Looking Up... from the Cellar

Is the "Magic Over"???


April 2, 2008, 9:46 am
America’s Global Image Stops Sinking in Latest Poll

By MIKE NIZZA (BBC)

The image of America abroad, which has been battered in recent years by an unpopular war and other policies, appears to have stopped deteriorating, judging by a worldwide survey by the BBC and GlobeScan:

While views of U.S. influence in the world are still predominantly negative, they have improved in 11 of the 23 countries the BBC polled a year ago, while worsening in just three countries.

The average percentage saying that the U.S. is having a positive influence has increased from 31 percent a year ago to 35 percent today, while the view that it is having a negative influence has declined from 52 per cent to 47 percent.

Looking just at the countries that have been polled in each of the last four years, positive views of the U.S. eroded from 2005 (38% on average), to 2006 (32%), and to 2007 (28%); recovering for the first time this year to 32 percent.

Israel, Iran and Pakistan were even more unpopular abroad than the United States, rated negatively by more than 50 percent of respondents.

Russia, which has begun an image burnishing campaign of its own, showed the greatest rebound in the poll, with 37 percent of respondents viewing the country positively, up from 29 percent a year earlier.

A total of 17,457 people were interviewed in 34 countries between October and January, the BBC said; the margin of sampling error varied from 3.4 to 4.6 percentage points, depending on the country.

Last June, the Pew Research Center’s survey of attitudes towards the United States showed a deepening of distrust in the Muslim world, a trend somewhat reflected in the BBC-GlobeScan survey released today. Negative views have grown in Egypt and Lebanon, but positive views have grown in Turkey and Indonesia; even so, the figures in those countries remain more negative than average.

Kurt Volker, a State Department official who has been nominated for NATO ambassador, told the BBC that the American gains are “a lagging indicator of what we are doing, working together with European governments and other elites.”

Steven Kull, a polling expert the University of Maryland, had a different take, saying that the upcoming presidential election may be playing a role. “Views of the U.S. are being mitigated by hope that a new administration will move away from the foreign policies that have been so unpopular in the world,” Mr. Kull said.

But that theory was doubted by Nikolas Gvosdev of The National Interest back in January, when The Christian Science Monitor covered the presidential candidates’ plans for addressing the issue. “People have bought into a narrative that all this negativity is the result of one man, or maybe two men in the White House, the president and vice president,” he said. “But to suggest that on Jan. 20, 2009, everything will change to the world’s liking doesn’t take into account how the world has changed.”

Other experts have suggested that American policies regarding the Middle East, national security and Iraq would have to drastically change before hearts and minds would follow. Otherwise, it’s “Mission: Impossible,” as one observer termed Karen Hughes’s effort to address the problem as the State Department’s chief of public diplomacy.

She stepped down in November without many concrete signs of progress, while another diplomat was left disenchanted after trying hard to reverse the trend, as a Times article on her resignation summarized:

“This is the conundrum that I faced every day,” Price Floyd, a former State Department public affairs official, wrote in an op-ed article in The Fort Worth Star-Telegram in May, after he left the department. “I tried through the traditional domestic media, and, for the first time, through the pan-Arab TV and print media — Al Jazeera, Al Arabiya, Al Hayat — to reach people in the U.S. and abroad and to convince them that we should not be judged by our actions, only by our words.”

Is a full recovery even possible? Not according to Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner of France. “It will never be as it was before,” he said in an interview with The International Herald Tribune last month. “The magic is over.”

Home of the Brave

NOW I remember.. it's on Video, must be true....

SCORTCHED EARTH

The Long Defeat
By DAVID BROOKS
Published: March 25, 2008 (NYT)

Hillary Clinton may not realize it yet, but she’s just endured one of the worst weeks of her campaign.

First, Barack Obama weathered the Rev. Jeremiah Wright affair without serious damage to his nomination prospects. Obama still holds a tiny lead among Democrats nationally in the Gallup tracking poll, just as he did before this whole affair blew up.

Second, Obama’s lawyers successfully prevented re-votes in Florida and Michigan. That means it would be virtually impossible for Clinton to take a lead in either elected delegates or total primary votes.

Third, as Noam Scheiber of The New Republic has reported, most superdelegates have accepted Nancy Pelosi’s judgment that the winner of the elected delegates should get the nomination. Instead of lining up behind Clinton, they’re drifting away. Her lead among them has shrunk by about 60 in the past month, according to Avi Zenilman of Politico.com.

In short, Hillary Clinton’s presidential prospects continue to dim. The door is closing. Night is coming. The end, however, is not near.

Last week, an important Clinton adviser told Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen (also of Politico) that Clinton had no more than a 10 percent chance of getting the nomination. Now, she’s probably down to a 5 percent chance.

Five percent.

Let’s take a look at what she’s going to put her party through for the sake of that 5 percent chance: The Democratic Party is probably going to have to endure another three months of daily sniping. For another three months, we’ll have the Carvilles likening the Obamaites to Judas and former generals accusing Clintonites of McCarthyism. For three months, we’ll have the daily round of résumé padding and sulfurous conference calls. We’ll have campaign aides blurting “blue dress” and only-because-he’s-black references as they let slip their private contempt.

For three more months (maybe more!) the campaign will proceed along in its Verdun-like pattern. There will be a steady rifle fire of character assassination from the underlings, interrupted by the occasional firestorm of artillery when the contest touches upon race, gender or patriotism. The policy debates between the two have been long exhausted, so the only way to get the public really engaged is by poking some raw national wound.

For the sake of that 5 percent, this will be the sourest spring. About a fifth of Clinton and Obama supporters now say they wouldn’t vote for the other candidate in the general election. Meanwhile, on the other side, voters get an unobstructed view of the Republican nominee. John McCain’s approval ratings have soared 11 points. He is now viewed positively by 67 percent of Americans. A month ago, McCain was losing to Obama among independents by double digits in a general election matchup. Now McCain has a lead among this group.

For three more months, Clinton is likely to hurt Obama even more against McCain, without hurting him against herself. And all this is happening so she can preserve that 5 percent chance.

When you step back and think about it, she is amazing. She possesses the audacity of hopelessness.

Why does she go on like this? Does Clinton privately believe that Obama is so incompetent that only she can deliver the policies they both support? Is she simply selfish, and willing to put her party through agony for the sake of her slender chance? Are leading Democrats so narcissistic that they would create bitter stagnation even if they were granted one-party rule?

The better answer is that Clinton’s long rear-guard action is the logical extension of her relentlessly political life.

For nearly 20 years, she has been encased in the apparatus of political celebrity. Look at her schedule as first lady and ever since. Think of the thousands of staged events, the tens of thousands of times she has pretended to be delighted to see someone she doesn’t know, the hundreds of thousands times she has recited empty clichés and exhortatory banalities, the millions of photos she has posed for in which she is supposed to appear empathetic or tough, the billions of politically opportune half-truths that have bounced around her head.

No wonder the Clinton campaign feels impersonal. It’s like a machine for the production of politics. It plows ahead from event to event following its own iron logic. The only question is whether Clinton herself can step outside the apparatus long enough to turn it off and withdraw voluntarily or whether she will force the rest of her party to intervene and jam the gears.

If she does the former, she would surprise everybody with a display of self-sacrifice. Her campaign would cruise along at a lower register until North Carolina, then use that as an occasion to withdraw. If she does not, she would soldier on doggedly, taking down as many allies as necessary.

Back at It...

Vacation's over.. back to the grind.

Scandal Rocks Detroit!

Detroit Mayor Charged With Perjury


By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: March 24, 2008

DETROIT (AP) -- Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, a one-time rising star and Detroit's youngest elected leader, was charged Monday with perjury and other counts after sexually explicit text messages surfaced that appear to contradict his sworn denials of an affair with a top aide.

Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy also charged the popular yet polarizing 37-year-old mayor with obstruction of justice and misconduct in office.

Former Chief of Staff Christine Beatty, 37, who also denied under oath that she and Kilpatrick shared a romantic relationship in 2002 and 2003, was charged with perjury and obstruction of justice.

In all, Worthy authorized a 12-count criminal information.

"This case was about as far from being a private matter as one can get. Honesty and integrity in the justice system is everything. That is what this case is about," Worthy said at a news conference.

"Just when did honesty and integrity, truth and honor become traits to be mocked, downplayed, ignored, laughed at or excuses made for them? When did telling the truth become a supporting player to everything else?"

The charges could signal the end of Kilpatrick's six-year career as mayor of one of America's largest cities.

Perjury is a felony, punishable by up to 15 years in prison. But for Kilpatrick, a conviction also would mean his immediate expulsion from office. The Detroit City Charter calls for any elected official convicted of a felony while in office to be removed.

Kilpatrick has said he would not resign and last week said he expects to be vindicated when all aspects of the scandal are made public.

The mayor was expected to hold a news conference at noon.

Worthy said she expected the mayor and Beatty to turn themselves in by 7 a.m. Tuesday.

Worthy has said she and her staff have pored over more than 40,000 pages of documents since January, when the Detroit Free Press published excerpts of sexually explicit text messages sent to Beatty's city-issued pager in 2002 and 2003.

The messages contradict statements Kilpatrick and Beatty gave under oath during a whistleblowers' trial last summer when each denied a romantic relationship.

My Habibi

Went for a Hike with
the Razor.

Never a Dull Moment.

Tossed her favorite toy,
The Stick, into a pile...
of sticks. She found "hers"
anyway.


Good Dog!!

Rome-In

Hooked.

Watched Rome with Jeff tonight.. first 2 episodes. Bloody, Nasty, Treacherous. Washington another day.

I think Jeff liked it though, so will have to watch the rest. Great Series.

Not Jim's genre, so will line up Carnivale' and Weeds. Love them ALL.. no worries here!

BASKET CASE

Ho Ho Ho....

Sunshine

From My Love

BREAKING NEWS!! BREAKING NEWS!! BREAKING NEWS!! BREAKING NEWS!! BREAKING NEWS!!

Madonna’s ‘Hard Candy’ hits shelves April 29

Album will be singer’s last release for Warner Bros.

LOS ANGELES - Madonna has dubbed her final album of new material for her longtime Warner Bros. label “Hard Candy,” and will release it on April 29, her publicist confirmed on Tuesday.

The album, which features such songs as “Candy Store” and the first single “Four Minutes,” is the follow-up to ”Confessions on a Dance Floor,” which debuted at No. 1 on the U.S. pop chart in November 2005.

The title and release date were first reported by Entertainment Weekly’s Web site, and the details were confirmed by Madonna’s spokeswoman, Liz Rosenberg. Entertainment Weekly quoted Rosenberg as saying the 49-year-old singer “loves candy.

"Hard Candy” will be Madonna’s last studio release for Warner Bros. before she begins a wide-ranging 10-year recording, touring and merchandising deal with Artist Nation, a new initiative launched by concert promoter Live Nation. Warner Bros., a unit of Warner Music Group Corp will also release a hits collection.

4 Minutes

Ok, so you can't SEE Madonna as it's not even her in the video (it's a clip from Nelly Furtado and Justin Timberlake for Promiscuous), but I can barely HEAR her either... hope this is not a sign that "Hard Candy" is going to be Rotten. No matter, you can rest assured I will be picking this up the Instant it hits the shelfs!

Full review to follow.....

Thanks Danny!

Too Good Not to pass on......

Art

\\

DIA

Jeff

Diego Riveria "Detroit Industry"

1. DIEGO RIVERA
   Mexican, 1886-1957
   Detroit Industry, 1933
   Fresco
   Founders Society Purchase, Edsel B. Ford Fund and Gift of Edsel B. Ford
   

The Detroit Industry mural cycle in the Detroit Institute of Arts is the finest example of Mexican muralist work in the United States, and Diego Rivera (1886-1957) considered it the most successful work of his career. The murals are a tribute to Detroit industry in the 1930s. It is one of the few major modern works to successfully incorporate representations of functional machines. Rivera transformed their physical power and practical design into dynamic images and sensual forms.

In 1932, when Diego Rivera was well known in the United States as one of the leaders of the Mexican muralist movement, he was commissioned to decorate the walls of what was then called the Garden Court of the Detroit Institute of Arts. Although he was originally asked to paint just two of the largest panels, Rivera was so captivated by Detroit and the Ford Motor Company's River Rouge industrial complex that he soon suggested painting murals on all four walls. The project took eight months to complete.

The only stipulation of the project agreement was that the theme of the murals should relate to the history of Detroit and the development of its industry. Major sections are based on Rivera's study of the Rouge; other sections are devoted to different industries active in Detroit at that time. The complete cycle combines the artist's love of industrial design and admiration for North American engineering with his philosophical opinions about industry's positive and negative contributions to society.