Perspectives, Creativity & Humour

KONRAD NG

2009-11-25T02:44:00.000-08:00

Maya Soetoro with her husband, Konrad Ng of Burlington, Ont., and their daughter Suhaila, 4, after meeting with Obama supporters in Honolulu in May 2007. (Lucy Pemoni/Associated Press)

Konrad's father Howard Ng was born in Sandakan and married his mother, Joan from Kudat. Howard and Joan then moved to Canada where Konrad Ng was born there. Though Konrad is a Canadian, his parents are Malaysian (or maybe ex-Malaysian).

Konrad then married Maya Soetoro, a half-sister to Obama. Maya was born to Lolo Soetoro, an Indonesian businessman, and Ann Dunham, a white American cultural anthropologist, who is also Obama’s mother.

That give Obama not only one but two links to Asia, i.e. Indonesia and Malaysia.

ASIAN CENTRE FOR JOURNALISM OFFERS 15 FELLOWSHIPS FOR 2010

2009-11-23T02:56:00.000-08:00

Nov 23, 2009 - Applications for the 2010-2011 Fellowships for M.A. Journalism are now being accepted by the Konrad Adenauer Asian Centre for Journalism at the Ateneo de Manila University (ACFJ).

The fellowships are awarded to full-time Asian journalists who have excellent professional and academic record, strong commitment to good journalism and leadership qualities.

According to a statement issued by ACFJ, the grant covers tuition and other expenses for the two-year M.A. Journalism programme which is offered by the Ateneo de Manila University with ACFJ's support.

Since its inception in 2003, 90 journalists from 15 Asian countries have received the grants.

Ateneo's M.A. Journalism is distinctive for its innovative use of online and conventional learning methods. The master's programme covers 12 courses which are conducted using a mix of online and conventional methods.

Six are purely online courses, three are held in the conventional classroom,
and another three are hybrid courses that take place alternately online and on-campus.

The statement says the programme's design allows working journalists and other media professionals to study at their own pace and time, and in their own homes or workplaces.

Courses in ethics, media law and news writing are at the core of the programme.

ACFJ, a joint project of Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS) and Ateneo, was founded in June 2000 to promote good journalism in Asia by providing training opportunities primarily for working journalists.

Application forms for the fellowship grants can be downloaded from http://www.ateneo.edu/acfj or requested by e-mail at newsroom@admu.edu.ph.

ACFJ can also be contacted by phone at (+632) 9263253 or (+632) 4266001 (local 5296), or fax at (+632) 9263254. The closing date is Feb 12 next year.

For admission to the M.A. programme, a separate set of application forms is
required. These are also available from ACFJ or Ateneo's Office of Graduate
Studies (OGS).

FOUR CHARACTERISTICS OF MUSCULAR MEN

2009-11-04T01:46:00.000-08:00

Want to be that guy in the gym?

You know the one; the guy who picks up a weight and seems to effortlessly grow muscle. If so, there are some adjustments you should make in your everyday life. These adjustments are in line with the four characteristics of muscular men, and following them will help you be the one that gym-goers aspire to be.

Here are four characteristics of muscular men and what they mean to you.

1. Muscular Men Don’t Skip Meals

When it comes to building and maintaining a large volume of muscle mass, total calories and total carbs are important. While there are many men who can successfully build muscle mass without a problem, the number of them who manage to keep this muscle mass on their frame is far smaller.

Maintaining a lean body weight means that you’re dedicating a significant portion of your day to eating. You simply cannot get by eating the usual three squares a day.Muscular men typically do some meal planning, so they know when their next meal is coming, at the very least. Many will plan out all their meals beforehand, ensuring their calorie intake is where it needs to be. Eating is important for muscle gains and maintenance, which is why it’s among the four characteristics of muscular men.

Further, muscular men understand that their meals are best made up of a combination of macronutrients: proteins, carbohydrates and moderate amounts of dietary fat. It’s hard to maintain such large volumes of muscle glycogen stores when you’re on a low-carbohydrate diet, even with weekend carb-ups. For this reason, muscular men usually aren’t using low-carb nutrition plans.

A smarter idea is to create a diet plan that contains a more moderate carbohydrate intake (30 percent to 40 percent of total calories), combined with enough protein to meet your requirements and healthy dietary fats to round out the diet.

2. Muscular Men Spend Less Time in the Gym

You might think that maintaining large volumes of muscle mass equates to hours spent in the gym, but in fact quite the opposite is true.Muscular men know that muscle is built when they are out of the gym; therefore, they design their workouts to allow for enough rest. If muscular men are spending more time in the gym per workout (one hour plus training sessions), they’re taking full days off in between sessions to allow for complete recovery. Now, that’s one of the four characteristics of muscular men that’s easy to adopt.

3. Muscular Men Sleep a Lot

If you survey professional bodybuilders, you’ll find that many of them take naps on a regular basis. Not only do they make sure to get a solid seven or eight hours of sleep at night, but they also take naps after their training sessions.

While taking midday naps may not be a practical solution for you if you’re busy at work, the point here is that you must give value to your sleep time. If it’s one of the four characteristics of muscular men, why can’t it be one for you too?

Cutting yourself short on nightly rest to stay up and watch late-night TV is going to seriously impact your ability to grow muscle over time. One or two nights isn’t something to get too worked up over, but if you’re regularly getting fewer than seven hours of sleep, something needs to change. Sleep time is the body’s prime time to repair the muscle tissue that’s been destroyed during your weight-lifting session and it is also when growth hormone levels tend to peak. Since growth hormones play a big role in the muscle-building process, maximizing the time when they are at their peak is definitely to your advantage.

4. Muscular Men Do a Variety of Workouts

While there are certainly some types of workouts that tend to be most conducive to putting on the muscle mass, muscular men get into the habit of applying different workout principles on a regular basis. In doing so, they are constantly challenging their muscles from different angles, applying different varieties of stimuli and shocking their muscles into growing. Once you hit a certain size and strength level, it can be hard to keep adding pounds to the bar every few weeks, which is why trying new techniques using the same weights becomes important.

I "Vant" to Pump You Up

So, if you want to be very muscular, start adopting the characteristics of muscular men. As the saying goes, if you want to be 200 pounds, eat like you are 200 pounds. Once you start walking in the steps of someone this size, you’ll find you are getting much closer to your goals.

WHAT BODY TYPE AM I?

2009-11-04T01:27:00.000-08:00

Mesomorphs

In a sense these individuals are the genetically blessed. They are muscular and ripped maintaining the best attributes of the ecto and endomorphs.

Mesomorphs are hard bodied and gain muscle easier than either of the other two body shapes.

Ladies will be hourglass shaped and Males rectangular.

Attributes & Traits of a MESOMORPH:

· Excellent posture

· Well defined muscle

· Large bones

· The torso tapers to a narrow low waist

· The bones and muscle in the head is prominent

· Facial features are well and clearly defined

· Arms and legs are well developed and even the digits in the hands are muscled

Attributes & Traits of an ENDOMORPH:

· Body may be round and soft

· Much of the mass is concentrated around the abdominal area

· Arms and legs may be short and tapered

· The feet of an endomorph may be small in relation to the rest of the body

· Upper arms and thighs are often more developed than the lower parts of the arms and legs

· Soft and smooth skin.

· Fine Hair

· Spherically shaped head

· Broad face and large head

Ectomorphs:

Ectomorphs are lean, and have difficulty gaining muscle. In woman there are no defined curves, in other words a straight up and down physique.

Men appear smaller, and slightly delicate.

Attributes & Traits of an ECTOMORPH:

· May have long fingers and toes

· May have a long neck

· Features are sharp and the face is triangular

· The skin is fair and tends to burn easily

· Due to their lack of muscle they may suffer extreme temperatures i.e. when it is hot they suffer extreme heat and when it is cold they suffer extreme cold

· They have fine, but not necessarily thin hair

I hope the pictures helped in pinpointing your body type.

Please remember, you fall into the category in which you have MOST attributes.

BUSH FAMILY POLITICAL HEIR IS SHIPPING OFF TO WAR

2009-10-29T03:00:00.000-07:00

George P. Bush, or "P" as he's known to some, is thought to be the biggest hope for a fourth generation of Bush family political leaders, with some suggesting that he might run for statewide office in Texas at some point in the next four to eight years. But, as The Daily Beast points out today, any future George P. Bush political ambitions will have to be put on hold as his Navy Reserve unit is set to be deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan in the coming weeks.
George P. Bush, son of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and nephew of former President George W. Bush, listens to a speaker during the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials annual convention in this June 23, 2006 photo, in Dallas.
(AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

Lt. Junior Grade Bush, 33, joined the Navy Reserve in 2007 as an intelligence officer. The Navy recently told him, like thousands of others, that the two ongoing wars required him to go active-duty overseas, potentially in Iraq or Afghanistan. "It's been communicated to me that it's not a question of 'if,' it's a question of 'when,'" Bush told The Daily Beast. "It's just a matter of time."

Bush, who said that he was inspired by the service of his grandfather George H.W. Bush as well as former NFL star Pat Tillman, signed up for an eight-year term in the Navy Reserve in 2007. When word got out about his enlistment, Bush told Politico that he was "disappointed" as he'd intended to keep it under wraps, saying, "I was hoping to keep this as confidential as possible. I'm not doing it for political purposes or anything along those lines." However, prior to his joining some opponents of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan roundly criticized the Bush administration for the Bush family's lack of service in the war effort, saying that if George W. Bush was willing to send the children of other Americans into harm's way overseas, then George P. Bush and other eligible Bush family members should join the armed services and risk their lives fighting for the country as well.

Compared to JFK Jr. due to his good looks and seemingly effortless public charisma, George Prescott Bush (his middle name honors his great-grandfather, former U.S. Sen. Prescott Bush) is the son of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and his wife, Columba Bush, who was born and raised in Mexico. Bush's half-Hispanic bloodline aided his burst onto the American political scene in 2000, when he helped his uncle George W. Bush rally up considerable Hispanic voter support by speaking at the Republican National Convention and starring in Spanish-language campaign ads, an effort that many feel helped Bush win the state of Florida's electoral votes, which turned out to be the controversial determining factor in the close election.

Born and raised in Florida, George P. Bush was a high school classmate of pop star Enrique Iglesias. After high school, he attended Rice University in Houston, where, just like his presidential uncle and grandfather, he was a walk-on on his school's baseball squad, though he quit the team during his sophomore year. After earning a degree in history from Rice, Bush got a job teaching at a Miami-area agricultural community. After leaving that job to hit the campaign trail in 2000, he entered law school at the University of Texas after NYU, Yale, Harvard, and Columbia rejected his applications. While there, he met his future bride, Amanda Williams, whom he asked to play golf on their first date. After graduation, they both practiced law in Dallas before moving to Austin in 2005. Bush now is a partner in a real estate investment firm while his wife practices law.

Other than being arrested at 18 for burglarizing the home of an ex-girlfriend, George P. Bush appears to have all the right credentials to carry the Bush legacy well into the future. While family members often refer to the former presidents Bush as "41" and "43," the Washington Post says that some close to the family have taken to referring to George P. Bush as "47," so it's probably safe to assume that those inside the family see him as a potential future Bush torchbearer just as many outside the family do. Could a possible Bush vs. Biden matchup be in the works for 2020 or 2024, with George P. Bush taking on Beau Biden, the attorney general of Delaware and son of the current vice president who also served in Iraq? In some circles, it may not be too early to speculate.

-- Brett Michael Dykes is a contributor to the Yahoo! News Blog

OBAMA: TWELVE MONTHS ON, THE STAR FALLS BACK TO EARTH

2009-10-29T02:56:00.000-07:00

By David Usborne

OCT 29 — If there was a degree of déjà vu for fans of Barack Obama crammed inside a university athletic arena in Hackensack, New Jersey, the other evening, it was entirely deliberate. They only had to close their eyes and listen to the deafening chants of "Yes We Can" to imagine they had been transported back to the heady days of a year ago when their candidate was on the verge of seizing the White House and making history.

Even with open eyes they could have felt some of that old frisson. Event organisers wandered the hall wearing shirts proclaiming "Yes We Can 2.0", as if they were selling the latest Windows update, and a giant banner stage-right gave top billing to Obama. The name beneath his, Corzine, might almost have been an afterthought.

This was not a re-election rally for Obama — not yet, please — but for Jon Corzine, the former boss of Goldman Sachs and now governor of New Jersey. He had invited the president to speak because, when Jersey voters go to the polls next Tuesday — New Jersey and Virginia are the only states where governorships are in play this year — it is not at all clear that they won't ditch him in favour of his Republican opponent, Chris Christie. The latest polls say it's too close to call.

That's better than in the summer when Christie had a double-digit lead. But, in the final stretch, Corzine needs to remind Democrats of the fervour of 12 months ago when they overwhelmingly chose Obama over John McCain. "One more time", the disco beat booms before the two men arrive on stage in front of a crowd of about 3,000 eager supporters. "One more time. We're going to celebrate. Oh yeah. Alright." Once at the microphone, Corzine promises to be brief. "I know who you came to see," he says.

Obama does what is required of him with his usual eloquence, speaking for 30 minutes. He looks happy to be campaigning again, relieved of Oval Office responsibilities for an afternoon, his stump oratory uncaged. But selflessness and politics do not go together. He is in New Jersey because what happens here next week will matter to him. This is an off-year for congressional races, so, rightly or wrongly, the outcome of these two gubernatorial races will be viewed by some as a first referendum on his presidency.

The President has already suffered a slow, but steady, decline in his approval ratings, so it cheers no one in the White House that the outcome in Jersey is so uncertain. In Virginia, where the President campaigned this week, the outlook is worse with most polls suggesting that the Democrat candidate, Creigh Deeds, will be walloped by his Republican rival, Bob McDonnell.

If Republicans seize the governors' mansions in both states, the embarrassment will be acute. That is just what happened in both New Jersey and Virginia back in 1993 before the Republicans seized control of the US Congress the following year, dealing a crippling blow to the newly minted Democratic President of the time, Bill Clinton.

But even losing one of them next week will scratch the sheen of President Obama, who seems, one year on from his election, to be hovering in the view of most Americans between competent and fumbling, notwithstanding the high esteem in which he is still held abroad and, of course, in the minds of the Nobel committee.

What is certain is that the almost-mad expectations placed on Obama that unusually warm night in Chicago's Grant Park when he delivered his victory speech last November, have given way now to a general unease about his performance in office. For sure, he has mostly avoided calamity. Not getting the Olympics for Chicago doesn't count. Nor is his administration in disarray or anything close to it. (Clinton had barely arrived in office before he was instantly engulfed in mini-scandals.) But the Obama magic that should be working to protect Democrats like Corzine and Deeds seems mostly to have leaked away.

New Jersey is a state that naturally belongs in the Democratic column. Moreover, since 1947, only two Jersey governors have failed to win a second term. But Corzine is unpopular in the state, thwacked by raising property taxes and the effects of the economic recession. "The New Jersey governor's race is going down to the wire," predicted the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

Virginia had been a red state — as far as the presidency was concerned — since 1964, but it turned blue for Obama and Democrats hailed it as a sign that their party was breaking the virtual lock that Republicans had long enjoyed on the South. Keep Virginia, they said, and the Democrats will keep the White House.

The plight of Deeds — 11 points down according to a recent poll in the Washington Post — is being interpreted as a measure of how far the pendulum is already tracking back to the Republicans in that state, and probably elsewhere. Just as Obama's victory was powered in part by his success in winning over independents, it is now the independents who are feeling disappointed and fleeing back to the other side.

"This is a state that Obama won by seven points," said Nick Ayres, executive director of the Republican Governors Association. "They don't want this to be their Olympics, Part II."

McDonnell, the Republican candidate, will be the first to put the blame on the President if he wins the Virginia race. "There are blocs of independent voters that are being driven over because they are very concerned about these federal policies: its spending and the new intrusions into the free enterprise system," he said. "Those voters probably leaned towards President Obama in the last cycle. But when voters see specifics... I think some bloc of voters said: 'This is not the change we thought we were getting'."

Back in Hackensack, Carrie Wilkins, a 44-year-old hairstylist, is exasperated by the bad press the President has been getting. "He has a very tough job," she says, arriving for the Corzine event with her 14-year-old son, Troy, whom she has taken out of school specially. "I don't think he has had a chance to do anything yet. He is trying, but it was such a mess when he came in. I kind of feel bad for him, actually."

Indeed, the attacks on Obama have become fiercer. Wisely, or otherwise, the White House has called out Fox News, owned by Rupert Murdoch, saying that it has abandoned all pretence of objectivity in the daily ear-boxing it gives Barack. Saturday Night Live, which last year so brilliantly skewered Sarah Palin, is getting sharper in its weekly skits on Obama. Meanwhile, the usual media stars of the conservative right, notably Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck, continue to grow their Obama-bashing brands. The Nobel Prize was a gift to them from heaven.

They know what they think, and would probably think it whatever the president did. A broader picture, and a much prettier one, is provided by the polls. According to the Real Clear Politics poll of polls, the President's approval rating is still hovering above 50 per cent, but only just. Sometimes we forget, however, to measure Obama against his opponents. Little fuss was made over a poll by CNN last week, which showed the Republican Party with just 36 per cent approval — the lowest it has been in a decade.

A more reliable observer of the scene may be Troy, the schoolboy. Asked if he thought Obama had done a good job so far, he paused for a second and then delivered a rolling shrug of the shoulders. "I guess so." Meaning he, like many Americans, is not quite sure yet.

A lot of things are in the pending tray in Washington. Pending is the economic recovery, for instance. While the signs of recovery seem to multiply almost daily, so do the warnings that this will be a largely jobless one, at least for the time being. The breaking of the 10,000 mark on the Dow Jones Industrial Average this month looks encouraging to economists, but it is galling to the almost one-in-ten Americans out of work.

Pending also is the grinding effort on Capitol Hill to pass healthcare reform. This has been much more of a struggle than the Obama team — many of whom came to Washington with scant experience of its labyrinthine ways — ever expected. The success or failure of the healthcare push could change the perception of Obama profoundly. While momentum towards a deal seems to be building at last, a wise person would not bet on its passing just yet.

The debate has also exposed what some now see as a naivety in Obama's candidature: his dream of creating a new spirit of bi-partisanship in Washington has hardly come to pass. So far, only one Republican has stepped forward to support just one of the versions of healthcare reform to have surfaced from five congressional committees.

Healthcare is one of several areas where Obama has displayed characteristics that his supporters call patience and a preference for conciliation, but which others brand as dithering and betraying an absence of the kind of toughness that was typically personified by Lyndon B Johnson, 45 years ago. "Healthcare could be his hammer," argues Larry Sabato, a professor of politics at the University of Virginia. "If he gets it, he will have proven that his style works, that you don't have to be an in-your-face LBJ type to get significant healthcare reform. But, if it falls apart or he gets a tiny piece of it, then there will be criticism that he is ineffective and not tough enough."

The narrative of a President who is too pliable has been growing in volume since the summer, much to the chagrin of the White House. Nor is it coming only from the right. There are those on the left who feel let down by Obama and are infuriated by his "political pragmatism". They object, for instance, when he refuses to push aggressively for the so-called "public option" to compete with private insurers in a new healthcare system, or when he declines to meet with the Dalai Lama in Washington because his agenda with China is more important to him. They even don't like it when he brushes off a member of Congress openly calling him a liar as being unimportant.

That's the way Obama is, but some contend it is unhelpful. "Obama has created an atmosphere of no fear," Douglas Brinkley, a history professor at Rice University and political biographer, told the National Journal. "Nobody is really worried about the revenge of Barack Obama, because he is not a vengeful man. That's what we love about him; he is so high-minded, and a conciliatory guy, and he tries to govern with a sense of consensus — all noble goals, but they don't get you very far in this Washington knifing environment."

As Obama takes his time deciding whether to send as many as 40,000 more soldiers to Afghanistan, he has again come in for attack, not least from Dick Cheney, who brooded in the shadows while in power but prefers daylight in opposition. "What ... Cheney calls dithering, President Obama calls his solemn responsibility to the men and women in uniform and to the American public," Robert Gibbs, the White House spokesman, shot back. "We've all seen what happens when somebody doesn't take that responsibility seriously."

The truth is that when Obama has played it tough, it has usually been in ways almost designed to infuriate the conservatives who call him lily-livered. He fired the CEO of General Motors earlier his year before bailing the company out and, just last week, his administration took extraordinary steps to force banks and lending institutions to scale back previously outrageous pay deals for their executives. Both things were bold and in-your-face. But they also represent severe cases of interfering in the private market, which the right abhors.

Obama knows he is still on probation. In his speech in Hackensack, he asked the crowd "to cast aside the cynics and the sceptics and prove to all Americans that leaders who do what's right and who do what's hard will be rewarded and not rejected". It was meant as an appeal to Jersey voters to show mercy to Corzine and give him back his job. But, with the Nov 3 polls being seen by some as the first verdict on Obama's infant presidency, he might too have been asking for a little understanding for himself. — The Independent

NO SEASON FOR POLITICS

2009-10-28T04:08:00.000-07:00

I just cannot help but give my two cents again on Malaysian politics particularly in Sabah. An active mind wants to get it out of the system and share to the world (even though none may want to hear) and that would somehow make my blog viable and relevant.

I would want to consider myself as thinking from outside the box and talking from a distance. I do not want to align myself with any political party in Malaysia (even though I admire one or two or three parties) but if I were in the USA I would proudly say that I am a Republican (that said because I think I am 80% traditionalist and 20% rebellious ~ in short, I am not really a full-fledged enterprising person or an adventurer just for the sake of being one in the sense that he goes to uncharted territories knowing the danger and finding it too late to make a U turn. I am a person who desires to know his available resources and bloom with them).

In US they have a season to "play" politics and time to sit down and work so that the country can move forward. There's the presidential elections and there's the mid-term elections. Simply put, why can't Malaysian politicians do the same?

Sadly, we are still in communalism politics ("still" I say, but looks like the way things go, communalism politics is here to stay in Malaysia for good!). But recently we heard someone said "ketuanan" could be replaced with "keterasan"; roughly, "ketuanan" means "supremacy" and "keterasan" is "vanguard" or "leadership". With that, there it seems to be some glitter of hope that I could be wrong when I say communalism politics is here to stay in Malaysia for good.

We saw how Nazi Germany crumbled and Apartheid South Africa no longer exist. Let's just hope that race-based politics or race-based anything, will see its demise not too long from now.

Today we heard in Sabah that the state PKR is fast dismantling itself. From my personal point of view Jeffrey Kitingan, Christina Liew and John Ghani should all join SAPP and form a new state government that practice autonomy from the central administration and also practice meritocracy. If SAPP can't then it would at least be a formidable opposition which is vital. And it should keep trying and trying. DAP in Penang and PAS in Kelantan are excellent examples where central influence has been kept at bay. We will try to do that in Sabah.

Then only we see a stable state which is able to preserve its cultural & socio-economic characteristics. No more Roman-type of empire trying to impose its will on far-ranging provinces, or neo-colonialism of British-style divide and conquer methodology attempting to subjugate certain communities.

When things stabilize, and strong political parties with impeccable leadership prevails (sans graft, cronyism and arrogance), then we can hope for seasonal politics where there will be time to fight and time to sit down together and move the country forward.

REBRANDING AMERICA ~ BONO

2009-10-18T03:37:00.000-07:00

Wow! This is one of the best articles I've read in a long time!
I wouldn't say that I am a fan of Bono, but I think I am beginning to admire and respect him.

OCT 18 - A few years ago, I accepted a Golden Globe award by barking out an expletive.

One imagines President Obama did the same when he heard about his Nobel, and not out of excitement.

When Obama takes the stage at Oslo City Hall this December, he won’t be the first sitting president to receive the peace prize, but he might be the most controversial. There’s a sense in some quarters of these not-so-United States that Norway, Europe and the World haven’t a clue about the real President Obama; instead, they fixate on a fantasy version of the president, a projection of what they hope and wish he is, and what they wish America to be.

Well, I happen to be European, and I can project with the best of them. So here’s why I think the virtual Obama is the real Obama, and why I think the man might deserve the hype. It starts with a quotation from a speech he gave at the United Nations last month:

“We will support the Millennium Development Goals, and approach next year’s summit with a global plan to make them a reality. And we will set our sights on the eradication of extreme poverty in our time.”

They’re not my words, they’re the president’s. If they’re not familiar, it’s because they didn’t make many headlines. But for me, these 36 words are why I believe Obama could well be a force for peace and prosperity — if the words signal action.

The millennium goals, for those of you who don’t know, are a persistent nag of a noble, global compact. They’re a set of commitments we all made nine years ago whose goal is to halve extreme poverty by 2015. Barack Obama wasn’t there in 2000, but he’s there now. Indeed he’s gone further — all the way, in fact. Halve it, he says, then end it.

Many have spoken about the need for a rebranding of America. Rebrand, restart, reboot. In my view these 36 words, alongside the administration’s approach to fighting nuclear proliferation and climate change, improving relations in the Middle East and, by the way, creating jobs and providing health care at home, are rebranding in action.

These new steps — and those 36 words — remind the world that America is not just a country but an idea, a great idea about opportunity for all and responsibility to your fellow man.

All right ... I don’t speak for the rest of the world. Sometimes I think I do — but as my bandmates will quickly (and loudly) point out, I don’t even speak for one small group of four musicians. But I will venture to say that in the farthest corners of the globe, the president’s words are more than a pop song people want to hear on the radio. They are lifelines.

In dangerous, clangorous times, the idea of America rings like a bell (see King, M.L., Jr., and Dylan, Bob). It hits a high note and sustains it without wearing on your nerves. (If only we all could.) This was the melody line of the Marshall Plan and it’s resonating again.

Why? Because the world sees that America might just hold the keys to solving the three greatest threats we face on this planet: extreme poverty, extreme ideology and extreme climate change. The world senses that America, with renewed global support, might be better placed to defeat this axis of extremism with a new model of foreign policy.

It is a strangely unsettling feeling to realise that the largest navy, the fastest air force, the fittest strike force, cannot fully protect us from the ghost that is terrorism .... Asymmetry is the key word from Kabul to Gaza .... Might is not right.

I think back to a phone call I got a couple of years ago from General James Jones. At the time, he was retiring from the top job at Nato; the idea of a President Obama was a wild flight of the imagination.

General Jones was curious about the work many of us were doing in economic development, and how smarter aid — embodied in initiatives like President George W. Bush’s Emergency Program for AIDS Relief and the Millennium Challenge Corporation — was beginning to save lives and change the game for many countries.

Remember, this was a moment when America couldn’t get its cigarette lit in polite European nations like Norway; but even then, in the developing world, the United States was still seen as a positive, even transformative, presence.

The general and I also found ourselves talking about what can happen when the three extremes — poverty, ideology and climate — come together.

We found ourselves discussing the stretch of land that runs across the continent of Africa, just along the creeping sands of the Sahara — an area that includes Sudan and northern Nigeria.

He also agreed that many people didn’t see that the Horn of Africa — the troubled region that encompasses Somalia and Ethiopia — is a classic case of the three extremes becoming an unholy trinity (I’m paraphrasing) and threatening peace and stability around the world.

The military man also offered me an equation. Stability = security + development.

In an asymmetrical war, he said, the emphasis had to be on making American foreign policy conform to that formula.

Enter Barack Obama.

If that last line still seems like a joke to you ... it may not for long.

Obama has put together a team of people who believe in this equation. That includes the general himself, now at the National Security Council; the vice president, a former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; the Republican defence secretary; and a secretary of state, someone with a long record of championing the cause of women and girls living in poverty, who is now determined to revolutionise health and agriculture for the world’s poor.

And it looks like the bipartisan coalition in Congress that accomplished so much in global development over the past eight years is still holding amid rancour on pretty much everything else. From a development perspective, you couldn’t dream up a better dream team to pursue peace in this way, to rebrand America.

The president said that he considered the peace prize a call to action. And in the fight against extreme poverty, it’s action, not intentions, that counts. That stirring sentence he uttered last month will ring hollow unless he returns to next year’s United Nations summit meeting with a meaningful, inclusive plan, one that gets results for the billion or more people living on less than $1 a day. Difficult. Very difficult. But doable.

The Nobel Peace Prize is the rest of the world saying, “Don’t blow it.”

But that’s not just directed at Obama. It’s directed at all of us. What the president promised was a “global plan,” not an American plan. The same is true on all the other issues that the Nobel committee cited, from nuclear disarmament to climate change — none of these things will yield to unilateral approaches. They’ll take international cooperation and American leadership.

The president has set himself, and the rest of us, no small task.

That’s why America shouldn’t turn up its national nose at popularity contests. In the same week that Obama won the Nobel, the United States was ranked as the most admired country in the world, leapfrogging from seventh to the top of the Nation Brands Index survey — the biggest jump any country has ever made. Like the Nobel, this can be written off as meaningless ... a measure of Obama’s celebrity (and we know what people think of celebrities).

But an America that’s tired of being the world’s policeman, and is too pinched to be the world’s philanthropist, could still be the world’s partner. And you can’t do that without being, well, loved.

Here come the letters to the editor, but let me just say it: Americans are like singers — we, just a little bit, kind of like to be loved. The British want to be admired; the Russians, feared; the French, envied. (The Irish, we just want to be listened to.)

But the idea of America, from the very start, was supposed to be contagious enough to sweep up and enthrall the world.

And it is. The world wants to believe in America again because the world needs to believe in America again. We need your ideas — your idea — at a time when the rest of the world is running out of them. – NYT

* Bono is the lead singer of the band U2 and a co-founder of the advocacy group ONE and (Product) RED.

CHEST WORKOUT

2009-10-17T03:23:00.000-07:00

Greg Plitt: Chest workout

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00X-A2qzsdM

ETHAN BORTNICK

2009-10-17T03:20:00.000-07:00

Meet six-year-old music prodigy Ethan Bortnick. He can play up to 200 melodies from memory, and has composed over 20 pieces.

THAT'S MY KING, OOOOH YEAH!!!

2009-10-10T09:01:00.000-07:00

Amen and amen and amen!

4-YEAR-OLD BOY MASTERS 'MIRACLE' SPEECH

2009-10-08T09:39:00.000-07:00

The awesome kid

Here's what Coach Herb Brooks's (Kurt Russell) speech sounded like in the film "Miracle":

CELINE & ELVIS

2009-10-08T09:29:00.000-07:00

Celine Dion with Elvis Presley (in hologram) on April 25th 2007

MILLENIUM PRAYER BY CLIFF RICHARD

2009-10-08T09:27:00.000-07:00

This was in 1999. A bit late but hey...

WHO SAYS OLD DOGS CANNOT LEARN NEW TRICKS?

2009-10-04T06:57:00.000-07:00

... or at least imagine and grumble about not having acquired them!

WHAT A BOSS SHOULD DO

2009-09-28T03:53:00.000-07:00

1. Respect his workers

2. Daily evaluation of his workers performance as well as his own; and when he does this, he must do it politely or else it would be counterproductive; he must ask "What he likes about his worker's performance", "What he doesn't like", "What needs to be kept" and "What needs to be changed", "How can things be improved", and so on.

3. Reward ~ consistently and at random (jackpot or surprises or bonuses)

4. Ice breaker ~ family day or field trips

5. Ongoing refresher courses and more training and retraining

6. Active communication

CHURCH GROUPS SPEAK UP ON POLITICS

2009-09-27T08:16:00.000-07:00

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 26, 2009 — When the provocative cow's head protest took place last month, the Council of Churches Malaysia (CCM) was among the first to issue a statement of condemnation.

When opposition aide Teoh Beng Hock died during a graft investigation in July, the CCM's youth section came out with a strongly-worded statement.

And when Perak descended into political chaos after the Barisan Nasional toppled the Pakatan Rakyat government in February, council members joined the chorus calling for fresh state elections.

These are not “Christian” issues, but the CCM — an organisation of the mainstream Protestant churches — considers them as issues of social responsibility.

It is not the only church body that has become socially conscious and vocal. The Catholic church has long been active in such issues.

“I think it augurs well for moral responsibility. This is a responsibility of our faith,” said Reverend Hermen Shastri, secretary-general of the CCM.

Christians make up about 9 per cent to 10 per cent of Malaysia's 27 million people.

Their active political voice adds a new dimension to a political landscape which already has many players. Political parties are the most active, but civil liberties groups and bloggers have emerged as another force.

However, until recently, non-Muslim religious groups have rarely been active in political activism other than a few Catholic churches.

“This will definitely have an impact on politics. We may describe the activism as activities by churches, but churches are made up of members, and voters,” said political analyst Khoo Kay Peng.

The church's political voice emerged just before the general election last year.

Shastri said it started with seminars for parishioners to discuss issues such as religious freedom.

“We felt then that Christians must be more aware, and must hold elected representatives accountable,” he said.

This culminated with an open letter by the Christian Federation of Malaysia (CFM) ahead of the election, asking them to vote for candidates whose policies “reflect God's standard and Christian values”.

The CFM is the umbrella body of the Catholic church, the CCM and the National Evangelical Christian Fellowship, which groups the evangelical churches.

Churches also invited election candidates to address their members.

Reverend Sivin Kit, of the Bangsar Lutheran church, believes that the activism arose because the political atmosphere in the last few years had created unease.

He said it was triggered by the refusal of the civil courts to hear cases where the rights of non-Muslims were affected by Islamic law. This includes cases of deceased Muslim converts whose families were caught in a tussle with the Islamic authorities over funeral rights.

The civil courts, instead, sent these cases to the Syariah courts.

“That was the start,” said Sivin.

The government's initial response was unfavourable. Last year, the Home Ministry sent a warning to the Catholic church after its newsletter, the Herald, carried articles on current affairs and politics.

However, representatives from the government have since then participated in dialogues organised by the CCM. Shastri said representatives from the MCA had taken part. So have officials from the Election Commission, which also held voter registration in the churches.

The CCM Youth recently held a dialogue with Umno Youth. — Straits Times

WORTH LOOKING

2009-09-27T07:28:00.000-07:00

I am not too crazy about prophecy issues. But perhaps this one is worth looking at.

"The prophet Ezekiel reveals in chapters 38 and 39 that an unimaginably huge military coalition from the north will one day launch an invasion into Israel. It is the purpose of Northern Storm Rising to explore the details of Ezekiel’s prophecy...."

Check out these links:

http://www.ronrhodes.org/

http://www.ronrhodes.org/NorthernStormRising.htm

THREE KEY POINTS

2009-09-27T06:08:00.000-07:00

Health, finance & relationship.

Like a game of chess, in a person's life he needs to place the King in a strategic position with three pawns in front of him.

When a person fails in one of the three, he will be off balanced. But of course as a Christian, I am placing Jesus as the central part of the three. The fear (reverence) of Jesus has to be the controlling factor. If a person says he doesn't need Jesus because he has health, finance & relationship, the next moment he could suffer from a stroke or a tsunami could wipe out his bank or a snatch thief could take away the life of his best friend. All these are within Jesus's sovereign power and will to let them to happen. And He lets "bad" things to happen for the good of His children.

Health:
We all need good health for without it how can we think with the right frame of mind? If we cannot think, we cannot live properly. And so we cannot work to earn money for a living. Or we cannot preach the Gospel to others.

Finance:
We cannot serve God and money at the same time. God can be the central thing in our life, yet we still can make a lot of money. We must control money and not let money control us. We need money. Even the church needs money. Preachers would preach about giving money. Preachers need salary to buy food for himself and for his family. Some people have the gift of making more money than others. Tony Fernandes has a good acumen to start entities that generate money. But he had to make many sacrifices along the way. He is willing to take the risks and persevere. When we have, we should give. Then God will give us even more. After all that's how economy persists. If everyone keeps their money, there's no economy. (Just as, if there is no people, there's no church ~ a church is not the building, it is the people.) If everyone thinks the economy is bad, they will not spend and thus an economic recession. If they think the economy is good, they are willing to spend and thus economic progression. It is all in the mind. Bill and Melinda Gates are now generously giving away their wealth to help the underprivileged around the world.

Relationship:
Without people around us, how would we share the love of Jesus? We cannot be an island or live high up on a mountain and expect to do God's "will" in our lives. Would we share the love and joy of Jesus to the fish or the rocks?

WHAT IS SUCCESS?

2009-09-27T05:59:00.000-07:00

From the messages of Adrian Rogers

BIBLE MEDITATION:
Romans 12:2 - "And be not conformed to this world: but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God."

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:
The one who dies with the most toys wins. Is that success? Having your dreams come true? Getting all you want? Earning enough money so that you never have to work again? May I tell you what success is? And I say this without equivocation. Success is the progressive realization of the will of God for your life. That’s what it is. It’s not how much money you have. It’s not how famous you are. It’s not how healthy you are. It’s not how many friends you have or how many toys you have acquired. Success is nothing more, nothing less, than the progressive realization of the will of God for your life.

ACTION POINT:
Do you want to know God’s will? Do you want your heart’s desire to come true? Read Micah 6:8. What does God require of you? Read Psalm 37:4. What is God calling you to do?

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA'S FIRST U.N. SPEECH

2009-09-26T10:01:00.000-07:00

Sept 23, 2009

Read full transcript

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-to-the-United-Nations-General-Assembly/

PRESIDENT OBAMA SPEAKS TO THE MUSLIM WORLD FROM CAIRO, EGYPT

2009-09-26T09:46:00.000-07:00

June 4, 2009

Read full transcript
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-at-Cairo-University-6-04-09/

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA'S INAUGURATION SPEECH

2009-09-26T09:32:00.000-07:00

January 20, 2009

Read full transcript
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/20/us/politics/20text-obama.html

JUST THINKING...

2009-09-17T08:08:00.000-07:00

MY academic background is Graphic Design. I come across people asking me, "John, what are you doing in the newspaper line?" That made me pause a bit and ponder. How can I explain? Or do I need to explain... I mean can I just let my performance do the explanation? I have been hoping that would happen; but so far, with doubting questions keep cropping up now and then, I think I need to be more pro-active again than I am now. I felt like "I've done that, been there" kind of attitude but now it is time again to do a bit of explanation... if you like to call it that.

I mean by gosh, I had a university education and I didn't just study "Graphic Design". As a media person now, suffice to say that I went through a hell of basic English courses that I felt I should have gotten a minor in English to justify my full-time career as a sub-editor currently for the past 11 years!

Anyway, the oft mind-boggling "what a waste of your Graphic Design degree" keeps coming. It seems that some people can never ever relate a person who studied graphic design to be working as a sub-editor. Er, that's purely logical thinking to me but we also need some intangible thoughts peppered to that equation. And thus, as a result, I Googled and found this link below.

This person is also a graphic designer (albeit a more experienced one than I) and she WRITES! So, that pacifies me a bit; that gives me a little bit of comfort as I think I am still kinda struggle with this puzzle of "what am I doing?" and "what direction am I headed?" Scary, isn't it when at 41 you are still struggling to provide a convincing answer to those questions.

Here meet Sue Campbell.

Sue Campbell has been a: roller skater, frosty-rootbeer mug-washer, tomboy, graphic designer, mom, wife, writer, younger, goatherd, domestic diva, world traveler, avid reader, birder, photographer, cheesemaker, poet, pauper, princess, queen?

She writes about design, books, art, writing, & life... and here is the link to her blog:

http://www.suecampbellgraphicdesign.com/?page_id=90

I know I won't be Bill Gates or Robert Kuok, or Tony Fernandes, but hopefully with clearer objectives in the area of my career and even life per se, I can make a more decent living financially. Not only this a responsibility of a husband, it is indeed a basic need of a human. The Apostle Paul was a tentmaker who earned a decent income to support his Christian works and travels. He could have depended on other people but he didn't want to trouble them. He did however accepted some help from others but he kept his tentmaking job. With thoughts along this line, I too want to keep a job that provides me a decent financial income and yet allows me to preach God's words and organise mission works, and at the same time provides me the freedom to visit places and people around the world at my own leisure. I am sure that ain't wrong, is it?

BORNEO IS CALLING

2009-09-17T06:41:00.000-07:00

BEING a long-time dweller of Borneo, and on the Malaysian part of the island, I know what Praba Ganesan is talking about. I agree with him that from the very beginning there was already a vested interest and agenda by the central government. A Malaysian lawmaker last year (2008) said it bluntly that if Malaysia is a house, then Sabah is the less important part of it. Sabah and Sarawak have always been sidelined in many ways. Wilayah Persekutuan Labuan should have been fully utilised to justify its status as a Federal Territory; instead of building Putrajaya, Labuan should have been the administrative capital. Or at least build a second Istana Negara and place some relevant federal ministries (like rural, security, agriculture and transport) on that small island located near the Sabah and Sarawak border. That I think can still provide some kind of dignity to the East Malaysian people. Read on, Praba puts it very articulately. Credit goes to Praba.

By Praba Ganesan

SEPT 17, 2009 — To East Malaysians, with Malaysia Day being yesterday, I offer my unreserved apology. Putrajaya has always given hell, quite literally, to the good people of Sabah and Sarawak.

Critics have insisted that the 46 years of “Malaysian-ness” has actually been colonisation by the peninsula over the former British colonies in Borneo. Cynics would add that if not for negotiations by Britain with the Netherlands in the post-Napoleonic War period leading to the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1824, they’d be in Indonesia or the Philippines now.

They’ve got a point. I’m for the sustained shape of the Malaysian federation, but it can’t morally go on just on the terms set by the boys from the 12 states land-linked to mainland Asia.

Sitting in an Indian restaurant in Bintulu two years ago, I was embarrassed.

The local paper related how Penan students, living away from their families, cope with things many of us take for granted, like schooling. One student had only one change of clothes other than her school uniform. The girl could only wash one set of clothes when she was wearing the other.

In a nation with an administrative capital built from ground up for the vanity of “he we will not mention”, not giving basic care to all Malaysians first is offensive. Did I tell you about the grotesquely large Ferrari showroom in KL, the biggest one outside Italy?

I may be old school, but countries should not be competing — using a national car company built on the financial sacrifice of car buyers for decades — in Formula One until they can provide tap water to all its citizens.

Where did it all go wrong?

Malaya courted Sabah and Sarawak, mind you. With full British withdrawal from Asia by 1960 with the exception of Hong Kong, Sarawak, Brunei and North Borneo (Sabah), the masters only fancied keeping Hong Kong. Singapore had already self-governing status, and union with Malaya was inevitable.

Lands had to be disposed of and Malaysia was mooted.

The Borneo leaders saw Singapore and Malaya to a lesser extent as means to improve things in their states. Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman saw in Borneo a chance to increase the overall number of “natives” in lieu of Singapore joining and the non-Malays already in the peninsula. He sent Umno minister Suleiman Abdul Rahman to Borneo to assess if the “natives” could be made into Malays.

Umno already had firm ideas on what was to become of the “natives” over there, and how its interest could be served first.

The people of Sabah and Sarawak, they never had a chance.

Sabah made Kuala Lumpur sign a 20-point agreement to safeguard its interest, but all the parts impeding the federal government were torn up in record time. Point 1 — no state religion for Sabah. And the rest which ebbed away; English as an official language without a time limit, constitutional reconciling on equal terms, Borneonisation of the civil service and British subjects holding the fort until the "natives" were ready and jus soli basis for citizenship post-union.

The socio-political developments of the two states are complex and lengthy, however the summary direct and telling. The politicians in East Malaysia may prosper as long as they submit to the federal government’s directions.

The rise and fall of Tun Datu Mustapha Harun and the continued reign of Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud underlined this Machiavellian attitude by the powers in Kuala Lumpur.

It was a skewed game all along.

There were dissenters to absolute federal rule, those who boldly pointed out there are state prerogatives, and without them they cease to be equal partners inside the Malaysian federation.

They were put down enough times that Borneo’s people and leaders came to a tautology — it is: Borneo had to remain backward enough to enable the simplistic “support if you want development” politics by both federal and state leaders.

The Batang Ai (Sarawak) by-election earlier this year is telling. Despite the clamour for change in Peninsular Malaysia, in Borneo elections are all about resources, because between elections a minority hoards it. Principles come second when you are asked to risk the ire of those quite unforgiving, and ready to abandon you. The stakes are too high for the voters to choose on principle.

Starting points?

Perhaps by giving their people self-determination. It is the right thing to do.

Partnership, not supplication. The world’s largest sea separates East from Peninsular Malaysia, and to expect homogeneity was always far-fetched. More denigrating is our efforts systematically undermining the faiths and cultures of the peoples in order for them to adhere to a singular peninsula-driven culture.

For these decades, Sabah and Sarawak have been only means to the peninsula’s intended ends. It is time Borneo was the end, the objective.

That goes for both BN and PR.

By bringing our national consciousness closer to Borneo we might just get closer to that ideal.

The constant competition between Victoria and New South Wales forced the formation of a lifeless Canberra in the Australian Capital Territory.

In the same vein, how about moving Parliament to Kuching or Kota Kinabalu?

And maybe housing some of the ministries in East Malaysia.

Redress the amount of content in Liberal Arts subjects (history, geography, sociology, languages, etc) in school and universities to reflect the clear physical representation of both the states?

Real change which cost the peninsula for a change.

I doubt we can change overnight. However by having that conversation without showing condescension edges us closer to a Malaysia of equals.

Praba Ganesan is a Hulu Langat boy with a penchant for durians and debate. He is part of balairakyat, an NGO promoting ideas exchange. More of him at prabaganesan.

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