President Obama with South Korean President Park Geun-Hye in the Oval office today – Photo by Pete Souza
****
****
U.S. President Barack Obama and South Korean President Park Geun-hye in Bi-lateral meeting
President Obama thanked President Park, who is South Korea’s first female president, for choosing the United States for her first foreign trip. This visit “reflects South Korea’s extraordinary progress over these six decades,” President Obama said, from “the ashes of war, to one of the world’s largest economies; from a recipient of foreign aid to a donor that now helps other nations develop.”
***
Video: President Obama – Sexual Assault In Military Is ‘Betraying The Uniform’youtube.com/watch?v=MDVtiW…
— TheObamaDiary.com (@TheObamaDiary) May 7, 2013
*****
FLOTUS does a book signing at “Politics & Prose”
Text of First Lady’s remarks
AP story: ” Buy away”
***
***
SF 49er’s SuperBowl QB met FLOTUS and got her to Kaepernick
***
.@kaepernick7: Had fun #Kaepernicking. Thanks for helping our kids get moving! letsmoveschools.org –mo twitter.com/FLOTUS/status/…
— FLOTUS (@FLOTUS) May 7, 2013
***
I got the opportunity to meet one of the greatest women in the world, the first lady first_obama and… instagram.com/p/ZBCX0CNBKW/
— Colin Kaepernick (@Kaepernick7) May 7, 2013
*****
****
My American story: Deputy senior advisor to the president on immigration
***
***
Week in Toons
***
The Obama Diary 
Chatting!
DARN!!! The scrolling down took forever.
Congrats donna on #1 🙂
Congrats Donna! Cman close 2nd…I shortened the post some. It was sort of a hodgepodge!
So long!!!
I need to get a copy of FLOTUS’ “Home Grown” book!
Me too!
Purchased 2 when first published; was blessed to get them signed when she was here last summer; that put me on the “good daughter” list – my Mom got to shake FLOTUS’ hand and I got our books signed.
Congrats to you & Mom Alycee. 🙂 Lucky, lucky you!
oh, how I wish my copy was signed by FLOTUS….
I don’t have my copy yet, but I still want one and man I would love to shake FLOTUS hand.
Nice afternoon post!
Happy Birthday 57andfemale!!!!
When has mike huckleberry EVAHHHH been right? He needs to shut his mouth. I am really getting annoyed!!!!!
That Colin Kaepernick is a real cutie and he has excellent taste in First Ladies.
Kaepernick is a pretty good quarterback too.
BREAKING:
YEA!!!!
Happy Birthday 57
Freaking fantastic.
Forward! In reality, it hasn’t been that long since PBO voiced his evolved opinion on the subject, so things are moving at a rapid pace!
“So, you know, I figured it was a domestic-violence dispute,” Charles Ramsey told a reporter for the ABC affiliate in Cleveland, explaining what happened after, as he put it, he “heard screaming. I’m eating McDonald’s. I see this girl going nuts trying to get out of the house.” Ramsey, and others who gathered, helped her break open the door, kicking it from the bottom. She told them her name, Amanda Berry. She had been kidnapped at the age of seventeen, ten years ago. There were two other women in the house, Gina Dejesus, who is now twenty-three, and Michelle Knight, now thirty, who had also been held for a decade. There was at least one small child.
Ramsey’s 911 call is transfixing. “Yeah hey bro,” it begins, “you check this out.” His intensity, the McDonald’s shout-out, his undoubtedly loose paraphrase of Berry’s account (“This motherfucker done kidnapped me and my daughter”), and also his competence (he does a better job with the essentials like the address than the 911 operator) make him one of those instantly compelling figures who, in the middle of an American tragedy, just start talking—and then we can’t stop listening. (See Ruslan Tsarni, Ashley Smith.) But one phrase in particular, from the interview, is worth dwelling on: “I figured it was a domestic-violence dispute.” In many times and places, a line like that has been offered as an excuse for walking away, not for helping a woman break down your neighbor’s door. How many women have died as a result? They didn’t yesterday.
more…
I posted this earlier, but the 911 call and interview are mindblowing….
His account was compelling. So many folks can’t be bothered to get involved; thank god he did…
Good luck with that???
Democrats Better Start Selling Obamacare Soon
By Kevin Drum
————————–
I know that it’s way too easy for a blogger with nothing at stake to say this, but I sure don’t see any possible response to the Republican attacks except for Democrats to get out of their crouch and start selling Obamacare like their lives depend on it. Which they do. A moderate response just won’t do any good here. Dems need to be promoting Obamacare with the same fervor Republicans bring to the attack, pointing out its benefits and upsides at every opportunity. So far I haven’t seen this—or even anything even close to this—and I suppose that might only be due to the fact that 2014 is still a ways off. But it better start happening soon.
—————————–
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/05/democrats-better-start-selling-obamacare-soon
h/t Steve Benen
Spandan’s back!
http://www.thepeoplesview.net/2013/05/aw-thats-cute-republicans-dreaming.html
yay! good read
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/06/us-usa-healthcare-spending-idUSBRE9450SW20130506
Jacki Schechtner on Stephanie Miller this morning made a great point: because of our effed up for-profit health care system prices are insanely inflated. This slowdown of health care spending comes from bringing some of it back to reality: an aspirin or a Band-Aid should not cost $11.00. It’s important to get the word out that this is NOT a cut in health care services, but bringing down the outrageously and artificially inflated costs that benefit no one but fat cat CEO’s.
I just caught the very end of Tweety’s “Let me finish” a few moments ago. I did not hear a name but it appears that he may be pimping Christie for 2016. I just heard him say “he would be the only person that both sides could vote for”. Am I right?
Yes…Tweety is very easily duped.
I also caught the end of CM’s promotion of Christy. I wonder if he knows something since I thought he was all out for Hillary for 2016? Sometimes it is hard to believe that he is a Dem.
He’s not a Dem – and that’s why you are (rightfully) having doubts.
Luckily, Tweety doesn’t base his utterings on anything tangible. He’s been wrong many times before. Seems the Clinton machinery is trying to set up the campaign with Hillary and Christie – very clueless. If America doesn’t open it’s eyes soon to the facts of Christie’s policies and Republican credentials (he did wholeheartedly endorse failed candidate Romney), then we’ll be punished for our stupidity.
Mattews loves the macho types. Does he have daddy issues ?
He’s in love with Christie. I hate to say it, but I think he’s right in thinking that the guy could be popular with some democrats ( the moderates in rural states for example…) Christie is your brother-in-law, your co-worker, the guy next door. He’s macho, he can fool people with his simplistic solutions to complex problems. An electorate that is the least informed in the western world can fall for this guy. And he’s a much better politician than Romney.
Yeah, his record is not that good. But can we abandon the notion that people vote with their head ? A good portion of the electorate don’t have a clue about policies, are very easily fooled by empty slogans. In the end, they dismiss many rational arguments and vote with the person they identify with, the person they like the most.
If Christie gets the nomination, I wonder if Joe Biden wouldn’t be a stronger candidate than Hillary against him… Sigh… we’ll see.
A word to the blog tyrants: I have a night owl music thread ready to go later tonight.
You spoil me Mister, do you know that? Thank you!
Meanwhile ….. did you see there’s talk Ferguson will announce his retirement this week?
I will cry like a baby if it’s true.
Wha wha wha??? Holy fuck, that means Jose is going to Man U, not Chelsea. Now *I’m* going to cry.
Hold yer horses …. huge money being bet on David Moyes replacing Fergie.
Okay, those tears are coming….
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/manchester-united/10042798/Sir-Alex-Ferguson-considering-retiring-as-Manchester-United-manager-before-end-of-the-week.html
David Moyes could probably do amazing work with Man U’s deep pockets. He’s basically kept Everton at near the top of the table every year with not a lot of money.
Really respect him LL, he’s done an incredible job with Everton, just fear he’s not a big enough ‘personality’ to replace Ferguson – although, other than Mourinho, I’m not sure anyone is. The key here is that Ferguson, much as I worship him, doesn’t remain at the club in some ‘upstairs’ capacity, that’s what happened when Matt Busby retired and none of his successors, until Ferguson, could live with that presence. Wow, huge decisions ahead – but still clinging to the hope this is all poppycock.
Admit it, you’re yearning for that Benitez fella to take over at Old Trafford.
You’re just trying to push me over the edge, aren’t ya?
Well, my Man U-loving librarian friend thinks Fergie is going nowhere.
Give him/her a monster huge hug for me – do it, NOW!
Man, what WILL you Red Devils do when Fergie decides to spend more time with his wine collection? Give Roman this much: he doesn’t give us much chance to get too attached to a manager. 😆
Roman’s very considerate that way!
Of course, the hilarious thing is that we only know about this because Man U is on the NYSE.
Ah, true, a sign of the times.
Hey Chips, just finished up one of the cakes, I can send a picture tomorrow when I put the topping on. White cake, Strawberry jello poured over it strawberries mixed in with lite cool whip for topping. Mouth watering yet. Chocolate Chip Cookies tasste awesome with sea salt sprinkled on top. Taster Please!!! 🙂
Roberta, I am drooling like a baby, that sounds disgracefully delicious! When we have our TOD party one day, you will be the official cake-baker!
(whew) 😉 (oops)
😉 love you!
and, after all, someone has to hold the line for VC while she’s out in the 9-5 world…. it’s tough, hope I’m doing her proud!
Our Collegekay is doing us PROUD!
STANDING OVATION!!!!! Serious APPLAUSE!!!! CK rules!
Congratulations! That is QUITE an accomplishment. Many late nights, all nighters, and long study days went to earn that.
AWESOME!!! Congratulations to our girl Collegekay! Work it Girl!!!
yeah college kay! so proud of you, and so happy for you!
blessings on your wonderful future!
This is pathetic….I don’t even feel sorry them. Bring back Ted Turner, ASAP!
Are you serious????
I wish this was the Onion or SNL, but……
The Republicans will try to say it’s because of sequestration and half the fools in the country will believe them.
Well, then I hope when the effects of the Sequester actually start to be visible in the economy, that the same fools will believe that, too. Roads are crumbling, bridges dangerously neglected, education standards failing… But, the rich CEOs are able to fly their tax-free private jets on time. Priorities…
LOL – Just had a call from Organization for National Faith & Family, caller says “Gov Mike Hucklebee…” cut her off with “Honey, I switched from Repub to Democrat — Hucklebee is the reason why! God Bless you.” *click* :LOL:
LOL! What a great response Alycee!! Good for you.
actually, it was Kyl & the SALT treaty, however, she didn’t need to know that… 😆
Huckabee was someone you disagree with but you still had some respect for him, but he has gone so far to the right that he is another one of those crazy right wingnuts.
He ALWAYS was far to the right. But he was good at hiding it during the 2008 primaries.
Winner!
He’s on AC 360 tonight.
oh thanks. He is a smart dude. His description of events and emotions are better than people paid to do it.
Heard some of the HLN/CNN folks say they hope he gets a reward for his actions!
100%
FLOTUS did a interview with the Today show and it will be on tomorrow.
How prophetic, the 3 Ohio women were rescued the day before the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children’s Hope Dinner. God is so good!
https://twitter.com/Lib_Librarian/status/331908684722601986
Eh, on second thought, not worth the bytes.
by way of smartypants
So, I’ve been thinking that I need a sabbatical. Then I get to Storytime this morning. Yeah, not so much anymore.
Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet!
And I walk into the room and she’s jumping up to greet me and yell “Yeah!!”
How is the election going in SC going,,,
Politico has figures – Sanford is ahead – no sanity – no truth – no character – nothing but hate on the blah guy
In these elections…it is all about the ground game…who can get their folks to the polls….her bashing of PBO…hurt her chances to build that crucial ground game…
I don’t know why these people think that they can bash President Obama and get away with that shit.
Don’t think it mattered what she did – she didn’t have an R behind her name. In a sane world NO-ONE, but NO-ONE would vote for the guy who lives on govt welfare – who deserts his state for sex. But this world is not sane
PBO cannot be the beginning and end of the democrat party. He is not the 2nd coming – and he can’t do this alone. He needs support in congress, be it 50% of the time or 100% of the time. Dems have to do what the GOP does – hold the nose and vote for their person – whether they are for/against guns or for/against health care.
I agree – I have given to some campaigns that aren’t in my state, but I knew that would just be money down the drain. Whichever R emerged had it in the bag. Rs forgive their own and hate all others no matter what.
It is about connecting with your forces…mobilizing and getting them out to the polls….they brought their folks out …she did not…aka 2010….this is the lesson that was shown in 2012…and if we do not heed that lesson we may not fare well in 2014
If they won’t come out to vote against a man like Sanford (his politics & desertion not his morals) then things don’t look good.
I don’t understand the GOTV that is necessary – given that voting is compulsory in my world – and there is no GOTV – that is not surprising. We also hold elections on Saturdays – when most folk do not have to go to work. Whoever designated Tuesday election day must have wanted to stop the workers from voting.
folks have to be organized into action…there are a lot of whys that make that so…
PBO had the better message…but he also had the better ground game and organization…this cannot be underestimated…and if the DEMS do not get this…2014 will look a lot like 2010
Nice
I hope Christie and his followers remember what this President has done to get them back on their feet when Christie starts bashing President Obama in 2016. It seems they’ve already and conveniently forgotten that the week before Sandy, Christie was joking that the President couldn’t find leadership and was rummaging around for leadership like a blind man looking for a light switch. Every time I hear about his poll ratings, I get furious at the stupidity/ignorance of many in the electorate.
Charles Ramsey tells how he rescued missing women
A good heart.
????
!!
…
;;;;
++++
^^^^^^^^^
So bored we are. LoL
Wow the “Fluke Effect” continues to affect Rush.
http://www.mediaite.com/online/report-48-of-50-top-advertisers-exclude-rush-and-hannity-from-radio-commercial-buys/
The picture after the one of FLOTUS standing, the one of her sitting smiling as a lady in green walk by, that is a beautiful picture of FLOTUS.
Buzzfeed is at it again…trying to get Obama supporters mad at PBO by spreading a rumor that VP Biden told an activist supporter that he’s against the Keystone Pipeline but he’s in the minority in the Obama administration. As if to suggest that that PBO is FOR the pipeline.
Disturbing that Michelle Knight, one of the 3 Cleveland victims, reportedly said that there was another woman in the house of horrors when she arrived, and then one day she was gone. There was a woman’s name on the basement wall, with RIP next to it, but there is no confirmation that was connected to the missing woman. And I was reminded again of —if you see something, say something. It seems many neighbors now report they noticed many strange goings-on in that house—–some reportedly notified the police on occasion, no confirmation on any of that—-a naked woman crawling on her hands and knees in the back yard a couple of years ago——a little girl peering out from attic window—–a woman allowed to sit in front of an open window for an hour a day and then window would close and shades pulled down—–pounding heard on doors—-a woman’s scream, all windows covered with plastic garbage bags or boarded up etc. etc. I know people are reluctant to get involved, but what would you do if you felt something wasn’t right, maybe called the cops who knocked on the door and left when no one came to the door. Would you be insistent that someone come back to investigate more thoroughly?
It was indeed a house of horrors. When the criminals are able to hide their crimes in plain sight, for so long, they probably felt they could get away with doing anything to those poor women. Especially if they killed one of them, as seems to be the case. It’s difficult to even think of it.
This is the culture of “you’re on your own”. When people forget that they’re a community, working together for the good of all, then you end up with this kind of thing happening in plain sight. It’s just awful.
On Anderson360 just now Charles Ramsey said there were 2 kids he would see playing in the back yard and he had been told that they were the kidnapper’s grandchildren. Horrors for sure. Can’t imagine the horror those women lived through.
Dear Democrats trying to win office by bashing President Obama,
Good luck with that.
Yours truly, Don
Indeed.
truly Don
But Chris Hayes and his ilk will be ready to blame PBO….no questions asked.
#JustImagineIf
#TrustBarack
The Republicans are so filled with hate, they’re probably hoping some of the prisoners will die, just so it can be a part of the President’s history. They are a bunch of sickos.
I think that at the core they’re filled with FEAR. They fear everything. They fear terrorists, they fear minorities, they fear the changes in society, they fear a more complex world where the USA won’t be able to keep the status of the only superpower, etc.
It’s that fear that creates the hate.
THere are many studies out there about the characteristics of the conservative mind. One of the most important: the conservative mind is more prone to fear. They can’t cope with complex situations. They have difficulty to cope with a changing world.
Today it’s terrorists, Muslims, gays, abortion. Yesterday it was civil rights, communism. And before it was jews, women’s vote. They’re present in each generation.
For those interested in keeping track of Internet outages, @Renesys is a good follow on Twitter. Here’s a few charts for Syria sent today:
I don’t know how this affects internal (e.g., military, FSA, etc. communications).
You can watch Syria ‘disappear’ from the Internet happened in less than 2 min …. what you will see, initially, are flows routing from different nodes in Syria and then, 1 by 1, all flows halt with perhaps one exception …
Oh shit!
So it appears that Serial Sanford will win the SC district 01 seat. Moral of the story: If you’re a Republican (particularly if you’re a white, male Republican) and you commit adultery, you can still go far in politics.
I can’t believe this. What is wrong with folks in SC?
Something in the water.
Don’t know the answer to your question, but this seems apt:
Evening Friends! What a lovely smorgasbord of goodies in this post! I love my TOD!! 🙂
criminy smdh
Maybe there are more women in the military … Or, as I suspect, military women feel more secure now to report an assault.
Sure hope this is legit…
What the fucking fuck is wrong with South Carolina?
Redneck, Super Red District, Stupid Fucks
RRR…….Racists Redneck Red District, That’s South Carolina for you.
They hate the black guy in the White House – that is all there is to say about this election. They prefer someone who deserts state and family to chase some sex around the world – to an intelligent, honest, reliable, sensible, truthful man – because of the color of his skin.
Big brands rejected Bangladesh factory safety plan
After a factory fire killed 112 garment workers in November, clothing brands and retailers continued to reject a union-sponsored proposal to improve safety throughout Bangladesh’s $20 billion garment industry.
And the country’s Finance Minister is of no help (just sees $ signs):
I may have missed this update from goBrooklyn yesterday, but for those of us who were wondering about her, I just saw her tweet, posted ~23hrs ago. 🙂 🙂 Glad to know that she’s okay!
oh thank you HF
Wonderful. TY Hopefruit…
THANK YOU, HF, for posting.
GoBrooklyn’s silence was worrisome, but glad she had the energy to tweet Chips.
Poor GB, that operation must have been excruciating.
thanks hopefruit– this is good news! prayers still winging your way, gobrooklyn! love and blessings, too!
That’s a good point!
Yo Chips!! 😀 😀 😀
The GW Bush Lie-bury in a FEMA trailer. What a perfect idea!
Evenin’.
New Post by LL http://theobamadiary.com/2013/05/07/evening-chat-ladies-gentlemen-elton-john/
My night owl chat has become an evening chat, because too many comments that’s why!
http://theobamadiary.com/2013/05/07/evening-chat-ladies-gentlemen-elton-john/
Chat responsibly.
Twitter reacts to Sanford win:
Sorry, the first tweet was response to Dudette upthread. Will respond to her entry now.
Here’s the response to Sanford win that I meant to post here:
I love our president’s body language with Madam President. That tells me all I need to know about the man.