President Obama will be heading to Massachusetts to campaign for Martha Coakley this Sunday, according to two senior sources informed of the president’s decision, a last-minute effort to give the Democrat a needed boost in the Senate race.
It's a sign that Democrats are deeply worried about Coakley’s prospects and the party's 60-seat majority, and believe the president can help turn out the Democratic vote in a state where he's viewed favorably.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs announced the president’s decision at today's briefing, and said the campaign stop will take place in Boston.
Teddy Pendergrass, who became R&B’s reigning sex symbol in the 1970s and '80s with his forceful, masculine voice and passionate love ballads and later became an inspirational figure after suffering a devastating car accident that left him paralyzed, died Wednesday at age 59.
The singer’s son, Teddy Pendergrass II, said his father died at a hospital in suburban Philadelphia. The singer underwent colon cancer surgery eight months ago and had “a difficult recovery,” his son said.
“To all his fans who loved his music, thank you,” his son said. “He will live on through his music.”
Pendergrass suffered a spinal cord injury and was paralyzed from the waist down in the 1982 car accident. He spent six months in a hospital but returned to recording the next year with the album “Love Language.”
He returned to the stage at the Live Aid concert in 1985, performing from his wheelchair.
Pendergrass later founded the Teddy Pendergrass Alliance, an organization whose mission is to encourage and help people with spinal cord injuries achieve their maximum potential in education, employment, housing, productivity and independence, according to its Web site
“And you know, Kristi, something happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it.
“They were under the heel of the French, uh, you know Napoleon the 3rd and whatever, and they got together and swore a pact to the Devil.
“They said, ‘We will serve you if you’ll get us free from the French.’
“True story.
“And so the Devil said, ‘Okay, it’s a deal.’
“And, uh, they kicked the French out, you know, with Haitians revolted and got themselves free.
“But ever since they have been cursed by, by one thing after another, desperately poor.
“That island of Hispaniola is one island. It’s cut down the middle. On the one side is Haiti on the other side is the Dominican Republican.
“Dominican Republic is, is prosperous, healthy, full of resorts, etcetera.
“Haiti is in desperate poverty.
“Same island.
The problem is, what “uncle Chuckles” is saying, is, of course, wrong. 90% of Haiti is Christian. Further more, the story of the Satanic pact story, is, of course, Wrong. Even a Christian from there says so.
As a Born-Again Christian, and a Baptist. I encourage ALL Christians who read this blog, and DEMAND that Pat Roberson either apologize and resign from his position. Here’s the contact info:
Mailing Address
The Christian Broadcasting Network
977 Centerville Turnpike
Virginia Beach, VA 23463
CBA Canada
680 Progress Avenue – Unit #2
Scarborough, ON M1H3A5
Canada
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va., January 13, 2010 — On today’s The 700 Club, during a segment about the devastation, suffering and humanitarian effort that is needed in Haiti, Dr. Robertson also spoke about Haiti’s history. His comments were based on the widely-discussed 1791 slave rebellion led by Boukman Dutty at Bois Caiman, where the slaves allegedly made a famous pact with the devil in exchange for victory over the French. This history, combined with the horrible state of the country, has led countless scholars and religious figures over the centuries to believe the country is cursed. Dr. Robertson never stated that the earthquake was God’s wrath. If you watch the entire video segment, Dr. Robertson’s compassion for the people of Haiti is clear. He called for prayer for them. His humanitarian arm has been working to help thousands of people in Haiti over the last year, and they are currently launching a major relief and recovery effort to help the victims of this disaster. They have sent a shipment of millions of dollars worth of medications that is now in Haiti, and their disaster team leaders are expected to arrive tomorrow and begin operations to ease the suffering.
Chris Roslan
Spokesman for CBN
The White House, as expected, is quite shocked at Robertson’s idiotic behaviour:
Robertson’s words instantly triggered a firestorm across the country, including a rebuke from White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, who told reporters “at times of great crisis there are always people who say really stupid things.”
“Our heart goes out to the people of Haiti. … That’s not the attitude that expresses the spirit of the president or the American people, so I thought it was a pretty stunning comment to make,” Jarrett said.
I think that his non-apology apology is just not good enough. He must resign, a penalty must be paid for this sort of foolishness.
Keith Olbermann is fighting mad about this, and rightly so:
I know what Rush Limbaugh said and I chose and still chose to ignore it. That is one of sad parts of being here on the right; is to have to be associated with the idiots like Limbaugh, Beck and Hannity. It is a part of the American experience, and the byproducts of a Free Republic. Freedom of speech does, at times, have it’s bad points.
I cannot, and will not apologize for Pat Robertson, nor can I explain his idiotic remarks. However, I can and I will say, publicly; that I wholeheartedly disagree and reject Pat Robertson’s and yes, even Rush Limbaugh’s idiotic and asinine comments — They do NOT reflect my feelings at all, about the situation in Haiti.
We launched Google.cn in January 2006 in the belief that the benefits of increased access to information for people in China and a more open Internet outweighed our discomfort in agreeing to censor some results. At the time we made clear that “we will carefully monitor conditions in China, including new laws and other restrictions on our services. If we determine that we are unable to achieve the objectives outlined we will not hesitate to reconsider our approach to China.”
These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered–combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web–have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China. We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.
The decision to review our business operations in China has been incredibly hard, and we know that it will have potentially far-reaching consequences. We want to make clear that this move was driven by our executives in the United States, without the knowledge or involvement of our employees in China who have worked incredibly hard to make Google.cn the success it is today. We are committed to working responsibly to resolve the very difficult issues raised.
Which totally destroys the Conservative Meme that Google is some sort of evil socialist company. In actuality, Google strikes me as being more of a civil libertarian type of a group. Because Google is very big on privacy and has fought in court against privacy invasion; they also support many organizations that fight for privacy. The reason why Google is hammered by the right, is because they refuse to show deference to the American Christian Holidays. The reason they do this is to be fair to all of the faiths and because Google is not solely an American Company, but an international company with people from many faiths and backgrounds. Personally, I would like to see good be a bit more friendlier towards America, it’s Holidays and Customs, but, I do understand their position on the matter.
I personally commend Google’s stance on privacy and I am extremely happy to see Google stand up for the privacy of the people of China, especially those who are fighting against that Communist Government in China.
Now the death toll and damage tolls are being shown. Reader GWSSDelta told me about a video, that comes via CBS News:
CNN, MSNBC and Fox News all have in depth coverage. Memeorandum has an excellent Blog roundup on the political front.
CNN’s Anderson Cooper is in Haiti now:
No word on death tolls yet; but this does sound very bad. I will have more in a bit.
Update: Here is how you can help with the relief effort, via DIPNote:
For those interested in helping immediately, simply text “HAITI” to “90999” and a donation of $10 will be given automatically to the Red Cross to help with relief efforts, charged to your cell phone bill.
Or you can go online to organizations like the Red Cross and Mercy Corps Mercy Corps to make a contribution to the disaster relief efforts.
The State Department Operations Center has set up the following number for Americans seeking information about family members in Haiti: 1-888-407-4747. We’ll provide more details and opportunities to help as we learn more. To stay up-to-date, follow us on state.gov.
Update #2: The Anchoress Reports a list of Relief Organizations helping: (H/T Malkin)
Update #3: As Always, our awesome Military is “on it!” Military Times is reporting:
The aircraft carrier Carl Vinson was rerouted Wednesday to support humanitarian relief efforts in Haiti, according to U.S. Southern Command. The carrier is expected to arrive off the coast of Haiti Thursday.
The command confirmed additional Navy ships are underway to Haiti, but did not specify what vessels would be going.
The command, based in Miami, also deployed a team of 30 people to Haiti to work with U.S. Embassy personnel as well as Haitian, U.N. and international officials to assess the situation and facilitate follow-on U.S. military support, according to the press release. The team includes military engineers, operational planners, a command and control group and communication specialists. They will arrive in Haiti today on two C-130 Hercules aircraft.
Elements of the Air Force 1st Special Operations Wing were deploying to the international airport at Port-au-Prince to provide air traffic control capability and airfield operations. They are expected to arrive in Haiti on Wednesday afternoon.
Early Wednesday morning, Coast Guard helicopters evacuated four critically injured U.S. Embassy staff to hospital at Naval Station Guantanamo, Cuba, for further treatment.
A U.S. P-3 Orion from the Forward Operating Location at Comalapa, El Salvador, also conducted aerial reconnaissance of the affected area.
SouthCom has supported 14 major relief missions in the region since 2005, including assistance to Haiti in September 2008. During that mission, forces from the amphibious assault ship Kearsarge and other units airlifted 3.3 million pounds of aid to communities that were devastated by a succession of major storms.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with the Haitian people and all those affected by this devastating earthquake,” said Army Col. James Marshall, SouthCom spokesman.
Vinson and its crew of approximately 3,200 sailors left Norfolk on Tuesday en route to their new homeport in San Diego. The carrier, which is commanded by Capt. Bruce Lindsey, was joined by Carrier Air Wing 17 and the cruisers Lake Champlain and Bunker Hill. As flagship of the newly established Carrier Strike Group 1, Vinson was to provide maritime security as it circumnavigates South America and provide humanitarian assistance or disaster relief, if required.
The call came fewer than 24 hours later.
Major Kudos on our Armed Forces for being ready for the call; wherever it might be from. Good Job men!
PORT-AU-PRINCE — A huge quake measuring 7.0 rocked the impoverished Caribbean nation of Haiti Tuesday toppling buildings and causing widespread damage and panic, officials and AFP witnesses said.
A tsunami alert was immediately issued for the Caribbean region after the earthquake struck at 2153 GMT.
An AFP correspondent said the ground shook for more than a minute. Just minutes later two aftershocks measuring both 5.9 and 5.5 on the moment magnitude scale hit, US officials said.
“I think it's really a catastrophe of major proportions,” the country's ambassador to the United States, Raymond Alcide Joseph, told CNN television.
The US Geological Survey said the powerful quake was initially measured at 7.3 on the scale and struck 16 kilometers (ten miles) from the capital Port-Au-Prince, and 27 kilometers (17 miles) from Petionville.
An AFP correspondent in Petionville said one three-story building, housing two offices, was toppled, and a tractor was already at the scene trying to dig out victims as people fled onto the streets in panic.
The up-scale area is home to many foreign diplomats and members of a major United Nations mission to the country.
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