Hhaing The Yu, 29, in rain falling on the ruins of his home, in a township outside Yangon, Myanmar.

This is not about politics; it is about saving people’s lives. There is absolutely no more time to lose.

— United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, pressing the military junta in Myanmar to accept international assistance as hundreds of thousands of its citizens reel from the effects of a devastating cyclone earlier this month; May 14.
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If our profits are taxed, that means we’ll have less capital to invest in new production.

— John Hofmeister, president of Shell U.S., to CNNMoney.com; May 6.

These companies are spending a very small amount of their operating cash flow on exploration. They are spending the majority of their funds buying back stock.

— Amy Myers Jaffe, a fellow in energy studies at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy, discussing results of her just-finished a two-year study looking at oil companies and how they spend their money; May 6.
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I think blogs are dedicated to cruelty, they’re dedicated to dishonesty, they’re dedicated to speed.

— Buzz Bissinger, author of “Friday Night Lights” and other bestsellers, castigating blogs on HBO’s “Costas Now”; May 1.

It’s one of the bigger Cadillacs. I’ve got a desk in it. It’s like an airplane. … I want them to feel that they are somebody and their congressman is somebody. And when they say, ‘This is nice,’ it feels good.

— Rep. Charles Rangell, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, describing the 17-foot-long, 300-horsepower, 2004 Cadillac DeVille he leases for for $777.54 a month; House rules permit members to lease any vehicle at taxpayer expense; May 1.
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I predicted three weeks ago that the cops who killed Sean Bell and wounded his friends in a 50-shot barrage would be acquitted.  Given the burden of proof on the prosecution and the testimony presented in court, I just didn’t see a way the judge would find the accused guilty. 

 Today, all three accused officers were found not guilty on all charges.

As I’ve posted before, Bell was killed not because the police did anything criminal, but because they royally screwed up.  They may have been cowards, they may have been trying to make a bust, any bust, to put a period on the end of their last night as a unit, but they were certainly incompetent.

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In a garbage dump in Haiti, people scavenge for food.

They look at me and say, ‘Papa, I’m hungry,’ and I have to look away. It’s humiliating and it makes you angry.

— Saint Louis Meriska of Port-Au-Prince, Haiti, whose “children ate two spoonfuls of rice apiece as their only meal recently and then went without any food the following day”; food prices in Haiti have spiked 45 percent since 2006; April 18.
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This is actually a boost to remind people that we can produce this kind of journalism at any time. We’re going to have a large enough newsroom to continue to produce this kind of quality journalism.

— Leonard Downie Jr., editor of The Washington Post, winner of six Pulitzer Prizes for 2008; The Post’s front-page story by media critic Howard Kurtz did not mention the paper has endured three rounds of staff cuts since 2003, but the AP’s story did; April 7; emphasis added.

I can only confirm that the route is dynamic.

— Nathan Ballard, a San Francisco city spokesman, as, said The New York Times, “The precise route remained in flux on Tuesday as the torch extravaganza threatened to become more civic migraine than celebration in the face of potential protests by those upset with China’s human rights record and recent crackdown in Tibet”; April 9.
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Nearly every morning for the past few weeks, I’ve brewed a strong cup of orange pekoe, sat down at my computer, and googled “Sean Bell” to get the latest information from a weeks-long trial. In case you haven’t heard, Bell is a young man who was gunned down on the morning of his wedding day by New York City cops who fired 50 shots at Bell and his two companions, claiming that one of them had a gun. No gun was found.

There is a wealth of information on the case here, including a nifty visual recreation complete with comments. If you prefer a more narrative style, you can find it here. But for those who’d rather not read all that, here’s a capsule of the events. Full Story »

I’ve seen a lot of brain-crushingly stupid stuff coming out of the so-called “paper of record” in recent years, but this just takes the aneurysm-inducing cake:

To achieve the change the country wants, he says, “we need a leader who can finally move beyond the divisive politics of Washington and bring Democrats, independents and Republicans together to get things done.” But this promise leads, inevitably, to a question: Can such a majority be built and led by Mr. Obama, whose voting record was, by one ranking, the most liberal in the Senate last year?

I love the fact that Robin Toner (or his/her editor) just threw in that “inevitably,” as if it’s just such a commonly accepted piece of wisdom that a liberal politician cannot possibly unify disparate points of view under their banner. It only gets better from there: Full Story »

NOTE: I reference a rather vulgar article from a recent edition of a publication whose name I have omitted, along with the author and the original name of the piece. I can’t for the life of me shut up completely about it, but at the same time I don’t intend this to be a hit piece, especially with the amazing way in which the issue was handled by the publication after the community gave its input. So, yeah, I’m using my First Amendment right, and being consarned opinionated about it, but with no malicious intent — this ark of snark may well hit an iceberg, but I won’t take anyone else down with me.

Chalk another one up to the gaytriarchy.

Once upon a time, a column in a Denver-area LGBT magazine was met with a brief but pointed shitstorm, prompting a retraction and official apology.

In case you don’t keep up with LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender — just think “gender outlaw” or “it’s those damn queers again”) media, a second-grade Douglas County boy is returning to school presenting as a girl, with the support of her parents and the school, which is going through the trouble to accommodate this change with pamphlets for interested parents and building gender-neutral restrooms…wait for it…
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Happy Belated International Women’s Day!!!

We should take this moment to reflect and recognize the importance of this day for women worldwide. Yesterday, women around the world celebrated the achievements they have made in their struggle for power and recognition that’s been waged for hundreds of years. In South America, we witnessed a change and attitudinal shift in both women’s and society’s thoughts about women’s equality and emancipation. In Argentina, the people spoke and elected Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, making her the first woman to be elected president in Argentina’s history. In 2006, in Chile, Michelle Bachelet became the first woman president. And Ellen Johnson Sirleaf made history by becoming Africa’s first elected female head of state and Liberia’s first elected female president. Fernández de Kirchner, Bachelet, Johnson Sirleaf and millions of women like them in many parts of the world have begun celebrating a new song of power, liberty, and justice. Full Story »

“The ‘Chechnya’ special operation has infected the whole country, which is becoming more and more beastly and idiotic. The value of human life was already very low in Russia, and now it has slipped to almost nothing. We have all reached the depths, like the unrescued Kursk [the sunken submarine]. And there’s no order for rescue.”
– “A Small Corner of Hell: Dispatches from Chechnya” by Anna Politkovskaya (University of Chicago Press, 2003)

One hundred twenty-six journalists have been killed in Iraq, many of them native to the country. We don’t mean to slight them, but we’ve chosen one from elsewhere to represent all journalists whose lives are imperiled. Full Story »

Maybe you once cared for a drug addict? What led them there, what keeps them there? Not your problem. And you believe in all that “tough love” shit; you know that they must make the decision to come clean and live responsibly.

But you also believe that you can make that journey easier for them by showing them how an addiction-free life can be, and by offering them the advantages that make it worth going cold to achieve.

At some point, though, maybe you get an inkling that the process isn’t working. Maybe it’s after they’ve come out of rehab once too often, only to go on a binge again, that you start thinking that the effort isn’t worth the stress.

Countries are like that too.

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Today, National Public Radio reporter Guy Raz reported that the Bush Administration is in negotiations with the Iraqi government of Nouri al-Maliki to create an “enduring relationship that will ensure that the United States occupies and guarantees the government’s safety against threats both foreign and domestic for at least the next 10 years. One Representative, Bill Delahunt of Massachusetts, has been trying to get both Administration and Pentagon officials to testify as to the nature of the negotiations, thus far with no success. Rep. Delahunt’s guess as to why? Because the agreement may qualify as a “treaty” instead of an “agreement,” and thus require Senate ratification, something that President Bush doesn’t want and doesn’t believe that he, as President, needs.

This represents yet another example of this administration’s expansive view of Presidential power, and it needs to be the one that breaks Congress’, and the public’s, back. Full Story »

How the heck does Obama’s letter to the US ambassador at the UN on January 23 (at bottom) jibe with his transcendent speech on January 20 (excerpt immediately below)?

“Unity is the great need of the hour — the great need of this hour. Not because it sounds pleasant or because it makes us feel good, but because it’s the only way we can overcome the essential deficit that exists in this country.”I’m not talking about a budget deficit. I’m not talking about a trade deficit. I’m not talking about a deficit of good ideas or new plans. Full Story »

Africa has a problem with causality.

Not that the rest of the world consistently gets the idea either, but there are no other regions that so consistently mess up the nature of cause and effect. The source of this confusion is the economic boom that results from the mere good fortune of having some valuable resources.

In both Russia and Venezuela the near vertiginous rise of oil prices has stimulated economic growth; which is a good thing. It has also led the Big Men in power to associate that boom with their own blunt political ministrations. Both Hugo Chavez and Vladimir Putin have perverted their constitutions to ensure their continued control. “After all,” they think, “if it weren’t for me the economy wouldn’t be doing so well.”

Sadly - for themselves - this is a woeful fantasy that the citizens of these oppressed lands are willing to go along with. They remember the poverty of previous leaderships and confuse democracy with economic neglect.

Lest you think this is mere speculation, consider the following: In 2003 Hugo Chavez, president of Venezuela, took control of his country’s oil production after declaring his lack of faith in private endeavour. It is difficult arguing that Chavez’ nationalisation was a bad thing when daily oil revenues have risen from $ 50 million in 2003, to $ 190 million in 2007. Yet it has been an appalling disaster. Full Story »

The Arrival, by Shaun Tan, first published October 2007, 128 pages, ISBN 978-0439895293

The dividing line between comic books and graphic novels - for many - seems to lie in the question: “Would I show this to a kid?”

Maus, by Art Spiegelman, or When the Wind Blows, by Raymond Briggs, are astonishing reinventions of the art, claiming a space in literature that defies either category. Both opened up the creation of artworks that tell human stories; allowing emotion and empathy with the images to fill the space left by the absence of words.

Taking four years to research and produce, The Arrival stands alone - not just amongst graphic novels - but amongst all art. It is like stumbling across The Kiss by Auguste Renoir placed inconsequentially at the base of the stairs in London’s Tate Modern, or hearing Pachelbel’s Canon played in the midst of a mix of faded pop-songs. Full Story »

And to think I was worried.

In spite of his apocalyptic proclivities, President Bush scored major points with this little lady last week by going mano a mano with King Abdullah on the Saudi rape case. Didn’t he?

“I talked to King Abdullah about the Middle Eastern peace. I don’t remember if that subject came up.”

But he is deeply and personally angry, not only on behalf of the individual victim, but about the continuing tyranny of Shari’a law in an ally of the greatest democracy in the world. Isn’t he? Full Story »

Some products are so critical to life and living that their absence would cause tremendous harm to society. One such line of products are pharmaceutical medications aimed at combating the diseases that fall predominantly on the poor.

Oxfam – a non-governmental organisation dedicated to “finding lasting solutions to poverty and injustice” – has released a report, “Investing for Life” in which they claim to have identified the source of injustice and illness amongst the world’s poor. It is the world’s large pharmaceutical firms.

Oxfam claims that, by enforcing their intellectual property rights and charging high prices for their products, Big Pharma is undermining everyone’s universal “right” to health. Full Story »

Ronald Suresh Roberts, sycophantic biographer of Thabo Mbeki

Jacob Zuma, some-time rapist, multi-million dollar arms-deal fraudster, populist, and permanently in search of his machine gun, declares that he is ready to “rule” South Africa.

This man is likely to be South Africa’s next president.

This is quite a departure for the African National Congress, the ANC, the party of Albert Luthuli and Nelson Mandela; both Nobel Peace Prize winners.

The noble ideal of setting asid