A Day in the Life
Thursday 04 June 2009
What we imagine is order is merely the prevailing form of chaos.
- Kerry Thornley
The Obama administration opened the White House doors to NBC correspondent Brian Williams and a large herd of television cameras last week, the fruits of which became a two-day television special titled "Inside the Obama White House," which NBC aired Tuesday and Wednesday nights.
Most of it is fluff - among other things, we learn that Rahm Emanuel walks fast, M&M's taste good, Bo the dog is growing fast and Five Guys makes a mean cheeseburger - but the lasting impression left by the show is how busy a place this White House is. During a Blue Room interview between Williams and President Obama, the question of whether the Obama administration is taking on too many massive tasks came up. Mr. Obama laughed, shook his head and made a good point: "What, exactly, would you have me give up?"
It's a fair question. The President has departed an overseas very-strained-friendship tour through the Middle East that will culminate with a historic address in Cairo. Eight years of Bush administration violence and idiocy in the region, coupled with a deliberate disinterest in fostering any meaningful movement in the Israel/Palestine peace process, has left the Mideast even angrier and more dangerous than usual. Can't ignore that.
Mr. Obama cannot give up his focus on the deteriorating situation in Pakistan for a variety of reasons, one being the ongoing and umbilically connected American war in neighboring Afghanistan, another being the fact that bungling the Pakistan situation could unleash a sub-continental conflagration that would imperil us all, and, well, those two reasons pretty much do the trick. Pakistan is fighting the Taliban in its own streets, and the security of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is dubious on the best of days. Can't ignore that.
Lees verder: http://www.truthout.org/060409J
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