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Monday, January 01, 2007
Happy New Year
Friday, December 29, 2006
Run, Obama, Run
Reasons to run.
- This is not about you. This is about the country. This is about the world. This is the call of a new generation. Step up.
- This is about your children, and the children of the world. You want them to have a great future. And so you run.
- This is a new century. Old fights need to be laid to rest. There is a need for a certain freshness. There is need for fresh air.
- The economy has to be reimagined.
- Restore intelligence to the White House. End the dumb war in Iraq. Forge lasting peace. Spread democracy the progressive way. Nudge the Middle East towards a final map.
- Export hope to Africa. The dictators need tough love. They need ouster slips.
- It is a fairly good career move for a politician. The perks are fine. They play music when you enter a room, things like that.
In The News
Lalu flags off train to Saharsa in Bihar
NEPAL: UN monitoring of arms and armies to begin Reuters AlertNet
First UN arms monitors arrive in Nepal
Spitzer: We'll build a snowman if the weather is bad
Cindy Sheehan arrested outside Bush's ranch San Jose Mercury News
NC offers up to $4.7M to lure Google
Google to expand newspaper ads experiment Guardian Unlimited
Google newspaper tie-up exceeds expectations
Holiday iPod Sales May Have Beaten Expectations
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Laloo Yadav: Future Prime Minister Of India
What are the possibilities?
There are 545 seats in the Lok Sabha. (Parliament of India - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) The chances of his party the Rashtriya Janata Dal getting half those seats on its own are nil. (Rashtriya Janata Dal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)
List of political parties in India - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Political Resources in the Net - India I (Parties and Organizations)
Indian Political Parties,Party Profiles,Political Parties in India ...
Political parties of India
India - Political Parties
List of political parties in India: Information from Answers.com
India Election 2004 - Manifestos of Indian Political Parties
The second best option would be the emergence of a Third Front. All the non-Congress, non-BJP parties would come together and go at it. That coalition would best be formed before an election. Maybe such a Third Front will gain a majority. If it does not, maybe that Third Front will still be larger than the Congress, and will get the Congress to support it by default.
A likely scenario would be where the Third Front is larger than the Congress, and a Third Front-Congress coalition takes over power. That is Laloo's best shot. He sure is qualified. He represents what is the Arkansas of India, Bihar. He represents the oppressed castes and Muslims. That is progressive. He has been an excellent Railway Minister. He has more than proven himself.
What comes to mind is a 1996 scenario when Jyoti Basu had the option to become Prime Minister but his party unwisely refused. Laloo will never refuge. Make him the offer he can not refuse.
Even today the seat distributions are as follows:
Congress 145
BJP 138
Rest 260
Should not 260 lead 145? But that asks for the creation of a Third Front, and within that Third Front, Laloo will have to build a coalition that makes it the largest group within that Third Front.
Indian Imponderables
In The News
Amitabh Bachchan, ‘The biggest film star in the world’ desiFans.com, India In 2002, he was voted as the most popular screen and stage icon of all time on a BBC online survey. ..... Singh, steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal – who is of Indian origin – and Bollywood actors Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai each followed with four percent votes each.
Lalu shares wisdom with Harward, Wharton pupils Hindustan Times
After IIM, Lalu makes an impact on Havard, Wharton
Graft charge for Indian minister 17 May 05 | South Asia
The lord of Bihar 30 Apr 04 | South Asia
Profile: Laloo Prasad Yadav 22 Mar 04 | South Asia
Bihar politician back in jail 21 Dec 01 | South Asia
Laloo Prasad sent to jail 26 Nov 01 | South Asia
Laloo Prasad taken into custody 05 Apr 00 | South Asia
UN envoy seeks Security Council action for Somalia CNN International
US Signals Backing for Ethiopian Incursion Into Somalia New York Times, United States
Islamists in Somalia Retreat From Ethiopia-Backed Forces New York Times, United States
Somali conflict is quickly deteriorating Los Angeles Times, CA
Ethiopian forces march to oust Islamist leadership in Somalia San Jose Mercury News, USA
Ethiopian, Somali Government Troops Score Major Advances Against ... Voice of America
Islamists flee Ethiopian onslaught in Somalia Telegraph.co.uk, United Kingdom
Ethiopia predicts victory against Islamists New Zealand Herald (Subscription), New Zealand
Israel moves to strengthen Abbas
Poll shows Clinton and Obama are neck-and-neck Capital News 9
Giuliani Leads Gore, Rodham Clinton for 2008 Angus Reid Global Monitor
And Now: Ford and Toyota? BusinessWeek
Ford Chief Seeks Ideas From Toyota
Recovering From Tragedy Washington Post, United States By Bill Clinton ..... more than 200,000 dead; 2 million people displaced; 370,000 homes destroyed or damaged; some 5,000 miles of coastline devastated; and 2,000 miles of roads ruined. ...... Nearly 150,000 homes have been rebuilt or repaired and 80,000 more are being reconstructed. ...... thus far translating some $13 billion in pledges into roughly $11 billion in firm commitments to critical projects. ....... the resilience of the human spirit ...... First, we must get better at managing risk. Climate change and patterns of human behavior ensure that more devastating natural disasters will occur in the future. ....... Second, we should pursue recovery practices that promote equity and help break patterns of underdevelopment. ...... Third, we must recognize that peace is critical to any recovery process. ..... Finally, we must do more to harness the talents of local entrepreneurs and established businesses, domestic and foreign, in relaunching economies. .... we need to do more to turn philanthropists into investors, and providers of access to new markets.
Olmert to meet Abbas in Jerusalem on Saturday Malaysia Star
UN Security Council sanctions Iran over nuclear program MarketWatch
Declare Nepal a Hindu state, demand religious leaders Hindustan Times
Maoists call off year-end strike in Nepal Times of India
Blogtalk: The Koran Debate New York Times
'Bomb could flood NY tunnels' News24
Driven out: Hevesi pleads to felony, resigns
US strike kills Afghan Taliban leader Houston Chronicle
Hillary Clinton embarks on media tour ABC Online
Toyota poised to become top car firm Toronto Star
China's cotton output unable to meet domestic demand
Spitzer Secretary of State Is Company Lobbyist
Tri-Band Test System supports worldwide WiMAX frequencies. ThomasNet Industrial News Room (press release)
Son performs last rites of living father Times of India
Spitzer Adds More People to Administration WNYC
Goode Has A Lot To Learn About Islam: Ellison All Headline News
Tunnel dangers in New York? USA Today
NY/NJ Subway Dangerously Vulnerable To Even A "Small Bomb"
Google Passes Yahoo in Tally of Visitors New York Times
Turkmenistan sets date for presidential elections Independent
Somali militia ready to fight Ethiopians Houston Chronicle
Dell wants its batteries back ZDNet.com.au
Soros sees India shining Daily News & Analysis
Beware of capital inflows, Soros tells India
Pakistan, India to survey disputed marshlands in January Monsters and Critics.com
Four Marines Charged With Murder In Haditha Killings MTV.com
Nigerian Militants Bomb Gov't Facility ABC News
U2's Bono receives honorary British knighthood
Bono Awarded Knighthood Voice of America
Rosie Beats Trump, By Numbers FOX News
NY Requires Health Insurance Coverage for Mental Health Patients eMaxHealth.com
Sunday, December 24, 2006
New York Times: Hakeem Jeffries
  |
New Guard, and Style, for Politics in Brooklyn
In decades past, the politicians who came out of central Brooklyn, New York’s largest black community, were shaped by the civil rights struggles of the 1950s and ’60s, with many coming of age politically during the Vietnam War era.
But this year’s elections, as well as last year’s, represented a changing of the guard that could signal a wider shift of black political consciousness in the city: the emergence of a class of politicians spawned in the professional world, with experience in private industry, nonprofit organizations and other fields.
One new state lawmaker was recently a lawyer for CBS. Another raised money for private schools. A third was a police captain; while another, who is headed to the City Council, worked for the transit system.
They are largely politicians who have little to no association with Democratic Party clubhouse politicians in Brooklyn, which has been tainted by recent corruption scandals. And the sheer number of newly elected officials in central Brooklyn, perhaps the biggest changeover in years, is something of a milestone — particularly in a political world in which incumbency, at least for state lawmakers, can last virtually a lifetime.
“We are now seeing a very new group of political leaders in Brooklyn who are, quite frankly, crossover politicians who have successfully delivered a message that speaks to the interests of different constituencies,” said Craig Steven Wilder, a professor of urban history at Dartmouth College.
Mr. Wilder, author of the book “A Covenant with Color: Race and Social Power in Brooklyn,” said the new crop of elected officials was “different from the group who came to power in the 1970s and 1980s, who came to politics through civil rights issues.”
“This group represents the post-civil rights generation. And they have to deal with a different agenda,” he said. “That includes meeting the needs of people who are gentrifying their areas, people who have been there a long time and people who have been marginalized.”
Notable among the new breed is Hakeem Jeffries, 36, who left his job as a lawyer for CBS to go to Albany. He was elected this year to the Assembly seat held for 25 years by Roger L. Green, who was convicted in a petty larceny case.
Another new assemblyman is Karim Camara, 35, who served as the director of fund-raising for the Cush Campus Schools, a private elementary and middle school in Brooklyn. He is also executive pastor at the First Baptist Church of Crown Heights. Last year he succeeded Clarence Norman Jr., the former Brooklyn Democratic Party chairman who was first elected in 1982 and resigned in a scandal.
And on the City Council, there is Darlene Mealy, 42. She is a former executive assistant at New York City Transit who won a hotly contested primary last year, beating William F. Boyland Jr., the patriarch of one of Brooklyn’s well-known political families. Also elected this year was Eric Adams, 46, who will go to the State Senate, succeeding Carl Andrews. Mr. Adams, a former police captain, was also a founder of 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care.
The best known of the new group is Representative-elect Yvette D. Clarke, 42, a city councilwoman and a former director of business development at the Bronx Overall Economic Development Corporation.
Ms. Clarke won a Democratic primary in September that received national attention when a white candidate, David Yassky, tried to capture the seat that for decades had been held by black lawmakers: Major R. Owens, and before him, Shirley Chisholm.
For many people in central Brooklyn who closely watch local politics, the new officials are a refreshing change after a period in which some of the incumbents they succeeded were tainted by scandal.
“The election of so many new black officials in Brooklyn has made a lot of people, including me, feel hopeful,” said the Rev. Clinton M. Miller, pastor of the Brown Memorial Baptist Church in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn.
“I think many of these new leaders are viewed as representing the political prototype of what an elected official should be in this era: someone who is steeped in the community, but who also knows how to operate in corporate and business settings.”
Mr. Jeffries, for example, was an assistant general counsel who specialized in litigation at CBS. “We are all products of the community who have gone out and excelled in various endeavors,” Mr. Jeffries said.
“But we have come back to work in the community, to use politics as a way to make a difference in the communities that we come from. That’s what the civil rights movement was all about.”
But some Brooklyn Democrats question whether they will be able to avoid the infighting that has created friction among many of their predecessors.
In fact, a generation ago, central Brooklyn’s black leadership was splintered into two factions. One was a group whose de facto leader was Albert Vann, an assemblyman who started his public career as a teacher. Mr. Vann, who is now a city councilman, was a community leader in the Ocean Hill-Brownsville struggle between the black community and the United Federation of Teachers over the local school board’s power to hire teachers.
Mr. Vann, who was a supporter of Mr. Owens, was also the political mentor of Mr. Green and several others.
On the other side were politicians who were loyal to State Senator Vander L. Beatty. Mr. Beatty often worked in collaboration with Brooklyn’s regular Democratic organization, which until recently was led by white politicians from southern Brooklyn.
Indeed, a generation ago, candidates and officials in Brooklyn routinely complained that the infighting among central Brooklyn’s black officials often hampered their ability to bring resources and funds into the area.
The feuding among politicians in those days was heated. In one case, in a 1982 primary race for Congress between Mr. Beatty and Mr. Owens, Mr. Beatty’s supporters hid in a crawl space above a bathroom at the Board of Elections office in Brooklyn. After the office closed for the day, Mr. Beatty’s supporters went to where the voter files were kept and doctored registration cards of Mr. Owens’s supporters, apparently in an effort to thwart an Owens victory.
Although that was an extreme incident, there have been long-standing tensions and rivalries in the borough for years. The newer elected officials have hopes of avoiding such squabbling, with plans to meet often, perhaps at regularly scheduled breakfasts, to determine ways to allocate recourses to their districts.
“One of the things about that that I think is a good sign is that we all like each other and get along well,” Ms. Mealy said. “Some of them have not even taken office yet. But we have camaraderie already. And it will make things easier for us to work together and get things done.”
But getting things done might take more than friendship and amity. They all have the disadvantage of being low in seniority in their respective houses of government. And they generally have fewer staff members and less influence than their predecessors, who enjoyed the benefits of incumbency and the clout and resources that came with it.
Still, they insist that their lack of seniority will not limit their effectiveness.
“We have the wisdom and experience of our predecessors to build upon,” Ms. Clarke said. “And our job is to find ways of working together and making even more of a difference in this new era. And I’m sure that we will all find ways to make our mark.”
Hakeem Jeffries Debate
Hakeem Jeffries: Principled Compromise
Dean, DFNYC, Daily Kos, Justin, Brooklyn, Nepal
Saturday, December 23, 2006
The Devil Wears Prada
I just watched the movie The Devil Wears Prada. It shook me that it is a 2006 movie. This is today. It is scary.
Smart girl lands a job right after school at a top magazine as an assistant to the editor who is a legend in the industry. Her boyfriend flips burgers. As she progresses, the boyfriend grows away. Less than a year later, she quits her job. The guy is still flipping burgers. Her quitting brings them back together.
That is so Martha Stewart, guys not being able to keep up with successful women. If nothing else, go enjoy the money!
Of course the movie made me think of the Obama-Hillary tussle that will soon unfold. I am for Obama. It is personal. But I do strongly believe Obama will have to take in the gender theme. He has to carry both race and gender to a whole new level. He has to think in concrete terms, like having half his cabinet female.
Meryl Streep is ugh. She is so good at what she does. Al Pacino and Meryl Streep. I always wondered why they did not end up a couple. Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bhaduri, the two most talented actors of their generation in the Hindi film industry did. But I guess they got married and Amitabh said he would not want his wife to be working from 9 AM to 9 PM, and so she just went ahead and quit.
This love and work balance thing is so not settled at all. This continues to be a very real issue.
I would like to design a company where half the workers are women. Number one reason: that company will beat the competition because of that because it will be running on all cylinders.
There's some great Madonna and U2 music in there, two artists in the musical realm that I adore. The movie is really, really well done. I have never watched an okay or bad Meryl Streep movie. She is rare.
I love the way she says, "That's all." It is like Donald Trump saying, "You're fired."
The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
The Devil Wears Prada
Apple - Trailers - The Devil Wears Prada
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The Devil Wears Prada
Amazon.com: The Devil Wears Prada: A Novel: Books: Lauren Weisberger
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www.myspace.com/tdwp
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Mark Goldblatt on The Devil Wears Prada on National Review Online
Amazon.com: The Devil Wears Prada (Widescreen Edition): DVD: Meryl ...
BBC - Movies - review - The Devil Wears Prada
The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Devil Wears Prada, The Movie - Yahoo! Movies UK
Devil Wears Prada | Now Showing | Guardian Unlimited Film
The Devil Wears Prada (film) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Devil Wears Prada - Moviefone
ODEON - - The Devil Wears Prada
THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA Movie Synopsis
Barnes & Noble.com - Books: Devil Wears Prada, by Lauren ...
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Thursday, December 21, 2006
Money And Manhattan
This town is full of people who went to good schools, work good jobs, make good money, are never going to become millionaires.
Money is in the air, you can feel it. There are the outer boroughs, and there is Manhattan. Like there was this one guy, he used to come to some of the same progressive meetings I used to. Then he gave up. "It is all yuppies," he complained.
Most of them must have worked very hard to get where they are at. Most of them continue to work very hard just to stay where they are at. More than the per capita income, it is the density. There are so many of them. Midtown Manhattan has the greatest concentration of office space per square foot than any place on earth. Each cubicle is someone in a decent income bracket.
Politicians come from all across the country to raise money here. This is supposed to be their all-weather ATM. There are people who specialize in doing fundraisers. It is socializing, it is entertainment, it is I-did-my-good-deed-for-the-day the Manhattan way.
Where do you live? Upper East Side. What do you ride? A cab. Those are status symbols.
My car died on me recently. What is it about cars? Too many fluids to keep a tab on. But I was kind of rediscovering the joys of the four-wheeler. But when I came into the city last summer, I was just so happy not to have to need a car. Everywhere else in America, you need a car for everything. Grocery shopping? Car. Haircut? Car. I relished the subway. I still feel that is the only place New Yorkers meet, it is just that I don't understand why those walls have not been painted in a hundred years. There have been some late night sojourns when I have slept through my station. Once I went all the way to the very last stop. The sky was already early blue.
The drink. The cab. The dress code.
At Drinking Liberally, the drinks are free, but I have mostly rather talked. I don't think I have ever enjoyed beer in my life. And who wants a beer belly? I think I am going to show up much less often. It is the same 10 faces week after week.
I have experimented with the dress code. It used to be utterly casual. Then I started dressing up, minus the tie, say no to Jesus. Then it has been dress up bottom, casual warm top, going for the Matrix look.
I have a healthy feeling about money. Money is like a good conversation. Money, like words, is a vehicle of expression. Wealth creation is like writing poetry. There's art and science involved.
This is more commercial than most cities. What do you do? That can be a pointed question. What does your cellphone look like? What color is your parachute? Mine is the one I got when I first got a cellphone. I am not a big fan. I am a laptop fan, not a cell fan. But the thing about mine is, you connect it to a laptop, and the laptop goes online, for free, on the same free nights and weekends deal. I have a few different cameras. I don't need a camera phone. I hardly ever need a phone. Mostly it gets used when you are near some place you have agreed to meet somebody, and they are not there on time, or it is a tussle locating the other person.
Otherwise the phone stays in the pocket, turned off. Try voice mail. And if you really intend to communicate, nothing works like email, Gmail to be precise.
Sam Walton had plastic chairs at his headquarters. I am listening.
The thing is, it gets said, you meet someone at some event for three minutes, and you never see them again. So at events, the air is electric. People make all this effort to show up, and they end up spending most of their time with these three people they already knew. When you step outside that familiarity zone, there are sharks out there. You don't want to be seen like you don't have friends. Standing alone for a few minutes is not meditation, it is something else.
Good thing I get a kick out of conversation. I don't care two whits about baseball, etc. But talk politics, and I am on. And business. Impressive salaries are not that impressive, they are still just salaries. But it is really something to get someone to talk about their work that they are really into. Oh, the craft of it. I don't care if it is pottery. It could be lawyering, it could be banking. Better still if its is entrepreneurship. But those are few and far between.
What do you do? How do you do?
It gets said New York City is the most diverse city on the planet. It gets said New York City is the most segregated city on the planet. Attitudes don't go away just like that. But then it is easy. If you don't connect, you don't connect. The city is a civil war in motion. Only bloodletting has been outlawed.
"We don't like minorities up there in Connecticut."
"We are the same here in New York." Whites are minority.
Playful talk with the funnyman at MYD, Aaron Short.
Organized chaos that the city is.
But most of the jitters are just plain awkwardness. It is hard for all people to go to a party and say hello to strangers. Mostly it is that. Going to political events eases that. You go often enough, you end up knowing all the movers and shakers, all the top people. You get that insider feeling. There are only so many of them. And they go to each other's events. A lot of cross pollination.
The city is the Amazon forest. All sorts of human life forms can be found. I think that is what people are talking about when they say either you love New York or you hate New York.
Rent is steep. Cabs charge money. There is the occasional racist comment. But mostly people are just running. Catch me if you can. In the subway, people are mostly withdrawn. Remember what mama said, don't talk to strangers.
Cabbies stream in from the outer boroughs. Many of my fanciest comrades from the April Revolution are cabbies in the city. I don't know of Manhattan progressives who have done anything fancier, or are likely. Nothing like that has ever happened in world history.
There are 40,000 Nepalis in the city, three of them lawyers. They get rockstar treatment.
Map of Manhattan, NY
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