Obama’s sentiment about sediment on 60 minutes…

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Chalk this post up to my interest in how the English language is used (and misused). I thought college linguistics was fascinating. I guess my fascination with presidential speech patterns is somewhat understandable.

Bear in mind that the last president particularly drove me to distraction with his misusing or mispronouncing about every thirteenth word that he uttered. I suppose I’m used to being hyper sensitive to listening to the chronic mistakes GW made.


I’m guessing most folk probably didn’t even notice this and if they did wouldn’t care but the other night (Sunday to be exact) on 60 minutes President Obama interchanged two words. He was talking about Guantanamo, Cheney and the creation of more anti American “sediment.” He clearly had meant to say “sentiment.” Many people mix those two words without realizing it, just take a look at the internet.
For the record: sediment is the matter that settles to the bottom of a liquid, while sentiment is a feeling, emotion, attitude or opinion towards something.

However, that wasn’t the interesting thing… everybody makes mistakes and the rest of the interview was pretty coherent. Afterwards I listened to what the different station’s pundits had to say about the 60 Minutes segment and they varied from “it was awful he laughed inappropriately at the economic crisis” to “he was informative, sincere and spoke directly to the issues.” Of course no one mentioned the mistake because it’s not a very important one in the scope of a speech.

I had to laugh though because when I got to Rachel Maddow afterwards they had shown the clip where Obama misstated as part of a story on Cheney. When Rachel spoke about it she very clearly enunciated the word “sentiment” with a smile. I’m pretty sure she noticed the switch. So is that the jaws of the liberal/socialist/left leaning media monster that we keep hearing about being too gentle on Obama? So she’s mean to that nice, sweet hearted old Dick Cheney while she’s indulgent towards that contemptible, nasty Barack Obama. Mildly amusing. And not to be soft on Rachel but she was a Rhodes Scholar and has a doctorate in political science. I think she can take it.

If it had been Bush it would have just been simply another day, another speech, another mangled word, because after all George W was certainly our most “misunderestimated” president.
Wait what’d he say?

G’night,

Laura

Obama laughs too much: quick get Rahm to pass that pissy look down.

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I watched President Obama on 60 Minutes last night and thought it went okay.
He seems to understand the issues and is willing to talk to the press and public about what’s going on.
This is something we haven’t seen in a president in a very long time.
And after eight years of a president that couldn’t seem to answer a question without confusing whatever it was he was trying to say (and sometimes we never quite knew what he was going for) it’s nice to have a president that can complete a thought without a teleprompter.

However when I got up all I heard about was how Obama laughed too much, it’s inappropriate, he’s not serious enough, and spending too much time talking to the public.
It seems absolutely impossible to please anyone these days.

There are so many things going on in the world and all that you could find were various clips of Obama laughing that were showing up everywhere all day and into the night. Discouraging.
I guess he needs to practice looking serious and pissy in the mirror more. Surely Rahm could help with that.




Far more interesting is the underwater volcano near Tonga in the Pacific. Amazing photos.



Also now Alaska’s Mount Redoubt, 100 miles southwest of Anchorage, erupted.
I bet Bobby Jindal wishes he hadn’t criticized money going towards volcano monitoring in his republican rebuttal speech now.

Some of AIG’s folk gave their bonus money back, but not all of them.

Bernie Madoff’s accountant David Friehling was charged with securities fraud… now how about that bookkeeping wife of his?

My thought of the day: Perhaps Dick Cheney would shut up and stop fear-mongering to deliberately undermine the President of the USA if he was being prosecuted on the criminal charges warranted for torture as he should be under our laws. Why after the Clinton debacle do we turn our eyes from true crimes?

On the lighter side: two marriages:
Bruce Willis (54) married a thirty-two year old model what a surprise… Hmm.
The interesting one is David Letterman. He finally married his long term mate Regina Lasko. They began dating in 1986 and have a five year old son.
Congrats and good luck!
And speaking of marriage: Politico reported that Senator Chuck Schumer of NY has changed his mind on same sex marriage. This might mark a broader change in thought towards equality and human rights. We shall see.

G’night,

Laura

Yes, maybe we have a stimulus package, well, so "they" say, we shall see.

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News said that the senate has come to an agreement on Obama's stimulus package with a few republican senators on board.
We'll see shortly I suppose. I'm interested in what the final adjusted product will turn out to be and what comes back from the conference committee. Won't help those that all ready lost their homes, or jobs but it seems something would be better than nothing for some people.
::sigh::

I'm a little bit confused however, if the government helping it's people, providing services for them or regulating those that have failed is socialism and bad. Then what the hell do we need a government for? Are they suggesting some kind of anarchy or perhaps we could divide the USA into independent "country states" that would OF COURSE have their own governments...
Now there's a nightmare situation.

What in the world is the fascination with Joe the Plumber? (well, the almost plumber and not exactly Joe either)
He's sent to Israel to "report on the war or the people or something I never really understood."
Now he's gone to Washington, DC to participate in a political strategy session as "The Conservative Working Group's" guest speaker. It's a group of Capital Hill GOP staffers. Politico's Joe the Plumber article

Why? That's the only question I can think of. I don't know why anyone would want his opinion of the economic stimulus package or any kind of strategy. Can we disapprove his nomination for speaking for anyone, especially the GOPers?
Seems he has tax issues and is unemployed. Is there no one else out there to listen to?
Oh wait, yea, I remember now there's Rush.
Not seeing any change in the republican party.

McCain sounds angry yet again.

Cheney just sounds scary and evil... another "Why?" there.
We never see or hear from him when he's in office and now he starts talking.
Sleep well my dearies, precious will take care of you.

G'night,

Laura

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Sixty-one days left of George W. Bush... or the white sale at the White House.

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Remember Michele Bachmann the republican rep from Minnesota who almost lost her re-election bid because of her statement about Obama being anti-American and that the media should investigate members of congress to see if they were pro or anti Americans?
Well, she's at it again. Now she calls it a "urban legend" and that she never said that on Hardball to Chris Matthews.
Here's a link to the story Bachmann's Urban Legend
This is the clip of her backtracking on what she previously said.


This is what she originally said to Chris Matthews:


Now my problem with this aside from the text of what she said going into the never never land of McCarthyism (as in what would she recommend is done with these anti-American representatives that were elected in a democracy by the people).
My real problem is that before the video "You Tube" world people like Michele could get away with backtracking by saying "you took my words out of context or I never said that I was misquoted" and nothing could be proven.
But now, everything is on video and available to the public. You can watch and hear what they say.
Lying doesn't work that well anymore... not when the whole conversations can be seen online.
LIAR, liar, lies... Nobody stands behind what they say anymore and now this culture of evasion and outright lying is easily exposed for what it is: people lying and cheating to cover their own asses. It's endemic and discouraging.
Too bad she was re-elected.

And speaking of lying... VP Dick Cheney and Alberto Gonzales (former attorney general) were indicted in Texas.
Cheney/Gonzales indictment
This amuses me, of all the outrageous things Cheney has been associated with this is what they indict him on. Amazing and sad at the same time. Of course it still might not go anywhere but it is an interesting development.

Another thing, the news reporters are tossing around the terms disinflation and deflation while talking about the economic crisis. They've been using disinflation more often but it's really a slippery slope from one to the other it would seem...
Scary stuff. Seems the auto industry is in real difficulty since congress is in disagreement about the bail outs now.
I think bankruptcy mightn't be a bad thing, it's a really tough call. What a mess.

disinflation:
A slowing of the rate at which prices increase. Typically, this occurs during a recession as sales drop and retailers are not able to pass on higher prices to customers.

deflation:
A general decline in prices, often caused by a reduction in the supply of money or credit. Deflation can be caused also by a decrease in government, personal or investment spending. The opposite of inflation, deflation has the side effect of increased unemployment since there is a lower level of demand in the economy, which can lead to an economic depression.

Declining prices, if they persist, generally create a vicious spiral of negatives such as falling profits, closing factories, shrinking employment and incomes, and increasing defaults on loans by companies and individuals. To counter deflation, the Federal Reserve (the Fed) can use monetary policy to increase the money supply and deliberately induce rising prices, causing inflation. Rising prices provide an essential lubricant for any sustained recovery because businesses increase profits and take some of the depressive pressures off wages and debtors of every kind.
Note: these definitions come from:Investopedia

Not political:
Got a free 21 pound turkey and a second one for $5.00 not a bad days shopping.
I'm a coupon clipper and shop depending on what we use that's on sale, and look for double coupons too.
For instance I totaled $47.87 in Waldbaums, saved $36.26 in coupons and qualified for a free turkey (which I got).
Not bad? Well, then I went to King Kullen and totaled $72.25 and saved $70.35 in coupons/sales.
So today I saved a total of $106.61. I love to do that and we can use the savings for other things that's for sure.
Really keeping an eye on the budget these days.

Anyway,
Going to pack it in early again.
Tired and needing sleep.
Had a bad nightmare last night, woke up and then couldn't sleep for a while.
Ugh.

G'night

Laura

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