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¡Viva Chávez!
César Chávez Celebration XVI / Celebración de César Chávez XVI
Saturday 31 March 2018 / Sabado 31 de Marzo 2018
Highlights from the record-breaking 2017 event at Circus Circus Reno

Ring up hope before checking out
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 5-30-2017 Sparks Tribune / Expansions in blue.

We live in a time of anger, division and despair. People feel powerless.
As always, answers arise from organizing toward common goals.

You can also be effective one-to-one.

Recently in the checkout line at SaveMart (a union shop, natch), a young woman ahead of me, still in her minimum-wage work clothes, had her debit card declined. She told the clerk to subtract the cost of some fruit juice.

I told the checker to put the bottle on my tab. The disheveled young woman turned to me and said "you don't have to do that."

"It's OK," sez I, "I've had a pretty good day."

"My children will be so grateful," she replied, "thank you."

Her face told a story I just about can't describe. It was almost expressionless, reflecting neither exhaustion nor exasperation nor determination nor gratitude. Or perhaps all. This beleaguered young mother had too much on her shoulders to do anything save moving to the next chore.

Such quiet desperation walks all around us. When you have a chance to help, please do.

DOWN AMNESIA LANE. A standing-room-only audience heard eminent Nevada author David Toll hearken back to the history of his legendary Gold Hill News last Thursday at Carson City's Nevada State Museum. He passed out aging copies of the legendary newspaper, some of which contained ads I produced four decades ago.

The GHN lived and died in both the 19th and 20th centuries. Given the beleaguered state of newspapering today, could a latter day GHN make it? Toll's publication was beautifully hand-illustrated and very well-written. Each edition was a collectable work of art.

Alas, great art dies a'borning without great marketing. Daily newspapers today make the fatal mistake of trying to morph into YouTube.

A new GHN, married to community radio and TV, could be awesome. Western Nevada community media have evaporated under unenlightened management.

Take hope in the words of President John F. Kennedy, born 100 years ago this week: "Any spot is tenable if brave men will make it so."

So?

A LEGEND LEAVES BUT LIVES ON. Former Reno-Sparks NAACP President and Nevada civil rights legend Eddie B. Scott is dead. A victim of cancer, the 2015 University of Nevada Distinguished Nevadan honoree was in his 80s. Watch RenoSparksNAACP.org for information as it develops.

My friend Eddie ventured onto the front lines when such temerity could (and often did) get people killed. May the great man rest in peace knowing that he did his work so admirably well.

NAACP PART DEUX. The Reno-Sparks Branch hosts a June 1 fundraiser on the occasion of President Patricia Gallimore's birthday. (I have it on good authority that she's over 21.) The event takes place from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at Bertha Miranda's restaurant, 336 Mill Street in Reno. Details at RenoSparksNAACP.org/

MEMORIAL DAY HANGOVER. After all last weekend's tears, I once again add my echo to General and President Dwight Eisenhower's farewell address: When do we stop making more veterans?

As Pete Seeger sang, when will they ever learn?

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)
______________
Andrew Barbano is a 48-year Nevadan, editor of NevadaLabor.com and first vice-president of the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his comments are his own. E-mail <barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us> Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Sparks Tribune since 1988.

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END OF TIMES SURVIVAL KIT. Defend yourself with humorous or humorless but always-peerless predictions for 2017 by subscribing to the Barbwire Confidential News Service.

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THE GOOD DON. Nominations are afoot for the Nevada Press Association Hall of Fame. Time to ramp up for world-famous Tribune photographer Don Dondero. Here's the compelling case for his induction.