Groundhog Day

Do you recall the 1993 comedy starring Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell called Groundhog Day?  For the benefit of those who aren’t fans of Ghostbusters star Bill Murray; aren’t film buff or are not that old, I’ll briefly go through the move plot: “A self-centered weather forecaster (played by Bill Murray) ends up reliving Groundhog day every morning until he finally realizes that in order for this routine to stop he must change from within. What is most striking about this movie is the alarm clock at the B&B Murray resides in; it wakes him up the same rituals and activities as the day before and Murray soon realizes, the day after.” IMDB rate this move at 8.1/10 and places is at position 168 of the top 250 movies of all times. 

 Photograph by Jason Cohn, Reuters

Has SASM started reviewing movies? No yet. We want to discuss the holiday celebrated on February 2^nd. Tradition has it that when a groundhog leaves its burrow on this day it will look for its shadow. If it can’t see its shadow (because it is cloudy) than the groundhog will leave its burrow signifying that winter-like weather will soon end. On the other hand if the groundhog sees its shadow (meaning that the sun is out), the critter will head back into its burrow and winter weather will continue for another six weeks.

Punxsutawney, a borough in Jefferson County, Pennsylvania, 135 km northeast of Pittsburgh holds the largest Groundhog Day celebration. It is followed by thousands of locals, tourists and news crews who gather every year to observe whether winter has come to an end or still has a few more weeks.

German immigrants brought the tradition with them. As they settled in hills of Pennsylvania, they began using the Groundhog to predict the arrival of spring. The tradition is based upon Candlemas, the day that is the midpoint between winter and spring. A famous Candlemas poems goes:

If Candlemas be fair and bright,
Winter has another flight.
If Candlemas brings clouds and rain,
Winter will not come again.

Obama vs Romney?

Mitt Romney's 16-point victory over Ron Paul in the New Hampshire primary provided a big boost for his candidacy as the race for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination heads to South Carolina. Romney is the first non-incumbent Republican presidential candidate to win both Iowa and New Hampshire since Iowa assumed the pole position in the party's race to the nomination in 1976.

New Hampshire is a state with only 12 delegates of which Romney picked up 7. The remaining 5 delegates went for Ron Paul and Jon Huntsman. This is still a long way from the 1,144 delegates needed by a candidate to secure the nomination but this state represents the first tangible step in the stuff that counts, delegates.

The next primary now moves south of the Mason-Dixon Line to South Carolina were there will be 25 delegates up for grabs. Polls see Romney leading with Gingrich close behind and Paul coming in third. The actual outcome will now depend on the rallying and lobbying of each prospective candidate’s camping team.

Mitt Romney was born in Detroit on March 12, 1947. His mother, Lenore, gave up an acting career when she met and married his father, George. Mitt’s father came from humble origins and never graduated from college. He apprenticed as a lathe and plaster carpenter and sold aluminium paint before beginning a career that brought him to the head of American Motors and then the governorship of Michigan.

Mitt married his wife, Ann, in 1969. They first met in elementary school when he was a Cub Scout. When they met again years later at a friend’s house, he was smitten. Between them, they have five sons and sixteen grandchildren, who are the center of their lives. Like any family, the Romney’s have faced hardship: Ann was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1998, and more recently fought a battle with breast cancer. She credits her husband’s unwavering care and devotion to her for helping her through these ordeals.

Martin Luther King Day - Jan 16

Martin Luther King Day is a federal holiday that will fall on January 16 this year. It celebrates the life and achievements of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (MLK), the civil rights leader. He is best known for his campaigns to end racial segregation on public transport and for racial equality in the United States.

This federal holiday is a relatively new one with all states observing it from the year 2000 -- New Hampshire was the last state to observe it. Four days after Dr King’s death in 1968, Congressman John Conyers, Democrat from Michigan, first introduced legislation for a commemorative holiday. Even though Illinois was the first state to adopt Martin Luther King Day as a state holiday in 1973, at a federal level everything was at a standstill. When the bill did not progress, a campaign was started. Following support from the musician Stevie Wonder with his single "Happy Birthday" and a petition with six million signatures, the bill became law in 1983 and Martin Luther King Day was first observed by some states in 1986.

MLK was born on January 15, 1929, in Atlanta, Georgia. According to him the civil rights movement began when he was six years old. Two of his friends did not show up to play ball and Martin decided to go look for them. He was met by the mother of one of the boys who told him in a very rude tone that her son would not be coming out to play with him ever again because they were white and he was black.

Rev King is probably best known for the speech he gave on August 28, 1963 on the steps of the Washington DC Lincoln Memorial. It goes as follows:

“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal. I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

Iowa Caucuses: And then there were 8

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has won the Iowa caucuses by only eight votes. Romney narrowly edged out former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum. Romney got 30,015 votes while Santorum received 30,007 votes.　

During the Iowa caucuses residents of Iowa State meet in precinct caucuses in 1,774 precincts and elect delegates to the corresponding county conventions. There are 99 counties in Iowa. These county conventions then select delegates for both Iowa's Congressional District Convention and the State Convention, which eventually choose the delegates for the presidential nominating conventions.

Romney was born on March 12, 1947. He was the 70th Governor of Massachusetts from 2003 to 2007. While Governor he presided over a series of spending cuts and increases in fees that eliminated a projected $3 billion deficit. He also signed into law the Massachusetts health care reform legislation, which provided near-universal health insurance access via subsidies and state-level mandates and was the first of its kind in the nation.

Santorum has on numerous occasions made derogatory statements against homosexuals. In 2003, Santorum stated that he believed mutually consenting adults do not have a constitutional right to privacy with respect to sexual acts. He described the ability to regulate consensual homosexual acts as comparable to the states' ability to regulate other consensual and non-consensual sexual behaviour, such as adultery, polygamy, child molestation, incest, sodomy, and bestiality, whose decriminalization he believed would threaten society and the family, as they are not monogamous and heterosexual.