[Editor’s note: The third in The Washington Post’s Obama accountability series, we now explore his key speeches with transcripts and videos tied in with their POTUS Tracker events. See trends in sum or by issue with our tag clouds and over time with charts. Credit goes to Wilson Andrews, Jackie Kazil, Nathaniel Kelso, Sarah Lovenheim, Ryan O’Neil, Paul Volpe, and Karen Yourish.]
Interact with the original at The Washington Post . . . Screenshot below.
This is “one gift I will definitely keep,” President Obama said when he was presented with a National Geographic Society map cabinet at the White House earlier this week.
Photo courtesy the White House
“The Obama family loves maps. I like the tactile feel of maps,” the President added, as he admired the cabinet that was leaning against the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office.
Photo courtesy the White House
The presentation in the Oval Office Wednesday, June 10, was by National Geographic President and CEO John M. Fahey, Jr., (seen on the left in the picture above), Global Media President Tim Kelly (on the right), and Executive Vice President Terry Adamson (next to President Obama).
National Geographic Tradition
Fahey told Obama that the presentation of the map cabinet specially constructed for the U.S. President has been a National Geographic tradition that goes back to Franklin D. Roosevelt.
[Editor’s note: Compare the state of the nation via an oddball set of statistics for when Bush took office and and Obama now in 2009. Thanks Laris!]
Republished from the Atlantic, January / February 2009.
By Timothy Lavin. Timothy Lavin is an Atlantic associate editor.
Then and Now. On March 4, 1933, Franklin Roosevelt addressed a crowd of 400,000 at his first inauguration. The past few years had seen a spectacular decline in the nation’s fortunes, born of what he called the “mad chase of evanescent profits.†Banks were failing, savings disappearing, real estate and commodities collapsing. Fascism was rising abroad. In response, Roosevelt pledged “a disciplined attack upon our common problems.†He didn’t get much more specific than that. And, really, he didn’t have to. The people wanted change, in the current vernacular—or, more precisely, they wanted a government that could respond coherently to the profound changes that were already under way.
Barack Obama assumes the presidency this year amid a similar sense of national crisis, and having made similar promises of change. And, like Roosevelt, he’ll be leading a country very different from the one his predecessor inherited: as the statistics on this map show, change itself is one thing we’ve seen in abundance in the past eight years. Making sense of that upheaval will be the first responsibility of the new administration.
Since 2000, America has changed in small ways, in big ways, and in ways that seem innocent enough now but no doubt herald some radical disruptions to come. Many more people are poor, uninsured, and in prison. Many more are billionaires. The burden of health-care costs has grown heavier, and so have we. We charge more, save less, and play a lot more video games. Even the things that haven’t changed much—like the amount of oil we consume, or the price of cocaine, or the size of our military—reflect not so much stasis as unsustainable trajectories. For Obama, responding to these problems will require breaking deep national addictions—to oil, to etherealized finance, to profligacy of all kinds—and, somehow, easing the tremens along the way. Perhaps, in doing so, he should heed a warning Roosevelt issued on the campaign trail: “Without leadership alert and sensitive to change,†he said, “we are bogged up or lose our way.â€
Click image above to view larger version of the map.
Click here to see the sources from which this map was compiled.
[Editor’s note: Continuing coverage of Obama inauguration on January 20th, 2009. Unprecedented crowds are expected, severely disrupting commuting patterns. If you are within two miles of the National Mall experts say to walk to your destination (and expect security checkpoints around the Mall itself). Other coverage includes: overview map, ticketed seating, special bus corridors, and road closures and parking restrictions.]
Republished from The Washington Post.
The bad news: Witnessing this historic occasion in person will require a bit of a schlep. The good news: Officials say pedestrians will be allowed to go just about everywhere. So what about those who have to park their cars and venture over the Potomac and Anacostia rivers on foot for the first time? Put on your sturdy shoes, grab a wind-resistant jacket and climb down into this guide to walking over the 10 bridges into the District of Columbia. — Reporting by Bonnie Berkowitz
SOURCES: U.S. Secret Service, Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency, D.C. Department of Transportation
NOTE: Closures and corridors are subject to change at the discretion of security officials.
Graphic By Laris Karklis — The Washington Post
[Editor’s note: Continuing coverage of Obama inauguration on January 20th, 2009. Unprecedented crowds are expected, severely disrupting commuting patterns. If you are within two miles of the National Mall experts say to walk to your destination (and expect security checkpoints around the Mall itself). Other coverage includes: overview map, ticketed seating, and special bus corridors.]
Republished from The Washington Post.
Original post on Jan. 7th, 2009.
[Editor’s note: Continuing coverage of how to best experience or cope with the Inauguration of Barack Obama as 44th President of the United States on January 20th. Other posts include: Overview map and Ticketed seating.]
Republished from The Washington Post. Jan. 9, 2009.
Metro has designated 23 special bus corridors to run extended rush-hour service from 4 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Jan. 20. Corridor service mainly follows existing Metrobus routes and bus stops across the region. The buses on these corridors pick up and terminate at 14 stops just outside the restricted area. They will run about every 10 minutes to accommodate inauguration crowds.
[Editor’s note: If you’re planning on being in DC for the Inauguration of Barack Obama this month, grab this free map of the festivities from The Washington Post made by Gene Thorp. The map is updated regularly with the latest information.]
Republished from The Washington Post. (Updated map on 11 Jan. 2009.)
The inauguration of President Barack Obama on Jan. 20, 2009, is expected to be one of the largest public gatherings ever to take place in Washington, D.C. Millions are expected to visit the National Mall and other nearby points to view the ceremony either in person or via telescreens, watch the parade from the U.S. Capitol to the White House, and more. On this 2009 inauguration map, The Post will detail information visitors can use to plan their trips downtown. It will be updated periodically as more information becomes available. (AÂ downloadable version is also available in PDF format.)
[Editor’s note: I created this interactive with Karen Yourish and Laura Stanton for the Dec. 21 edition of the Washington Post. President-elect Barack Obama completed his Cabinet picks just 7 weeks after his election on November 4th, 2008. Explore who he’s picked for twenty government agency compare to previous administrations. The little human shapes on the timeline are interactive, as well as the Obama cabinet photo collage, and the week tabs.]
Republished from Washington Post.
NOTE: Barack Obama won the Nov. 4, 2008, election’s popular vote. He will be inaugurated as the 44th president on Jan. 20. As both of these days fall on a Tuesday, “weeks” are calculated as Wednesday through Tuesday.
NOTE: Some agency positions have two nominees per president if the first nominee rescinded his name and another was nominated in his place.
SOURCE: Staff Reports | GRAPHIC: Karen Yourish, Laura Stanton and Nathaniel Vaughn Kelso, The Washington Post.
First posted: 20 December 2008. Last updated: 21 December 2008.
[Editor’s note: President Elect Barack Obama has a lot riding on his shoulders these days. The economy has tanked and multiple wars drag on yet “hope” is high. How have other presidents faired in their first 100 days to deal with the problems they faced and in enacting the initiatives they championed on the campaign trail. This graphic from Good magazine’s politics section shows us just that, tracking the 12 past presidents since 1933. Indicators include their popular vote, economic issues, social issues, foreign conflicts, diplomacy, first moments, red-phone moments, top secret issues, and energy issues. Thanks Patterson and Kristin!]
Republished from Good magazine.Â
“I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people,” Franklin D. Roosevelt told supporters in 1932 while accepting the presidential nomination. When he took office, he spent his first 100 days enacting a dizzying number of reforms designed to stablize an economically depressed nation. Since then, a president’s first 100 days have been an indicator of what he is able to accomplish. In January 2009, the clock starts again.
[Republished from kottke.org. Click on the media outlet name below the map image to go to the final map results presentations. The Washington Post entry is 75% the way down the page. The Onion map at the very bottom is quite amusing.]
Most media outlets covering the 2008 US Presidential Election used the familar red/blue map to track the progress of the race as results from the polls rolled in Tueday evening. Here are several of those maps, in some ways as similar to each other as they are varied. If you run across more maps, send ’em my way. (Note: Most of these aren’t the final maps…I wanted to get screenshots before the sites started moving things around too much.)
Update 11/5 @ 11am: I added 10 new maps to the bottom, including a DIY map drawn on a dry erase board.
New York Times – Nice big clean map, the consensus best map of the 2008 election.
Fox News – Fox is never subtle.
FiveThirtyEight.com – These guys are all about the data. No fancying up the maps.
