Historians marvel at the rapidity of: • Alexander the Great’s conquests • Islamic expansion • Genghis Khan’s Golden Horde • the rise of the United States as a world power • Nazi blitzkriegs But those phenomena proceeded at a snail’s pace compared to social networking in cyberspace. They were clunky and messy by comparison. And [...]
Read More...Today is Ethnic Cleansing Day in America. Or it would have been if a federal judge had not temporarily barred Arizona from enforcing parts of its Draconian immigration law. The law would turn undocumented immigrants into something like prey in Arizona, and other states plan to follow suit. If Arizona has its way it will [...]
Read More...The gaping disconnect between newspaper and television journalism is on full display in the WikiLeaks Afghanistan war controversy. Television, and cable news in particular, would have us believe that the story is about posting 90,000 documents on the Internet and not what the documents themselves say. Television would have us believe that the Pentagon’s outrage [...]
Read More...Keeping your spirits up these days may mean turning your television off. The alternative is to be water-boarded by dire warnings about disease and the consequences of taking drugs to combat them, deficits, failing banks, Wall Street casino, and every other manner of disquieting infotainment. The alternative is, in fact, to be entertained to death. [...]
Read More...(Deserted Memory, Christine and Dominique Fasse, 77 Books, UK, 2010) “The future may not be completely unknown to us.” These are the concluding words of Deserted Memory on the back cover of an extraordinary collaboration of father and daughter portraying a colonial Algeria that refuses historical segmentation. The words suggest that the bell cannot be [...]
Read More...What is the business of the United States, to assure peace, prosperity and a bright future for its people—or to make war? Are we the United States of America or War Inc.? Do we the people govern ourselves or do paid stooges govern in behalf of bankers? Since World War II we have been more [...]
Read More...When it comes to bungling, nepotism and corruption, local government is getting a free pass across the land. The mainstream press has reneged on its commitment to keep watch on town hall. It has substituted titillation for news, because flirtation is cheap and often passes for something more than it is. It is self-destructive to [...]
Read More...(Cold Spring In Winter, Valérie Rouzeau, Translated from the French by Susan Wicks, Introduced by Stephen Romer, Arc Visible Poets, UK, 2009, 129 pp) Translation is a collaboration, not a process, and for that reason the preface by Susan Wicks is in its own right a work of art, remarkable for its humility, respect for [...]
Read More...If you suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, as I do, do not on your life visit The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City this summer. The entire museum reverberates with amplified shrieks. So ear-splitting and disturbing were the screams of kids and adults that I began searching the walls for those right-angle [...]
Read More...Someone recently emailed us twenty-two images of old military posters, the kind so familiar to what has been called the greatest generation. I enjoyed scanning through them, remembering some of them from my childhood and not suspecting they would be hitched to an anonymous hate wagon at the end. Here is what I found at [...]
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