NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

This is a pretty good interview with Nicholas Kristof, discussing race, inequality, privilege and the inability to perceive that privilege among white people in the United States. Comedian Bill Maher recently made a joke, that the idea of white Christians being an oppressed group today, which is being attacked on all sides, is bewildering, because there are no articles and videos of white pastors and priests being brutally attacked and sometimes killed by cops with itchy trigger fingers. Privilege comes in so many forms, and part of its power and the reason it is so difficult to give up, is because as a regime of knowledge and power, it comes equipped with ways of projecting blame elsewhere, or doing everything possible to justify and mystify it, even to the point of taking ludicrous positions that in any other context, you would see as being shameful and embarrassing. It is easy to not realize the ways in which the color of your skin privileges and protects a person, at so many diff

Ilek-na na Si Rudy Giuliani na ti ha guaiya Si Obama Amerika. Ai adai. Mas put patida este na sinangan kinu minagahet. Parerehu Si Obama yan todu i otro siha na presidenten Amerikanu. Manhongge gi put Amerika na uniku gui', na mas takhilo' gui' kinu todu i otro nasion siha. Lao Presidente Obama mas ti sesso ha puni i isaon Amerika pat i West, lao manhohongge ha' put i uniku-na i US. Gi fino' Ingles ma fa'na'an este "exceptionalism." Gi este na isao i bida-na i US sasahnge yan i bidan-niha todu i otro na nasion siha. Anggen manhatme i US otro tano', sahnge este yan otro na hinatme ginen otro na nasion. Si Rudy Giuliani ha sen hongge este. Anggen i US chumo'gue maolek ha', lao i otro ahe', cha'-niha. Si Obama ha hongge este lokkue', lao i sinangan-na mas mesklao, mas lebok. Ha admite na ti perfekto i US, ti taiisao, lao ha sapopote ha' sinembatgo ayu na hinasso na sina ha cho'gue maseha hafa malago'-na. *******

  The election for President in the US in 2016 has already started, and even though I am only casually following the coverage it does already seem like every single Republican or every possible stripe is teasing that they are running. It is interesting to see the bubbles in which people live and how it sustains their egos and gives them delusions of grandeur and potential power. All of these Republicans keep telling us that everyone they know is compelling them to run for President, and most of the country is wondering how many followers on Twitter or Facebook count as "everyone" nowadays. This video here from Bill Maher who has created a convenient guide for billionaires out there who are interested in buying a candidate and want one that matches their ideology or would be willing to say the craziest things. Some other articles are included below as well. ******************** Sarah Palin and the Demise of the Tea-Party Media By Eric Boehlert Huffingpost 1/30/2015

I wrote on this blog and in my Variety column about the debate brought out last month over Islam first starting with the exchange between actor Ben Affleck and Bill Maher and Sam Harris (both well-known atheists) on Maher's show Real Time. Since the debate didn't really start with them but is something that has been going on for centuries, the debate has continued, although in its current iteration constantly referring back to Maher and Affleck as being different discursive positions within the discussion. Below I've pasted two letters. The first from Michael Moore from his Facebook page where he defended Bill Maher and the second from a Pakistani/Canadian blogger Eiynah who is critical of Ben Affleck's position. ********************* A Message in Support of Bill Maher Michael Moore 11/10/14 Facebook Bill Maher is a friend of mine. He stood up for me when I was attacked after my Oscar speech (given on the fourth night of the Iraq War, a war Bill publicly oppo

--> I am a big fan of Bill Maher and his show Real Time on HBO. I have actually been a fan of him since his Politically Incorrect days and even remember him making his comments that lost him his original show so long ago. He has been spearheading this election season a campaign he calls “Flip a District.” After receiving thousands of suggestions from people across the US, claiming their incumbent Congressperson as being the most useless and whose absence in Congress would make their state a better place, he chose Rep. John Kline from Minnesota. Kline, a Republican is not one of the loud and aggressive and sometimes hardly sane mouthpieces that dominate Fox News, such as Louis Gomert and Michelle Bachmann. He doesn't say the sometimes ridiculous things his fellow Republican became notorious for. But he votes alongside them and practices the age-old art of incumbent invisibility. He says little, stands for less, but collects lots of money from major corporations whose a