April 13, 2012

Obama-Biden 2012

President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden walk around the South Lawn of the White House (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

April 12, 2012

Michelle, Love, Beyonce

http://www.beyonce.com/news/michelle-obama

April 12, 2012

Wrapped Up in Florida

Florida Atlantic University, April 10

http://theobamadiary.com/

April 11, 2012

Change

Christopher Charles Tuck II, 7, of Westchester N.Y., wears a t-shirt with the image of U.S. President Barack Obama at an Obama campaign fund raising event in Hollywood, Florida, April 10, 2012. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque


(Obama Diary)

April 9, 2012

President Obama "Where the Wild Things Are"

President Barack Obama reads a book "Where the Wild Things Are" alongside first lady Michelle Obama and their daughters Sasha and Malia during the annual White House Easter Egg Roll in Washington, April 9, 2012 (REUTERS/Jason Reed)




The night Max wore his wolf suit and made mischief of one kind and another his mother called him “WILD THING!” and Max said “I’LL EAT YOU UP!” So he was sent to bed without eating anything.




That very night in Max’s room a forest grew and grew- and grew until his ceiling hung with vines and the walls became the world all around . . . And when he came to the place where the wild things are they roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and rolled their terrible eyes . . .




Max said “BE STILL!” and tamed them with the magic trick of staring into all their yellow eyes without blinking once and they were frightened and called him the most wild thing of all . . .




The wild things roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and rolled their terrible eyes and showed their terrible claws . . .

April 8, 2012

First Family Walks Hand-in-Hand to Easter Sunday Services

President Barack Obama walks hand-in-hand from the White House to an Easter church service with his wife Michelle and their daughters Sasha and Malia in Washington April 8, 2012.




REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst



REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst






REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

April 8, 2012

Another Easter in Charleston

(This is a re-post of mine from earlier years . . . hope it's not too familiar)




I remember Easter as a child. Mom would take us to Charleston, West Virginia every year to visit my grandfather for the Spring holiday.

Granddad lived in a huge two story house off of Main Street, and there, he rented out the upstairs to a few folks that I never really saw much, and a room off of his kitchen where a dapper garbage man slept. Granddad was a short, strong man, dark as night, with a hearing aid for his deafness that happened when he worked in the glass factory after WWI. He'd turn it down when my mom would lecture him about something or another, and whenever he fell asleep in his red reclining chair with the red duct tape covering the cracks, while he watched the baseball game turned up way loud. He'd wake up every now and then to spit his tobacco in his brown ceramic spittoon and record the score on his TV guide.

Bobo, his faithful mixed border collie who would bark whenever the phone rang or the door chimed, laid and slept by his side as he slept. Bobo would never fail to bite me almost every visit, sending me three times to the doctor for stitches, the last time after taking the other half of a cookie I gave him from my hand. Besides that, nothing much at all happened in that town for us young ones. The biggest thing was when the huge car carrier pulled up on the other side of the street. My sister and I would run outside on the porch and sit on that rough painted metal rocking chair and bench and watch as the man unloaded the new cars one by one until the very last.

Charleston was like a large retirement community to me, with a Dairy Queen where I sometimes got to go to by myself to get mom her butter almond, and an all night laundromat where we sometimes went after dark to wash our clothes. There were a bevy of old relatives who we would visit with Mom, walking for endless miles in the heat in our new spring wear. There was a lady with who had been stuck in bed for years (I never saw her get up) who was always in her nightgown and robe. Mom said she tried to get up one morning and found she couldn't walk. She was a kind woman with several pictures of Jesus on the wall. There was a lady who took care of her who had a huge goiter on her neck. The bedridden lady always gave my sister and I some change before we left.

Then, there was Mrs. Gilmore who lived in a huge brownstone with a funeral parlor in the basement that her husband had left her. Everyone in town brought her their business when someone passed away. She had a wide painted smile with her hair pulled back so tight that it seemed stuck on. She had long fingers with the longest nails I had ever seen. Years after she died the National Park Service made her home a landmark because of her work as a civil rights activist in Charleston and elsewhere.

There was Annie Joe, my mom's best friend who would do her hair with the hot combs heated on the kitchen stove, and her mom, Cousin Gussy and Uncle Moore who lived across the Kanawha bridge in one of a suite of plaster houses with sunken floors. They had two trees with white washed trunks and red mites that crawled up and down. We'd salt the slugs on the walkway for fun and climb the trees to wait for them to shrivel. The railroad tracks were just a few feet from the house and the train would barrel by occasionally. We'd leave pennies on the track and collect them flattened when the train rolled over them. Gussy would cook up a Sunday meal that I'll never forget with fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and greens that would melt in your mouth while Mr. Moore watched the ball game.

Easter Sunday was a great pain for a small kid like me. Mom was a terror as she got us ready for church. She'd scrub me, brush my hair raw, and dress me in this powder blue, Lord Fauntleroy suit with shorts and a beanie cap. She'd hustle us outside as Granddad carefully backed his gold Oldsmobile out of the garage with the shed on the side which had a ton of pipe parts, motor parts, nuts and bolts and everything wonderful. I smoked my first cigarette there one Sunday before church, a Pall Mall without a filter. Granddad would stop at the wide gate he had built at the end of the long driveway (with pipe parts) which had a pulley and a rope with a brick tied on that slowly shut the gate by itself until it clicked surely into its handmade latch.

We'd arrive early at the First Baptist Church and sit in the pew as the parishioners would stream in. First Baptist was a huge church with a wall of stained glass windows on both sides and a pulpit that towered above us all with room for its large choir. The church on Easter Sunday was always packed full and humming from the rich, sickly perfume of the women there. The smell was unbelievable. And the hats . . . wide brimmed monstrosities with feathers and such, atop processes and wigs. There was this one large lady who owned and lived in a dubious consignment shop along Main Street with a few dust-covered ceramic figurines and plastic flowers on the window shelf who would always arrive at the last minute. She'd saunter down the aisle with her silver tipped cane, and her hat was always the largest, most outlandish one there, with fake birds, fruits or something amazing on top. She'd make her way down to her reserved seat in the front row. She was the only holy roller I think that was allowed in First Baptist. I understood that she had been informed that she'd have to tone down her shouts of praise to the Lord which, nonetheless, still echoed through the hall at several key points in the service.

Granddad always left us to take his place up front. He was a longtime deacon who would fully memorize the passage he would get to read before the congregation. I'd be stuck on that hard bench for the full 3 hours that the service ran on Easter Sunday. Mom would do her best to keep me still and quiet throughout the service with gum, or some starlight mints and butterscotch candies. A few of the stained glass windows swung open to let in whatever breeze could be had, but it was always sweltering hot. Almost everyone (but me) had a hand fan with a wooden handle and a picture of Jesus and a lamb on the front and a picture of the church on back. You could hear the fwap, fwap of the parishioners waving them back and forth in vain attempts to ward off the heat. I always fell asleep several times throughout, taking advantage of Mom's arm, probably the only time that she didn't terrify me.

The First Baptist Church was led by the Reverend Moses Newsome, a towering, light-skinned black man with a deep baritone and kind eyes. He would lead the congregation through prayers, through acknowledgments and death and sick mentions. He would stop in between and sit as the choir belted out some rollicking gospel tune, rocking, bobbing, and clapping their hands in unison as they rocked the house. They had an unbelievable sound. And folks would rock along with them. There was nothing subtle about the choir. They were loud and righteous. Whew! The one holy-roller up front would be on her feet, shouting out, " Praise glory!" she would cry. "Thank you Jesus!"

Then came the sermon. One hour long. An eternity. I'd have a sore butt by then and the candy just wouldn't cut it anymore. Reverend Newsome would speak in a low, measured tone as he counseled the congregation on the vestiges of evil and the virtues of good. His long arms reached out from under his flowing robe and he firmly grasped the lectern on both ends as he glared down on the flock. Sweat poured off of his freckled brow while he cautioned us about the Devil and warned us to look everywhere for Christ's coming.

Somewhere near the end, you would get a whiff of the food cooking in the church kitchen for after the service. The smell of fried chicken and gravy, beans, cornbread, and greens wafted uncontrolled into the great hall. Folks got restless, but they were mostly patient and still until, at once, the Reverend's voice would rise to a fevered timbre as he brought on the end of his sermon. Folks would shift in their seats and sit upright again as the Reverend boomed out his ending.

Then came the benediction, that wonderful benediction that signaled the end of the service. And then it was over. There were Easter baskets full of jellybeans and chocolate waiting at home, and the sun was shining full outside as we filed past Reverend Newsome and he grasped my small hand with his giant soft ones. "You be good now, you hear?" the Reverend would say. "I'll be good sir." I'd answer, as I pushed out into the Spring air to soak up another Easter in Charleston.

April 5, 2012

Who's Really Threatened Here?

THE Supreme Court can do great harm to the presidency. but the president can do very little of significance to affect the Court -- outside of nominating replacement justices. That's what makes all of the hyperventilated hissyfits from lawmakers and others about the President's use of the word 'unprecedented' such opportunistic nonsense.

Even if you just completely ignore the years and years where conservatives have railed against 'activist' judges and warned them against playing politics with their decisions, these republican critics of President Obama couldn't be more transparent in their political opportunism on this; or more inane.

This court challenge of the health law that lawmakers spent so much political capital to craft and enact is a dagger hanging directly above the heads of the American public; not just the President.

There's nothing that the White House and Congress can do about that except just wait, hope, and cajole from the outside. They can also start over and craft new laws, but that would be at the expense of millions of families, in this case, who are already invested and dependent on important and sustaining provisions in the new health law.

The President is correct in strongly defending the legislative process that the Court so callously and recklessly threatens to undo with an intellectual, imperious wave of their unelected hands. Overturning this health law might not actually be 'unprecedented' but it would be an unusual and earth-shattering rebuke to the authority and provenance of the other two branches of government.

That threat from the Court would seem to demand a more forceful response than a few choice words of warning from the Chief Executive. That's a challenge worth defeating in the only way available to the President and Congress; through their political activity and legislative impetus. If one discordant and confrontational word can cause so much angst among the Court's defenders, then that would appear to call for even more sharp reminders of the primacy of the efforts of our elected representatives.

Political activity is what the other branches of government are designed for. Not so with the Supreme Court. They are supposed to decide these cases dispassionately, without regard to the political din outside of the actual legislative process which produced the bill under judicial review. That's their lot. If they don't decide this case fairly -- even as the President reminds them of the boundaries of their roles in making that decision -- their independence doesn't really deserve defending.

Now, who's really threatened here?

March 25, 2012

Our Early Spring Bloom

THIS has to be the earliest Spring blooms in my memory. The trees and bushes are already leafing out and flowering. The daffodil and tulip bulbs are up and blooming. The hostas have come up and are unfolding into proud stands of bright white and green to contrast with the rest of the emerald and burgundy explosions of color.

It's a welcome end (a tentative end) to the winter's bleakness and relative cold. There are certainly broader environmental implications and consequences to ponder and worry over in this unprecedented change of climate. Those can't completely quash my enthusiasm for shedding my heavy jackets and sweaters and venturing out, barefoot and in shorts.

I can't be dissuaded from my joy in the unexpected events of sprouting and bloom which are unraveling before me. I am a giddy fool, basking in the incidental sunlight and warmth; much of its early arrival presumably generated by the abuses and neglect of our industries regarding the atmosphere. My ecological conscience is (almost) undone by the betrayal of my arthritic bone's warming to the beauty and promise of this early Spring. I can't wait to see what comes up next!


This election year is much like our unusual weather. There's so much unprecedented in the atmosphere and landscape of our party's upcoming defense of our Democratic presidency. There's the obvious historic nature of this current president who's race is being deliberately (if not mindlessly) highlighted and framed by many of his bigoted, republican opponents and their supporters; so far, mostly to the advantageous effect of mobilizing and energizing our Democratic base to his heightened defense and support.

I'm mindful that it was just months ago that both the economy and President Obama's appeal was teetering on a precipice of indifference in his re-election to an outright wave of opposition from his own base of supporters. A combination of a populist appeal and some executive action has attracted enough of an early buzz regarding the president's re-election from his party regulars and others that he has effectively placed himself firmly into the vital role of our party's political champion.

It's a welcome end of term of a operationally defensive presidency caught up worrying about smoothing out every republican-induced bump in the legislative roadway. Free from any significant or noticeable primary challenge -- and advantaged by the distracted republican field still fighting it out over their eventual nominee -- President Obama has been able to appeal to both the traditional factions of our party, and to many more progressive interests, as well, and position his supporters to rally against the extremes coming from his republican opponents.

It's been a perfect storm of opposition which has inspired many passionate defenses of this presidency from potential Democratic voters; of its agenda; and of its legislative accomplishments. The opposition party has muddied up what had just recently augured to be a dry referendum from them on the struggling, incumbent President.

I am a giddy fool in my unquestioned, enthusiastic, energetic support for the re-election of Barack Obama; basking in the glow of his excellent character, his steady and progressive logic, and in his warm and embracing appeal to our core Democratic principles; reveling in the bold contrast he offers against the bleak and caustic republican opposition. I am a dedicated and loyal toiler against his demagogic attackers.

My natural aversion to the reflexive moderation and unnerving compromises which marked much of his first term is undone (almost) by the warmth, strength, and beauty of this Democratic President's substantive and inspiring campaign and office.

I can't wait to see what comes up next!



REUTERS/Jason Reed

March 15, 2012

Stunningly Elegant

U.S. President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama talk as they wait to receive Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife Samantha as they arrive for an official dinner in their honor at the White House in Washington, March 14, 2012. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst




U.S. President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama greet British Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife Samantha after arriving at the White House for a State Dinner held in their honor March 14, 2012. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque