The Same Suit

♠
If Mrs. Clinton were elected and served two terms, then for seven consecutive presidential terms the White House would have been in the hands of just two families. That’s just not the kind of equal-opportunity democracy we aspire to. Maybe we can’t make America as egalitarian and fluid as we would like, but we can at least push back against the concentration of power. We can do that in our tax policy, in our education policy — and in our voting decisions.

... And if Jeb Bush succeeds Hillary Clinton in the White House, I’ll flee to Sri Lanka.

-- Nicholas D. Kristof for The New York Times

Maybe Americans just like to play if 'safe'. It's kinda like movies and sequels. We apparently feel comfortable sticking to the same stories. Besides, our two-party system gives us essentially the same formula every election. Different man, same suit. One of the things that makes the 2008 election look more interesting is the prospect of getting a woman or a black man to sit behind the big desk. Something a little different.

xXx

The Same Suit

♠
If Mrs. Clinton were elected and served two terms, then for seven consecutive presidential terms the White House would have been in the hands of just two families. That’s just not the kind of equal-opportunity democracy we aspire to. Maybe we can’t make America as egalitarian and fluid as we would like, but we can at least push back against the concentration of power. We can do that in our tax policy, in our education policy — and in our voting decisions.

... And if Jeb Bush succeeds Hillary Clinton in the White House, I’ll flee to Sri Lanka.

-- Nicholas D. Kristof for The New York Times

Maybe Americans just like to play if 'safe'. It's kinda like movies and sequels. We apparently feel comfortable sticking to the same stories. Besides, our two-party system gives us essentially the same formula every election. Different man, same suit. One of the things that makes the 2008 election look more interesting is the prospect of getting a woman or a black man to sit behind the big desk. Something a little different.

xXx

The Politics of Language

♠
But spin – the pronouncing on things from an interested angle – is not a regrettable and avoidable form of suspect thinking and judging; it is the very content of thinking and judging. No spin means no thought, no politics, no debating of what is true and what is false. The dream of improving mankind through a program of linguistic reform – a dream that dies hard and probably never will die – looks forward to a world in which everything is always and already “unspun.” There is such a world; it is sometimes called heaven and it is sometimes called death. It is never called human.

-- Stanley Fish for The New York Times

I suppose it can also be called Utopia.

Mr. Fish is discussing a new book by Brooks Jackson and Kathleen Hall Jamieson titled "unSpun: Finding Facts in a World of Disinformation". He points out the long and proud history of attempts to separate the bare facts of life from that rhetoric which is politicized and seeks to lead us down the primrose path, going back to Aristotle's "Rhetoric" and including such famous works as George Orwell's "Politics and the English Language". And Mr. Fish points out that especially when it comes to poltics there is no such thing as the objective truth. What is partisan spin to one is the truth to another, and what is truth to you is spin to an other. That, of course, is not to say that there is no point in becoming more versed in how the other side spins their language, if only to make yourself a better spinner.

xXx

The Politics of Language

♠
But spin – the pronouncing on things from an interested angle – is not a regrettable and avoidable form of suspect thinking and judging; it is the very content of thinking and judging. No spin means no thought, no politics, no debating of what is true and what is false. The dream of improving mankind through a program of linguistic reform – a dream that dies hard and probably never will die – looks forward to a world in which everything is always and already “unspun.” There is such a world; it is sometimes called heaven and it is sometimes called death. It is never called human.

-- Stanley Fish for The New York Times

I suppose it can also be called Utopia.

Mr. Fish is discussing a new book by Brooks Jackson and Kathleen Hall Jamieson titled "unSpun: Finding Facts in a World of Disinformation". He points out the long and proud history of attempts to separate the bare facts of life from that rhetoric which is politicized and seeks to lead us down the primrose path, going back to Aristotle's "Rhetoric" and including such famous works as George Orwell's "Politics and the English Language". And Mr. Fish points out that especially when it comes to poltics there is no such thing as the objective truth. What is partisan spin to one is the truth to another, and what is truth to you is spin to an other. That, of course, is not to say that there is no point in becoming more versed in how the other side spins their language, if only to make yourself a better spinner.

xXx

About that French Election

♠
There never was any doubt that Nicolas Sarkozy would become France's next president. After a passionate campaign marked by record turnouts and television audiences, the rightwing challenger breezed into office with a commanding 53% of the vote, six points ahead of the woman who had warned France on Friday that there would be violence and brutality if he were elected. The French have not voted in a man they particularly like. Ségolène Royal came across as a better person. But France has voted in a president it feels it needs. It has unequivocally decided that the cure for 12 years of drift is a sharp swing to the right, and this is exactly what it is going to get.

-- The Guardian

Well, there goes the neighborhood! I'm dying to see how this is going to look in a couple of years.

xXx

About that French Election

♠
There never was any doubt that Nicolas Sarkozy would become France's next president. After a passionate campaign marked by record turnouts and television audiences, the rightwing challenger breezed into office with a commanding 53% of the vote, six points ahead of the woman who had warned France on Friday that there would be violence and brutality if he were elected. The French have not voted in a man they particularly like. Ségolène Royal came across as a better person. But France has voted in a president it feels it needs. It has unequivocally decided that the cure for 12 years of drift is a sharp swing to the right, and this is exactly what it is going to get.

-- The Guardian

Well, there goes the neighborhood! I'm dying to see how this is going to look in a couple of years.

xXx

The Black Ronald Reagan?

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DISILLUSIONED supporters of President George W Bush are defecting to Barack Obama, the Democratic senator for Illinois, as the White House candidate with the best chance of uniting a divided nation.

... For his optimism about the future, Obama has been dubbed the “black Ronald Reagan”.

-- Sarah Baxter for TimesOnLine

Sometimes the news makes Monk smile.

The report also notes that Hillary is also drawing some of that Bush money and support, and that part of this has to do with the prevailing sense that the Democrats are going to come up winners in 2008, and the big boys want to get in good with the new power. Everyone loves a winner.

xXx

The Black Ronald Reagan?

♠
DISILLUSIONED supporters of President George W Bush are defecting to Barack Obama, the Democratic senator for Illinois, as the White House candidate with the best chance of uniting a divided nation.

... For his optimism about the future, Obama has been dubbed the “black Ronald Reagan”.

-- Sarah Baxter for TimesOnLine

Sometimes the news makes Monk smile.

The report also notes that Hillary is also drawing some of that Bush money and support, and that part of this has to do with the prevailing sense that the Democrats are going to come up winners in 2008, and the big boys want to get in good with the new power. Everyone loves a winner.

xXx

Roger "The Rocket" Clemens

♠
Clemens announced Sunday from owner George Steinbrenner's box that he was rejoining the New York Yankees. The Rocket has won seven Cy Young awards and two World Series rings, and now faces the challenge of getting his 44-year-old body ready to pitch again.

"If you think it's about money, you're greatly mistaken. I'm not going to put my body through the paces I put my body through to earn a few more dollars," Clemens said at a charity golf tournament.

-- Rebecca Santana for Associated Press

The Rocket will presumably still pocket the $26,000,0000 one-year contract with the Yankees, though the money is only incidental. It's really about team spirit and his love of New York and his love of baseball, I imagine.

xXx

Roger "The Rocket" Clemens

♠
Clemens announced Sunday from owner George Steinbrenner's box that he was rejoining the New York Yankees. The Rocket has won seven Cy Young awards and two World Series rings, and now faces the challenge of getting his 44-year-old body ready to pitch again.

"If you think it's about money, you're greatly mistaken. I'm not going to put my body through the paces I put my body through to earn a few more dollars," Clemens said at a charity golf tournament.

-- Rebecca Santana for Associated Press

The Rocket will presumably still pocket the $26,000,0000 one-year contract with the Yankees, though the money is only incidental. It's really about team spirit and his love of New York and his love of baseball, I imagine.

xXx