Romney on his work as a Mormon missionary: “We didn’t convert one person”
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney appeared on MSNBC’s Morning Joe on Tuesday, where co-host Joe Scarborough asked him about his experience as a Mormon missionary in France in the 1960s. “Talk about your rejections as a missionary knocking on door, after door, after door in a hostile environment,” Scarborough asked.
Romney recalled five months he spent in one French city, where he said near-constant brush-offs built his resilience:
“We knocked on doors from morning until quite late in the evening,” he said. “We didn’t convert one person in five months. So, you understand the rejection, you know that’s a pretty high level of rejection and you get used to it. You say, ‘okay, what do I believe, what’s important to me,’ and you don’t measure yourself and your success by how other people react, but instead by how you’re doing and how you feel about the things you care about.”
Watch the clip below (Romney speaks about his experience as a missionary starting at the 2:00 mark):
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from Environment Forum:
Is Michelle Obama strumming along with Gibson Guitar?
It's not often that a U.S. first lady's gift makes news -- years after the fact -- but Michelle Obama's 2009 present to Carla Bruni-Sarkozy has sparked some comment among free trade boosters and guitar pickers. The gift in question: a Gibson Hummingbird guitar.
Gibson Guitar Corp. has been making some news of its own this week, which is why those in Washington with long memories recalled the gift to the music-loving French first lady. Gibson CEO Henry Juszkiewicz was in town to raise awareness about a problem he has with a long-standing U.S. law aimed at curbing illegal trafficking in tropical hardwoods, among other materials. Federal agents raided two of his Tennessee factories and confiscated more than $1 million worth of rosewood, ebony and finished guitars. No charges have been filed but Gibson's chief says he is being investigated for possible violation of the Lacey Act of 1900. Read more about that here.
At a lunch with reporters and others, Juszkiewicz said he favors using sustainably harvested wood for Gibson instruments, and because guitars need such a small amount of tropical hardwoods for their fingerboards -- the wooden top of the guitar's neck -- that's well within the realm of possibility. But he says a 2008 amendment to the act is more protectionist than environmentally friendly. And he says the seizure of the materials his company needs to make the instruments makes it harder for Gibson's hundreds of U.S. employees. The Justice Department has refused to comment on the ongoing litigation.
The 2008 amendment to the Lacey Act passed during the Bush administration with bipartisan support, but still hackles were raised soon after the latest raids at the end of August.
About Michelle Obama's gift to Carla Bruni-Sarkozy: the Hummingbird model features a rosewood fingerboard "with rolled edges for an extremely comfortable in-the-hand feel," according to the company's website. And as the site says, "It all starts with the wood."
But it may not end there. Juszkiewicz hopes to gather some momentum to modify the Lacey Act, and has been talking with members of Congress, whom he says have been largely supportive.
Photo credits: REUTERS/Brendan McDermid (Carla Bruni-Sarkozy performs at The Mandela Day concert at Radio City Music Hall in New York July 18, 2009)
The right is always banging their pots and pans about something. Every week a new “scandal” appears on the website of the Drudge Report and slides down the right wing news ladder. It’s just how they roll.
Obama draws query by signing Patriot Act extension with auto-pen
What’s a president to do when Congress passes a bill just hours before key anti-terrorism surveillance measures are about to expire and he’s 4,000 miles away? Auto-pen of course.
For the uninitiated, lawmakers and yes, even the president of the United States, have a machine that has a real pen which goes over a copy of the person’s actual signature. It is typically used for signing proforma letters or souvenir pictures to send constituents or fans.
Well, President Barack Obama has been in Europe for the annual G-8 summit and Congress was racing to pass legislation extending the authorization of key surveillance methods used to try to thwart attacks on the United States, which were due to expire Thursday night at midnight. Congress came through just hours before midnight but Obama was in France.
The White House released a statement just before midnight saying that the legislation had been signed and a White House aide told Reuters that the auto-pen was used to do so at Obama’s direction.
That prompted at least one lawmaker, Georgia Republican Representative Tom Graves, to question whether that was legal or not, writing Obama a letter seeking clarification.
“I thought it was a joke at first, but the President did, in fact, authorize an autopen to sign the Patriot Act extension into law. Consider the dangerous precedent this sets. Any number of circumstances could arise in the future where the public could question whether or not the president authorized the use of an autopen,” Graves said in a statement.
Well, for those who may question the use of the auto-pen, there is a legal opinion issued during the Bush administration that gave the green-light to using it.
Bring our bill of rights & Constitution back. We can only hope… Ron Paul 2012
Just the right tavern to celebrate 200 years of U.S.-French military ties
Not every U.S. ally who visits the Pentagon needs to be treated to a dinner that evokes more than 200 years of peaceful military relations.
France is the rare exception.
So when Defense Minister Alain Juppe traveled to Washington this week for talks with Robert Gates, the U.S. defense secretary found just the right venue: Gadsby’s Tavern in Alexandria, Virginia, one of the few establishments in the United States that can boast of “fine dining since 1770.”
Its historical guest list includes the likes of U.S. presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, James Madison and James Monroe.
Gates had his eye on a slightly different pair of clients when he hosted Juppe for dinner the evening before the two signed a space cooperation agreement.
“I had the pleasure of hosting Minister Juppe along with other French and U.S. officials for dinner at a tavern where Secretary of State John Quincy Adams played host to General Lafayette in 1824,” Gates told reporters during the signing ceremony.
“Two centuries later, France remains our strong and valued partner on the global stage. We’re grateful now, as ever, for their support and their friendship.”
Has U.S. “missed the boat” on long-range renewable energy planning?
There was President Barack Obama, working a friendly crowd in Henderson, Nevada, not far from Las Vegas. And then a sympathetic comment from a French businessman who wants to see U.S. regulation of climate-warming greenhouse emissions seemed to get the president all wound up.
After noting that the weather has been particularly wild lately — five feet of snow in Washington DC, rain at the Vancouver Olympics — Obama said the best way to “unleash” dynamism in the energy market is to set fuel efficiency standards, notably for cars.
“If you’ve got a fuel-efficiency standard in place that says your car needs to get 20 miles a gallon or 30 miles a gallon, suddenly all these engineers are thinking, well, how do we do that? And all these companies start coming up with new technologies that make your cars more fuel-efficient. Ultimately, you end up seeing jobs and businesses thriving in response to the regulation that’s been put there,” Obama told the town hall meeting.
Putting a price on carbon emissions could have the same effect by spurring innovation and ultimately creating jobs, he said.
The transition to cleaner renewable energy isn’t going to happen overnight, the president said.
“But what we should be doing is planning over the next 20, 30 years to move in that direction. That’s what countries like China are doing. That’s what countries like France are doing. That’s what countries all across Europe are doing, and all across Asia are doing. We don’t want to be left behind. We’re the only ones who have kind of missed the boat. So we’re still using 20th century technologies and everybody else is producing 21st century technologies.”
Strong language, but the crowd seemed to be with him. And he went on:
We have already come to the conclusion that using fossil fuels is accelerating the greenhouse effect that normally occurs in cycles as geological history shows. Entrenched business want to continue profiting from brown technologies.
That’s all well and good for now. But there has been no major push for clean energy technology. And this is what is REALLY needed if we are to lead in the 21st century. I haven’t seen any incentives for clean energy development yet. Obama needs to push the issue on clean tech.
But even more importantly he needs to do what he can to remove corporate constituents. Corporations are not people. If business is allowed to sway law makers into making the environment easy for them to profit while they do nothing to innovate, then innovation will go out the window in favor of easy profit. This is happening now and is why there is such a strong lobby against climate change bills. They are being obstructed by entrenched brown energy companies.
Get rid of corporate citizenship. Strike down corporate personhood and return the government of the people back to the people.
Game Night AND Date Night for President Obama
It was unlikely that President Barack Obama, a big basketball fan, was going to miss the seventh and final game of a hard fought NBA playoff series between his hometown Chicago Bulls and the Boston Celtics on Saturday night. But it happened to fall on one of the regular “date nights” that the U.S. leader had promised First Lady Michelle Obama upon their arrival in Washington in January. Solution: an early dinner at French restaurant Michel Richard Citronelle in Georgetown. A 14-vehicle Presidential motorcade pulled up outside the swanky restaurant, drawing hundreds of onlookers and blocking traffic as the upscale area’s Saturday night party scene got underway. The restaurant is one of Washington’s most exclusive eateries. A table was not available on its online booking system until May 29, and that was before the Obamas appearence made headlines and was widely Twittered. After the U.S. leader dined with Washington Mayor Adrian Fenty at Ben’s Chili Bowl in January, the landmark DC institution had queues outside for weeks. Although Citronelle’s website boasts that Conde Nast Traveler magazine called it “one of the world’s most exciting restaurants,” Washington Post restaurant critic Tom Sietsema was not so flattering in an October 2008 review. “Throughout a recent dinner at what used to be a four-star experience, an unmistakable joylessness courses through the fading underground dining room that bears the name of one of the country’s most esteemed chefs,” Sietsema wrote http://www.washingtonpost.com/gog/restaurants/michel-richard-citronelle,795996.html#editorial-review Nonetheless, Sietsema added in his review that Richard and his staff still put on an impressive show. “I adore Citronelle’s tomato tart, which springs from a pastry base (and cucumber gelee) like a colorful bouquet. And sablefish marinated with sake, miso and mirin before hitting the broiler is about as good as that creature gets.” Like clockwork, two hours after departing the White House, the Obamas’ 14-vehicle motorcade departed cheering crowds in Georgetown and arrived home apparently in time for the Bulls-Celtics 8 p.m. tip-off. The President then took the First Lady for a brief stroll across the White House grounds, waving to photographers. Game Night could now begin. “Click here for more Reuters political coverage”
I’m all in favor of the president working on his marriage, but why do I have to pay for it?
Probably less money out of the presidents pocket if he goes to dinner outsided the white house, afterall he has to pay for his meals in house from his wages.
First Draft: French kiss
Can this be France? What happened to the days when cross-Atlantic gauntlets were thrown down and French fries turned into Freedom fries?
President Barack Obama was welcomed like a rock star in a land notorious for its air-sniffing disdain of almost everything American.
Although first lady Michelle Obama is almost overshadowing her husband in media coverage about their European jaunt, with many comparisons to Jackie Kennedy who wowed them all overseas.
Aside from atmospherics, some news was made. France agreed to take a Guantanamo Bay detainee and Obama warned that “appropriate steps” will be taken if North Korea goes ahead with a threatened missile test.
North Korea special envoy Stephen Bosworth speaks at the Foreign Press Center at 11 a.m.
Another dose of bad news for the U.S. economy which lost another 663,000 jobs in March, when the unemployment rate rose to 8.5 percent, the highest since 1983.
Barack Obama has charmed everyone in a country where its President is getting all the heat from the trade unions day in and day out. As Nicolas Sarkozy’s popularity is hitting all time low, Barack Obama has become an idol of younger French all over France. Having been assertive and focused when it comes to communication, the greetings <> of Barack Obama was an irresistible gesture for the French audience wherever President Obama encountered ..
from MacroScope:
Watch out for the G20 spin
Be careful this week about buying wholeheartedy into any G20-related spin about supposedly savvy, free-spending Britain and America doing more to combat the world economic crisis than supposedly stubborn, overly cautious Germany and France. The actual figures show it is much more complex than that.
A Reuters calculation on discretionary fiscal stumuli and the International Monetary Fund's assessment show that, if anything, Britain is the significant laggard and that German spending almost matches the United States over the next two years. Here are the IMF's numbers (% of GDP):
2009 2010
Germany 1.5 2.0 France 0.7 0.7 UK 1.4 - 0.1 US 2.0 1.8
Just to add to the complexity, discretionary spending estimates do not include bank bailouts (which would boost UK and U.S. anti-crisis spending numbers) But nor do they include automatic economic stabilisers such as existing social welfare schemes and safety nets (which would boost Germany and France versus the U.S. where such things are rare to non-existant).
There is bound to be some squabble over who is doing what when the G20 starts on Wednesday. Just remember the numbers.
Clinton goes on charm offensive with French
WASHINGTON – Hillary Clinton went on a charm offensive with France’s foreign minister on Thursday, fondly recalling many trips to Paris and heaping praise on the country’s education system as a model for America. Clinton has played up the Transatlantic relationship this week, choosing to meet first with the foreign ministers of Britain, Germany and France in her second week as new U.S. secretary of state. “I have been to France many times and I always have a good impression. I enjoy visiting in France,” the former first lady and New York senator said at a joint news conference with France’s Bernard Kouchner at the State Department. She recalled meeting Kouchner’s wife “longer ago than Christine or I care to admit” and said she was impressed by the country’s preschool facilities, prompting her to return home to try and get the United States to follow France’s example. “I not only have enjoyed my time in France but I have learned a lot from my visits. I look forward to returning,” she added. “As soon as possible,” gushed Kouchner, beaming at her side. The Bush administration had a prickly relationship with France at the time of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, to the extent that in congressional cafeteria the words “French fries” were changed to “Freedom fries” on menus. For more Reuters political news, click here
Photo Credit: Reuters/Hyungwon Kang (Clinton, Kouchner speak at the State Department)
tc have you noticed the change in priorities,our greatest friends and allies in the past were the brits, never any cooperation from the french particularly in the UN.the first clinton visit was to france probably because of obamas new strategy they see the french as now the nation that have more in common with us.
This about as irrelevant as can be. Romney’s experience in France is just about average for LDS missionaries in France at that time.