The Briefing Room
General Category => National/Breaking News => Topic started by: Rapunzel on December 10, 2013, 02:18:14 am
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http://dailycaller.com/2013/12/09/in-contrast-with-thatcher-snub-top-obama-officials-jet-off-to-mandelas-memorial/
In contrast with Thatcher snub, Obama inner circle jets off to Mandela memorial
Posted By Neil Munro On 3:50 PM 12/09/2013
President Barack Obama is bringing his family of aides and advisors down to South Africa for Nelson Mandela’s mass-media send-off.
“For us it’s the President and the First Lady, the Attorney General [Eric Holder], Susan Rice, Valerie Jarrett,” Ben Rhodes, the White House’ deputy national security advisor for strategic communications, told reporters during an impromptu press conference on Air Force One.
Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State John Kerry are staying behind, but former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was on board Air Force One as well.
The memorial is expected to be attended by hundreds of world leaders, broadcast by hundreds of cameras, boosted by thousands of journalists and to be watched by millions of people.
Obama’s eagerness to bring his inner circle to the memorial for the dead South African leader stands in contrast to the snub he sent to the United Kingdom a couple of years ago.
In April 2011, Obama only sent a few former diplomats to mark the death of former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who had revived the U.K. economy with free-market policies and also solidified the U.S.-U.K. alliance.
Obama’s memorial speech for Mandela is expected to be “in the 10-15 minute range,” said Rhodes.
The speech about Mandela will partly focus on Obama, Rhodes said.
“I think, for the President, he’ll reflect on what Nelson Mandela meant to the people of South Africa, [and] to him personally as well,” Rhodes said.
Obama’s speech will echo his domestic political pitch, and Obama’s own public biography, Rhodes suggested.
“I think one of the points the President will make is that it took decades of persistence and talent and a wide range of very unique skills to make Nelson Mandela the figure that he was and make him capable of bringing about that change,” Rhodes said.
Obama wrote a forward introduction for Mandela’s book, titled “Conversations with Myself,” Rhodes said.
However, Rhodes said that since 2008, Obama and Mandela have had little communication.
“I think that, generally, when [Obama and Mandela] did speak, since the President took office, they didn’t delve deeply into substantive — [they] more dealt with how each of them were doing, asking after Nelson Mandela’s health and family,” he said.
“We had not done any work on this particular speech before the passing of Nelson Mandela… [but Obama] has reflected on him many times,” Rhodes said.
Rhodes portrayed Mandela as a saint-like figure. .
“I’d also note that the President was grateful that the First Lady and his daughters were able to see Nelson Mandela, even very late in his life,” he said.
“This is obviously a very unique event really in world history, given the number of leaders coming to pay their respects, as well as the people of South Africa,” Rhodes said.
Obama is also bringing two former presidents — George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, plus their wives — while former president Jimmy Carter is also attending the funeral.
Obama’s departure from D.C. means he’s absent from the long-planned Christmas parties scheduled with member of Congress, absent from budget talks and from the effort to rebuild the Obamacare system.
He’s left the vice president to take his place at the parties.
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The Bush's flew down with The Obama's and Hillary on AF1......
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The Bush's flew down with The Obama's and Hillary on AF1......
I wish they hadn't.
Edit to add: not that they shouldn't go to South Africa, just hate to think of them surrounded by the sleazy Obamaites on the plane.
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In contrast with Thatcher snub, Obama inner circle jets off to Mandela memorial.
OMG.....gotta get my vision prescription updated. I cannot tell you what I thought I saw there. LOL!
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Obammy just couldn't wait to do this at Mandela's funeral:
Obama shakes hands with Cuba’s leader
By Associated Press
December 10, 2013 | 7:20am
JOHANNESBURG — President Obama has shaken hands with Cuban President Raul Castro at a memorial service for former South African President Nelson Mandela.
The handshake between the leaders of the two Cold War enemies came during a ceremony that’s focused on Mandela’s legacy of reconciliation. Obama was greeting a line of world leaders and heads of state attending the memorial in Johannesburg. He also shook hands with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, who has clashed with Obama over alleged National Security Agency spying.
The US and Cuba have recently taken small steps toward rapprochement, raising hopes the two nations could be on the verge of a breakthrough in relations. But skeptics caution that the two countries have shown signs of a thaw in the past, only to fall back into old recriminations.
(http://thenypost.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/castro.jpg?w=720&h=480&crop=1)
Bowing as low as he can.
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Obama urges world to act on Mandela’s legacy
By Associated Press
December 10, 2013 | 6:56am
JOHANNESBURG — President Obama said Nelson Mandela earned his place in history through struggle, shrewdness, persistence and faith.
Obama eulogized the former South African president at a memorial service in Johannesburg. He compared Mandela to Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. and Abraham Lincoln.
Obama urged the world to act on Mandela’s legacy by fighting inequality, poverty and racism. He says progress in the U.S. and South Africa mustn’t cloud the fact there’s still work to be done. He says South Africa shows us that we can change.
Obama called Mandela the last great liberator of the 20th century, and says he thinks about how to apply Mandela’s lessons to himself as a man and as president.
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The Bush's flew down with The Obama's and Hillary on AF1......
Said on another thread - why not? Bush and Mandela had a close working relationship and got on well together. The Bush's are very active in African charities to improve people's lives, and Mandela was too. Since the Worm is taking AF1, why not hitch a ride?
Bet they chip in for gas though.
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People feigning confusion at why Obama didn't go to Thatcher while stopping his entire life and job to rush to Mandela, are being intentionally obtuse.
What does he have to do, hit you on the head with a frying pan? He couldn't make it more clear from his books and his actions how he feels about White Europeans, and the British in particular.
Mandela fits perfectly with Obama's afrocentric, and islamophilic radical outlook on history and the world.
Obama has proven to be the exact opposite of everything which the media portrayed him to be. In that vein, he is far from the great post-racial global uniter we were told. He is a racial, pro-Islam, radical activist.
Anyone claiming not to get this at this point is either really late to the game, or they are just being silly and coy.
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Said on another thread - why not? Bush and Mandela had a close working relationship and got on well together. The Bush's are very active in African charities to improve people's lives, and Mandela was too. Since the Worm is taking AF1, why not hitch a ride?
Bet they chip in for gas though.
Agree. With the Bush's concern for Africa, and for freedom abroad, this is no surprise.
Nor for me, a concern.
Many, MANY more things to get upset about these days. Our country is being destroyed.
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goopo
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Said on another thread - why not? Bush and Mandela had a close working relationship and got on well together. The Bush's are very active in African charities to improve people's lives, and Mandela was too. Since the Worm is taking AF1, why not hitch a ride?
Bet they chip in for gas though.
It is not about Bush attending the funeral - it is about him going TO the funeral with Obama........
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You can't make this stuff up! :silly:
Mandela ceremony sign language interpreter ‘a fake’
By Associated Press
December 11, 2013 | 6:53am
JOHANNESBURG — A man who provided sign language interpretation on stage for Nelson Mandela’s memorial service, attended by scores of heads of state, was a “fake,” the national director of the Deaf Federation of South Africa said on Tuesday.
The unidentified man seen around the world on television next to leaders like U.S. President Barack Obama “was moving his hands around but there was no meaning in what he used his hands for,” Bruno Druchen, the federation’s national director, told The Associated Press.
South Africa’s government told AP it is preparing a statement. Jackson Mthembu, spokesman for the governing African National Congress party, declined to comment. “Government will be able to assist you,” Mthembu said.
Druchen and two other sign language experts said the man was not signing in South African or American sign languages. South African sign language covers all of the country’s 11 official languages, according to the federation.
Nicole Du Toit, an official sign language interpreter who also watched the broadcast, said in a telephone interview that the man on stage purporting to sign was an embarrassment.
“It was horrible, an absolute circus, really, really bad,” she said. “Only he can understand those gestures.”
South African parliament member Wilma Newhoudt-Druchen, a member of the ruling party who is deaf and who is married to Druchen, also said the man communicated nothing with his hand and arm movements. AP interviewed both Druchen, who also is deaf, and Newhoudt-Druchen by telephone using an interpreter.
(http://brotheryellow.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Garrett_morris_SNL_news_for_the_hard_of_hearing.jpg)
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Now we know why W went.
(http://www.remote-dba.net/images/bush_flipping_bird.jpg)