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Puttin’ it in park
This blog is on pause while I travel. Back in late March. What a terrible time to leave New York, just when Bobo Stenson, Anthony Braxton, Jenny Lewis, the Pogues, Edward Simon, Dilated Peoples and the Silver Jews are gearing up for gigs. At least I got to hear Roy Haynes tear the roof off the Vanguard tonight (er, last
The Sopranos returns
With breathtaking results. I’m a latecomer to the series but a huge fan for the last 18 months or so (OK, I’m really late). Tonight’s season premiere met expectations many times over. I won’t discuss the plot but wanted to highlight a comment from Emanuele Alfano of the Italian-American One Voice Coalition (sorry, paid NYT link), who has led the
Items
At the risk of dignifying the shabby comment in response to my previous post, I’ll state for the record that I’m 100 percent opposed to any military strike on Iran. The women’s activists beaten on March 8 are among those who will abolish the rule of the clerics, in time. For Cheney & Co. to run amok right next door
Iran beats feminists
Doug Ireland carries a report from Janet Afary about the International Women’s Day gathering in Tehran on March 8: The peaceful gathering of women’s rights activists, women’s groups and human rights defenders who had gathered in Park Daneshjoo (Student Park) yesterday, in commemoration of March 8th, International Women’s Day, ended in violence, when they were attacked and assaulted by plain
Bravo, Roger Waters
The ex-Pink Floyd singer refuses to cancel his show in Israel. He condemns the separation wall and the occupation but tells the Guardian: I have many fans in Israel, many of whom refuse to serve in the military. I won’t cancel my trip to Israel because I don’t agree with the government’s policies, just as I won’t stop performing in
Now that’s a lede
Just got around to reading Lawrence Kaplan’s attack on the Hummer, which begins: At first glance, Route 27, which winds its way into the Hamptons, and Route Irish, which winds it way into Baghdad, appear to have basically nothing in common. But they do. On both roads, today’s vehicle of choice is the Humvee. Needless to say, they serve vastly
A letters exchange on Chavez
I have a letter in Jewish Currents magazine (March-April ’06) responding to Bob Cartwright’s adulatory article on Hugo Chavez in the previous issue. In my letter I argue that Cartwright glossed over Chavez’s professed admiration for dictators on the order of Robert Mugabe and Fidel Castro. I also noted that Chavez traveled to Libya in 2004 to accept the grotesquely
A reader responds
Back in November I harshly criticized The World Can’t Wait, an activist “coalition” fronted by the Revolutionary Communist Party. Just the other day I discovered that this comment had come in from a reader: I am not a communist, i am a part of this organization. Our organization is united around “The Call”, the call is not communist at all,