Body English

Soap Box Ravings has observed lots of "Body English". I observed a lot of learning points which were openly demonstrated by students and staff alike at the Department of Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute (DEOMI) when I was a facilitator there. DEOMI is the Defense Department's school on racial, sexual and religious bias and how to combat those biases.

An understanding of "Body English" was also useful in my 15 year career in law enforcement after retiring from the US Navy.

Soap Box Ravings can't help but wonder if an elitist such as President Obama knows or cares of the image he often presents.

Furthermore, anyone who has to report to a supervisor with that look on their face is going to be very careful about the information they share with that supervisor.

From The Writings Of Theodore Roosevelt

"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."



We have room for but one flag, the American flag, and this excludes the red flag which symbolizes all wars against liberty and civilization just as much as it excludes any foreign flag of a nation to which we are hostile. We have room for but one language here and that is the English language, for we intend to see that the crucible turns our people out as Americans, of American nationality, and not as dwellers in a pollyglot [sic] boarding house; and we have room for but one, soul [sic] loyalty, and that loyalty is to the American people.

This Picture Says It All

Pete Souza, The White House

Soap Box Ravings says: "I would double bitch slap one of my kids for that look".

Soap Box Ravings wonders exactly who the President is thinking about. He wonders if the look is for the Vice President or if the President is thinking of the ungrateful masses who speak with such disdain about his personal health care legacy.

Regardless, Soap Box Ravings while not an "expert" in body language thinks that look bodes ill for whomever Obama is thinking of.

Obama Speaks About An "Attempted" Attack

Getty Image

On December 29, 2009,U.S. President Barack Obama spoke to the American people from Marine Corps Base Hawaii located at Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii.

In his opening statement Obama said, "Yesterday I updated the American people on the immediate steps we took, the increased screening and security of air travel, to keep our country safe in the wake of the attempted terrorist attack on Christmas Day."

Soap Box Ravings asks what does it take to make a terrorist attack? In this case, a Muslim on a US aircraft preparing to land initiated an explosive device and the President of the United States of America refers to the incident as an attempted attack instead of a failed attack.

If you point a gun, at a police officer be it real or a BB gun I can guarantee you it will be seen by that officer as an attack in progress.

Soap Box Ravings feels that regardless of the failures of our security system, which the Secretary of Homeland Security initially said worked perfectly, as long as the President and his peers see these incidents as just "attempts" the security system will never work.

Soap Box Ravings believes neither the President nor the Secretary of Homeland security appear to understand what they are up against; or perhaps they just don't care.