Category Archives: news

blog, news, politics

Swinger Gingrich and his defense of open marriage

Defending open marriage isn’t like defending the open meetings or open records act.   

You can argue the subject has no place in a public policy debate. But character is character and asking your wife about an open marriage is important if you believe as most conservatives in South Carolina do, that conservatives are nothing if they don’t stand for some kind of family values agenda.

Gingrich can’t talk about that issue because it exposes him as a hypocrite. But he could and he did, attack the media for bringing up the issue. Those louts.

And then, he used his loud and brash defensiveness to advantage by pointing out how it shows what a forceful, passionate leader of the free world he could be.

We must not underestimate a governmental leader’s ability to defend wrongful acts!  Gingrich as president would have lots of opportunities for that.

I’d feel better if Gingrich was as passionate for poor, down and out Americans as he was for cheating on his wife. But that’s not what we have here.  Instead, we have a selfish egotist, who finds it chivalrous to at least ask before screwing over his wife.

He’d be just as thoughtful of the American people if given the chance, you can bet on that.

blog, diversity, journalism, movies, news, politics, race

No”yahoo!” for a “Yahoo-less” Yang; He’s free, but the internet may not be

Seems odd that on the day  we protest the corporate driven legislation that threatens the web, we  find ourselves contemplating the resignation of Chief Yahoo and pioneering web organizer, Jerry Yang.

Read my take Yang’s future on  the Asian American Legal Defense and Education blog at www.aaldef.org/blog

Yang resigned yesterday, leaving the company he founded while a student at Stanford in 1995.

It was a very different world  and a very different internet back then.

Of course, the business and the corporate world remains the same. Heartless, cold, money-driven.

Given that, how did Yang ever survive his biggest faux pas?   After all, his success has  nothing to do with cool technology or intricate algorithms.  In 2008, it wall about simple math.

That’s when he blew it on the Microsoft deal.

Rejecting the Microsoft take-over bid at more than$30 a share, nearly twice what the company was worth, was a tad naive for our country’s brand of  hard-ass capitalism.

Yang didn’t want to take the money and run. He had a dream, after all. But even after that, he stayed. When he was ousted as CEO, he hung around.  And now he’s gone from Yahoo for good.

I’ve got some suggestions for Yang 5.0. on my blog at  the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund:

 http://aaldef.org/blog/bye-bye-yahoo-hello-jerry-yang-50.html

Yang at 43 is a bit of a throwback,  a geek’s geek, less corporate money guy. And certainly less political.

If the web’s old values are to be enshrined as “the way,” it’s going to take a lot more political might from web veterans like Yang to protect it.

The fight over SOPA and PIPA is about how old media companies are trying to take back their old monopolies.And they’re using tried and true methods, the kind of special interest lobbying that produces legislation that protects the likes of Big Pharma, Big Auto, Big Oil, etc. 

SOPA and PIPA would have the effect of changing the democratizing nature of the web.  It’s got nothing to do with privacy. Just money and control. A taming of the world wide web? That’s way different from scouring and searching the web for whatever cool stuff was on it.

That was what a younger Yang was all about when he was a graduate student and Yahoo was his baby.

blog, news, politics

From New Hampshire to South Carolina, his bane is Bain: Romney the Sado-Capitalist is truly out of touch

The irony of the good capitalists going after the bad capitalists is really hilarious. But that’s the primary issue in the Republican campaign.

We have Gingrich, the former House Speaker, going after front-runner Romney, the bad 1 per center, and talking about the villainy of “Crony Capitalism,” as if he never participated in anything of the sort during his leadership tenure.  

Of course, Romney’s saving grace is that his harshest critic is Gingrich, the campaign’s biggest megalomaniac.   (Rick Perry, you can’t count. This is now just political exercise for him. It is for Gingrich too, but like everything else Gingrich’s attack is so grand).

The others are playing nice because they wouldn’t mind a cabinet post or ambassadorship. Or maybe a job at Bain if Romney loses.

But Bain really does matter. Not necessarily for Romney’s won and loss record, but for all that it stands for. Critiquing venture capitalists and the Wall Streeters for their greed and lack of regulation is a legitimate issue.

Matt Lauer on TODAY exposed Romney, who thinks any criticism is a matter of envy.

Really.

That just shows how out of touch the Mister Mitt really is.

Read the quote in my New Hampshire comments on the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund blog:

http://aaldef.org/blog/sado-capitalist-romney-heads-to-the-south.html

blog, news, politics, race

The Diversity Deficit: Why it’s hard to get excited about the GOP even on Caucus night

Will Mitt Romney eek by? Will Ron Paul upset? Santorum? 

If you’re a person of color, it’s hard to care who says what in Iowa. Or even the next stop, New Hampshire.  The candidates just aren’t talking to the rest of us. At least, not yet. 

http://aaldef.org/blog/the-diversity-deficit-in-iowa-and-new-hampshire-gingrichs-pearl-harbor-and-danny-chen.html

With Cain out of the running, it really is an all-white horse race in these all-white venues.  And by the time they get to a state that looks like America, the race will likely be over.

Did they really want people of color in the Republican party anyway?

www.aaldef.org/blog

Hey, even George Bush had the Patti Labelle and the  O’Jays singing “Love Train” at the 2000 convention. Eleven years later, the GOP still hasn’t quite figured out a way to spread the love.