered some liberals for selecting Rick Warren to speak at the inauguration festivities.  Actually, he already has irritated some of his supporters by appointing intelligent thoughtful people to his cabinet instead of party hacks.  Keeping Robert Gates really irked some of the more extreme members of the Democratic party, who view him simply as a retainer from a poisoned administration and not a guy who’s just as willing to admit when things are going right as when things are going wrong.  Obama's promise to change Washington D.C.

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  • Swimsuit Model Obama

    By msarko on 12/24/08 9:34am
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    This week, the mainstream news media finally got what it's been longing for all these months. They got to fuse their desire to report the real news with their desire to exercise all the recklessness and emptiness of the tabloids. What brought this on? Well, the same thing that has brought hope and exhilaration to millions, nay, billions world-wide. Of course, I'm talking about Barack Obama.

    Drink it in, folks. Some Hawaii swimming photos from months ago have resurfaced just in time to fill a programming gap on CNN. The 47-year-old President-Elect not only has the honor of being the first African-American president of the United States, he's also the first president to be featured in the same kind of media reporting as Amy Winehouse (NSFW). Now, I've heard a lot of phrases connected to Mr. Obama.

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  • Politics 2.0

    By msarko on 12/23/08 1:52am
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    Our soon-to-be former President George W. Bush has talked a lot about legacy and how the writers of history will tell the story of leaders past. While Bush is typically referring to future revisionists painting him in a much kinder light than today's sentiment would likely reflect, the general concept of how we condense the complexities of major political events is an interesting one. While the cynic in me wants to call such reductiveness just another bit of evidence of the inherent laziness of people, I think there's more to it than that. Throughout the history of civilization people have faced the same problems over and over again. The scarcity of resource and the injustice of corruption aren't new or even unique enough to be anything more than footnotes after a few decades pass.

    This is why it will be interesting to see what people remember about the rise of Barack Obama. Even though there's been plenty of obligatory noise about him being the first black president, does anyone honestly believe that's the most historic thing about his career?

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  • "New York Sugar Party" Doesn't Have As Nice A Ring To It

    By msarko on 12/18/08 2:02am
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    Well, it has finally started happening. For the past month and a half we've enjoyed an atmosphere of relative dignity and progress in the political realm. We elected a decent man for president, we've watched him consistently pick qualified people for high administrative posts and a lot of former rivals have been making nice.

    Queue New York's governor David Paterson.

    That's right. In an era torn by war, poverty, epic laundry lists of corrupt leaders and their crimes, in a time when Americans are dying on emergency room floors because they're poor and Western travelers get gunned down in luxury hotels, David Paterson was brave enough to do what bored Democrats just can't ever seem to resist. Paterson began making a lot of noise about a non-issue, then created an intricate plan to legislate an unnecessary inconvenience into our lives because of it.

    This week, Paterson proposed an 18 percent tax on sugary drinks for the purpose of fighting childhood obesity.

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  • Commentary on an Exit

    By msarko on 12/15/08 10:33pm
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    I can't be the only one who's fascinated by the George W. Bush of the last month. For nearly a year, no one has paid any attention to the man that, believe it or not, is still technically the president of these United States. The reason for that is fairly simple, especially in retrospect. The election was an exciting process, promising to be extremely meaningful regardless of the outcome. Had John McCain been elected, many would have seen it as a conclusive statement of unchanging politics, where others would have seen it as a moment of sobriety and realism. On the other end, the election of either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama would have been hailed as a great moment in history.

    But it all really came from a terminal exhaustion. The majority of this country just got exhausted with G.W. Bush and his entire administration. We're officially living in a political age in which nothing's shocking anymore. In the past week, Mr. Bush altered endangered species laws abruptly and for no apparent reason. Did this get the attention of the big news outlets? Yep, for about five minutes.

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  • Obama Selects Energy Secretary

    By msarko on 12/10/08 9:43pm
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    Dr. Steven Chu, winner of the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics, has been nominated by President-Elect Barack Obama to serve as the incoming administration's Secretary of Energy. He currently holds a post at the University of California at Berkeley. As seems to be the typical reaction to every one of Barack Obama's cabinet picks who aren't already familiar faces in Washington, both politicians and pundits are asking if Dr. Chu has the experience necessary to rise to the occasion of a major governmental post.

    Were Steven Chu not a highly accomplished professional in the same field as his proposed spot in the incoming cabinet, this would be a valid question. It seems that, though the election ended a month and a half ago, some people are still pursuing the smear campaign.

    Dr. Steven Chu is not Harriet Miers. He is qualified for  the job of Energy Secretary due to his experience in the field that has most recently become relevant to US energy concerns.

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