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Dick Cheney: One of the Worst CEOs in History?

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From Salon today: "it's clear that Cheney deserves another nomination: as one of the worst CEOs in recent American history. Of course, there are plenty of CEOs that deserve to be on that list, including Enron's Kenneth Lay, Tyco's Dennis Kozlowski and Adelphia's John Rigas. While those bosses certainly are being pilloried, Cheney's disastrous five-year-long tenure at Halliburton deserves far more scrutiny than the mainstream business press has bothered to provide."

Ann Williams

Ann Williams, 54, is a bit tough, a little hard to take in at first. But that's because she's passionate. And she speaks the truth.

Jaro, Staxx Featured in Clarion-Ledger

Cheers to Jaro and Staxx for all the hard work they do for Jackson. We're very proud.

Today, The Clarion-Ledger featured JFP photographer Jaro Vacek and John "Staxx" Tierre in a story about Staxx's company Blockwear distributing in the Czech Republic with Jaro's help. We consider Staxx a member of the family, too, having featuring his clothes several times in JFP shoots. And, last October, Charlie Braxton wrote in the JFP about Staxx, and other local hip-hop designers who are distributing nationally and internationally last October. We also featured Staff as a young businessman to watch in April.

[Lott] Opposing Homosexual Marriage

The Senate has failed to pass legislation calling for a Constitutional amendment to protect traditional marriage and halt the proliferation of same-sex marriages. Despite the current setback, I believe debate on this issue has only just begun, and the topic is bound to fester until Congress assumes its responsibility and deals with it decisively.

State GOP Offended that Hood Supporting Kerry

"Kedwards"? Are they guys for real? They sound like a bunch of fourth-graders.

The state GOP party is all bent up like a pretzel over the fact that a DEMOCRATIC attorney general is supporting the DEMOCRATIC candidate for president. They whine on their Web site: "Jim Hood (D - Houston) ran for Attorney General as a mainstream, small-town Mississippian, but yesterday he came out for the gun-grabbing, anti-Mississippi, anti-family agenda of the Kerry/Edwards - 'Kedwards' - ticket. What is he thinking? Are Hood's true beliefs coming out now that the election is over? One thing is certain, Hood's endorsement of Kedwards is a long way from mainstream Mississippi values. Do we really want him issuing legal opinions on our behalf?"

Mississippi Dems ‘Ready to Rumble'?

Bill Minor writes: "Barbour, the guy who won the governor's job with supposedly unmatched political smarts, made a colossal blunder by pushing through legislation that left thousands of recipients - many of whom voted for him - panicky over losing their present medicine benefits under Medicare. His administration has failed to convince those cut from the state program that they would keep similar medical benefits under his plan. It switches them in September into the federally run Medicare program. They would otherwise be forced to go there in January 2006 if the Medicare reform law is not revised by Congress.

Blogging, the Dems and Trent Lott

A New York Times editorial today: "H. L. Mencken is said to have guffawed and slapped his thigh in delight at times as he would write about a typical day at a presidential nominating convention. Those long-ago times are enviable for their unpredictability — eons removed from the scripted conventions that will soon be offered to the nation once more as lean cuisine for thought. All the more reason to hope, then, that this year's one potentially risky innovation — accepting dozens of free-form online bloggers as accredited convention journalists — may lace the proceedings with fresh insight and even some Menckenian impertinence."

Creating a 'Brand of Passion' for Voting

New York Times reports: "WHILE partisan political ads continue to dominate attention, a rapidly growing number of nonpartisan campaigns from recently created groups are trying the tactics of Madison Avenue pros to register new, and especially young, voters. Today, Declare Yourself, a nonpartisan voter-registration group started by the television producer Norman Lear, will raise two giant billboards in Times Square, showing Christina Aguilera and André 3000 with their mouths held shut, next to the message, 'Only you can silence yourself.

Doth the State GOP Protest Too Much?

It strikes me that the state GOP is getting pretty bent out of shape over Edwards, considering that the state is supposedly so locked up for George Bush. Over on their Web site, they're playing the Pickering and Kennedy cards left and right (pardon the pun). Are they really as confident as they let on over this election, or are they worried that voters in the state that given up so many of its children in the Iraqi War might not be so predictable this time around?

Dueling for the NRA Vote

Evan Derkacz writes for Alternet that the pro-gun vote doesn't necessarily belong to George Bush. He writes: "Although Kerry seems to have learned from Gore's mistakes and Bush has lost favor among much of the vigilant Second Amendment crowd, conventional wisdom grants NRA endorsement—a lock for Bush—a great deal of political weight. The NRA has been heavily involved in politics since at least 1980, when it endorsed Ronald Reagan for president. Since then, it has become the bogeyman of many a political campaign, wielding clout beyond its numbers, and is largely responsible for what many consider to be some of the world's most reckless gun control policies. But does it deserve the mythic make-or-break reputation this time around?"

Cheney Says He's Staying on GOP Ticket

AP is reporting that Vice President Cheney says he's staying on Bush's ticket. Good news for Dems and the ABB crowd?

Register to Vote!

Click here to get the process rolling and get involved. And remember to change your address if you've moved.

Can Dems Get Back on Track with Blacks?

In his column, Earl Ofari Hutchinson says yes, but only if they boldly speak out for issues that matter to African Americans: "Edwards potentially can ensure that blacks turn out in big numbers. But he must do more than take digs at the Confederate flag. He must use his vice presidential candidacy as a bully pulpit to speak out for affirmative action, tougher and expanded hate crimes laws, repeal of the mandatory drug laws that warehouse thousands of young blacks for mostly non-violent, non-serious crimes and attack the glaring race inequities in the death penalty and funding for mostly black and Latino schools."

Andy Hilton

Andy Hilton, with his curly-blonde locks, seems like any 24-year-old—slightly laid-back and slightly restless, ever ready to talk about ideals. What surfaces, however, is a great sense of his unique vision: "I want to use design skills to benefit the community."

JFP PoliticsBlog Is Back! (Almost)

The JFP is re-launching our popular PoliticsBlog to track information about candidates our readers can vote for this year—from U.S. president to judicial races in Mississippi. Our news interns are currently assembling photos of candidates, putting together candidate questionnaires (can't wait to see Bush's answers) and preparing the site for re-launch by 2004 with new candidates. Meantime, you can click around the site, which still contains candidate information on last fall's candidates (including a very lengthy blog discussion about Haley Barbour!). And while you're in there, e-mail the interns at [e-mail missing] about what you'd like to see on the 2004 candidate blog—including specific questions you'd like to answered about the candidate. (We don't expect all the questionnaires to be returned — ;-) — but we will do research on your questions and post what we can find. You can also suggest links to information and the like. And, of course, we welcome your participation in the discussion.

Major Crime Down Dramatically in Jackson

Richard Weiss

Before Richard Weiss, 36, got busy providing art house and other indie films to Jacksonians, he worked in the tech industry. After cutting his teeth renting foreign films at Video Library, Weiss started making databases of the movies he had seen and ones he hadn't seen but wanted to. Even though Video Library offered a wide selection, Weiss wanted more: "I noticed that there were a lot of things on DVD that they probably could never carry."

John Edwards: Friend of Business?

The Washington Post today: "Business associations in Washington were uniformly hostile yesterday to John Kerry's choice of Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) as his running mate, promising that a trial lawyer on the ticket will energize them and their members to defeat the Democrats in November."

"Fahrenheit 601": JFP Readers Want Film in Jackson

Here's the blog that has Jackson talking; originally posted June 19, 2004, this thread spawned a movement to bring "Fahrenheit 9/11" to Jackson. Now the energy has turned to bringing more independent film to the area. Read this thread to see how this grass-roots community effort came about. Be sure to support independent film (and media, and all local businesses, while you're at it). And join Crossroads Film Society if you're really interested in good indie film.

"Fahrenheit 9/11": What Did You Think?

If you've seen "Fahrenheit 9/11," please share your thoughts about the film. What did you like? What surprised you? What fact did you question? What questions did it raise for you? Did it change your vote, or your plans to vote? Please give us honest—some of which we may run in the print edition—reactions about the film, without devolving into personal attacks or nastiness. Please keep it civil!

Summer of ‘64: A Mississippi Freedom Fighter Remembers the Struggle

with JoAnne Prichard Morris

You never know when something's going to happen that will change your life completely. If I had stayed in Florida canning tomatoes, I wouldn't have been here when the civil rights workers came to Mississippi in the summer of 1964. But here I was in Mayersville, chopping Jimson weeds and Johnson grass out of Mr. Wilkerson's cotton for $3 a day. It was 1964, and I was 31 years old. We were living in our old two-room shotgun shack without indoor plumbing.

David Dennis, Jr.

Tall, slim, wearing his hair in neat, short braids, David Dennis Jr. looks like a high school basketball player, maybe on his way to play in college—if he's got the grades. That's the stereotype, anyway.

We Want Our Indie Pics

Why can't we see "The Pianist" (pee-a-nist, it's OK to say it) in Jackson? For that matter, why can't we see "Bowling for Columbine" or "The Quiet American"? Why are our choices limited to the same 10 or 15 mind-numbing films at all three of our local multiplexes? Don't get me wrong, sometimes I'm all for a little cheap thrill of a movie or a quick belly laugh. But, on the other hand, when was the last time you saw a movie, on a big screen in Jackson, er, "the Metro," that made you think or challenged your sensibilities?

E. Willander Wells

"Elegance" is a word that keeps surfacing in conversations with fashion designer E. Willander Wells as we sit outside Broad Street bakery.

Barbour Revitalizing Democratic Party?

Bobby Harrison argues in the Daily Journal that Barbour is singlehandedly revitalizing the Democratic Party in the state. I think he has a point. "Haley Barbour lives, eats and sleeps politics. He knows it inside and out. Having said that, Barbour, a Republican political strategist dynamo, has done more to revitalize the Mississippi Democratic Party than any Democrat in the state. He has given a disjointed, divided group of Democrats something to rally behind - public education and Medicaid." [...]

1.6 Million Women Sue Wal-Mart for Discrimination

The NY Times reports: "A federal judge ruled yesterday that a lawsuit that accuses Wal-Mart Stores Inc. of discriminating against women can proceed as a class action covering about 1.6 million current and former employees, making it by far the largest workplace-bias lawsuit in United States history. The lawsuit, brought in 2001 by six women, accuses Wal-Mart of systematically paying women less than men and offering women fewer opportunities for promotion. The lawsuit stated that while 65 percent of Wal-Mart's hourly employees are women, only 33 percent of Wal-Mart's managers are.

Barbour Trying to Bring Back 1920s

Excellent column by Ole Miss professor Joe Atkins:

Down a Southern Road

Monday, June 21, is the 40th anniversary of the deaths of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner.

Dick Molpus Raises the Roof in Neshoba County

June 20, 2004—With Gov. Haley Barbour sitting right behind him, former Secretary of State and Neshoba County native Dick Molpus made a thundering speech in honor of slain civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner Sunday in his hometown. The speech went far beyond his historic 1989 speech in which he became the only public official to have apologized for the murders. Sunday, Molpus not only called for fellow Neshobans to provide evidence they've kept to themselves for many years, but also called for Mississippians to get past harmful race rhetoric that has divided the state for so long and to continue the legacy of the three men by taking care of fellow Mississippians. Following is the full text of Molpus' call to action that was interrupted frequently by applause and drew him a lengthy standing ovation by the diverse audience ...

UPDATED: Music Sked for Jackson Lounge at the JAM

Just in: The working schedule for the Jackson Lounge tent at the JAM. Check back or at the tent for schedule changes/updates. See you out there. It's a *very* good time

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