Newshoggers Archive: 2010 Ukulele Festival Hawaii

Farewell. The Flying Pig Has Left The Building.

Steve Hynd, August 16, 2012

After four years on the Typepad site, eight years total blogging, Newshoggers is closing it's doors today. We've been coasting the last year or so, with many of us moving on to bigger projects (Hey, Eric!) or simply running out of blogging enthusiasm, and it's time to give the old flying pig a rest.

We've done okay over those eight years, although never being quite PC enough to gain wider acceptance from the partisan "party right or wrong" crowds. We like to think we moved political conversations a little, on the ever-present wish to rush to war with Iran, on the need for a real Left that isn't licking corporatist Dem boots every cycle, on America's foreign misadventures in Afghanistan and Iraq. We like to think we made a small difference while writing under that flying pig banner. We did pretty good for a bunch with no ties to big-party apparatuses or think tanks.

Those eight years of blogging will still exist. Because we're ending this typepad account, we've been archiving the typepad blog here. And the original blogger archive is still here. There will still be new content from the old 'hoggers crew too. Ron writes for The Moderate Voice, I post at The Agonist and Eric Martin's lucid foreign policy thoughts can be read at Democracy Arsenal.

I'd like to thank all our regular commenters, readers and the other bloggers who regularly linked to our posts over the years to agree or disagree. You all made writing for 'hoggers an amazingly fun and stimulating experience.

Thank you very much.

Note: This is an archive copy of Newshoggers. Most of the pictures are gone but the words are all here. There may be some occasional new content, John may do some posts and Ron will cross post some of his contributions to The Moderate Voice so check back.

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Thursday, July 22, 2010

2010 Ukulele Festival Hawaii

By John Ballard

Break time.
PRI's The World aired this refreshing story today. There are links at the site to pictures and a contemporary performance of Jake Shimabukuro performing the timeless George Harrison tune.

Thousands of people from around the globe turned out to attend the 40th annual Ukulele Festival in Hawaii. The instrument has seen a resurgence thanks in part to musician Jake Shimabukuro (pictured). Reporter Heidi Chang attended the festival. She spoke to Shimabukuro and other musicians from France and Japan.

Here is the viral video from 2006 that started it all.
It blew me away at the time and still does.