Stories from October 2007
October 18, 2007 at 7:05am
What’s so funny about the 2008 presidential race?
Not much so far, unless you count Rudy Giuliani taking a cell phone call from his wife while he was giving a speech to members of the National Rifle Association, a moment that became a YouTube hit.
But, take heart; JibJab.com is back and making fun of the scary side of politics.
JibJab, you may remember, is the Internet humor site that produced the flash animation video, This Land is Your Land for the 2004 presidential race.
The video established the JibJab brand and significantly improved its fortunes.
The This Land video featured singing heads of George W. Bush and John Kerry dissing each other to the tune of the Woody Guthrie song.
October 17, 2007 at 7:02am
While CEO Erik Prince has been the public face of Blackwater USA during recent weeks of intense government and media scrutiny, the often outspoken Cofer Black, company vice chairman, has kept out of the limelight.
Black, one of the nation's eminent authorities on combatting terrorism, is deeply involved in the network of Blackwater-related companies. He also serves as chairman of Total Intelligence Solutions and is CEO of Black Group, LLC.
With more than 30 years of service in the Central Intelligence Agency, Black is known as a superspy. He helped catch the international terrorist Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, better known as "Carlos the Jackal" and in 1999, was named head of the CIA's Counter-Terrorism Center.
October 16, 2007 at 7:09am
The script has changed.
Pointing to Al Gore, parents throughout the country may be telling their children that if they study hard, lead good lives and not become president they could be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
Gore is the co-winner of this year’s Peace Prize for sounding the alarm on global warming. He shares the prize with the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
While Gore may have fashioned a grand comeback, a look at the post-defeat careers of other recent unsuccessful presidential wannabes shows that there can be life, a good life at that, after losing. All have found things to do, sometimes lucrative things, and many have held elective office, most often in the U.S. Senate.
All have continued in public life and some have remained in politics, most especially in the U.S. Senate.
October 15, 2007 at 8:05am
America’s newest quarter-billionaire, who just completed one of the largest corporate buyout deals in history, plans to relax a bit for the next few months.
Among John Wilder’s main ambitions in that timespan are driving coast-to-coast, reading the Bible cover to cover, riding a camel, camping with his sons, and learning how to ballroom dance.
The former chairman and CEO of TXU is now technically unemployed. But he personally walked away with more than $270 million from the $32 billion private equity buyout, completed last week.
October 14, 2007 at 7:46am
It’s the sort of windfall that not-for-profits don’t receive every day.
A little more than a year old, the Alliance for Climate Protection gained $750,000 when former Vice President Al Gore was named co-recipient of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize Friday.
Gore announced that he would give his share of the prize to the alliance, a Palo Alto, Calif., organization he formed last year.
The group’s goal is to increase awareness about threats to the environment from global warming.
It helped put on this July’s Live Earth concerts in seven cities around the world.
October 13, 2007 at 7:33am
When Curt Schilling takes to the mound in the American League
Championship series, he’ll be pitching for the Boston Red Sox against
the Cleveland Indians.
Off the field, Schilling is one of a relatively small group of baseball players who are willing to pitch for political candidates.
He campaigned for President Bush in 2004, and earlier this year, he
said he was backing Sen. John McCain of Arizona for the 2008
Republican presidential nomination. However, he added that if Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois were the Democratic candidate he would have a hard time choosing between the two men.
October 12, 2007 at 8:11am
Sure, he’s won every award known to man except the Olympic gold. (Unless he gets into wrestling or weight lifting, that honor seems beyond even his reach.)
But the main achievement of Al Gore is not his comeback from having the White House snatched away, not his Oscar or even his sharing of the Nobel Peace Prize, announced today.
The real phenomenon of Al Gore is how connected he has become despite (and because of) his losing the presidency.
Gore has forged strong bonds not only in politics, science and the international environmental movement, but in finance, high-tech and Hollywood.
October 11, 2007 at 7:54am
Portfolio has an excellent story this month detailing Chiquita Brands‘ illicit payments to Colombian paramilitary groups responsible for killing thousands of people.
No wonder there was some outrage when a U.S. court recently approved a deal that punished Chiquita with only a fine.
“For $25 million those who financed a mass massacre of Colombians were able to purchase impunity,” Colombia Interior Minister Carlos Holguin told the Associated Press.
October 10, 2007 at 12:35pm
Two seasons have collided - the endless season of the presidential campaign and the shorter season of the baseball playoffs.
This means that presidential candidates have been showing up at the playoffs, most especially Republican presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani, who was there front and center to see his beloved New York Yankees exit the playoffs in the first round.
These sporting appearances make sense. The politicos get a little TV airtime away from the coffee shops of New Hampshire and Iowa. And they associate themselves with a game that’s American as apple pie and steroids. (OK. They don’t stress the steroids.)
But there can be risks to rooting for a team, as it inevitably means rooting against another team. Giuliani have picked up some votes in New York, but the inhabitants of Red Sox Nation might not be able to forgive his connection to, in their opinions, an evil empire.
|
|
