July 2009 - Reading The Pictures

International Focus Photo July 31, 2009

We Are All Neda

International protests on the fortieth day after the young martyr, Neda Agha Soltan, was killed in Iran.

President Obama Photo July 30, 2009

Your Turn: Reading The Beer Summit

BAGnewsNotes readers "read" The Obama Beer Summit.

International Focus Photo

The product of one of the more disingenuous photo ops circling now, we see Netanyahu taking to the desert with a pair of binoculars, the picture of an "outward looking" leader surrounded by empty expanse.

The Great Recession Photo July 29, 2009

Your Turn: Newsweek Calls the Recession

Besides having just scored the kind of publicity money can't buy, I was interested in your thoughts on the symbolism as well as the audacity of the Newsweek "Recession is Over" cover.

Business Focus Photo

Health Care: New Lower Prices!

I'm interested in your thoughts on this image, and whether Obama -- in rallying the public over health care legislation -- set himself up being photographed in a supermarket lined up with lemons and framed by sales signs.

Race Focus Photo

Why Henry Louis Gates Should Sue

Given that the now dominant picture in my head of Henry Louis Gates highlights the man agitated and in handcuffs on his Massachusetts front porch, this photo gave me a start

Race Focus Photo

Budweiser Notwithstanding, Might Joe "Six Pack" Photo Op Reinforce "Obama Latte"?

To the extent that the Gates affair exposes a race/class divide, doesn't this photo op simply reinforce the split, with Obama further identified with Gates and the "Harvard elite"?

Uncategorized Photo July 28, 2009

One World Alliance

Slightly more than 6 months into his term, Obama is making clear headway in establishing a more collaborative environment on Capitol Hill.

Bush Focus Photo July 27, 2009

Bush/Cheney Suppressed Global Warming Images

When evidence of global warming (courtesy of their own spy satellites) was staring them in the face, not one speck of evidence ever informed Bush and Cheney's behavior

Uncategorized Photo

Quitters Ever Prosper

By now, Sarah Palin's pose is signature, the blood-smelling "six gun" gesture packaged with that cocked head and part-coquettish, part sadist's smile serving as the visual envelope to deliver, vague and scattershot, another hate-loving threat.

Business Focus Photo July 26, 2009

Another Picture of the Health Care Process

The Max Baucus Health Care Lobbyist Complex: A diagram from the Sunlight Foundation detailing Finance Committee Chairman Baucus's connections to the health care industry.

Culture Focus Photo

Remembering Apollo 11: Techno-Porn and Modernity’s Gamble

To many, the Apollo 11 moon landing is “the” moment of national triumph in the post-World War II era—marked by recent 40th anniversary slideshows of “remembrance" at major media websites. I am typically reluctant to concede the all-too-easy identification of a phallic symbol, but it is pretty hard to...

Race Focus Photo July 25, 2009

More Henry Louis Gates: Porch Choice Of Evidence

And then, isn't this arrest photo of Henry Louis Gates the quintessential racial projective -- to one eye, shouting racial profiling; to another, the picture of "uppity"?

Media Focus Photo July 24, 2009

Not So Subliminal CBS News Take-Away: Gates a Criminal

Yeah, it's not like CBS is playing the race card using visuals like these to tell the Gates story, right?

Media Focus Photo

Obama Feeling The Heat? …Or, Would Cable Have It So?

Like it or not, what Obama has cooking is an incredibly complex (and necessarily protracted) process of give-and-take going on across the broadest spectrum of political and industry stake holders. Unfortunately, you would barely appreciate it given the media framing.