Author: michael o. allen

  • March of history

    I found this story, From slave cabin to White House, a family rooted in black America, published by the Times of London, over the weekend and could not get over it. As an immigrant to this country, I cannot claim to know what African-Americans who have slaves for ancestors must feel at this barrier-shattering historic…

  • Ayers again

    The remarkable thing here is that Bill Ayers was utterly reasonable in the interview while his questioner, Chris Cuomo, seemed desperate. First Hillary Clinton, then John McCain and Sarah Palin went out of their way to destroy William Ayers. Anyone who has gone through this kind of crucible has every right to be hurt, angry…

  • Sarah in 2012!

    APOCALYPSE THEN: Would the world have to end first . . . or, is it, simply, going to be the end of the world as we know it? Love0 Share Tweet Share Pin

  • Social Inbox 2.0

    November 13, 2008, 10:07 AM Microsoft Beats Yahoo and Google to Social Inbox 2.0, By SAUL HANSELL Exactly one year ago, I wrote about the race between Yahoo and Google to turn their e-mail and instant message systems into something closer to social networks. Both companies figured it was futile to take on Facebook and MySpace directly. So they rushed…

  • Bait, then switch

    The Central Virginia Progressive-The DAVISReport sent us Bait and Switch Are you confused? I know I am. Unsure from the beginning, I grudgingly supported this financial bailout fiasco, believing the money moguls in D.C. who said we had to. Turns out they don’t know what they are doing either?! Now instead of using all that big money…

  • Watching catastrophe

    Photo: Yasuyoshi Chiba/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images via The New York Times The United Nations warned today of “humanitarian black holes” in the North Kivu region of Congo as continued fighting has forced aid agencies to halt operations in some areas. At a camp for internally displaced people, a girl huddled near a fire in…

  • Learnin’

    What I’m Learning (Slowly) From Obama By Jim Sleeper, TPMCafé, November 11, 2008 It’s well known by now that Barack Obama learns from his mistakes and tries hard not to make them twice. So can those of us who supported him. Even here on what we fancy is the right side of history, we can…

  • Historic record*

    I had complained in a post earlier about the front page of The New York Times that carried the news of President-elect Barack Obama’s victory in the 2008 presidential election. I felt that it was, at least, inappropriate and did not rise to standard of previous his Times front pages. I don’t know if this…

  • A noble name

    Until I read  Jim Sleeper‘s TPM Cafe column, Swear Him in as ‘Barack Hussein Obama,’ it never occurred to me that the president-elect would be sworn in by anything other than his full name. The protests during the primaries and the general elections have been when bigots have wielded the name as an invective or…

  • Leadership

    President-Elect Barack Obama Holds First Press Conference Transcript of the news conference: Obama: Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you very much. This morning, we woke up to more sobering news about the state of our economy. The 240,000 jobs lost in October marks the 10th consecutive month that our economy has shed jobs. In…