Salon blogger and former constitutional law litigator Glenn Greenwald posted his exclusive interview with Helen Thomas, the oldest member of the White House Press Corp. The questions are exceptional, as are Thomas’ answers and insights. One of today’s must reads!
Consider this excerpt regarding the secrecy of this Administration:
I did think that tough questions were always very important. With Kennedy, we knew he enjoyed the banter with the press, and he had the first live televised news conferences. And it made a big difference in terms of really capturing the imagination of the public. It was the first time they really saw reporters in action, they saw a witty president that was able to dodge questions as deftly as anyone, and he had great eloquence. That was the first time the American people really became interested in presidential news conferences.
And then Johnson had a love-hate relationship with the press. He couldn't live without us, and yet at the same time, he thought we were hurting him every day. The words "credibility gap" were created in that era.
With Nixon, that is when news management and manipulation really began. Now, every president wants to put his best foot forward, and always be able to manage and manipulate news coverage.
All presidential candidates, especially, vow to run an open administration. But they step foot in the Oval Office and the Iron Curtain slams down. Suddenly, all information that I think belongs in the public domain becomes their private preserve.
The manipulation of the press has become greater and greater. This is the most secretive administration I have ever covered. And they're all secretive.
My friend Shawn Hammond has recently launched his editing and writing business, stormbrain. His editing, writing, and proofing services incorporate research and consultation documentation; marketing materials; magazine articles (including features, profiles, how-tos, and reviews); books; online content; user guides; and any other documentation that requires copy.
Having known Shawn for over ten years, I wanted to do something that 1) would acknowledge this important venture; and 2) show my support. (My dad threw a couple of good years of his 40's into trying to get his own company successful, so I know firsthand the tremendous effort one expends.) I figured the best way to do this would be to build him a visually captivating, informative, and practical website.
To do this, I chose the highly-adaptable and fresh UI of SwishMax's template #56 as the shell for the site. I then modified images, helped worked on content, and then threw all of the content in. After three weeks of work (off and on in the evenings), the site went live this morning.
I'm very pleased with it. Besides intriguing, I think it succeeds at introducing Shawn's impressive resume of writing and editing experience and clients. Check out stormbrain here. In fact, hire him to write you an article, review, profile of one of our new hip rock bands; or to proofread your company's user documentation or messaging.
To fix, I accessed another active Salon Blog, Dave Pollard's fine How To Save the World, right-clicked on his "permalink" image, and selected Save As.... to save it to my desktop. Dave kept the same file name as the macro template so that when I copied the file into my images/salon folder and posted, RadioLand recognized it and displayed it, accordingly.
Note to self: Don't go deletin' system files, even if you think they aren't being used.
I recently exceeded my maximum amount of free disk space with Salon Blogs (40 mb). So I started eliminating old images that I've used or intended on using. IN the process, I deleted the "permalink" image, which resulted in the unsightly macro error you see in the date/time stamp and comments line at the end of each post. Tonight, I'm troubleshooting and trying to make things right with the blog again.
Have you ever fiddled with something, only to break it? "Me. Me. Pick me."
One of the ministers with whom I met, who had supported the invasion of Iraq and had been an admirer of outgoing British Prime Minister Tony Blair's, ruefully cited Blair's remark about Iraq at his joint press conference with Bush on May 17 at the White House: "This is a fight we cannot afford to lose." "Cannot? Cannot lose?" mocked the minister. "Should not have lost."
High officials of European governments describe U.S. influence as squandered and swiftly eroding (one minister went down a list of Bush administration officials, rating them according to their stupidity), the country's moral authority nil. Lethal power vacuums are emerging from Lebanon to Pakistan, and Europeans are incapable on their own of quelling the fires that burn far closer to them than to the United States through their growing Muslim populations and proximity to the Middle East. They have no illusions that they will be treated seriously as real allies or that there will be a sudden about-face by the Bush administration. Their faint hope -- and it is only a hope -- is that they have already seen the worst and that it is not yet to come. Even worse than Bush, from their perspective, would be another Republican president who continued Bush policies and also appointed neoconservatives. That would toll, if not the end of days, then the decline and fall of the Western alliance except in name only, and an even more rapid acceleration of chaos in the world order.
Throw this into the category of guilty pleasures-- POP music, which I have always enjoyed and very recently, as of today, have been teased about. (Thank you, Ace!) And that's perfectly all right. Really. No. Really.
Last week, Justin Timberlake announced he created a new recording label, Tennman Records. Today, he announced his first recording contract is going to the YouTube phenomenon Esmee Denters, from Holland.
Her covers of hit songs, in which she’s been recording in her own home in front of a web cam and then posting on YouTube, have been viewed over by the millions, including the 3 million views for this cover of the Justin Timberlake track "What Comes Around." (I actually think, as this post is dated May 28, that this recording is Esmee’s audition for Tennman Recordings.)
If you are familiar with JT’s version, you’ll appreciate the increased emotional integrity that Esmee adds to the tune. JT mentions at the end of the clip that Esmee’s version is better than his. I like JT’s version for the nice, smooth, groove factor. But Esmee’s vocals, on the other hand, reach further inside, grab me, and refuse to let my attention go.
Esmee’s debut album is expected in stores later in the year. You can learn more about her at her website, www.esmeeworld.com.
Congratulations Esmee on the recording contract. I look forward to your debut.
My friend Shawn sent a link to Gary Kamiya’s extraordinarily beautiful composition "I'm younger than that now," published by Salon, about that epiphany we all experience that we are over the hill! I was very moved by it. (Thanks again Shawn for sharing it with me.)
I have been facing this very harsh junction in the road of life, because of my health. Tonight, I had an appointment with the neurosurgeon. While I received good news–that indeed the hemangioma on my L2 vertebrae showed benign and had not grown in the past nine months – I was expecting another lecture on living with the cards dealt me by fate and live with my back pain. But the neurosurgeon was highly amiable; knowledgeable; understanding of my frustrations, concerns, and desires to retrieve some of my quality of life back; and helpful.
I learned that I have a unique nerve canal that is more narrow than the average person. This is the reason why my bulging disks at L4 and L5 have been causing me so much pain. (We talked about how this is most likely genetics at work, as all my brothers and dad have bad backs. In fact, just this week, my dad and second-oldest brother had their backs go out on them.)
Since I already had a disc operation on L4 when I was 26, we discussed that my next operation would have to be a fusion. So, before I even consider that harsh procedure, we decided that I would see a pain doctor and undergo a facet joint block. If that works, I will undergo a procedure called a radio frequency lesion. More info on that later, if it comes up on the horizon.
I now pass the torch over to Gary Kamiya. Enjoy!
Lately I've been asking myself: When did I get so damn old?
Will it be on Saturday, when my son graduates from high school? Did it start 10 years ago, when my knees gave out and I had to say goodbye to sports other than bocce ball? Was it last week, when I saw my reflection before I was ready and was shocked by the man with thinning hair and white in his beard who looked back at me? Was it five years ago, when a doorman in Copenhagen stopped me as I was about to walk into a club filled with 20-somethings with the soul-shriveling words, "There's nothing for you here, sir"? Or did it start decades ago, a long defeat measured in fears not overcome, things not said?
It's all of these things, and none of them. Aging is an imperceptible and abstract process -- until it rears up and bites you in your increasingly southward-aiming ass. And then it's still imperceptible and abstract. If life is a long dying, how can you single out one moment when you cross the line into the homestretch? What bifocals can you get that will let you see the enormous changes that are happening to you in slow motion?
