High Apple Pie In the Sky Hopes

If you're free next Wednesday, the University Near Here has a major event: "High Hopes", which is described this way:

President Barack Obama's election and presidency hold different meanings for many people. The University of New Hampshire will explore the diverse and layered meanings of hope and the real-life manifestations and complications of change in the "era of Obama" at an event Wednesday, Sept. 23, 2009.
Uh, ok. But what's it about? Take it away, Cait Vaughn:
"Since November, whether one is having an academic conversation in a university setting with faculty and students, or sitting on the porch with friends, or talking to young children -- the themes of hope, change, and possibility continue to emerge and they grow more complex and layered with each conversation," said Cait Vaughan with the UNH Center for the Humanities.
Yes, I've noticed that myself. Emerging, complex, layered themes out the wazoo. It's a mess, frankly. But the thing, again: what's it about?
At this event, participants will explore what import and substance these concepts have to the culture of the United States, now and in the future. How do people of all different backgrounds view and understand "the price and promise of citizenship," particularly under the Obama administration? What do President Barack Obama's words, ideas, and style of leadership convey to and demand of U.S. citizens as we work toward the perfecting of our union?
Where do people learn to write like this? Where's the style guide that suggests overstuffing your paragraphs with vagueness and bullshit?

Oh well. Maybe there will be a part where everyone writes letters to themselves about how they can help the president.

Who's going to be there?

The event will consist of a moderated panel discussion followed by questions and a group discussion with the audience. Panelists are Marla Brettschneider, professor of political science and women's studies; Carol Conaway, assistant professor of women's studies; and Melissa-Leigh Gore, an undergraduate student in English and Africana and African American studies.

The event is sponsored by the minors in Africana and African American Studies; American Studies; and Race, Culture and Power under the UNH Center for the Humanities.

I think it's safe to say this will be yet another shining example of the University's political monoculture delivering a tongue bath to its current idol. (Apparently they couldn't coax anyone with a token Y chromosome to participate.)

I found Melissa-Leigh's blog, by the way. Interesting! Her qualifications to be on the panel?

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
This year I fell in love with Barack Obama!

36. What political issue stirred you the most? Haha see number 35.

She'll fit right in.

URLs du Jour

2009-09-18

  • In today's "This Is How Those People Think" Department, Patterico quotes LA Times writer Noam N. Levey:
    Imagine the debate over healthcare legislation on Capitol Hill as a tussle among three friends out for dinner.

    All three have been struggling to pay their bills lately. When the check arrives, they try to figure out how to divide it. The problem is no one can really afford the meal. And if one manages to pay less, the other two will go home even deeper in the hole.

    […]

    Think of our three friends as consumers, businesses and government, the three major groups that pay for healthcare in America.

    Uh huh. I'm sure readers will note the problem there, so I won't beat you over the head with it; if you'd like to see Patterico's analysis, click over.

    Mr. Levey probably thought he was making a clever analogy, and (even worse), the LA Times editors agreed, and (even worser) the LA Times probably paid him for it.

  • Jonah Goldberg has a great column today, noting the race cards that so many Obama supporters have been playing in an effort to discredit and muzzle critics of the Administration. His final point, inspired by a recent Maureen Dowd column containing this gem about Congressman Wilson's "You lie!" shout during Obama's recent speech:
    But, fair or not, what I heard was an unspoken word in the air: You lie, boy!
    Jonah's response:
    It's the "fair or not" that gives Dowd away. She admits to hearing racism whether or not it's warranted. That's called prejudice. And unlike Wilson's foolish outburst, Dowd's was carefully considered. Dowd, Carter and Sharpton can't grasp that conservatives are less hung up on race than they are and that we can get past Obama's skin color. "Some people just can't believe a black man is president and will never accept it," writes Dowd. She's right. She's one of them.

  • Iowahawk foregoes his usual laff riot and pays tribute to Norman Borlaug, the greatest Iowa farmer who ever lived. That boy can write.