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Freedom
loving racists
Expanded from
the 6-22-2008 Daily Sparks Tribune
Updated 6-27-2008, 6-28-2008, 9-14-2008
My favorite college history professor bought into the propaganda that the Civil War was not about slavery, but merely a by-product of the emerging industrial age. As he put, agrarianism versus industrialization.
Saturday, June 28, 2008, 12:06 a.m. PDT
Just how much more screwed up can this get? I just tried to tune in the Tavis Smiley Show on KNPB TV-5 which is instead airing an unannounced rerun of Traces of the Trade.
Go figger.
AB
Friday, June 27, 2008, 10:11 p.m. PDTSalt in the wound
Dear Friends:
The TV Guide listing on Charter cable's system was wrong. KNPB TV-5 is NOT re-airing last week's Moyers show on race relations, but another program from 2006 which I am viewing as I write this.
My apologies.
Andrew
Friday, June 27, 2008, 8:27 p.m. PDT
TO: Reno-Sparks NAACP and friends
FROM: Andrew Barbano
RE: Moyers
I sent the e-mail below to Channel 5 on Monday, June 23, and they have not responded — or maybe they have. The June 20 edition of Bill Moyers' Journal, certainly the best discussion of America's race relations that I have seen in many years, was bumped to the wee hours on Channel 5 and available in prime time only to those who possess expensive high definition TV sets and know how to access KNPB's high-def signals either over the air or via cable.
In checking tonight's program listings, I find that this week's 9:00 p.m. installment of Moyers' program will be followed at 10:00 p.m. PDT by a rerun of last week's. It is not scheduled again, so catch or tape it tonight only. If you get this in time, send this to a friend.
As you will note if you read my June 22 column, Moyers devoted a major portion of the bumped June 20 program to the history of the reimposition of slavery in the south after the Civil War, the second coming of slavery in the U.S. (I will comment on the Third Epoch of American Slavery in the Sunday Tribune.) He interviewed the author of Slavery by Another Name and aired a clip from Traces of the Trade, which premiered nationally last Tuesday.As you will note in my column's footnotes, KNPB TV-5 also bumped this additional important program to the wee hours and delivered it in prime time only via its high-def channels.
Someone once said that half a loaf is better than none, but you can get awful skinny on half a loaf.
Be well. Raise hell.
Andrew Barbano
ps: My new live phone calls+chat crawls TV show moves permanently to Charter cable channel 16 on Tuesday. It will also remain available at Barbwire.TV, as it has been since we launched on D-Day (June 6), Monday-Friday, 2:00-4:00 p.m. PDT, followed by the live telecast of Amy Goodman's nationally syndicated TV talk show, Democracy Now.
6-23-2008
TO: KNPB TV-5I commented at length in the Sunday Sparks Tribune about the bumping of Moyers and the issues raised on his program.
I would like to know why most locals will not be able to see Traces of the Trade.
Thanks.
Andrew
"Among voters who say race matters, McCain leads Obama by almost 20 points."
— ABC News, 6-22-2008
The south has risen again: Racism means never having to say you're sorry
Barbwire / 9-14-2008White sheets and dirty laundry
Barbwire / 6-29-2008
Bull.
Film maker Ken Burns stated it properly while commenting on his 1990 PBS series The Civil War. He said that no matter all the other factors, racism remained like a deadly snake curled up under the table.
A few years ago, the Rev. Billy Graham was asked if he could fix one national problem, what would it be?"Racism," he immediately answered.
The old snake abides with teeth that puncture, a whiplike tail which cuts like a scalpel, a muscular body for immobilization and, worst of all, a vapory venom which causes delusion as it slowly poisons.
The candidacy of Sen. Barack Obama has done U.S. politics a grand service. He has brought our embedded racism out of the closet.
As the great Justice Louis Brandeis once so wisely stated, "sunshine is the best disinfectant."
Oh, momma, have we got a lot of disinfecting to do.
Reminders of Nevada as Mississippi dropped around me like artillery shells last week.We rank 45th in the country for fostering technology and science ahead of — surprise — five southern states, including Ole Miss, at bottom as usual.
And what's our response? Gov. Jim the Dim is slashing education budgets like Johnny Depp.
It won't be long before somebody sues over the starvation of our school system and we end up like other southern states with a federal judge running it. (A federal judge has run this area's water system since 1944, so we're used to it.)
A year or so back, a visiting lecturer at UNR told a group of doctoral candidates that she was amazed that Nevada hadn't been hit with such litigation already, given our stinginess.
One in five West Virginia voters admitted that race played a role in how they voted in the May Democratic primary. John Edwards, a white southern male who had already dropped out, still garnered seven percent.
A news network interviewed some West Virginia female voters.
One said she would not vote for Obama because he's a muslim. Another said his middle name is Hussein, right? A third simply said that he's black.
Having worked for high profile African-American candidates in the past, I know that in reviewing any poll, a black office seeker must allow at least five points for respondents who won't admit their prejudice.
Looks like it's gotten worse.
About 15 years ago, I filled in for a couple of days as morning newsman on a local oldies station. Things were going swimmingly until I played my interview with the Rev. Jesse Jackson about a civil rights bill pending in congress.Listeners bouncing to the Motown sound suddenly turned ugly when that black guy's voice was allowed on their radio station.
I was not offered the permanent job by a manager who curtly informed me that the station catered to a "white bread" audience. (Barbwire 11-7-99)
Fast forward to the present. A few weeks ago, I sent out an e-mail notice about the Reno-Sparks NAACP Freedom Fund Banquet. It generated this exchange:
"I will go when Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson apologize to the Duke Lacrosse players in public. Hypocrites, both of them, shame on you," wrote some yahoo.
"The definition of bigotry and prejudice is when you paint everyone with a broad brush," I responded.
"What does this Reno event have to do with your hatred for two black preachers if not the obvious of guilt by association or, worse, melanin? Thanks for keeping the NAACP in business. Be well. Raise hell."
Here is his unedited reply: "do not e mail me again or it will be reported as harassment. a copy of this will be sent to the appropriate people with in the naacp and authorities. how dare you call me a racist. your actions creates them. be well, go to hell"
Talk about moral obtuseness. He actually threatened to turn me in to the NAACP.
Just when you think it can't get worse, in came a phone message from a well known local media personality. Here it is, verbatim:"You know what, every time I turn around…and send…I hear another whimpering, whining black person. I didn't say nigger, I said black person.
"Now, you know, somewhere, being a victim has got to cease. Stand up, grow a big pair of cojones like the black congressman, er…the black, uh, uh lieutenant governor of Illinois, a conservative by the way, he doesn't follow your ilk, he stands on his two feet — they're black and he is somebody.
"Quit using the race card to get promotions and jobs and housing, fudisherary (sic) and in school.
"Where is it written that a (sic) education is a guarantee for anybody?
"If you work hard and play by the rules, you get ahead, not playing the victim. Quit playing the race card.
"But you of the N double-A LCP, that's the liberal colored peoples' organization — and I might add, Barack Obama — you know what, you people are losers."You're going to continue to lose. Quit playing the victim and become the victor," he screamed and hung up, leaving no number.
A calm and literate response that this poor man needed to see was presented by Bill Moyers on Friday night, but few northern Nevada viewers were allowed to see it.
Ironically, KNPB TV-5 bumped Bill Moyers' Journal to 2:00 a.m., replacing it with an American Masters retrospective on civil rights giant Pete Seeger.
Moyers discussed America's inherent racism with two historians and promoted a TV show which I hope KNPB will air. (See below.) Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North, premieres nationwide on Tuesday.
First-time filmmaker Katrina Browne therein makes a troubling discovery — her New England ancestors were the largest slave-trading family in U.S. history.
Moyers followed a segment of the film with a repressed chapter of Americana: how millions of southern black men were re-enslaved from the 1880s until after World War II.
Too bad so few residents of Mississippi West were allowed to see it.
CORRECTION from last week (thanks to local lawyer Neil Grad): The Nevada usury law was repealed in 1981.
Be well. Raise hell.
The Bill Moyers Journal most northern Nevadans weren't allowed to see
Moyers previews Traces of the Trade
Author Douglas Blackmon talks with Moyers about his book,
SLAVERY BY ANOTHER NAME
Slavery by Another Name: The shameful history of the reimposition of slavery in the U.S. from the 1880's to about 1950Profs. Patterson and Loury discuss race in America with Bill Moyers
NOTE: As with Moyers, KNPB TV-5 will not air P.O.V.'s Traces of the Trade: A Story From the Deep North when and where most Nevadans can get it.
Channel 5 over-the-air and cable analog: Thursday, June 26, 3:00 a.m.
High Definition Only: Tuesday, June 24, 7:00 p.m. and 10:30 p.m.
Source: pbs.org
...and more ammo
Nevada Legislature
State of Nevada
Secretary of State
Clark County
City of Las Vegas
Reno City Council
Sparks City Council
Washoe County Commission
Washoe Registrar of Voters
The Dean's List
The Dean of Reno Bloggers could very well be Andrew Barbano, self-described "fighter of public demons," who started putting his "Barbwire" columns online in 1996 and now runs 10 sites.
RENO NEWS & REVIEW, 11-9-2006
And they wonder why the newspaper business is dying?
Phillips, Kevin; Numbers Racket: Why the economy is worse than we know
Harper's Magazine; May 2008; page 43
Phillips has authored numerous books on history and politics over the past 40 years. His most recent, Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism, was published by Viking on April 15, 2008.NAOMI WOLF: Fascist America in 10 Easy Steps
There are some things common to every state that's made the transition to fascism. Author Naomi Wolf argues that all of them are present in America today.
Alternet 5-20-2007Johnson, Chalmers; REPUBLIC OR EMPIRE? A National Intelligence Estimate on the United States; Harper's magazine; January, 2007. I love it when heavy hitters validate what I've been saying for years in the tiny Sparks Tribune.
Barlett, Donald L. and Steele, James B.; America: What Went Wrong? (1992); America: Who Really Pays the Taxes? (1994); America: Who Stole the Dream? (1996) ; Andrews & McMeel/Universal Press Syndicate. For additional comments on the work of the two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning team, use the NevadaLabor.com search engine and sweep for "Barlett."
Review of Alex Carey's Taking the Risk Out of Democracy:
Propaganda in the US and AustraliaThe Orwell Diversion by Alex Carey
Excerpted from the book available below
ORDER Taking the Risk Out of Democracy
Corporate Propaganda versus Freedom and Liberty
By Alex Carey
Edited by Andrew Lohrey
Foreword by Noam Chomsky
University of Illinois Press
SEE ALSO: Lapham, Lewis H.; Tentacles of Rage: The Republican Propaganda Mill, A Brief History; Harper's Magazine cover article; September, 2004, page 32.
By one conservative estimate, the corporate right has spent about $3 billion over the past three decades manufacturing public opinion to suit big business goals. Lapham's number covered the early 1970's to the present day. Alex Carey noted that by 1948, anti- New Deal corporate propaganda expenditures had already reached $100 million per year, not adjusted for inflation, for advertising alone. (Carey, ibid; page 79)
Adjusted for inflation, that 1948 $100 million becomes $801,659,751.04 in 2005 dollars.
Conservatives Help Wal-Mart, and Vice Versa
As Wal-Mart struggles to rebut growing criticism, it has discovered a reliable ally: conservative research groups.
New York Times 9-8-2006; Free registration may be required.BARBWIRE: Labor Day '94: People vs. corporate con job, 9-4-94
Chilling forecasts from Alex CareyBARBWIRE: The Nevada Republican Party Becomes Communist, 3-30-97
A prescient Plato on the dangers of oligarchyThe sands of time do not cloud the long memories of the sheiks of Araby
Barbwire 9-10-2006
Rinfret, Pierre A.; Peace is Bullish; Look magazine, 5-31-1966
Copyright © 1982-2008 Andrew BarbanoAndrew Barbano is a 39-year Nevadan, editor of NevadaLabor.com and JoeNeal.org; a member of Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO, and the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Daily Sparks (Nev.) Tribune since 1988.
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