White House honors legacy of Cesar Chavez by inviting his family over. I worked for the United Farm Workers in the summer of 1986. If they’re who I think they are, the two lovely women on the right were Cesar’s pre-teen granddaughters who always insisted we listen to bubblegum pop on our commute into NYC. Looks like they turned out all right. From part of the White House Proclamation:
Chavez could not sit idly by while such abuses occurred. He became an organizer, a leader and a voice for justice, bringing farm workers together to demand change through boycotts, strikes and other nonviolent demonstrations. He established the United Farm Workers of America (UFW), which continues to champion his cause to this day. In fact, several of his family members continue to lead the UFW today.
Happy Cesar Chavez day everyone!
This video pretty much says it all about the first year of Obama’s term.
As the chair of a group of people of diverse faiths who have been meeting since 9/11 to promote justice and peace, I agree with President Obama that the Peace Prize is a “call to action.” We hope it will encourage and challenge him not only to fulfill his promises, but to go further. It is not enough to withdraw troops from Iraq, he should also have an exit strategy for promptly withdrawing troops from Afghanistan.
Yes, it’s coated in a kind of diplomatic double-speak, but listen to it:
“Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near term (next 12 months) — while Afghan security capacity matures — risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible,” General McChrystal writes.
This is an eight year war and the US’s top general is saying he doesn’t think the other side can be defeated without an emergency influx of more troops.
Relief to know Michelle doesn’t look fabulous in just anything!
Alternate caption contest! Obama compares sizes w/Italy’s Berlusconi, France’s Sarkozy & Russia’s Medvedev.
Leave your captions in the comments.
"The idea, as far as I can determine, was to sell the liberal group on those aspects of Obama’s plan that are a break from George W. Bush’s policies, and to sell the centrist group on the toughness of the president’s approach and the fact that it squares with Bush’s more moderate moves later in his second term. The dual selling job was helped along immensely by former Vice President Dick Cheney’s attacks on Obama right after the president delivered his own speech."
The White House said on Friday that some Guantánamo detainees would be prosecuted in a military commission system that was a much-criticized centerpiece of the Bush administration’s strategy for fighting terror. Administration officials said they were making changes in the system to grant detainees expanded legal rights, but critics said the move was a sharp departure from the direction suggested by Mr. Obama during the campaign, when he characterized the commissions as an unnecessary compromise of American values. In a statement, President Obama noted that there was a long American tradition of using military commissions, and said the administration was proposing changes to make them provide fairer justice.
"[US Rep] Obey said he would give the White House a year to demonstrate progress, just as he gave the Nixon administration a year to show progress in the Vietnam War inherited from the Johnson administration. “The problem is not the administration’s policy or its goals. The problem is that I doubt that we have the tools there that we need to implement virtually any policy in that region.” Mr. Obey, who entered Congress in 1969, added: “At the end of the year, Nixon had not moved the policy, and so I began to oppose the war. I am following that same approach here."
Standup Barack: President Obama at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
