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election: This is your new President. Barack Obama was sworn in on Sunday as the 44th President of the United States, an official act overseen by Chief Justice John Roberts, in advance of the inaugural ceremonies on Monday.  The White House released a new official portrait of the President, taken in the Oval Office last month, for government use in the second term. Is a second official photo necessary? If nothing else, it shows how much four years can age a President. The Washington Post even has a new feature comparing the iconic pictures, with a breakdown of how Obama’s face shows “deeper creases” and whiter hair.  One doctor told the Post that Presidents typically age abnormally fast because — you guessed it — they are “chronically” exposed to an unusual level of stress.  —Via Ari Melber. Check back here for more live Tumblr inaugural coverage. 
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election:

This is your new President.

Barack Obama was sworn in on Sunday as the 44th President of the United States, an official act overseen by Chief Justice John Roberts, in advance of the inaugural ceremonies on Monday.  The White House released a new official portrait of the President, taken in the Oval Office last month, for government use in the second term.

Is a second official photo necessary?

If nothing else, it shows how much four years can age a President. The Washington Post even has a new feature comparing the iconic pictures, with a breakdown of how Obama’s face shows “deeper creases” and whiter hair.  One doctor told the Post that Presidents typically age abnormally fast because — you guessed it — they are “chronically” exposed to an unusual level of stress. 


—
Via Ari Melber. Check back here for more live Tumblr inaugural coverage. 

[USA]: LGBTQ+ Vote Proved a Boon for Obama

… the backing Mr. Obama received from gay [Ed Note: and lesbian and bisexual and trans* and queer/questioning et. al.] voters also has a claim on having been decisive. Mitt Romney and Mr. Obama won roughly an equal number of votes among straight voters nationwide, exit polls showed. And, a new study argues, Mr. Romney appears to have won a narrow victory among straight voters in the swing states of Ohio and Florida.

Mr. Obama’s more than three-to-one edge in exit polls among the 5 percent of voters who identified as gay, lesbian or bisexual [Ed Note: and trans* and queer/questioning et. al.] was more than enough to give him the ultimate advantage, according to the study, by Gary J. Gates of the Williams Institute at the U.C.L.A. School of Law, in conjunction with Gallup …

“In the younger population, there is a much wider range in the geography and ethnicity of those who are identifying as LGBT,” Dr. Gates said, using a common term for lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. That range now extends well beyond major cities and into multiple swing states …

newsweek: The post-election issue of Newsweek hits newsstands and tablets (iPad, Kindle, Nook) tomorrow morning. On it, a very Napoleonic-looking Barack Obama stands triumphantly with sabre under the cover line, “The Obama Conquest.” “Give me generals who know something about tactics and strategy,” Napoleon Bonaparte once said, “but best of all give me generals who are lucky.” So the question: Is Obama a lucky general—or master of the game? Daniel Klaidman’s cover story, Fortunate One, says sure, Obama’s lucky. But he also relentlessly seizes his chances and makes every one of them count. [Update! Switched “Napoleonic” from “Napoleonistic,” grammar h/t gifthorsedentistry] Great Cover but the copy-editor seems to not know history (or Art) very well and has strangely misidentified who the Obama portrait was actually based on. It’s more likely the artist was either going for George Washington OR possibly Haiti’s Toussaint L’Ouverture, decedent of a famous ruling warrior family from Dahomey (who actually DEFEATED Napoleon).
Zoom

newsweek:

The post-election issue of Newsweek hits newsstands and tablets (iPad, Kindle, Nook) tomorrow morning. On it, a very Napoleonic-looking Barack Obama stands triumphantly with sabre under the cover line, “The Obama Conquest.”

“Give me generals who know something about tactics and strategy,” Napoleon Bonaparte once said, “but best of all give me generals who are lucky.”

So the question: Is Obama a lucky general—or master of the game? Daniel Klaidman’s cover story, Fortunate One, says sure, Obama’s lucky. But he also relentlessly seizes his chances and makes every one of them count.

[Update! Switched “Napoleonic” from “Napoleonistic,” grammar h/t gifthorsedentistry]

Great Cover but the copy-editor seems to not know history (or Art) very well and has strangely misidentified who the Obama portrait was actually based on. It’s more likely the artist was either going for George Washington OR possibly Haiti’s Toussaint L’Ouverture, decedent of a famous ruling warrior family from Dahomey (who actually DEFEATED Napoleon).

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