Nextgov/FCW - Authors - Esther Zuckerman

Stephen Colbert Forced Bill Clinton to Join Twitter

Esther Zuckerman, The Wire — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 13:52:43 -0400

Bill Clinton's Twitter philosophy? "There's nothing worse than a friendless tweeter." Well now he has close to 34,000 Twitter followers for the new account Stephen Colbert took the liberty of setting up for him: @PrezBillyJeff. During last night's Colbert Report, filmed at the Clinton Global Initiative University meeting in St. Louis, Colbert segued a discussion of whether young people should get into politics into Clinton's social media presence. After Clinton discussed how new emailwas during his presidency, Colbert decided to get Clinton into the 21st Century. "Well, sir, I took the liberty of opening you a Twitter account," he said, explaining that "PresidentClinton" and "WilliamJeffersonClinton" were taken, but "PrezBillyJeff" was available. Clinton then dictated his first tweet—bizarrely aware of what would make up 140 characters. The crowd shouted at Colbert to add the hashtag.

Obama to pardon both turkeys after useless Facebook contest

Esther Zuckerman, The Wire — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 11:52:35 -0500

Despite pitting two animals against one another in a Facebook contest to choose the National Thanksgiving Turkey, the president will still pardon both birds—Cobbler and his alternate Gobbler—per a White House release this morning. The annual ceremony will take place this afternoon in the Rose Garden, though a White House official tells The Atlantic Wire that only the official National Thanksgiving Turkey will participate, not Gobbler. (Obama also pardoned both "Apple" and "Cider" last year, with only one bird attending the ceremony.)

The whole thing won't make PETA any happier—they want Obama to do away with the tradition altogether—but that's not stopping outlets like NPR from joking that the animal community has an easier time getting clemency from this president than their human friends.

White House turns turkey fate over to social media

Esther Zuckerman, The Wire — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 16:04:18 -0500

The White House turkey pardoning ceremony is a Thanksgiving tradition, but what happens to the poor birds that don't get pardoned? The White House's new social media outreach makes us go all existential on the holiday. The White House is asking people to choose which fowl will be the 2012 National Thanksgiving Turkey. Per the White House blog this is "first time ever, the American public will get its say" in this matter, and they are faced with two worthy candidates.

Dewatering SWAT Team has been pumping out more than an Olympic-size pool per minute

Esther Zuckerman, The Wire — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 11:57:49 -0500

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said yesterday that its dewatering task force removed more than an Olympic-size swimming pool's worth of water per minute from New York's flooded mass transit tunnels. The press release (via Boing Boing ) said the team was overseeing pumps at six sites that each could get rid of 116,000 gallons per minute. Combined, that's 696,000 gallons of water, well over the 660,000 gallons it takes to float Ryan Lochte. The release explains that when they began pumping on Thursday there were about 600 million gallons in the tunnels. You can see video of the mission at work on the Battery Underpass and the South Ferry Subway Station here: