About Google Trends
With Google Trends, you can compare the world’s interest in your favorite topics. Enter up to five topics and see how often they’ve been searched on Google over time. Google Trends also shows how frequently your topics have appeared in Google News stories, and in which geographic regions people have searched for them most.
- How does Google Trends work?
- How accurate and up-to-date is the information provided by Google Trends?
- When will Google Trends be available for my country or language?
About Hot Searches
With Hot Searches, you can see a snapshot of what’s on the public’s collective mind by viewing the fastest-rising searches for different points of time. You can see a list of today’s top 40 fastest-rising search queries in the U.S. You can also select a recent date in history to see what the top rising searches were and what the search activity looked like over the course of that day. Hot Searches are updated hourly.
Working with Google Trends
- How many terms can I compare? And what other functionality is available?
- How is the data scaled?
- Is the News reference volume graph scaled?
- Is the data normalized?
- Do the numbers on the graph reflect actual search traffic numbers?
- I see a number next to my search term at the top of the graph. What does it mean?
- When comparing two or more search terms, I sometimes see results with all zeros. Why?
- Is there a way to adjust how the terms are ranked and scaled?
- How does counting and ranking of the top regions, cities, and languages work, and are they scaled differently?
- How is information gathered to determine the regions, cities, and languages?
- How do I change the time frame, region, or sub-region of the results?
- Is there a way to export the data?
- How does the geographical assignment change from 1/1/2011 affect the data I see?
Privacy and Terms of Use
- When is it okay to use the information I find on Google Trends?
- This tool makes search information public. What about my personal search data?
1. How does Google Trends work?
Google Trends analyzes a portion of Google web searches to compute how many searches have been done for the terms you enter, relative to the total number of searches done on Google over time. We then show you a graph with the results – our Search Volume Index graph.
Located beneath the Search Volume Index graph is our News reference volume graph. This graph shows you the number of times your topic appeared in Google News stories. When Google Trends detects a spike in the volume of news stories for a particular search term, it labels the graph and displays the headline of an automatically selected Google News story written near the time of that spike. Currently, only English-language headlines are displayed, but we hope to support non-English headlines in the future.
Below the search and news volume graphs, Trends displays the top regions, cities, and languages in which people searched for the first search term you entered.
2. How accurate and up-to-date is the information provided by Google Trends?
The data Trends produces may contain inaccuracies for a number of reasons, including data-sampling issues and a variety of approximations that are used to compute results. We hope you find this service interesting and entertaining, but you probably wouldn’t want to write your Ph.D. dissertation based on the information provided by Trends.
The information provided by Trends is updated daily, and Hot Searches is updated hourly.
3. When will Google Trends be available for my country or language?
Currently, Google Trends is only available in English and in Chinese. Hot Searches is only available in English, but both Singapore and India show information specific to their regions. We hope to roll out Google Trends in other regions and languages in the future.
4. How does Hot Searches work?
Hot Searches reflects what people are searching for on Google today. Rather than showing the most popular searches overall, which would always be generic terms like “weather,” Hot Searches highlights searches that experience sudden surges in popularity, and updates that information hourly. Our algorithm analyzes millions of web searches performed on Google and displays those searches that deviate the most from their historic traffic pattern. The algorithm also filters out spam and removes inappropriate material. For each search, Hot Searches shows related searches and a Search Volume Index graph. The page also displays news, blog posts, and web results to give context about why a search may be appearing on the Hot Searches list. You can also choose a date in the past to see what the top Hot Searches were for that date by clicking change date.
5. Is the list of Hot Searches comprehensive?
No. We know there may be numerous queries that experience sudden surges in popularity, but Hot Searches only highlights the top 40 such queries. You can view all 40 searches by clicking More Hot Searches; this list is updated throughout the day. You can also get this list through a feed. To do so, click Site Feed after you’ve clicked More Hot Searches, and follow the instructions.
6. How many terms can I compare? And what other functionality is available?
You can compare up to five terms by separating each one with a comma. For example, to compare “boots” and “sneakers”, simply enter boots, sneakers and click Search Trends.
To see how many searches contained either term, list them and separate with a vertical bar ( | ):
boots | sneakers
To see how many searches were done for either “snow boots” or “sneakers”, use parentheses around the multi-word term: (snow boots) | sneakers.
You can also exclude terms from your search by using the minus sign. For instance, to see how many searches contained the term “boots” but not “hiking”, enter boots-hiking.
To restrict your results to only those searches that contain your terms in the specific order you’ve entered them, you can put your terms in quotation marks: "snow boots". (By default, Google Trends will show you all searches that contain the terms you entered in any order.)
Note that when you use any of these advanced features – quotation marks, minus signs, or vertical bars – Trends will only display the Search Volume Index graph. The news portion doesn’t support advanced functionality at this time.
7. How is the data scaled?
The data is scaled based on the average search traffic of the term you’ve entered.
There are two modes of scaling – relative and fixed – and the only difference between them is the time frame that’s used to calculate the average. However, fixed scaling is only available as a .csv export. Please note that the ability to see numbers on the graph and to export this data with either mode of scaling are available only after you’ve signed into your Google Account for Trends.
In relative mode, the data is scaled to the average search traffic for your term (represented as 1.0) during the time period you’ve selected. For example, if you entered the term dogs, the graph you’d see would be scaled to the average of all search traffic for dogs from January 2004 to present. But if you chose a specific time frame – say 2006 – the data would then appear relative to the average of all search traffic for dogs in 2006. Then, let’s suppose that you notice a spike in the graph to 3.5; this spike means that traffic is 3.5 times the average for 2006.
In fixed mode, the data is scaled to the average traffic for your term during a fixed point in time (usually January 2004). In our example, 1.0 would be the average traffic of dogs in January 2004. If you chose 2006 as your time frame, you would be comparing data for dogs in 2006 to its data in January 2004. Since the scale basis (1.0) doesn’t change with time, you can look at different time periods, and relate them to each other. (Note: For keywords without a historical record, it may not be possible to establish a fixed scale).
8. Is the News reference volume graph scaled?
No. The graph is for illustrative purposes, and simply shows you the number of times your topic appeared in Google News stories.
9. Is the data normalized?
All results from Google Trends are normalized, which means that we’ve divided the sets of data by a common variable to cancel out the variable’s effect on the data and allow the underlying characteristics of the data sets to be compared. If we didn’t normalize the results, and instead displayed the absolute rankings of cities, they wouldn’t be all that interesting – a densely populated area like New York City would be the top city for many results simply because there are lots of searches from that area.
Remember, Google Trends shows users’ propensity to search for a certain topic on Google on a relative basis. For example, just because a particular region isn’t on the Top Regions list for the term “haircut” doesn’t necessarily mean that people there have decided to stage a mass rebellion against society’s conventions. It could be that people in that region might not use Google to find a barber, use a different term when doing their searches, or simply search for so many other topics unrelated to haircuts, that searches for “haircut” comprise a small portion of the search volume from that region as compared to other regions.
10. Do the numbers on the graph reflect actual search traffic numbers?
No. The numbers you see on the y-axis of the Search Volume Index (which you can see after you’ve signed in to your Google Account) aren’t absolute search traffic numbers. Instead, Trends scales the first term you’ve entered so that its average search traffic in the chosen time period is 1.0; subsequent terms are then scaled relative to the first term. Note that all numbers are relative to total traffic.
Read more about how we scale and normalize the data.
11. I see a number next to my search term at the top of the graph. What does this mean?
The number you see next to your search term corresponds to its total average traffic in the time frame you’ve chosen.
When comparing multiple search terms on a relative scale, the first term you enter will always be 1.0, as subsequent terms are ranked and scaled against this term. For example, you may see: blogs (1.0) and newspapers (0.51). In this case, newspapers has approximately half the searches of blogs.
If you export the data to a .csv file and you’ve selected fixed scaling, 1.0 corresponds to the average traffic for the search term in fixed point of time (usually January 2004), and all numbers are relative to this point. If you chose a time frame of 2007, the number you see for blogs (for example, 5.82) would mean that blogs has had approximately 5.8 times more relative traffic in 2007 than it had in January 2004. Similarly, the the number you see for newspapers (2.05) means that newspapers has about 2 times more traffic in 2007 than blogs had in 2004.
Note that the ratio between these numbers always remains constant and corresponds to how the keywords compare to each other; only the scaling basis (or the meaning of 1.0) changes.
Learn more about scaling.
12. When comparing two or more search terms, I sometimes see results with all zeros. Why?
If you see all zeros for one of your search terms, it could be that the term doesn’t have enough search volume to be reflected on a graph. It’s also possible that the term’s search volume is insignificant compared to the other terms you’ve entered. In those cases, the system will automatically rank your results by whichever term has greater search volume.
13. Is there a way to adjust how the terms are ranked and scaled?
Yes. Use the drop-down menu underneath the graph to change the search term by which all the data will be ranked and scaled (to 1.0). If you have more than one search term, the other terms will be ranked to the first one you’ve entered.
14. How does counting and ranking of the top regions, cities, and languages work, and are they scaled differently?
To rank the top regions, cities, or languages, Google Trends first looks at a sample of all Google searches to determine the areas or languages from which we received the most searches for your first term. Then, for those top cities, Google Trends calculates the ratio of searches for your term coming from each city divided by total Google searches coming from the same city. The city ranking you see on the page and the bar charts alongside each city name both represent this ratio. When cities’ ratios are fairly close together, the corresponding bar graphs will be roughly the same length, and the exact ranking between these cities is less meaningful.
If you export the data to a .csv file, you’ll see numbers for the top regions and cities. These numbers are based on a scale where the top region or city for the search term which you’ve ranked the data by will be 1.0.
15. How is information gathered to determine the regions, cities, and languages?
Google Trends uses IP address information from our server logs to make a best guess about where queries originated. Language information is determined by the language version of the Google site where the search originated.
16. How can I change the time frame, region, or sub-region of the results?
Once you’ve entered your search terms, you can use the drop-down boxes at the top of the results page to restrict your results to a particular time frame or region. The restrictions will affect both the Search Volume Index graph and the News reference volume graph. Please note that News reference volume may not be available for every region.
When you restrict your results to a specific year or multi-year period, each point on the graph will represent a week’s worth of searches. When you restrict the results to a specific month, each point on the graph will represent one day of searches.
17. Is there a way to export the data?
Yes. You can export the data to a .csv file, which can be opened in most spreadsheet applications. Click Export this page to a CSV file at the bottom of the page. You can choose to export the file with relative or fixed scaling. You’ll also see numbers corresponding to the bars under the Regions, Cities, and Languages columns.
The .csv file will also contain data for the top regions, cities, and languages for your search term. Read how this data is counted and ranked.
Along with the search index volume data, the file will include the upper bound of relative standard error for each data point. In your spreadsheet application, every column with search index data will be followed by a column of corresponding relative standard error. This information can be used to calculate the confidence interval for a data point.
Please note that since the news data isn’t scaled, it won’t be included in the file.
18. How does the geographical assignment change from 1/1/2011 affect the data I see?
On July 12, 2011 we rolled out a significant improvement to our geographical assignment. The improvement allows us to provide even better geo-location data for search queries. This update was applied retroactively from January 1, 2011 and may manifest itself in certain queries as a discontinuity in the trend line.
19. When is it okay to use the information I find on Google Trends?
You’re free to use any of the information you find on Google Trends, subject to the Terms of Use. If you choose to use the information, please make sure to appropriately attribute it to Google.
20. This tool makes search information public. What about my personal search data?
You can rest assured your personal search data remains safe and private. Our graphs are based on aggregated data from millions of searches done on Google over time. Moreover, the results Google Trends displays are produced entirely by an automated formula. As an additional measure, Trends only returns results for terms that receive a significant amount of search traffic.
Discouragement and apathy are natural and normal reactions to unemployment or loss on one's home. Democrats must find ways to encourage people towards hope and motivate them to act. If the Democratic party can turn out people to merely vote, their election worries could be over, not only in Ohio but all over the country.Amplify’d from www.slate.com
Digging Out the Grass Roots
A visit to Ohio shows how hard it will be for the Democrats to motivate voters.
By John Dickerson
Posted Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2010, at 11:29 PM ET
out and survival may come down to Steve Nicholson vs. Rachel Harris. Neither is likely to vote Republican. But it's unlikely that both will vote Democratic. As Nov. 2 approaches, Democrats face a high
For the Democratic Party, the difference this year between a rout and survival may come down to Steve Nicholson vs. Rachel Harris. Neither is likely to vote Republican. But it's unlikely that both will vote Democratic. As Nov. 2 approaches, Democrats face a highly motivated opposition. The search for ways to excite people—not just their core voters but anyone who might be receptive to their message—grows more desperate by the day. "Folks, wake up!" President Obama told a group of Democrats Monday night. "This is not some academic exercise."
Democratic hopes rest in part on Organizing for America, the Obama campaign organization that mobilized such an army for his victory in 2008. In Ohio OFA, has joined with the Democratic Party in perhaps the largest ground effort in the country. They are aided by labor unions. The AFL-CIO has been targeting workplaces and walking the streets talking to its members.
Some of the challenges come simply from trying to motivate voters in a midterm rather than presidential year. There's no presidential horserace to follow. People are unfamiliar with the candidates. (Democrats can take heart that several people said they'd vote for the party even though they were unfamiliar with the candidates.) Conservatives are motivated by the desire for change. Democrats can't use that argument this time. Instead they have to make arguments for patience and herald incremental change, none of which is very stirring.
"It's grim," says one Democratic strategist involved in helping a variety of House and Senate candidates. When I asked another Democratic strategist for his assessment of Ohio, he referred to Bill Clinton's ability to come back in 1996 after the '94 losses. Handicappers are making ominous predictions, too. Congressional Quarterly just moved two Ohio congressional races from "toss-up" to "lean Republican." The difficulty on the ground in Ohio has led to speculation about whether the national Democratic committees are going to write off the state. Why throw good money after candidates that are sure to lose?
If there is to be a Democratic comeback in Ohio, it will rely on a two-pronged attack that relies on tying Republican candidates to Wall Street and their support for free trade. In the African-American community, the comeback argument is different: It's all about Obama. Posters at OFA headquarters that go up in African-American communities read "Our Time is Now" and show Obama getting his hair cut at the barber shop. Says one organizer explaining the pitch, "The Republicans want to take down Obama in 2010, and you need to have his back."
Read more at www.slate.com
Earlier this summer, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) waged a high-profile, wildly-dishonest campaign against the Census. The Minnesota congresswoman said she was so worried about the threat of the government asking “very intricate questions” and collecting information that she would illegally refuse to fill out the form. “They will be in charge of going door to door and collecting data from the American public,” she said. “This is very concerning.” She repeatedly used inflammatory and fear-mongering rhetoric against the Census.
. . . Bachmann’s irrational diatribes about scary stalking Census workers quickly spawned a right-wing movement. During an interview with Bachmann, Fox News’ Glenn Beck said, “Ok, so let me talk about the Census because there’s a lot of people that are concerned with it because they don’t want to fill it out, they’re not comfortable with ACORN members coming to find out all this information, they don’t want to give the government all this kind of information.”
Conservative radio host Neal Boortz told a caller, “Most of the rest of the [Census] information is designed to help the government steal from you in order to pass off your property to the moochers. They’re looters.” Boortz urged his listeners to resist the Census workers. “If somebody comes to my — if a burglar came to your house, are you going to show him where the silverware is?” he asked. “Maybe you will if he pulls out a gun.”
U.S. forces are being increased by 21,000 to 68,000, bringing the coalition total to 110,000. About 9,000 are from Britain, where support for the war is waning. Counterinsurgency theory concerning the time and the ratio of forces required to protect the population indicates that, nationwide, Afghanistan would need hundreds of thousands of coalition troops, perhaps for a decade or more. That is inconceivable.
So, instead, forces should be substantially reduced to serve a comprehensively revised policy: America should do only what can be done from offshore, using intelligence, drones, cruise missiles, air strikes and small, potent special forces units, concentrating on the porous 1,500-mile border with Pakistan, a nation that actually matters.
Genius, said de Gaulle, recalling Bismarck's decision to halt German forces short of Paris in 1870, sometimes consists of knowing when to stop. Genius is not required to recognize that in Afghanistan, when means now, before more American valor, such as Allen's, is squandered.
Because I am not one of the high profile journalists featured in today's post, I am a bit reluctant to weigh in myself. But I will. My vote for President Obama was predicated upon his commitment to get out of Iraq and go after Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. I believed that the U.S. needs to finish the job ignored by the Bush administration. That does not mean replay Iraq in Afghanistan. It is time to get back on point -- pursuit of Al Qaeda.So send more troops, or lose the whole shooting match. It is easy to see why the memo was leaked. The Pentagon does not want Obama to go wobbly on Afghanistan. It wants him to stay and fight. And stay and stay and stay.
“I don’t have a deadline for withdrawal,” Obama told David Gregory on “Meet the Press” Sunday, “but I’m certainly not somebody who believes in indefinite occupations of other countries.”
But if Iraq was George W. Bush’s war — and it certainly was — Afghanistan has now become Barack Obama’s war. He wasn’t the president who started it, but he can be the president who finishes it.
Or he can be the president who stays there indefinitely.
"This fully exposes the illusion that is Barack Obama," Limbaugh told POLITICO in an e-mail. "And with this 'award' the elites of the world are urging Obama, THE MAN OF PEACE, to not do the surge in Afghanistan, not take action against Iran and its nuclear program and to basically continue his intentions to emasculate the United States."Limbaugh continued: "They love a weakened, neutered U.S, and this is their way of promoting that concept. I think God has a great sense of humor, too."
Later more sane reactions -- The Huffington Post linked to President Obama's Nobel speech, and provides more analysis of the selection of Obama, headlining that "Twitter explodes in response to the Obama Nobel win." New York Times "The Lede" gathered world reaction "to a Nobel surprise." McClatchy gives out "more updates." Matt Cooper spoke of President Obama's "elegant remarks" from the White House rose garden.
Earlier items -- The White House was surprised by the announcement, according to NPR. Taegan Goddard at the Political Wire reported on Twitter that "Obama will make a statement on the Nobel prize in the Rose Garden at 10:30." (It was just been delayed until after 11:00). Goddard also provided a round up of reactions to the Oslo announcement. Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic rounds up some fascinating opinions on why Obama should turn down the prize.
In conclusion -- Those who would disparage the Committee's award as merely honoring the President's "aspirational" sentiments dismiss it too lightly. One cannot be a peacemaker without engendering hope for peace in those who are in conflict. Those who dismiss the award as "not George W. Bush -- thank God he's in Dallas," diminish the strength of Obama's influence over people who do not live in the United States. Those who dismiss the award because we are still fighting in Afghanistan should take note of how much trouble the President is taking to figure out how to narrow the conflict and find ways to build bridges to the people of Afghanistan, including reconcilable members of the Taliban. Those who feel the President does not deserve the Peace Prize because of his civil liberties shortcomings should take note of his long commitment to denuclearizing the world. Those who dismiss the award because the President has yet to fulfill his campaign promises should take note of the unusually long list of serious problems he inherited from the previous administration. Sometimes it is enough to be hopeful, respectful of others, inspirational and willing to tackle anything. That is the elemental stuff of which real peace can be made.
Reference: The Nobel Committee announced that President Barack Obama is their selection for the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize. To quote in full:
The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 is to be awarded to President Barack Obama for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples. The Committee has attached special importance to Obama’s vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.Obama has as President created a new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position, with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can play. Dialogue and negotiations are preferred as instruments for resolving even the most difficult international conflicts. The vision of a world free from nuclear arms has powerfully stimulated disarmament and arms control negotiations. Thanks to Obama’s initiative, the USA is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting. Democracy and human rights are to be strengthened.
Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future. His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world’s population.
For 108 years, the Norwegian Nobel Committee has sought to stimulate precisely that international policy and those attitudes for which Obama is now the world’s leading spokesman. The Committee endorses Obama’s appeal that “Now is the time for all of us to take our share of responsibility for a global response to global challenges.”
Oslo, October 9, 2009
Publishers fear repeating the mistakes of the music industry, which delayed exploiting digital businesses until Apple created iTunes, now the world’s largest seller of digital music.
The creation of the store comes on the heels of a devastating advertising decline for newspapers and magazines as consumers migrate to the web, where material is available free of charge. Amazon.com’s Kindle e-reader device and service has also emerged as the frontrunner in digital book sales, creating unease among publishers.
John Squires, an executive vice-president at Time overseeing digital development, has met publishers in recent months. He has also met about a dozen digital device makers to discuss the store.
A person who has seen demonstrations of the products said they do not merely reproduce the website or the print edition but allow readers to personalise the material and dive more deeply into subjects.
Publishers including Time have held separate talks with Apple about placing magazines on Apple’s forthcoming tablet device. The publishers’ product is designed to be technology “agnostic”, but it is unclear if or how the venture would work with other systems developed to charge for content.
Blogs: My general purpose/southwest focus blog is at Southwest Progressive. My creative website is at Making Good Mondays. And Carol Gee - Online Universe is the all-in-one home page for all my websites.
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See also Behind the Links, for a cross-post of this entry.
Carol Gee - Online Universe is the all-in-one home page for all my websites.
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Apparently in honor of "The First 100 Days," the U.S. House of Representatives adopted the Obama administration's fiscal 2010 budget resolution; the Senate will probably follow suit by the end of the day, CQ Politics reported Wednesday morning. It will be another huge accomplishment of this very talented leader. Despite the President's constant reaching out to Republicans, no Republicans voted for it and 17 Democrats also voted against it. They reported Tuesday that it was the deal with Blue Dog Democrats over deficit controls that cleared the path to passage. CQ explains the terms of the resolution:
The budget resolution is non-binding but it sets the framework for Congress to make legislative decisions on taxes, appropriations and entitlement programs later in the year.
The $3.56 trillion budget resolution includes reconciliation instructions that would allow Obama’s proposed health care overhaul to move through Congress immune from a Senate filibuster.
Since Senator Specter has switched to the Democratic Party, I agree with Senator Kent Conrad that the reconciliation rules will never be used. In a way one could give President Obama, and certainly Vice President Biden, credit for smoothing the way for the Senator's change of party affiliation. And the timing was probably no accident, as it maximizes the good PR for what the administration has called the "Hallmark event." Senator Specter saw by his recent poll numbers that his reelection fate had gone into the hands of Pennsylvania's Republicans, and that was too much. I like that he was very straightforward about his desire to stay in the Senate. All the while maintaining his "independence," Senator Specter realistically represents the magic number of 60, for those key procedural votes that he can in effect throw away.
What decisions follow those in the initial period could prove just as vital to Obama's legacy as the first 100 days, according to Politico's Jonathan Martin. Mike Allen, writing for the same shop, maintains that President Obama still has members of the GOP stumped about how to combat him. The smart ones are not trying, probably because they have their hands full trying to keep the party from disappearing altogether in its migration to the hard southern right. I predict that this wildly popular president will continue in the great middle, accepting disagreements graciously from both those on the left and the right.
The biggest downside to the new administration's accomplishments is its failure to restore privacy protections in domestic surveillance, along with avoiding accountability demands for the war crimes of the previous administration. But the reality is that I am now in the minority of public opionion on those issues. But I will continue to advocate as a civil libertarian blogger. This is my 1300th post since I started blogging in March of 2005.
Finally, since the "100 Days" thing is really a concoction of the media I am concluding with a bit from a US News and World Report story called, "Taking the Pulse of the Mainstream Media." It begins with data from a recent poll:
Reference: "Where the 100-days rule comes from," out of Time Magazine (4/29/09). "It all started with Napolean."
[Post date 4/29/09]
See also Behind the Links, for further info on this subject.
Carol Gee - Online Universe is the all-in-one home page for all my websites.
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Everybody has an idea about how President Obama is doing now that he is 60+ days into his presidency. "He's doing to much. He's not moving fast enough. He shouldn't be laughing during such times. He says one thing and does another. He is overexposed in the media, etc., etc." Today's post talks about last night's prime time news conference media fallout. It says a bit about the President's upcoming trip abroad, and it concludes with conversation about citizen involvement in the political process and in the community.
The Chattering Class includes White House correspondents -- President Obama held his second formal news conference Tuesday night. When MSNBC's Chuck Todd asked the President why he hadn't asked the American people to make more sacrifices, President Obama (to paraphrase) pointed out that a lot of people are making great sacrifices due the the severity of the current economic crisis.
The Chattering Class regarding Obama's news conference -- All the beltway pundits are weighing in with judgments about how it went in my morning's e-mailed newsletters.
Obama fluently answered the questions, sometimes at considerable length. But his responses were typically variations on a single-word theme: Whatever.
. . . Most of all, he’s entirely comfortable with his bet that he and the country can worry about certain inconvenient facts—like a 10-year deficit total of $9.3 trillion under his plan — some time later. . .
[concluding with] ON DEFENSE SPENDING.
What he said: “Kevin Baron, Stars and Stripes. Is Kevin here? There you go.”
What he meant: You have to admit, I am clever. I get to call on a reporter who is not from one of the big news organizations, whose subject is going to be easy to predict, and whose question I can answer by pointing out that I want to improve health care for veterans.
Obama also told Baron he supports reforming military procurement policies, a bipartisan goal, but acknowledged it is hard to do.
He also called on reporters from other niche outlets, such as the Hispanic network Univision, while stiffing reporters from the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal.
. . . Obama has embarked on a publicity blitz that included recent appearances on “The Tonight Show” and “60 Minutes” and continued Tuesday night with his hourlong session in the East Room with reporters.
“We will recover from this recession. But it will take time, it will take patience, and it will take an understanding that when we all work together, when each of us looks beyond our own short-term interests to the wider set of obligations we have to each other — that’s when we succeed,” Obama said in his opening remarks.
. . . The appearances also could mobilize public if not business support for expanded regulation of hedge funds and non-bank financial companies that Obama is expected to push at the Group of 20 economic summit in London early next month.
The Advocates regarding the President's upcoming trip to the G-20 --
Leaders of the world's largest economies will get together in London in a few days. Josh Peck of ONE.org wants President Obama to exercise his influence over other world leaders to include the poorest nations in their solutions to the financial crisis. And he wants us to join in the effort. To quote:
Please advocate for the resources, reform, and regulation that developing countries need to weather the financial crisis. Please sign the petition.
The President said at his news conference that he wanted us to keep up with what is going on in our government. We should work to stay informed and to stay involved by letting the government know our opinions about issues. We are encouraged to continue the conversation by raising our citizen voices. One way to do that is through the Pledge Project at Organizing for America, the old Obama campaign organization now housed at the Democratic National Committee. Michelle Obama has already "set an example at the nation's table and beyond," reports Christy Hardin Smith of Firedoglake. At Democracy for America - Howard Dean returns to celebrate the March 25 anniversary of the founding of his community action organization.
Congress is doing its part to encourage community action. They are currently working on legislation that expands community service opportunities. The House passed the "GIVE Act" that rewards young people with education stipends, job training and more. The Senate will soon take up its version, the "Serve America Act." Heather Smith is at Rock the Vote. She encourages us to speak up for passage of the measure: We need the Senate to pass the Serve America Act, the boldest service legislation in 70 years.
Additional Advocacy Resources:
See also Behind the Links, for further info on this subject.
Carol Gee - Online Universe is the all-in-one home page for all my websites.
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I apologize for my lack of posting this weekend [various things] . . . kept me from blogging, and, on top of all that, I've been battling an annoying cold for the past week or so.
And, somewhat tired of what I've been writing about lately, I think I just needed a couple of days off to relax and refresh.
I'll be back at it tomorrow, though -- and of course there will be much more from the co-bloggers, who continue to make this blog so much better than it ever could have been had I kept it a solo project.
So stay tuned for new posts. And enjoy the rest of your weekend.
The Siren's Chronicles -- In May of 2008, through my blog friend Betmo, I became a (Tuesday Featured) "Siren" at Sirens Chronicles, cross-posting there at least once a week. I got an e-mail this morning from Dusty, the editor, that the site has been hacked. All of our posts have disappeared from the site's remaining template. A few comments survive. Dear Dusty's poignant e-mail puts it this way:
I checked the site tonight, as I always do and found that someone has hacked the site.
All posts are gone...poof. It's like Sirens never existed. All that is up is the template.
I don't know what to do. . . I am very upset, I don't know if I can fix this.
If anyone has any ideas, please let me know.
It has been a tough period for my friends and I, far tougher for some than others. I have not felt my writing is up to par. My linking collaborators have been challenged. Betmo was on a self-imposed news blackout for some weeks around the holidays. Jon's e-mail was traumatically out for a few days recently. Michael needed the weekend off. Dusty, the Siren's, Chronicles were expunged. These experiences were wide ranging in level of difficulty. I am amazed at the convergence of our experiences and the inter-connectedness of web communities. So here we are, all in it together at various levels. I feel sure that this little vignette occurs all the time in one version or another in blogger communities all over the world.
Good news update: Dusty reports that she has been able to restore the site, except for the graphics. She wants us all to post to make sure we are back in business. Yippee!
See also Behind the Links, for further info on this subject.
Carol Gee - Online Universe is the all-in-one home page for all my websites.
Technorati tags: blogosphere blogging news writing community psychology
