President
Bush, Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk, Chinese environmentalist Ma Jun, German
Chancellor Angela Merkel, and hip hop renaissance man Sean "Puffy" Combs have
made Time magazine's list of the year's 100 most influential people.
In a series of essays, some written by celebrities, Time lauded a few people
for the second time in the three years since the list began. The repeats were
Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, former President Bill Clinton,
Microsoft CEO Bill Gates and NBC morning news anchor Katie Couric.
Bush, despite high disapproval ratings and an unpopular war, is "already
assured a large place in history," Time wrote.
Sean Combs, whom designer Vivienne Tam described in her essay as "a force of
nature," is a product of Harlem who began as a rapper and grew into a producer,
clothing designer and philanthropist.
East German physicist Angela Merkel, Germany's first woman chancellor, "now
boasts stratospheric approval ratings, and the improvement in the German economy
is commonly put down to the 'Merkel effect,'" Time wrote.
Time also praised writer Orhan Pamuk, who was forced to leave Turkey for a
while in 2005 because of his book "My Name is Red." In the novel, he "pointedly
criticized his country's all-too-willful historical blind spots," genocide of
Armenians in 1915 and suppression of Turkey's Kurdish minority.
Former journalist Ma Jun wrote "China's Water Crisis" (1999), which "may be
for China what Rachel Carson's 'Silent Spring' was for the US, the country's
first great environmental call to arms."
The list also dipped into popular culture. Wildly popular US cooking show
host Rachael Ray has inspired working people to "eschew the trap of fast-food
facility and truly cook - even the easy fast stuff - at home."
Separately, Time named 15 power couples such as singers Jay-Z and Beyonce and
actors Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, plus five couples from history including
the artists Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera.
To view the name list: