The most important Native American instrument was and still is the drum, as you
can tell by going to any powwow or Indian event. Different tribes have different
traditions about the drum and how to play it, but the basic construction is very
similar in most tribes: a wooden frame or a carved and hollowed-out log, with finely tanned buckskin or elkskin stretched taut across the opening by sinew thongs. Traditionally American Indian drums are large, two to three feet in diameter, and they are played communally by groups of men who stand around them in a circle. However, there were also some tribes in which each drummer had his own instrument, and it is possible to buy a smaller Native American hand drum for either musical or decorative purposes. (These hand drums are the ones that are sometimes called “tomtoms” by non-native people–contrary to popular belief, tomtom is not an American Indian word, but rather an old British word for a child’s drum toy.)
There have been a number of Indian tribes in existence and in all of them the drum was usually an important part of their culture. Each tribe had their own customs so it stands to reason that the drum beats also signified certain things. Sometimes the meanings were vastly different from tribe to tribe.
Because the Indian culture has always been a big believer in the circle of life, many of them believe that the drum beats in their ceremonies were the heartbeat of their Mother Earth.
Native American Drums: The Heart & Soul of the People
Felt by many to be the heartbeat of the Oyate (the people), the drum is much more than a tool for making music. It is often considered as a living being with a powerful spirit and a life all its own – it speaks to its owner with a resonating tone that belongs only to that drum.
The Heartbeat of the Drum: From large pedestal drums, to smaller hand drums, it is said the drum’s ability to unite people in one emotion is what makes it such an integral part of Native American culture. It is considered sacred because of its ‘voice’ and the spiritual nature of its power.
Once you hear the drum, you will never be the same.
The Native American flute has achieved some measure of fame for its distinctive sound, used in a variety of New Age and world music recordings. Its music was used in courtship, healing, meditation, and spiritual rituals.
The Native American flute is the only flute in the world constructed with two air chambers – there is a wall inside the flute between the top (slow) air chamber and the bottom chamber which has the whistle and finger holes. The top chamber also serves as a secondary resonator, which gives the flute its distinctive sound. There is a hole at the bottom of the “slow” air chamber and a (generally) square hole at the top of the playing chamber. A block (or “bird”) with a spacer is tied on top of the flute to form a thin, flat airstream for the whistle hole (or “window”). Some more modern flutes use an undercut either in the block or the flute to eliminate the need for a spacer.
This week let 3 Chics take you on a journey with our tribute to “FIRST NATIONS” people and Native American music. Through chants, drums, percussion, and dance, the music tells of their history of courtships, healings, meditation and spiritual rituals. With a mix of traditional, inter-tribal, and subgenre the transformative sounds and chants will definitely lift your spirits.
If you are of Native American heritage and would like to share lyrics, videos or chants, please feel free to do so. We love learning about artists, their instruments, and the contributions they’ve made to their tribes and our nation.
Pingback: 1000 Books In 10 Years: Vol. 281: Crave, by Sarah Kane
Seth MacFarlane SUCKED last night. He was RUDE, juvenile, and attacking. HATED IT!!!!
Tonight On EyeCenterwitness News
By Charles P. Pierce
at 3:00PM
The administration made a sharp play today, releasing a list of how the upcoming Sequester Plague is going to affect each individual state. (You will note the predominance of red states with Republican governors in the Top 20. Here’s Kansas, the most enthusiastic lab rat in the Republican experiment, and it will lose $5.5 million in school funding and have around 8000 defense-related employees furloughed. When will someone take these moochers and looters in hand?) There’s some not unexpected bleating coming from John Boehner’s office, as they duck phone callsfrom the district and hide behind either the curtains, or behind Bob Woodward’s reputation, whatever’s handiest.
This would probably bring us to our knees,” said Dr. Thomas Boat, dean of the University’s College of Medicine and vice president for health affairs. He was referring to a possible 8 percent cut in federal research grants, which support everything from clinical trials to the development of new drugs. The university receives about $111 million annually from one federal agency alone: the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the National Institutes of Health. A bevy of other agencies, from the Defense Department to the National Science Foundation, also fund research projects at the school. In all, the university and its affiliates, such as the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, received $404 million in federal research funding in 2012, according to a tally compiled by university officials. If the cuts go through, “we’re talking about probably close to $30 million in lost funding,” Boat said. “That’s money we can’t really make up.”
This is where the Republicans can possibly lose this gamble in a big way, because they don’t appear to see that the administration’s greatest ally in this isn’t the cadre of people it can muster to The Sunday Showz. It’s local TV news and what’s left of the local newspapers around the country. In the Beltway view of things, The Sequester Pandemic is a series of numbers arrayed as though on a scoreboard, as a way to judge who’s up and who’s down, and who’s winning and losing. That’s how the Republicans have come to decide that there’s some coherence in the position that the cuts don’t really matter, except in that they are both cataclysmic and the president’s fault. They can sell that in the Green Room, and in the vast spaces for entertainment in Cleveland Park. But none of those people have 35 minutes of air to fill every night before Jeopardy! comes on.
Out in the country, every truncated grant proposal is a story.(“Marilyn is a local Hamilton County girl who worked her way through college and medical school after growing up in a homeless shelter. She has an idea for cancer research that the NIH says i the most interesting it’s seen in years. But, because of sequestration…” Cue Marilyn, and some cancer patients.) Every laid-off defense worker is a story. Every closed national park is a story, weeping children live at 5:30 with Sarah, or Jennifer, or Russell from Our News Team discreetly herding the distraught tot into camera range. Local columnists can find easy columns in closed Head Start classrooms. Empty airport terminals make for outstanding video. This was a serious act of pre-emption aimed at using everything that’s maudlin and provincial about local TV news. You wanted the White House to play tough. This is Ronnie Lott stuff right here.
Read more: Sequestration By State – Tonight On EyeCenterwitness News – Esquire http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/sequestration-by-state-022513#ixzz2LxoWb35I
Michael Dunn, accused in Jordan Davis’ death, refuses to be served civil suit paperwork
7:24 PM, Feb 6, 2013
The man accused of killing 17-year-old Jordan Davis refused to be served paperwork on Tuesday.
The server hired by attorney John Phillips, who is representing Davis’ parents and two of the teens in the car with him the night he was killed, came to the Duval County Jail to serve 45-year-old Michael Dunn with summons for two civil lawsuits.
He said Dunn was alone in a small cell and the guard managed to get him to come out.
But Randall Hoke said what happened next is something that has never happened in his 20 years of serving paperwork.
“He came out and was face to face with me on the other side of the glass and I explained to him as the guards were there, this was a 20-day summons attached to the lawsuits, etc., and you’re being served. And that was pretty much his answer: ‘No,’ as he stared you down and just said ‘You’re not serving me.'”
Hoke said he’s never had an inmate refused to be served. But when someone does refuse a server can leave the paperwork at their feet or right by them.
http://www.firstcoastnews.com/news/article/296340/483/Michael-Dunn-accused-in-Jordan-Davis-death-refuses-to-be-served-civil-suit-paperwork
What?
WTF? YOU HAVE BEEN SERVED MOFO.
Republican congressman: Dick Cheney is going to hell for the Iraq war
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/02/25/republican-congressman-dick-cheney-is-going-to-hell-for-the-iraq-war/
Republican Rep. Walter Jones of North Carolina said Saturday that former Vice President Dick Cheney would likely end up in hell because of his role in the Iraq war.
At a Young Americans for Liberty conference, Jones said it was impossible under current law to prosecute a president for intentionally manipulating intelligence reports to make the case for war. He explained he co-authored a bill to change the law, but the legislation was killed in committee by his Republican colleague Lamar Smith of Texas.
“I have no malice towards Lamar, I have respect for him,” Jones remarked. “But that again is the problem. Congress will not hold anyone to blame. Lyndon Johnson’s probably rotting in hell right now because of the Vietnam War, and he probably needs to move over for Dick Cheney.”
Jones initially voted in favor of the Iraq war in 2002. He infamous called for “French fries” to be renamed “freedom fries” after France refused to support the U.S. invasion of the country.
The conservative Christian turned against the war after witnessing American causalities and once it became clear Iraq was not building any weapons of mass destruction.
C. Everett Koop, ex-surgeon general dies.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/25/17090722-c-everett-koop-ex-surgeon-general-dies?lite …
AFRICA
Africland- Ivory coast has been represented
Beautiful woman.
Pennsylvania’s electoral vote rigging bill is on the move
http://bit.ly/YSPSXr
Pennsylvania Senate president Dominic Pileggi (R) has formally introduced a bill to award the state’s electoral votes proportionally, a move that would effectively end its position as a swing state while likely aiding the next Republican presidential candidate.
A vision of loveliness!
Love the pic of Quvenzhane on the sidebar. THANKS!
fabulous comment from GN:
GN
Wonder when and if this will ever be credited: Barack Hussein Obama defeated the GOP on the gay/women culture wars, period, point blank, full stop. He has also taken away the GOP’s edge on national security matters and did so by being LESS belligerent and LESS inclined to open new war theaters. All the GOP has left is that they are winning on racism, particularly racism against black people as it has worsened over the last years. But in those other areas, it has been a complete rout, President Obama has simply won. The brilliance of this man has never received the full due IMO.
They can’t ERASE history. We won’t let them.
The prerequisites to ‘bipartisan compromise’
By Steve Benen
Mon Feb 25, 2013 12:05 PM EST.
For quite a while, it seems most of the political news out of Virginia has been quite discouraging — medically-unnecessary ultrasounds, state-based currencies, election-rigging schemes — so it comes as a welcome change of pace to see the commonwealth approve a sweeping, bipartisan transportation package years in the making.
Responding to the news, National Journal’s Josh Kraushaar argued that the deal should offer the White House a reminder of “what bipartisan compromise looks like.”
I find this take rather puzzling, not because the Virginia transportation bill falls short — as best as I can tell, the package has some worthwhile elements* — but because I don’t think it’s the White House that needs the reminder.
In this case, Virginia was able to get something done because Republican leaders were willing to accept concessions their counterparts on Capitol Hill are not.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/02/25/17088457-the-prerequisites-to-bipartisan-compromise?lite
Glutton for Punishment
by BooMan
Mon Feb 25th, 2013 at 02:29:50 PM EST
When Michelle Obama showed up at the end of the Academy Awards to announce that Argo had won Best Picture, she really upset J-Rube. The thing I don’t really understand is why J-Rube considers watching the Academy Awards one her “simple pleasures” when, as she says, it’s all “for the benefit of the Hollywood glitterati who so lavishly paid for [Michelle’s] husband’s election.” I mean, I am a liberal, and I can’t stand those people. Taken alone, I think some of them are outstanding individuals, but put them together for a self-congratulatory awards ceremony where everyone pretends to like each other while not-so-secretly lobbying and backstabbing, talking about “who” they are wearing, and otherwise taking ostentation and self-absorption into the stratosphere? Yeah, they make me want to puke.
So, why was J-Rube sitting at home watching these people she hates so much in the first place? Was she really basking in the glow of all that beauty and fame until the moment that Michelle Obama appeared? Doesn’t sound like it:
It was the average too-long, unfunny, over-produced Academy Awards TV show and then, after suffering through the 10-hour (well, it seemed like it) show, there was the first lady. In a ball gown. With military service personnel in dress uniform behind her.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2013/2/25/142950/178
GOP can’t help itself on Planned Parenthood
By Steve Benen
Mon Feb 25, 2013 2:10 PM EST.
In the 112th Congress, Republicans repeatedly targeted Planned Parenthood funding — to the point of being preoccupied with the subject — though their efforts never came close to succeeding. On the contrary, Democrats used the campaign against the GOP to great effect, painting Republicans as extremists, and expanding the gender gap.
And so, in the 113th Congress, with President Obama re-elected, the Senate Democratic majority larger, and the House Republican majority smaller, surely conservatives won’t renew this crusade, right? Wrong.
In early January, Rep. Diane Black (R-Tenn.) vowed to “continue trying to starve Planned Parenthood of federal funds,” and this week, we’re seeing the manifestation of those efforts.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/02/25/17089471-gop-cant-help-itself-on-planned-parenthood?lite
Even in Texas, ‘never’ is a long time
By Steve Benen
Mon Feb 25, 2013 3:11 PM EST.
As “red” states go, Texas is a very long way from attaining “battleground” status. It’s been nearly two decades since any Democratic candidate won any statewide office, a dry spell that stretches to a quarter-century for U.S. Senate candidates. The state legislature is dominated by Republicans, and the last Democratic presidential candidate to carry the state was Carter in 1976 — before the South finished realigning.
And yet, as Texas becomes more racially and ethnically diverse, and cities like Austin and Dallas become more progressive, Democrats have begun to look anew at the Lone Star State. A Democratic effort called “Battleground Texas” has begun to do something the party didn’t even consider for the better part of two decades — create a meaningful Democratic infrastructure in the state. Jeremy Bird, the former national field director for President Obama’s re-election campaign is reportedly heading up the multi-million dollar effort.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) was asked over the weekend about whether his state might become electorally competitive in the near future, and he literally laughed out loud at the possibility, calling it “the biggest pipedream I have ever heard.”
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/02/25/17089911-even-in-texas-never-is-a-long-time?lite
Ted Cruz’s ‘curious’ defense
By Steve Benen
Mon Feb 25, 2013 10:02 AM EST
We talked Friday about Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-Texas) affinity for McCarthyism, including allegations he made at a far-right event in 2010, when he argued that Harvard Law School harbored 12 secret communists — each of whom supported “overthrowing the United States government” — on its faculty during his time as a student there.
As the story gained attention, the Republican senator’s office felt compelled to respond. So, Cruz aides contacted a website created by Glenn Beck — I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried — to explain that Cruz was correct and communists really did enjoy a role on the Harvard Law School faculty.
His spokeswoman Catherine Frazier told The Blaze website that the “substantive point” in Cruz’s charge, made in a speech in 2010, was “was absolutely correct.”
She went on to explain that “the Harvard Law School faculty included numerous self-described proponents of ‘critical legal studies’ — a school of thought explicitly derived from Marxism — and they far outnumbered Republicans.”
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/02/25/17087582-ted-cruzs-curious-defense?lite
SPEAKING OF APOLOGIES
where is the one from Ben Jealous?
This fool needs to be added to the other thread. The stupid burns.
CNN Slams Michelle Obama Oscar Appearance With ‘Jumping the Shark’ Clip.
http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/david/cnn-slams-michelle-obama-oscars-fonzie
You can see why CNN calls itself “The Most Trusted Name In News.” You want hard-hitting coverage?
Following Michelle Obama’s Sunday night video appearance at the Academy Awards, CNN used a clip of Happy Days character Arthur “Fonzie” Fonzarelli jumping a shark on water skis to question whether the first lady had diminished herself.
The 1977 Happy Days scene and the phrase “jump the shark” has come to describe the moment when a gimmick damages someone or something’s reputation beyond the point of repair.
“An editor at Salon.com thinks the first lady is following in Fonzie’s footsteps by presenting the award for best picture at the Oscars,” CNN host Carol Costello announced on Monday after showing the Happy Days clip.
Costello noted that the first lady had also recently met with Sesame Street’s Big Bird about her campaign to combat childhood obesity, appeared on Jimmy Fallon’s show and talked to TV chef Rachel Ray “about those much-buzzed-about bangs.”
“Some say maybe the Oscars aren’t the best use of the first lady’s time,” the CNN host continued. “Instead of all those cameos, she might champion some grittier political issues like the deficit, gun control or the pressing need for bipartisanship… Did Michelle Obama jump the shark at the Oscars?”
CNN contributor L.Z. Granderson reminded Costello that Laura Bush had also appeared in a video at the 2002 Academy Awards.
Granderson also noted that critics were forgetting that Michelle Obama “is not actually a politician, she’s married to a politician.”
@ CNN….
THANK YOU
Jealous, bitter BECKIES! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAH WAHH! Michelle stole our throne!!
Crazy bitches. LOL
@ Rikyrah
The Obamas have no more fucks to give so I did it for them. CNN can go to hell.
CNN is no better than FOX, in fact worse, for imitating them, right down to the annoying tickers at the bottom of the screen. FAIL!
Can we get Quvenzhane Wallis’ pic on the sidebar, please? :-)
check the dashboard in the pics for sidebar post.
it’s the first one.
Thanks!
And another thing, that McFarlane dude who hosted the Oscars was awful last night. Just one insult after another. HE.WAS.NOT.FUNNY.
Memorial Tribute. Protesting The Killing of Trayvon Martin.
Trayvon Martin, Gone But NEVER Forgotten!
http://youtu.be/utVcdh93sOE
I’m LOVING the Native American music this morning. Looking forward to the series this week, SG2. Looks like We’re going to need the calm, from all the HATERS!
Crossed Paths: Chicago’s Jacksons and Obamas
When Barack and Michelle Obama were married in Chicago two decades ago, Santita Jackson, a daughter of the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, sang at their wedding. When Mr. Obama ran for his first national office, he made sure he was not stepping on the ambitions of her brother, Jesse L. Jackson Jr., who later became a co-chairman of his 2008 presidential campaign.
Now the younger Mr. Jackson, 47, who served 17 years as a congressman representing his hometown, is most likely headed to prison for campaign fraud, trailed by a string of problems from an extramarital affair to mental illness. Although the fates of Mr. Jackson and Mr. Obama could not be more different, their stories, and those of their families, are bound together. The rise of the current leading black political family in the United States is inextricable from the unraveling of an older one, with the two tangled in shifting alliances, sudden reversals of fortune and splits.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/25/us/politics/crossed-paths-chicagos-jacksons-and-obamas.html?hp&_r=0
The Onion Apologizes
http://on.fb.me/Zvcm1q
Dear Readers,
On behalf of The Onion, I offer my personal apology to Quvenzhané Wallis and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for the tweet that was circulated last night during the Oscars. It was crude and offensive—not to mention inconsistent with The Onion’s commitment to parody and satire, however biting.
No person should be subjected to such a senseless, humorless comment masquerading as satire.
The tweet was taken down within an hour of publication. We have instituted new and tighter Twitter procedures to ensure that this kind of mistake does not occur again.
In addition, we are taking immediate steps to discipline those individuals responsible.
Miss Wallis, you are young and talented and deserve better. All of us at The Onion are deeply sorry.
Sincerely,
Steve Hannah
CEO
The Onion
now where’s the apology from John Legend’s fiance?
Town’s reponse about whether Legend has a clue:
Town
He’ll be too stupid to see the flag.
Black men, NEVER date a non-black woman who has negative things to say about black females! She’s not just talking about that chick “over there,” she’s talking about your mom, your sister, your daughter, your gramma, your auntie etc!
Non-black women, NEVER date a black man who has negative things to say about black women! He’s not just talking about the women he used to date, he’s talking about his mom, his sister, his daughter, his gramma, his auntie etc!
John Legend better get a fking clue. We don’t play that ish!
Yes; that BITCH was throwing major shade at BLACK women, only she was too coward to go after an actual black woman. Instead, she went after a nine year old Black girl, who has more success and smarts than she’ll ever know.
This is HOW it’s done, folks. You Take responsibility for your behaviors.
Check out what this bee.itch.said on Jezebel
darmo1467
20 minutes ago
I’m pretty sure the joke was supposed to be making fun of the way people talk about celebrities, not Quvenzhane Wallis, so this apology just makes me depressed. The smartest writers in america were forced to apologize to the idiots of america who didn’t even get it. A huge chunk of the people reacting on Twitter were black people imagining a racist attack on themselves. The whole reaction was just pathetic.
So this bitch is supposed to be depressed, because the Onion writer joked about a nine year old girl being a CUNT and apologized?
Lemme guess, she’s white and does not have a child. It’s typical for someone like this fool to not see anything wrong with verbal attacks on a black child. Her life is not worth anything to the blind and racist. Fuck her/him!
Depressed b/c the Onion apologized. Ain’t that some ish? And she’s blaming black folks on Twitter for causing the Onion to apologize. What an ignorant bee.itch.
The public’s striking opposition to spending cuts
By Steve Benen
–
Mon Feb 25, 2013 9:10 AM EST
Despite his woeful lack of popularity, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) loves speaking on behalf of “the American people.” And wouldn’t you know it, John Boehner is absolutely certain that the electorate agrees wholeheartedly with … John Boehner.
This is especially true in the fiscal debate, in which the nation’s most powerful Republican conveniently ignores all available public opinion data to argue that “getting our spending under control” is “the number one priority for the American people.”
There is, however, a quantifiable way of testing Boehner’s boasts. Indeed, the Pew Research Center published a report (pdf) late last week that found that, nationwide, there’s “little support
for cutting most programs.”
In fairness, I’ll concede that “spending cuts,” in a vague and undefined sense, remain quite popular — Americans want a smaller deficit, they’re not eager to pay more taxes, so cutting public investments is, in the abstract, a preferable remedy.
But it’s when we look at the details that the Republican argument falls apart.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/02/25/17087215-the-publics-striking-opposition-to-spending-cuts?lite
Jindal wants GOP change, but not on culture war
By Steve Benen
Mon Feb 25, 2013 7:59 AM EST.
Last week, former Utah governor and failed Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman published a piece in The American Conservative, arguing that it’s time for the right to embrace marriage equality. There is nothing conservative about denying other Americans the ability to forge that same relationship with the person they love,” Huntsman wrote, adding, “The party of Lincoln should stand with our best tradition of equality and support full civil marriage for all Americans.”
Any chance we might see other national Republican voices move in a similar direction? As we were reminded on “Meet the Press” yesterday, it’s going to be a slow process.
For those who can’t watch clips online, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R), who appears to have national ambitions, explained his vision of a renewed Republican Party, “which is about growth, not austerity, it’s not being the party of big government, big Wall Street, big banks.” Host David Gregory responded with a good question: “Jon Huntsman says that it’s truly conservative to allow gays and lesbians to marry. Is that a change you could support?”
The Louisiana Republican replied, “Look, I — I believe in the traditional definition of marriage.” Jindal then promptly changed the subject, arguing that his party can win on economic issues.
It’s a dubious argument — most of the public rejects Jindal’s economic ideas, too — but how (and whether) Republicans adapt to changing attitudes on the culture war may be more relevant electorally than Jindal is prepared to admit.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/02/25/17086510-jindal-wants-gop-change-but-not-on-culture-war?lite
The Morning Plum: Republican governors urge GOP to act on sequester
Posted by Greg Sargent on February 25, 2013 at 9:06 am
With the sequester set to hit this week, the White House will intensify its public campaign to draw attention to how the cuts will bring the hammer down on state budgets. So one outstanding question is this: Will Republican governors put pressure on the Congressional GOP to agree to new revenues?
Politico has a roundup of quotes from Republican governors, and some seem to be edging up ever so gingerly to the idea. They don’t say so in those terms, but many of them are urging all parties to come to the table to make a deal. Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell is urging lawmakers to figure out a way to avert the sequester, but as Politico notes, he no longer appears to be willing to blame only Obama for the current standoff.
McDonnell is particularly interesting because he has just completed a deal in his state for a sweeping transportation bill financed largely by higher sales and car taxes. Given that McDonnell represents a state that will be hit hard by the sequester, Dems hope he’ll urge Congressional Republicans to compromise on revenues, too. If McDonnell is willing to agree to new revenues to make governing possible, which is earning him props for placing pragmatic problem-solving over ideology, why not urge Congressional Republicans to do the same, particularly since his state is in the sequester’s crosshairs?
It may be too much to expect the likes of McDonnell to anger conservatives by calling on the national party to accept the need to compromise. But Republican governors have a history of bucking the national GOP message when the pressure of reality grows hard to resist. During the 2012 presidential campaign, Republican governors who were seeing the economy improve in their states — and rightly wanted to say so out loud — found themselves at odds with the national GOP message that the economy was sinking into recession under the weight of Obama’s policies.
Congressional GOP leaders are currently mulling a plan to continue funding the government after the shutdown deadline of March 27st — but at the lower levels specified by the sequester. As the reality of these cuts set in over time, how will Republican governors react?
\
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2013/02/25/the-morning-plum-republican-governors-urge-gop-to-act-on-sequesetr/
Changing of the young guard at the Obama White House
By Christi Parsons
February 24, 2013, 5:27 a.m.
Tommy Vietor was the first youthful convert to pack his bags, leave home and sign on to the Barack Obama campaign, joining the Chicago operation before his boss, then running for the Senate, had even given the convention speech by which the rest of Democratic America would discover him.
He rose from driver of a press van across rural Illinois to fixture of the White House situation room. Now, the 32-year-old is contemplating something new — a future not working for Obama.
Amid the high-level departures and appointments of Obama’s second term, a quieter changing of the guard is taking place farther down the food chain. Stalwarts of the Obama generation have begun to take their leave.
The March 1 departure of Vietor, the original Obama youth, marks the moment.
“It’s hard to imagine things without someone like Tommy here,” said Dan Pfeiffer, whose tenure with Obama dates back to the U.S. Senate office and who recently became a senior White House advisor. “It’s definitely a turning-of-the-page moment.”
Senior members of the original Obama team have cycled through the White House in grueling two-year shifts before handing off to other loyalists. There are still plenty of Obama long-timers in leadership positions around the West Wing.
But early enlistees, including Vietor; Jon Favreau, 31, who was in his early 20s when he became Obama’s lead speechwriter; and Joshua DuBois, 30, the Pentecostal minister who has led Obama’s faith-based outreach since the first campaign, have begun to go. And that has brought about a change in the personality of a White House defined in part by the unusual authority vested in the Obama youth who powered the 2008 campaign.
Such handoffs are the way of the West Wing. Political analyst David Gergen, veteran of four administrations, compares the presidency to a road race in which the president runs a marathon and a rotating team of staff runs alongside him in a relay. The work can be grueling.
Some of the key personalities who left earlier in the Obama administration have gone in pursuit of creative goals. Onetime media aide Reid Cherlin is a political contributor to GQ magazine. Former speechwriter Jon Lovett is co-creator of NBC’s White House-based comedy “1600 Penn.” DuBois hopes to publish a book based on the devotionals he has sent to the president over the years.
Vietor and Favreau have been cooking up an idea for a television series and hope to begin writing it this year. To pay the bills in the meantime, they plan to form a political consulting business. Vietor also hopes to appear on news shows to speak as a Democratic strategist.
The young administration alums have experience rare for their age group, owing to the responsibility Obama and campaign manager David Plouffe handed them in 2008.
“The deal was, they trusted us with a lot of information,” said Favreau. “They figured, ‘We have a lot of young kids out there, right out of college, but they’re smart, and we’re going to trust them with really big jobs.'”
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-changing-of-the-young-guard-20130224,0,2851466.story
Loved seeing & hearing DAme Bassey!
they need to apologize to the White House like NOW
The Crisis Magazine @thecrisismag
@BarackObama What will Sasha and Malia say when they see what the keystone pipeline does to our environment #NoKXL
Ben Jealous = MAJOR FAIL. They are no better than the RWNJ! Fuck JEALOUS.
sandycNY @sandycNY
“My name is not Annie. It’s Quvenzhané.” — 9-year-old Quvenzhané Wallis, corr the AP Rprter who said she was “just going to call her Annie
BWA HA HA HA Just letting folks know that she KNOWS who she is. HOMEY don’t play that.
Camille’s wonderful outrage about the attack on twitter of Quevenzhane Wallis.
Camille
Wow!
There’s no excuse for this. To call a kid that word – not even in jest. How very despicable!
The lack of respect and humanity some of these supposedly liberal people show black women and black kids is just so unbelievable.
I woke up this morning to the most ridiculous grumbling about our magnificent First Lady doing the Oscars an honor by presenting their best movie category – after they’d asked her.
How insane is this ODS so many people seem to be suffering from?
Did Bill Clinton not just show up at the bloody SAG awards to a standing ovation just 3 short weeks ago partly to lobby for his friend Spielberg and his movie Lincoln?
Did you hear anyone at all rag on Clinton for his appearance not just at the SAG awards, but at all the after parties following? Was it déclassé when Bill Clinton presented and partied at the SAG awards just 3 weeks ago?
But now it’s somehow un-First Lady like for the First Lady to accede to a request from The Academy to briefly appear from the White House to thank the artistes and present the Best movie award?
Is it lost on these people that in her capacity as Chair person of the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, this actually very neatly fits into her role as First Lady.
They came to her! The Oscar people flew all the way to D.C to lobby her to do this. She didn’t even have to leave home like Clinton. They came to her!
My goodness, some people in this country have lost their freaking minds.
But heaven forbid this smart, gorgeous, caring, amazing First Lady be ever cast in positive light – or extended the courtesy and respect she has more than earned. Not as long as the spiteful, envious, shriveled upTina Brown’s of the world have their way.
These Beckies and house negroes did the same thing to Gabby Douglas too, remember.
FLOTUS Is much to much for these BECKIES. She stole their throne, don’tcha know!
FUCK THEM!
QUEBEC COPS HARD AT WORK
Oh the irony of Hollywood, “ARGO” gets praise and best picture for freeing 6 WHITE folks, and Daniel Day-Lewis gets Best Actor for playing “LINCOLN,” a man who freed millions of BLACK folks.
LOL
Sorry, Argo was not ALL THAT. Besides the Canadians were the real heroes in this caper. It was just another White Savior moivie.
Hollywood couldn’t have Lincoln and that PESKY Thirteenth Amendment garner the big prize.
LMAO
Opinions
Why we still need the Voting Rights Act
By John Lewis,
Published: February 24
John Lewis, a Democrat, represents Georgia’s 5th District in the U.S. House.
On “Bloody Sunday,” nearly 50 years ago, Hosea Williams and I led 600 peaceful, nonviolent protesters attempting to march from Selma to Montgomery to dramatize the need for voting rights protection in Alabama. As we crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge, we were attacked by state troopers who tear-gassed, clubbed and whipped us and trampled us with horses. I was hit in the head with a nightstick and suffered a concussion on the bridge. Seventeen marchers were hospitalized that day.
In response, President Lyndon Johnson introduced the Voting Rights Act and later signed it into law. We have come a great distance since then, in large part thanks to the act, but efforts to undermine the voting power of minorities did not end after 1965. They still persist today.
This week the Supreme Court will hear one of the most important cases in our generation, Shelby County v. Holder. At issue is Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which requires all or parts of 16 “covered” states with long histories and contemporary records of voting discrimination to seek approval from the federal government for voting changes. The court is questioning whether Section 5 remains a necessary remedy for ongoing discrimination.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-we-still-need-the-voting-rights-act/2013/02/24/a70a930c-7d43-11e2-9a75-dab0201670da_story.html?wpisrc=nl_opinions
Good Morning, Everyone. Happy MUN-dane! :-)
Good Morning, Everyone at 3CHICS!