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Obama in Cairo

Obama delivered a much-anticipated speech to the Muslim world on Friday. Mitt Romney jumped on the Fox News bandwagon and called it the latest stop in Obama’s “apology tour”. I guess Mitt didn’t really watch the speech, but instead decided to parrot out the right wing talking points. Or perhaps he was watching the speech through shit-stained glasses. I don’t know.

The fact is the speech was not apologetic. It was honest. He spoke frankly about the stereotypes that divide us and the common principles we share. He acknowledged the stereotypes we have about the Muslim world, and the stereotypes the Muslim world has about us. The message was not directed at Al Qaeda or terrorists, but to moderates in the Muslim world. It was the beginning of the dialogue that has been sorely lacking.

I guess to some, the speech would be jarring considering that our last president neatly packaged foreign states as “against us” or “with us”. Those who were “against us” did not deserve to be heard by us. I understand, the tactic Obama is taking is huge departure from what has been done in the past and it could be uncomfortable.

The substance of the speech was to explain to Muslims the ideals which America stands for and the reasons that extremism should not be accepted in their countries. After listening to the speech in its entirety, I was very proud of his performance.

But Sean Hannity of Fox News had a different take, he said:

While much of America was asleep this morning, President Barack Obama delivered a major address in Egypt that was billed as a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world. But in the end, the president decided to use his time on foreign soil to point the finger directly at America for many of the world’s problems. And he faulted the U.S. for the tension that exists between Americans and Muslims. And that is our headline tonight: “Blaming America First.”

Now, in his remarks, Mr. Obama refused to use these words: “terror,” “terrorism,” “terrorists,” or even that term “manmade disasters.” But he repeatedly quoted the Quran and even accused Americans of overreacting to the 9-11 terror attacks.

His reporting of the speech is patently false and irresponsible. Not once did he blame America for the world’s problems, but he did characterize the Iraq ware as a “war of choice”, which it was. He did not lay blame on either party for the tensions that exist between Americans and Muslims, but he did acknowledge they exist. While he did quote the Quran, he also quoted the Bible and the Torah to illustrate how their teachings share the same fundamental ideals. Hannity’s characterization of the president’s remarks on 9/11 is twisted and just wrong. In fact, what Obama said about 9/11 was:

I’m aware that there’s still some who would question or even justify the events of 9/11. But let us be clear: Al Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 people on that day. The victims were innocent men, women and children from America and many other nations who had done nothing to harm anybody. And yet al Qaeda chose to ruthlessly murder these people, claimed credit for the attack, and even now states their determination to kill on a massive scale. They have affiliates in many countries and are trying to expand their reach. These are not opinions to be debated; these are facts to be dealt with.

There were no apologies, none at all. I’m proud of our president: Barack Hussein Obama. And I have no apologies, none at all.

Tags: bible, country, existence, friday, iraq, irresponsibility, news, obama, Opinion

What I’m Doing Now

I told you I’d fill you in on what I’m doing. As I’ve mentioned I work at home now, which poses its own challenges to my productivity. But ultimately, there is nothing standing in the way between me and work except myself and distraction. Fortunately, distraction is low.

I now promote scholarships for new students and those wanting to return to school, referring them back to the details at TheEssayContest.com. I’m using every method available and need lots of help.

My job is to get the word out to as many people as possible that these scholarships exist. It’s no small task as I’m sure you can imagine. There is A LOT to be done on the site, A LOT. I have a lot of writing to do, changes to make, and pages to build, oh my.

To put it very simply, we’re giving money to students who can write good position style essays of 1200 – 1500 words and meet our guidelines.

Additionally, we’re raising money to provide grants to K-12 schools through a separate essay contest. There will be more to come on other projects we’re working on.

We’re aiming to try to have 125,000 applicants by July 10th and I need to hire around 1000 people to help me spread the word about this opportunity for students to start their careers where they should, debt free and ready to take on the world.

Ironically, I get to hire people to do a job they would get fired for doing on any other job.

I’m excited about promoting this opportunity to new and returning students, since I just recently returned to school myself with my eyes on going back full time to obtain the degree I’ve been after for several years.

The grand prize winner of this contest could potentially win a full scholarship and a car! The more people that apply, the better the contest is for everyone and the bigger the scholarship awards. Our scholarships are self funded which means everything we get in as far as entry fees and donations go right back out into scholarships, we’re not waiting on investors to come up with the scratch to award you, when we notify you that there is an award for you, we have it.

You can find more details at theessaycontest.com.
But wait, there’s more, I’ve started revamping the website so that it’s easier to navigate and I’m also working on putting forms up for people to get more information. I would like to put up an FAQ page, but to do that you have to have questions, so ask away, and help me build the FAQ page.

You can comment here if you questions or you can send them to me at faq@theessaycontest.com and I’ll answer them as quickly as I can.

Tags: college scholarship, contest, economy, existence, followers, fortunate, job, money, news, scholarship, socialism, want

Wendy’s Weekly Take: Mad As Hell

Americans are furious.

We are furious that some CEOs are getting bonuses by way of taxpayer money. We are furious that 60 days after Obama took office the economy isn’t fixed. We are mad that we are spending money we don’t have. We are mad we’re losing our jobs and homes. We are mad as hell.

We should be, but not for what’s going on right here and now, but for the events that brought us to this moment in our collective history. Some people say that this is all the previous administration’s fault. It is not. This has been going on for some time, over decades and under many different administrations.

Let’s start with Ronald Reagan. Reagan was famous for saying, “Government isn’t the solution; it’s the problem. And there we went. From there on out, the powers that be started chipping away at the regulation put into place at the time of the Great Depression (the ones put into place so we’d never see another Great Depression). The markets were free to do whatever the hell they want.

Under Clinton, the Gramm-Leach-Biley Act was passed which repealed the Glass Steagall Act of 1932 which prohibited a bank from offering investment, commercial banking and insurance services. This was done because the banks were in our legislators pockets. In fairness to Clinton, this was a republican bill. But he signed it. From this act, AIG emerged, and Citigroup and JP Morgan Chase. And things were going fine for awhile. CEOs started making bigger and bigger bonuses. Success should be rewarded. And apparently, CEOs think that their own success should be rewarded at a rate of 200 times the amount of its average worker.

In the 1990’s we saw another thing happening: Globalization. CEOs figured out that they could send American jobs overseas and pay someone in 3rd world country $200 a month to do the same job. By the end of the decade, nearly all of our manufacturing jobs were placed overseas. The money the companies were saving in labor meant more profit and of course more bonuses for the CEOs. All the while, we stupidly went on buying their products while our jobs were being shipped away.

During the time of 2000 and now, wages went down. We settled for jobs making less money because we believed that our work wasn’t worth as much as it used to be. And our incomes declined. Wall Street made bets (aka credit default swaps) on whether or not we’d go belly up on our mortgages. And when we started walking away from our debts because we didn’t have our jobs anymore (and because we figured out we were duped with the whole adjustable rate mortgage thing), Wall Street lost their bets.

Now we have to bailout AIG, JP Morgan Chase, and Citigroup because they are too big to fail. And they are. They hold most of American wealth. If they no longer existed, our economy would collapse. But they are only too big to fail because Congress gave them the power to be. So when you hear them say the government is too big, remember this was all caused by shrinking the government. Our government didn’t work for us, the people. THAT should make you mad as hell.

Tags: AIG, bonuses, commercials, economy, executive bonuses, existence, hell, income, job, money, obama, republican, shipping, want, what lead to bailouts