Thought for Food

(Source: themidnightclub, via cleverlikewhoa)

Phase three of Let’s Move! — addressing food deserts across America. The goal is to reduce the childhood obesity rate to 5% in one generation (by 2030). She may end up making a more lasting impact on the country than her husband.

latimes:

Michelle Obama promotes healthy eating at Inglewood store site: The market, set to open in April, is part of a statewide push to reduce obesity by attracting grocers to low-income neighborhoods and making healthy food more accessible.

Photo: First Lady Michelle Obama, flanked by Inglewood Mayor James Butts, left, and L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, told residents and leaders gathered at the future market site: “I’m here today because I believe every family in our country should have access to healthy food.” Credit: Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images

(Source: Los Angeles Times)

I’ve thought about this article many times since the uprising began in Syria. Even when it came out last February — months before people took the streets and Assad went on the attack — I wondered who Vogue was trying to please or appease in whitewashing an already controversial regime. I still wonder what went on behind the scenes (why scratch a dictator’s back?). As their web-scrubbing proves, their timing and perspective could not have been more tasteless.

The Only Remaining Online Copy of Vogue’s Asma al-Assad Profile

Max Fisher for the Atlantic:

In February, Vogue magazine published, for the benefit of its 11.7 million readers, an article titled “A Rose in the Desert” about the first lady of Syria. Asma al-Assad has British roots, wears designer fashion, worked for years in banking, and is married to the dictator Bashar al-Assad, whose regime has killed over 5,000 civilians and hundreds of children this year. The glowing article praised the Assads as a “wildly democratic” family-focused couple who vacation in Europe, foster Christianity, are at ease with American celebrities, made theirs the “safest country in the Middle East,” and want to give Syria a “brand essence.”Vogue’s editors defended the controversial article as “a way of opening a window into this world a little bit,” conceding only that Assad’s Syria is “not as secular as we might like.” A senior editor responsible for the story told me the magazine stood by it. A few weeks later, the article and all references to it were removed from Vogue’s website without explanation. In August, The Hill reported that U.S. lobbying firm Brown Lloyd James had been paid $5,000 per month by the Syrian government to arrange for and manage the Vogue article. […]

Sadly, Vogue’s piece of the Syrian puzzle has been almost entirely scrubbed from the internet. But, somehow, the text can still be found at a website called PresidentAssad.net, a gif-filled but meticulously updated fan page to the Syrian dictator. The site is registered to a Syrian man living in Rome named Mohamed Abdo al-Ibrahim. A personal site for Ibrahim lists him as an employee of the Syrian state-run news agency.

(via kateoplis)

Classic Dad Humor.

(via lemdi:kelsium)

(Source: jonwithabullet, via apsies)

Stephen Colbert Interviews Maurice Sendak About Newt Gingrich and Tallywackers (via comedycentral)

National treasure, that one.

SOTU: President Obama embraces Rep. Gabrielle Giffords ahead of tonight’s State of the Union address. (via thedailywhat)

I was just reading about how horrified the Obamas were by the attempted assassination of Giffords — in part because they have long feared for Barack’s safety.* This heart-lifting embrace reminded me of how profound their relief must be not only to see her well but for every day that goes by without attempted violence.

* As has my dad: he thought it was a bad omen when I named my cat — adopted two days before the 2008 election — Wilkes, as in John Wilkes Booth. It hadn’t even occurred to me. I wanted to commemorate Wilkes-Barre, the city where we were getting out the vote for Obama when we found two kittens, but as a man who came of age in that horrible era of assassinations, he felt differently. My little love-cat hasn’t killed so much as a mouse (so far as I know) but I still worry people think of that murderer when I tell them his name.

Then I got the ring and loved it, and a year later, on Valentine’s Day, I proposed to him in Santa Monica. That was four years ago. The callous on my right hand is long-formed—and not from masturbation. I’m dying to move over to the other hand. I’d also like to call him my husband. I’m not the biggest fan of the word “partner”: It either means that we run a business together or we’re cowboys. “Boyfriend” seems fleeting, like maybe we met two weeks ago. I’ve been saying “better half” for as long as I’ve been able to. I think it’s a little self-deprecating and clearly defines that we’re in a relationship, but it would be nice to say “my husband.”

— Neil Patrick Harris (via apsies)

(via mariahnotcarey)