Arianna Huffington

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"We must make a clear difference between Islam and the terrorists who are abusing the religion," liberal commentator Arianna Huffington argues. Huffington says "moderate" Muslims have nothing to do with the "extremists."

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Is the fate of the American newspaper industry in the hands of the government?

The hearing's last speaker, Arianna Huffington, co-founder and editor-in-chief of the Huffington Post, opposed antitrust exemptions, paywalls, or really any government intervention. In fact, she countered some speaker's doom and gloom position with the opening statement, "Journalism will not only survive, it will thrive." Her main point is that the industry has changed and moved forward and there is no going back.

Huffington says, "The future is to be found elsewhere: it's a linked economy, it's search engines, it's online advertising, it's citizen journalism, and the foundations supporting investigative journalism. That's where the future is, and if you can't find your way to that, then you just can't find your way."

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Huff Post

Bye-Bye 2008: Things I Want to Forget

But with the New Year quickly approaching, and the Bush Years coming to an end, I'd like to take a moment to focus on the things that happened over the last twelve months that I'd love to forget. Here is my list:

That Dick Cheney still doesn't believe waterboarding is torture.

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Huffington Post

When it comes to addressing America's disastrous war on drugs, the Obama administration appears to be moving in the right direction -- albeit very, very cautiously.

On the rhetorical front, all the president's men are saying the right things.

In his first interview since being confirmed, Obama's new drug czar, Gil Kerlikowske, said that we need to stop looking at our drug problem as a war. "Regardless of how you try to explain to people it's a 'war on drugs" or a 'war on product,'" he told the Wall Street Journal, "people see war as a war on them. We're not at war with people in this country."

He also said that it was time to focus more on treatment and less on incarceration.

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Huffington Post

Over the weekend, Barack Obama made an encouraging move to reverse that unintelligent design by appointing retired General Eric Shinseki to be the Secretary of Veterans Affairs. While having had a long and distinguished career, Shinseki is most famous for getting it right when it came to Iraq - and for suffering the consequences typical in the Bush administration for getting it right: being shown the door.

Shinseki, you may recall, was the general who told Congress in February 2003 that it would take "on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers," to occupy Iraq, because "we're talking about post-hostilities control over a piece of geography that's fairly significant with the kinds of ethnic tensions that could lead to other problems."

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Huffington Post

For the last eight years, we suffered from the soft bigotry of low presidential expectations. Taken as a whole, Obama's first 100 days have been an inspiring change from a White House that expected as little from us as it did from itself.

The road ahead is indeed going to be long and steep. But at least we're on the right road.

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Huffington Post

In other words, use any window dressing you want, just take the steering wheel out of Geithner's hands.

It might seem extraordinary to be calling for the resignation or demotion of President Obama's point man on our financial system.

Things that we never would have imagined are happening all around us. So this is a time for doing things that might have seemed unthinkable just a month ago.

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Huff Post: It's Time to Treat America's Homeowners as Well as We've Been Treating Wall Street's Bankers

Someone loses his or her home. It sits vacant. Surrounding home values drop. Others move out. Squatters move in. Crime goes up. Tax revenues plummet, taking school budgets down with them. For a devastating look at what foreclosures do to a community, read this brilliant New Yorker piece by George Packer.

 

So why hasn't the foreclosure crisis gotten the attention it deserves? A combination of perverse priorities and flawed thinking.

 

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Huff Post

If the stimulus plan doesn't work, it won't be because it wasn't bipartisan -- it will be because it's not big and bold enough.

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From CNN:

KING: Were you moved, Arianna?

ARIANNA HUFFINGTON, THE HUFFINGTON POST: Very moved. I took my 19- year-old daughter to the Capitol this morning to actually be there when he was sworn in. And it was very moving being there with her and a lot of other young people and getting there early and experiencing the excitement mounting.

And then, when he spoke, it was clear that his message was a very somber message. I mean, his opening line was "I'm humbled by the task ahead." You know, the enormity of the task, the challenges that he talked again and again about.

And the message for me really was grow up, America.

The most compelling moment was when he quoted scripture and he said it's time to give up childish things.

 

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Not quite a special prosecutor, but seems close enough to me

That's why I am in favor of John Conyers' efforts to create a National Commission on Presidential War Powers and Civil Liberties -- a DC version of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission created after the fall of apartheid in South Africa. The new Commission would come with subpoena power, a $3 million budget, and the mandate to investigate a host of issues ranging from Guantanamo, to torture, to extraordinary rendition.

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From HuffPost:

Arianna Huffington
Winner: Obama
Electoral College: Obama 318 McCain 220
Senate Seats: 58 Democrats 40 Republicans
House Seats: 254 Democrats 181 Republicans