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Quagmire reality check
In the midst of the Obama-McCain sparring over Iraq this past week, George Packer provides a useful reminder: “The Shiite-led government has been trying to get American forces out of the way for at least two years.” Maliki’s endorsement of the Obama timetable is not some bolt from the blue, and it has everything to do with Iraq’s internal politics,
Johnny Griffin R.I.P.
And just after I mentioned him in my Ronnie Mathews post. All I can say is: Wes Montgomery’s Full House and Thelonious Monk’s Misterioso. Some of the scariest, most perfectly realized tenor sax playing ever. Thankfully I caught him at the Vanguard in the early ’00s, with Michael Weiss on piano. I seem to remember “Just One of Those Things”
Questions
“Will we extend our hand to the people in the forgotten corners of this world who yearn for lives marked by dignity and opportunity; by security and justice? Will we lift the child in Bangladesh from poverty, shelter the refugee in Chad, and banish the scourge of AIDS in our time? “Will we stand for the human rights of the
Matt Davis and Aerial Photograph
My cover story on guitarist Matt Davis and his incredible Aerial Photograph project, in the current edition of Philadelphia Weekly.
Know your enemy
And über-fashionable leftist author Naomi Klein does not, according to Jonathan Chait’s dismantling of The Shock Doctrine: Klein’s relentless materialism is not the only thing driving her to see conservatives merely as corporate puppets. She pays shockingly (but, given her premises, unsurprisingly) little attention to right-wing ideas. She recognizes that neoconservatism sits at the heart of the Iraq war project, but she
On Ronnie Mathews
In the better-late-than-never department, I have to double back and say a brief word about the recent death of pianist Ronnie Mathews. Because when I entered the New School jazz program in 1987, Mathews was the first teacher I had. It was a jazz harmony course, and my memory of it is hazy (I turned 40 this year, folks). But
The week on disc (22)
In case you missed the last one… Jeff Gauthier Goatette, House of Return (Cryptogramophone) Ben Wolfe, No Strangers Here (MaxJazz) Joel Harrison, The Wheel (Innova) Scott DuBois, Banshees (Sunnyside) Torben Waldorff, Afterburn (ArtistShare) Jen Chapin & Rosetta Trio, Light of Mine (Purple Chair)
Mandela at 90
One of the high points of my adult life was watching Nelson Mandela, Mario Cuomo and David Dinkins ride past in a motorcade in New York on June 20, 1990. The legacy of Mandela, or “Madiba” as South Africans affectionately call him, is a complex one. His reaching out to Castro, Gadhafi and other autocrats during those days is still