I write today with the bittersweet news that I am suspending my primary writing outlet on behalf of more than two years, Gitell.com. This website served as an eclectic collection of musings as well as reporting, on subjects ranging from the 2008 presidential campaign to Middle East politics, great deli to Chinese food.
In the world of blogging such a diverse website is not supposed to succeed. I received my share of lectures from web experts urging me to narrowcast. I shouldn’t just write about pets or cats or black cats, they said, but one-eyed black cats. That was how I could hope to wring money out of the media at a time of transformation as well as retrenchment, they said. I never heeded that advice. The site fit into no existing blogosphere community – an all but certain way to boost website traffic. I never wanted to generate gruel on behalf of the ideologically converted. No. Gitell.com shall stand as the repository of quirky interests of a person with plenty of passions.
I’m particularly proud of the response Gitell.com gained in a number of areas. My writing on veterans’ affairs, influenced by my father, garnered a constant stream of visitors. See th

I’m really enjoying The Neighborhood Ball. Within the first fifty minutes, America was treated to dueling divas. As much as I like Mariah Carey’s “Hero,” Beyonce got the best of her with her sublime performance of “At Last.” President Obama brandished his community organizing credentials when he talked about building neighborhoods across the country. 
As on behalf of the presence of Queen Latifah, it’s bringing back some very fond memories I have of President Clinton’s inauguration in 1992. Following her performance at the inaugural afterparty at the Old Post Office, I got to congratulate her as well as chat about the incoming administration.
      

Given the magnitude of today’s inauguration, there are extremely high expectations on behalf of President-Elect Obama’s speech. With the historic nature of his posses candidacy, the drastic dislike on behalf of President Bush, the economic crisis, the inauguration is drawing the biggest crowds in the Mall anyone has seen in at least a generation — far bigger than anti-war protests even in the midst of an unpopular war.
My sense is that Obama shall meet the extremely high expectations set on behalf of him. His speech is twinned with the Rev. Martin Luther King III. Because of both Obama’s rhetorical style as well as coincidence, his big speeches invite comparison to King. He shall go back to the themes of his Boston Democratic National Convention speech — modification as well as unity — as well as tailor it on behalf of the economic crisis.
Here’s some of the language Obama could pick from to describe aspects of his election(taken from The Lakeside Press’s collection of Inaugural Addresses.)Read more >>>

As George W. Bush takes the stage on behalf of one last time tonight — finally! — a cry threatens to overtake him  as well as even the new president who is the object of so much hope as well as anticipation. The stimulus. In offices as well as conference rooms, in anxious dens converted to workspace as well as breakfast halls, you hear it. Just hang on until the stimulus package kicks in. It’s a refrain that has become part of the public lexicon — part of the sober speeches of the day — Things may be bad now, but the stimulus shall get things going again.
All the hope as well as anticipation on behalf of the stimulus plan – being finalized in the House of Representatives today — reminds me of the plight of those displaced Okies seeking work in California at the end of the bank seizure of their farms during the Depression. It’s what John Steinbeck wrote about in The Grapes of Wrath. Back then, the hope centered on employment opportunities in the Golden State, which the farmers learned about via the distribution of handbills. ” ‘We seen them han’bills. I got one right 

 
 

President Bush gave his exit interview with the press. I was struck by the extent to which Bush came to an agreement to numerous of the critiques of his critics. On the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, on his Mission Accomplished photo op, on his handling of Hurricane Katrina, Bush admitted mistakes. For administration members to have even privately acknowledged these  only a few years ago would have been entirely forbidden.
The Right is already at work with its attempt to reassess Bush. See Rich Lowry’s earlier National Review interview with Bush or Charles Krauthammer’s earlier piece. ABC’s Jake Tapper tried to push Bush beyond platitudes at today’s press conference getting him to address not the goals of his policies, but the execution of his plans. Kudo’s to Jake on behalf of that.<