Update!

First and foremost Ickis is feeling better! Now he is turning into a little piggy and has the cutest round belly from eating so much. He isn't quite as bony and gained the 10 ounces he lost back with interest! I just weighed him and now he is four pounds!

Here are some funny photos that I took of him last night. He was yawning:)



FINALS are HERE! And I'm actually doing okay. I have two finals today in Journalism: Media Professions and Comparative Literature: Orientalism. Then next week I have a final on Tuesday in Grammar, a final on Wednesday for Media, and a final on Thursday for Economics. Yikes! It looks like a lot when I type it all out but I know I will do just fine. The only one I am truly worried about is Economics but how hard can it be?

Since class is ending I wanted to share something important that we have been learning about. In my Media and Communications class we study the affect of journalism on media, media on people, and vice versa. One of the points we spoke about yesterday included Lord Haw Haw, Axis Sally, Hanoi Hannah, and Tokyo Rose. They are all people who became broadcasters and used their propaganda to push one-sided information onto American soldiers and in some cases, citizens. I had heard of Tokyo Rose but the others were news to me.
They would tune their radio signals into enemy area where the broadcasters would tell soldiers that their wives and girlfriends were cheating on them and that they were going to die if they didn't stop fighting this war. Hanoi Hannah was outspoken about Vietnam, Axis Sally, Tokyo Rose, and Lord Haw Haw were all speaking for WWII. All of them were tried for treason(except Hanoi Hannah because she wasn't born in the U.S.).
Why am I telling you this? Because we can learn from history and know that if a major war is going on history will repeat itself. Without further ado I bring you Azzam the American!


From the New Yorker:

Adam Gadahn, the first American to be charged with treason in more than fifty years, was born in Oregon, grew up in rural California, and converted to Islam at the age of seventeen. He is now twenty-eight. No one who knew him before his religious awakening ever thought that he would join Al Qaeda, and many people who knew him after he did are still perplexed. And yet, in a short time, Gadahn has become one of Osama bin Laden’s senior operatives. (He is believed to be hiding in the North Waziristan region of Pakistan.) He is a member of Al Qaeda’s “media committee,” and his responsibilities are thought to include those of translator, video producer, and cultural interpreter. Primarily, though, Gadahn is a spokesperson, a role he performs with tremendous conviction. He has addressed the United States in five videos, most of which reach a wide audience on the Internet and, in some form or another, have been discussed on the evening news. Last year, shortly before the fifth anniversary of September 11th, Al Qaeda’s leadership featured Gadahn in a video titled “An Invitation to Islam.” The video began with an introduction from Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al Qaeda’s main theoretician, who referred to Gadahn tenderly as a brother and as “a perceptive person who wants to lead his people out of darkness into the light.” Zawahiri implored his Western audience to listen to Gadahn, even to follow his example. Al Qaeda had never before given one of its members, let alone an American, an endorsement so intimate and direct.

There is a certain stylistic uniformity to all forms of propaganda, but the personality of the propagandist is never far from the surface. Bin Laden’s murmuring voice belies the contempt in his words. Zawahiri speaks in the confident, rhythmic clauses of a master strategist. Adam Gadahn, though he tries to adopt the composure of a statesman, exudes the zealotry of a convert, and of youth. Sometimes his syntax is so baroque, his sentiment so earnest, that he sounds like a character from “The Lord of the Rings.” “The call has gone out,” he proclaimed in one video. “The era of jihad and resistance has dawned in all its glory.” Mostly, though, Gadahn sounds angry. In 2005, with his head wrapped in a black turban and his face covered with a black veil, he warned, “We love nothing better than the heat of battle, the echo of explosions, and slitting the throats of the infidels.” Last July, while discussing civilian casualties in Iraq, he said, “It’s hard to imagine that any compassionate person could see pictures, just pictures, of what the Crusaders did to those children, and not want to go on a shooting spree at the Marines’ housing facilities at Camp Pendleton.” In a feature-length Al Qaeda documentary that was released on the Internet on September 11, 2006, Gadahn referred to the United States as “enemy soil,” and celebrated the September 11th hijackers as “dedicated, strong-willed, highly motivated individuals.”

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“An Invitation to Islam” allowed Americans to observe Gadahn at length. For nearly forty-five minutes, he urged the people of the United States to discard their myriad religious and political beliefs, adopt an uncompromising form of Islam, and “join the winning side.” This time, he wore a pristine white robe and a white turban, and he was seated in what appeared to be a modern office; beside him were a flat-screen Compaq computer monitor, a neat row of books, and a full glass of tea. Gadahn has brown eyes, a prominent brow, and thick brown hair. His skin was tanned. A long beard of tight curls puffed outward along the sides of his full cheeks. He is nearly six feet tall, and is thought to weigh more than two hundred pounds. Gadahn cannot keep his body still when he speaks. He points his finger upward, or wields a copy of the Koran, or swipes his hand in front of his chest to dismiss an erroneous idea. “Time is running out,” Gadahn said, waving an arm up and down. “So make the right choice before it’s too late and you meet the dismal fate of thousands before you.”

Read more: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/01/22/070122fa_fact_khatchadourian?currentPage=all#ixzz0YY594RRl

Why am I telling you this? I assume if I haven't heard of it there are other people out there who haven't. To be honest this person is expressing freedom of speech. I don't agree with what he says or does but I do agree with his right to say it.