Obama – Slugger O'Toole

That #Selfie: Do our elite really ‘get’ the new grammar of digital democracy?

Mick Fealty on December 11, 2013, 1:43 pm | Readers 63

So what do you make of that ‘selfie’ from the Mandela Memorial? Personally the nearest I’ve been to an African funeral/memorial service was just ordinary a Mass at the windowless Catholic Cathedral in Abuja. I’d never quite witnessed anything like the joy, the singing the dancing and the time taken anywhere else I’ve attended Mass (from Horsens in Denmark to Los Angeles). What in the old days at least used to take some Irish priests just 35 minutes on a …

Obama’s “Peace comes dropping slow (but not necessarily this slow)” speech in Belfast…

Mick Fealty on June 18, 2013, 11:58 am | Readers 75

So, Obama’s speech? As Fionnuala O’Connor pointed out on BBC NI yesterday comparisons with past speeches are ill-placed. When Clinton spoke in 1995, she argued there was a lot riding on it. There was virtually nothing riding on Obama’s delivery yesterday. The regular mis-pronunciations were testament to the downgrading of Northern Ireland both in the President’s own strategic hierarchy and the amount of resources set aside for it at State. As Barak headed west to Fermanagh, Michelle wasted no time …

Obama’s Speech in Belfast…

Mick Fealty on June 17, 2013, 9:33 am | Readers 74

Obama’s just arriving at the Waterfront Hall… I’ll try and note the main highlights of the speech here (when he gets to the podium)… We're about to go LIVE!! UTV with full #Obama coverage at 9.25am. And don't forget the live online blog http://t.co/2o7j6pC8P9 — Marc Mallett (@MarcMallett_UTV) June 17, 2013 And US people, this is Belfast HUMOUR… Obama in East Belfast. Someone take him to The Oval and lock him in until he agrees to get the club money. …

King 1963: I have a dream. Obama 2013: I have a drone

Patrick Corrigan on January 21, 2013, 11:54 am | Readers 67

In 1963 Martin Luther King Jr stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., and gave his famous “I have a dream” speech. Today, fifty years on, in tribute to the great civil rights leader, the US marks Martin Luther King Jr Day with a federal holiday in his name. Today also sees Barack Obama take to the steps of the city’s Capitol Building for his second public inauguration as President of the United States of America. …

Visual Comment of the Week

Brian Spencer on November 11, 2012, 4:07 pm | Readers 50

Cartoon by Brian Spencer with commentary from Aaron Callan. So Obama’s made it over the line and won his ticket back into the White House. But already the US media are making predictions on the 2016 Presidential election. It’s interesting to see how the US media, starved of the Presidential election to feed on, turn their attention, almost immediately, towards 2016. Even though President Obama hasn’t even started his second term! What was more interesting was the predictions being made …

A historic vote just took place in the USA. Oh, and Obama won too…

Andrew Gallagher on November 7, 2012, 10:55 pm | Readers 59

I’ve no idea how this flew under the radar, but the outside world (bar the BBC) has largely ignored the most historic American plebiscite since the 1950s. Obama’s re-election, important though it is in itself, might find itself eclipsed by what just took place in Puerto Rico – a clear popular vote in favour of statehood. If ratified by Congress (there is bipartisan support for the idea, although getting it though today’s cantankerous House may be tricky), PR will become …

Obama’s coalition: what’s the NI alternative?

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on November 7, 2012, 9:05 pm | Readers 56

Democrat donkey

What can NI parties learn from Obama’s continued success at the polls? Last night was a night to sleep. November 2008 was a night to stay up and watch the US Presidential election results. Wakening up this morning at 6am was early enough to catch Governor Romney’s short and sweet concession speech (did he even bother to mention the military?) followed a good while later by Obama’s more upbeat acceptance speech. Unlike four years ago, Obama wasn’t in an outdoor …

US election may be tight but probably not tight enough to change the guard…

Mick Fealty on November 5, 2012, 12:40 pm | Readers 48

You have to congratulate Mitt Romney for running a more than decent campaign. He took on the run that few others in the GOP fancied has made a good job of it. The most exciting moment was the first debate, when he literally cleaned the floor with a sitting President who’s minders has not remotely prepped him for a proper fight. As noted in Slugger’s US panel on Google Plus, it was probably the only time policy raised its head. …

Late night panel: US Election and what matters on Main Street?

Mick Fealty on August 31, 2012, 9:17 pm | Readers 48

Gore Vidal once famously noted of American politics, “there is only one party in the United States, the Property Party … and it has two right wings: Republican and Democrat.” An exaggeration, of course. But it is not always obvious to those of us who live far beyond the watery borders of the American Republic exactly what ‘animal spirits’ have the capacity to move votes in the world’s most powerful democracy. What we do know is that many of the …

Happy travels! Guantánamo Bay: a decade of failure

Patrick Corrigan on January 11, 2012, 10:42 am | Readers 45

Ten years ago today, the first detainees were transferred to the US naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Since then 779 people have been held, yet only one has been given a trial in an ordinary US federal court. Yesterday I met with the impressive acting US Consul General, Kevin Roland, at the Consulate in Belfast to record our demand that the Guantánamo Bay detention camp be closed down, and our call that the 171 remaining prisoners be charged with …

He Came, He Saw, He Complimented.

John Ó Néill on May 24, 2011, 10:06 am | Readers 3

Yesterday, and yesterday only, President Obama was in the house. Unlike the formality of the previous week, his brief visit culminated in a speech to a large crowd in College Green. Following an introduction by Enda Kenny, Obama pleased the crowd but it was largely sentiment and reassurance rather than substance with an obligatory is féidir linn thrown in at the end. Did it play well with the crowd? You bet. Did they care about the content? Hell, no. Job well …

There’s no one as Irish as Barack O’bama … something for the weekend

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on May 21, 2011, 8:43 pm | Readers 29

Corrigan Brothers / Obama Moneygall image

The Corrigan Brothers generated a lot of publicity – including an appearance on Andrew Marr’s Sunday morning show – with their O’bama ditty which they ended up performing during the inauguration festivities in Washington DC. Here’s a link to the original. With the US president due to touch down on Irish soil on Monday morning, the Corrigan Brothers will be hanging around a Moneygall pub when Obama calls in Offaly to visit his ancestral roots. (UTV’s Ken Reid suggests that …

President Obama’s speech on the Middle East and North Africa

Patrick Corrigan on May 20, 2011, 1:16 pm | Readers 7

President Barack Obama is due to give an open-air speech on Dublin’s College Green on Monday afternoon. That a huge crowd will be there to hear him is not in doubt. Neither is the President’s speech-making ability. Indeed, it has been one of the hallmarks of his presidency and the campaign which preceded it. Remember the foreign policy speech he gave in Berlin in July 2008 to an estimated crowd of 200,000? It was great. He spoke about the US …

#Obama v #OBL: “We finally got our man last week, it’s true”

Mick Fealty on May 6, 2011, 7:59 am | Readers 4

On the front page of the Irish Times this morning Lara Marlow asks: “WHAT WAS Barack Obama thinking during that long moment of silence, after he laid the wreath at the foot of the Survivor Tree?” This great piece of writing from Walter Kirn outlines his own complex thoughts: It had to end somewhere, History’s Greatest Manhunt, but the fact that it climaxed in dull suburbistan next to a training base for the hunters’ allies proved less startling than the …

Wikileaks reminder that Obama’s still Guantánamo gaoler-in-chief

Patrick Corrigan on April 27, 2011, 11:31 pm | Readers 4

As Ireland readies itself to welcome President Obama to these shores next month, those with an interest in upholding international law have been given reason to recall how he has failed the litmus test of Guantánamo. While the President appears to have forgotten his January 2010 promise to close the internment camp within a year, a new batch of leaked government documents provides a reminder of just how iniquitous the US experiment in unlawful detention has proven. The new document …