Barack Obama is speaking out about how he wants to use the film projects he develops with Netflix to heal the political divide and tell America’s stories.
Earlier this week, Netflix announced it is partnering with Barack and Michelle Obama to develop original content for the video streaming giant. Initially, no real details were released — including the actual price tag of the contract. But three days later Obama has filled in some of the blanks about his plans, Business Insider reported.
Speaking at a Las Vegas tech conference hosted by cybersecurity company Okta, Obama waxed poetic about the “stories” Americans have to tell and said he wants to use his multi-year contract with Netflix to help “train the next generation of leaders.”
Barack Obama said he relied on “stories” to fuel his political career. “Everyone has a story that is pretty sacred” about their life, Obama said. Listening to people’s stories is what helped him better serve, he explained.
“We want to tell stories. This [Netflix deal] becomes a platform. We are interested in lifting people up and identifying people doing amazing work,” Obama said, adding, “We did this in the White House.”
Obama related meetings to hear the stories of Hamilton creator and Broadway producer Lin-Manuel Miranda and rocker Bruce Springsteen, and he noted that identifying talent in a similar fashion is his intent with Netflix.
Obama said he wants to produce stories “we think are important, and lift up and identify talent, that can amplify the connections between all of us. I continue to believe that if we are hearing each other’s stories and recognizing ourselves in each other, then our democracy works.”
“We are all human. I know this sounds trite, and yet, right now globally, we have competing narratives,” Obama said.
The ex-president also warned against “tribalism,” saying that when people feel threatened, “We go tribal. We go ethnic. We pull in, we push away.”
He concluded saying he wants to use Netflix to help “set up institutions based on rule of law and a sense of principals and the dignity and worth of every individual.”
Finally, after noting there is still a “clash” in the country, Obama told the crowd what he hopes his new work will do.
“I’m putting my money on the latter way,” Obama said. “That’s what we hope to be a voice to, through Netflix and through my foundation, where we’re identifying and training the next generation of leaders here in the United States and around the world. So they can start sharing their stories and cooperating.”
Film director Spike Lee launched a profanity-filled tirade against President Donald Trump at the Cannes Film Festival, accusing him of failing to sufficiently denounce those involved in the Charlottesville protests.
Speaking at a press conference for the premiere of his film BlacKkKlansman, Lee attacked Trump for saying that there were “very fine people on both sides” of the riots in Charlottesville, while also denouncing the “right-wing bullshit” taking place all over the world.
“That motherfucker was given a chance to say ‘we’re about love and not hate,’ and that motherfucker did not denounce the motherfucking Klan, the alt-right, and those Nazi motherfuckers,” Lee said. “He could have said to the world, not [just] the United States, that we’re better than that.”
“We look to our leaders to give us direction, to make moral decisions,” he continued. “This bullshit is going on all over the world, this right-wing bullshit.”
Lee’s comedy-drama, BlacKkKlansman, follows the story of the first black Colorado Springs police detective named Ron Stallworth, who infiltrates a chapter of the Ku Klux Klan.
A trailer from the film shows Ku Klux Klan members shouting the slogan “America First,” a reference to one of Donald Trump’s campaign promises to prioritize American interests.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, Lee’s film drew a 10-minute standing ovation following its world premiere.
“We have to wake up. We can’t be silent,” Lee continued. “So this film to me is a wake-up call,” he added. “I know in my heart — I don’t what the critics say or anybody else — we are on the right side of history with this film.”
Lee, 61, whose major works include Malcolm X, 25th Hour, and Inside Man, has previously suggested that the world may not survive to 2020 with the likes of Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong-un in power.
“Shoot, I hope this nuclear code doesn’t get punched. I’m not thinking about 2020,” he said in an interview with Variety over the possibility of Bernie Sanders running again. “Look, you got Putin. You got the other crazy guy in North Korea and this other crazy guy, Agent Orange. That’s not a good trio for me, my children, for the world.”
Just imagine if you were going through a home robbery or you had an emergency accident
Crenshanda Williams, 44, was found guilty of interference with emergency telephone calls while working at a 911 Emergency center. She only got 10 days in jail and 18 months on probation.
Williams was hanging up on individuals that needed emergency help for over a year. Her lawyer claimed that she was going through a rough time which led to her poor performance: “But punishing her doesn’t do anything to fix the problems that still exist at the emergency center.”
I know her lawyers have to give her the best defense because that’s his job but this woman has to be put away for a long time, it’s only right. Think of the many people that she could have help, was disconnected on purpose.
Williams spent a year and a half taking 911 calls at the Houston Emergency Center until she was caught in August 2016 and fired by the city. A supervisor who oversaw Williams was also placed on one year of internal probation, officials said at the time.
Williams’ misdeeds came to light after HEC officials performing routine monthly audits of 911 calls noticed a high volume of Williams’ calls lasted less than 20 seconds, known as “short calls.” In a news release detailing the sentencing, prosecutors said a review showed Williams hung up on “thousands” of short calls.
The calls included one where a caller tried to report a violent robbery and another where a caller was about two drivers racing in an area on Interstate 45 where people had been killed speeding just weeks earlier.
Williams told investigators she often hung up because she didn’t want to talk to anyone at those times.
“The citizens of Harris County rely on 911 operators to dispatch help in their time of need,” said Lauren Reeder, a Harris County prosecutor.
There’s no excuse for an action like this by a public servant. Imagine if you were going through a home robbery or you had an emergency accident that could be fatal, and you dialed 911 for help and the assistant hung up on you?
That is what this woman did for over a year and a half so I don’t see any reason why she shouldn’t be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
Do you think this woman’s life problems should matter if she is tried and convicted? Do you feel her lawyer is going to try to get her off with mental illness? SOUND OFF in the comment section below and at this story to your social media page.
Bringing A Rock To A Gun Fight Is Like Fighting This Creature With A Plastic Fork.
The superintendent of Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania’s Blue Mountain School District says his students avail themselves of rocks with which to defend against mass shooters.
WNEP reports that superintendent Dr. David Helsel told a Pennsylvania House Education Committee, “Every classroom has been equipped with a five-gallon bucket of river stone. If an armed intruder attempts to gain entrance into any of our classrooms, they will face a classroom full students armed with rocks and they will be stoned.”
Bringing A Rock To A Gun Fight Will Get You Put In Boothill Graveyard In Tombstone City.
Helsel explained how the plan to throw rocks came about: “At one time I just had the idea of river stone, they`re the right size for hands, you can throw them very hard and they will create or cause pain, which can distract.”
He stressed that doors have been re-enforced, making them difficult to break through, and students have also been trained in “barricading the doors” to make breaching them even more difficult. But the students are armed with rocks in the event that a shooter does get through.
“She Will Not Take To Test Because She Knows She Is Lying”
by PAM KEY11 Mar 201816,117
Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) said she knew who she was when host Chuck Todd when pressed her on her claims of a Native-American heritage.
When asked about taking a DNA test, Warren said, “Look, I do know. I know who I am and never used it for anything. Never got any benefit from it anywhere.”
Obama, stands with his nominee to become Health and Human Services secretary, Budget Director Sylvia Mathews Burwell who is the President of the liberal college now.
American University rolled out a $121 million diversity and inclusion plan Tuesday, which includes the creation and implementation of a mandatory two-semester race and social identity course.
American has allocated $60 million for FY 2018, though it began spending the $121 million last spring, and intends to keep spending through next year.
The majority of the funds have been earmarked for scholarships to minority applicants, but $7 million has already gone toward the creation of the American University Experience course.
The first section of AUx, taken in the first semester of freshman year, is built as a psychological, social, cultural, and academic transition into college life. Topics covered include “exploring and expressing identities,” as well as “diversity, bias, and privilege,” in addition to mental health maintenance.
The sole focus of the second semester is “race and social identity.” Students will be instructed in identifying and countering the “coded, contentious, or uncomfortable ways” in which “ethnicity, gender and sexual expression, class, disability, and religion are often discussed.”
“AUx2 seeks to create a space for conversations and learning about these topics that pushes beyond the norm,” according to the course description.
The year-long class will be mandatory for freshman starting in fall 2018, as part of American’s overhauled core curriculum — which includes an additional, separate “Diverse Experiences” requirement.
AUx director Andrea Malkin Brennertold a campus news outlet, “The best critique of things that we could change for [the course] would be to expand the number of intersectional identities that we talked about.”
An effort to increase faculty diversity has also been promised in the new American diversity blueprint .
The school has said the initiative has been in the works for the last couple of years, but its character was impacted by incidents in recent semesters that some have labeled racist.
In May bananas marked with the acronym for the black women’s sorority were found hanging from noose-like ropes, while in September a Confederate flag was hung on campus. Last week, anti-immigration posters were found posted around the campus.
According to a 2016 campus survey, 33 percent of black students reported feeling included at American, compared to 71 percent of white students.
The University of Maryland-College Park announced last week that it had allotted nearly $4 million for diversity programming, including a $200,000 program to train student leaders on intercultural competency, following the murder of a black Bowie State University student by a white Maryland student in May.
