A favorite quote on Freedom

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.

Ronald Reagan
40th president of US (1911 - 2004)

Obama not American?

From The Times

National Election Day

This is the big day, then. Tonight at around 8p.m. we should know who will be Prime Minister for the next 4 years. Or so.The last one lasted 4+2. Although I would like a little bit of excitement. I would like to see the exit poll men worry about their statistics! Isn't it an insult even to the so-called democracy that we have (more of that later) to have the results of the vote before every vote has been counted?
I wrote "so called democracy" and there is a reason for it. Many in fact, but as far as elections go, it has become quite obvious that it is the media  who set the tone and proclaim the winner.

This has been the most quiet yet the most interesting media campaign I can recall.
The best TV ad came from aspiring Prime Minister George Papandreou's socialist party. A masterpiece of propaganda, it is very pleasant to watch, and it really boosted his reputation, from a rather odd figure who cannot even handle Greek well (his mother is American and he has studied in the States), to an energetic, decisive, powerful figure. The master phrase used: "Pame!", meaning "Let's Go!" is very powerful, too, and he says it great, combining his own somewhat quiet character, with a revitalising word. Watch the video below:




We haven't voted yet. We shall go in the afternoon, as we have been working all morning on setting up the bookcase etc. in the attic. I'll let you know about the results later today.

May I just add to show you the extend and the importance given to the media, that this short film/ad was directed by no other than Laurence Dunmore who directed Harvey Keitel in the Johnny Walker ad campaign and co-directed with Ridley Scott such iconic films like The Gladiator!..

Point of view

Lee has become a non-person or even worse, someone identified with Southern slavery, although there is nothing to suggest that this Christian gentleman favored that institution or that he led the Confederate forces in Virginia for any reason other than the one he gave upon turning down an invitation to command the Union army—to protect his ancestral state against invasion.
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Lest I be accused of being unfair to my subject, let me stress that he was not really responsible for this glorification. As far as I know, King could never have imagined how he would be used after his death, any more than Karl Marx could have imagined that his ideas would be cited to justify Soviet tyranny. He might even have had the decency to blush if he had heard our “conservative” presidential candidate John McCain apologizing last spring in Memphis for having not supported the King public holiday soon enough. McCain characterized this failure as “the single biggest mistake in my political life.”

(Read full article here)
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Armistice Day

"If only the United States could be
on the right side of an intelligent war!"

Charles A. Lindbergh

The armistice deal signed on 11 November 1918 brought yearned-for relief to Western Europe. But the same pact has been blamed for the return to conflict in Europe only 20 years later. Does the deal deserve the criticism, asks Professor Gerard De Groot of the University of St Andrews. (BBC article).

A beautiful but moving illustrated post can be found here.

Let us not kill each other, for a change.

Allez les femmes!

This is the female contingent of Finland's new government. Twelve out of twenty ministers are women. Nice and strong. I wish they do their best for their country and for Europe. Let us see how Mme Royal does in the French elections!
Une femme, un sourire, une couleur...dans un monde politique d'hommes, d' austerite et de grisaille. (A woman, a smile, a color...in a political world of men, of austerity and gray).