 |
Newest Blog Entries:
Bruce McEwen: The Great Marijuana Boom
McEwen on CounterPunch via Mendecino County's Anderson Valley Advertiser ...With ever more people getting into the marijuana business, the pot market has become glutted. Prices are down. But two thousand dollars a pound still looks good to people fighting the economic downturn with outdoor agriculture. The “Green Rush” is on, and it's been building for a decade now ... Black is the color of the DEA. They wear black jump suits, drive black SUVs, and fly black helicopters. They had a whole squadron of little black choppers at the Ukiah airport a few weeks ago to train law enforcement personnel from all over in spotting and eradicating marijuana crops. The DEA also uses military choppers, and they had a big Blackhawk apparently working as flagship with the smaller choppers brought in for the training exercises. Some of the little black choppers are still around, as is a big CH 46, the one with the twin rotors and a tailgate that you can drive a Hummer into. It seems to be the mothership.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Thursday, July 29, 2010
Hedges: A Needed Antidote to the Worst of Commodity Culture
Posted by Bill Swiggard, Tuesday, July 6, 2010NYT (8): National News
AS 50,000 MARCH IN AZ, BREWER TRIES TO REIN IN AG; Ohio as gauge for midterms; Salt industry fights regs; How YouTube is planning to get you to watch more; a book on Obama's first year; a book on "national security, the media, and the rule of law"; a memoir by a Muslim woman who survived radical Islam; and a new translation of The Second Sex.Posted by Ian Alterman, Sunday, May 30, 2010
NYT Editorial & Op-Eds (7)
"Changes the Texas State Board of Education made to the state’s social studies curriculum bear no relationship to neutral pedagogy" (Editorial); "Though every religion has a sense of exclusivity as part of its core identity, there is genuine potential for mutual understanding" (Dalai Lama); "All those acronyms from Wall Street to Washington to the wetlands — and crises abound" (Dowd); "It’s shameful for Brazil and Turkey, nascent democracies, to embrace the Iranian president, who crushes democracy" (Friedman); "Elena Kagan’s law review writings betray a desire to trim back the president’s powers" (Yoo); "BP has been an environmental menace since before the recent gulf disaster. Federal regulation and oversight have been weak, and the president must take action" (Herbert); "America has never settled whether its governing form of reason is one of radical abstraction or humility and gradualism" (Brooks)Posted by Ian Alterman, Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Joe Bageant: The Fearless Plain
Bageant ...This great loom of media images, and images of images, is so many layers deep that it has replaced reality. No one can remember the original imprint. If there was one. The hologram is a hermetic snow globe, a self-referential circuitry of images, and a Möbius loop from which there is no logical escape... No thinking required, we just cycle and recycle through an aural dimension. Not all that bad, I guess, if it were not generated by forces out to fuck every last pair of eyeballs and mind plugged into it. The investing class has put thousands of billions into movies, TV and other media to keep the hologram lit up over the past six decades. Which is to say, keep the public in an entertained stupor, awed, mislead, and most importantly, distracted. But the payoff probably runs in the trillions.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Saturday, May 15, 2010
John Ross on “El Monstruo: Dread and Redemption in Mexico City”
Ross is a beat-era poet from Greenwich Village who has lived in Mexico for the past 30 years - this is a fascinating interview - mab .. Democracy NowPosted by Mike Blaxill, Thursday, April 29, 2010
Tate Modern – A symbol of Britain as it would like to be. Alain de Botton (Telegraph)
Posted by Alexander Harper, Wednesday, April 28, 2010NYT (5): International Affairs
Thai protests finally turn ugly as 18 people are killed and over 600 wounded; In totally unexpected move, Iran strongly supports Sunni involvement in Iraqi politics; Clinton calls acting leader of Kyrgysztan, partly to balance Russian influence; James Cameron "lives Avatar," leading Amazon tribe against "civilizing" influence; and a new book by Ian Buruma on "religion and democracy on three continents."Posted by Ian Alterman, Sunday, April 11, 2010
NYT Editorial & Op-Eds (6)
"Attacking lawyers who take on controversial causes makes it harder for unpopular people to get representation — and weakens all Americans’ constitutional rights" (Editorial); "The financial crisis in Ireland offers clues about our own, and about how to prevent another one" (Krugman); "As the varieties of religious experience in America multiply, will true faith suffer?" (Douthat); "There’s no case for giving a cost-of-living adjustment to Social Security recipients on either equity or stimulus grounds" (Guest Op-Ed); "Congress should scrap a plan to grant biologic drugs 12 years of protection from generic competitors" (Guest Op-Ed); "President Obama should focus high-speed rail investment on Acela" (Guest Op-Ed)Posted by Ian Alterman, Monday, March 8, 2010
NYT (3): National News
WHITHER "THE LEFT?"; A year after coal ash spill, problem may actually be getting worse; and Scientology under fire from its own adherents.Posted by Ian Alterman, Sunday, March 7, 2010
Gary Greenberg: “Manufacturing Depression – The Secret History of a Modern Disease”
Democracy NowPosted by Mike Blaxill, Tuesday, March 2, 2010
NYT Editorials & Op-Eds (9)
The Times on "carry" laws ("The actions by supporters of Open Carry, a group that flaunts the right under a California law to pack weapons in public, has pushed many businesses to ban patrons with guns. Starbucks should follow"); The Times on the amazing growth of cellphone use ("Mobile communication and access to digital information are essential and powerful development tools and aids to self-sufficiency"); Evan Bayh on why he is resigning ("Action on the deficit, economy, energy, health care and much more is imperative, yet our legislative institutions fail to act. Congress must be reformed"); Lincoln Chafee seconds Bayh's emotion ("Leaving office doesn’t always mean giving up Washington. A third party may evolve out of the G.O.P. and Democratic dysfunction"); Bob Herbert on broken schools et al ("Ignoring the sad state of our nation’s schools and infrastructure will hurt us"); Gail Collins on anger as a political tool ("Politicians often get into trouble when they’re trying to sound more furious than they feel"); Nick Kristof's MUST-READ humorous piece on "news reform" ("What if the news industry were like our unreformed health care system?"); Tom Friedman on paying for 911 calls ("President Obama’s calling is to lead nation-building. He clearly understands this but he has yet to give full voice to it"); Charles Blow on the "spirit quest" ("Young adults are looking for spirituality but not necessarily through organized religion")Posted by Ian Alterman, Sunday, February 21, 2010
NYT (4): International Affairs
Obama meets with Dalai Lama, and China expectedly protests; U.N. climate chief quits; Czech court bans far-right party; and what happened to Russian dominance of the Winter Olympics?Posted by Ian Alterman, Friday, February 19, 2010
The Winter of America’s Discontent
Posted by Michael Butler, Monday, February 8, 2010NYT Op-Eds (4)
"The way the Senate works is no longer consistent with a functioning government, and senators should change the rules to end obstructionism" (Krugman); "Linking the antiproliferation agenda to the dream of universal nuclear abolition, as President Obama seems intent on doing, is a naïve approach to a very difficult problem" (Douthat); "The 'Twilight' series’ makers owe it to the Quileute people to let them have a say in, and benefit financially from, outsiders’ use of their cultural property" (Guest Op-Ed); "Every bit of Christian teaching can be summed up in three words: God is love. That is the simple truth that teaches tolerance of same-sex unions" (Guest Op-Ed)Posted by Ian Alterman, Monday, February 8, 2010
NYT (5): International Affairs
Iraqi court overturns barring of candidates; Moussavi gets "harsh" in Iran; Blair called "liar" by former British official; Despite China's warning of "consequences," Obama will meet with Dalai Lama; And Lancet retracts controversial 1998 article linking autism to vaccines.Posted by Ian Alterman, Wednesday, February 3, 2010
JD Salinger’s Neighbors Protected Him
A fascinating article in the Rutland Herald about JD Salinger's neighbors in Cornish NH, how they fended off "the annual parade of English majors". One time during Halloween he and his wife forgot candy and gave out pencils instead - expect eBay to be flooded w claims of JD Salinger pencils in the next few weeks - mab .. read morePosted by Mike Blaxill, Saturday, January 30, 2010
Is Pot a Cancer Cure?
Bruce Mirken in TruthOut ...In his 1971 State of the Union speech, President Richard Nixon declared war on cancer ... four years later, scientists from the National Cancer Institute published a study demonstrating that a group of compounds taken from a common, widely cultivated plant shrank lung tumors that had been implanted in mice, extending their survival. In a world that made sense, this plant and the anticancer drugs it produced would have been rushed into further testing .. Instead, research proceeded at a glacial pace ... What got in the way was Nixon's other war, the "war on drugs." The plant in question was cannabis sativa -- marijuana -- public enemy number one in that other war.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Tuesday, January 26, 2010
NYT Editorial & Op-Eds (5)
"President Obama must keep his promise to get rid of the thousands of freelance gunmen still deployed in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere" (Editorial); "Despite what conservatives claim, Europe has a successful economy and a social democracy that works" (Krugman); "The supermajority’s use of the procedural filibuster is, at worst, unconstitutional and, at best, at odds with the founders’ intent" (Guest Op-Ed); "Pretrial rulings may put the opponents of same-sex marriage at a disadvantage in court" (Meese); "Did the call by a cable news analyst for Tiger Woods to convert to Christianity go too far?" (Douthat)Posted by Ian Alterman, Monday, January 11, 2010
NYT (6): National News
Obama revives C.I.A.-environmental data-sharing; Oil hits 15-month high of $81/bbl; In MA, its the environment v. freedom of religion; NJ unlikely to pass gay marriage; Chafee to run for governor of RI; and Paterson seeks "sweeping overhaul" to combat political corruption.Posted by Ian Alterman, Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Sarah van Gelder: 12 Innovations From the ‘00s That Could Save Us
Van Gelder in YES! magazine with the glass is half full side of the picture...People around the world turned away from ways of life and practices that are endangering our world and worked to make communities, work places, and technologies green and egalitarian. And peoples movements challenged the power of corporations, the military, and finance interests, insisting on putting people and the planet first. It's this combination of smart, local innovation and people power that offers hopeful possibilities for the '10s, '20s, and beyond.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Sunday, January 3, 2010
NYT (3): National News
The ultimate environmental holiday gift - carbon dioxide; A "cash for clunkers" program...for fireplaces; and the reversal of a silly holiday ruling in CA.Posted by Ian Alterman, Friday, December 25, 2009
NYT Op-Eds (2)
"The difficulty of trying to pass health care reform shows how dysfunctional the Senate, and the United States government as a whole, has become" (Krugman); "The film “Avatar” is the director’s long apologia for pantheism, Hollywood’s religion of choice for a generation now" (Douthat)Posted by Ian Alterman, Monday, December 21, 2009
NYT Op-Eds (2)
"When did we decide that letting private contractors stand in for our military in sensitive and dangerous situations was a good plan?" (Collins); "Americans continue to cobble together spiritual identities from a hodgepodge of beliefs — bending dogmas to suit them instead of bending themselves to fit a dogma" (Blow)Posted by Ian Alterman, Saturday, December 12, 2009
Imagine Peace: John Lennon Peace Crater on The Moon
John Lennon Peace Crater ...The International Lunar Geographic Society has announced that a crater on Luna, Earth’s Moon, has been renamed to honor musician and peace activist John Lennon. The crater, which is located in the Moon’s Lacus Somniorum (“Lake of Dreams”) district, has been given the honorary designation as the John Lennon Peace Crater on the occasion of the 69th anniversary of Mr. Lennon’s birth. Forty years ago, in March 1969, Mr. Lennon and his wife, the artist Yoko Ono, staged their first “Bed-In For Peace” in Amsterdam. The event was followed in June of the same year by a second “Bed-In” in Montréal, during which Mr. Lennon composed and recorded the anthem “Give Peace A Chance.”.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Saturday, December 5, 2009
