Candide's Notebooks

Where You Ought To Be

2008-07-11T20:02:00.002+01:00

If you've landed here, you're two years to late. This is where you want to be:

http://pierretristam.com

Lost Causes

2007-02-13T13:26:00.000Z

Good Morning. A couple of new items today.

There is, after all, another war going on, the original war, the one “on terror,” the one that was supposed to end terrorism and states that support it. That Afghanistan is getting little attention anymore is the fruit of two poisoned trees: the situation there is intractable. And it is not about to be resolved, neither by a splurge of surges nor by imports of cash, no matter the tonnage. Canadians are catching on. NATO isn't. See "Remember Afghanistan?"

And it's not as if Iraq has it better. It wasn’t 48 hours ago that the Bush junta was chatting up its lockdown of Baghdad as a result of the ongoing “surge” of Iraqi and American forces through the capital. It was the latest of dozens of so-called lockdowns over the years. None of which have done more than fuel the insurgency. See "Now what?"

"From the Diary of an Iraqi Librarian."

Much more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading Candide's Notebooks. Spread the word.pt

Severed Heads and Sensibility

2007-02-12T03:56:00.000Z

Good morning. Too many new items to count...

In Book Eight of Marcus Aurelius’s “Meditations,” we come across this line: “Have you ever seen a hand or a foot cut off, or a head sliced off, lying anywhere apart from the rest of the body?” The question has more relevance today than we're willing to admit. So does Aurelius's answer. Pierre's essay explores both. See "Severed Heads and Sensibility."

Target Iran: The Bush junta is going after Iran with the same guile and mix of propaganda and fabulism as it did going after Iraq. Yet again, the media are swallowing the farce whole. See "Iranian Gulf of Tonkin"

On the US-Mexico border, there are vigilantes, and there are murderers. And there are both. See "Vigilantes and Murderers."

Fox News decides to do business porn.

Fear of lesbians begins early, often and cruelly. A tale from the trenches. See "Fifth-Grade Homophobia."

As always, more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Anna Nicole Smith or Jimi Hendrix?

2007-02-09T03:26:00.000Z

Try both.

You can see Anna Nicole Smith in her more pious poses (and some of those fabulous Playboy covers): "Vickie A.N. Smith, Alas"

What was the meaning of Jimi Hendrix's star-spangled ordnance at Woodstock? See Candide's Notebooks contributor Rick de Yampert's "Anthem to Jimi Hendrix"

Good weekend everyone...pt

Of Vaccine Trials and Deaths Foretold

2007-02-08T12:33:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few new items today...

Sexually-Transmitted Profits: See "Merck, God, and the War Over the HPV Vaccine."

Remember Bush declaring victory in the Iraq war on the USS Abraham Lincoln in May 2003? Even then, the writing of the mayhem to come was on the wall--or in the papers. See "Chronicle of Deaths Foretold."

If it's a romp through Tim Russert's Rolodex you're interested in, fine. But "Spare Me the Libby Trial."

Surge here, disperse there: "The Iraq Insurgency Goes Suburban."

More in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading Candide's Notebooks. Spread the word.pt

Taser Brutality in Our Schools

2007-02-07T12:34:00.000Z

Good Morning. A couple of items today...

Last Thursday morning a 16-year-old special education student at a Florida high school was shot with a Taser by a school cop. It all began when the student refused to do his school work. He ended up with a felony charge and in juvenile detention. Welcome to our brave new America. See "Taser Brutality In Our Schools."

"Ehren Watada's War Theater: A Soldier Disputes an Illegal War"

Happy Birthday, Eubie Blake: a Ragtime Rover.

The WPA Guides: Arizona, "Ancient and Venerable Land"

As always, thanks for reading... and welcome new subscribers. Spread the word...pt

Cowards and Militarists

2007-02-06T12:52:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few new items today. Cue up the Sousa.

When a society is no longer exclusively and vigilantly civil, its claim to be a civilized society, let alone a civilizing one, is in peril. Other countries have been discovering that about the United States . We’re discovering it at home, too, every time a police shield is flashed with the presumptive power of an M-16 burst. See "America's March Toward a Military State."

The Senate folds on an anti-war resolution. See "Cowards."

He's a Sixth Amendment thug. See "Henry Stimson, a Lousy Pentagon Lawyer, Thankfully Resigns."

Had a Snickers bar lately? Feeling woozily homophobic? See "Those Superbowl Ads Again."

The best of the blogosphere and more crumbs and quickies in The Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Superduds

2007-02-05T13:10:00.000Z

Good morning. A few new items as the sogginess outside our Floridian windows continues. In FEMA's absence, as always.

I didn't know who the Colts were and wasn't sure why the Bears were there, but commented the Superbowl anyway. See "The Superbowl, Semi-Live."

Robert Fisk and the fallacies of the word terrorist, see "Spare Me the Word Terrorist"

It's getting old: The Bush administration has been inventing a case for war against Iran out of thin air. See "Iran, the Muddle."

More in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Loquacious Ineloquence from Bush to Biden

2007-02-02T12:38:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few items for the weekend...

President Bush was scampering discrepant all over Wall Street This week, including a lay-over with the Wall Street Journal Editorial board. The result? See "Bush's Wall Street Bull."

Joe Biden's Loquacious Ineloquence.

Remembering Molly Ivins, and her Queens Days.

Why is the Federal Emergency Management Agency the stand-out champion among federal agencies of the Bush administration's incompetence? See "FEMA's Shams."

The Pentagon thinks there are almost 30,000 fewer casualties than does the Veterans Administration, which recently put the number of wounded out of Iraq at 50,000. The discrepancy is indicative of the government's total war on truth. See "When Casualties Aren't."

Tales of neo-martial law: "What Military States Are Made Of."

Plenty more in the various editions of the Daily Journal. Good weekend everyone (and welcome, new subscribers: the past ten days have brought a surge of their own, and I'm all for this one).pt

War Trash

2007-01-31T12:29:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few new items...

A two-part column on war's most common by-product: art and memorials. See part I, "Ash to Art, Art to Dust," and part II, "The Human Tolerance Walls Can Speak Of."

West Virginia is a rolling heartbreak. The explosion at a convenience store on Monday is one more example. See "An Explosion in Ghent."

Hezbollah Wears Prada: See "Lebanon's Nasrallah, Coy Warrior"

America's police agencies are going military. See "Cops' Military Fetish."

Plenty more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Genocide as Wallpaper

2007-01-29T02:30:00.000Z

Good morning. A few new items:

What happens if a genocide takes place and the press does report it as it's happening? Usually, indifference. See "Genocide as Wallpaper"

"Banning Unpleasant Muslims"

Holocaust Memorial Day and its (attempted) hijackers

Roger Federer wins the Australian Open. Big yawn.

More in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading, and welcome new subscribers: Last week The Notebooks got linked by Crooks & Liars, Slate, Romenesko's Media News and Meta Filter, among others.pt

Kafka in Canada

2007-01-26T12:24:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few items for the weekend...

Maher Arar is the Syrian-born wireless technology consultant American authorities detained on false information from Canada, then "rendered" to Syria, where Arar was imprisoned and tortured for almost a year before his release. Canada cleared him of all suspicions. The Americans refuse to remove him from a terrorist watch list. See "The Hounding of Maher Arar"

"The Bush presidency Is Over." Need we say more?

"The Multinational Failures of Condi Rice"

"Hugo Chavez, Press Thug"

"Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Islam's Prickly Enlightenment"

Plenty more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt
Plenty

Herbert Tippen Davidson Jr., 1925-2007

2007-01-24T02:54:00.000Z

Good morning,

On Tuesday morning, Herbert Davidson, third-generation owner of the last major family-owned newspapers in Florida, died. A personal tribute, "Colossus of Heart and Verve."

Hezbollah is at it again in Lebanon, edging the country toward civil war: See "Lebanon's Slide."

A tribute to Jacques Brel and "Le plat pays," see "Brel, Ever Alive and Well."

Much more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Education's Heists

2007-01-23T12:27:00.000Z

Good Morning. A couple of new items today...

What's the purpose of education--to manufacture workers or mold individuals? The "free" market drives the answer. See Pierre's Tuesday Column, "Cogs and Ends: Education's Heist?"

Anthony Swofford scored big with Jarhead, his memoir of the first Gulf War. His first novel, Exit A, draws less than pink mist. See "Jarhead Shoots Blanks."

From the archives: 15 years old and shot down for wielding a fake gun. Remember "Chris Penley's Fatal Bullies."

Plenty more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Bush the Empire Slayer

2007-01-22T12:23:00.000Z

Good morning. A few items from the weekend...

Bernard Chazelle, a computer science professor at Princeton, contributes a terrifically written piece that sums up the Bush years in red white and blight: See "Bush the Empire Slayer."

The war on terror's great delusion? That Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are American allies, when they are, in fact, al-Qaeda's enabling axis. See "Pakistan, Bush and the Taliban"

On Lebanon's Michel Aoun, "The General in His Laban Cloth"

Can Bach--or any classical music--be translated into words? Not likely. But don;t let that stop you from trying. See "For the Love of Bach."

Plenty more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Deceptive Reversal on Spying

2007-01-18T02:56:00.000Z

Good Morning. Several new items today...

What was that about Bush's reversal on domestic spying? Don't believe it. See "Bush Isn't Ending Domestic Spying. Only Due Process."

Condi Rice--and most Americans--aren't paying a personal price for the Iraq war. See Pierre's Tuesday Column, "Barbara Boxer was right."

So it turns out the US government has been torturing prisoners without a clue about the effectiveness of the technique. See "Torture for Dummies."

"How to Eradicate Poverty By Ignoring It."

A Lebanese Immortal Dies: See "Pepe, 1910-2007."

Plenty more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading. pt

Reviled Prophets

2007-01-16T02:51:00.000Z

Good Morning. Several new items on the theme of reviled prophets today.

Today marks the fifteenth anniversary of the break-out of the first Gulf War, brought to you by CNN's Peter Arnett, Jim Holliman and Bernard Shaw live in Baghdad. But let's not forget what Peter Arnett prophesied about the second war, just eight days into the invasion, on April 1, 2003, only to be summarily fired for it. See "Peter Arnett's Prophesies"

Whatever happened to the $1 billion American embassy in Baghdad? See "Fortress of Folly"

Mark McGwire's steroid problem was his own. And ours. See "Of Beefcakes and Role Models"

Notebooks contributor Ohdave reviews Jimmy Carter's Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid. See "Jimmy Carter's Holy Land"

Diarist: $5,000 braces. For what? See "For the Love of Torture"

Plenty more, including Glenn Gould and Burqah-bikinis, in the Daily Journal...

Thanks for reading...pt

Bush's Cambodia

2007-01-13T15:54:00.000Z

The latest from the Daily Journal: see Bush's Low Grade War on Iran

Bush's Lethal Way Forward

2007-01-11T03:38:00.000Z

Good Morning. A couple of new items today...

The Bush speech is on a few people's minds. Overly so? It was anticlimactic, poorly written and not quite the change in direction advertised. See "A Calamity Foretold"

Why Ali Allawi, an Iraqi ex-minister, isn't proposing a more realistic alternative: "A Real Blueprint for Peace?"

Thomas Friedman Smugwatch

More in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Bush Speech Therapy

2007-01-10T02:50:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few new items:

The best therapy for -- and most forceful civic response to -- Bush's speech on Iraq? "Don't Watch."

It's not all gloomy in America. See Pierre's Tuesday Column, "American Scriptures: Speeches that Made a Nation"

Another grim marker: On Thursday, the Guantanamo's Gitmo turns five years old.

Plenty more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Escalation to Nowhere

2007-01-08T03:57:00.000Z

Good Morning. Today's new items at the Notebooks:

Even when the victors write the rules of war, the results are absurd. What happens when the losers keep writing the rules? See "We Are the Savages."

Bob Nardelli took a $215 million severance package after reaping more than $200 million in salaries and stock options as head of Home Depot, even though the company's performance was middling to anemic. Yet Nardelli was hailed as a new kind of leader for his military style. See "Military Freaks at Home Depot"

Afghanistan bans "Kabul Express," a movie critical to the Taliban

Israel readies to Nuke Iran?

A review of the blogosphere and plenty more in the Daily Journal... Thanks for reading.pt

Hangings

2007-01-04T12:33:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few new items to start the year...

The way Saddam Hussein was hanged isn't the emebarrassment. The skittish reaction by those who choreographed his assassination was the embarrassment. See:

Reflections on the New Year: "Elegy for Two Cardinals"
From L.D. Amabed Jr: "New Year"

Plenty more in the Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt

Wounded Knee, With Arabic Subtitles

2006-12-29T12:32:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few new items to wrap up the year.

Today, December 29, marks the anniversary of the Wounded Knee Massacre in South Dakota in 1890. Looking back at the way The New York Times interpreted the event, the similarities between the justifications of massacres now and then is a shock of recognition. See "Wounded Knee, With Arabic Subtitles."

More American soldiers have died in Iraq than on 9/11. But what does it mean when 9/11's death are set at "2,973," intentionally not to include the nineteen hijakers who also died that day? There's a direct link between that erasure and the de-humanizing way the "war on terror" has been carried out since. See "Demonism's DNA: "2,973""

Massacres are committed in every war. But the casualties aren't only the victims. See "Murderers, and Casualties, of War."

Gerald Ford, "The Book of Laughter and Forgetting"

An All Bach Christmas

Plenty more in Candide's Daily Journal. Thanks for reading, and of course Happy New Year.pt

Daily Journal Latest: Mercenaries, Atheism and Johnny Carson

2006-12-27T19:42:00.000Z

Here are the latest items in today's Daily Journal at Candide's Notebooks (click on the link for the post)...

Pentagon Flirting With Mercenaries
West Bank Mephisto
Democracy in Asia?
In the Blogosphere
Atheism’s Enemies
Alimony’s Next Frontier in India
Letterman’s Tribute to Johnny Carson
Artist of the Day: Beppe Giacobbe

Teen Sex in Stalinist Georgia

2006-12-21T12:32:00.000Z

Good Morning. A few new items today.

What happens when a 17-year-old boy receives a consensual blow job from a 15-year-old girl at a party in Georgia (the American one of Cobb County, Newt Gingrich and CNN, not its former Soviet namesake and Stalin’s homeland), and when the boy happens to be black? He gets sentenced to 10 years in prison without parole. See "Teen Sex as Gallows in Georgia"

"We're not winning," the president finally conceded to the Washington Post about Iraq. No schnitzel, Sherlock. But Bush's labyrinth is worse than he lets on. See "We're Not Winning..."

Where has Osama been? And why is his No. 2 man , the bloodlusting Ayman al-Zawahiri, grabbing the spotlight? There may be some good news and some bad news. See "Is al-Qaeda Finished?"

Plenty more in Candide's Daily Journal. Thanks for reading.pt