The Truth Behind Oil Windfall Profits Tax Vote Failure

The world has a supply of oil, but will the United States ever be allowed to grow beyond being the third largest producer of oil in the world? Image Credit: Daniel Taghioff - Writing on the Wall

The Truth Behind Oil Windfall Profits Tax Vote Failure

Yesterday, all day, the news services were broadcasting and printing the following headline:

Republicans block Democrats' attempt to

impose windfall profits tax on oil companies

In several respects, this is not a clear picture of what really happened.

Sure, the Republican members of the Senate began debate on the Democrat proposal to impose a 25% tax upon the subjective “UNREASONABLE” profits of the five largest United States based oil companies – and the Democrats could not raise enough votes to stop the debate.

The truth behind the failure begins with the Democrats who hold a voting majority if all of the Senators showed up to vote, had seven additional Republican Senators willing to vote to stop debate.

One prominent Democrat that was not in attendance to vote with the majority was Barack Obama.

Senator Obama, the presumptive Democrat Party nominee for President issued a statement after all action on the bill was ended and one wonders, WHY? If one does not show up to participate and vote, do they really have anything constructive and informed by the process of failure to communicate?

Blah, Blah, Blah!

The Senate has 49 Democrats, 49 Republicans, and one Independent that votes Democrat, giving the Democrats the leadership of the Senate. If ALL Democrats had showed up to vote and all voting Democrats and 1 Independent voted for the bill, added to the 7 Republicans that crossed party lines and against the wishes of the Republican leadership … the vote would have been 57 Yes and (who cares) No … still not the 60 votes needed for the bill to pass – REGARDLESS.

This excerpted and edited from Associated Press -

Republicans block Democrats' attempt to impose windfall profits tax on oil companies
The Associated Press - Published: June 11, 2008

Republicans, however, have said the bill would do nothing to ease soaring gasoline prices in the United States.

The Democrats failed, 51-43, to get the 60 votes needed to overcome a Republican filibuster — a procedural tactic to delay debate on a bill — and bring the energy package up for consideration.

The defeat affords Democrats another opportunity, going into the November congressional and presidential elections, to try to cast Republicans as siding with the oil companies at a time of record gasoline prices.
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But Republican leaders said the Democrats' plan would do harm rather than good — and they kept the legislation from being brought up for debate and amendments.
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At the Capitol, Democratic leaders needed 60 votes and they got only 51 senators' support, including seven Republicans who bucked their party leaders.
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Republican opponents argued that little was to be gained by imposing new taxes on the five U.S. oil giants: Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp., Shell Oil Co., BP America Inc. and Conoco-Philips Co.

While these companies may be huge, they do not set world oil prices and raising their taxes would discourage domestic oil production, the Republicans said of the Democrats' plan.

"In the middle of what some are calling the biggest energy shock in a generation ... they proposed as a solution, of all things, a windfall profits tax," Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky chided the Democrats. He called their proposal "a gimmick" that would not lower gasoline prices and only hold back domestic oil production.
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Neither Republican presidential candidate John McCain nor his Democratic rival, Barack Obama, were in Washington to cast votes on the energy issue on Tuesday.

Obama, in a statement, said Republicans had "turned a blind eye to the plight of America's working families" by refusing to take up the energy legislation. Obama has supported additional taxes on the oil companies [and did not attend the debate]. McCain is opposed to such taxes and has proposed across-the-aboard tax reductions for industry as a way to help the economy [and did not attend the debate].

Election-year politics hung over the debate. Democrats know their energy package has no chance of becoming law. Even it were to overcome a Senate Republican filibuster — a longshot at best — and the House acted, President George W. Bush has made clear he would veto it.
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In addition to the proposed windfall profits tax, the Democrats' bill also would have rescinded tax breaks that are expected to save the oil companies $17 billion over the next 10 years. The money would have been used to provide tax incentives for producers of wind, solar and other alternative energy sources as well as for energy conservation.
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After Tuesday's defeat, Democrats did not rule out pushing the issue again.

"This was politics at its worst," complained Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill. "This was a refusal to debate the biggest problem confronting the American people. ... That takes nerve."
Reference Here>>

The "real politics at its worst" (as stated by Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill) on this subject is the irrational support for the NO NUKES for power stance the environmentalists hold and the Democrats (and leftists) back without debate.

Let us, here at MAXINE, not mention the refusal to allow oil field exploration, drilling, extraction, transportation, refinement, and sale of any NEW OIL here in the United States ... for the last four decades.

If only we could restrict the world's oil supply and reproduce long lines at the gas pumps, then we could all experience what Barack Obama and the Democrat Party would bring to the country if elected ... Carter's Second Term.

Bimbo Eruptions vs Radical America-Hating Liberal Eruptions

Christopher Hitchens' latest column in Slate states: "In April 2004, Barack Obama told a reporter from the Chicago Sun-Times that he had three spiritual mentors or counselors: Jeremiah Wright, James Meeks, and Father Michael Pfleger -- for a change of pace, a white Catholic preacher who has a close personal feeling for the man he calls (as does Obama) Minister Farrakhan." Image Credit: Sweetness & Light

Bimbo Eruptions vs Radical America-Hating Liberal Eruptions

The last time the Democrat Party was placed under the societal microscope during a period of political consideration for the highest office in the Free World, it was Bill Clinton and the 1992 presidential elections.

Way back then, character was somewhat important to the voting populous and it seemed that everytime we flipped on the tube to get caught up on the events of the day, we were treated to the sexual indiscretions and behavior of Bill Clinton as recalled by Paula Jones, Gennifer Flowers, and Juanita Broadderick almost stopped the eventual Clinton era from happening. While in office, we all were treated to a disgusting display of philandering of the man and it tainted what would have been remembered as a mostly politically successful presidency – unlike the presidency of Jimmy Carter.

Bill Clinton was fully impeached while in office in his second term over his behavior. While he was not removed, he was stripped of his law license and the whole process made most people feel numbed to politics in general. Collectively we asked ourselves, why can’t people at least attempt to perform at their highest self as opposed to lowering the bar and live at a gutter level. Bimbo eruptions were the order of the day for the two-terms of the Clinton presidency.

In 2008, we all are, again, asked to ignore and accept the philosophical character of the current presumptive candidate the Democrat Party is putting up for the office of President of the United States. Barack Obama holds himself out to be a new type of politician … he is post-racial, a clean living and upstanding family man, and works hard for the betterment of ALL mankind. He is credited with ushering in a new brand of politics. The problem is, that when one begins to look at what has informed Barack Obama, at nearly 48 years old, for the last twenty years of his adult life, one sees a cast of characters that predominately Hate America, and express a separatist, racist attitude toward anyone other than the institutions they come from. Reverend Jeremiah Wright, William (Bill) Ayers, Bernadine Dohrn, and now Father Michael Pfleger have all surfaced and have either been held up and sited as friends or worse, mentors and lifesource guides by Barack Obama through his journey in adult life and Chicago area politics.

The latest of these eruptive episodes of discovery happened a little over one week ago when Father Michael Pfleger took to the pulpit of the church that Obama claimed as his own for the last twenty years (the one he was married to Michelle in, the one that his kids were baptized, and educated on “Christianity” in), and vividly mocked white people and called America “the greatest sin against God.”

Barack Obama’s response, after sitting in the pews of this church for the last twenty years, naming Reverend Jeremiah Wright and Father Michael Pfleger to his campaign steering committee and sighting them as spiritual advisors, was to hold a press conference to announce his family’s withdrawal of membership to the Trinity United Church of Christ.

We have to ask, does this automatically end the direction and education of Barack Obama for the last twenty year span of time and influence?

This excerpted and edited from The Weekley Standard –

Obama the Ditherer
Posted by Dean Barnett on June 2, 2008 08:39 AM

Over the weekend, Barack Obama gave his best Roberto Duran “No Más” impersonation and divorced himself from Trinity United Church, however belatedly. The proximate cause was a sermon given at the church last Sunday by his longtime friend, Father Michael Pfleger.
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Of course, the big question most people will ask is did Obama associate with people like Pfleger and the equally kooky Reverend Wright because he saw in them fellow travelers or did he do so out of political expedience. Personally, I go with the latter. Although I don’t care for Obama’s politics and consider him unprepared to be president, I believe the reports of virtually everyone who’s known him that he’s a decent guy.
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If Obama acted decisively on this matter 18 months ago, it wouldn’t be a major issue today. And yet he tacked the opposite direction with his racial reconciliation speech:

Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way….

Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety - the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity’s services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.

With these comments, Obama wed himself to Trinity United for the duration of the campaign.

For better or for worse.

And the whole reason was because he seemingly lacks the capacity for decisive action. He prefers talking to doing. And he prefers ambiguity to clarity.

These are not desirable qualities for a President.
Reference Here>>

Will Tony Rezko be the next “Radical Eruption” (his trial is set to end soon) to visit the campaign for Barack Obama … or is there another America Hating Priest or Terrorist waiting in the wings to take away the spotlight on Rezko’s apparent corruption of Barack Obama?

One has to ask … What in his life will Obama have to disavow or give up next in order to become President?

We are all just sitting here on the road to Carter’s Second Term!

The Misery News Network – MSNBC

Image Credit: msnbc.com

The Misery News Network – MSNBC

In the nineteen-nineties when Bill Clinton was president, many people began to tune out from CNN, the 24 hour cable news network, when the reporting “loop” from the channel ran stories that appeared to be unbalanced and favorable to the daily goings on of the Clinton Administration, and Bill Clinton. This observation became so universal that the nickname of CNN was the Clinton News Network.

CNN Logo - Image Credit: Depauw.edu

After catching another edition of the daily morning political news and discussion program on MSNBC, Morning Joe, it is becoming clearer what MSNBC should change its name to when the rumored separation between software giant, Microsoft, and the National Broadcasting Corporation, removes its association from “MS”NBC.

Just in time for Carter’s Second Term, the Democrat Party will be able to trot out the MNN, the Misery News Network.

This is a place where in today’s broadcast, the performance artists pontiffs rantings are not really news to analyze or understand as it relates to the insights on the background of Barack Obama, the suicide rates of military personal in Iraq requires exhaustive review, Scott McClellan, former press secretary to the Bush Adminstration, is hailed as a hero for his recently released book that political consultant, Dick Morris recently characterized as a tome for money that really adds insights to … nothing (paraphrased … “we already know all of this information about public relations efforts on behalf of the Iraq war effort – executive administration’s do this – what was the purpose of the “Gettysburg Address” for example?”), and health care (a Government fixed health care system) is the biggest issue that needs to be addressed in this next election cycle. This just in … a crane collapses in New York City, thank-you, broadcast producers, for the cut-away.

My Box is The Most Viralist Video! - I got lots of nice emails after last night MSNBC named my video the "Most Viralist Video." Thanks to MSNBC... and thanks for the emails!! Caption and Image Credit: myboxinabox.typepad.com

We see the second coming of the Misery Index and the perfect messenger of this broader attitudinal “groundswell” – The MNN. The cable news outlet for the decidedly liberal General Electric corporate broadcast property of the NBC network (featuring Jeffery Immelt, CEO/Who does business with the mullahs in IRAN, Keith Olberman, Sportscaster turned Political Pundit/”Reporter”, Chris Matthews, Political Pundit who gets a strange feeling in his leg when he thinks of Barack Obama – HIS WORDS, cipher Mika Brzezinski, Boston plagiarist, Mike Barnacle), and the voice for Carter’s Second Term.

All Hail To The MNN!

Barack Obama “Doubles-Down” On Ignorance

We believe in Barack as a great leader and we are committed to working together. Our goal: Get the best candidate, Barack Obama, to be President in 2008. Caption and Image Credit: Oregon for Barack website

Barack Obama “Doubles-Down” On The Level Of His Ignorance

In a speech given to a crowd of Democrat supporters in Oregon, Barack Obama proves how totally ignorant he is in his template thinking and point-of-view.

He believes that all he has to do once he is president is talk to hostile nation leaders without pre-conditions. He improperly sites the activities of past presidents in his argument without any proof of how their activities were able to be compared to his declaration of unilateral talks without conditions.

Where Obama doubled-down is he compared the size of the nation and threat posed by Iran to Communist Russia during the Cold War. That Iran, in comparison to the former Cold War Russia, is tiny … they spend only one one-hundredth on their military than we in the United States spend.

The basics of what the clueless and self-centered Obama misses are the obvious threats posed through asymmetric warfare.

Questions:

How much money and weaponry investment did the nineteen people who took down the World Trade Center, and attempted to take out the Pentagon have?

How much does planning, boxcutters, airline tickets and surprise cost the people who wanted to take down our freedoms and way of life?

But for a little error in the execution and the bravery of citizens on the plane that crashed into a field … our government’s central meeting house was spared an attack.

This edited and excerpted from the Washington Post’s, The Trail –

McCain Blasts Obama Over Iran Talks
By Peter Slevin – CHICAGO - Updated 2:57 p.m.

Obama has stuck firmly to his position that the president should be willing to talk with America's enemies as part of a return to a more open and ambitious use of diplomacy. He cites President Nixon's opening to China and President Reagan's negotiations with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. He frequently quotes President Kennedy's position during the escalating nuclear arms race that the United States should be willing to meet with its adversaries.

"So let us begin anew, remembering on both sides that civility is not a sign of weakness and sincerity is always subject to proof," Kennedy said in his 1961 inaugural address. "Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate."
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Obama did not use the word "tiny" to describe the threat, but to describe the size of Iran, Cuba and Venezuela compared with the former Soviet Union.

"Iran, Cuba, Venezuela -- these countries are tiny compared to the Soviet Union. They don't pose a serious threat to us the way the Soviet Union posed a threat to us," Obama had said.

"And yet we were willing to talk to the Soviet Union at the time when they were saying, 'We're going to wipe you off the planet.' And, ultimately, that direct engagement led to a series of measures that helped prevent nuclear war, and over time allowed the kind of opening that brought down the Berlin Wall."

Obama went on, "Iran, they spend one one-hundredth of what we spend on the military. If Iran ever tried to pose a serious threat to us, they wouldn't stand a chance. And we should use that position of strength that we have to be bold enough to go ahead and listen.

"That doesn't mean we agree with them on everything," Obama concluded. "We might not compromise on any issues, but at least we should find out other areas of potential common interest, and we can reduce some of the tensions that has caused us so many problems around the world."

McCain said the United States should "communicate with Iran our concerns about their behavior" at an "appropriate" diplomatic level. But, he said, "a summit meeting with the president of the United States, which is what Senator Obama proposes, is the most prestigious card we have to play in international diplomacy. It is not a card to be played lightly."
Reference Here>>

McCain added his remarks to a prepared speech on economic policy. Before he turned to a discussion of jobs, taxes and trade, he said he wanted to respond to comments about Iran made Sunday in Oregon by Obama.

"Senator Obama claimed that the threat Iran poses to our security is 'tiny' compared to the threat once posed by the former Soviet Union," McCain said. "Obviously, Iran isn't a superpower and doesn't possess the military power the Soviet Union had. But that does not mean that the threat posed by Iran is insignificant."

Accusing Sen. Barack Obama of "inexperience and reckless judgment," Sen. John McCain blasted his likely Democratic opponent on Monday for being willing to talk with Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad without preconditions during his first year as president. McCain said such talks would only embolden "an implacable foe of the United States."

What we, at MAXINE, do not understand is why isn't the MSM able to back away from their absolute love of the presumed Democrat Party candidate for President and do the math on Barack Obama's level of ignorance?

Barry just isn't ready for PRIMETIME!

You know, he only hears the responses from the 70,000 person adoring crowd that is in front of him (he is so self-absorbed and clueless) but he can't hear the reaction of the 750,000, or so, people that are listening to him on the radio or television that understand the depth of the ignorance of his statements.
(ht: Hugh Hewitt)

Google Shareholders On Human Rights: Not So Much

The starting view in Google Earth. If one were to type in an address in Denver, Colorado, USA, one can zoom in and out from 1600 Curtis St. and watch it disappear into a satellite view of the Earth and then zoom back in as if one were falling onto 1600 Curtis St. from space; and if one were to click on "Forbidden City" in the "Sightseeing" column, one would see what it would look like to fly Superman-style from 1600 Curtis St. in Denver to the Forbidden Palace in Beijing, China. Image Credit: Google Earth™ mapping service via How Stuff Works

Google Shareholders On Human Rights: Not So Much

It wasn’t long ago when the business information and technology airwaves were filled with human interest stories about the emerging search engine powerhouse, Google, and how the company should be held out as an example of what a socially conscious corporate society should be.

The Google campus boasted a multitude of social services like gyms, flex-time, in-house medical services, an accommodating and understanding rules infrastructure with staffing to help employees with everyday human life problems … in short, a social/corporate wonderland.

Apparently, this commitment to recognize the plight of the human condition does not extend or apply outside of the walls of the corporate environment.

In recent votes on proposals that would have the search engine giant recognize and adhere to policies that would help to enforce human rights agendas, the shareholders voted down moves in taking a stand.

This excerpted from IDG News Service via Computerworld -

Google grilled on human rights
Google shareholders voted down two proposals that would have compelled the search giant to implement more stringent human rights policies
Nancy Gohring (IDG News Service) 09/05/2008 10:57:04

Google's shareholders, following the advice of the board, voted down two proposals on Thursday that would have compelled the search giant to change its human rights policies, but the issue dominated the company's annual shareholder meeting nevertheless.

Sergey Brin in participation at a Web 2.0 Conference Q & A. Image Credit: James Duncan Davidson/O'Reilly Media, Inc. (2005) via Wikipedia

Sergey Brin, cofounder and president of technology for Google, abstained from voting on either of the proposals. "I agreed with the spirit of these proposals," Brin said. But he said he didn't fully support them as they were written, and so did not want to vote for them.
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Google has come under fire for operating a version of its search engine that complies with China's censorship rules. Google was criticized for launching a search service in 2006 aimed at Chinese users that blocks results considered objectionable to the Beijing government. Google argues that it's better for it to have a presence in the country and to offer people some information, rather than for it to not be active in China at all.

In March Google's board of directors indicated they opposed a ban on Internet censorship as well as the creation of a committee that would review the company's policies on human rights, according to the company's proxy statement filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission and released publicly Tuesday.
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The proposal, presented by an Amnesty worker, suggested that Google institute a series of policies to protect freedom of access to the Internet. The policies should include using all legal means to resist demands for censorship, informing users when the company has complied with requests for censorship, and hosting information that can identify users only in countries that don't restrict the Internet.
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Google is participating in an initiative to develop voluntary guidelines for how Internet companies should respond to censorship demands in countries like China, said Tony Cruz, the Amnesty International member who presented the proposal. While that's a step in the right direction, he said, Google still hasn't made any improvements since its launch in China.

"We've seen little more than talk and defensiveness from Google since the problems emerged," he said. "Nothing precludes Google from taking steps to ameliorate this problem while conversation about the standard goes on."

Harrington Investments submitted a related proposal that was also voted down. It would have created a human rights committee at Google to review the implications of company policies on human rights.

Brin defended Google's activities in China. "Google has a far superior track record than other search companies with respect to making information freely available," he said. He may have been referring to Yahoo, which turned over information to Chinese authorities that led to the imprisonment of a writer.
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That explanation didn't seem to placate everyone in the room. Another Amnesty International member said he appreciates the difficulty of the situation in China, but Google hasn't gone far enough.
Reference Here>>

This lack of action toward the issue of human rights may give a whole new twist on the expression "Google Earth".

So what do we, at MAXINE, think about Google Corporation's recent activities and moves to absolve themselves from being a responsible player on the world's human rights front?

Ahhhh, Not So Much!

At Xerox, It's Here Today ... Gone Tomorrow!

Graphic showing the "invisible ink" effect of the Xerox "photochromatic compound" transient document process. Image Credit: Xerox Corp.

At Xerox, It's Here Today ... Gone Tomorrow! - Originally posted 2/24/07

Just when you begin to think that paper documents are about to be a thing of the past ... "Everything is going digital!" ... Xerox reveals that it still is applying R&D assets on hardcopy processes.

That's right, there is an identified need to have a printed (on a sheet of paper) document that has a ticking-time value for its intended use. The image is applied to the paper, then, after about sixteen hours, the image disappears.

We at MAXINE will define the document derived from this process as a "Workday Lifetime Document" or WLD.

Output from a Xerox inkless printer. Images last only about one working day. Image Credit: Xerox via TFOT

Excerpts from PC Pro (United Kingdom) -

Xerox reveals transient documents
By Alun Williams – PC Pro - Originally published Thursday 7th September 2006, 11:04 AM

Xerox has lifted the veil from some of its research and development work in the field of printing. The cutting-edge research highlighted at a press event involved current projects that are expected to see the commercial light of day within 18-months, including a twist on the theme of invisible ink.

Mario Jarmasz, an engineer from one of the company's R&D centres, in Grenoble, was speaking at the launch of the Xerox's entry-level A4-only multi-function printers. As well as a looking at 'print infrastructure mining', which brings the techniques of data mining to enterprise print logs to better optimise the flow of print jobs around an organisation, he also demoed the very intriguing 'transient documents'.

This offers the prospect of reusable paper in the sense that the content is automatically erased after a period of time, ready for fresh printing. Inspired by the fact that many print outs have a life-span of a few hours (think of the emails you may print out just to read, or the content you proof read on the train journey back home), the specially prepared paper will preserve its content for up to 16 hours.

XRCC researcher Peter Kazmaier with erasable paper output in the lab. Image Credit: Xerox via TFOT

The paper has a photochromic compound that changes from a clear state to a coloured state under ultra-violet light. This can create the print face, which will duly fade with time. Further research is being undertaken to give the option of subsequently preserving the content if the user desires, which might literally involve warming up old data through the heating of the paper.
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Jarmasz also demonstrated the company's work on mobile document imaging, for example capturing data from business cards through a process of OCR compression and then transmission. Possible developments of this work include expanding email interfaces to incorporate handwritten input and the management of distributed forms.

Xerox, of course, is legendary for its Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), which claims credit for developing Ethernet and laser printers as well as the first personal computer. Having developed the machines, the researchers then wanted to connect them and then to print, and the rest is history.
Reference Here>>

Okay ... so, what do you think about this technological document imaging "breakthrough"? MAXINE would like to hear your thoughts. The lines are open!

And this, from an interview posted at The Future Of Things 2-15-2007 -

To learn more about Xerox's inkless printer technology, an interview with Dr. Paul Smith, laboratory manager at the Xerox Research Centre of Canada provides updated insights.

Q: When did you start working on the erasable paper technology and what was the motivation for the project?

A: We began work on erasable paper about three years ago. This followed extensive research by our work practices team from PARC who spent time with customers in offices. People still like the feel and look of paper—it is one of the best ways to communicate and show information. But our customers told us they would like to use a little less paper, so we began working on ways to create paper documents that could be reused.

Q: Did you have a Eureka! moment during the development?

A: The Eureka moment really came during the discussions with customers when we determined that two of every five documents are only used for as little as a day or even for less than a minute. Individuals might print their calendar or memos for a meeting or even the header sheet that goes with networked printers that tells who the document belongs to. You use that literally for only a minute and then put it in the recycle box.

Q: How does the erasable paper work? Could it be used to print in color?

Dr. Paul Smith with inkless output from two different runs. Image Credit: TFOT

A: The erasable paper is not really printed. The paper is coated with a coating of only a few microns. This overlay contains chemicals that are activated by a light bar in the printer or multifunction device that creates the image. At this time the image is black or a dark purple color. It is conceivable that color could be created, but we are not working in that area now.

Although on the surface it may appear simple to develop a paper that can be imaged using UV light alone and then fades at a specified rate at room temperature, in practice there are many complex elements which must come together to make this a viable technology. Erasable paper technology is based on a photochromic concept similar to transition sunglasses which turn dark in bright sunlight and are seen through in a dark room. In the case of sunglasses the photochromic molecule, normally from a class of molecules such as spiropyran, reversibly converts from a colorless form to a colored form. In the case of the erasable paper, the compound that is present within the paper also turns from a colorless form to colored when exposed to a specific wavelength of light. The compound then gradually reverts back to its original colorless form over a period of time.

The end result is a reusable paper which feels very much like regular paper and is not at all like the older, waxy fax paper. The reusable paper technology has been developed from scratch but does incorporate elements which have been disclosed before. With respect to the light source, it is just beyond the blue end of the visible light spectrum. The intensity required is directly related to the writing speed that one would like to support.

Q: Can we describe what you have developed as an inkless printer?

A: People normally associate printing with inks and toners which are deposited onto the paper to make the image. This in fact is an inkless printer. The media itself creates the image after exposure to light.

Q: How many write-rewrite cycles did you perform with each paper?

A: We have been able to rewrite on the paper as many as fifty times.

Q: What printing resolution did you achieve?

A: We currently use 150 dpi, but this is not a limitation, this is just due to the resolution of the image bar that we use. This resolution is more than adequate considering the documents that are being considered for use with transient documents such as cover sheets and e-mails. We could have a much higher resolution if required.

Q: Since the paper is sensitive to U.V. radiation, what happens if you leave paper near the window or even outside on a sunny day?

A: This paper responds to a specific wavelength of light and requires a certain intensity level to change color. The intensity required is higher than the intensity observed in sunlight.

Q: Many other technologies developed in the past by Xerox failed to materialize and were later introduced by other companies. Do you fear a similar fate for the erasable paper?


Xerox's erasable paper—gradual disappearance over time. Image Credit: Xerox via TFOT

A: It is sort of a Silicon Valley myth that Xerox has not been successful in bringing technology products to market, yet we are a $15.7 billion company based on technology that we created ourselves. Our researchers invented the Ethernet, the first laser printer, the first plain-paper fax machine and the graphic user interface. There have been more than 40 successful spin-outs and startups based on Xerox technology. We are confident, based on our extensive focus groups, that there is customer interest in this project and that we will be able to develop a successful product.

Q: Can the erasable paper be used for security purposes?
A: There are many potential applications and a large amount of interest for this technology. Xerox is currently considering all potential commercialization avenues.

Q: When do you predict the erasable paper to reach the consumer market, and what obstacles do you still face in its development?

A: This is a very early research project that is several years away from reaching the market. We will be looking at a number of elements related to quality of image, length of time for the image to fade and more. There is a great deal more work to be done before this will be a product.

Q: How much do you predict the erasable paper will cost when launched?

A: Because erasable paper is still in the research centers, there is no way to speculate on what the cost of the paper will be. However, I want to clarify that this may not require a stand-alone special printer. In our prototypes, we use it as an added feature in existing Xerox multifunction devices. The erasable paper would be in one of the three or four paper drawers that these devices typically offer.

Q: What are the current limitations of the erasable paper technology? Will you be able to control the time it takes for the text to disappear?

A: Currently the image fades in about 16 to 24 hours. We do expect further research will be able to control how long the image lasts. You can also immediately erase the paper and use it again by applying a heat source or putting the paper right in the machine to be reprinted.

Q: Do you fear people will mix regular paper and erasable paper and print important documents on erasable paper? Will it be possible to allow future printers to recognize the type of paper as erasable or regular and notify the user accordingly?

A: The way Xerox multifunction devices are set up, you can currently select what type of paper you wish to use, based on sizes, color, transparencies, and so forth that are loaded into the drawers. So it will certainly be an option that you will be able to tell the printing device when to use erasable paper.
Reference Here>>

Originally Posted At Symblogogy (updated 2-24-2007) September 8, 2006

UPDATED 5-2-2008:

Xerox touts erasable paper, smart documents
The hi-tech paper can be reused up to 100 times
By Agam Shah - April 29, 2008 (IDG News Service)

Xerox Corp.'s research arm yesterday showcased its latest innovations, including erasable paper and tools that make documents "smart" by adding a deeper meaning to words and images.

Since its establishment in 1970, the Palo Alto Research Center Inc. (PARC), funded by Xerox, has created numerous technologies now available on PCs, including Ethernet, the graphical user interface (GUI) and the computer mouse. The laboratory, with other Xerox research facilities, is now trying to help its parent company and other start-ups by focusing on printing and other innovations to access, use and secure electronic documents.

Scientists demonstrated paper that can be reused after printed text automatically deletes itself from the paper's surface within 24 hours. Instead of trashing or recycling after one use, a single piece of paper can be used a second time, and reused up to 100 times, said Eric Shrader, area manager at PARC.

Predictions that paper would disappear in the 1970s in favor of electronic documents were wrong, Shrader said. As the number of electronic documents produced increases, about two to five pages are printed in the office for daily use, like e-mail messages and Web pages, which are discarded or recycled after being read. Reusable paper reduces waste, is environmentally safe, and helps reduce overall printing and paper costs, Shrader said.
Reference Here>>

Barack Obama’s Vetting Through Association

Bill Ayers is shown in 1982 with wife Bernardine Dohrn and their son, Zayd Dohrn, then 4. Image Credit: By David Handschuh -- Associated Press

Barack Obama’s Vetting Through Association

Most people who have a complaint about the Junior Senator from Illinois, Barack Obama, say that he has not been around long enough to have built a record ... upon which one can judge the underpinnings of the decision-making of the man.

Information has surfaced recently about the friends and associations of this Senator and Democrat candidate for President of the United States. This information should cause one to pause and reflect on the fact some vetting has indeed taken place.

This vetting through association should not be confused with “Guilt Through Association” because this focus does not have to take into account what Barack Obama actually thinks … it has everything to do with what these people, their background and what they think, and further, what they think about Barack Obama.

This vetting is in the form of the judgments of the people who know him best. They have worked with him, taught him, served on committees with him. They embrace him as their choice for the leader of the “Free World”.

The people we, at MAXINE, are talking about are the former radical SDS/Weather Underground members William Ayers, Bernardine Dohrn (Ayers’ wife), Tony Rezko, and Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. of the Trinity United Church of Christ. The first two names are of greater trouble than the latter.

This excerpted from Hugh Hewitt and other collateral supplied from his blog –

William Ayers at the time of his arrest.

Underground links likely to resurface for Obama
John Kass - Chicago Tribune - April 23, 2008

This story involves two Chicagoans, former Weather Underground terrorist leaders Bernardine Dohrn and her husband, William Ayers, both Obama supporters who blessed his initial foray into politics. Last week, the unrepentant Ayers became a flash point in Obama's debate with Hillary Clinton.

"And what they [Weather Underground] did was set bombs and in some instances people died," said Clinton, sweetly playing the white terrorist card. "I know Sen. Obama is a good man and I respect him greatly, but I think this is an issue that certainly the Republicans will be raising.”

And why shouldn't they?
----
But no association is above question for a candidate, whether Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Illinois political fixer Tony Rezko, or Ayers and Dohrn.
----
Broadway Baby was implicated in an investigation of a series of violent armed robberies in New York—netting more than $2 million over a two-year span—committed by former Black Panthers and Weather Underground members in the early '80s.

Their aim? Global revolution, naturally. They needed cash, but the rich white parents weren't in a giving mood. So their privileged offspring grabbed guns, pointed them at the faces of the working man and, sometimes, they pulled the trigger.

At Broadway Baby, customers often paid by check and used driver's licenses for identification. On Dec. 28, 1979, information from two customer files was used to apply for two driver's licenses at the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles. The fraudulent licenses were used to rent getaway cars for the gang.

Investigators tracked the identities on two licenses for the getaway cars. The names belonged to women who had shopped at Broadway Baby in December 1979. But they weren't robbers.

And who was the manager of Broadway Baby during that period of the customer ID theft?

Dohrn, the future wife of Ayers, identified by investigators as taking customer information from one, and possibly both, of the women shoppers. Dohrn was never charged in that case.

Dohrn and Ayers had been running for some 11 years, fleeing federal charges that they instigated riots in Chicago in 1969.

They finally came in out of the cold in 1980, but the New York gang continued its spree, ending in the bloody 1981 robbery in Rockland County that left a Brinks security guard and two police officers dead.

The federal charges from the riots were finally dropped because the FBI used illegal wiretaps. But the local charge of aggravated assault stuck to Dohrn. She pleaded guilty to two counts, receiving a $1,500 fine and no jail time

In 1982, Dohrn was brought before a federal grand jury investigating radical conspiracies linked to the New York robberies. She refused to cooperate or to provide a signature sought by FBI handwriting analysts. Dohrn was held in contempt of the grand jury and imprisoned for seven months.

A few years later, Ayers got his job as a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. And Dohrn was employed at the Children and Family Justice Center affiliated with Northwestern University's School of Law.

I've always been fascinated as to how the radical underground stop running and get jobs in academia. Is there a Terrorist Patronage Office for Rich White People? And how did a convicted Dohrn get hired to teach at a law school?
Reference Here>>

Bernardine Dohrn at the time of her arrest.

Former '60s Radical Is Now Considered Mainstream in Chicago
By Peter Slevin - Washington Post Staff Writer - Friday, April 18, 2008

In the 1960s, Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn saw themselves as urban guerrillas who just might be able to overthrow the U.S. government and force an end to the Vietnam War. They were members of the Weather Underground, a radical offshoot of the antiwar movement, who went into hiding for a decade after a bomb accidentally exploded, killing three members of the group.

Nearly 30 years after surrendering to police, Ayers and Dohrn, both in their 60s, are tenured university professors whose work on school reform and juvenile justice have won them bipartisan respect.

Ayers is an informal adviser to Mayor Richard M. Daley and has been awarded more than $50 million in charitable grants for his promotion of small schools as a solution to a crisis in education. Dohrn lectures widely on children's law and serves on a variety of boards and committees. Together, they have raised three boys in the intellectual haven of Hyde Park, where Sen. Barack Obama is a neighbor.

For months, their connection to the Democratic presidential candidate -- they hosted a gathering for him in 1995 when he first ran for the state Senate and later contributed $200 to his reelection campaign -- has been a source of growing anger among conservatives.
----
"I don't condone what he did 40 years ago, but I remember that period well," said Daley, an Obama supporter whose father, Richard J. Daley, was a favorite target of the antiwar movement when he was mayor in the '60s. "It was a difficult time, but those days are long over. I believe we have too many challenges in Chicago and our country to keep refighting 40-year-old battles."

Their pasts have hardly escaped Ayers and Dohrn. After Sept. 11, 2001, alumni at the universities where the two teach protested their presence and said the couple were unrepentant.
----
This is a community that has regularly elected former Black Panther Bobby Rush (D) to Congress and mostly sees Obama's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., as the onetime heart of an established African American church with thousands of members.
----
Ayers and Dohrn did not return calls or e-mails seeking comment. In an April 6 posting on his blog, Ayers described his reaction to his intermittent celebrity as conservative pundits hammered him for his Weather Underground past and his comment in a New York Times profile, published by coincidence on Sept. 11, 2001, that he did not regret his militant tactics.

"Day in and day out," he wrote, "I go about my business, I hang out with my kids and my grandchildren, take care of the elders, I go to work, I teach and I write, I organize and I participate in the never-ending effort to build a powerful movement for peace and social justice."

The Weather Underground claimed responsibility for roughly a dozen bombings. Targets included the Pentagon, the Capitol, police stations, banks and courthouses. Beyond the three conspirators killed in 1970 when a bomb exploded prematurely, no one was injured in a campaign defined by what one critic has called "immensely bad ideas and dreadful tactics."
----
Dohrn pleaded guilty to a state charge and later served seven months for refusing to give a handwriting sample to federal authorities. She told a reporter that the FBI already had a sample, and that she considered grand juries "illegal and coercive."
----
When Obama was asked about Ayers during Wednesday's debate, he described him as "a guy who lives in my neighborhood." He said he does not exchange ideas with him "on a regular basis."

The two men served for three years on the board of the Woods Fund, an anti-poverty group. The board, which Obama has since left, was small and collegial, said chair Laura Washington, who served with them. It met four times a year for a half-day, mostly to approve grants, she said. The atmosphere was "friendly but businesslike."
----
Under fire on Wednesday, Obama questioned the relevance of Ayers's past to his candidacy: "The notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values, doesn't make much sense."
Reference Here>>

Both Ayers and Dohrn were recently recorded making statements that would cause the average person to ask … “What is former about the nature of the radical statements made and recorded just five months ago in November 2007?”

Sample Transcript Excerpts:

Ayers and Dohrn address a Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) reunion in November 2007 – a reunion of a radical, liberal, socialist, communist, terrorist, Anti-American action group formed in the 1960’s.

William Ayers, on America - "Empire resurrected, and unapologetic, war without end. An undefined enemy that is supposed to be a rallying point for a new kind of energized jingoistic patriotism. Unprecedented and unapologetic military expansion, white supremacy changing its form … but essentially intact.

Attacks on women, and girls --- violent attacks. Growing surveillance in every sphere of our lives, on and on and on, the targeting of gay and lesbian people as a kind of a scapegoating gesture, to keep our minds off of what is really happening."

Bernadine Dohrn on working politically in America - At the same 2007 SDS reunion, Dohrn quotes Martin Luther King, Jr., referring to the US government as "the greatest purveyor of violence" in the world. She says she believes this sentiment to be true today. She tells the audience that living in America constitutes living in "the belly of the beast" and "the heart of the monster."

Full Audio Of Past And Present Statements Here>>

Video, With Statements From Dohrn Here>>

Ann Coulter's thoughts on how this information relates to, "Her Girl", Hillary Clinton and a perspective as to how this should apply to Barack Obama.

Excerpted from Human Events:

You Don't Need A Weatherman to Know Which Candidate Blows
by Ann Coulter - Posted: 04/23/2008

On one hand, Obama pals around with terrorists. On the other hand, Hillary pals around with James Carville. Advantage: Obama.

Asked why he would be friends with the likes of Weatherman Bill Ayers, Obama said: "The notion that ... me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values doesn't make much sense."

That's a slick answer -- even "Clintonian"! -- but the problem is, Ayers and his Weatherman wife, Bernadine Dohrn, won't stop boasting about their days as Weathermen.

It's not simply that they haven't repented. To the contrary, those were their glory days! And Ayers isn't just someone who lives in the neighborhood: He and Dohrn were there at the inception of Obama's political career, hosting a fundraiser for Obama at their home back in 1995.
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At one rally, Dohrn famously praised the Manson family for murdering Sharon Tate and others, shouting: "Dig it. First they killed those pigs, then they ate dinner in the same room with them. They even shoved a fork into a victim's stomach! Wild!"

In a better country, just saying "Dig it!" in public would get you 20 years in the slammer.
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At other rallies, Dohrn said, "Bring the revolution home, kill your parents -- that's where it's at."
----
So in addition to being stupid and violent, the Weathermen were also incompetent terrorists.

Would that Timothy McVeigh had been so inept!

If he [Timothy McVeigh] had only said he bombed the building in Oklahoma City to protest American "imperialism," McVeigh, too, could be teaching at Northwestern University, sitting on a board with and holding fundraisers for presidential candidate B. Hussein Obama.
Reference Here>>

The views held as expressed through the statements and actions of Ayers and Dohrn, are NOT the views of America held here, at MAXINE ... are these views, yours?

One last addendum:

Guy Benson is the young producer that has assisted in helping Hugh Hewitt on the Ayers/Dohrn collateral materials. Guy dug up the 2007 tape of William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn speaking at an SDS reunion, audio of which debuted on the Sandy Rios Show which Guy produces, then on my show, Hannity & Colmes, Laura Ingraham.

Benson has now posted a column analyzing Senator Obama's responses to the Obama-Ayers-Dohrn connections.

- PLEASE Read The Whole Article -

We, at MAXINE, are dumbfound struck at how these people have not evolved one inch in a life and world that has advanced and evolved forty years from when these folks gained their fame.

In the video above, Bill Ayers wears a FREE MINDS t-shirt, yet his mind has been LOCKED DOWN in the same mode for over forty years!

In those same forty years, for example, many of us have changed, or modified our opinions due to the temperance of time and reflection ... or just plain temperance. Again, these folks have not - - - and they think that Barack Obama is the perfect person ... their marxist based thinking process for the person ... to be the leader of the free world.

Poll Answers

From Shades Of Grey To B&W – Obama Comes Into Focus

Comparison of warm and cool shades of grey. Image Credit: Knulclunk, vectorized by Fvasconcellos

From Shades Of Grey To B&W – Obama Comes Into Focus

This rocket ship ground swell of support for Barack Obama is pretty amazing when one just stands and watches what is actually going on. The press is in the tank for Obama, he never gets questioned on any subject that requires meat to be on the bone to answer … and when he gives only a bare bones response to a difficult question, no follow-up question that would flesh out a real answer is forthcoming.

“Yes We Can”, “Change You Can Believe In”, “Moving Forward Into The Future”, “The Audacity Of Hope”, is all we are fed on the way to the Democrat Party political convention to be held this summer. No real pushback on the issues of Gay Marriage, Abortion, the tensions developing in South America, Israel and the rocket attacks of 2008, the reality of a stronger, more Communist Russia, and the changing world economic landscape.

But now, we do not have to wait on the Mainstream Media (MSM) to do this work of definition for us anymore. Barack Obama, in an unguarded yet genuine moment, captured and reported on by a “citizen journalist” posting in the Huffington Post, Barack Obama has provided us with a glimpse of the core values embedded in his belief system.

By stating to a group of Democrat Party faithful at a fundraiser in San Francisco April 6, 2008, that the way to understand a large group of voters in small town America is to first explain why they “cling” on to religious faith and principles, personal freedom and gun ownership, the dislike toward open-borders immigration, and caution in the acceptance of people different than themselves is a bitterness built as a result of a 25 year shifting economic landscape.

This opinion by Jonah Goldberg excerpted from The Los Angeles Times -

Barack Obama, the yuppie candidate
By Jonah Goldberg - April 15, 2008

Barack Obama is finally coming into focus.

For a while now, the Obamaphiles have insisted that their candidate represents a profound break with the past. No more culture wars. No more "re-litigating the 1960s," in Obama's own words.

But what about re-litigating the 1980s?

There's always been a certain cultural lag time to Barack and Michelle Obama, a kitschiness that's been hard to pinpoint. But I think I've got it: They're self-hating yuppies straight out of the 1980s, which was to the Obamas what the 1960s were to the Clintons.

For those too young to remember, "yuppie" was shorthand for young urban professionals
----
Ironically, the biggest complaints about yuppie materialism came from self-loathing liberal yuppies -- like the Obamas.

The Obamas still seem stuck in that time warp, clinging to '80s-style resentments and political assumptions. Michelle Obama is never so eloquent as when she's complaining about the burden of student loans for her two Ivy League law degrees and covering the high cost of summer camp and piano lessons for her kids on her family's half-million-dollars-a-year income.
----
It's Ronald Reagan -- the president of the 1980s -- who seems to loom so large in Obama's world. (Recall how last year, Obama caught some flak suggesting he might be a new Ronald Reagan.) Reagan famously restored confidence in the nation while reducing confidence in government as the solution to our problems.
----
The Reagan Revolution moved the country durably to the right -- so much so that even Democrats saw the writing on the wall.
----
Bill Clinton's 1992 victory stemmed from the fact that he was a "different kind of Democrat" -- that is, one who understood the lessons of Reaganism, or at least claimed to, and rejected the "brain dead policies" of the old Democratic Party. He was a pro-death-penalty free-trader who oversaw the triumph of the Reaganite critique of welfare.

It's as if Barack Obama spent the 1990s in some kind of Democratic Brigadoon -- and I guess Cambridge, Mass., and the South Side of Chicago might qualify -- and didn't keep up with his party, let alone the nation. Barack Obama, the man of the future, in fact stands athwart that history yelling "Stop."

This is the best way to understand his recent comments at a San Francisco fundraiser as he explained his challenge of connecting with rural and small town voters.

"You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania," he said, "and ... the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. ... It's not surprising, then, that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."

Later, when his comments sparked a controversy, he dismissed it as a "little typical sort of political flare-up because I said something that everybody knows is true."

But everybody doesn't know anything of the sort. Not in this decade anyway. Obama's merely recycling the liberal cliches of the 1980s, namely that Pennsylvania's "bitter" voters have been duped by "wedge issues" like guns, religion and racial resentment. New Democrats recognized that wedge issues are legitimate concerns. Old Democrats remain in denial.
----
Slate columnist Mickey Kaus has been waiting for Obama to "pivot" to the center as Clinton did in 1992. But it may be that America's most reliably liberal senator doesn't think he has to. He isn't a unifier. He's a counter-revolutionary. And waiting for him to pivot is like waiting for Godot.
Reference Here>>

These observations by Jonah Goldberg, we at MAXINE believe, are the best gauge on the what, why, where, when, and how a Senator Barack Obama’s presidency would look like and the shape it would take.

A counter-revolutionary Marxist willing to place socialism over personal freedom in order to bring proper definition to a group of people HE doesn’t understand or relate to ... Americans!

Barack Obama's Judgement Of Us Is A Bitter Pill To Swallow

The Modern-Day Pied Piper Of Hamlin - Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) addresses supporters during a campaign stop at Columbus East High School in Columbus, Indiana, April 11, 2008. Image Credit: REUTERS/John Sommers II

Barack Obama's Judgement Of Us Is A Bitter Pill To Swallow

Obama touched off controversy with his remarks at a closed San Francisco fundraiser over this previous weekend. The remarks became public late Friday afternoon via the very liberal internet politics posting site The Huffington Post.

He said jobs had been disappearing in small towns in Pennsylvania and across the Midwest for 25 years with nothing to replace them and that people become "bitter".

"It's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations," said Barack Obama.

In short, Barack Obama declared in front of a crowd of politically friendly people that one of the root causes of racism, the dislike toward open-borders immigration, the perceived need for personal gun ownership, and a deep and entrenched focus on religious principles is bitterness.

NICE!

Washington D.C. Opens New Museum - NEWSEUM

NEWSEUM At Night - The museum is set to officially Friday, April 11, 2008. Image Credit: NEWSEUM Pressroom 

Washington D.C. Opens New Museum - NEWSEUM 

Originally Published April 10, 2008 - 8:27am - Edmund Jenks, MAXINE

 The nation’s capitol city, Washington D.C., plays host to a new major museum dedicated to news, news gathering, news print, production and broadcast, news workers and memoriam, and a Newsroom where interviews are broadcast. 

 NEWSEUM – The interactive Museum Of News, is located adjacent to the Smithsonian museums on the National Mall at the intersection of Pennsylvania Avenue and Sixth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C.. 

The official dedication ceremony and opening is scheduled for Friday, April 11, 2008. The Newseum features seven levels of galleries, theaters, retail spaces and visitor services. It offers a unique environment that takes museumgoers behind the scenes to experience how and why news is made.

 

A $25 million grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to the Newseum — the largest investment from the news community to the newest museum in the nation's capital — will honor the news legacy of the Knight brothers. The grant gives the Knight name to two broadcast studios and a conference center at the Newseum, the largest single project ever devoted to journalism and the free flow of news. Image Credit: NEWSEUM Pressroom 

This morning, NEWSEUM held one of its first broadcasts of a live news conference from a studio inside the museum. 

The joint news conference began with statements from General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker on the status of conditions in Iraq, followed by questions fielded from the audience (presumably museumgoers and actual reporters) as a final appearance after their debriefing reports delivered to the Senate and Congress over the last couple of days.

5 Freedoms Walkway - Image Credit: NEWSEUM Pressroom

This excerpted from the NEWSEUM website – 

Newseum Blends High-Tech With Historical 

The Newseum — a 250,000-square-foot museum of news — offers visitors an experience that blends five centuries of news history with up-to-the-second technology and hands-on exhibits. ---- 

"Visitors will come away with a better understanding of news and the important role it plays in all of our lives," said Newseum Executive Director and Senior Vice President Joe Urschel. "The new Newseum is educational, inspirational and a whole lot of fun." ---- 

What They're Saying - A look at media coverage of the Newseum 

“Were he alive today, Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan would have appreciated the Newseum, opening April 11 on the last revitalized site along Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest. 

He spearheaded the four-decade-long effort to revive the inaugural parade route with distinguished buildings and open spaces worthy of “America’s Main Street.” The Newseum caps his vision with contemporary architecture far bolder than the last major design completed on the street. … It is sheathed in glass, not masonry, to reveal some of its activity inside and counter the sealed-up monumentality so prevalent in Washington.” 

— Deborah K. Dietsch, The Washington Times “An endless network of corridors and theaters contains a wealth of news materials that are, at least to someone of my generation, a wonderful and moving evocation of the past. … The Newseum is an attic simply packed with fascinating stuff.” 

— Robert Campbell, The Boston Globe “The new incarnation of the Newseum is dazzling, innovative and absorbing, a first-class addition to the capital's cultural institutions.” 

— Howard Kurtz, The Washington Post “From every frenetic corner, the Newseum fairly shouts, ‘News is necessary to a functioning democracy. News is fun, news is cool, news matters.’” 

— Maria Puente, USA Today “Many Washington museums document the nation’s history. ... As it elevates and illuminates the usually gritty, sometimes glamorous work of the press, the Newseum looks set to give its neighbors some competition.” 

— Owen Phillips, Men's Vogue The Newseum is "among the most prominent" museums in the world, "perched on the last buildable site on the presidential inaugural parade route between the Capitol and the White House. And it is one of the most ambitious, both in design and aspiration." 

— Katharine Q. Seelye, The New York Times "At a time when journalists are reeling from scathing rebukes and public skepticism about their profession, the gleaming Newseum is poised to become a welcome reminder of all that's good about the business." 

— Jessica Meyers, American Journalism Review "The importance of the First Amendment is hard to miss at the Newseum: Visitors are greeted with a three-story-high engraving of the amendment's words next to the front entrance. ... The new location has a commanding view of the Capitol." 

— APME Gazette "The Newseum will be particularly exciting because officials expect it will be a place to spot news personalities and newsmakers alike." 

— Elizabeth Brotherton, Roll Call ----

NBC Newsroom - Image Credit: NEWSEUM Pressroom

 

KNIGHT FOUNDATION JOINS NEWSEUM'S FOUNDING PARTNERS WITH A LEAD CONTRIBUTION OF $25 MILLION 

Conference Center, Broadcast Studios to Be Named in Honor of Knight Brothers WASHINGTON — 

A $25 million grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to the Newseum — the largest investment from the news community to the newest museum in the nation's capital — will honor the news legacy of the Knight brothers.  

Opening April 11 on Pennsylvania Avenue, the new 250,000-square-foot, interactive museum of news will remind generations of Washington visitors of the importance of the First Amendment, free speech and the role of the media in a free society. 

The grant gives the Knight name to two broadcast studios and a conference center at the Newseum, the largest single project ever devoted to journalism and the free flow of news. ---- 

"The Newseum will immediately become one of the most important platforms for discussion of free speech in America," said Alberto Ibargüen, president of Knight Foundation. "We want to be part of that conversation, we want our journalism grantees to be part of that conversation and we want the values the Knight brothers stood for and defended to be integral to that conversation." ---- 

Once opened, the new museum's two Knight broadcast studios, including the Pennsylvania Avenue Studio overlooking the U.S. Capitol, will be the location of top-flight news programs and civic dialogue on the issues of the day. 

"Millions of Americans travel to the National Mall to learn more how to be an American," said Steiger, editor in chief of ProPublica. "It's fitting for the Fourth Estate to take up residence there." Knight Foundation joins a host of supporters from news and journalism contributing to the Newseum, including the Annenberg Foundation, The New York Times, News Corporation, Cox Enterprises, Hearst Corporation, ABC News, NBC News and Time Warner. ----

KSAS-TV Channel 5 News Heliocopter - Image Credit: NEWSEUM Pressroom 

Addmission Hours 

The Newseum is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily and is closed on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day. 

2008 General Admission Rates * • Adults (13 to 64): $20 * • Seniors (65 and older): $18 * • Youth (7 to 12): $13 * • Children (6 and younger): Free * • Group discounts are available. School Groups Public and private school students in grades 1–12 in The Washington Post metropolitan market receive free, general admission through March 31, 2009. 

To qualify, schools must make group reservations in advance. The schools must be located in one of the jurisdictions listed below. College and university student groups located in the same areas listed below also receive free admission through March 31, 2009. To qualify, colleges must make group reservations in advance. 

Reference Here>>

One Question: 

(spawned after a review of the names of supporters contributing to the NEWSEUM) 

Will the New Media spur of the “fourth estate” get its own Wing and Blogging studio? 

 Anytime soon?

 

NowPublic Awarded

UPDATE - UPDATE - UPDATE 

NEWSEUM closes it's doors for good on February 19, 2021 - and in this age of Social Media censoring, dubious "Fact Checking", and account suspension/cancellation along with outright social portal de-platforming from server farms (as what happened with the 1 Billion dollar social media platform PARLER being pulled off of Amazon Web Services server farm - without notice or cause given tenants of Free Speech) supported by America's Fourth Estate - this is good.

Yes, the Newseum’s First Amendment Tablet Is Coming Down. 

No, It’s Not Because Democracy Has Failed.

The 50-ton, 74-foot-tall marble tablet is going into storage, and maybe someday, a new home.

WRITTEN BY MIMI MONTGOMERY, Washingtonian   | PUBLISHED ON FEBRUARY 18, 2021

Yesterday, photojournalist Megan Smith tweeted out now-viral images of the tablet being disassembled from the building’s facade. Of course, because this is the internet, some folks decided this was an apt metaphor for the state of today’s media, or a reflection of the Biden administration’s approach toward journalists.

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In reality, the tablet is coming down because…the museum is closed and the building has been sold. You can still check it out, though: The display hasn’t been fully taken apart, says a Freedom Forum representative. Once it is fully disassembled, it will go into storage, says the representative, with hopes to find it a home where it can be permanently displayed.

ENDS

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