Wednesday – Day 4

The morning sessions are too early in my opinion.  The first part of the session started with Steve Bell commenting on the media, and then with another C-SPAN live broadcast.  The guest was Dana Perino – Press Secretary of the United States.  She took questions from students and callers from around the nation.  Through her answers she hoped that Bush’s legacy would reflect his commitment to freedom, and also claimed that Bush’s immigration policy reflects his acceptance of all cultures.   She also claimed that the invasion of Iraq had nothing to do with oil.

That’s what she said…

After the C-SPAN session, former host of ABC’s Nightline Ted Koppel came to speak to us about the media.  He began by telling us that a journalist cannot and should not think of the consequences of what they are reporting.  Only once in his career did Koppel not report something, and that was when the American government specifically asked him not to report so that some government workers would not be killed.  But aside from that, journalists need to report the news and not think of the consequences.

Nightline was started after CBS created 60 Minutes in 1968 and the show actually made money for the network.  Koppel also stated that he thinks the internet is the “ultimate democratization of journalism” since anyone can put news or stories on the internet.  He also refuted Secretary Perino’s claim that Iraq was not about oil.

The questions from students continue to be ridiculously repetitive.

And then Clarence Page –  a columnist from the Chicago Tribune spoke.  He recalled the different phases of labels applied to him in his life time.  He has been from being called “colored” to “people of color” and is very excited about Obama becoming President.

Lunch was at Elle’s pizzeria near the Verizon Center and the National Portrait Gallery.  This was the restaurant that our Court’s class ate at last year, but Dr. Brickman, Cara and I could not remember what the name was or where it was located.  So we discovered it yet again and ate there.  Jenn and I split two pizzas – Margharita and Genovese (potatoes and pesto).  It was extremely delicious and pleasant.  And the food is extremely healthy.  5 out of 5 stars

We then met the Amabassador to the United States from Algeria.  He answered our questions about their economic and political relationship between the two nations and explained their hope for the new Obama administration.  Algeria and the US are working out some kind of open air deal between the two nations since both are committed to fighting terrorism – which Algeria experienced heavily in the 1990’s.  The Ambassador was extremely nice though and had a good sense of humor about the outgoing Bush administration and it’s complex to “rule the world”.

Then a few of us went to the National Portraitl Gallery and looked at all of the portraits of famous Americans and American Presidents.  The Abraham Lincoln room was awesome, they have a WANTED flier from when Lincoln was shot and the government was looking for Booth and his helpers.

We then tiredly returned to the hotel and ate dinner, and it’s time to sleep.