MillionFace

Obama’s win over McCain has generated all kinds of racial tension alongside the entire USA, coast to coast.

In a usual scene, an interracial couple in Pennsylvania who woke up to find the remains of a burnt cross in their front garden.

California has been the worst hit. The towns around are facing cars and garages vandalized with swastikas, racist epithets and slogans such as “Go Back to Africa.”

Black effigies hung from nooses in an island community in Maine. Students chanting “assassinate Obama” on a schoolbus in Idaho.

Barack Obama’s historic election as America’s first black president has led to a surge of racist incidents across the United States, hate-crime monitoring groups and analysts say.

The last few days of the US election campaign and its immediate aftermath had witnessed “hundreds and hundreds” of hate-related incidents.

“Since the closing weeks of the campaign, we’ve seen a real and significant, white backlash break out and I think it’s getting worse.”

While the racial hate crime origins can not be traced but it’s somehow related to the entry of white Sarah Palin. On her onset the incidents to around the time of election rallies by Republican vice-presidential hopeful Sarah Palin where shouts of “Kill Him!” were reportedly heard from sections of the crowd.

“But what we’re seeing now is everything from cross burnings, to death threats, to Obama effigies hanging in nooses to ugly racial incidents in schoolyards around the country,”

“It’s been really quite something. I can’t quantify the figures beyond saying that clearly there have been hundreds and hundreds of these incidents.”

Brian Levin, a professor from the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino also said the rise in hate crimes appeared to fit into part of a longer term trend.
“We don’t have exact figures but what I can say anecdotally is that there does seem to be a significant spike in hate crimes from around the election period up until now,” Levin said.
Levin also said there was evidence of a surge in traffic on white supremacist Internet websites such as StormFront, whose server crashed on the day after the November 4 election due to the uptick in activity.

Levin said he had also noticed a ramping up of the vitriol. “It is harder to gauge but it does seem to be much more severe than usual,” he said.
For white supremacists, Obama — who is also reportedly preparing to appoint the country’s first ever African-American attorney general, Eric Holder — represented the doomsday scenario espoused by their ideology, Levin said.

“To them Barack Obama is nothing less than the anti-Christ. He not only represents policies that are eroding the white culture and bloodline of the United States; he is a walking, talking symbol of what they would call the ‘mongrelization’ that has occurred,” he said.

The increase in non-white immigration, the recent estimate by the US Census Bureau that whites would lose their majority status by 2040 and rising unemployment all helped create a climate favorable for hate groups.
“Add to all of that the idea of a black man in the White House and you have a very significant number of whites who feel as if they’ve lost everything, that the country built by their forefathers has somehow been stolen from them.”

The racist surge fit into a historical pattern that he described as the “push-me-pull-you” of American politics.

“Many times when we’ve had advancements in race relations in the United States we’ve also had concomitant violent backlashes,” he said, citing as an example the fact that the Klu Klux Klan was formed shortly after slavery was abolished in 1865.

“Inter-group relations and politics in the United States is a marathon and not everyone crosses the finish line at the same time, or at all,”

“Barack Obama is a perfect storm that incites a nerve within the hardcore racist movement in the United States.”

This year, I voted in a presidential election for the first time. This year, I understood and discussed the presidential election, its candidates from both major parties and the issues at stake. The last time a new president was elected in America I was too young to vote and too young to be intuitively aware of the challenges and concerns the country faced. Apart from my increased capacity to participate, this year was different.

The difference, I believe, can be understood from the perspective of a university student. While not all college-aged Americans voted for Barack Obama, the Democratic Party candidate, a clear majority did. Obama’s opponent was John McCain, the Republican Party candidate. The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement estimates that youth vote favoured Obama by more that 2-1.

I am a third-year student at George Washington University in Washington DC. My campus is located approximately four blocks from the White House and two blocks from the State Department. On election night, not unlike Americans across the country, I came back from work and watched TV. I watched as the major cable news channels covered voting procedures, made early predictions, and eventually announced state-specific results as polls started closing across the nation. At 11 pm eastern standard time, Barack Obama was declared the 44 th President-elect of the United States.

By 11:15 pm, my friends and I decided to walk to the White House. We were ecstatic and proud from having participated in a historic election. And we wanted to participate in something bigger than ourselves, something that symbolised the moment collectively and paralleled a celebration of the collective action that exists in voting and democratic elections. In front of the White House was pandemonium.

Hundreds of students had gathered along Pennsylvania Avenue, separated from the White House by a single fence. Most of these students were from my university. Each person had only about six inches of standing room. It was raining and cold. Yet, each person’s face exhibited immense joy. Smiles never ended, cheering never ceased. Strangers gave each other high-fives and hugs. If I close my eyes and imagine that night again, I can still feel the qualities of that emotional experience. Everyone was hopeful and their emotions were intensified by a shared understanding that everyone else felt the same way. Running was more appropriate than walking. Shouting more than talking. Dancing rather than standing still. What we were celebrating was not just the victory of one candidate over the other, but a deep-felt celebration of the process of democracy and how it had manifested within our individual voting privileges.

Many of the students present had worked on political campaigns, donated money, or spent time at voting drives and campaign rallies. Others had been fans for more than two years. Still more had engaged in lively debates and arguments with their roommates and peers and parents on what change meant for the United States and how Barack Obama could be that needed catalyst. Bill Clinton and George W Bush were presidents of another generation. Obama has the chance to be our President, beholden to our interests and understanding of our perspectives on the world and our present and future needs.

As an international relations major, my classes predominantly focus on discussions and analyses of world trends, new security issues and altered perspectives on global development and discourse. The world is changing; it is becoming more complex. Increased global interconnectedness has changed how economies grow, national security is preserved, diplomatic relations are constituted, energy solutions achieved and human capital and societal development expanded. Understanding these trends is part of my education, both in and outside the classroom. Through recognition of changed global and domestic needs and issues, the country was fairly unanimous on the need for a change in our political agenda and executive leader.

Electing a new President is always a risk. With no incumbent candidate, who previously served a term as President, change was an inevitable effect. Across campus, students worriedly discuss future employment opportunities, stock market tumbles, mortgage crunches, America’s threatened relationships abroad and the financial viability of attending graduate school. If we are going to take a risk and if we are going to face a change, why not vote for the candidate who is campaigning on a determination to execute a changed approach rather than just constitute a change. Obama is new to the political landscape of the United States. Many of us who gathered there are too. Obama has a diverse background. We also represent a large diversity. In his speech right after the election results were announced, Obama said, “This victory alone is not the change we seek — it is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. It cannot happen without you.” Obama wants us to help. We want to help too. In front of the White House, students shouted “yes we did,” an updated version of Obama’s campaign slogan “yes we can.” Obama’s administration will begin just as we start our adult lives. Right now, achievement in college and education is paramount. But, it is not enough. We all want jobs and successful livelihoods. We all want futures we had a part in creating. We voted with all that in mind.

On the night of the 2008 US presidential election, I was in front of the White House. From the assortment of mental images and emotions from that night, I will never forget the chanting. Cheers of “OBA-MA” erupted spontaneously as hundreds of students celebrated until three in the morning. Students sang the American anthem and other patriotic songs that we never hear apart from sporting events and last sang in grade school. In a gathering symbolic of faith in democracy and the individual power in voting and while a Republican President occupies the White House, just a few feet away a thousand students celebrated their joy in ushering in this Democratic Party candidate.

Collected Via Emails

He has proved to be an extraordinary crowd puller, he no doubt is the “World’s Biggest Celebrity and his appeal extends from Columbus to Cape Town., from St. Louis to St. Georges’s, from Denver to Dublin.

Barack Obama drew his biggest US audience of 100K at a rally in St. Louis. He drew the largest crowd to ever attend a political event in Columbus. Sixty-thousand people packed into a park alongside the banks of the Willamette River to listen to Obama, with another 15,000 left standing outside the gates, according to city fire officials. Hundreds more anchored their motorboats, or floated in kayaks and canoes.

In Denver “well over” 100,000 people attended the rally at Civic Center Park, at which Obama also chanted “si se puede,” or “yes we can,” in Spanish, with the attendees.

And now his inauguration is expected to draw ONE MILLION PLUS to the capital, and already some lawmakers have stopped taking ticket requests and hotels have booked up.

The largest crowd ever recorded on the National Mall was for President Lyndon B. Johnson’s 1965 inauguration. At the time, the park service estimated 1.2 million people descended on the area.

In 1981, President Ronald Reagan’s inauguration drew about 500,000 people, and President Bill Clinton’s 1993 inauguration drew about 800,000 people.

Of course, the crowds can always thin out. Ronald Reagan’s second swearing-in ceremony had to be moved indoors, and the parade was canceled when the temperature dropped below 10 degrees (with a wind chill at 10 degrees to 20 degrees below zero.) John F. Kennedy’s inauguration in 1961 came with a blanket of snow; still, 1 million people turned out.

Some people are bartering on Craigslist for places to stay for the Jan. 20 ceremony when the Illinois senator takes the oath of office. They are offering cash or even help with dishes for residents willing to open up their homes.

The National Park Service, which is planning for an inaugural crowd of at least 1 million, will clear more viewing space along the Pennsylvania Avenue parade route. Jumbo TV screens will line the National Mall so people can watch the inauguration and parade, park service.

The District of Columbia’s delegate, Eleanor Holmes Norton says.

“You can’t judge by past inaugurations. It’s going to break all the records,” “They’re going to come with or without tickets. … It’s each man and woman for himself.”

Seat tickets had sold for between $15 and $150 in 2005 to help pay for the inaugural parade. Details for the 2009 parade tickets have not been set because Obama’s Presidential Inaugural Committee, which organizes the parade, is being formed

The inauguration has been designated a National Special Security Event, giving the U.S. Secret Service the lead in coordinating all law enforcement agencies to secure the event. There are 58 federal, state and local law enforcement agencies working together.

Sales sites like eBay, StubHub and Kijiji, said it will not allow tickets to the inauguration to be sold on its Web sites.

The inauguration will come at the end of a four-day holiday for federal workers, following the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday on Jan. 19.

Barack Obama will resign his Senate seat this Sunday as he focuses on his transition to the White House.

“It has been one of the highest honors and privileges of my life to have served the people of Illinois in the United States Senate,”

He also said he would “leave the United States Senate and begin the hard task of fulfilling the simple hopes and common dreams of all Americans as our nation’s next president.”

We salute you Sir

President-Elect Barack Obama is having a mesmerizing effect on the audience not only in the US but globally as well. It’s not just because of his charm and persona, but because he has become a real Action Figure. It may be Barack Obama’s charisma, his charm, his persona, or perhaps he is a great figure to make iconic action figures out of.

It is not surprising to see how quickly people are flocking to create new products, items and even games such as “Super Obama World” based on the newly elected US President Obama.

Her are a few President Barack Obama Action Figures that might make you proud, make you laugh, or spike you.

Obama Harry Potter

President Obama just proved that he definitely knows a number of different charms.

Obama David Bowie

I wonder if David Bowie would be proud to see the newly elected President of the United States wear his make up.

Read the rest of this entry »

In a world where borders are becoming increasingly porous to everything from drugs to infectious diseases to terrorism, America must mobilise international coalitions to address shared threats and challenges

One of the first challenges that President Barack Obama will face is the effects of the ongoing financial crisis, which has called into question the future of American power. An article in The Far Eastern Economic Review proclaims that “Wall Street’s crack-up presages a global tectonic shift: the beginning of the decline of American power.” Russian President Dmitri Medvedev sees the crisis as a sign that America’s global leadership is coming to an end, and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has declared that Beijing is now much more relevant than New York.

Yet the dollar, a symbol of American financial power, has surged rather than declined. As Kenneth Rogoff, a Harvard professor and former chief economist of the IMF notes, “It is ironic, given that we just messed up big-time, that the response of foreigners is to pour more money into us. They’re not sure where else to go. They seem to have more confidence in our ability to solve our problems than we do.”

It used to be said that when America sneezed, the rest of the world caught a cold. More recently, many claimed that with the rise of China and the petro-states, an American slowdown could be decoupled from the rest of the world. But when the United States caught the financial flu, others followed. Many foreign leaders quickly switched from schadenfreude to fear — and to the security of US treasury bills.

Crises often refute conventional wisdom, and this one reveals that the underlying strength of the American economy remains impressive. The poor performance of Wall Street and America regulators has cost America a good deal in terms of the soft power of its economic model’s attractiveness, but the blow need not be fatal if, in contrast to Japan in the 1990’s, the US manages to absorb the losses and limit the damage. The World Economic Forum still rates the American economy as the world’s most competitive, owing to its labour-market flexibility, higher education, political stability, and openness to innovation.

The larger question concerns the long-term future of American power. A new forecast for 2025 being prepared by the US National Intelligence Council projects that American dominance will be “much diminished,” and that the one key area of continued American superiority — military power — will be less significant in the competitive world of the future. This is not so much a question of American decline as “the rise of the rest.”

Power always depends on context, and in today’s world, it is distributed in a pattern that resembles a complex three-dimensional chess game. On the top chessboard, military power is largely unipolar and likely to remain so for a while. But on the middle chessboard, economic power is already multi-polar, with the US, Europe, Japan and China as the major players, and others gaining in importance.

The bottom chessboard is the realm of transnational relations that cross borders outside of government control. It includes actors as diverse as bankers electronically transferring sums larger than most national budgets, as well as terrorists transferring weapons or hackers disrupting internet operations. It also includes new challenges like pandemics and climate change. On this bottom board, power is widely dispersed, and it makes no sense to speak of unipolarity, multipolarity or hegemony.

Even in the aftermath of the financial crisis, the giddy pace of technological change is likely to continue to drive globalisation, but the political effects will be different for the world of nation-states and the world of non-state actors. In inter-state politics, the most important factor will be the continuing “return of Asia.”

In 1750, Asia had three-fifths of the world population and three-fifths of the world’s economic output. By 1900, after the industrial revolution in Europe and America, Asia accounted for just one-fifth of world output. By 2040, Asia will be well on its way back to its historical share.

The rise of China and India may create instability, but it is a problem with precedents, and we can learn from history about how policies can affect the outcome. A century ago, Britain managed the rise of American power without conflict, but the world’s failure to manage the rise of German power led to two devastating World Wars.

The rise of non-state actors also must be managed. In 2001, a non-state group killed more Americans than the government of Japan killed at Pearl Harbour. A pandemic spread by birds or travellers on jet aircrafts could kill more people than perished in World Wars I or II. The problems of the diffusion of power (away from states) may turn out to be more difficult than shifts in power between states.

The challenge for Barack Obama is that more and more issues and problems are outside the control of even the most powerful state. Although the US does well on the traditional measures of power, those measures increasingly fail to capture much of what defines world politics, which, owing to the information revolution and globalisation, is changing in a way that prevents Americans from achieving all their international goals by acting alone.

For example, international financial stability is vital to American prosperity, but the US needs the cooperation of others to ensure it. Global climate change, too, will affect the quality of life, but the US cannot manage the problem alone. And, in a world where borders are becoming increasingly porous to everything from drugs to infectious diseases to terrorism, America must mobilise international coalitions to address shared threats and challenges.

As the world’s largest economy, American leadership will remain crucial. The problem of American power in the wake of the financial crisis is not one of decline, but of a realisation that even the most powerful country cannot achieve its aims without the help of others. Fortunately, Barack Obama understands that. —DT-PS

Joseph S Nye Jr, a former US assistant secretary of defence, is a Distinguished Service Professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and author, most recently, of The Powers to Lead

Accompanied by double-amputee Iraq war veteran Tammy Duckworth, President-elect Barack Obama went to The John F. Kennedy War Memorial at Chicago’s Soldier Field yesterday morning for a wreath-laying ceremony.

Clad in a dark overcoat, Obama placed a wreath in front of the bronze memorial, bowed his head for a moment, then saluted and walked away.

Inscribed on the back of the memorial is President John F. Kennedy’s famous quote: “Let every nation know whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”

President-elect Obama issued the following statement:

“As we mark Veterans Day, all Americans are united in honoring the extraordinary service and selfless sacrifice of our nation’s veterans. Our veterans are part of an unbroken line of heroes who have defended the American people and stood up for American values - from the beaches of Normandy to the battles in East Asia; from the deserts of Kuwait to the skies above Kosovo; from the cities of Iraq to the mountains of Afghanistan. Since 9/11, a new generation of American heroes has borne a heavy load in facing down the threats of the 21st century, and their families have been asked to bear the painful absence of a loved one. These Americans are the best and bravest among us, and they are all in our thoughts and prayers.

“On this Veterans Day, let us rededicate ourselves to keep a sacred trust with all who have worn the uniform of the United States of America: that America will serve you as well as you have served your country. As your next Commander-in-Chief, I promise to work every single day to keep that sacred trust with all who have served. May God bless our veterans, and may God bless the United States of America.”

• He collects Spider-Man and Conan the Barbarian comics

• He was known as “O’Bomber” at high school for his skill at basketball

• His name means “one who is blessed” in Swahili

• His favourite meal is wife Michelle’s shrimp linguini

• He won a Grammy in 2006 for the audio version of his memoir, Dreams From My Father

• He is left-handed – the sixth post-war president to be left-handed

• He has read every Harry Potter book

• He owns a set of red boxing gloves autographed by Muhammad Ali

• He worked in a Baskin-Robbins ice cream shop as a teenager and now can’t stand ice cream

• His favourite snacks are chocolate-peanut protein bars

• He ate dog meat, snake meat, and roasted grasshopper while living in Indonesia

• He can speak Spanish

• While on the campaign trail he refused to watch CNN and had sports channels on instead

• His favourite drink is black forest berry iced tea

• He promised Michelle he would quit smoking before running for president – he didn’t

• He kept a pet ape called Tata while in Indonesia

• He can bench press an impressive 200lbs

• He was known as Barry until university when he asked to be addressed by his full name

• His favourite book is Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

• He visited Wokingham, Berks, in 1996 for the stag party of his half-sister’s fiancé, but left when a stripper arrived

• His desk in his Senate office once belonged to Robert Kennedy

• He and Michelle made $4.2 million (£2.7 million) last year, with much coming from sales of his books

• His favourite films are Casablanca and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

• He carries a tiny Madonna and child statue and a bracelet belonging to a soldier in Iraq for good luck

• He applied to appear in a black pin-up calendar while at Harvard but was rejected by the all-female committee.

• His favourite music includes Miles Davis, Bob Dylan, Bach and The Fugees

• He took Michelle to see the Spike Lee film Do The Right Thing on their first date

• He enjoys playing Scrabble and poker

• He doesn’t drink coffee and rarely drinks alcohol

• He would have liked to have been an architect if he were not a politician

• As a teenager he took drugs including marijuana and cocaine

• His daughters’ ambitions are to go to Yale before becoming an actress (Malia, 10) and to sing and dance (Sasha, 7)

• He hates the youth trend for trousers which sag beneath the backside

• He repaid his student loan only four years ago after signing his book deal

• His house in Chicago has four fire places

• Daughter Malia’s godmother is Jesse Jackson’s daughter Santita

• He says his worst habit is constantly checking his BlackBerry

• He uses an Apple Mac laptop

• He drives a Ford Escape Hybrid, having ditched his gas-guzzling Chrysler 300

• He wears $1,500 (£952) Hart Schaffner Marx suits

• He owns four identical pairs of black size 11 shoes

• He has his hair cut once a week by his Chicago barber, Zariff, who charges $21 (£13)

• His favorite fictional television programmes are Mash and The Wire

• He was given the code name “Renegade” by his Secret Service handlers

• He was nicknamed “Bear” by his late grandmother

• He plans to install a basketball court in the White House grounds

• His favourite artist is Pablo Picasso

• His speciality as a cook is chilli

• He has said many of his friends in Indonesia were “street urchins”

• He keeps on his desk a carving of a wooden hand holding an egg, a Kenyan symbol of the fragility of life

• His late father was a senior economist for the Kenyan government

Courtesy Telegraph UK

With the presidential elections coming close on the heels we have a splurge of negative twist going around in a presidential campaign air filled with worst accusations of race-baiting and gutter politics

Here we have John McCain’s campaign accusing Barack Obama of playing racial politics. The twist in the campaign for the November 4 election was prompted by a McCain television advertisement that called Obama a celebrity akin to star-crossed U.S. personalities Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.

“Barack Obama has played the race card, and he played it from the bottom of the deck. It’s divisive, negative, shameful and wrong,” McCain campaign manager Rick Davis said in a written statement.

Obama responded firmly and said McCain was trying to scare voters away from him by pointing out he has “a funny name, and he doesn’t look like all the presidents on the dollar bills and the five dollar bills.”

Looking at the current scenario, last thing Obama would have wished for is to stay away from the firm support of black rappers in his favor. Obama must be cursing himself for acknowledging Ludacris as his favorite rapper. And look what Luda comes up with, a profanity laced song “Politics (Obama is Here)” that also takes pokes at George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton and John McCain.

Obama camp isn’t exactly embracing the Song. In past interviews, Obama has stated that he likes Luda’s music.

In the song, Ludacris raps of himself:

“You never should have doubted with a slot in the prez’s iPod/I’m one of his favorite rappers.”

Later, he adds: “You can’t stop what’s about to happen/The first black president/We going to paint the White House black/The world is ready for change because Obama is here.”

Luda “Chris Bridges”, calls the current president “the worst,” refers to Clinton using a less than genteel definition of a female canine and mocks McCain’s age and suggests he needs a wheelchair.

On The Politico.com, political blogger Ben Smith reports that the Obama camp is condemning the song. The site posted the following quote from Obama spokesperson Bill Burton: “As Barack Obama has said many, many times in the past, rap lyrics today too often perpetuate misogyny, materialism, and degrading images that he doesn’t want his daughters or any children exposed to. This song is not only outrageously offensive to Senator Clinton, Reverend Jackson, Senator McCain, and President Bush, it is offensive to all of us who are trying to raise our children with the values we hold dear. While Ludacris is a talented individual he should be ashamed of these lyrics.”

Be it a race card or a funny name, or no resemblance to all the presidents on the dollar bills it doesn’t change my opinion on who I’m going to vote for!