Friday, November 22, 2019

Invasion 68: Prague", By Josef Koudelka, 1968 / Exacta Varex



As he was listening to the sighing of the sails, he became aware that there was a grain lodged under his thumbnail. It was a single poppy seed: prising it out, he rolled it between his fingers and raised his eyes, past the straining sails, to the star-filled vault above. On any other night he would have scanned the sky for the planet he  had always thought to be the arbiter of his fate – but tonight his eyes dropped instead to the tiny sphere he was holding between his thumb and forefinger.


 

"Invasion 68: Prague", By Josef Koudelka, 1968 / Exacta Varex


"Invasion 68: Prague", By Josef Koudelka, 1968 / Exacta Varex


Josef Koudelka had returned from a project photographing gypsies in Romania just two days before the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968. He witnessed and recorded the military forces of the Warsaw Pact as they invaded Prague and crushed reforms of the so-called Prague Spring. Koudelka's negatives were smuggled out of Prague to the Magnum agency, and published anonymously in The Sunday Times Magazine under the initials P. P. (Prague Photographer) for fear of reprisal to him and his family.
Koudelka documented the overthrow of Alexander Dubcek’s government with his Exakta Varex camera.



Meaningful moments, historic days



Today’s front page of The Washington Post. (Courtesy The Washington Post)
One of the more difficult things about covering impeachment is sifting through all the noise and spin to determine what moments are truly meaningful. But it sure felt like that moment was Wednesday, and the testimony of EU Ambassador Gordon Sondland was a historic day. That’s how both the Washington Post and New York Times played it on their front pages.
The Post headline: “Diplomat acknowledges ‘quid pro quo.’” The Times' was a quote from Sondland: “We followed the president’s orders.”
But will it be a historic day after all?
On Fox News, whose afternoon coverage actually has been mostly balanced except for the on-screen graphics, anchor Bret Baier said Sondland’s testimony was “very damaging” to the Republican party’s arguments. Anchor Chris Wallace said Sondland sounded like he was trying to protect himself and added, “To a certain degree, he took out the bus and ran over President Trump, Vice President Pence, (Secretary of State) Mike Pompeo, (former national security adviser) John Bolton, (Trump's personal attorney) Rudy Giuliani, (acting White House chief of staff) Mick Mulvaney. … He implicates all of them.”
But in a column for The Washington Post, Max Boot doubts even Sondland’s testimony will have a lasting effect.
The impeachment hearings continue today.
Now on to other media news …
 
You Chose; You chose; You chose; You chose; You chose to give away your love; You chose to have a broken heart; You chose to give up; You chose to hang on; You chose to react; You chose to feel insecure; You chose to feel anger; You chose to fight back; You chose to have hope; You chose to be na‹ve; You chose to ignore your intuition; You chose to ignore advice; You chose to look the other way; You chose to not listen; You chose to be stuck in the past; You chose your perspective; You chose to blame; You chose to be right; You chose your pride; You chose your games; You chose your ego; You chose your paranoia; You chose to compete; You chose your enemies; You chose your consequences; You chose; You chose; You chose; You chose; However, you are not alone; Generations of women in your family have chosen; Women around the world have chosen; We all have chosen at one time in our lives; We stand behind you now screaming: Choose to let go; Choose dignity; Choose to forgive yourself; Choose to forgive others; Choose to see your value; Choose to show the world you?re not a victim; Choose to make us proud;