Clinton bis

One of the funny things about this campaign is the use made by Hillary Clinton of her husband, Bill. As few may know in France, Hillary is not really popular here. There is a big risk for democrats if they nominate her that she will not be able to get the vote of the most moderate voters who might prefer voting for McCain or Giuliani.

Right now is one of the most important time of the presidential race. At the end of the month, candidates must declare for the first time how much money they have raised.
This is extremely important because it is an early sign to demonstrate how capable you are to finance your political campaign. During his first campaign, Pres. Bush surprised everyone by raising more than 7 millions dollars twice as much as its next immediate follower John McCain.

As a result, Hillary is using her husband in order to help her raise as much money as possible before the end of the month.
This move is important because I don't know how much she can capitalize on her husband who left the White House after a succession of scandals.

Blue Ridge Parkway

 

I have to say the Blue Ridge Parkway is extremely beautiful. The Parkway is a road that travels through the Appalachian mountains of Georgia, North Carolina and Virginia. This is a very scenic drive. Of course, it is referred to as America's favorite driveway.

The road passes near Asheville and Boone in North Carolina and Roanoke in Virginia.

The scenery is absolutely stunning. The light is incredible and the reflection on the mountains really makes them look blue.

We had the opportunity to drive a little bit on the parkway during our visit to Asheville.

The picture I took last week end do not really show the beauty of the site, but I hope that they actually give you a good idea of the views you can have driving on this fantastic road.

 
 

Asheville, NC

 
Asheville is a cool little city nested in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina.

It is about 4 hours away from the Raleigh/Durham area.

The city is really cool. The downtown was built in the 1940's and never destroyed afterwards. The buildings are gorgeous and nicely proportionated. There are cafes with terraces (the only real thing that I miss from Europe) where we lounged during the evening. It is very nice to see a lively downtown with people actually living in it. It is so rare in the US where the downtowns are either depressed areas or transformed into office parks.

The art scene is also really active. There are several art galleries and artists in residence. We saw a really cool chandelier made by a local glass blower but unfortunatelly the cost was prohibitive: over $10,000.
Next time!


 
 

Asheville, NC part II

 

 

 

 

EU's 50th Birthday

This week's issue of the Economist offers a very interesting analysis of the European Union. My favourite magazine recalls that, despite the fact that today the European Construction is kind of stopped, the European construction has been a tremendous success. The newspaper is pretty optimistic and adds that there is a lot to celebrate. As an European enthusiast, I totally agree with this analysis.

Of course, the rejection by French and Dutch voters of the Constitution should not be underestimated. But, as pointed out by the magazine, I personally believe that in the French case at least, it had a lot more to do with the poor economic performance of the French economy than to the EU. Had the France been in a better financial situation, I am sure that the result of the referendum would have been different.

This, of course, is not the fault of the EU, but of our national politicians (our president in particular) who have failed to enact the proper legislations which would have put France back on track to economical prosperity.
I am particularly quite resentful towards J. Chirac who has, in his 12 years tenure, not accomplished much. The country is more or less in the same situation than the one he found when he arrived to power. Unemployment is still high, racism and antisemitism have not been defeated, deficits are still growing, the economy is not expanding fast enough, and so on.
In other words, I won't regret Chirac.

Photo from the Economist.com

Josh McRoberts

Josh, a sophomore, has decided to leave the Duke basketball team and go pro. He will enroll in the 2007 NBA Draft.
As I said in a previous post, Josh is probably the most talented player of the Duke team. We'll miss him next year.

It will be tough to find someone with his talent.



Photo from newsandobserver.com

Elizabeth Edwards

Today, in a news conference, John Edwards, a political candidate for the US Presidential election and his wife, Elizabeth Edwards have announced that she is having an another cancer located in her bone. She was already a breast cancer survivor. Of course, this one is a resurgence of this past cancer she had.
Unfortunately, her bone cancer is already a stage 4 cancer which means that it is an already pretty advanced form of the disease.

I have to say that I was impressed when she announced very calmly that despite the fact that this cancer was not curable but only treatable, she was going to continue the campaign for the election.

On Larry King live, tonight, there was several interviews including the one form Sheryl Crow. This was of course very emotional. Sheryl Crow is a cancer survivor and now one of the most public figures involved in the fight against cancer.

The campaign is going for sure to be very exhausting for her since she has to travel a lot all around the US and attend meetings and reunions.

On the other hand, her disease might be a blessing for their campaign. This unfortunate news captured national attention and the media are going to be crazy interested about her health. I have to say so far Edwards campaign is not going very well. He is well behind Barrack Obama and Hillary Clinton. Today, I am sure they sent a strong message of courage and commitment to the American people. A lot of people might start admiring them for this reason.

I wish her and her husband good luck.

Photo from salon.com

Sarah P. Duke Gardens

Hey it's spring time. One of the coolest things about living in the Southern United States is that the weather is really really nice. It's a very sunny place and Spring arrives early. Yesterday, we had 24 degrees in the shade.
One of the cool things about where we live is that there are lots of open spaces. Natural parks, gardens are in abundance.
Of course, there is a beautiful botanical garden at Duke. It's called the Sarah P. Duke Gardens. The garden dates back to the foundation of the University when Sarah P. Duke, a widow of one of the founders of the University, was convinced by one of her friends to sponsor the creation of a fantastic garden on the grounds of the University.

The garden is divided into four major parts: the original Terraces and their immediate surroundings, the H.L. Blomquist Garden of Native Plants (a representation of the flora of the southeastern United States), the William L. Culberson Asiatic Arboretum (devoted to plants of eastern Asia), and the Doris Duke Center Gardens.

My favorites are the Asian arboretum and the terraces.

Of course,it is a good time to visit the gardens at this time of the year because all the flowers are blooming.

Enjoy.

Goodbye Ray!

 

On Sunday, we went the Nasher Museum at Duke University. It is a cool museum which opened in 2005.

Raymond Nasher owned one the world's largest private art collection and has been exposing it in museums he funded. He died last Friday.

Fortunately, Duke University hosts one of its museums. The permanent collection now includes more than 13,000 pieces of art. The museum itself was designed by architect Rafael Vinoly is also extremelly well conceived and allows a nice display of the artits's works.

You can see some pictures I took in the museum during our visit.

 

 

 

Nasher Museum

Here are some additional pictures!

 

 

 

Welcome to America!

A quick post to salute the first arrival of the Airbus A380 in America.

Actually, I should say the first arrivals. Let me explain why: It was agreed that the first airport to welcome the A380 was LAX near Los Angeles. Of course, New York did not like this at all and pressure both Airbus and Lufthansa to modify their plans and have the big apple to be the first city to greet the new machine.

As a result, Airbus decided to have not one but two planes land in the US at the same time at both LAX and JFK.

Unfortunately for Los Angeles, History will remember that the first plane to touch down was in New York and not in California. The LAX plane landed only minutes after the JFK one.

Anyway, It's an historic moment for Airbus.

Saint Patrick's Day

 
 

Today was Saint Patrick's Day. We got the bad idea to reserve a table at the party our church was aving that day. It was pretty boring not to say extremelly boring. That was quite a deception considering that our church is usually pretty active and young. At this party, when we entered I saw a sea of white hair busy eating an auwful meal. I almost went home directly. What a disapointment!!!

The only funny thig about this is that we got to wear funny hats, but sponsored by Liberty Tax Service. We are in America Business is Business and It is tax season.

Jacques was so bored at the end that he decided to wear the hat as a rapper in a sign of protest.

 

Home Theater

 
Although, I have to admit that watching the game in a Home Theater with an High Definition TV makes the defeat sweeter!

LOOOOOOOOOOSSSSSTTTTTTTTTTT

 
I am totally disgusted. Duke has lost again: 77 - 75.
VCU was totally beatable. They are ranked 11th and Duke is 6th. How is it possible that they can't win a game.

What an horrible season. After loosing 2 times again Carolina and 4 games in a row during the regular season, then being eliminated at the first rounds of the ACC and the NCAA tournaments, Duke is really not the team of the year.

I have to salute Josh McRoberts (in the picture) though, he is a fantastic player and was able to avoid any additional dramas.

Bye I am going to bed now.

What an horrible season...

March Madness continues

After the conferences tournaments ended, all the best selected teams end up playing the National Tournament: The National Championships.

Duke plays tonight Virginia Commonwealth University.

For all the basketball fans, you can watch it live here for FREE!

Conservapedia.com

The conservative right in this country has started a new war on ideas. The war is waged against Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia. After doing their own research, they realized that Wikipedia was biased mainly because it was written mostly by liberals.

So weird!! As a way to fight that they have come up with the idea that they needed their own online encyclopedia : conservapedia.com

It's exactly the same argument they had with Fox News. The general press was not fair and had a liberal bias so they had to come up with their own news channel.

So let's play: I searched Kangaroo:

Here is what conservapedia says at the end of the article:

According to the origins theory model used by creation scientists, modern kangaroos, like all modern animals, originated in the Middle East[1] and are the descendants of the two founding members of the modern kangaroo baramin that were taken aboard Noah's Ark prior to the Great Flood. (...)

Also according to creation science theories, after the Flood, kangaroos bred from the Ark passengers migrated to Australia. There is debate whether this migration happened over land[2] -- as Australia was still for a time connected to Europe by a land bridge similar to the one that connected Asia to America[3] -- or if they rafted on mats of vegetation torn up by the receding flood waters.[2] Another theory is that God simply generated kangaroos into existence there. "


Any comment so far?

Mine is: "laughable but real"

Another funny search is, for example: France.

Pres. Bush's visit to South America

Pres. Bush is currently in Latin America accomplishing one of his longest tours in the region.
He is visiting Uruguay, Brazil, Colombia, Guatemala and Mexico. Of course, his visit generates protests in these countries. His most famous opponent in the region is of course the extravagant Venezuela's president (future dictator?) Hugo Chavez. He held a meeting in Buenos Aires while Pres. Bush was in Montevideo where he quoted saying "Gringo, go home". That's not helpful!

It is true that having lived in Chile and now in the US, I understand maybe both societies a little more.

I understand that the US does not invest enough in South America. Of course, there are some economical exchanges but cultural, educational, artistic projects are totally insufficient and underfunded.
Before the 9/11 attacks, he had a lot more active policy south of the border. He also speaks Spanish, was a border state governor (Texas). Because of all these assets, he convinced a lot of Hispanics to vote for him.
After 9/11, everything changed. Latin America is not a priority any more.
Too bad, because there is a lot to be done.

On the other hand, many times the US is trying to do something in these countries, this is not understood as a co-development project but has a way for the US to push for its own agenda.


For example, I believe in free trade as one of the fastest way to reduce poverty all around the world. The Bush administration has been pushing for a free trade zone in the Americas. This project is not progressing mainly for political reasons in Latin American countries. This is really unfortunate. The US is the main economy in the world and I am sure both sides would benefit from such agreement. Developing countries could export more to the US and vice-versa.

Of course, the US would have to renounce to its agricultural exports subsidies which are totally unacceptable. By the way, The EU is not better than the States in this matter and should go forward with the Doha round.

What do you think?

Pictures from USAtoday.com and CNN.com

Go to Hell Carolina, Go to Hell!

As you might know, in the Raleigh/Durham area, basketball is taken VERY VERY seriously.
With three of the best college teams in the same metro area (N.C. State in Raleigh, UNC in Chapel Hill and Duke in Durham), school rivalry is a big deal mainly between UNC and Duke since they are usually better teams. Everybody talks about it.
In our case, Sheila is at UNC and I am at Duke and we are what is known as a "House divided".
Unfortunately for a Duke fan like me, UNC has won the ACC tournament today against N.C. State. Don't worry I still love my wife. ;)

Despite some good moves like the one in the picture, N.C. State was unable to contain UNC. They lost 89-80.

This is not really a surprise since Carolina (the other UNC name) finished first of the regular season.


Picture from ESPN.com

NC Botanical Gardens

 

One of the cool things to do on a sunny sunday is to go to the North Carolina Botanical Gardens in Chapel Hill.
They are not as impressive as the Sarah P. Duke Gardens in Durham (I'll have a post about this later) but they are kind of cool.

 

There are two parts. One is made of a garden and the other one is a forest. Today, we did the forest part. There are a couple of trails and it was fun to be outside in a woodded space right totally isolated from the rest of the city.

American Tobacco Historic District

 

North Carolina was not so long ago a place where the main crop was tobacco. Durham was totally part of this adventure. Most of the downtown was occupied by some large cigarette factories.
Of course, tobacco being not so trendy as before, the factories have closed leaving huge empty warehouses all across downtown.
Downtown Durham became a place where it was not so good to hang around after dark.
Things are changing as you can see in the picture. Warehouses have been rehabilitated and transformed into lofts, office spaces and restaurants. The downtown is getting revitalized thanks to some investors and the city council who believe in the future the Bull City. They are now protected and part of the American Tobacco Historic District.

 

Here you can see the old Lucky Strike factory totally rehabilitated. There are several restaurants, some office spaces, several art galleries and of course, some trendy lofts. It is a cool place. In the summer, not only you can hang around on the lawn but you can also listen to some music and attend all kinds of cultural events.