Clooney tells Bono: 'I considered politics'
Bono interviewed George Clooney for the Time 100/AC 360° Special. Clooney says he considered entering politics. Watch more on the Time 100/AC360 special airing this Friday, May 1, at 11:00 p.m. ET.
Read Producer Chuck Hadad's behind-the-scenes account of the interview.
Obama is nudging views on race, a survey finds
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/POLITICS/04/28/crowley.obama.democrats/art.obama.cnn.jpg]
Program Note: Tune in to CNN’s full coverage of President Obama’s first 100 days with the best political team on television Wednesday at 7 p.m. ET.
Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Marjorie Connelly
The New York Times
Barack Obama’s presidency seems to be altering the public perception of race relations in the United States. Two-thirds of Americans now say race relations are generally good, and the percentage of blacks who say so has doubled since last July, according to the latest New York Times/ CBS News poll.
Despite that, half of blacks still say whites have a better chance of getting ahead in American society, the poll found. Black Americans remain among the president’s staunchest supporters; 70 percent of black respondents now say the country is headed in the right direction, compared with 34 percent of whites.
The poll found broad support for Mr. Obama’s approach on a variety of issues, including one of the most contentious: whether Congress should investigate the harsh interrogation tactics authorized by George W. Bush. Sixty-two percent of Americans share Mr. Obama’s view that hearings are unnecessary.
What happened to the office of urban policy?
After 100 days, Obama’s shiny-new dream for our cities is looking more like a bureaucratic nightmare.
[cnn-photo-caption-image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/POLITICS/04/28/crowley.obama.democrats/art.obama.cnn.jpg]
Dayo Olopade
The Root
In November 2008, less than one week after winning the votes of city dwellers by a margin of 28 points, President-elect Barack Obama announced he would reward them by creating the first-ever “White House Office of Urban Policy.” Like other new aspects of Obama’s executive branch, appointing a city czar was intended to fast-track communications among city governments, federal agencies and the White House. With great fanfare, Obama dispatched his friend and fellow Chicagoan Valerie Jarrett to tell America that he was making good on his campaign pledge to “stop seeing cities as the problem and start seeing them as the solution.”
Will the flu change our lifestyles?
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/HEALTH/04/27/pandemic.next/art.newspaper.cnn.jpg]
Jim Wooten
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
In the family photo, she is a strikingly beautiful young mother, vibrant and healthy.
At age 24, she gives birth to my father. Five weeks later, on June 18, 1918, she is dead, one of the tens of millions of victims of the 1918 influenza outbreak that raged between March, 1918 and June, 1920.
My mother-in-law, born in 1907, remembered so many people dying in Cartersville that the town ran out of caskets to bury them. Death, disproportionately to the young, hit most every family.
Fearing another possible flu pandemic, the Obama Administration and other governments around the world declared a public health emergency this weekend as clusters of swine flu started surfacing around the globe. The U.S. declaration allows the feds to ship 12 million doses of flu-fighting medications to the states. So far, the 20 confirmed cases in this country are mild and no extraordinary medical response is yet warranted.
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official said Sunday that the current flu vaccine does not appear to offer any added protection against the new virus, though older people who’ve been exposed to the mutating viruses for decades may have built up some immunity.
Iran's new target: Egypt
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/WORLD/meast/12/24/ahmadinejad.christmas.message/art.ahmadinejad.afp.gi.jpg]
Abdel Monem Said Aly
The Wall Street Journal
On April 8, Egypt announced it had uncovered a Hezbollah cell operating inside its borders. This startling pronouncement offers a rare insight into the way Iran and its proxies are manipulating Middle East politics.
According to Egyptian authorities, the cell was tasked with planning attacks against tourist sites in Sinai, conducting surveillance on strategic targets including the Suez Canal, and funneling arms and money to Hamas. Hezbollah's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, has admitted that the ringleader of the cell was indeed a member of his organization to provide "logistical support to help the Palestinian brothers in transporting ammunition and individuals."
These latest actions by an emboldened Hezbollah have been spurred on by Iran, which is seeking to further its quest for power in the Arab Middle East. In the past six months, there have been irrefutable signs of Iran's determined effort to sabotage Egypt's attempts at regional stability. At Tehran's instigation, Hamas rejected the renewal of the six-month, Egypt-brokered cease-fire last summer between it and Israel. This rejection led to the Gaza war in December. At the height of that war, Mr. Nasrallah called on the people of Egypt and its army to march on the city of Rafah to open the border to Gaza by force, a highly inflammatory appeal aimed at causing insurrection.
Why We Must Prosecute
Torture Is a Breach Of International Law
[cnn-photo-caption-image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/POLITICS/04/27/torture.memo/art.cuffs.gi.jpg]
Mark J. McKeon
The Washington Post
On Sept. 11, 2001, when the twin towers were hit, I was sitting in a meeting in The Hague discussing what should be included in an indictment against Slobodan Milosevic for war crimes in Bosnia. I was an American lawyer serving as a prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and there was no doubt that Milosevic should be indicted for his responsibility for the torture and cruel treatment of prisoners. As the head of state at the time those crimes were committed, Milosevic bore ultimate responsibility for what happened under his watch.
Where Will the Swine Flu Go Next?
[cnn-photo-caption-image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/HEALTH/04/28/swine.flu/art.swine.flu2.cnn.jpg]
John M. Barry
The New York Times
As the swine flu threatens to become the next pandemic, the biggest questions are whether its transmission from human to human will be sustained and, if so, how virulent it might become. But even if this virus were to peter out soon, there is a strong possibility it would only go underground, quietly continuing to infect some people while becoming better adapted to humans, and then explode around the world.
What happens next is chiefly up to the virus. But it is up to us to create a vaccine as quickly as possible.
Cheney for president
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/POLITICS/12/22/poll.cheney/art.dickcheney.gi.jpg]
Ross Douthat
The New York Times
Watching Dick Cheney defend the Bush administration’s interrogation policies, it’s been hard to escape the impression that both the Republican Party and the country would be better off today if Cheney, rather than John McCain, had been a candidate for president in 2008.
Certainly Cheney himself seems to feel that way. Last week’s Sean Hannity interview, all anti-Obama jabs and roundhouses, was the latest installment in the vice president’s unexpected – and, to Republican politicians, distinctly unwelcome – transformation from election-season wallflower into high-profile spokesman for the conservative opposition. George W. Bush seems happy to be back in civilian life, but Cheney has taken the fight to the Obama White House like a man who wouldn’t have minded campaigning for a third Bush-Cheney term.
Imagine for a moment that he’d had that chance. Imagine that he’d damned the poll numbers, broken his oft-repeated pledge that he had no presidential ambitions of his own, and shouldered his way into the race. Imagine that Republican primary voters, more favorably disposed than most Americans to Cheney and the administration he served, had rewarded him with the nomination.
Video: Swine Flu hits home
In an exclusive interview, Anderson talks with a girl who was infected with the Swine Flu virus at her Texas school.
On Twitter
