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Archives
mass delusion
I've been thinking lately how the press and our fearfull leaders are living in an alternate universe divorced from all reality. So has Stirling Newberry.
Nietzschean Journalism: Judith Miller and the Shape of Evil
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We are left then, with an elite which is, bluntly, so divorced from the reality of their actions as to be suspect in all of those actions. We are left, then, with the more troubling problem that removing Judith Miller is inconsequential - swatting at one fly out of millions.
Instead, we must realize that there is a basic ethical collapse at the top of our system, that the very contempt that they hold the public in is the source of the problem. The "Consumer Society" - where the masses are herded this way and that by the elites - is at an end, simply because it can no longer make decisions, pay its bills, or tell reality from unreality.
In order to deal with threats, we must understand their proportionality. It is the requirement imposed even on ordinary citizens - to respond with force proportional to the threat.
The essence of public judgement is the ability to manage problems, and prevent them from becoming situations - gradually contaning and removing the source of the problem.
It is clear that judgment is a quality which we no longer have in our public life - where Clinton was allowed to be railroaded into an embarassing position, and then strung up by - the New York Times among others - even as Islamic radicals grew in strength. The "unlimited political war" which the Republicans were allowed to wage struck deeply at the heart of our ability to manage and govern our own affairs.
We must, then, have a basic restoration of judgement before we can procede in any other way, and the metric will be the fall from grace of those who have failed to display judgement themselves.
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books
"Notes From Underground" by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Forget Constance Garnett -- the Pevear-Volokhonsky translation makes the most cryptic of existential cult classics stranger, funnier and more alive than ever.
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I shudder to think what Auden's or Nietzsche's or my own reaction would have been had we first read "Notes From Underground" in the translation by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky in the new Everyman's Library edition. When I was growing up, the great Russian writers were only available in translation by an Englishwoman named Constance Garnett, about whom I know nothing except that she made Russians sound like Edwardian Englishmen. (I don't know any Russian, but even as a freshman in college I knew something about bad English.)
The 1970s brought Penguin Classics and Dostoevsky translations from another Englishwoman, Jessie Coulson, which were only a mild improvement, often sounding like something translated from Russian to Esperanto to English. Dostoevsky's Underground Man is one of the first characters in literature infected with the modern disease of alienation, but rendered in such stilted English prose, it's amazing that he seemed modern at all to us.
Pevear and Volokhonsky have translated seven of Dostoevsky's novels, including "The Brothers Karamazov" (for which they were awarded the PEN/Book-of-the-Month Club Translation Prize). This is the fourth version of "Notes From Underground" I have read, and for the first time I can hear what Pevear calls in his introduction its "striking language, unlike any literary prose ever written; its multiple and conflicting tonalities; the oddity of its reverse structure, which seems random but all at once reveals its deeper coherence."
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does someone feel a draft?
Voting with Their Feet
By David H. Hackworth
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Top military managers insist that our all-volunteer Army isn’t stretched too thin from this country’s heavy and hazardous commitment to hot spots like Iraq and Afghanistan and cooler places in another 131 countries around Planet Earth. They spout positive numbers like carnival hucksters, hyping enlistment and re-enlistment rates they keep insisting are at an all-time high.
“Loyalty, patriotism and seeing the results of successfully accomplishing their missions are the key factors in this success,” said Col. Elton Manske, an Army personnel chief in the Pentagon.
Except that’s exactly 180 degrees out from what hundreds of soldiers have told me during the past few weeks.
It also doesn't square with the fact that the Army is currently extending 44,000 soldiers under stop-loss provisions – which, like a form of the draft, arbitrarily keep a soldier in service beyond the agreed-upon term of enlistment.
"Stop loss is not only a breach of contract, it’s a form of slavery,” railed a Special Forces (SF) senior noncommissioned officer. “There's a tidal wave of folks getting out. ... The number of senior SF NCOs leaving is amazing. Our battalion had three of five sergeant-majors retire, and our sister battalion had two of five. The number of master sergeants was well into double digits. I predict that the exodus will devastate the senior NCO corps at a time when experience and stability are most needed.”
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Unless so-called Army short tours in the badlands of Iraq and Afghanistan become manageable based on the number of troops available – right now the Army is trying to do the work of 14 divisions with 10 under-strength, active-duty divisions – we’ll see a mass exodus from the Green Machine and the inevitable return of the draft.
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thanks to Antiwar.com
Pending Draft Legislation Targeted for Spring 2005
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There is pending legislation in the House and Senate (twin bills: S 89 and HR 163) which will time the program's initiation so the draft can begin at early as Spring 2005 -- just after the 2004 presidential election. The administration is quietly trying to get these bills passed now, while the public's attention is on the elections, so our action on this is needed immediately.
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thanks to wood s lot
engravings
Engravings by Piranesi
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Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778) was an Italian engraver. He was famous even in his own times because of his very detailed and precise engravings of Rome in the 18th century, and especially for his pictures of the ancient ruins found in the city and surroundings.
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Basilica of Saint Peter
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thanks to Cipango
The Stain is Spreading
Israel's Occupation is Undermining the Jewish State
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How many half truths, if not outright lies, is one allowed to spread in order to cover up the fact that the campaign in Rafah was first of all a campaign to instill fear and to break the spirit of the population?
Is it true that only a few houses were destroyed in Rafah, as the defense minister has said? Did they come to search for tunnels? How does an army that lies shamelessly look young soldiers and cadets in the eye in officer training courses? Who would once have believed that the Israel Defense Forces would accept the death of children with equanimity?
The stain on the army uniform is steadily spreading, as Danny Wolf has said. (Wolf is a former paratroop commander who testified to the massacre of Egyptian workers in Sinai by the IDF during the 1956 Sinai Campaign.)
It won't be cleansed easily, but the stain itself is only a manifestation. The reason lies both in the objective situation created by the occupation and in the destructive norms bequeathed to the army by the settlement enterprise. That is the root of the evil, and if it is not uprooted - this large stain will end up sinking the entire society.
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prints
Universes in collision:
Men and Women in 19th Century Japanese Prints
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thanks to Marja-Leena Rathje
a message from our elected president
Where was this Al Gore four years ago when we needed him? Better late then never. Read this.
Bush Promised Us Humility; Brought Us Humiliation
by Al Gore
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George W. Bush promised us a foreign policy with humility. Instead, he has brought us humiliation in the eyes of the world.
He promised to "restore honor and integrity to the White House." Instead, he has brought deep dishonor to our country and built a durable reputation as the most dishonest President since Richard Nixon.
Honor? He decided not to honor the Geneva Convention. Just as he would not honor the United Nations, international treaties, the opinions of our allies, the role of Congress and the courts, or what Jefferson described as "a decent respect for the opinion of mankind." He did not honor the advice, experience and judgment of our military leaders in designing his invasion of Iraq. And now he will not honor our fallen dead by attending any funerals or even by permitting photos of their flag-draped coffins.
How did we get from September 12th , 2001, when a leading French newspaper ran a giant headline with the words "We Are All Americans Now" and when we had the good will and empathy of all the world -- to the horror that we all felt in witnessing the pictures of torture in Abu Ghraib.
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[Update: 10:30AM]
Here is a link to an archived broadcast of Al's speech. Listen. Al is on fire!
Al Gore's Speech on Iraq
thanks to American Samizdat
photography
Walter Martin and Paloma Muñoz
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thanks to Expose
new york
Won't you please come to New York?
Peace activists plan to assemble a million anti-Bush protesters in New York this summer on the Sunday before the Republican National Convention -- and the city plans to stop them
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Granted, we can all be thankful if Crosby, Stills, et al. choose not to rework their 1968 Chicago protest anthem this year. But the massive protest being planned for this summer's Republican National Convention is already shaping up as even larger -- and potentially more contentious -- than that watershed event.
The largest of the over 20 protest permit requests this far has come from United for Peace and Justice, the umbrella group which helped sponsor many of the largest Washington and New York anti-war protests of the past two years. Officially, UPJ organizers say they expect 250,000 people; unofficially, the group is hoping for over a million. Given the timing, location, and the fervor of many of the country's Bush-haters, they might just get it.
What they won't get is any help from the city. Republican mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration has refused UPJ's application for a permit to assemble in Central Park, saying that 250,000 people would damage the grass. This is the same park, mind you, that held over two million for an anti-nuclear concert and rally in 1982. But not to worry: none of the other 20 groups has gotten a permit yet, either.
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gasoline
outofgas.com
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Click Here to view our television ad running in New York City, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C.
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prisons r us
Report: 1 of every 75 U.S. men in prison
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America's prison population grew by 2.9 percent last year, to almost 2.1 million inmates, with one of every 75 men living in prison or jail.
The inmate population continued its rise despite a fall in the crime rate and many states' efforts to reduce some sentences, especially for low-level drug offenders.
The report issued Thursday by the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics attributes much of the increase to get-tough policies enacted during the 1980s and '90s, such as mandatory drug sentences, "three-strikes-and-you're-out" laws for repeat offenders, and "truth-in-sentencing laws" that restrict early releases.
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made safe for work
Work-Safe Art 5
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If you've ever walked into a musuem with your child, you were certainly shocked at the flagrant nudity being touted around for pure shock value. Whatever happened to morals? Whatever happened to kissship? How can you appreciate art when it's so...nude? In this contest your task is to make nude art work-safe in creative ways. Remember, cleanlines is next to godliness.
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thanks to Coudal Partners
jobs
Worst Dem better than best Gooper
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postcard art
Art of the Japanese Postcard:
The Leonard A. Lauder Collection at the MFA, Boston
A new graphic art for a new century
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During the first decades of the twentieth century, the new medium of the postcard quickly replaced the traditional woodblock print as the favored tableau for contemporary Japanese images. Hundreds of millions of postcards were produced to meet the demands of a public eager to acquire pictures of their rapidly modernizing nation. Many of the first cards were distributed by the government in connection with the Russo-Japanese War (1904–5), to promote the war effort. Almost immediately, however, many of Japan’s leading artists—attracted by the informality and intimacy of the postcard medium—began to create stunning designs. For these painters and graphic designers postcards also provided exciting opportunities to experiment with the latest European styles, such as Art Nouveau and Art Deco.
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thanks to reenhead
iraq — heart of darkness
Our Darkest Days Are Here
by Andy Rooney
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In the history of the world, several great civilizations that seemed immortal have deteriorated and died. I don't want to seem dramatic tonight, but I've lived a long while, and for the first time in my life, I have this faint, faraway fear that it could happen to us here in America as it happened to the Greek and Roman civilizations.
Too many Americans don't understand what we have here, or how to keep it. I worry for my grandchildren, my great-grandchildren. I want them to have what I've had, and I sense it slipping away.
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Report: US Needed 500,000 Troops to Pacify Iraq
The New Draft U.N. Resolution Allows for Perpetual Occupation
Fox to Guard Henhouse - Subject to Periodic Review by Fox
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The new U.S.-British drafted Security Council resolution is a scam. Under cover of a “transfer of sovereignty,” it seeks to have the United Nations give the United States legal authority to continue the occupation indefinitely
You wouldn’t know that listening to Bush or from following most media but it’s there in black and white in the text of the draft resolution.
The draft calls for a “review” of the status of the occupation troops at the end of 12 months, or at any time at the request of the “Transitional Government of Iraq”, by the U.N. Security Council. However, this review is meaningless since, of course, the United States has a veto over the U.N. Security Council.
In other words, the reviewer is the reviewee.
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'Its best use is as a doorstop'
Brian Whitaker explains why a book packed with sweeping generalisations about Arabs carries so much weight with both neocons and military in the US
'Spray and slay': are American troops out of control in Iraq?
From A Soldier
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I am more than happy to share with whoever will listen. Especially if it helps my friends and I see freedom again. There really isn't much morale to go around. Most soldiers have accepted their year commitment and some soldiers have already assumed they won't live through it. My Scout friends roll out the gate more then any other section in our battalion.
They have seen the worst that Iraq can offer and we've only been here for three months. The papers that I see always show the death reports, but what about the casualties. More then three times the number of wounded to killed.
What about the kids that can't walk again? What about the ones that will never see? Most lose their hearing. The gunners of the humvees sit with their head exposed to man the crew serve weapon. When a roadside explosion goes off, and if they aren't killed, the blast ruptures their eardrums. Imagine never hearing another Souls song again or hearing the voice of your children.
I can see myself in a few years sitting in a lawn chair outside the recruiter station with a case of beer explaining to every kid that goes inside why I have a stump for an arm. I guess the sick thing is not the fear of death or maiming. It is the fact that most of us don't believe in this shit. We are all just a bunch of suckers that signed up for stupid reasons. It is like when a person goes to prison and his fellow inmate asks what he's in for.
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república federativa do brasil
I first discovered Brazil in the 60s with the movie Black Orpheus (you must see it.) And the music. The incredible music. In the 70s I had a friend from Sao Paolo and he turned me on to more Brazilian music. Miles Davis had a Brazilian percussionist — Airto, who, with his wife, Flora Purim, moved into the sophisticated US Jazz world but kept a foot in the primative world of his father, a healer. The contradictions of Brazil, where poverty reigns and the Minister of Culture is Gilberto Gil, one of the most sublime musicians in this world. (And we have Lynne Cheney.) This site takes you to Brazil with pictures, words, and music. Enjoy. A little something for the soul.
Canto do Brazil
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a special thanks to J-Walk Blog for this one. I needed it.
torture, inc.
An Abut Ghraib Photo We Didn't See on the Front Page of the NYTs
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Israeli Agents Believed Involved in Abu Ghraib
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Diplomatic sources in Washington tell NewsMax's U.N. correspondent Stew Stogel that Israeli nationals are believed to be involved in the Iraq prison controversy.
"Israelis have been to Abu Ghraib and other prisons [in Iraq]," says one source familiar with the U.S. operations.
It was explained that the Israelis involved have been assigned as "civilian contractors" to work with Coalition forces in interrogating Iraqi POWs.
The "contractors" are said to be veterans of Israel's domestic intelligence unit, Shin Bet, as well as the more famous international intelligence agency, the Mossad.
"Who has better experience in dealing with the Arabs than Israel?" one source asked.
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thanks to Antiwar.com
Abuse of Women Detainees
by Juan Cole
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Iraqi women were also abused at Abu Ghuraib, according to the Taguba report and reports of photographs seen by the US Congress. As this Islamist PakNews story notes, most of the reporting on torture and abuse of detainees at Abu Ghuraib has focused on men. It is clear, however, that Iraqi women were also made to strip naked, were photographed in that compromising position, and it is alleged that some were raped by US military personnel. Although, of course, the soldiers who behaved this way and the officers who authorized or allowed it were not "crusaders," as the article alleges, the abuse of women was designed to take advantage of Muslim and Arab ideas concerning female honor.
A scandal that has not yet broken in the press is the story of how many women ended up in US prisons. The fact is, few were suspected of having themselves committed a crime or an act of insurgency. Rather, they were taken as hostages or potential informants because their husbands or sons were wanted by the US military. This kind of arrest, however, is a form of collective punishment and not permitted under the Fouth Geneva Convention governing military occupations of civilian populations. The sexual abuse of these women is therefore a double crime.
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duck art
Die Duckomenta
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thanks to J-Walk Blog
oil
The View from Hubbert's Peak
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M. King Hubbert was a celebrated oil geologist who in 1956 correctly prophesized that U.S. petroleum production would peak in the early 1970s, then irreversibly decline. In 1974 he likewise predicted that world oil fields would achieve their maximum output in 2000; a figure later revised by his acolytes to somewhere between 2006 and 2010.
If the curve of global oil production is indeed near the point of descent, as these experts believe, it has epochal implications for the world economy. More expensive oil will undercut China's energy-intensive boom, return OECD countries to the bad old days of stagflation, and accelerate the environmentally destructive exploitation of low-grade oil tars and shales.
Most of all, it will devastate the economies of oil-importing third-world countries. Poor farmers will be unable to purchase petroleum-based artificial fertilizers just as poor urban-dwellers will be unable to afford bus fares. (Already, rising oil prices have brought chronic blackouts to cities throughout the globe's southern hemisphere.)
The only certain beneficiaries of this coming economic chaos will be the big five oil corporations and their corrupt partners: the Nigerian generals, Saudi princes, Russian kleptocrats, and their ilk. Crude oil truly will become black gold.
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painting
Gustav Klimt (Austrian, 1862-1918)
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thanks to plep
elect bush and end social services. that would be social services for the poor, not the rich.
2006 Cuts In Domestic Spending On Table
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The White House put government agencies on notice this month that if President Bush is reelected, his budget for 2006 may include spending cuts for virtually all agencies in charge of domestic programs, including education, homeland security and others that the president backed in this campaign year.
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los angeles
An incredible collection of early pictures of LA...
A Visit to Old Los Angeles and Environs
Coming into Long Beach, Arthur avoided the middle of town, and brought us in via the rather swampy western approaches. The ocean opened out before us; and just as downtown Long Beach came into sight, Papa cried, "And that, I believe, is our hotel—the Hotel Virginia," as Arthur pulled into a driveway.
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thanks to Coudal Partners
oregon 1 ashcroft 0
Ruling Upholds Oregon Law Authorizing Assisted Suicide
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A federal appeals court yesterday upheld the only law in the nation authorizing doctors to help their terminally ill patients commit suicide. The decision, by a divided three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, said the Justice Department did not have the power to punish the doctors involved.
The majority used unusually pointed language to rebuke Attorney General John Ashcroft, saying he had overstepped his authority in trying to block enforcement of the state law, Oregon's Death With Dignity Act.
"The attorney general's unilateral attempt to regulate general medical practices historically entrusted to state lawmakers," Judge Richard C. Tallman wrote for the majority, "interferes with the democratic debate about physician-assisted suicide and far exceeds the scope of his authority under federal law."
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movie poster art
Noir Cinema
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thanks to Life In The Present
iraq
Stirling Newberry says what needs to be said.
Justice Must Be Seen To Be Done
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Every so often a speech that marks an executive eager, even craving, to hide policy catastrophe behind fig leaf of verbiage is made. Often, it contains a remark that becomes emblematic. For Jimmy Carter, it was the word "malaise" - because he could not use the power of the Presidency well enough to solve the problem.
That speech did not happen tonight, but, instead, the opposite happened, Bush became a laughing stock, as will anyone who bothers to defend the tissue of lies and deceptions which he continues to repeat. He has no other.
At this point, considerations for the campaigns I am working, or my own personal standing must be set aside. It is time for someone, someone with something to lose, come forward and state the obvious: we have, installed in our oval office, a man who is so unfit for the duties - by reason of a pathological dishonesty and complete disregard for the welfare of the citizens of this country - as to demand that we remove him, and his party, from power - and then use every law and organ of government to investigate the nakedly criminal underpinnings of that party. And exact precisely the punishments that they have so gleefully inflicted upon others.
There is no other alternative - any individual who can, backed by media and political system - state that Iraq is part of the war on Terror - is beyond hope. Any journalist, politician, general, writer, political operative or other so called public intellectual who can cling to such a statement is, equally, beneath contempt.
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Read it, it's a long rant. There are several other pieces that I could have posted and still may. Any of them would put you in a bad mood. Our leadership is stark raving insane. But that's not why I am in a bad mood tonight.
I posted some pictures of my new grandson the other day. One of my favorites was of the proud new dad. His name is William and my daughter couldn't have picked a finer young man.
William is in the Army and is stationed in South Korea. He came home on leave to be at the birth of his son. He went back to Korea today and found out he will be going to Iraq. This is just so fucking wrong!
I need a little help from my friends
I've been busy scanning negatives from my trip to DC and NYC. Unfortunately, my scanner software seems to have been corrupted and I can't get it to work again. I've deleted, defragged, and reinstalled to no avail. I've been using SilverFast 5 SE, which came with my Epson 2450. I downloaded the demo to SilverFast 6 Ai, which is the current professional version. It works. Not only does it work, but it works so well I now need to rescan everything. It's the Photoshop of scanner software and the controls it has let me get detail out highlights and shadows that make my scanner into a brand new machine. I was up until 5 in the morning, yesterday, scanning negatives I've already scanned and the images I got were so much better. So incredibly much better.
However, with the move and everything else, I could use some help. It's $119 for the software. Below is a PayPal Donate button for donation's to the New Scanner Software for Gordy Fund. If 12 of my readers donated $10, that would give me $120, which would let me get the software with a dollar left over for a party. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.
New Scanner Software for Gordy Fund
Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus
I recently linked to Rick Perlstein's story of rapture Christian's influence on US Israeli policy: The Jesus Landing Pad in the Village Voice. (It's at the bottom of the post.) If you haven't read it, you might check it out. I received a note from Rick...
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My book on the rise of the conservative movement, BEFORE THE STORM: BARRY GOLWATER AND THE UNMAKING OF THE AMERICAN CONSENSUS, has been very well received.
The reviewer in The Nation wrote: "I've read Before the Storm twice and intend to go on reading it, as my opiate, as long as Bush is in the White House.... Before the Storm is the story of such a fascinating era and Perlstein is such a great storyteller--one of the most enjoyable historians I've read--that I guarantee for a while you will simply forget the dreariness of today's politics."
In the Village Voice: ". Daring, virtuosic writing, and encyclopedic mastery make the book's title and its Goldwater focus inadequate to all Perlstein accomplishes. This is an exciting volume, an outstanding debut. It goes beyond conservatism. It ups the ante on what popular
history can, and should, do."
OK. Enough. I'm blushing. If you liked "The Jesus Landing Pad: Bush White House checked with rapture Christians before latest Israel move," you'll, um, love BEFORE THE STORM.
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I remember watching reporter John Chancellor being being physically ejected from the 1964 Goldwater Republican convention. Only a taste of how conservative Republicans deal with those saying what they don't want to hear. This book covers the beginnings of where we are now. It's now in my wish list. Again, the link to the book: BEFORE THE STORM: BARRY GOLWATER AND THE UNMAKING OF THE AMERICAN CONSENSUS.
RAFAH TODAY
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8.30 p.m.: She went to buy some sweets from the grocer's. Her mother just gave her pocket money - a half shekel - (10% of 1 dollar) to buy some sweets from the neighboring grocer in Al Brazil Camp. She didn’t know that going to the grocer's would cost her her life. But that was what had happened to 3 year old Rawan Abu Zaed. Two bullets:one in her neck and the other right through her head.
I interviewed a man standing close to me. He seemed in great pain ss he said: "I saw her get shot with my own two eyes. Yes I saw that innocent child wearing a blue blouse and trouser and no shoes. My legs could not carry me towards her because of the blood which was pouring out like a fountain."
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By telephone 3 p.m. Rafah time: The journalists are surrounded near the Taha Hussein school. The IOF is refusing to let them move and they are all surrounded. Internationals, Israeli, local. All journalists.
The Red Cross today is calling on the world to expose the crimes of the occupation. They were outraged at the murder of people inside their homes. They are not even asking people to come out of their homes before they demolish them.
There is sniper shooting all the time besides the shelling. Anything moving is shot. The worst shooting is at night in particular. Any light in any window is a target for sniper shooting, so we all leave our lights turned off - of course whenever we do have electricity. They just shoot randomly and in all directions, and it does not matter who gets shot.
The situation is far worse than anyone can imagine. Food and water supplies are scarce, and so are medical supplies.
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News flash: Israeli newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth online wrote that Israeli Justice Yousef Lapid said: "The picture of an elderly Palestinian woman in Rafah searching on all fours for her medication after her house was demolished reminded him of his grandmother." Justice Minister Yosef Lapid on Sunday harshly criticized Israel's demolition of Palestinian homes in the Gaza Strip, saying it must end and warned that it could seriously damage Israel's standing in the world.
Specifying the potential damage in the international community, Lapid said: "Israel must halt the destruction, and the demolition of houses in Rafah must stop. It is not humane, not Jewish, and causes us grave damage in the world. At the end of the day, they'll kick us out of the United Nations, try those responsible in the international court in The Hague, and no one will want to speak with us."
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Home demolitions in Rafah
The Rape of Rafah
All This...for What?
by Uri Avnery
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The immense might of the Israeli army, assembled from all over the country, has attacked a small Palestinian township on the margin of the destitute Gaza Strip. Palestinians, both fighters and civilians, are being killed by the dozen, homes are being destroyed wholesale, the sight of the fleeing population bring back memories of 1948.
All this--for what?
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Residents seethe as dead go unburied
by Amira Hass
They must pay the price
by Gideon Levy
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On a day when bodies of children were being stuffed into a big refrigerator used to store potatoes, and when thousands of homeless people were fleeing for their lives (some of them refugees rendered homeless for the second or third time), life in Israel went on as usual, as though what was happening in Rafah was not being done in the name of the country's citizens. Such apathy renders all of us responsible - and yet there are some who bear a heavier burden of responsibility. In a climate less lax than the one which has gripped Israel in recent years, they would be ostracized.
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We're in bad hands
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It is incredible how the commanders of such an experienced army have walked straight into their own booby trap. Many humble non-combatants have discreetly asked themselves this week what the point is of the operation in Rafah. How could it possibly succeed? How could something not go wrong?
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collage
A Technical Investigation of Joan Miró's Collages of the 1920s
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Miró experimented with a wide variety of media and methods in the course of his artistic career - and his extraordinary sensitivity to surface and media is revealed to an unprecedented degree in his collages of the 1920s. The deliberate and informed choices of materials and characteristics of the papers utilized, with particular emphasis on tar paper, abrasive papers, and flocked papers which are commonly found in Miró's collages of 1928 and 1929, are a main focus of this study. The collages of the 1920s had never before been studied as a group. This presented an ideal opportunity for collaboration between the disciplines of art history and conservation.
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Spanish Dancer (with Doll's Shoe)
Paris, mid-February - spring 1928.
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Joan Miro's Drawing-Collage, August 8, 1933: the "intellectual obscenities" of postcards
the iraqi intifada — vietnam, lebanon, and the west bank on internet time
BUCK DODGERS OF THE 21ST CENTURY:
by Hesiod
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Okay. I've had it. Let's get something straight, shall we? The screw ups, miscalculations, lying, corruption. illegalities and all around bad decisions made by the Bush administration, particularly in foreign policy, are all President George W. Bush's fault
Not his underlings. Not Condi Rice. Not Douglas Feith. Not Paul Wolfowitz. Not even Donald Rumsfeld or Dick Cheney.
They are HIS fault, and HIS fault alone.
Not because "the buck stops" with the President. That's the "he's ultimately responsible," line of argument, which in the end is an inherent dodge of responsibility.
Why? Because the President can take faux responsibility for the screw ups of his underlings, but still dodge true responsibility.
No...the major bad decisions of the administration may have been authored by others, pushed by others, lied about by others or incompetently managed by others, but George W. Bush (make no mistake) authorized, approved and may have even instigated most if not ALL of them
Look, at some point, the President of the United States has to make the ultimate decision to go to war. Not even the Vice President can do that for him. It's not a delegable duty. Even if Dick Cheney told our military commanders (we're going to war) they wouldn't have done jack shit without a Presidential go code.
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Apocalyspe Iraq
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It's late, but I can't sleep. It's a little warm in here, and Apocalyspe Now Redux is on IFC. This mean its unedited and letterboxed. The resolution isn't as good as my monitor, but it's one of the things I have to buy on DVD.
I've seen parts of the redited movie for months, but not in one shot. I've seen the original 10 times, five in theaters. The reason this comes to mind is Iraq. Things are far worse than i predicted. I haven't been following each turn in the erupting scandal because I still have to make sense of it. Something, wrong, horribly and awfully wrong is happening there and I don't mean in the platitude "war is evil" way.
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I couldn't agree more. As bad as I thought it could get, this is much worse. I guess I expected the Army to have some honor. What a mistake.
Zinni on What Went Wrong
Juan Cole
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In the wake of Gen. Anthony Zinni's 60 Minutes appearance, it is worth looking in detail at his recent essay on what went wrong.
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Zinni doesn't mince words. Read it and weap. Read all the other posts by Juan Cole if you want to have a clue as to what is happening in Iraq.
Iraq Setbacks Change Mood in Washington
Lawmakers in both parties as well as some military leaders fear the occupation is heading for failure. Bush stands firm, but U.S. goals may be scaled back.
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A series of Senate hearings last week showcased the growing fears of many foreign policy experts — a mood some described as "panic."
"I believe we are absolutely on the brink of failure," retired Marine Gen. Joseph P. Hoar, a former commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. "We are looking into the abyss. We cannot start soon enough to begin the turnaround."
"If the current situation persists, we will continue fighting one form of Iraqi insurgency after another — with too little legitimacy, too little will and too few resources," warned Larry Diamond, a former advisor to the U.S. occupation authority in Baghdad. "There is only one word for a situation in which you cannot win and you cannot withdraw: Quagmire."
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Did Somebody Say War?
by Bob Herbert
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As for the Iraqis, they've been had. We're not going to foot the bill in any real sense for the reconstruction of Iraq, any more than we've been willing to foot the bill for a reconstruction of the public school system here at home. There's a reason why Ahmad Chalabi and the Bush crowd were so simpatico for so long. They all considered themselves masters of the con. They all thought that they could fool all of the people all of the time.
There's a terrible sense of dread filtering across America at the moment and it's not simply because of the continuing fear of terrorism and the fact that the nation is at war. It's more frightening than that. It grows out of the suspicion that we all may be passengers in a vehicle that has made a radically wrong turn and is barreling along a dark road, with its headlights off and with someone behind the wheel who may not know how to drive.
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homer
l'Marquis has a great post of how maybe, just maybe, you might forget the movie and just go read the read the book. He suggests these translations of Homer by Stanley Lombardo. I agree wholeheartedly. They are now in my wishlist. Scroll down to s'always something... 5.21 for the worthy comments of L'Marquis.
Michael Leddy interviews
Stanley Lombardo
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Leddy: Your Iliad and Odyssey have met with great praise from classicists. But they’re also ‘controversial’ — a characterization that seems to come only from Greekless readers. What expectations are such readers bringing to Homer?
Lombardo: That because it’s a classical work, it should sound like Elizabethan English, or at least have some element of archaic diction — I think those are the expectations. I suspect that these expectations come, ultimately, from the King James Version of the Bible, and from Shakespeare. If Milton were read more, I would blame Milton.
I don’t know of any classicist who has said anything negative about my translations. I’m sure there are some who don’t like them, but they’ve never said anything in public [laughs]. I think you’re right, that it’s Greekless readers who see them as controversial. Their only basis for comparison is other translations, which except for Fitzgerald and maybe T.E. Shaw, do have some of that archaic quality. So they think that must be the way Homer is. But for Homer’s audience, there’s no doubt that the poetry was an immediate, direct, vital experience, or it wouldn’t have survived, much less had the reputation that it had.
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Translations from the Greek
Stanley Lombardo
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Iliad 19.379–end
Snow flurries can come so thick and fast
From the cold northern sky, that the wind
That bears them becomes an icy, blinding glare.
So too the gleaming, polished weaponry—
The helmets, shields, spears, and plated corselets—
All the bronze paraphernalia of war
That issued from the ships. The rising glare
Reflected off the coppery sky, and the land beneath
Laughed under the arcing metallic glow.
A deep bass thrumming rose from the marching feet.
And, like a bronze bolt in the center, Achilles,
Who now began to arm.
His eyes glowed
Like open furnace doors, and he grit his teeth
Against the grief that had sunk into his bones,
And every motion he made in putting on the armor
Forged for him in heaven was an act of passion
Directed against the Trojans: clasping on his shins
The greaves trimmed in silver at the ankles,
Strapping the corselet onto his chest, slinging
The silver-studded bronze sword around a shoulder,
And then lifting the massive, heavy shield
That spilled light around it as if it were the moon.
Or a fire that has flared up in a lonely settlement
High in the hills of an island, reflecting light
On the faces of men who have put out to sea
And must watch helplessly as rising winds
Bear them away from their dear ones.
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torture, inc.
Body and Soul is back. This is a long post that is a must read. She covers a lot of ground and ends with...
And in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink
A scattered and contradictory post on responsibility and Abu Ghraib
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Why do we want to absolve people implementing immoral policies? One of the reasons, I think, is relatively honest. It goes back to what I was saying about the video of the killings in Iraq. Just speaking for myself, I can't imagine what those soldiers are going through. Even if the people they killed were innocent and unthreatening, I'd be loathe to second guess what they did because I don't honestly know what I'd do in the same situation.
Another honest reason is that even when we recognize that people have done horrible things, some innate need for justice rebels against the least culpable, the ones who are in the weakest position, receiving the greatest blame, the most punishment.
But Toufe also suggests a less noble motive for our hesitation to grant individual soldiers responsibility for their actions:
Perhaps we shy away from this deeper recognition of individual moral agency because it has such far reaching consequences. When we deny another's moral agency, we help to create the conditions for denying our own. If we start talking about individual responsibility when it comes to soldiers, how long is it before we discover our own individual responsibility when it comes to war, colonialism, disproportionate consumption, racism, ecological damage, global poverty and hunger, millions of dead children who lacked simple drugs.
In absolving them, we absolve ourselves. Unfortunately, self-absolution isn't worth much.
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Torture and Truth
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Last November in Iraq, I traveled to Fallujah during the early days of what would become known as the "Ramadan Offensive"—when suicide bombers in the space of less than an hour destroyed the Red Cross headquarters and four police stations, and daily attacks by insurgents against US troops doubled, and the American adventure in Iraq entered a bleak tunnel from which it has yet to emerge. I inquired of a young man there why the people of that city were attacking Americans more frequently each day. How many of the attacks, I wanted to know, were carried out by foreign fighters? How many by local Islamists? And how many by what US officers called "FRL's"— former regime loyalists?
The young man—I'll call him Salih —listened, answered patiently in his limited but eloquent English, but soon became impatient with what he plainly saw as my American obsession with categories and particulars. Finally he interrupted my litany of questions, pushed his face close to mine, and spoke to me slowly and emphatically:
For Fallujans it is a shame to have foreigners break down their doors. It is a shame for them to have foreigners stop and search their women. It is a shame for the foreigners to put a bag over their heads, to make a man lie on the ground with your shoe on his neck. This is a great shame, you understand? This is a great shame for the whole tribe.
It is the duty of that man, and of that tribe, to get revenge on this soldier—to kill that man. Their duty is to attack them, to wash the shame. The shame is a stain, a dirty thing; they have to wash it. No sleep—we cannot sleep until we have revenge. They have to kill soldiers.
He leaned back and looked at me, then tried one more time. "The Americans," he said, "provoke the people. They don't respect the people."
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'I will always hate you people'
Family's fury at mystery death
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The Red Cross visited him on January 19. On February 17, the organisation informed the family that he was dead. "I went to the morgue in the hospital and found him in a black US body bag," Ashraf said yesterday. "There was a cut on his head behind his right ear. It was hard to miss."
It was discovered that US doctors had made a 20cm incision in his skull, apparently in an attempt to save his life after the initial blow.
The family presented its autopsy findings to an Iraqi judge. "He told us, 'You can't do anything to the coalition. What happened is history,'" Ashraf said.
Yesterday, as darkness fell around the scientist's home, the family showed some of their father's belongings returned from the jail - a few Red Cross letters, a bag of clothes and a framed photo.
But there also was the legacy of emotion - of a kind now common across Iraq, and swelling into a storm. "I won't allow myself to rest until I have got revenge for him," Rana said.
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A Corrupted Culture thanks to BuzzFlash
US general linked to Abu Ghraib abuse
Leaked memo reveals control of prison passed to military intelligence to 'manipulate detainees'
goya
I love Goya. I thought I was familiar with most of his work, but these are new to me. Amazing.
Goya's Caprichos
Blow
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thanks to wood s lot
Goya: los caprichos
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The powerful originality and creative vision of the Spanish master, Francisco Goya, have fascinated and enthralled viewers for the past 200 years. In the late-eighteenth century, the artist first attracted Spanish royal attention with a set of decorative tapestry designs; subsequently he was appointed court painter in 1786 and First Court Painter in 1799. While executing public paintings and imperial portraits in his official capacity, Goya channeled his private expressions of distaste for human vices and folly into the graphic series, Los Caprichos. A master of etching and aquatint, Goya used this democratic art form to indict, among other things, the vanity and vacuity of the nobility, the gluttony of monks, the venality of judges, the stupidity of blind faith, the lust and lechery of gender relations, and the prevalence of superstition. After only two weeks of advertising in 1799, the eighty prints were suddenly withdrawn from publication, perhaps because they were found objectionable by the Inquisition. In an effort to preserve his work, four years later the artist offered Los Caprichos to King Charles IV of Spain, who accepted the present of both the unsold copies and the plates. Due to this fortunate turn of events, Goya's caricatural renderings of human blunders, prejudices, and conceits eventually became available to a wide audience.
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O what tangled webs we weave, when first we practice to deceive!
How bad can Iraq get? Well, they neocons got conned. The thought the were fighting a war for Israel's interests. It now turns out that their man with all the information on Saddam was an Iranian agent — Chalabi. Does the term dumb-fucks spring to mind? The three stooges do Iraq. It would be funny if so many people weren't dying. These people need to go to jail for a long time. This is treason.
Bay of Goats
Maureen Dowd
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So let me get this straight:
We ransacked the house of the con man whom we paid millions to feed us fake intelligence on W.M.D. that would make the case for ransacking the country that the con man assured us would be a cinch to take over because he wanted to run it.
And now we're shocked, shocked and awed to discover that a crook is a crook and we have nobody to turn over Iraq to, and the Jordanian embezzler-turned-American puppet-turned-accused Iranian spy is trying to foment even more anger against us and the U.N. officials we've crawled back to for help, anger that may lead to civil war.
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America's 'Best Friend' A Spy?
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Senior U.S. officials have told 60 Minutes Correspondent Lesley Stahl that they have evidence Iraqi politician Ahmad Chalabi has been passing highly-classified U.S. intelligence to Iran.
The evidence shows that Chalabi - who was once seen as the man likely to lead Iraq by White House and Pentagon officials - personally gave Iranian intelligence officers information so sensitive that if revealed it could, quote, "get Americans killed." The evidence is said to be "rock solid."
Sources have told Stahl a high-level investigation is under way into who in the U.S. government gave Chalabi such sensitive information in the first place.
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thanks to The Agonist
While Talking Points Memo and Political Animal are great sources for keeping up on this, a new one to me is all over it: War and Piece. Excellent.
photography
ROADSIDE GHOSTS
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thanks to Conscientious
the temperature at which freedom burns
'Fahrenheit 9/11' Wins Top Prize at Cannes
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At the awards ceremony that wrapped up the 57th Cannes Film Festival on Saturday night, the jury gave "Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore's stinging critique of the Bush administration's foreign policies, the Palme d'Or, the festival's top prize and one of the most coveted honors in international cinema.
The announcement, made by jury president Quentin Tarantino, met with enthusiastic cheers from the audience in the Grand Théâtre Lumière, where Mr. Moore's film had received what many thought was the longest standing ovation ever at Cannes when it was screened here last Monday. "What have you done?" Mr. Moore asked Mr. Tarantino as he accepted the prize, looking both overwhelmed and amused. "You just did this to mess with me, didn't you?"
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Michael à Go-Go
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Rest easy, folks. Moore's film will be coming soon to a theater near you. The buzz is that U.S. distribution deals are about to be signed, with Harvey Weinstein holding out only for a guaranteed opening on (gulp) the Fourth of July
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can technology
"THE ARMY'S GREATEST INVENTION"
P-38 CAN OPENER
IT'S ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY
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During WWII when hungry GI's were ready to dive into that delicious meal of C-Rations, they used their trusty P-38s to open the cans. No it wasn't a WWII fighter plane or a pistol, it was an amazingly simple 1-1/2 inch stamped metal gadget that was developed by the Subsistence Research Laboratory located in Chicago during the Summer of 1942 and unbelievably in just 30 days.
It's official designation is 'US ARMY POCKET CAN OPENER' or 'CAN OPENER, KEY TYPE', but is know more commonly but it nickname P-38. It supposedly acquired it's nickname from the 38 punctures required to open a C-Ration can. By many it's also known as a "John Wayne" because the story goes is that he demonstrated using them in a WWII training film, so when soldiers would ask for one if they forgotten the name they would just ask for a "John Wayne". Originally they came in individual paper packets with the directions how to use printed on it, about a dozen came packed with a case of C-Rations. Unopened Vietnam era vintage P-38s still in their original paper wrapper are hard to find so if you find one resist the temptation to open it. These handy little gadgets have adorned dog tag chains and key rings ever since
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thanks to J-Walk Blog
I remember my dad, a WWII vet, had one of these on his keychain. The really work! I need to get some.
moving day
Well, not quite yet. It was beautiful on Honeymoon Lake, this evening. The sun had just gone down over the hill on the opposite site of the lake and the swallows were swirling around enjoying there evening repast of insects. I'm going to miss it. My house is a rental and it has been sold and I need to move by June 15. I won't be moving far. I will be moving 15 houses up to road to Zoe's — my fiancée. Merging two houses worth of valuable artifacts into one will be interesting. I will still be able to see the lake but we won't be on it. However, it is a community lake so we will still have rowing privileges. Last night I moved the first batch of stuff to storage in Zoe's mom's garage. Let the move begin.
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