http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com Literary, cultural and political dialogue Sun, 21 Mar 2010 15:21:32 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en About those people who always seem too busy to give you the time of day, but maybe later, if you’re sympathetic with how busy and important they are: I haven’t much use for them. It’s their shtick, self-aggrandizing and defensive. I wish I could say I came by this insight on ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/21/too-busy-oh-yeah/ Weather happens. There’s not much we can do about it. But television newsrooms hype it as if it were a controversy. We can stop wars, feed the hungry, house the homeless and heal the sick, but weather is something else, so why all the fuss about the latest snowstorm or ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/19/making-money-off-the-weather/ A name plays an active lifelong role in shaping your life. And a culture’s response to a name plays a similar role. My given name is Djelloul. It’s fairly ordinary in Algeria. But here in America it’s not. Keeping this name, rather than changing it to a more American-sounding name, has ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/16/how-names-shape-us/ I like the trick can opener and kitchen knife advertisements. They come to me as comic relief from the unrelentingly sleazy health insurer, pharmaceutical, accounting and lawyer advertisements. Television advertising strikes me as a composite portrait of a corrupt society. Buy our insurance and we guarantee we’ll pull every dirty trick ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/14/advertising-as-a-sleaze-bath/ Republicans are partying heartily on the reluctance of most of us to call them racist. But their unprecedented obstruction of President Barack Obama's every initiative and their intransigence towards our most conciliatory president in recent memory makes it hard not to think that the color of his skin has something to ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/12/the-real-republican-strategy/ Israel is like a rose. The scent of democracy is sweet, the appearance reassuring, but the thorns draw blood, and it needs more TLC from us than any other nation on earth. Vice President Joseph R. Biden went to Israel to assure it of our undying friendship. He was rewarded by ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/10/israel-is-like-a-rose-it-has-thorns/ There was a time when Americans believed this advertisement. There will come a time when . . . —We will no longer believe we have the best health care system in the world. —We will accept the fact that we have the 37th ranking health care system in the world, as well ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/09/dancing-for-the-vulture-class/ (Hyacinth for the Soul, Joan I. Siegel, Deerbrook Editions, 2009, 87pp, $16.95) Many of Joan Siegel’s poems sound like the whispered confidences of angels, sound being the operative word. Most poems “read” one way or another, but only the rare poem engages eye and ear simultaneously. There is from poem to poem ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/07/the-angelic-confidences-of-joan-siegel/ Smartphones and baby strollers—weapons for mowing down the innocent and strutting one’s stuff, even when one’s stuff is the folly of having a child one has no intention of nurturing or yakking at the top of one's voice about matters of towering inconsequence. But what ill-mannered behavior may we expect of ... http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/06/the-smartphone-exhibitionists/ See me speak with writer Mimi Moriarty Hear me read and talk about poetry Enjoy original music from Far From Algiers Tune in to Paul Elisha's Bard's Eye View as he interviews me on Veterans Day for WAMC, Northeastern Public Radio http://www.djelloulmarbrook.com/2010/03/04/come-as-you-are/