Uganda Be Kiddin' Me

A genuinely disturbing story out of Uganda, evidently there is significant pressure among the legislation in that country to go beyond making Homosexuality merely punishable by life imprisonment, and actually make it a crime punishable by death. This on its own is disturbing, but where it gets really twisted is the connection to a semi-secret society in America known as "The Family", which is essentially a Christian sect dedicated to keeping themselves in power and spreading their agenda throughout the world.

How this relates to the subjects in the class is that sometimes, some politicians have no aims beyond keeping themselves in office, and have no intention of representing the people they are elected to represent.

Also, it shows that often there are deep, deep connections among politicians that can have further reaching influence than merely domestic issues.

Biden campaigns for Dodd

Vice President Joe Biden visited Connecticut today to help campaign for Senator Chris Dodd who is up for re-election in 2010. We discussed the importance of supporters during the campaign process and I think this article/event hits a major perspective on politics. If the elections held earlier this year are any indicator for support, it shows that Obama doesn't have the power to successfully stump for other candidates. While Obama certainly drove in an immense amount of support (and voters) for the 2008 election, the elections held earlier this year proved that he can't bring in the same support for other candidates. So apparently the party decided to send the Vice President instead to see if his pull was any stronger. Unfortunately while the Vice President was in attendance, Senator Dodd was a no show to his own fund raiser/event. At $500 a plate you'd think that Senate business could be put on hold in order to attend. Its not like they forgo breaking session in order to get business done but I guess its better when everyone else does it along side you.

Will Biden's support be enough to get Dodd re-elected? We'll find out in 2010 but I have a feeling, if it does work, we'll be seeing a lot more of Biden stumping rather than Obama himself. I guess you can't win them all.

http://www.necn.com/Boston/Politics/2009/12/11/Biden-campaigns-for-Dodd/1260572202.html

Audit the Federal Reserve?

Ron Paul and Alan Grayson's amendment to audit the federal reserve, which they claim is an act of well overdue transparency, passed in the House as part of a larger finance reform package. As Grayson states, “Exposing how the Federal Reserve operates is a crucial component to any meaningful reform. We need to find out what they’ve done and then we can figure out how to respond,”

I feel like in these tough times, and with so much bailout money going in various directions and sometimes underaccounted for, more transparency cannot be a bad thing. Incidentally, the more wall street executives are against something, the better it sounds just by default.

It will be interesting to see if this amendment survives the Senate or not.

What happens to political losers?

I found this article very interesting because we really didn't discuss much outside the political campaign world. So what do political figures do when they lose a campaign? Apparently they go back to their day jobs and completely shrug off any lose (while charging upwards of $5 for a bottled water at their losing parties). Something that seems to lag behind most political figures is that a great deal of them actually do something else for a living. This doesn't seem to get as much exposure because the President generally just runs the country rather than keeping his previous job as the Texas Ranger owner or community organizer. When we think of politicians we think of figures that used to do something else (even it that something is politics itself) but now are Gov., Senators, Representatives, etc... But after they leave office they become professional speakers, writers, and have libraries with their names on them.

So I guess the saying "Don't quit your day job" applies to politicians as well. Hint, hint Lou Dobbs and Sarah Palin...

Obama & Nobel Prize

We spent quite some time in class talking about political speeches. I thought this was a great example of an effective acceptance speech. Obama's Nobel Prize acceptance speech is, like all of his other speeches, encouraging, hopeful and optimistic. He repeatedly, presents himself well, and continues to impress America with all that he is doing. In addition to this story, there are numerous other stories on cnn.com about other politician's opinions about Obama's acceptance speech. The consensus is that it rocked. (Even Sara Palin liked it). As we discussed in class, the performance of a political speech and either help, or hurt your career. This speech by Obama, as his other speeches have, will only help his career, and add to his credibility.

Tiger & His Image

As we discussed in class, the media can either make or break a politician. I have to argue that the same goes for celebrities. Take Tiger Woods for instance. One of the best golf players, ever. He had an amazing career, and tons of fans. He cheats on his wife and all of that is gone. A week or two after the media broke the news about his scandal, he is now taking an "indefinate break from golf". Relating to the media, this also is a fine example of how important image is.  In the matter of a couple of weeks, all of the years of hard work Tiger put into hig career, was ruined by a sex scandal. Image in the media is extremely important. However, things always get worse before they get better. The fact that Wood's used the word, "break" tells me that he isn't actually planning on quitting golf over this. This is merely a move for the media to help repair his image. If Bill Clinton can bounce back, there is no doubt in my mind Tiger can, too. Once this all blows over (likely because of a new sex scandal from someone else deemed "important"), he will be back in action, picking up on this career where he left off.

Jolie fights for Sudanese

In class we discussed what defined a person or music group as being political and the argument that everything can be seen as political. This article would be what I define as an individual becoming political. Now don't get me wrong, Angelina Jolie was political before asking Obama to do more for the Sudanese people by promoting peace. However, by taking that step towards involving yourself in world events (political events by nature) you become seen a political individual from that moment forward. Being a public figure already it is hard to maintain any form of private life and keep away from representing an issue (ask Tiger Woods or Rihanna) but as soon as you inject your public self into an political issue, you become a representative for that issue for life. It becomes a part of your public image and, for good or bad, you become part of the issue.

I do agree with the argument that everything can be seen as political but for the non rhetorical scholars thinkers, I do believe that a public figure can retain some form of privacy as long as they avoid injecting themselves into political/social issues.