May 13th, 2008 by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, TMV Columnist
Recap of BBC Show, as promised to TMV readers earlier.
I was on a BBC radio show today as a blogger from The Moderate Voice.
The issue of the day there was (still), “Should Hillary Clinton quit?”
As a sign of intense international interest in the Obama-Clinton primary race, the BBC has been airing many opinion shows about the elections.
This one segment of one particular show today was just a few minutes of discussion on that topic.
There were, in those few moments on air, lots of emails flying, listener-phone callers… also, about 7 passionate bloggers on the long distance lines too at the same time… and a well-spoken BBC reporter on site at Clinton headquarters in West Virginia.
The BBC show was what I would call ‘a scattershot of opinions,’ wherein as one of the many guests, you sort of get called on by the radio host, as in school, to give your briefest .02 worth… the question itself pressuring for a yes or no response with some details of support.
There’s no time, really, ‘to question the question’… and it would have been bad form on my part, disrespectful of the host and all the planning that went into this segment… but I wanted to ask, “But, is this the right question?” or, “What is behind this question?”
I do hope that’ll be another show though that will cover such ideas. I think we need opinions. But also, like any living entity, we need routes into far larger ideas too.
Quicker vs. Deeper
I note, and certainly not just in this segment at the BBC, that radio guests cannot respond nor interact with one or two other persons, as one would in an actual conversation.
So, the talk-fest is almost like a subliminal/ fast slide-show of opinings, valuable in an instant-snapshot-of-the-culture montage way. Yet, it cannot– as a true conversation in depth would– provoke or catalyze thoughtful grasp and grappling with deeper issues… the latter, I think, adds value to listeners’ shorter-term ‘right/wrong’ and yes/ no/maybe judgments re election issues.
In such important cultural discussions, just to coin a metaphor, I wish for a flowering plant with roots. Rather than just a cutting and gathering of the roses as one may. Both beautiful forms. But, one has far more longevity.
Yet, the radio show was interesting nonetheless, and the male radio host was snappy and energetic. The woman reader of emails on-air was very expressive in tone of voice, lending a theatrical air to listener’s emails. And, the people who are this show’s producers are good-natured, smart, and gentlemanly to the bone.
Though I’ve been on radio many times over these years, at length, and as the sole guest… I’m sincerely appreciative of being asked on today… even though I’m not sure they’ll ever ask me back again… as I interposed Read the rest of this entry »
Why is it that Popes don’t usually visit the United States during presidential election years? Lucas Mendez writes for the BBC Brazil, “As neutral as the papal robe is, his messages can and will be used by the candidates … every time Benedict XVI opens his mouth, Democrats and Republicans will interpret and “spin it,” according to their own political ‘gospels’” Read the rest of this entry »
March 25th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
Unbelievable? It has emerged that Barack Obama is a tenth cousin, once removed, of the man whose job he wants - George W Bush. The New England Historic Genealogical Society, founded in 1845, claims that the politicians’ ancestries show they have more in common than they think. The society is the oldest and biggest non-profit genealogical organisation in the United States.
The society has established that Bush and Obama are linked by Samuel Hinkley of Cape Cod, who died in 1662, reports the BBC. Obama is also a distant cousin of the actor Brad Pitt while Hillary Clinton is related to Mr Pitt’s girlfriend, Angelina Jolie.
“The ties of the US Democratic rivals were established by a respected US genealogical organisation after three years’ investigation. Obama’s political lineage includes not just President Bush but also Gerald Ford, Lyndon Johnson, Harry S Truman, Dick Cheney and Winston Churchill.
“Hillary Clinton’s distant cousins include the singers Madonna, Celine Dion and Alanis Morisette, as well as the beatnik author Jack Kerouac and Prince Charles’s wife, Camilla Parker-Bowles. She and Angelina Jolie are ninth cousins, twice removed. They are both related to one Jean Cusson, who died in St Sulpice, Quebec, in 1718.”
Crimes against humanity come large now–wars, holocausts, ethnic cleansing–but sometimes a small horror rises from the past and pierces the heart. Such is the case of a man convicted last week of grave robbing–harvesting and selling body parts, including those of the most civilized man I ever knew.
For several generations of Americans, Alistair Cooke was the Englishman who loved America, writing about life here for the Manchester Guardian, doing “Letter From America” radio broadcasts that were heard around the world and finally sitting in an armchair in front of Public TV cameras as the cultivated host of “Masterpiece Theater.”
March 8th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
I am again reminded of one of my favourite singer Harry Belafonte’s number “Women smarter…” after I read this court judgement pronounced in Italy. Their lordships observed women were justified in bending the truth in order to conceal extra-marital relationships. (For my “Women smarter-Part I… click here.)
Italy’s highest appeal court has ruled that married Italian women who commit adultery are entitled to lie about it to protect their honour, reports the BBC. “In a predominantly Catholic country you might expect the courts to take a dim view of lying and adultery. But not in this case.”
Just think for a moment of that mighty nation that convulsed when their president had an affair with a young woman!!! And yes let’s not forget about that nation with a president named Sarkozy…Compared to Europe what would you say about the US of A? People in those nations that are very very serious and believe in work…work…and more work…sooner than later lose their natural appetite (as this news story indicates).
Listen here if you’re interested in knowing what the BBC wanted to know about how I feel and how I feel about the Samantha Power incident.
From a clinical perspective, the fact that Ms. Power was unable to filter out intense negative comments about Hillary Clinton and her campaign during an on-the-record interview while on a book tour indicates that Ms. Power may be the one who is obsessed with Ohio, rather than, as she says, Ohio being obsessed (about what, we’re not quite sure but some believe Ms. Power meant that Ohio is obsessed with Hillary Clinton).
But the fact remains: as much as we malign strategists, advisers and consultants, those individuals have to be obsessed, at some level, with their candidate and winning and campaigning. Isn’t that a requirement? Sure - the money is a factor. But at the level where Ms. Power served, it’s about passion, maybe power but less likely money - at least at this campaigning stage.
And if the Obama campaign has been about anything, it’s been about getting obsessed with his message. They didn’t call one of his campaign ads “Join” for nothing.
For the Russians, U.S. recognition of Kosovo’s independence was tantamount to an international crime, and the burning of the United States Embassy in Belgrade by angry Serbs could hardly have been avoided. The New York Bureau Chief of Russia’s Novosti News Service, Dmitry Gornostayev writes, ‘It was somewhat ridiculous to hear the appeal by Deputy Secretary of State Nicholas Burns to the Serbs to respect international law. What is he talking about? He and his colleagues violated it themselves last Monday by recognizing Kosovo’s independence!’ In regard to the past two U.S. presidents and the larger issues of Yugoslavia and Iraq, he writes with a burning sarcasm, ‘If reduced to the terms of criminal law, these global actions at least qualify as robbery and murder. According to the laws of Arkansas and Texas - the home states of the past two U.S. Presidents - the crimes of launching illegal wars in Yugoslavia and Iraq would be punishable by the death penalty. But at the homes of these U.S. presidents no one behaves that way - they are decent gentlemen: they play the saxophone, ride bicycles, keep mistresses under the desk and at the very worst, they drop their bagels and ice cream on the couch. All with perfect decency. But once they go outside, you had better get out of the way.’
By Dmitry Gornostayev, Novosti’s New York Bureau Chief
Translated By Igor Medvedev
February 22, 2008
Russia - Novosti - Original Article (Russian)
When the burning of the American Embassy in Belgrade appeared on television along with armored personnel carriers (filled with Serb policemen bereft of any desire to disperse fellow Serbs with Molotov cocktails), I thought to myself: How long will it be until the Americans recall international law and the Vienna Conventions? [which safeguard the immunity of diplomats and embassies] … They remembered very quickly.
It was somewhat ridiculous to hear the appeal by Deputy Secretary of State Nicholas Burns to the Serbs to respect international law. What is he talking about? He and his colleagues violated it themselves last Monday by recognizing Kosovo’s independence! Read the rest of this entry »
BBC journalist Matt Frei interviewed George W. Bush, who defends US policy in Darfur and his own ’seminal decision’ (sic) not to commit troops to Darfur (BBC transcript). I can’t upload the 15 minute video here, but you can watch it here or read a summary here.
Grim as most of the subjects the two of them canvassed were, and are, several of the things he said evoked mocking laughter or incredulous giggling. But other parts just made me shake my head in disbelief. Still others made me feel vaguely ill. Others evoked the usual helpless rage. The worst part is that I can still see, in a way, why people the people who liked him liked him, and why some might like him still. It was kind of an emotional roller coaster.
Among other things that would have upset me if I thought there was a chance of his persuading anyone, he once again misrepresented the position of those who oppose torture. He seems to think it’s because we don’t see terrorism as a threat instead of because we think (1) terrorism is morally wrong; and (2) a violation of international law. I oppose waterboarding and all forms of torture because, among other reasons, I consider it a cowardly and fearful response. Furthermore, my religious views, unlike, apparently, George W. Bush’s, require me to view it as a moral issue on which no compromise is possible. Even if I weren’t religious, I’d still believe in the Kantian precept of acting as if your own behavior would become the law for others. There is actually a certain rough common sense in the injunction to “do unto others, etc.” If you expect or demand that others comply with the highest standard of behavior, social, military, or otherwise, you have to set it yourself.
So I’d like to assure Bush and all hardliners and advocates of “harsh interrogation methods” that I am indeed afraid of terrorists and believe in the threat. But I am not a coward.
“We’re a nation of law,” Bush said, after explaining why he opposed the waterboarding ban. One law for us, another for the rest of the world, I suppose—at least if you assume that we wouldn’t put up with having the interrogation methods he wishes to preserved used against our own.
One of the things about Bush I will miss (in the way you miss a car alarm when it stops shrilling) is his way of walking up to, around and alongside what he means, so he’s always only ever in the general area. Like when he said that America “believe[s] in the human condition.” What?
While you were busy with Super Tuesday, CIA Director Michael Hayden was acknowledging to Congress that the CIA actually has used waterboarding on three “high value” detainees.
Until Hayden’s comments before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence today, no senior U.S. intelligence official had publicly acknowledged the technique.
Hayden, who prohibited the practice of waterboarding by CIA agents in 2006, confirmed that his agency waterboarded Khalid Sheik Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim Nashiri, in efforts to compel the men to talk. He told senators the agency believed at the time “that additional catastrophic attacks were imminent.” The men told CIA interrogators things that “led to reliable information,” Hayden told reporters after the hearing…
The CIA chief asserted to reporters later that Mohammed and Zubaydah had provided roughly 25 percent of the information the CIA had on al Qaeda from human sources….Some intelligence officials who reviewed reports based on those interrogations have challenged the idea they provided useful information.
December 21st, 2007 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
People living outside America find it difficult to get a clear picture of the issues and candidates in the US presidential election 2008 as a majority of the US media and the blogs seem to have become rather emotive (and partisan?), and the verbiage in the news reports and commentary is not of much help to non-Americans.
Perhaps this is understandable owing to the unenviable situation the USA finds itself today…but isn’t the media supposed to uphold the basic tenets of journalism by providing fair, objective and understandable news/commentary, whoever the audience?
I also wonder whether this emotive/sensational/partisan approach to presidential election is leading to an increasingly garbled reporting and commentary, which may, in turn, also creates a degree of confusion among the American voters. It is a known fact that in the US elections the voter participation varies between moderate and low (not a good commentary on the state of democracy in one of the world’s leading democracies).
Maybe I don’t have the correct information. But I, and many others worldwide, would be delighted to know which magazine/newspaper/blog/site/journalist offers the most objective/fair election information with a degree of clarity and simplicity. It will be a good exercise to conduct a poll to this effect. We in the media love to quote from polls on different personalities/issues but seldom turn the searchlight inwards.
In this context, I found extremly useful information on issues and candidates relating to the US election 2008 at the BBC website (please click here…).
Another useful site for non-Americans to understand the American presidential election is this one…
Any more suggestions please…??? After all this election promises to be unlike any other US presidential election in the recent memory!
November 13th, 2007 by MICHAEL STICKINGS, Assistant Editor
With the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) finalizing its 2007 report, the BBC helpfully examines “10 of the arguments most often made against the IPCC consensus, and some of the counter-arguments made by scientists who agree with the IPCC.”
For each argument, the so-called “sceptic” presents his/her case, which is then rebutted with a “counter.” I would hasten to add that many of these arguments aren’t really arguments at all, at least not in the scientific community, given that widely established facts are known, consensus achieved. The case made by global warming deniers are driven by what I will henceforth call the three “ayes” (’I’s): ignorance, ideology, and industry.
This case is given credence (and a platform) in the media, if not in the scientific community, largely because its backers are powerful and because cowardice and unprofessionalism run amok in newsrooms everywhere. These backers, many of them from the energy industry, buy up advertising space, generating revenue for the conglomerate-sized parent companies of major media outlets. To say that they or their mouthpieces, from lobbyists to pundits, are merely sceptics is to make them seem reasonable. They’re out there spinning lies, pushing a partisan and pro-industry agenda, not contributing to some admirably healthy debate with genuinely skeptical objections to the consensus on global warming and the climate crisis.
Still, they’re out there, a lot of them, well-funded and influential, and for that reason we who do not deny global warming but see it for what it is, namely, the most pressing crisis of our time, potentially a world-catastrophic phenomenon, need to be prepared to challenge their claims and assertions, to respond with the truth to their lies and distortions.
It is not an argument, and they are not skeptics, but the BBC has nonetheless provided a useful tool. Make sure to read it and to keep it handy.
November 10th, 2007 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
The BBC reports: Six US soldiers and three Afghan troops have been killed in fighting in eastern Afghanistan, Nato officials have said. Eight US troops and 11 Afghans were also wounded, Isaf officials said.
“The ambush is one of the costliest for US forces this year, already the deadliest for the US since it helped overthrow the Taleban in 2001.
“Attacks have increased in remote Nuristan province, on the border with north-west Pakistan, which has also seen increasing violence from pro-Taleban militants.”
In another report BBC notes: “Tensions over Nato’s mission in Afghanistan are clearly far from over, though the message from Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer was one of reassurance.” More here…
An expert on the U.S. military said in a report this month that the average number of attacks in Afghanistan each month has risen 30 percent this year, from 425 in 2006 to 548 this year. He labeled the Afghan conflict a “war of attrition that can last 15 or more years” that militants can win simply by outlasting U.S. and NATO efforts.
September 13th, 2007 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
The Big Question is STILL out there:
So how DO you talk to children about 911?
The issue bubbled to the forefront this week when the already-beset BBC had to remove a page from its website amid a raging controversy over bias.
So (to paraphrase a classic commercial) what’s a Mother (or Father) to do? Pajamas Media’s editor Aaron Hanscom has some extensive thoughts based on his experience and knowledge:
On September 11, 2001, I woke up to reports that an airplane had crashed into the World Trade Center. A few hours later I was in front of my 5th grade class trying to explain the incomprehensible.
Many of my students had already seen television footage of the attacks while getting dressed or eating breakfast that morning. One boy asked me excitedly if I had seen “the huge explosion in the big building.†It wasn’t surprising that 10-year-olds would use the language of video games to try to make sense of something that shouldn’t happen in real life.
During the morning assembly our principal opted for more restrained language. She called what happened a “tragedy†not an attack, and spoke of those who “lost their lives†instead of those who were murdered. While no member of the faculty yet knew who had taken control of those planes, it was immediately clear to all that the nation was under attack. I’m not suggesting that elementary school students should have been made aware of this fact. Indeed, I did my best to make sure they felt as safe as possible. Protecting their innocence was the one thing that kept running through my mind.
Looking back on that day six years later, I can’t help but wonder how teachers discuss the anniversary in their classrooms. (That’s assuming they mention it at all, which they didn’t do this year at my younger brother’s Los Angeles high school.) In many ways, their challenge is much greater than mine was. We now all know that 19 radical Islamists hijacked those planes that Tuesday morning with the intention of murdering as many innocent Americans as possible. We also know that terrorists are not hesitant about slaughtering children to further their goals. Are we doing the next generation more damage by shielding them from the reality that the Western world faces ruthless enemies?
Read it all for his take on what to do.
Yours truly also does a lot of work with children and visits many schools (this is written from a hotel in Bakersfield, CA after doing a program in a school, and later today I will drive 2 hours to do a school show near L.A., then up to the San Francisco area to do two more school shows there). I talk to teachers and kids all the time. And here’s my take on it: Read the rest of this entry »
But if it seems as if the argument is less about an impending tsunami of Iraqi blood than it is about who should be blamed for it, it’s because one of the things this week’s exchange demonstrates is how divided politically engaged Americans remain by competing historical memories of Vietnam.
On the right, Vietnam remains an example of defeat snatched from the jaws of military victory by an ideologically motivated defeatist fifth column on the home front.
On the left, Vietnam is a morality play involving the horrific consequences of imperial hubris and political mendacity.
About the only thing on which red and blue agree is that the Southeast Asian war was a historic tragedy compounded by bad American decisions. The Web — even when it is serious and knowledgeable, as it was in this instance — remains an intensely politicized medium. People talk past rather than to each other.
He argues that the blogosphere started the real debate first, then the mainstream media chimed in. His last paragraph:
This new world in which online and print commentary complement each other already is deepening our civic conversation in ways that clearly matter. Will it help us move from cacophony to consensus? In a democracy, is that ever attainable — or even desirable?
Yes, we see this tendency by some — BUT not all — to want to talk past each other. Real dialogue comes about when weblogs can disagree on issues and there is a give and take on specific issue points and there isn’t this tone of anger because someone DARES to see things differently.
Talking past each other is when a website demonizes another website as whole or even tries to demonize a weblog writer due to one post. (In TMV’s case, we have so many posts we may move some of our archives to a new page or server and people who write on this site don’t even agree or at times get along with each other). Lash out blogging usually comes in the form of kind of written insult or an attempt to stick a label or derogatory term on them. It goes after the person who dared to differ versus the actual points they raised.
BUT the good news is that there are lots and LOTS of people in the blogosphere who WILL and DO discuss issues without having to detest, label or put down another website or writer. The TMV blogroll has sites of all kinds that in our own experience may have differed with us (or thought a given post written from a centrist, center left or center right perspective was total crap) but challenged us on specific analytical points. And when we link to all kinds of sites, you often see a genuine dialogue over issues occur.
So the web is indeed intensely politicized (so some feel if we run a post a bit to the left everyone on TMV MUST be liberals collecting a DNC paycheck or if we run one to the right the site MUST be Rush, Sean and Michael Savage writing under assumed names and pretending not to be registered Republicans). But many people who write weblogs do NOT talk past each other.
Just visit www.memeorandum.com and go through all the links or take a day (or two) and go through our entire TMV blogroll. You’ll see plenty of sites discussing.
The BBC has apologized to the Queen for “misrepresentation.” Even worse, as this BBC report notes, there is now a major inquiry about whether there have been other BBC journalistic glitches.
Watch the report and you’ll note the key role of “fatal” journalistic ASSUMPTIONS…which led to misreporting…which led to the Queen’s image being soiled (to “assume” makes an “ass” out of “u” and “me”). Which led to the BBC getting yet another black eye:
