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The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

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Page Links
Wednesday
Jan122011

Tucson Shootings -- January 13

President Obama speaks at a memorial service at the University of Arizona:

... Here's the prepared text of the President's speech. He added during his speech that Rep. Giffords opened her eyes for the first time just after he had visited her this afternoon. New York Times story here. ...

... Michael Crowley of Time has a thoughtful, slightly mixed, review of the speech. The speech -- and the review -- end on a high note. Says Crowley: "These calls to our better angels -- directed less at the secondary issue of public discourse and more at the first principles of what we value as a society and the nobility of public service -- perfectly matched the heartbreaking occasion. All the better that Obama delivered these words with both lyrical eloquence and moral authority. It was certainly the finest rhetorical moment of his presidency--and perhaps of his life." ...

... Amy Sullivan of Time highlights Crowley's misgiving: "I suspect I was not the only one who squirmed uncomfortably at the implicit message: These victims did not die in vain; they died in part so that we might have a reason to call on Republicans and Democrats to cut it out and start acting like adults." ...

... Amy Davidson of the New Yorker: "Obama’s speech was one of his best in a long time; it wasn’t so much a rallying cry as a call to sustain an embrace." ...

... Politico's headline: "Obama Takes Opportunity Palin Missed." Jonathan Martin: "At sunrise..., Sarah Palin demonstrated that she has little interest — or capacity — in moving beyond her brand of grievance-based politics. And at sundown in the west, Barack Obama reminded even his critics of his ability to rally disparate Americans around a message of reconciliation."

New York Times: the funeral of 9-year-old Christina-Taylor Green took place in Tucson today. ...

... ABC News: "Arizona lawmakers successfully curbed members of the Westboro Baptist church from picketing the funeral of the Tucson massacre's youngest victim, Christina-Taylor Green. On Tuesday afternoon, Gov. Jan Brewer signed a new law that requires protesters to remain 300 feet from a funeral site. The law, which took effect immediately after it was signed, took only 90 minutes to pass in Arizona's legislature. Triggered by Westboro's plans to picket the funeral of 9-year-old Christina-Taylor Thursday, the law passed by a unanimous vote."

Washington Post: "NASA has named a backup commander for the Space Shuttle Endeavour's forthcoming mission to the International Space Station, a trip scheduled to be led by Mark Kelly, husband of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, (D-Ariz.) wounded in the Tucson shooting.... Astronaut Rick Sturckow will serve as Kelly's backup commander; ... Kelly remains commander of the mission." ...

... Arizona Republic reporters: "Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords is continuing to exhibit progress, from opening her eyes spontaneously and tracking people and objects to moving all her limbs, her doctors said Thursday morning.The physicians at University Medical Center described the steps as 'a major leap, a major milestone for her.'" ...

... Helene Cooper of the New York Times: "Nancy Pelosi ... was in Gabrielle Giffords‘ hospital room when she [Giffords] opened her eyes for the first time since being shot in the head last Saturday.... Mrs. Pelosi, along with two other Democrats, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, were in the room, shortly after President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama finished their visit to the hospital...." ...

... Anne Kornblut of the Washington Post: "Giffords opened her eyes a total of five times and reached for her husband's hand, according to the people in the room." ...

     ... Update: here's a bit more from Robert Gibbs' press gaggle aboard AF1 on the return trip to Washington. ...

     ... Update 2. The Women: this is terrific. A White House stenographer recorded a press gaggle by Sen. Gillibrand & Rep. Wasserman Schultz aboard AF1. ...

... Rep. Wasserman Schultz & Sen. Gillibrand tell of their hospital visit to Rep. Giffords:

Jennifer Medina of the New York Times profiles Dr. Peter Rhee, chief of trauma at Tucson's University Medical Center.

Joe Klein of Time has a smart, brief column in which he asks -- and implicitly answers -- two questions: "Given the flood tide of massacres perpetrated by crazy people, have we made a grievous error in our policies regarding the confinement of the mentally ill? ... Are there any limits at all to our gun fetishism?" Klein notes that "Even such a conservative stalwart as Judge Robert Bork said, in 1989, that the Constitution's Second Amendment guaranteed 'the right of states to form militias, not for individuals to bear arms.'" ...

... Gail Collins: "Congress should have an actual debate about Representative Carolyn McCarthy’s bill to reduce gun violence." ...

... Nicholas Kristof suggests reframing the gun debate (what gun debate?) as a public health issue. We don't regulate guns as seriously as we do toys. ...

... Then there's this:  There is a rash of legislation further infringing on Second Amendment rights that has been unwisely proffered in the wake of events in Tucson. If members of Congress wishes to carry a weapon in the federal District of Columbia, it should be permissible. Accordingly, we are in the process of drafting a bill that will allow members of Congress to do that. -- Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas)

Dana Milbank: "... a day that was originally supposed to see a fiery clash over repealing the health-care law turned out to be the most uplifting day in Congress at least since the Sept. 11 attacks. Breaking only for a prayer service, the members spent eight hours exchanging vows to do better by each other." ...

... BUT John Bresnahan of Politico: "Senior Democrats - who to date had been impressed with [Speaker John] Boehner’s response to the Arizona tragedy - expressed surprise at what they saw as an unmistakable misstep by the new speaker: appearing at a partisan political event on the same night as the the president, first lady Michelle Obama, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and the Arizona congressional delegation come together at the memorial service....

The left had this all planned out even before the incident occurred.
-- Sen. Rand Paul, on the Tucson shootings (no link, but an unimpeachable source)

Washington Post: "The black bag that alleged Tucson gunman Jared Loughner is said to have had with him in the hours before last weekend's shootings turned up Thursday in a dry stream bed near his neighborhood. It was a diaper bag ... and it contained ammunition that matched the type used in the attack." ...

... Here are copies of reports Pima Community College wrote & collected on Jared Loughren's problems at the school. ...

... A. G. Sulzberger & Trip Gabriel of the New York Times: "After the release of detailed reports on Mr. Loughner’s bizarre outbursts and violent Internet fantasies that [Pima Community College] had kept, the focus has turned to whether it did all it could to prevent his apparent descent into explosive violence last weekend." CW: my answer: hell, no. And I still fault the parents, too. ...

... Amy Gardner, et al., of the Washington Post: "A picture of [Jaren] Loughner gleaned from interviews with more than two dozen friends, classmates, teachers and neighbors, as well as from his own writing in online forums, shows no evidence that politics or government were among his defining or enduring obsessions. Rather, his deepest, most disturbing questions were about the very nature of reality: He appeared to have lost any clear sense of the line between real life and dreams or fantasy." ...

... Marc Lacey & Serge Kovaleski of the New York Times: "Officials at Pima Community College, where Jared L. Loughner was a student, believed that he might be mentally ill or under the influence of drugs after a series of bizarre classroom disruptions.... In 51 pages of confidential police documents released by the college on Wednesday, various instructors, students and others described Mr.Loughner as 'creepy,' 'very hostile,' 'suspicious' and someone who had a 'dark personality.' He sang to himself in the library. He spoke out of turn. And in an act the college finally decided merited his suspension, he made a bizarre posting on YouTube linking the college to genocide and the torture of students."

Was this juxtaposition of two stories on the front page of yesterday's New York Times Web edition a editorial goof? Or -- maybe it's really all the same story. Via Jim Fallows of The Atlantic.Jeff Zeleny & Michael Shear of the New York Times: Sarah Palin's video speech "... stirred an emotional response from some Democratic lawmakers, Jewish groups and even some fellow Republicans, who said it was in poor taste for Ms. Palin to deliver her statement on a day that was devoted to remembering victims of last weekend’s shooting.... The video ... seemed to be aimed at appealing to her committed supporters rather than winning over her critics...." ...

... Karen Tumulty & Peter Wallsten of the Washington Post: Sarah Palin's attempt to diffuse controversy about her blunt language & crosshairs chart backfired -- because of the blunt language she used in her presidenty speech. ...

... You have to look at it and see, what are they like when they’re tested, what are they like when they’re not scripted, what are they like when they’re pushed. And I would contend to you that if Governor Palin never does any of those things, she’ll never be president, because people in America won’t countenance that. They just won’t. -- Gov. Chris Christie (R-NJ)

 

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