Obama Trip: Press Corps Update
We arrived in Amman, Jordan, about 6 p.m. local time to temperatures in the mid-90s and a slow, steady breeze.
Clambering on buses we headed into downtown Amman, created by billboards for billboards for all-variety of high-end goods (watches, flat-panel televisions, to name just two). We also passed a road sign showing the direct route to Iraq. We didn’t make the turn.
In downtown, traffic tightened considerably on our two-lane road with very pale lane markers. I noticed that cars really don’t follow lane markers so much as their own desire to dodge in and around traffic. The main streets signs are in Arabic and English while most local businesses announce themselves with billboards in Arabic.
Near the Four Seasons, the press hotel, we spied a string of familiar fast food restaurants: Burger King, Popeye’s and Kentucky Fried Chicken (known now by its universal KFC logo). The massive U.S. fast food places announce themselves in Arabic and English.
A giant traffic circle near the hotel showed how traffic moves — no rules, but eye contact and speed rule all maneuvers and it appears to work. En route to the hotel, we warned about walking in Jordan. It’s safe, but there is no tradition of yielding to pedestrians. “No one will stop for you and there are no crosswalks or pedestrian crossings of any kind. So be careful.”
Obama’s traveling advisers appear very upbeat about the Afghanistan and Iraq parts of the trip. A press conference with Obama and his traveling companions, Sens. Jack Reed D-R.I., and Chuck Hagel, R-Nebraska, is planned at the Citadel in Jordan tomorrow. We were advised the press conference setting is very hot and to wear lots of sunscreen — an Obama advance staffer said she wore SPF 70 sunscreen and still got a bit burned. The Bourbon Room is thinking of arriving in a burlap bag — hot, but no sunburn.
More updates to come…..especially as we get a better sense of the policy agenda as far as Obama’s meeting with King Abdullah tomorrow.
Sounds like the kind of reporting that my fourth grader does after visiting the museum on a field trip. Glad to see you really dumbing down to your audience of undeveloped thinkers.
Will you be the first Muslim convert? Just wondering you seem to pander a lot to Obama. Maybe you should cool it, so should Juan Williams, it’s getting a little weird….feeling any tingles up the leg like chris matthews??
ok obama 08
Did the Rev. Wright make it to Iraq and Afghanistan? Obama could introduce Wright to the native people and possibly get them to turn against the terrible USA!!!!! What a joke!!!!!
Press Corps “Update”…get real!
“Sounds like the kind of reporting that my fourth grader does after visiting the museum on a field trip. Glad to see you really dumbing down to your audience of undeveloped thinkers.”
That was right on the money. But hey, this is FAUX.
i just dont know what to say. i just cant figure out these people that claim that obama is the best person for the presidency. the man has no experience (proven), he’s a socialist (proven/read up on HIS bill to give 845 BILLION of OUR DOLLARS to ALL POOR COUNTRIES but not one cent to the people of the USA), he’s anti energy independence (proven/he doesnt want nuclear plants or drilling which, by the way, would put MANY AMERCIAN people to work) and he is anti white, anti american and anti jew (proven/why else would you spend 20 years listening to the hatred IF YOU DIDNT BELIEVE IT YOURSELF?). the people that want obama also want us to become governement owned and controlled. obama wants to take from all of us to give to the poor who refuse to get a job and earn an honest living. what did he do in chicago for 8 years? oh yea he organized the community. well he did a great job didnt he? gangs run the city, drugs are everywhere corrupt politicians reside there and all around the city etc etc etc. he didnt accomplish anything in 8 years! well, he did see to it that asbestos was removed from low income housing. yea he’s qualified all right. NOT! i keep seeing the words that were written by a FELLOW SENATOR FROM ILLIONOIS when obama was there for 8 long years,…he said, and i will quote, “IF OBAMA COULD RUN FOR KING OF THE WORLD, HE WOULD”. well that man, whoever he was, knows obama BETTER THAN obamas supporters and if he thinks obama thinks that he is GOD then obama supporters are being led off a cliff. glad i am not a part of the insanity and am really glad that i will be voting for mccain.
ya know what? the msm cant be that stupid. maybe, just maybe, they are shoving obama down our throats so much so that we will get so sick and tired of him that we wont vote for him! maybe, just maybe, the msm really is stupid.
The election-year rhetoric has made me think a lot about Cuba and what transpired there. In the late 1950s, most Cubans thought Cuba needed a change, and they were right. So when a young leader came along, every Cuban was at least receptive. When the young leader spoke eloquently and passionately and denounced the old system, the press fell in love with him. They never questioned who his friends were or what he really believed in. When he said he would help the farmers and the poor and bring free medical care and education to all, everyone followed. When he said he would bring justice and equality to all, everyone said, ‘Praise the Lord.’ And when the young leader said, ‘I will be for change and I’ll bring you change,’ everyone yelled, Viva Fidel!’ But nobody asked about the change, so by the time the executioner’s guns went silent, the people’s guns had been taken away. By the time everyone was equal, they were equally poor, hungry, and oppressed. By the time everyone received their free education, it was worth nothing. By the time the press noticed, it was too late, because they were now working for him. By the time the change was finally implemented, Cuba had been knocked down a couple of notches to Third-World status. By the time the change was over, more than a million people had taken to boats, rafts, and inner tubes. You can call those who made it ashore anywhere else in the world the most fortunate Cubans. And now I’m back to the beginning of my story. Luckily, we would never fall in America for a young leader, who promised change without asking, what change? How will you carry it out? What will it cost America?
‘Would we?’
Obama acted like he was already President on his overseas trip. He freighten
me and never would I vote for him
Carol Campbell