tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35127712024-03-13T16:32:36.707-04:00thoughts on the eve of the apocalypseUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger4144125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-7362385396716859712008-08-31T21:16:00.000-04:002008-09-02T00:33:00.046-04:00No MasAfter mulling things over, I've come to the conclusion that it makes sense to close up shop here. Things have run their course.<br /><br />Thanks to everyone for stopping by, at one point or another. There's a good chance I'll pop up elsewhere on the blog front, eventually. Perhaps we'll run across each other there...Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-54634072763828343632008-07-08T00:09:00.004-04:002008-10-29T03:54:20.723-04:00AhoyWell, I guess I should say something. <br /><br />Blogging is not do-able for me at the current moment, at least not in the way I'd like. I'm leaving stuff on ice for the time being until I figure out whether to: a) resume things here; b) close up shop altogether; or c) possibly start a different blog, with a different focus.<br /><br />I'm not sure how long it's going to take me to figure out what to do next, since I'm juggling a couple of variables. Sorry about that. Stay tuned, I guess.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-41689813557101244912008-05-10T00:20:00.002-04:002008-05-10T02:35:37.601-04:00'Agreed in principle'<a href="http://www.amconmag.com/blog/2008/05/09/war-with-iran-might-be-closer-than-you-think/">War With Iran Might Be Closer Than You Think</a>.<br /><br />(<a href="http://www.antiwar.com/blog/">via</a>)Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-90177262081055095242008-05-10T00:19:00.000-04:002008-05-10T02:00:29.716-04:00Israel Without Zionism?Tony Karon: <a href="http://tonykaron.com/2008/05/08/israel-is-alive-zionism-is-dead-what-now/">Israel is 60, Zionism is Dead, What Now?</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-56809055259920319062008-05-10T00:16:00.003-04:002010-01-26T01:33:33.304-05:00'The Arab Mind'I have long found it amusing how the people most likely to denounce Edward Said's thesis in <span style="font-style:italic;"><a href="http://crookedtimber.org/2008/05/06/the-iraq-war-orientalism-and-the-arab-mind/">Orientalism</a></span> routinely confirm that very thesis with their constant opining and alleged understanding of the "Arab" or the "Muslim." <br /><br />The <a href="http://toteota.blogspot.com/2004/05/acceptable-racism.html">Patai stuff</a> is just the most obvious marker here; examples abound in the neocon-o-sphere, not atypically in the <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB107576070484918411-IBje4Nklah3m5uvan2GcKuEm4.html">reverence</a> given to Bernard "<a href="http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/brian_whitaker/2006/08/world_to_end_on_august_22.html">22 August</a>" Lewis.<br /><br />ps - Said torched Lewis' critical style in this old <span style="font-style:italic;">Harper's</span> <a href="http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/crisis/said.htm">essay</a>. Well worth the read.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-40043158205860470472008-05-10T00:15:00.002-04:002010-01-26T01:33:16.570-05:00Fall downGreg Mitchell wonders why it took <a href="http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003801271">so long</a> for the press to break the Abu Ghraib story. <br /><br />A good question, but still too tame when you consider the <a href="http://toteota.blogspot.com/2004/05/war-crimes-galore.html">larger context</a> of the scandal -- something that also was readily apparent at the time, if you bothered to look.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-43527822120856933872008-05-10T00:14:00.001-04:002008-05-10T02:00:38.813-04:00Deploying the unfitOk, so it's <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/military/2008-05-07-nondeploy_N.htm">not</a> the <span style="font-style:italic;">Washington Post</span> and it's only been a year, but I wasn't too far <a href="http://toteota.blogspot.com/2007/04/enough-bodies.html">off base</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-58169575572216681992008-05-08T14:10:00.002-04:002008-05-08T14:33:17.046-04:00A DIY journalistCheck an <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/may/08/iraq.iraqandthemedia">interview</a> with Dahr Jamail in the <span style="font-style:italic;">Guardian</span>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-71312986238444485462008-05-08T14:08:00.004-04:002008-05-08T15:17:29.572-04:00Israel's bdayA joyous occasion for some. For others, it's been <a href="http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/17574">sixty</a> years of <a href="http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/1998/376/pal1.htm">dispossession</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-40409573887124540942008-05-08T14:05:00.000-04:002008-05-08T14:33:19.522-04:00Gated<a href="http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/attytood/Dont_go_back_toPaulville.html">Paulville</a>? Seriously?Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-88630380358857637532008-05-08T01:24:00.004-04:002008-05-08T01:43:19.897-04:00Defiling another cityYet another example of <a href="http://toteota.blogspot.com/2007/06/defiling-cities.html">destroying a village</a> to save it, so to speak. This time it's <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7387960.stm">Sadr City</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-67723116698568298922008-05-08T01:19:00.005-04:002010-01-17T12:06:44.785-05:00"Surge" StrainsJim Lobe says that Bush soon will be <a href="http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42281">running into problems</a> funding his beloved "surge" in Iraq.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-28294255594861588342008-05-08T01:18:00.000-04:002008-05-08T01:48:28.767-04:00Demolishing Feith and Wolfowitz<a href="http://www.ips.org/blog/jimlobe/?p=137">Gosh</a>, maybe if I start lying more and enabling war crimes I, too, can teach at Georgetown. Or -- even better -- run the World Bank for a stretch of time.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-34438478919163027462008-05-07T12:58:00.006-04:002008-05-08T01:19:35.873-04:00Celebrating a terroristI like Miami. I really do. It's such a shame that, using the <a href="http://toteota.blogspot.com/2008/01/coddling-terrorists.html">logic</a> of the GWOT™, we're going to have to <a href="http://fairuse.100webcustomers.com/itsonlyfair/latimes0273.html">bomb the shit out of it</a>, pronto.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-68338950369509816912008-05-07T12:55:00.004-04:002008-09-30T00:27:54.415-04:00Persistent InjusticeLet's hope Jeremiah Wright doesn't see <a href="http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42264">this</a>. Might make him angrier.<br /><blockquote>African Americans have suffered much higher rates of arrests and imprisonment than whites in the nearly 30-year-old U.S. "war on drugs", according to two reports released here this week.<br /><br />While white citizens constitute the large majority of convicted drug offenders, African American communities have been the principal "fronts" in the war, according to "<a href="http://hrw.org/reports/2008/us0508/">Targeting Blacks: Drug Law Enforcement and Race in the United States</a>", by New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW).<br /><br />Among other conclusions, the 67-page report found that African Americans constituted 53.5 percent of all individuals who were sentenced to prison for violating drug laws between the war's launch in 1980 and 2003, the most recent year for which statistics are available.<br /><br />Across 34 states covered by the HRW report, a black man was found to be nearly 12 times more likely than a white man to be sentenced to prison for drug offences. A black woman is nearly five times more likely to go to prison than a white woman.<br /><br />In a separate study of data from 43 of the largest U.S. cities, the Sentencing Project found that the rate of drug arrests for African Americans increased by 225 percent, compared to 70 percent among whites over the same 23-year period, despite the absence of any statistical evidence that the rate of drug use in each community had changed.<br /><br />In 11 cities, the 45-page study, "<a href="http://www.sentencingproject.org/PublicationDetails.aspx?PublicationID=614">Disparity by Geography: The War on Drugs in America's Cities</a>", found that black arrest rates grew by more than 500 percent over the period.<br /><br />"Urban black Americans have borne the brunt of the war on drugs," said Michael Tonry, a professor of criminal law at the University of Minnesota associated with the Sentencing Project. "They have been arrested, prosecuted, convicted, and imprisoned at increasing rates since the early 1980s, and grossly out of proportion to their numbers in the general population or among drug users." </blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-65086020065740434062008-05-07T12:54:00.000-04:002008-05-07T13:09:00.970-04:00Recreate sixty-eight?Frida Berrigan takes apart some <a href="http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/05/07/8793/">myths</a> about the peace movement.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-84434687005517113312008-05-06T14:34:00.002-04:002008-05-06T14:43:24.101-04:00'The horrific mess that is America'Some interesting <a href="http://blogs.salon.com/0002007/2008/04/26.html#a2139">thoughts</a> about Bageant's <span style="font-style:italic;">Deer Hunting With Jesus</span>.<br /><br />(<a href="http://theriverblog.blogspot.com/">via</a>)Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-4034586568100408112008-05-06T14:33:00.002-04:002008-05-06T14:47:52.963-04:00Targeting hospitalsLast week US and Iraqi forces <a href="http://www.mcclatchydc.com/iraq/story/35735.html">bombed</a> a hospital in Sadr City, inadvertently or not. This week they're <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/06/AR2008050600935_pf.html">storming</a> hospitals, beating and arresting workers. <br /><br />They must be getting nostalgic for <a href="http://www.empirenotes.org/november04.html#08nov042">Fallujah</a> or something.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-29744017650761261522008-05-06T14:32:00.000-04:002008-05-06T14:43:19.376-04:00Off the Table?Bill Berkowitz wonders, <a href="http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42257">how will immigration issues play in Election 2008?</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-9939568443671090632008-05-06T00:13:00.003-04:002008-05-06T02:58:20.560-04:00The Coming Collapse of the Middle Class<object width="425" height="355"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/akVL7QY0S8A&hl=en"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/akVL7QY0S8A&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="400" height="310"></embed></object><br /><br />A talk by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Warren">Elizabeth Warren</a>. Also see some related pieces/links:<br /><br />* <a href="http://harvardmagazine.com/2006/01/the-middle-class-on-the.html">The Middle Class on the Precipice</a> <br />* <a href="http://bostonreview.net/BR30.5/warrentyagi.html">What’s Hurting the Middle Class</a> <br />* <a href="http://www.hno.harvard.edu/gazette/2003/10.30/19-bankruptcy.html">Middle-class income doesn't buy middle-class lifestyle</a><br /><br />Some more <a href="http://www.law.harvard.edu/news/2003/09/08_warren.php">here</a>, too. If you've read her <span style="font-style:italic;"><a href="http://www.motherjones.com/news/qa/2004/11/10_400.html">Two-Income Trap</a></span>, much of this will look and sound familiar.<br /><br />(<a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/43702.html">via</a>)Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-15701231587025656162008-05-06T00:12:00.001-04:002008-05-06T02:31:09.495-04:00Post-War Suicides May Exceed Combat Deaths"<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601124&sid=a2_71Klo2vig&refer=home">It's quite possible that the suicides and psychiatric mortality of this war [GWOT] could trump the combat deaths</a>."Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-13945261364259089192008-05-06T00:11:00.001-04:002008-05-06T02:31:07.281-04:00Immigrant deaths in custodyThe WSWS's Naomi Spencer <a href="http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/may2008/mir-m06.shtml">flags</a> a disturbing <span style="font-style:italic;">NYT</span> <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/05/nyregion/05detain.html?pagewanted=all">story</a> about a rash of immigrant deaths in government detention centers.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-24768174162714063882008-05-06T00:08:00.004-04:002008-05-07T16:33:35.997-04:00Cyclone falloutFollow the fallout from the deadly cyclone in Burma/Myanmar <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/Asia-Country.aspx?Country=MM">here</a>, <a href="http://www.burmadaily.com/">here</a>, <a href="http://www.ipsnews.net/new_focus/burma/index.asp">here</a>, and <a href="http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&um=1&tab=wn&scoring=n&q=myanmar+cyclone+Nargis&btnG=Search+News">here</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-26426542636794762522008-05-05T00:36:00.002-04:002008-05-05T04:56:29.304-04:00Free-MarketeeringStephen Holmes <a href="http://www.lrb.co.uk/v30/n09/print/holm01_.html">reviews</a> <span style="font-style:italic;">The Shock Doctrine</span> in the <span style="font-style:italic;">LRB</span>. He has somewhat mixed feelings for the book, but generally comes across as more negative than positive. <br /><br />Holmes is especially critical of Klein for mistaking the forest for the trees, so to speak, and placing corporate greed at the heart of too many disparate developments. He also doesn't like the liberal deployment of the "shock" metaphor, a point noted by several previous reviewers.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3512771.post-30060210834781249102008-05-05T00:34:00.003-04:002008-05-05T05:02:36.378-04:00J Street<a href="http://www.palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=13722">No</a>, we don't need another <a href="http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42002">Israel</a> <a href="http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/2008/04/29/j_street/print.html">lobby</a>. <br /><br />If the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is ever to be "solved" in a judicious manner, it's going to come about from the effort of forces who are not aligned with Israel out of the gate. Because when it gets down to it, Israeli doves and hawks have long been in agreement about the prudence of grafting a "secure Israel" over the lives and livelihood of Palestinians. Their disputes are mostly tactical, and tangential. <br /><br />I fear that all J Street is going to give us is more clucking from Dennis Ross, et al. and hand-wringing over why Palestinians don't jump at whatever "generous offer" of a ghettoized, cantonized state is in vogue this time around. Surely, that's not going to help the situation.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0