BARBWIRE
by
ANDREW BARBANO
Pirate Laureate of the High Desert Outback of the American Dream


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Je Suis Charlie
"Our republic and its press will rise or fall together." — Joseph Pulitzer

"Media is the plural of mediocre."
— Jimmy Breslin (1928-2017)

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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

All the news you never knew you needed to know—>Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential


   Everybody knows the dice are loaded.
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
   Everybody knows the war is over.
Everybody knows the good guys lost.
   Everybody knows the fight was fixed.
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich.
   That's how it goes.
Everybody knows...
Everybody knows the scene is dead
   But there's gonna be a meter on your bed
That will disclose
   What everybody knows...
   Everybody talking to their pockets.
Everybody wants a box of chocolates
   and a long red rose.
   Everybody knows. Everybody knows.
That's how it goes.
Everybody knows.


I hope you understand I just had to go back to the island.
Leon Russell, 1942-2016


Legislative Betrayal: One for the books under the bus
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 6-21-2017 Sparks Tribune / Updated 6-22, 7-3 and 12-27-2017 / Expansions in blue.

Legislative Democrats threw their ATM under the bus in the 2017 Nevada legislative session.


Greatest Hits Dept.

WE WON: BIG NEWS FROM THE NEVADA PRESS ASSOCIATION CONFAB IN GOMORRAH SOUTH —> BARBWIRE NOMINEE GUY RICHARDSON INDUCTED INTO HALL OF FAME ON FIRST BALLOT

Support Don Dondero next
Note: Alas and alack, Dondero did not make it in 2015 or 2016.
Make this the year!

7-COME-11!
Barbwire wins 7th Nevada Press Association award

BRONZE 2016
4-28-2015
11-24-2015
1-19-2016

6-pack: BRONZE 2014
Hopelessly trying to win an earthquake / 4-18-2013

The 2013 Loony Tunes Legislative Lexicon / 5-30-2013

The politics of media ga-ga boosterism / 3-20-2014

We Don't Need No Education—> Neverending Barbwire Series

Barbwire.TV
Watch NevadaLabor.com for show times.
Help us get the word out.

Support the project at http://resurge.tv#donate

SUING FOR SCHOOLS
Reruns on Carson-Dayton 226

Additional programs
on Boulder City cable. Go to bcnv.org and then
go to the BCTV link.

If Reform Fails: Health Care, Jobs and Unions — new power to the people on the public airwaves

The program premiers were available to every television set in the region because of a high-mileage media hybrid.

The shows appeared on both commercial and community stations. The non-corporate entity produced the events, commercial TV greatly expanded distribution.

Thus began an ongoing series of sane public interest programs which generate both entertaining heat and more than a little light.

Please spread the word and consider contributing to the cause online at ReSurge.TV.

You may also take the public option known as the U.S. Postal Service and send a check or money order to ReSurge.TV, P.O. Box 10034, Reno NV 89510.

Your contribution will help fund the distribution as well as ongoing efforts at developing new media, including a regional, non-corporate community radio station and the return of community television to Reno-Sparks-Washoe.

You are present at the creation of what I hope can become a new media model where the programming accurately reflects what's happening on the ground and the media impact is powerful enough to forcefully pass the message upward.

Thanks.

Be well. Raise hell.

Andrew


Click here for selected on-demand re-runs from the Barbwire.TV archives

Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success

Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008

The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
Highlights from radio days
mp3 file


Tomorrow's news today —> Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential

Republicans got $20 million for private/religious school vouchers. Senate Minority Leader Bulldog Roberson, R-Gomorrah South, has publicly bragged about the success of GOP immigrant bashing.

Democratic leaders chirp about victories but mutter a "there-there" pat on the head to workers who got less than nothing.
Not only is the drain hose firmly in the public school bucket, but all the anti-labor "reforms" of the 2015 Republican-controlled ledge remain.

Hardest hit: Public employees still working for 2007 pay and construction workers. The 2008 depression caused many to permanently leave the trades.

Their ranks remain thin while their wages and benefits have been permanently cut because they were used as pawns, traded away in the eleventh hour of the last night of the session.

Adding insult to injury, Gov. Veto El Obtúsè made sure minimum wage workers remain stuck at 1950's rates, adjusted for inflation.

Democrats will face primary challenges and perhaps an alternative party from their shattered union ATM.

DR. HANNIBAL LECTER, CALL YOUR OFFICE. The July issue of the venerable Harper's Magazine published this unintentional advice for errant Democrats: "Cannibalism is not nutritious. Fava beans come from Lower Galilee." Nice Chianti, of course, comes from France.

HIT AND RUN. A guy was walking his young German shepherd at 9th Street and N. Virginia near UNR at dusk Saturday.
The dog sniffed his way over the curb and a driver swerved to hit him. His death yowl was heard a block away. Reno police are investigating.

If you know something, call them or secret witness, 775-322-4900.

HIT MEN. Post-mortems of Hillary 2016 reveal a new culprit. Actually, an old one: former Sparks schoolboy Karl Rove.

After Rove smeared Dubya back into office in 2004, less-talented consultants emulated his method of slicing and dicing every U.S. precinct into well-researched targets which could be hit with customized messages telling people what they wanted to hear (kinda like Trump).

UNDER THE BUS, PART DEUX. Clinton's Brooklyn computer controllers ordered busloads of Iowa union members to turn around and campaign back home to create a "diversion" in a state Trump was going to win easily.
They were on their way to Michigan where they knew Clinton was in trouble but viable.

Brooklyn countermanded because their algorithms showed Hillary with a comfortable(?!) five-point lead in the Motown state.

The consultants hoped Trump would waste time in Iowa. I guess it worked. He went to both states just before the election anyway and won both.

LIKE PLAYBOY, YOU CAN LOOK AT THE PICTURES. This Thursday thru Sunday, my friends at Reno's locally-owned Grassroots Books on Grove Street offer 10,000 mint-condition items in Spanish, for which my limited skills arise from growing up Italian and two years of high school Latin. I can skim a printed page and get the sense of it, but you don't even have to do that. [1. Español]

The selection includes a panorama of titles on photography and architecture, for instance, where you need only open them to be amused and occasionally amazed.

Each page of a coffee table-sized illustrated history of Julius Caesar is on heavy cardstock with art worthy of a medieval parchment Bible. Kid stuff and comics, too, all from a quarter to 99 cents.
Fill a bolsa (that means bag) from the 10,000 for $4.99.

However, if you're into Clive Cussler thrillers, best be fluent in Español.

If you're like me, you should not be allowed in that store without adult supervision. I always go in for one and walk out with five or six.

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)

[1] Sucediendo pronto MÁS MANERAS DE AHORRAR Del 22 de junio al 25 de junio. Venta en Almacén 10.000 libros 99 ¢, DVDs, CDs y cómics 59 ¢, libros para niños 25 ¢ Domingo 25 de junio 9 am-5pm. Venta de bolsas Llene una bolsa de artículos de almacén por sólo $ 4.99. Ver más ventas.

        Annuncio non pagado. (The latter is not a paid advertisement.)

SMOKING GUNS —> Workers stiffed: Labor has bipartisan grudges
By Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review 6-29-2017
Condemned at Birth
The diabetes establishment inhibits research on a very promising diabetes CURE
"Tell us how it will make ever make us money."

Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno
/ Expanded from the 6-14-2017 Sparks Tribune / Updated 6-14 and 6-20-2017
Nevada consumers consumed again
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 6-6-2017 Sparks Tribune / Updated 6-8 and 6-14-2017

ONLINE EXTRAS —>

GREAT SCOTT. Rev. William C. Webb will come out of retirement to conduct the memorial service for Nevada civil rights legend Eddie Scott. the 2015 University of Nevada Distinguished Nevadan honoree.
It's scheduled for 11:00 a.m. on Friday, June 30, at Reno's Second Baptist Church, 1265 Montello Street. Arrive early. Nevada's best journalist, former Tribunite Dennis Myers, published an outstanding and touching obituary of my friend Eddie in the Reno News & Review. Please read the very hopeful story of the grand accomplishments of a very humble man.

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.

Last year's dark foreshadowings unfortunately became reality. I thus suggest inoculation by signing onto the HushHush! list at BallotBoxing.US/ It's cheap as well as enlightening entertainment.

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.

TOMORROW'S NEWS TODAY: FEEL UP YOUR FIRE METER. The Reno Gazette-Journal did big spreads on three consecutive Sundays (Sept. 14, Sept. 21 and Sept. 28, 2014) on NV Energy smart meter fires. Welcome aboard. Barbwire readers were two years ahead on the fire meter issue. (Touch a Smart Meter, Go to Jail — 11 October 2012)

FIRE METER UPDATES: THE NEVADA FIRE MARSHALL'S INVESTIGATION concluded "don't worry, be happy." I'm still worried and will continue fondling NVE's precious equipment —> If your smart meter feels very hot, not just from sunshine, call 911. In its Sunday 21 Dec. 2014 front page headline major story, the Reno Gazette-Journal published results of the NVEnergy-commissioned "don't worry, be happy" echo study. On 1-27-2015, the RGJ published an analysis based on veteran reporter Anjeanette Damon's review of more than 1,000 pages of documents.

Barbwire
bottom line: NVE handles this like auto manufacturers handle defects —> It's cheaper to pay legal settlements after people are injured or killed than to fix the problem.

Don'tcha worry 'bout a thing! If you can't trust your power company, whom can you trust?

Smoking guns: Rooftop solar assassination
NevadaLabor.com Energy War Room

DIDN'T THEY MAKE A MOVIE CALLED "THE INCREDIBLES"? On 2-6-2015, the RGJ reported that the Public Utilities Commission has ordered NVE to hire an independent laboratory to review the material.

UPDATE: The report said all is well. I still recommend feeling up your fire meter on a regular basis.

ANTE INTO THE GAME: Support the new season of Barbwire.TV by putting your money where my mouth is. A thousand thanks to those who keep sending show suggestions.

"Media is the plural of mediocre."
— Jimmy Breslin (1928-2017)

  Stay tuned.

  I encourage you to donate to the cause at Barbwire.TV/ The medium that shapes public opinion needs at least one refuge where it is not filtered through the distorted green eye shades of prissy corporate accountants for whom profit is the only priority; where self-censorship is the journalist's normal work environment and where all sins of omission are tacitly encouraged and forgiven with the wave of a balance sheet. This is important. We've got a lot of work to do.

Get ahead of corporate-influenced news—>Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)


Andrew Barbano
is a 48-year Nevadan, chair of the Nevada César Chávez Committee, producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration, first vice-president and political action chair of the Reno-Sparks NAACP, labor/consumer/civil rights advocate, member of Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO and editor of NevadaLabor.com and SenJoeNeal.org and DoctorLawyerWatch.com/ As always, his opinions are strictly his own. Check local listings for other Nevada cable systems. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Sparks Tribune since 1988.

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Copyright © 1982-2017 Andrew Barbano

Andrew Barbano is a 48-year Nevadan, editor of NevadaLabor.com and SenJoeNeal.org; and former chair of the City of Reno's Citizens Cable Compliance Committee. He is producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration and serves as first vice-president, political action chair and webmaster of the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us.

Barbwire by Barbano moved to Nevada's Daily Sparks Tribune on Aug. 12, 1988, and has originated in them parts ever since.
Whom to blame: How a hall-of-famer's hunch birthed the Barbwire in August of 1987
Tempus fugit.

Betty J. Barbano
2-7-1941 / 12-27-2005

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