Saturday Open Thread

Posted on May 17, 2014 by rikyrah

Good Morning. Hope you are enjoying this weekend with family and friends.

Here’s the Politics Part of the Post:

This week, the President praised the power of solar, honored this year’s TOP COPS, awarded the Medal of Honor and traveled to New York for the opening of the National September 11 Memorial & Museum.

Now for some cultural reminders.

If you haven’t checked it out, please check out the web series An African City.
It’s the story of five Western-Educated African women who have returned to their home country of Ghana. The first season has just finished. Absolutely loved it. I love Sade, she cracks me up.

Then, there is the Nigerian produced Half of a Yellow Sun – the first big Nigerian production to go stateside.

From The Root

Half of a Yellow Sun Comes Full Circle

The story about identity, anxiety and love, set during the Nigerian civil war, doesn’t stray far from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s brilliant novel.
By: Diana Ozemebhoya Eromosele
Posted: May 13 2014 12:45 PM

Movies rarely do books justice, and thus I was surprised that the film adaptation of Half of a Yellow Sun captured the nuance that author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie achieved in her award-winning novel.

The stellar ensemble cast is partially responsible. Wealthy Nigerian twin sisters Olanna (Thandie Newton) and Kainene (Anika Noni Rose) are each involved in romantic relationships that are effected by the political and social unrest underway in Nigeria during the Biafran civil war of the late 1960s. Olanna, the caramel-complexioned and somewhat prissy sister is dating (and eventually marries) a sharp-tongued revolutionary professor by the name of Odenigbo (played by Afro-British actor Chiwetel Ejiofor). Kainene, the chocolate-complexioned sister who’s funny and delightfully acerbic, is dating a white British writer by the name of Richard (Joseph Mawle). Throughout the course of Richard’s time in Nigeria, he begins to identify as a Nigerian and ultimately a Biafran. It’s such an interesting character arc to see this white man come into himself in Africa.

Newton’s and Rose’s on-screen chemistry is palpable. They’re distant, yet synchronized—as is often the norm for sisters. Both Olanna and Kainene are smart as whips, cultured (they were schooled in London), and have an uncomfortable relationship with the wealth they stand to inherit.

………………..

Like the book, the film Half of a Yellow Sun is an African story through and through, and yet there’s something universal and familiar about the way the movie depicts the indigenous people and sounds of rural and urban Nigeria.

Finally, BELLE is finally in theatres. Check it out.

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39 Responses to Saturday Open Thread

  1. Yahtc says:
    May 17, 2014 at 7:46 pm

    How was “Belle,” Ametia?

    Reply
    • Ametia says:
      May 17, 2014 at 10:19 pm

      Hey just getting back from the movies. Belle was interesting, and because it was based on a true story, and didn’t get irritated by the fact that it had a happy ending.

      This story explored the slave trade and how the men starved & drowned the slaves on their ship to collect insurance money. They got more for the slaves dead than if they stayed sick and alive.

      Race, class, privilege, money and love were explored. Belle fights for them and her dead mother.

      Reply
  2. rikyrah says:
    May 17, 2014 at 6:48 pm

    did you see the EdLover video about Solange/Jay Z

    the cartoon part was hilarious

    http://youtu.be/8IdBbu_kfzQ

    Reply
  3. SouthernGirl2 says:
    May 17, 2014 at 6:23 pm

    Preakness 2014

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLGZbeC1kzc

    ************************
    Get it, California Chrome! Get it!

    Running around

    Reply
  5. Ametia says:
    May 17, 2014 at 5:40 pm

    Kentucky Derby winner California Chrome won the 139th running of the Preakness Stakes in Baltimore today — moving a step closer to the illustrious and elusive Triple Crown.

    If California Chrome wins at the Belmont Stakes in New York on June 7, he’ll be the first Triple Crown winner since Affirmed in 1978.

    Of the 38 horses that took both the Derby and Preakness, only 11 went on to win in the Belmon

    http://cnn.com/CNNtv

    Reply
  10. Ametia says:
    May 17, 2014 at 11:56 am

    Going to see Belle this afternoon.

    Reply
  13. Ametia says:
    May 17, 2014 at 11:03 am

    Holder, confronting issue of race once more, says ‘subtle’ threats to equality ‘cut deeper’
    By Sari Horwitz, Updated: Saturday, May 17,

    In a pointed and at times personal speech, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. on Saturday morning argued that America’s struggle for racial equality has become defined less by expressions of outright bigotry than by policies that subtly but systematically impede equal opportunity.

    Speaking during the commencement ceremony at Morgan State University, a historically black college in Baltimore, Holder referred obliquely to a series of racially charged episodes that have “received substantial media coverage” in recent weeks — an apparent reference to the controversial comments made by Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling and Nevada cattle rancher Cliven Bundy. But Holder also said that the “outlandish statements that capture national attention” obscure a more troubling reality.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/holder-confronting-issue-of-race-once-more-says-subtle-threats-to-equality-cut-deeper/2014/05/17/66e63482-dd57-11e3-b745-87d39690c5c0_story.html

    Reply
  14. rikyrah says:
    May 17, 2014 at 9:09 am

    Vladimir Putin Has Been Outplayed by Barack Obama

    —By Kevin Drum
    | Fri May 16, 2014 10:27 AM EDT

    Max Fisher notes this morning that although President Obama got a lot of flak for his restrained response to Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, his approach of giving Vladimir Putin enough rope to hang himself has turned out to be a lot cannier than his critics expected:

    This has been so effective, and has apparently taken Putin by such surprise, that after weeks of looking like he could roll into eastern Ukraine unchallenged, he’s backing down all on his own. Official Russian rhetoric, after weeks of not-so-subtle threats of invading eastern Ukraine, is backing down. Putin suddenly looks like he will support Ukraine’s upcoming presidential election, rather than oppose it, although it will likely install a pro-European president. European and American negotiators say the tone in meetings has eased from slinging accusations to working toward a peaceful resolution.

    Most of this is economic. Russia’s self-imposed economic problems started pretty quickly after its annexation of Crimea in March and have kept up. Whether or not American or European governments sanction Russia’s broader economy, the global investment community has a mind of its own, and they seem to have decided that Russia’s behavior has made it a risky place to put money. So risky that they’re pulling more money out.

    A lot of that may have come the targeted sanctions that Obama pushed for against individual Russian leaders and oligarchs. Those targeted sanctions did not themselves do much damage to the Russian economy. But, along with Russia’s erratic behavior in Ukraine and the lack of clarity as to whether Europe and the US could impose broader sanctions, it appears to have been enough to scare off global investors — the big, faceless, placeless mass of people and banks who have done tremendous damage to Putin’s Russia, nudged along by the US and by Putin himself.

    http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2014/05/vladimir-putin-has-been-outplayed-barack-obama

    Reply
  15. rikyrah says:
    May 17, 2014 at 8:55 am

    Off to swim and run errands. See you later.

    Reply
  16. rikyrah says:
    May 17, 2014 at 6:40 am

    Good Morning Everyone

    Reply
  17. Yahtc says:
    May 17, 2014 at 6:37 am

    “The 60th Anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education: Remembering When Parents Stood Up for Change”

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/otha-thornton/brown-v-board-of-education-60th-anniversary_b_5338561.html

    Reply
  18. Yahtc says:
    May 17, 2014 at 6:36 am

    Good Morning, Everyone :)

    Wishing you a great weekend!

    Reply

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