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January 21, 2009
Merle Vasanti Gyan
KIW has never had a bigger booster . . . nor has the vast worldwide staff ever been keener than we are (and always will be) on Toronto-and-Trinidad's effervescently beautiful Merle Vasanti Gyan.
Merle stands out in a crowd. She sparkles and shines with her own special luminance.
In 2006, the hosts of a Toronto television show plucked Merle out of the studio audience and gave her a few minutes of her own airtime.
It's so fun to watch :)
In this part, Merle is pulled out of the studio audience in a local Toronto television show . . . all because of her infectious laugh . . .
(Watch this episode (1) in a separate pop-up window by clicking here)
A week or so later, this episode ran - documenting her "makeover" . . .
(Watch this episode (2) in a separate pop-up window by clicking here)
Some things never die.
Seattle Times; 25 December 2007; p. B4
(From each and every staff member here at KIW ... Thanks Merlie!)
Posted by williamfrick at 3:25 PM | Comments (2)
January 20, 2009
2396 words . . .
KIW's rhetoricians . . .as well as our musicians, engineers, scientists, athletes and . . . well . . . let's just say the entire staff, feel very good today.
It's been a long time since we liked the sound of the world, but we do indeed like the sound of the world today . . .
. . . [T]he time has come to set aside childish things [ . . . ] to choose our better history [. . .] Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.
US President Barack Obama, 20 January, 2009, Washington, DC
Text of President Obama's Inaugural speech; 20 January 2009 (pdf)
Posted by williamfrick at 4:06 PM | Comments (0)
January 17, 2009
a sad tale . . .
As the Republican party's President prepares to leave the White House in a few days, KIW is reminded that it's been a long eight years.
Kieth Olbermann lays it out for us . . .
Countdown, MSNBC; 16 January, 2009
And speaking of Mr. Olbermann . . . some of the more, well . . . profane members of the vast worldwide staff find the following quote worthy of a chuckle . . .
"Because I can't say, 'Shut the fuck up,' that's why, frankly."
MSNBC Journalist Keith Olbermann responding to the following question from his boss at MSNBC: "Why do you have to tell the President of the United States to 'Shut the hell up'?"
'One Angry Man - Is Keith Olbermann changing TV news?'; by Peter J. Boyer; The New Yorker; June 23, 2008
Posted by williamfrick at 3:54 PM | Comments (0)
January 14, 2009
common sense ...
"The U.S. must make clear that we will not support either side when it uses violence beyond its borders.
We must demand that humanitarian aid as well as press and U.N. observers be permitted to enter Gaza without delay -- and that hostilities cease so that lifesaving commodities can be distributed.
If Israel will not comply, as when it attacked a U.N. relief convoy Thursday, the U.S. should break the siege of Gaza itself to supply food and medical supplies, just as we would for Israel in similar circumstances.
The special U.S.-Israeli relationship puts us in a unique position to take that temporary step, while assuring our Israeli friends that no rockets enter Gaza along with aid."Craig Corrie Father of Rachel Corrie an an Officer of the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice
Seattle Post-Intelligencer; 14 January, 2009; P A15; 'U.S. strategy for Mideast peace misguided'
PDF
Posted by williamfrick at 3:05 PM | Comments (0)
January 13, 2009
seal 1991
Back in the mid-1990s one member of KIW's music department remembers being asked what music he was currently listening to. He replied, "Mozart and Seal."
Somehow the two still seem to go together.
Enjoy this studio concert that Seal put out on videotape during the 1990s ...
Watch the concert in a pop-up window, here
Seal in Wikipedia
Posted by williamfrick at 4:30 PM | Comments (0)
classic Joni Mitchell
Sometime during the early 1970s Joni Mitchell gave this concert for a BBC television audience. It's Joni in all of her talented hippie chick glory (KIW's favorite of her many brilliant incarnations) . . .
Watch her concert in a pop-up window, here
Posted by williamfrick at 4:19 PM | Comments (0)
January 12, 2009
fear and loathing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
With just days left in his Presidential term, George W. Bush faced the press in the White House this morning.
The result was a bizzare spectacle. That of a mediocre man, who - eight years prior - had been catapulted into an office completely above his abilities, by a political party concerned only with taking power via any means available.
Radicals at the core of the Republican party used his bumpkin appeal, his family name and his genuinely simple-minded view of the world, to successfully manipulate a large and apparently clueless portion of the American electorate. Bush himself probably didn't realize what an empty suit he was viewed as, when he was given the office of the Presidency eight years ago. It may have dawned on him recently.
But the man speaking to the press today still - stubbornly and against the weight of reality - refuses to consciously fathom the profound depth of his incompetence.
Yet there seems an unconscious realization - unable to remain hidden, even from this simple mind - that he has failed at everything.
One senses pain . . . and shame . . . under the surface of this 62-year-old man's childish mannerisms.
One senses that in his heart-of-hearts he knows that his negligence likely allowed the attacks of 9/11/2001 to be carried out, rather than contained. One knows that he knows that he took a noble nation to war based upon propaganda that even he must now realize was absurd. Even the dumbest fool now understands that hundreds of thousands of people - innocent people - were killed and maimed and hurt, on a misguided and seemingly cavalier whim.
We see in our President a genuinely fearful person. Afraid - still - of cave-dwelling boogie men who "want to attack the homeland." He is so terrorized by this truth, that one wonders if he only discovered it after 9/11/2001. . . because it was there for any reasonably aware person to know long before that day. Any person qualified to be President should have known.
But that is the ultimate point . . . so evident in every day of his Presidency. This man is not of the caliber required in a President. Let's hope that even the simple-minded among us now know that. Let's hope that even the simple-minded among us are just a little smarter after these long eight years . . .
George W. Bush, on behalf of this great nation . . . Ciao baby!
It can't come soon enough.
Posted by williamfrick at 9:45 PM | Comments (0)
January 11, 2009
Neil Young in 1971
Just before the album Harvest was released in 1971, a young Neil Young ventured to England and performed this nearly perfect concert for a small British television audience . . .
Thanks for the good old BBC :)
Posted by williamfrick at 4:21 PM | Comments (1)
toughness . . .
KIW is encouraged that somebody in the mainstream press is finally writing the truth ...
"Having brushed aside warnings of the terrorist threat, the Bush White House panicked in the wake of 9/11, magnifying a band of stateless religious zealots into an existential threat to the republic."
Author and columnist Gene Lyons of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
We had to go to a small newspaper at the edge of the country to read this truth . . . but it's a start.
The Garden Isle (Kauai, Hawai'i); 8 January, 2009; p A3; 'Torture: A coward's idea of toughness'
Tortute - a coward's idea of toughness.pdf
Posted by williamfrick at 11:29 AM | Comments (0)