Archive for March, 2011
Saturday Open Thread: March 12, 2011
What’s on your minds this Saturday?
What are people talking about in your part of the country?
Obama wants a new gig
According to The Weekly Standard, our president thinks it would be easier to be the president of China. No, really…that what one White House official said.
“Mr. Obama has told people that it would be so much easier to be the president of China. As one official put it, ‘No one is scrutinizing Hu Jintao’s words in Tahrir Square.’”
Mr. Obama is right.
If you’re president of China, people around the world who are fighting for freedom don’t really expect you to help. If you’re president of China, you don’t have to put up with annoying off-year congressional elections, and then negotiate your budget with a bunch of gun-and-religion-clinging congressmen and senators. If you’re president of China, you can fund your national public radio to your heart’s content. And if you’re president of China, when you host a conference on bullying in schools, people take you seriously.
Unfortunately for him and us, Barack Obama is president of the United States. That job brings with it certain special responsibilities. It’s a tough job—maybe tougher than being president of China. But Barack Obama ran for president of the United States. Maybe he should start behaving as one.
Do they have golf courses in China?
Firefly in Boystown closing: hope and change continue to roll across America
Firefly is a little bistro in Boystown that part of me still thinks is a CIA safe house or a front for the mob, because of the erratic hours this restaurant kept in the six years or so it has been around. Some days, apparently, the staff would just not feel like opening, so it would be closed on random week days with no explanation. There were menus posted that implied it should be open every day (and not closed on Sundays and Mondays like a lot of restaurants here in Boystown), but I swear this place was closed more times than it was ever open when I walked by.
My friend Panda loves this place, and was heartbroken when he learned it is closing. Apparently, he was privy to the double secret squirrel calendar of when it was actually open, so he had more of a relationship with it than I ever managed to (but, then again, last night at 2am Panda was frantically texting everyone in his phone that a monster had attacked Japan and was headed for Tokyo…only to “nevermind” and backtrack a few hours later when this all proved to be the work of an earthquake and not the Chuthlu or even Oprah).
I actually had one of the weirdest Boystown experiences in Firefly. This was maybe five years ago, and my friend Robby’s sister Ann-Louise had asked me to do her a favor and show her friend from New York around Boystown while he was in Chicago on a business trip. I volunteer to this day with the Chicago Greeter program, which pairs Chicagoans up with tourists so we can show them around, and I especially love taking people around Boystown so I was happy to do Ann-Louise this favor.
I forget her friend’s name but he was the original inspiration for the “Eeyore” term I have used ever since to describe a person dragging around their own personal rainclouds. This guy was the absolute most negative and picky person I had ever met.
Everything was terrible to him.
It was late August and one of those perfect evenings in Boystown where a cool breeze picks up the crispness of the lake and all the colors seem so vibrant and happy…like the whole neighborhood is a giant theme park filled with pleasant and attractive oddballs with adventure around every turn.
But, not for Ann-Louise’s friend, who loudly told me how much he hated everything he saw on our tour. Everything was better in New York, of course, and none of the restaurants we passed on Halsted were good enough for either him or his gourmet Manhattan palate.
Until we got to Firefly, which he agreed to try only because he was a Joss Whedon fan and it shared its name with his short-lived SciFi-Western that FOX canceled several years before.
The only time this guy stopped complaining or issuing his nonstop running criticism of a gorgeous day in Chicago was when his fork was delivering bites of chicken something-or-another to his otherwise perma-frown at Firefly. The food was not just good that night…it was evidently seasoned with pharmaceutical magic, since it seemed to have a positive narcotic effect on this Eeyore. He actually cracked a smile while eating and honestly licked the plate like a basset hound when he was done, because it was so good.
I imagine various waiters in New York to this day still listen to running streams of complaints regarding how poorly Pastis or 21 or wherever compare to Firefly…a restaurant that was open only when it felt like it, but apparently laced everything its chef touched with industrial grade anti-depressants.
Ann-Louise later explained to me this Eeyore is an air traffic controller…who was working at one of the New York airports around 9/11. “I swear, he never used to be like this. But he has never been the same since 2001. He really liked that restaurant you took him to, though, Lightning Bugs or wherever”.
I will always call this place “Enigma”, the restaurant of mystery, and will be sad to see it go…leaving another empty storefront in Boystown, right on the Halsted main drag…joining all the other odd, trendy, fancy, and enigmatic little “how do they stay in business?” places in Chicago that have been around since I moved here…but are dropping like fireflies in our hopechangey Obamaconomy.
A common thread with all of them, oddly enough, is that I honestly remember most of the staff and proprietors of these small businesses being big Obama nuts.
Firefly plastered its windows back in 2008 with those creepy blue and red Shepherd Fairey “Hope” posters…and soon those same windows will have the “Closed!” and “For Rent” signs that are depressingly ubiquitous in even the most trendy and magical parts of town.
Do you have stories like this about little shops that seemed to stay open no matter what for years that are now collapsing in this The Golden Age of Hope and Change?
How do we really draw public attention to just how poorly Obama kept his 2008 promises…especially to small business owners like those who ran places like Firefly, who believed in the Media’s Obamapropaganda…and who were ultimately destroyed by their own stupidity in voting for him?
France takes the lead
Yep…I said France takes the lead. They are the first country to recognize Libya’s new rebel leadership. Where is the United States? Playing golf?
(from France24) In a major diplomatic victory for the Libyan opposition, France has become the first country to formally recognise Libya’s rebel leadership, pledging to exchange ambassadors between Paris and the Libyan opposition stronghold of Benghazi.
France became the first country to formally recognize the Libyan opposition — the Interim Transitional National Council — as legitimate representatives of the Libyan people on Thursday, pledging to exchange ambassadors with the country’s newly created transitional council in a major diplomatic victory for the Libyan opposition.
The announcement followed a meeting between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and two representatives of Libya’s Interim Transitional National Council in Paris Thursday
Speaking to reporters at the Elysée presidential palace in Paris, Ali al Issawi, a former Libyan ambassador to India who quit his post last month, announced that, “France recognises the National Council as the legitimate representative of the Libyan people.
“There will be an exchange of ambassadors between Paris and Benghazi,” he added, referring to the eastern Libyan city that has emerged as a rebel stronghold over the past few weeks.
The recognition comes as European Union foreign ministers meet in Brussels Thursday and defense ministers of NATO’s 28 member states also gathered in the Belgian capital to consider the imposition of a no-fly zone over Libya.
Ahead of the Brussels meeting, AFP reported that Sarkozy would propose “targeted airstrikes” in Libya as a way to end the violence.
Go France Go
Japan rocked by 8.9 earthquake
Tokyo — An 8.9-magnitude earthquake hit Japan early Friday, triggering tsunami warnings and sending people fleeing out of buildings in the capital.
Its epicenter was 373 kilometers (231 miles) from Tokyo, the United States Geological Survey said.
The quake rattled buildings and toppled cars off bridges and into waters underneath. In Tokyo, crowds gathered in the streets and tried to reach relatives via cell phone.
Scenes inside office buildings showed papers strewn all over the floor and people clinging onto seats and desks.
Such a large earthquake at such a shallow depth creates a lot of energy, said Shenza Chen of the U.S. Geological Survey.
A tsunami in the Pacific was moving closer to other shorelines in other countries, according to CNN metereologist Ivan Cabrera.
It triggered tsunami warnings for various countries, including Japan and Russia, the National Weather Service said.
“Earthquakes of this size are known to generate tsunamis potentially dangerous to coasts outside the source region,” it said.
“Based on all available data a tsunami may have been generated by this earthquake that could be destructive on coastal areas even far from the epicenter.”
The quake was the latest in a series in the region this week.
Please say a prayer for the people of this region.
Liberal patriotism explained
Our friends are back….this time explaining how liberals are patriotic.
Hilarious
Friday Open Thread: March 11, 2011
Not the best way to pick up a Muslim girl...
What’s on your minds this Friday?
What are you doing this weekend?
What are people talking about in your neck of the woods?
Chicago lampoons Charlie Sheen's insanity
I was in Wicker Park today and spotted this flyer and tee shirt lampooning Charlie Sheen’s “winning” as of late.
There are immensely creative people out there who pounce on pop culture moments for maximum impact.
Are you creative at all?
Just imagine if creative conservatives capitalized on political events this way.
Pop culture is only driven by the Left because so many Lefties have these guerrilla marketing and rapid response skills.
How do we match this on our side…and make Obama and the unions a shameful national joke the way bars and tee shirt shops here in Chicago have done to Sheen?
Ideas?
Alaskan chic in Boystown
There is a growing spontaneous eruption of Alaskan chic in Boystown.
Watch gay culture for trends that hit suburban and rural areas a year or two later.
I have never seen flannel shirts and lumberjack beanies on more gay guys (and some lesbians) in all my life.
Not to mention all the moose, deer, and other antlered ungulates displayed unironically everywhere from clothing shops to eateries.
Lots of guys rocking Todd-like goatees or full on grizzly beards too.
It’s an outdoorsy, aggressive, pioneer spirit rising as a definite undercurrent here and there in Boystown.
And it is NOT in Palin-mocking mode…it’s a legitimate effort on the part of the trend-obsessed Brendens of Boystown to look hip and relevant.
In 2008, it was all about the hopeychange super-creepy Shepherd Fairey propaganda posters, and corresponding gear.
Now, these same guys want to butch it up and masquerade as Iron Dog snow machine teams.
These Brendens always go where they think the zeitgeist will flow in a year or so.
If they are wearing flannel and rocking Todd-like makeovers, then I can only imagine what all the bitter clinging Midwesterners and Independents will be doing in 2012.
You betcha!
The first public madrassa set to close due to violence
The first public school madrassa (in NYC) will have to close because of low enrollment and high violence. My first question is….where is the media coverage of this? Nevermind….I know the answer to that. Thank God we have people like the wonderful Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs to keep us informed of what is really going on in the fight against the Islamic invasion.
Here is the latest on the New York City middle school madrassa…..
The first public school madrassa in Brooklyn is an abject failure. They are closing the middle school because of the low enrollment and perhaps the worst violence of any of the city schools. Last year I reported that the school was forced to suspend more than one-third of its student body for infractions ranging from hitting to weapons.
In March of 2010:
“Every day, they’re fighting,” said Voneeda Black, who nervously sends her 6-year-old to the elementary school with which Gibran shares a building.
“You don’t see parents,” she said. “Three or four times a week, there are cops here, if not more.”
It may be the worst record in the city.
So I think it appropriate to take a hard look at Gibran — a school founded on the flawed notion that segregating Arabists will lead to harmony.
Since it opened, the tiny school on the edge of DUMBO has had one of the city’s highest rates of violence. A teacher was taunted by kids as a “terrorist” in 2008. It’s gotten steadily worse.
More than a third — one in three! — of Gibran’s 114 students, grades six through eight, have been suspended this year, according to the Department of Education.
Twenty-two were yanked from school for five days. Eight kids were considered so rowdy or dangerous, they were banned from class six to 10 days.
Nineteen fights led to student injuries or intimidation. In two other cases, weapons were used. This number has climbed from last year’s 17 violent incidents and 26 suspensions.
So they are closing the middle school and reopening as a a high school (!). Why is beyond me — just close this publicly funded madrassa.And you’ll notice in the reportage the violence and school failure is never mentioned.
Join me — we have been fighting this madrassa, the Khalil Gibran International Academy, since the city announced plans to open it in 2007. Pamela Hall has been leading this fight as well. We were both first on the story and the fight, Atlas as early as February 2007. August 2007: NY PUBLIC SCHOOL MADRASSA IMAM: “Jihad is our way, And death in the way of Allah is our promised end”
Write, call, email Michael Doomberg, mayor of New York and urge him to close this dangerous, violent school.
City Hall
New York, NY 10007
PHONE 311 (or 212-NEW-YORK outside NYC)
FAX (212) 312-0700
E-MAIL:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/mayor.html
