Give Sharon Stone 5 minutes, she'll net you $1 mil.

[prodigal_green]

What the article doesn't mention, but what I heard on the BBC last night was that Senator Frist tried to get her to shut up and sit down several times. She bulldozed right over him. It was lovely.

I will go and rent every one of her movies this weekend.

Damn Hollywood libruls.

http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-stone29.html

<snip>About an hour into the panel, when a U.N. official said 150,000 African children were dying of malaria every month because they didn't have bed nets, Stone rose from her seat in the audience.

''I'd like to offer $10,000 to help you buy some bed nets today,'' Stone told Tanzanian President Benjamin William Mkapa, who was on the panel along with Microsoft founder Bill Gates and others.

Stone then implored others in the hall -- packed with several hundred well-heeled executives and political leaders attending the World Economic Forum -- to reach into their pockets.

Immediately, an unidentified man promised $50,000.

Around 30 others quickly followed, and within five minutes, Stone had raised $1 million, said Sen. Bill Frist, the Senate leader who moderated the panel discussion on how rich nations can best fund the war on poverty.</snip>

[Skittles]

1. good for Ms. Stone

EXCELLENT!

[katinmn]

2. Love it! I hope it starts a trend.

You know, helping those less fortunate has and continues to be a Democratic value.

[FuzzyDicePHL]

3. If she asks you to do something, you do it

According to Kathy Griffin ("The D-List"), if Sharon Stone asks you to do something, you do it.

"If she asks you to eat her poo, you eat it. 'Mmmmm, great poo, Sharon!'"

(paraphrased)

WELL DONE MS. STONE.

[Deb]

4. She's a wonderful person

''Just stand up. Just stand up. People are dying in his country today,'' she said. ''And that is not OK with me today.'' Go Sharon!

Why would Frist want her to shut up and sit down? Why? I just don't understand.

[prodigal_green]

6. because Frist is an evil jackass

You see, forums like this are for talking about doing further study not actually getting anything done. Then Frist can say, "look, I'm a compassionate conservative! I sat and listened to some Africans talk about their babies dying."

Meanwhile, none of the money that has been appropriated for aid will get released by Congress.

[BR_Parkway]

16. There's no MONEY in it for them and their friends, so they study it

for a while, while their buddies set up a company to accept the study dollars and other friends set up a company that buys the rights or patents or whatever to the eventual solution that the study group comes up with.

[The Zanti Regent]

5. Someone had the courage to stand up to the Nazi Party!

And what is even more shocking is that it appears in the Whore Press!

[Maraya1969]

7. I watched it and it fantastic

She would NOT let Frist shut her up! She just kept saying, "TODAY, we need the money TODAY"! And she kept moving forward and taking over the place.

I swear I thought the Tanzanian President had tears in his eyes.

Someone needs to get a link to the video.

:yourock: SHARON

[bushisanidiot]

8. Without "Hollyweird" getting involved, contributions from the U.S. for

causes like this would be embarrassingly low. It's no wonder Frist was trying to stop her.. "Hollyweird" is supposed to be composed of selfish self-righteous snobs. Freepers can keep their heads in the sand and pretend their party is the party of compassion and that God is on their side, etc. etc.... but time after time we Democrats show which party is truly selfless and compassionate when the chips are down and someone needs help.

[zbdent]

15. Yeah, "liberal Hollywood" has been putting out pretty much nothing but

pro-war propaganda when it comes to "issue movies". Only the actors have had some voices heard.

Name one anti-war movie not done by Michael Moore since 9/11, or where the movie maker "blames America first".

[MrPrax]

24. Can't think of a one...

Of course, as you already know this is a rightwing myth and the closest the Hollywood industry comes to 'liberal' movie is usually 'allegorically reflective' leaving the issue of war aside to focus on an examination of 'what war does to the soul'. And only then, years or decades after the war.

I am thinking of movies like Platoon (liberal because it showed fragging and suggested druggies were more noble than drunks) or even We Three Kings (liberal because it opin'ed that greed might be a motivating factor in war adventurism)

Your right...you have to go back Post-Wars European filmmakers and a few Indepedents to find explicit statements on war itself.

[sonicx]

9. link to video here...

http://clients.world-television.com/worldeconomicforum_annualmeeting2005/_S13805.asp

Sharon's part takes a while to come (about 11 mins in).

[sonicx]

10. I just watched it myself and...

I think i'm in love. :loveya::loveya::loveya:

[libbygurl]

11. Thanks so much for the link! You GO, Sharon!

Yeah, she's one of them "evil liberals", eh?

[Rabrrrrrr]

30. Cranking damn cool!! GO SHARON!!

She went all "Quick and the Dead" on Frist!

[Sydnie]

12. Whooooooo Hooooooooo Way to go Sharon! n/t

[Ilsa]

13. I watched just now on the link provided by sonicx

and she is a passionate woman. She has a wonderful morality regarding the use of money for the common good. She fully understands "you can't take it with you" and she wants to help others.

[madrchsod]

14. kicked the old cat killer square in the balls

now didn`t she! hey bill,hows your nuts feel? better get some new ones,sharon just nutured you....

[Stuckinthebush]

17. That made me tear up

Wow. Sometimes one can use their celebrity status to do incredible good. If I had stood up and said the same thing Ms. Stone did, I would not have received the response because I do not have the voice. Sharon does have the voice and the recognition and can use it for powerful purposes.

Thank you Ms. Stone.

[AP]

18. An aside: Mkkapa's point about why his economy is instable was very...

...interesting.

Mkapa said that African countries are sources of raw materials, but they do not have factories that add value by processing the raw materials into consumer goods.

Explicitly and implicitly, he argues that raw material prices are highly instable. They shoot up, and then they drop dramatically. So, if Africa had more factories, they would benefit from exporting products and products have much more stable prices. That would make their economies much less vulnerable to the market swings.

Now, what do you want to bet that capital knows this, and that's why Africa doesn't have factories?

You have to wonder why they don't have factories, like Asia and Indonesia, Philippines, and the rest of the world. You'd think it would make sense, since they have the labor and the raw materials. It certainly would create cost efficiencies that would...uhm...turn these countries with great raw material resources which the rest of the world uses to make rich people rich into Democracies with wealthy middle classes which would no longer let the rest of the world rip them off in the marketplace for raw materials.

I bet Africa doesn't have factories because capital knows that it would be harder to control the politics of these countries without the destabilizing influence of wide swings in the prices of their raw materials.

[supernova]

20. Yes, I would have liked to have heard more from

Pres. Mkapa.

I'm still thinking it's a hold over from colonialism. If you're a colony you don't produce goods yourself, you give raw materials to the mother country.

Although now it's economic more than political, but the mindset is still there.

[AP]

23. The more value you add on site, the more value you leave behind in the

colony.

Taking raw materials away at less than market value is theft. The colony will never get the diamonds, platinum and gold back, so that money is gone.

But if you build a factory, pay workers, etc (which then results in secondary service markets, and more economic development) then you're leaving assets and money behind. Of course, you can rip off the workers. You can make them so desperate that they're willing to work for a tiny percentage of the wealth they create (see Haiti). But if there's any level of organization, power, and progressive and independent political conscience, you run the risk of creating a situation like China, where a lot of wealth circulates within country rather than flows out to Europe and N. America.

[supernova]

19. That brought tears to my eyes

:cry: God bless Sharon Stone. And fuck you Bill Frist.

[depakid]

21. Well, I sure didn't hear anything like that about Frist on BBC

Not sure what you were listening too... must have been a different BBC version of the story....:shrug:

[prodigal_green]

25. I heard it on BBC radio last night

they may have re-edited it since then.

[depakid]

32. Could be

I wasn't calling you out or anything. I honestly just didn't hear it on any of the reports.

[w4rma]

22. This article makes Frist out to be a hero while he was telling her to shut

up and sit down. Although, to his credit, he gave up pretty quickly as he realized the audience was responding to her.

[jdj]

31. I'm telling you what, I saw him in the audience and he

had the funniest look on his face. While the Nigerian president was speaking.

It was all like he was telling himself "quick, the camera is on you, look like you are all enthralled and enlightened by what he is saying and that you are really not a closet member of the KKK."

I really pondered on that. My other theory was that he was farting and trying to play it down.

[AngryWhiteLiberal]

26. I knew I liked her for more than her crotch...way to go, Sharon!

We need video of this!

JB

[donheld]

27. I'll take Ms Stone's Morality over Frist's any day

Sharon showed a warm heart, while Frist could not care less.

[ScreamingMeemie]

28. And to think there are some in the Democratic Party who think we should

back away from Hollywood. Simply amazing.

[sophie996]

29. and angelina attacks her for it

Jolie raps celebrities on poverty

Saturday, January 29, 2005 Posted: 10:51 AM EST (1551 GMT)

story.jolie.ap.jpg

DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) -- Angelina Jolie, the "Tomb Raider" star voted the sexiest woman alive, said on Saturday that celebrities grandstanding as advocates of the poor can do more harm than good.

"I think you can do damage," Jolie said, a day after fellow actress Sharon Stone raised $1 million in five minutes from business tycoons at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss ski resort of Davos with a spontaneous plea for generosity.

>snip<

Jolie, 29, has spent four years as goodwill ambassador to the U.N.'s refugee agency UNHCR.

She has used her pulling power to draw public attention to humanitarian crises in Chad, Sudan and Sierra Leone, winning praises from United Nations officials, and says she donates one-third of her income to charity
www.cnn.com
*****************************************
and a fat lot of good it seems to have accomplished

Stone was magnificent in the BBC World News segment (on satellite). yes, Frist tried to shut her up, and couldn't. she didn't really try to hijack the meeting--just said (paraphrasing) let's have team to collect donations while the meeting goes back to its business.

it may have been her repeated, urgent, 'TODAY .. TODAY .. TODAY" that was so effective.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

33. As I mentioned on another thread,

Sharon Stone spent Election Day 2004 flying around the country giving pep talks to Democratic GOTV workers, including here in Minneapolis.

She was dressed very plainly, and no one in the crowd of door-knocking teams at the "command center" recognized her until she was introduced.

[sophie996]

34. "She was dressed very plainly"

and it certainly wasn't glamour togs that got her the attention at Davos!
:toast: