Wired News Quotes The Nordic Link Re: Ferrari Man

Wired News picked up on my report about the liquidators and Stefan Eriksson.

Ex-Gizmondo Exec Dodging Investigators

Here is my post on the Nordic Link

And for those of you who read Swedish, here is my report for Realtid.se

Barack Obama Breaks With His Fiery Father

Barack Obama in New York.                     Photo: Hans Sandberg 

He had to do it, but I don't think he did it because he has become an ordinary politician like Hillary Clinton. He had to do it, because the issues Jeremiah Wright raises cut to deep into the American fabric of history. And this election is not about setting up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. It’s about cleaning up the mess after George W. Bush, and setting America on a new course, one of fairness, sustainable growth and one that seeks peace and international cooperation.

Much of what pastor Wright said at his speech to the NAACP on Saturday was true (excluding his comments on the spread of AIDS and homecoming chickens), despite what all the pundits say. He named and cursed the abuses and abusers of the past, and drew the line from then to now. And there is such a line.

America’s history is not pretty. For all the progress and greatness, it is also a story about genocide, slavery, desegregation and prejudice, a story of atrocities at home and abroad, like in the Philippines, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Vietnam, and now in Iraq. For a preacher who is looking for sins to condemn, the U.S. history certainly does not lack material, and Wright surely knows how to spin a gruesome cathartic tale out of it.

But the difference between Wright and Obama is not one of historic morals, but of remedies. Powerful preachers like Wright have staged their thunderous performances for decades, but they have failed to change America. Obama realized that to change America, you have to build a broad coalition, and to build a broad coalition, you have to leave behind emotionally satisfying, but divisive rhetoric like that of reverend Wrights, and seek a conversation that speaks to the majority. Barack Obama understands what Oprah Winfrey understood. You can’t withdraw and lick your wounds and curse injustice. You have to reach out wide, and if you do, you will find that you’re not alone, you’re not an oppressed minority, but part of a broad post-racial coalition that can build the future.

It must have hurt bad to break the bond to a pastor, who might even have served as a surrogate father. He didn’t want to do it, but reverend Wright didn’t give him a chance. He was trapped in his rhetoric of bitterness, and as much as we understand him, we also realize that he could not provide a path ahead in this world.

Hans Sandberg

Note: Check out Maureen Dowd's take on the father-son dynamic

"Having been deserted at age 2 by his father, Obama has now been deserted by the father-figure in his church, the man who inspired him to become a Christian, married him, dedicated his house, baptized his children, gave him the title of his second book and theme for his presidential run and worked on his campaign."
***
"The Illinois senator doesn’t pay attention to the mythic nature of campaigns, but if he did, he would recognize the narrative of the classic hero myth: The young hero ventures out on an adventure to seek a golden fleece or an Oval Office; he has to kill monsters and face hurdles before he returns home, knocks off his father and assumes the throne.

Tuesday was more than a Sister Souljah moment; it was a painful form of political patricide."



 

Jon Stewart Pokes Fun With John McCain - Enjoy!

Bill Moyers Serves Up the Full Jeremiah Wright

I can't think of anybody better to interview Jeremiah Wright, the retired pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, than Bill Moyers, one of America's most illustrious and eminent journalists.

Bill Moyers is probably most known for his fascinating interview with Joseph Campbell, which was broadcast on PBS as the six hour long program The Power of Myth, but as important as this interview was, it's just one piece in his work. Moyers trademark interviews are deep and penetrating, and so was his interview with Jeremiah Wright. Here we saw the a profound and progressive intellectual behind the fiery preacher, who has been cut up and served as political sushi on Youtube and the various news networks.

”God Damn America” has become synonymous with his name, but when we here Moyers give us the context and Wright lay out the Biblical backstory, the words come out full of meaning and well withing the bounds of American self-improvement and reform through unflinching self-scrutiny.

You don't need to agree with him, but you have to respect him for taking his country seriously enough to dare to challenge it. Will it hurt Obama? Yes, maybe, but it might also make the difference between Obama and Wright clearer. If the country can't digest more than soundbites and hypocrisy, then maybe it doesn't deserve better than Hillary or more likely McCain... 

Hans Sandberg

Watch the whole interview on PBS’ website!

Jeremiah Wright's speech at the NAACP dinner in Detroit!



Part 2



Part 3



Part 4



Part 5




Washington Post-reporter Dana Milbank's discussion of Jeremiah Wright

The Democratic Village Counsel Might Be Getting Ready To Show Hillary the Door

Maureen Dowd wrote on Wednesday that "it will take a village to help Obama escape from the suffocating embrace of his rival." (New York Times, April 23, 2008)

Well it might actually happen.

The Huffington Post reports today that Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Howard Dean May Intervene In Dem Primary

"Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid took his comments about the state of the Democratic primary one step further today, suggesting that he and other prominent Democrats would intervene in the race if primary season concludes without a clear winner: Reid said he would consider writing a joint letter with Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) demanding that superdelegates make their endorsements public.

'The three of us, we may write a joint letter [to superdelegates],' said Reid. 'We might do individual letters, we are in contact with each other.'"

New York Times Warns Hillary In Editorial

New York Times has endorsed Hillary Clinton, but it looks as if they are having second thoughts, judging from today's editorial The Low Road to Victory:

"The Pennsylvania campaign, which produced yet another inconclusive result on Tuesday, was even meaner, more vacuous, more desperate, and more filled with pandering than the mean, vacuous, desperate, pander-filled contests that preceded it.

Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.

If nothing else, self interest should push her in that direction. Mrs. Clinton did not get the big win in Pennsylvania that she needed to challenge the calculus of the Democratic race. It is true that Senator Barack Obama outspent her 2-to-1. But Mrs. Clinton and her advisers should mainly blame themselves, because, as the political operatives say, they went heavily negative and ended up squandering a good part of what was once a 20-point lead.

On the eve of this crucial primary, Mrs. Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11. A Clinton television ad — torn right from Karl Rove’s playbook — evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war and the 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden. 'If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,' the narrator intoned."

Hillary's aggressive campaigning "does more than just turn off voters who don’t like negative campaigning, New York Times writes and adds the following warning:

"She undercuts the rationale for her candidacy that led this page and others to support her: that she is more qualified, right now, to be president than Mr. Obama." (Our italics.)

Hans Sandberg

OK, Hillary, You Won Pennsylvania Alright - Now Please Get Out Of the Way!

Hillary Clinton won as expected, but her win was not enough for her to outdo Barack Obama in the democratic primary campaign.

"The senator from Illinois still leads in the number of pledged delegates and the popular vote. He is almost certain to hold the delegate lead and will probably maintain the popular-vote advantage when the primaries end in early June. Perhaps more important, Clinton's campaign is nearly broke, whereas Obama has an enormous amount of money in the bank to throw into the next two contests and beyond." 

(Washington Post, April 23, 2008, my italics.) 

The best she could do for the Democrats and the country would be to use her PA victory to bow out with dignity. But that's not going to happen. She has no business staying in the race other than helping John McCain's campaign. She feels entitled to have her turn at the wheel, and if that means that the Democrats loose in 2008, there is allways 2012. She's driven, and she's got the money (remember her and Bill's 100 million dollar tax return!), so she can wait for more years for her personal triumph. But if Obama wins in November, there is no way she would ever be president.

Also read Maureen Dowd's sharp comment on the Pennsylvania outcome:

Wilting Over Waffles

"Now that Hillary has won Pennsylvania, it will take a village to help Obama escape from the suffocating embrace of his rival. Certainly Howard Dean will be of no use steering her to the exit. It’s like Micronesia telling Russia to denuke."

(Maureen Dowd in New York Times, my italics.)

Hans Sandberg

Baracky - Watch It!

Pope: Human Rights Better Than War On Terror

"The promotion of human rights remains the most effective strategy for eliminating inequalities between countries and social groups, and for increasing security," Pope Benedict XVI told the U.N. General Assembly.

“Indeed, the victims of hardship and despair, whose human dignity is violated with impunity, become easy prey to the call to violence, and they can then become violators of peace,” he continued.

Maybe he never had a chance to meet Dick Cheney when he visited the White House.... for he would surely had set his holiness straight, explaining how such loose talk about human rights and dignity could distract us from the war on terror. After all, the way the Pope went on about absolute values, one might think the U.S. would have to shut down Guantanamo Bay.

Hans Sandberg