Hillary or Hussein?

From the time I first heard of her, I’ve been an admirer of Hillary Clinton. My earliest curiosity about her personality stemming from the headlines such as ‘Hillary’s Husband Elected’ ran by the East German news papers when Bill Clinton was elected President for the first time. My admiration grew as I read more about her views on social issues and it peaked after noticing the remarkable dignity with which she handled each crisis in her life brought about by the irresponsible ways of her husband. I often thought of her as the best bet to be America’s first woman President.

But the sudden appearance of a fresh face, that of Senator Barack Hussein Obama from Illinois, on the scene of the Presidential race leaves me a bit confused. Sen. Obama already had to answer questions on his early schooling in some Islamic Madrassa in Indonesia; and he’s on the back foot, pleading for his ‘devout Christian’ status! How annoying is it to see persons of integrity and values forced to fall over backwards and eat their words by the fools and fanatics who control the 'religious under world', once they bid for an elected office.
Whenever the Americans chose to ignore the conservatives, they had brought in a refreshing change on the way their country was governed. They had elected the ‘Compassionate’, the ‘Crippled’ and the ‘Catholic’ in spite of the heavy odds staked against them and history changed course each time. And it's badly in need of another course correction now.

Years ago when a highly decorated general, a hero of the American state, announced his intention to run, the campaign managers of the then President ran a vitriolic attack on him, digging up information on his past. The pro-President news papers derided him as the “son of a common prostitute” and the “paramour husband of a convicted adulteress” and asked the voters whether such a person could be elected as the President of that devoutly Christian land! And when his supporters decided to pay back with the same coin, he had heroically restrained them stating “I never war on the females, it’s only the mean and cowardly that do”. The Americans then responded by electing him for two consecutive terms, perhaps the first orphan to be democratically elected as the President of any nation, and also made sure that those behind the campaign never made it to the White House. Any doubt on why the Americans continue to command respect in spite of their recent record?

Is there a way out of my present dilemma? With all due respect to the hopes & aspirations of the African Americans, I wish Hillary to run for President & Obama for the veep.

From Stories Sports Photographs Told Me........

Some of the greatest sports photographs involved no sporting action at all. And often they told me stories; of chivalry, of rivalry, of tragedy and of true heroism.
One of them, for example, had an apparently shivering man, as weak as a 'butterfly' struggling to stay clear of the fire after lighting the Olympic flame, in front of a teary eyed President.
Another had a fallen hero returning to his fans, whom he had fled, at the top of a motorcade, oblivious to the surroundings, his head hanging on his shoulders with no sign of consciousness.
Yet another had a cricketer, bowler & Captain, walking back, retracing the run up all alone as his team mates, huddled together across the pitch at the other end, celebrated a wicket off his bowling! And a fourth one had 'The Saint' carrying the coffin of his rival who had fallen in the 'battlefield'.
One such photograph, a rather old one, had a young woman hugging a pole!
She did it after winning some obscure tennis tourney in Orlando, which incidentally was her first. Far away from home, cut off from family & friends, in a strange & distant land, at her moment of immense joy, as there was no one to hug, she hugged the nearest object she could, a light pole next to the Umpire's chair. Some one captured it on his camera & it got published on the next day's papers.
I'm not sure if she made it big in the highly competitive world of professional tennis. But she must have been a trend setter for many girls these days take up the sport which demand extensive traveling across the globe.
Wait a minute.....
............the caption below the photograph gives her name.............
it reads ...........
Martina Navratilova!