flashback …. a good sport

Rodeo:

NASCAR:

Gymnastics:

Tour de France cycling:

Quarterbacking:

Prize Fighting:

Pretend-golf:

Mind-reading:

Cow-taming:

Fencing:

Juggling:

Dancercise:

Aerobics:

International Ping Pong:

Power-paddling:

Yachting:

Orienteering:

Stone-flinging:

Karate Chopping:

Long Distance Running:

Chess:

Ice-skating:

Hurdling:

Wave-riding:

High-Jumping:

Backwards Tennis:

Cricket:

Really Big Fish Catching:

Marathon:

Invisible trampolining:

Saber-swinging:

Soccer ball juggling:

Ultra tie-tugging:

Extreme baby-whispering:

Very-small-ball-whacking:

Pocket Battleships:

Climbing:

Bat-swinging:

Ball-potting:

Weight-lifting:

Left-leaning (a popular sport in Communist Europe):

Snow-ploughing:

Egging:

Hurling:

That ‘don’t-blink’ game:

Thumb-Wrestling:

Arm-Wrestling:

Taekwondo:

Sprinting:

Fly-swatting:

Judo:

Decathlon:

Pitching:

Squash:

Powerlifting:

Power-walking:

Ballroom dancing:

Rodent-taming:

Winning:

😉

as promised….

Politifact: In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the federal government (along with state and local help) committed more than $14 billion to develop a levee and pumping system around New Orleans capable of protecting against a 100-year storm. It would be the biggest civil works project in the history of the Army Corps of Engineers. And Obama promised it would be completed by 2011.

As promised, nearly six years since the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, that goal has largely been accomplished.

According to a May 29, 2011, story by Mark Schleifstein of the New Orleans Times-Picayune, “The new system represents an unprecedented engineering feat that took six years to build, with more than $8 billion spent so far on design and construction. And it required a complete rewriting of the rules used by the corps to build both levees and hurricane levees.”

…. the second part of Obama’s campaign promise …. “the ultimate goal of protecting the entire city from a Category 5 storm”.

To that end, a federal task force sent the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Study to Congress last year including several options to reach that longer term goal …. John Barry, vice president of the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority-East, said the levees designed to protect against a 100-year storm are “pretty much finished” and that he’s satisfied the corps has met that part of its goal….

More here

drive away

President Obama shares a golf cart with Eric Whitaker at the Mink Meadows Golf Club in Vineyard Haven, Aug. 24

President Obama with Eric Whitaker, left, and Sam Kass, right

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‘a new era in u.s. foreign policy’

President Obama holding a copy of Fareed Zakaria’s “The Post-American World”, 2008.

Fareed Zakaria (CNN): Back in March, many neoconservatives in Washington were extremely dismissive of the way President Obama was handling the intervention in Libya. They argued that he was doing too little and acting too late – that his approach was too multilateral and lacked cohesiveness. They continuously criticized President Obama for, in the words of an anonymous White House advisor, “leading from behind.”

But now that these critics are confronted with the success of the Libya operation, they are changing their tune and claiming paternity of the operation. They are further arguing that if their advice had been heeded, the intervention in Libya would have been swifter and even more successful. But the Libya intervention is so significant precisely because it did not follow the traditional pattern of U.S.-led interventions. Indeed, it launched a new era in U.S. foreign policy.

…. It is important to emphasize that even though it was a “supporting role,” the U.S. was indispensable to the operation. Nobody else could have eliminated Gadhafi’s air defenses – and, effectively, his air force – within three days. Without America, the operation in Libya could not have taken place. But the U.S. was also “supporting” in the sense that after these initial strikes, it moved into the background and asked its NATO partners to do the heavy lifting. Thereafter, the U.S. intervened only when it felt it needed to. All of this suggests a very different model for intervention, which I believe is a vast improvement over the old, expansive and expensive model.

… The question before Libya was: Could such interventions be successful while keeping costs under control – both human and financial.

Today’s answer is: Yes.

Full article here

Thank you Dorothy

the onion pretty much sums it up

The Onion

vacation?

President Barack Obama receives an economic briefing from Brian Deese, Deputy Director of the National Economic Council, in Chilmark, Mass., August 24

‘are you there mitt?’

‘this may be a truly great foreign-policy president in the making’

Michael Tomasky (Daily Beast): Yes, the economic recovery is too slow. But events in Libya suggest that this may be a truly great foreign-policy president in the making.

…. Yes, of course, let’s stipulate: the war isn’t actually, you know, over. And even after it is, Libya could descend into chaos or extremism or both (although it is heartening to read that the National Transitional Council, the recognized new governing body, apparently has detailed governance plans in place). So could Egypt, and Tunisia, and so on and so on. Lots of things could, can, and undoubtedly will go wrong….

All that said, the administration has already handled a lot of these changes well (and in the face of absolutely constant know-it-all criticism)…..

Obama took a lot of stick for not being more forceful on Egypt in February, but he was right to be cautious …  He then took heat for moving too slowly on Libya, but here again he was correct…..

….. That’s starting to sound like a doctrine to me. Call it the doctrine of no doctrine: using our power and influence but doing so prudently and multilaterally, with the crucial recognition that Egypt is different from Libya is different from Syria is different from someplace else. According to the foreign-policy establishment, if you want to have a self-respecting big-D doctrine, you’re not supposed to recognize differences…..

…. there’s work to be done. But it’s hardly impossible to envision an Obama administration in a few years’ time that has drawn down Afghanistan and Iraq, helped foster reforms and maybe even the growth of a couple of democracies around the Middle East, and restored the standing of a country that Bush had laid such staggering waste. And killed Osama bin Laden. If this is weak America-hating, count me in.

Full post here

****

Tomasky has been hugely critical of the President recently on domestic issues, without ever really acknowledging the opposition he faces when he tries to get anything done. He’s critical of him again in this article (click the link to read it all), but at least he gives credit where it’s due on the foreign policy front.

heads up – briefing by deputy press secretary

Live here at White House site (audio only)

Live streaming at CNN here

‘playing scrabble with the dog’

Thanks ChristiMtl 😉

Down memory lane …

2007

Thanks Ladyhawke 😉